After receiving the envoy in Xuanchen Hall, Yugong Lie immediately dismissed court and summoned his trusted aides to Qingliang Pavilion in the inner palace to discuss the situation.
His left and right arms exchanged silent glances all the way into the pavilion.
Yugong Lie had forced himself to endure in front of outsiders, but the instant they reached a place with no one else present, he finally lost control.
Crash!
He swept the writing implements and tea service from the imperial desk, sending everything smashing across the floor.
Then he roared at Yugong Zhaoye:
“Is this how your Yeguang handles affairs?!”
Yugong Zhaoye dropped to one knee without the slightest hesitation and lowered his head.
“This humble subject failed in vigilance. May Your Majesty punish me.”
“What damn good would punishment do?!”
Yugong Lie shouted, completely losing his composure.
“He’s already reached Quting! How did Yeguang notice absolutely nothing?! I established the Purple Empyrean Court and let you recruit all those subordinates so the lot of you could sit around enjoying retirement?!”
Although “monitor Yugong Ming” had never been one of Yeguang’s assigned duties, failing to notice him secretly slipping through their defenses was indeed an oversight.
Therefore, Yugong Zhaoye simply knelt there and accepted the scolding in silence, brows lowered in an obedient display of submission.
He had no intention of arguing with the King while the man was still furious.
The covert agents who had escorted the two royal children to foreign countries years ago were not the same people as Yeguang’s present network.
For instance, when Yugong Yao married into the Wuchi royal court, barring some extraordinary accident, she would never return to Longsha in her lifetime.
The agent beside her therefore regarded protecting his charge as his highest priority. Aside from regularly exchanging messages with Bihua, he was essentially no different from an ordinary guard.
At most, he functioned like a carrier pigeon, sending reports that she was safe. Gathering intelligence was not his primary responsibility, much less surveillance.
When Bihua became hunted and blockaded by every nation, Yugong Fengting had feared that his children might be implicated. At one point, he even ordered those contacts temporarily severed, minimizing exposure as much as possible in order to maximize their safety.
Later, after Yeguang was rebuilt, it inherited the two communication lines from Bihua.
Yugong Zhaoye already had his own personnel in Wuchi and Dongyu gathering intelligence, so there had been no reason to plant additional eyes directly beside the two royal hostages.
Thus, the old agents had simply continued their original task of regularly reporting their charges’ safety to court.
And after Yugong Lie ascended the throne, he completely forgot Yugong Ming existed.
Ordinarily, he neither asked after him nor showed the slightest concern. Only when something went wrong did he suddenly remember his brother and fly into a rage, demanding accountability from everyone in sight.
Never mind that Yugong Zhaoye had no explanation to give him. After so many years of master and servant depending on one another in a foreign land, wouldn’t their bond naturally run deeper than their attachment to some distant royal court?
On what grounds should they give up an opportunity to return to their homeland for something as vague and intangible as “loyalty and righteousness”?
Although Yugong Ming’s actions had gone badly beyond the rules, Yugong Zhaoye did not actually dislike what he had done very much.
The Third Prince had been sent to Dongyu years ago in order to save Longsha.
He was genuinely a meritorious subject.
He had left home at only thirteen and endured eight years alone in a foreign country.
No one had thought of bringing him home.
So he had found his own way back.
Even if that created some trouble, Longsha ought to clean up the aftermath for him.
Besides, their principal enemy, Yanyuan, was currently trapped in domestic turmoil and had no attention to spare elsewhere.
Longsha needed to recover the price it had paid for victory in the old war.
The peace negotiations with Qiyun had only been the first step.
The issue of Dongyu’s stationed troops would have to be settled sooner or later.
Yugong Ming freeing himself now was still better than leaving him in Dongyu as a hostage who could someday be used to threaten Longsha.
Yugong Lie clearly did not see matters that way.
His anger seemed particularly fierce.
“You can’t even keep track of one person! What use are any of you?! Useless—”
“Your Majesty.”
A reminder, neither loud nor soft, cut him off at precisely the right moment.
Wei Fu was expressionless.
Once he stopped smiling, those peach-blossom eyes normally overflowing with warmth and affection became startlingly dark, deep, and solemn.
He regarded the furious Yugong Lie gravely.
“Your Majesty’s only younger brother has endured countless hardships and finally returned to your side.”
“Is that not something worth celebrating?”
Wei Fu’s calmness struck Yugong Lie like a basin of cold water poured directly over his head.
His voice remained composed and unhurried, yet every word was clear and forceful. Rather than persuasion, it sounded almost like a warning.
“Why is Your Majesty afraid?”
“…”
Yugong Lie’s chest heaved.
Breathing heavily, he glared at Wei Fu with bloodshot eyes, the veins in his neck bulging.
He looked like a maddened lion, agitated enough that he might charge over and start cursing Wei Fu to his face at any moment.
Yet some strange force pinned him where he stood.
His fingertips dug hard into the tabletop, nearly sinking into the solid wood. Even when his nails split, he seemed not to feel it.
No one could tell whether he was struggling against Wei Fu—or himself.
Wei Fu said nothing more.
He simply looked at him in silence.
They remained locked that way for several breaths.
At last, the savage beast was dragged by its chains back into its lightless cage.
Yugong Lie let out an exhausted breath.
As though every bone had been pulled from his body, he staggered around the wreckage scattered across the floor and sank weakly back behind the imperial desk.
That seemingly mild, harmless warning had struck directly at the center of him.
His usual composure returned.
Only once Yugong Lie turned away did Wei Fu have enough attention to notice another gaze beside him.
Lowering his head, he found the half-kneeling Yugong Zhaoye looking up at him.
Those eyes were full of amusement, teasing, appreciation, and laughter—everything except the faintest hint of reflection or repentance.
Wei Fu: “?”
Is this funny?
The fox spirit was angry.
Yugong Zhaoye had seen countless expressions on Wei Fu’s face. Perhaps there was simply something missing from him by nature, because the expression he liked most turned out to be Wei Fu’s anger.
Yugong Zhaoye himself possessed the kind of cold face that could frighten people simply by remaining blank.
Wei Fu, on the other hand, looked as though he were smiling even when perfectly calm, thanks to the natural upward curve of his lips and those exceptionally soft, affectionate eyes.
Perhaps even Wei Fu had never noticed that when he completely withdrew his smile and believed he was putting on a stern face, his eyes actually became larger and rounder.
His lips would tighten as he stared solemnly at the person opposite him, trying to exert pressure purely through his gaze. If he did not speak, however, it was almost impossible to tell that he was angry.
Instead, he looked as though he were gazing at someone with extraordinary seriousness and concentration.
It was, in a word, a little…
cute.
Wei Fu’s puffed-up expression gradually transformed into bewilderment beneath their exchanged gazes.
His eyes became even rounder, making the confusion within them particularly clear.
Yugong Zhaoye failed to hold back.
He turned his head and laughed again.
Wei Fu: “…”
We rushed back before your birthday was even over to clean up this mess, and you just got cursed bloody by the King.
What exactly is so funny?!
Wei Fu rarely had the chance to observe Yugong Zhaoye from such an extreme difference in height.
His Highness’s half-kneeling position happened to place him level with Wei Fu’s waist.
Looking upward from below, he resembled some fierce beast crouched beside its master’s leg, murderous yet utterly loyal.
But once Yugong Zhaoye smiled, that wickedly handsome, almost rakish charm emerged.
It was enough to shake a person’s soul.
Worse, he was kneeling in an extremely inappropriate place.
The two of them stood close enough that the slightest reach of a hand would touch the other, and Wei Fu could lift one sleeve and practically hide Yugong Zhaoye beneath it.
Was this really a posture and expression one ought to display inside the royal palace—directly beneath the King’s eyes?!
Wei Fu shot Yugong Zhaoye a look telling him to stop laughing.
If he absolutely could not manage that, he might as well pretend to cry.
Seeing Wei Fu purse his lips like an irritated little cat, Yugong Zhaoye felt as though foxtail grass had scratched the tip of his heart.
So he simply tugged Wei Fu’s sleeve over his face to conceal the smile he could no longer suppress.
The cuff trembled lightly.
It trembled until even Chancellor Wei’s ears turned red.
Yugong Lie’s temper had finally cooled.
Wei Fu, meanwhile, seemed to be heating up somewhere he really should not…
“Get up.”
Yugong Lie had at last recovered his composure.
Remembering his earlier loss of control, he looked somewhat unnatural. Without bothering with either name or title, he addressed the two outwardly solemn and proper men before him.
“Chancellor Wei stays.”
“Bring Yugong Ming back to the palace as quickly as possible.”
With a King this easily startled, once Yugong Ming comes home and Wei Fu leaves, how exactly is Longsha supposed to survive?
Yugong Zhaoye sighed silently.
“By your command. This subject takes his leave.”
He gathered the hem of his robe and stood.
In the instant their sleeves crossed, he quickly crooked one finger across Wei Fu’s palm.
Wei Fu nearly launched himself two li away.
Yugong Zhaoye, meanwhile, behaved as though nothing whatsoever had happened.
He nodded politely to Wei Fu, smiled faintly, then sauntered away with all the smugness of a wolf whose tail was held high.
Wei Fu: “…”
Does Longsha have any law left at all?!
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