18. The Cold Feast of Vermilion Pavilion

The Cold Feast of Vermilion Pavilion

It was early November, and the weather had turned cold and bleak. The autumn wind blew fiercely, causing the trees to wither and the flowers to fade.

It was the beginning of the month again, and after the morning court, according to protocol, Emperor Ren had to first dine with Empress Mei in Vermilion Pavilion before attending to other duties or resting elsewhere.

Even if he disliked Mei, Ren had no choice but to go to Vermilion Pavilion.

"This palace greets Your Majesty..."

As his wife and the mother of the nation, Mei did not refer to herself as a concubine like the other consorts. She only slightly bent forward, her large, prominent breasts tightly wrapped in her ornate robe, outlining a breathtaking curve. With every movement, it was striking enough to catch anyone's eye, yet Ren had no heart to appreciate it. His face remained wooden as he nodded and stepped into the palace.

Mei was captivating, still as beautiful as a young bride, with only a hint of mature charm between her brows. If she smiled, it would surely be enchanting, like a blooming peony, radiant and graceful.

But Mei was the epitome of a perfect wife by the standards of etiquette. Her upbringing made her perpetually solemn and meticulous. She never showed her teeth when she smiled, managed the household frugally, never meddled in external affairs, excelled in both the kitchen and the court, and treated her husband with respectful distance, never overstepping.

She was like the flawless embodiment of the virtues extolled in the biographies of exemplary women.

Yet, this only deepened Ren's irritation. Mei always wore a stern expression, silent during meals and mute during rest. She never spoke beyond what was necessary, and outside of official matters, she was as still as a wooden statue.

No sweet words, no tenderness, not even a gesture beyond the bounds of propriety.

To Ren, seeing Mei felt like facing a stern, humorless scholar rather than his wife.

"How has the empress been lately?"

He sat at the dining table in the hall, the two of them facing each other, waiting for the meal to be served. Silence hung heavy between them until Ren finally spoke, his tone flat.

"Thanks to Your Majesty's blessings, all is well in the palace."

And then? Nothing.

Silence resumed.

Ren felt as if he were sitting on pins and needles, barely able to stay a moment longer.

When the meal was finally served, even though it included dishes he liked, Ren only picked at his food a few times before standing up. "I have matters to attend to. I'll return another day."

Mei's hand, holding her bowl and chopsticks, trembled slightly. She opened her mouth to ask him to stay, but as a virtuous wife who followed her husband's lead, she could only rise and see him off. "Farewell, Your Majesty."

Ren nodded and left without looking back.

Mei stood alone at the palace door, speechless for a long time. After a while, her attendant of over a decade, standing behind her with lowered eyes, whispered, "My lady, these are the dishes you made yourself..."

What Ren liked to eat was something only Mei, his wife from the beginning, knew. Ren could indulge in whatever he pleased as a prince, but as the emperor, he couldn't openly show his preferences. If someone with ill intentions exploited them, it could threaten the foundation of Bright Hua.

Mei knew Ren hadn't eaten his favorite dishes in months, so she had personally cooked this meal, hoping he might linger a little longer for the sake of his palate.

But clearly, she had misjudged. His aversion to her outweighed everything else.

"Throw it away."

Mei spoke.

The attendant bowed her head lower. She knew that Mei, usually thrifty and considerate of the servants, would share excess food with them. But today, ordering it discarded showed just how deeply her mood had sunk.

"I'm tired."

Mei walked straight to the inner chambers.

After an unknown amount of time, Vermilion Pavilion fell silent. Then, a faint, mournful sigh echoed through the stillness, long and wistful.

"Ah..."

All of this was witnessed by a pair of eyes.

Qing stood at the peak of the imperial city, her gaze piercing through the thick walls and halls, silently observing everything.

Normally, within the imperial palace, no one could spy freely. Even the imperial enshrined cultivators couldn't overstep, or they'd face backlash from Bright Hua's dragon aura. At best, they'd be gravely injured; at worst, their soul would shatter, their cultivation would collapse, and their lifespan would drastically shorten.

But as Ren's eldest daughter, Qing was naturally immune to the dragon aura's hostility. She could use spells freely in the palace as long as she didn't cross a certain line and harm Bright Hua's dragon aura, which wouldn't reject her.

Seeing her parents' relationship deteriorate to the point where even the façade of mutual respect was crumbling stirred waves in Qing's heart.

Her gaze shifted to one side of Lunar Tower, a residence halfway up the mountain. It should have been bustling with people, but she had dismissed most of the maids and eunuchs, leaving it cold and empty.

Yet one person had been personally summoned by her.

Elder Mu.

Months had passed, and as the weather grew colder, Elder Mu still wore his tattered robes and loose pants, shivering in the chill wind. Every day, aside from three meals, he chopped wood on one side of the palace.

And, of course, there was his increasingly intense lust, day after day.

His scrotum, altered by some unknown force, had a terrifying capacity for producing semen. Each ejaculation was like a fountain. If it lasted a little longer, the semen would solidify into chunks, like tofu curds. The stench was unmatched; without concealment, the reek of his semen could spread over a dozen yards.

If this place hadn't been cleared of people, Elder Mu's abnormality would have been discovered long ago.

"Oh!!"

Elder Mu lay on his bed, the warm bedding and new room shielding him from the cold wind. Yet his body burned with restless heat. His claw-like, withered fingers gripped his swollen, meaty, scorching cock. The shaft was wrapped in countless bulging veins, rising like earthworms, and the glans had grown even larger. At nearly thirty centimeters, it was almost as thick as his thigh, resembling a monkey's tail or a third leg. This "leg" stood erect at a ninety-degree angle, pointing straight at the ceiling.

The slit at the tip opened and closed with the glans' swelling and shrinking, like a little mouth. Each time it opened, it expelled thick, transparent precum, dripping onto Elder Mu's fingers. As he stroked furiously, it coated the entire shaft evenly. His massive, reddish-purple cock glistened under the slick fluid, reflecting a fleshy sheen.

"Ohh... ahh..."

After a while, Elder Mu let out a groan of pleasure and relief. His thirty-centimeter cock swelled further, the glans reaching its peak, as large as a strongman's fist. The urethra beneath twitched uncontrollably, pumping out the thick, long-brewed semen from his two goose-egg-sized testicles.

But Elder Mu retained a shred of reason. Just before release, he aimed the glans at a water vat by the bed. Dozens of thick, scalding, foul-smelling streams of semen erupted, some solid chunks straining his urethra with a mix of pain and indescribable pleasure. It overwhelmed him, drowning out thought and everything else, leaving only the ecstasy of the explosive release.

"Hey!!!"

A sudden shout nearly scared Elder Mu out of his wits as he savored the afterglow. Panicking, he scrambled to his feet. A long streak of white semen still hung from his glans, residue from the ejaculation. Ignoring whether he'd fully finished, he pulled on his pants, covered the vat now brimming with his semen with a wooden lid, and shuffled out, head bowed.

A maid stood at the door with a food box. Seeing Elder Mu emerge, she caught a whiff of an old man's odor mixed with an unidentifiable, pungent stench. Wrinkling her nose, she stepped back, unwilling to come within a yard of him. She set down the box and said, "The big portion is for the princess, the small one's yours."

"Thank you, thank you!"

Elder Mu nodded obsequiously, bowing repeatedly. His nearly bald head, with only a few scraggly hairs flapping like weeds, was revolting.

"I'm leaving."

The maid felt like she might vomit. Facing this, she finally understood why others dreaded delivering meals here. Now she knew.

With that, she fled as if escaping a plague, running until she was far away, gasping for fresh air.

"Why would the princess have him work here...?"

Puzzled but not daring to speculate too much about the nobles' whims, the maid shook her head and descended the mountain.

Elder Mu took the food box, first opening his own portion. He pulled out the food and returned to his room, devouring it ravenously.

Though not lavish, compared to the scraps he used to eat, this was a rare delicacy. It deepened his gratitude for Qing's kindness and mercy.

Ah! The princess is so benevolent...

With his hunger sated, Elder Mu's extraordinary lust stirred again. He shot another load of thick semen into the half-full vat, then shook his cock with satisfaction.

His gaze fell on Qing's food box, and a dark, thrilling idea suddenly sprouted in his mind. Once it took root, it grew wildly, like vines spreading through his thoughts.

Trembling, he reached out, opened the top of the food box, and positioned his cock. With a light stroke, the last drops of semen lingering in his urethra oozed out, hanging from the glans like snot.

After a long moment...

A drop of semen fell into the still-warm, fragrant rice.

Elder Mu shuddered. A thrill far surpassing his own climax surged through him, mixed with fear, dread of committing such a heinous act, and a twisted pleasure he couldn't name.

He quickly rubbed a few more times, letting all the semen from his slit drip into the meal Qing would soon eat. Imagining his semen entering the mouth of the kind, merciful, fairy-like princess, then sliding down her smooth, flat stomach, his cock swelled again, aching with the strain.

But he knew his limits. He had to deliver the meal before it cooled. Enduring the throbbing in his groin, he stuffed his iron-hard cock into his pants and carried the box up the mountain.