172: Chapter 172 Love Beans in the Cold Palace

Su Daji spoke, her voice unconsciously turning soft and gentle.

She deliberately feigned the appearance of a considerate consort who cared for the monarch's well-being and felt no jealousy.

"I have been away from the palace for many days, and in my heart... I have truly been quite concerned."

"I heard that Sister Queen Jiang has been living in seclusion in the Cold Palace since that day. I wonder if her phoenix body is in good health."

"She is, after all, the mistress of the six palaces, and she looked after me in the past."

"Now that the disaster in the Zheng Territory has subsided, could Your Majesty find some time to visit her?"

"It would also fulfill your marital bond and put the harem's mind at ease."

She spoke euphemistically, keeping herself completely out of it.

She only mentioned her concern and the marital bond.

She pushed the decision of whether to go or not entirely onto Su Chen.

Su Chen slowly opened his eyes and turned his dark gaze toward her, his eyes calm and rippleless.

Yet that gaze seemed as if it could pierce through all her little schemes.

Su Daji's heart tightened, and she subconsciously avoided his gaze.

After a long while, Su Chen gave a barely audible "Mhm" and closed his eyes again.

"I am very satisfied that my Beloved Consort can be concerned about Queen Jiang."

"Granted."

...

The Cold Palace was indeed worthy of its name.

It was located in the most remote western corner of the royal palace.

Along the way, Su Chen saw vines climbing the mottled palace walls, and spiders on their webs seemed to be performing a cross-talk comedy routine with nesting sparrows.

It was late autumn; the vegetation in the courtyard had withered, and yellow leaves were piled across the ground, adding to the desolation.

Only an old plum tree in the corner, with its gnarled branches standing tall, was silently brewing the atmosphere of winter.

Su Chen stepped into this forgotten world alone.

He hadn't brought Su Daji, and he had left the guards outside the palace gates.

This was the first time he had come here since he had banished Queen Jiang to the Cold Palace.

To be honest.

In Su Chen's estimation, Queen Jiang shouldn't be an important figure in this round of investment.

At most, she was a Lawful Good NPC.

Su Chen didn't plan to have too much contact with such an existence.

As for his choice to banish her to the Cold Palace as soon as he arrived in the Great Yin, it was also out of consideration for her personal safety.

After all, this place was far from the whirlpool of court struggles.

But he hadn't expected.

That Queen Jiang, having been exiled here, would instead block many disasters for him.

He thought about it all the way there.

The old Eunuch leading the way had a hunched back, his footsteps so light they were almost silent.

After leading him to the front of the main hall, he retreated silently.

The hall door was ajar, and the light inside was dim.

Su Chen pushed the door open and entered, taking in the environment of the Cold Palace hall.

The furnishings in the hall were extremely simple: a table, a chair, a couch, and a half-worn screen.

Other than that, it was almost empty.

Only on a low table by the window sat a plain white porcelain vase, holding a few sprigs of unknown greenery that still retained a hint of life.

It was the only sign of life.

Queen Jiang stood by the window, her back to the door.

She wore a half-worn lotus-colored palace dress made of ordinary fabric, and the style was from several years ago.

Her long hair wasn't styled in a high bun; instead, it was loosely tied behind her head with a simple wooden hairpin, with a few stray strands falling near her neck.

Her figure was thin, standing in the faint light of the autumn afternoon.

Like a jade statue without the slightest warmth.

Hearing footsteps, she slowly turned around.

Su Chen finally saw her face clearly.

She was indeed extremely beautiful.

Unlike Su Daji's soul-snatching, vibrantly seductive charm.

Queen Jiang's beauty was the gentle and pure elegance soaked in the misty rain of Jiangnan.

In the real world, Jianghai City, where Su Chen went to school, was the largest city in Jiangnan.

But even in Jianghai.

Such a stunning Jiangnan beauty was extremely rare.

Her eyebrows were like distant mountains shrouded in mist, and her eyes were like the ripples of autumn waters.

Her nose was elegant and straight, and her lip color was somewhat pale.

But at this moment, her face was devoid of makeup, making her complexion appear somewhat pale.

Seeing Su Chen, her nominal "husband."

Queen Jiang did not speak.

She only gazed at him quietly with those clear eyes.

In her gaze, there was only calmness and a faint, lingering resentment.

Su Chen studied her features.

Suddenly, he felt.

That this face... actually seemed somewhat familiar to him.

And it was a very clear, déjà vu-like sense of familiarity.

He was almost certain.

That he had absolutely seen someone with a face similar to Queen Jiang's somewhere before.

Only.

That memory, which should have been very, very clear.

Seemed to have been blocked by something.

No matter what, he couldn't remember.

"Your Majesty."

Queen Jiang spoke first, her voice soft.

She was, after all, the mistress of the harem; she didn't bow, but merely nodded slightly, her posture distant yet polite.

"The Zheng Territory must have been arduous."

"I heard Your Majesty was injured. How is the wound?"

Su Chen walked into the hall and sat on a chair that looked relatively sturdy, his gaze sweeping over this extremely desolate dwelling.

"It's fine."

"And you?"

"Are you used to living here?"

Hearing this, the corner of Queen Jiang's mouth twitched ever so slightly.

That smile carried a hint of faint mockery.

Whether toward him or herself, it was unclear.

"The Cold Palace is quiet and undisturbed; it is very good."

She paused and looked up at him.

"Much quieter than being in the court, watching Your Majesty deal with the officials."

"Or... the singing and feasting at the Deer Terrace."

Su Chen heard the hidden thorns in her words because of Su Daji, but he didn't mind and only said.

"These days, the palace has not been peaceful."

"You've worked hard."

These words had no beginning or end, yet Queen Jiang understood.

She lowered her eyelids, her long lashes casting two curved shadows on her pale cheeks.

"It was merely my duty."

"I am incompetent; I cannot help Your Majesty with great matters like governing the country or expanding the territory."

"I can only stay in this small space and block the demons and monsters behind Your Majesty's back."

Her tone was flat, as if she were speaking of a trivial matter unrelated to her.

But Su Chen knew how eerie and hard to defend against the methods of those cleared Hehuan Sect spies were.

For her, a weak woman of the harem without any cultivation, to be able to block them all.

The danger and mental effort involved were by no means something that could be summarized by the words "merely my duty."

"You have done very well."

Su Chen looked at her, his tone becoming a bit more sincere.

Queen Jiang was unexpectedly the only person he could trust in this isolated and helpless investment world.

From this perspective.

Her role was definitely not as simple as that of an NPC.

He made a silent decision.

In this round of investment, besides figuring out the matter with Su Daji, he must also protect Queen Jiang.

Queen Jiang looked up and gazed at him again.

This time, her gaze lingered on his face a bit longer, as if she were carefully identifying something.

Or perhaps she was just looking through him at something else.

That gaze was too complex.

It was as if she were trying to find a hint of affection for her on Su Chen's face.

"Did Your Majesty come today for a reason?"

She looked away, turned to take a few thin scrolls of silk from a half-worn wooden box nearby, and placed them gently on the table by Su Chen's hand.

"These are the movements of some abnormal personnel in the palace recently and my conjectures."

(Children, I believe you can also see that the data for this book has been very poor lately.)

(On the 15th, ten days ago, this book had 28,000 readers, but yesterday on the 26th, it dropped to less than 4,000.)

(One of the reasons is that after the new arc started, everyone began stockpiling the book.)

(Because there are no daily reads, Fanqie's algorithm thinks I can't maintain the traffic volume and has started slashing it. New readers aren't coming in, and old readers are leaving while stockpiling. The daily income has slowly dropped to the full-attendance line, which is less than seventeen yuan a day. It has almost been abandoned by Fanqie's algorithm.)

(If everyone really wants to stockpile and wait until the arc ends to read, I also implore you to scroll to the end of the book every day and click 'Remind to Update,' and watch the gift ads. This way, Fanqie might still judge it as having active readers and trigger its traffic mechanism.)

(If the data still hasn't improved by the Qingming Festival, I can only consider finishing this arc and then resort to an outline-based ending.)

(Thank you all T_T!!)