Four Years Ago(7)

Lowering the curtains, Yi Jie dressed her daughter in clothes that were scattered on the floor.

The whole room was in chaos when General Li entered. His eyes sank when he saw his wife Yi Jie weeping on the bed. Her face was pale as she tried to check what was wrong with her daughter.

His daughter, Li Rui, was lying on the bed with her eyes closed. As if Yi Jie sensed his presence, she raised her head to look in his direction. His heart twisted in pain when he looked at her condition. Ignoring everything, he rushed towards the bed and tried to console his wife.

The Empress had ordered everyone to go out of the room. Despite their desperate will to stay in the room, all the ladies went outside.

General Li didn't know anything. He was having a conversation with other Ministers at the banquet when suddenly a palace maid informed him that something has happened to his elder daughter.

He had expected it to be another argument between Princess Wenling and his daughter but now looking at the situation, things were worse than his expectations.

On the way to this room, when he was coming he saw some maids holding unconscious Princess with a pale face. Then he saw Prime Minister Xi Ying standing outside the door with a cold face.

When he glanced at him, there was a trace of sneer and contempt in Lord Xi's eyes. Inside the room was his unconscious daughter and when he rushed to the bed, he saw patches of blood on the silk bedsheet.

On connecting all these things to each other, he had a very bad premonition in his heart.

Suppressing her sobs, Yi Jie briefed the whole incident to her husband. 

General Li's whole face was black and his eyes were filled with rage after he heard everything. The General in his fifties was excluding a murderous aura same from the battlefield. Leaving the bed, he opened the door violently and rushed towards Xi Ying with a roar.

But before he could attack Lord Xi, he was controlled by four Imperial guards. The four guards were applying their whole strength but they were not able to control him.

Xi Ying was standing with an indifferent expression like the whole Incident had nothing to do with him and the person who was just going to be punched wildly was not him. He looked at the struggling General in the hands of Imperial guards.

In his heart, he wondered.

If General Li was pretending then he had to praise him for his good acting.

This pushing and pulling were interrupted by a deep cold voice of a man.

"Restraint Your Emotions, General Li."

A man in his forties in a yellow robe with the lining of Gold on its hem entered the hall. His face showed no sign of old age. His body excluded a dominating aura. Behind him, a eunuch and a royal guard followed.

All the Ladies and Empress kneeled on the floor. Xi Ying stood straight. The Imperial guards lowered their heads. The struggling General suppressed his anger and lowered his head.

The man was the Emperor of Empire Xin, Zhao Wang Lei.

"Your Majesty, M...my daughter, Li Rui is inside the room. She is unconscious. This one doesn't know what happened to her, whether she is fine or not."

Yi Jie kneeled in from of Emperor. With tears streaming down through her eyes she tried to explain the situation and between her lines, she also glanced at Lord Xi who indifferently glanced at her.

Emperor Zhao Wang Lei's eyes flickered with a strange gleam of light for a second when he heard Yi Jie crying and sobbing in front of himself. As if it was an illusion It vanished in the next second but it did not go unnoticed by General Li Heng.

Anger surged through his veins as he pushed all the guards in one attempt and got free from their hands. Everyone looked startled for a while only to see the violent General kneel by his wangfei's side.

Taking her one hand in his he kneeled in front of Emperor as if silently comforting her. With his eyes lowered, no one saw the emotion passing through General Li's eyes.

All the ladies present on the scene were legitimate wives of the officials. They looked enviously at the couple kneeling on the floor. They have to manage the courtyard full of concubines while fighting to maintain their position but Yi Jie need not worry about all of this as she was the only woman in General Li's courtyard and his legitimate wife.

They came out of their reverie of thought when a cold voice echoed in the hall.

"Summon the Imperial Physician to check on the First Lady Li."

The eunuch followed the orders given by the Emperor and in a few moments, an old man with a white beard went inside the room with a maidservant.

At this moment, Yi and Li's family gathered outside the room waiting for the physician to come out.

The imperial physician came out of the room with a very solemn expression on his face and told the Emperor about Li Rui's condition.

" Your Majesty, Lady Li has high-level aphrodisiacs in her body but now she is alright. She will regain her consciousness till tomorrow.

The revelation was shocking. Some Ladies and officials present knew that a person drugged with a high level of aphrodisiacs can not live if he or she is not allowed to release the heat inside their body. The guess that they had formed in their heart on seeing Lord Xi coming out of the room was now firm.

"How can this happen in Zhen's imperial palace? Who was daring enough to do this shameful act? Minister Xin, Investigate this matter. "

The Emperor announced several orders including asking the Empress to take care of the matters related to the staying of Lady Li in the imperial Palace but none of them mentioned Lord Xi.

According to the circumstances, the Emperor should have announced the marriage between the involved parties, that is, Lord Xi and Li Rui. But when they looked at the person emitting a cold and suffocating aura standing in the center of the hall, they understood something.

His Majesty will never force Lord Xi to marry Li Rui.

So unless Lord Xi willingly asks for Li Rui's hand in marriage, her life was destined to get ruined.

Looking at the indifferent expression on Lord Xi's face, a trace of pity and sympathy for Li Rui aroused in their heart.