Elio’s Notes: The title comes from Li Shangyin’s Falling Flowers (《落花》), the same poem echoed in Chapter 72. In the original line, fangxin (芳心) can evoke both the flower’s inner life and the heart of the person cherishing the flowers, giving the image a deliberate double resonance.
The bright-yellow sword tassel was presented, and as expected, it opened every gate without obstruction.
Zhao Kuangyin saw A-Shui again. The ingenious plan for crossing the river had been written clearly onto a sheet of paper. “What is your name?”
“Fan Ruoshui.”
“Good. Fan Ruoshui, you have rendered great service with this. When Jiangnan is taken, that will be the day you receive your reward.”
Zhao Kuangyin carefully examined Fan Ruoshui’s measurements of the river’s width and the depths at different points and confirmed that the plan was feasible. He immediately decided to take the method to Jiangling himself. Zhao Pu tried again and again to stop him and finally dropped to his knees to remonstrate. “Your Majesty absolutely must not do this. Leaving Bianjing secretly is far too dangerous. This subject is willing to go in Your Majesty’s place and personally convey the method for crossing the river.”
Without even lifting his head, Zhao Kuangyin strode toward the rear hall and ordered attendants to change his clothes. He would not tolerate even a moment’s delay. The Chancellor plainly had no way to stop him. Suddenly he raised his voice and brought up the Empress’s illness. “The Empress’s high fever has not subsided. It has already dragged on for several days.”
Zhao Kuangyin froze. “Yunjie… the Empress’s wind-cold still has not improved? Wang Ji’en!”
Wang Ji’en hurried forward trembling and knelt as well. “Yes. This subject heard that the Empress has remained depressed day after day and that her illness keeps returning. It began as a minor ailment, but after lingering so long, perhaps…”
Zhao Kuangyin immediately barked, “What nonsense are you talking?”
Wang Ji’en was frightened into silence. Only then did Zhao Kuangyin remember that since the army departed, he had gone many days without paying attention to Zichen Palace. For all those days the Empress had remained quietly there, and neither woman had sent anyone to him. He had long assumed her wind-cold had passed.
He considered it anxiously, unable to tell how she truly was. “Go to Zichen Palace.”
Only after entering Zichen Palace did he see autumn leaves piled across the ground. Lazy palace servants leaned beneath a corridor, gossiping as they pointed toward Huanfang Palace. The moment they saw the Emperor arrive with a frown and urgent steps, they all panicked. Zhao Kuangyin looked around at the cold, deserted atmosphere and finally lost his temper. He shouted at everyone, and silence fell on all sides.
Ling’er knelt at the doorway without lifting her head.
“Ling’er! Why was I not told that the Empress’s illness kept returning?” His mind was already strained by countless urgent affairs and he was about to assign blame when the woman inside spoke softly, her blocked nasal voice clearly audible. “Your Majesty, calm your anger. This consort was the one who forbade them to speak carelessly.”
Zhao Kuangyin steadied himself and pushed open the door. Yunjie lay on the couch, her face faintly flushed. A low fever had apparently never left her. He reached out to test her forehead. “Yunjie…” Halfway through, he no longer knew what to ask. Her condition was already before his eyes. Yunjie shook her head instead. “Your Majesty carries the air of battle all over you. There must be urgent matters of state. There is no need to concern yourself with this consort. I forbade Ling’er and the others from reporting it because such a small matter should not disturb Your Majesty.” Her tone held no visible ripple. When she finished, she slowly closed her eyes.
It was already past noon outside. Zhao Kuangyin watched her for a long time. “Today circumstances leave me no choice. I must leave the palace and hurry to Jiangling. Yunjie… be certain to recover properly. Everything else can wait until I return victorious from this campaign…”
Yunjie opened her eyes. “You are leaving the palace?”
“Yes.” He could not bear to wait even another moment. Yunjie frowned. She knew little of warfare, but after the upheavals shaking the realm, even those in the rear palace had heard enough. For him to leave the palace secretly now meant abandoning Bianjing while personally placing himself in danger. It absolutely could not be right. “I have heard that every part of this campaign has already been thoroughly arranged. There is no need for you to leave the palace now.” They had known each other for too many years. In her anxiety she no longer cared about court etiquette. “Why must you go?”
Zhao Kuangyin pulled the brocade quilt over her properly. “Yunjie, you are still ill. Do not think too much. When I return, there are certain things…”
Yunjie’s expression dimmed. “If Your Majesty intends only to say that this is because of the request my father made before he died, then there is no need. This consort understands everything. At least now I know I have never troubled or clung to Your Majesty.”
“Yunjie!”
“Your Majesty should still reconsider leaving the palace.”
Zhao Kuangyin glanced at the sky. Pan Mei and the others were surely traveling day and night without stopping. He had to catch up as quickly as possible. He rose abruptly and lowered the hanging gauze. “Whatever happens, you are ill now and must not burden yourself with trivial matters. Wait until I return. Yunjie, recover from your illness.” He emphasized the final words.
It had always been this way from the first day she knew him. His words invariably carried a tone that permitted no doubt. He had clearly dispatched his generals and arranged every force properly, yet now he suddenly intended to hurry to the river himself. It was far too strange. “Does the Chancellor agree with Your Majesty leaving the palace?”
Zhao Kuangyin had no time for more. He turned and walked out, only looking back once from the doorway. “Yunjie, sooner or later you and I must speak clearly about what lies between us. But there is no time now. I must leave the palace. Wait until I return.”
She did not even have time to nod before a flash of imperial yellow disappeared through the doorway.
His Majesty changed clothes and prepared to leave the palace immediately. Zhao Pu continued trying to persuade him. “Your Majesty, this subject risks death to remonstrate. The palace coup of that year inevitably left hidden dangers. Moreover, Your Majesty first rose from Wang Rao’s household. There may still be people harboring resentment and injustice. For Your Majesty to leave the palace suddenly at this moment is truly improper.”
Zhao Kuangyin ignored him completely.
Inside his sleeve lay the method for crossing the river. He had to see with his own eyes as Song troops crossed south into Jiangnan. He had waited too long for this day.
Far too long.
“Your Majesty! This subject believed Your Majesty would never lose reason and do something of no benefit to the state.” Zhao Pu had truly staked his life on the words. If Zhao Kuangyin gave the order, this single sentence could bring extermination upon his entire clan.
The man who had exchanged his dragon robe for common clothes looked at him coldly and said nothing for a long while. Then he walked straight around Zhao Pu, stepping on one edge of the Chancellor’s robe without slowing even half a pace.
“Your Majesty!”
His steps stopped, but he did not turn. “Chancellor Zhao, have you ever seen sky and water become one?”
Zhao Pu had no time to understand. He stood frozen, unsure how to answer, and after a long while could only say, “I have not.”
Zhao Kuangyin’s tone suddenly softened until nothing remained but a sigh. “Then Chancellor Zhao would never cast away the realm beneath heaven in exchange for that meeting of sky and water.”
No one could keep him here. Even if today’s choice became something he regretted for all eternity, Zhao Kuangyin had decided to leave. Everything before his eyes had been gained through countless hardships. If he had to exchange all of it for…
He spurred his horse away in a cloud of dust.
Then he would exchange it.
Beneath the horse’s hooves, brilliant golden chrysanthemums were ground into fragrant dust. Within Xunfeng Gate, a high pavilion of the Hall of Honoring the Worthy stood far away. Noon sunlight blazed upon its gilded roof. Zhao Kuangyin thought that this was an old dream of Jiangnan he had forged with his own hands: Jiangnan warm in spring, its soul stirred by blossoms flying through an entire city; Jiangnan beneath a cold moon, shadows swaying over an ancient islet and windblown willows. Now, at last, he could make it rightful.
It was a thought so mad that Zhao Kuangyin had never known its like. Even back then, at that [□□] palace, when he was on the verge of obtaining the imperial power he had planned for so long, he had never been this crazed.
Elio’s Notes: The JJWXC raw itself contains two missing characters here, shown as □□ immediately before “palace.” FD preserves the source gap rather than guessing at the lost wording.
I said I want both the realm and you.
Facing the wind, he rode south. Though it was late autumn, flowers seemed to bloom across the fields.
The Yangtze.
Passing waters flew like arrows amid the struggle beneath heaven. At autumn’s end, the killing air on both banks of the Yangtze rolled into towering waves, swallowing mountains and rivers.
Song forces advanced by both land and water. Pan Mei led troops overland through the night, reaching the river no slower than Cao Bin’s naval force. Cao Bin won the opening engagement and broke the Tongling navy. Tang troops stationed along the river saw the Song fleet and actually mistook it for a routine patrol, offering no resistance at all. Everything went far more smoothly than Zhao Kuangyin had expected.
After the defenders fled Tongling, Song troops set fire to the empty houses left in the city. Dust and smoke instantly rolled into the sky, alarming every direction. The Tang forces had little experience of war. Looking from the river and seeing flames soaring over Tongling, they immediately panicked. More than a hundred naval vessels had still been holding their position on the river to protect Chizhou, but now all of them thought first of landing on the southern bank to rescue the city.
The Song troops lying in ambush inside Tongling surged out and annihilated twenty thousand Tang soldiers. Chizhou fell that same day. Zhao Kuangyin had originally appointed Cao Bin commander and Pan Mei army supervisor, ordering their naval, infantry, and cavalry forces to force a crossing around Caishiji. The purpose was unmistakable: seize the opportunity and close around Jinling.
Unfortunately, Pan Mei now stood on the northern bank gazing toward the distant southern beacons without any solution. Since ancient times the broad Yangtze had formed a natural barrier. However they tried, fifty thousand Song soldiers could not all cross within a short time. If they delayed much longer, then after Cao Bin’s naval force landed, would it not remain isolated and unsupported until the situation changed?
That night the armies remained deadlocked without finding a workable way across. While Pan Mei stood alone in the river wind, someone suddenly arrived in secret to report that His Majesty had personally come to the military camp.
At the Song encampment north of the river, Pan Mei knelt to receive him.
Zhao Kuangyin had kept the journey extremely secret. He helped Pan Mei to his feet. “How is the battle?”
Pan Mei reported everything in detail. “What we lack now is only a reliable method of crossing the river. Otherwise fifty thousand troops cannot reach the opposite bank quickly enough. General Cao’s advantage from the first victory may change if he remains unsupported.”
In Jinling, at Guangliang Temple, Li Yu set down his teacup after hearing the battle report. “Hold the Yangtze.” He spoke only those four words.
The Young Elder stood respectfully at one side. “Why does the Ruler not send troops north of the river and take the initiative? Retreating to defend Jiangnan alone seems far too dangerous.” He had expected that after hearing of defeat after defeat, Li Yu would finally become furious and act rashly. Instead the man had answered cleanly and decisively that they should only hold the river. It seemed he truly had no will to fight at all.
Li Yu shook his head faintly. “Father already resisted once. The result was clear. If another path had existed, why would Father have bowed his head and called himself a subject? Even in the Zhou era the difference in military strength was enormous. Zhao Kuangyin is more skilled in warfare and has spent his life campaigning. For Tang troops to advance now would be to strike stone with an egg. Soldiers too have parents, wives, and children. I do not want them sacrificed for nothing. For now we can only rely on the Yangtze’s natural barrier to delay them, exhaust the Song forces’ supplies on the southern bank, and then consider what can still be done.”
The Young Elder remained silent. He had thought that when a person faced the loss of home and country, all benevolence would eventually be forced away, and that compassion was merely a decoration worn in peaceful times. Li Yu had known splendor and favor from childhood. Now that he stood on the verge of losing everything, the Young Elder had expected him to cast aside lives and kindness simply to fight for one moment of satisfaction. Yet what he saw was a man stubborn to the bone, possessing what could without exaggeration be called the heart of a child: if bloodshed would achieve nothing, why spill it merely to force a fleeting victory?
He truly did not want to see ordinary lives destroyed. Between imperial honor and human life, he always chose the latter with startling ease. A person like this reflected everyone else’s smallness directly back at them. You all had to struggle and seize before you could feel secure. I, Li Yu, passed through life without such struggle. What I value has never been what you cling to.
That posture only provoked still more anger. Yet even accusing him somehow made the accuser seem lesser.
Why should you alone remain so far above everyone else?
The Young Elder forced down his anger and thought of the fool living in a hut beside the river. By now he should have seen Big Brother. What was one Yangtze between them?
Black gauze kept the light from Li Yu. The color of his double pupils had dissolved until it was as pale as his robes. Autumn was almost over, and even Jiangnan’s gentle climate now carried a chill in the night wind.
After seeing Li Yu return to his own meditation room, the Young Elder remained seated briefly, then secretly went to the rear of the temple where the monks lived. These monks had been gathered from many places at Li Yu’s whim. There were so many that no one had ever checked each of them individually.
The mistake lay in Li Yu’s nature. He had never cared to investigate the hidden intentions of others. In the end there was only one Li Yu in this world. Not everyone could stand beneath night rain and remain serene.
Piaopeng arrived carrying another battle report. When he reached the Buddhist hall and waited to have himself announced, he found no one around at all. He could only wait. After a long time he finally approached the window and peered inside. No one. It was already deep into the night, so the Ruler must have gone to rest. Piaopeng stared at the memorial submitted by the defeated commander at Chizhou and hesitated, then decided he had no choice but to find the Ruler. It was terribly late and the Ruler had remained ill. Had this not been military intelligence, Piaopeng would never have dared disturb him.
He too had followed Li Yu for many years and knew better than most how much the Ruler exhausted himself with thought. Jiangnan was not something he could truly control, yet he carried all of it inside his heart. Was this too one of the mistakes of his life?
Piaopeng sighed for a long while and looked around. Better to search the meditation rooms behind the temple.
He acted without intention, yet in doing so wrote his own ending.
Meanwhile Zhao Kuangyin listened to Pan Mei’s concern, smiled, and took out the sheet of paper. “Crossing the river is no longer difficult.”
That night everyone gathered inside the command tent and did not sleep. According to Fan Ruoshui’s calculations, the only way for fifty thousand infantry to cross in the shortest possible time was to build a pontoon bridge across the Yangtze. Nothing like it had been attempted on this scale. If the Song army crossed successfully, this campaign would surely leave its name in the histories.
At dawn, Pan Mei appeared before the army and ordered the troops to cut timber and rush construction of the pontoon bridge.
Two days later the bridge was complete. Fifty thousand Song soldiers marched across the vast river as though walking over level ground, successfully crossing the Yangtze barrier and reaching Jiangnan’s bank.
Under Pan Mei’s command, the fifty thousand soldiers advanced directly toward Jiangning Prefecture.
Night had fallen when the battle report reached Jinling’s imperial palace. The Young Elder accepted it in Li Yu’s place and closed the central doors of the Buddhist hall. As usual, Li Yu had returned to his meditation room. At night, all urgent matters were to be delivered there and reported at once. The Young Elder should have presented it immediately, yet holding the urgent dispatch in his hands, he quietly smiled.
As expected. Fan Ruoshui looked hopelessly pedantic and ignorant of worldly affairs, but the Young Elder understood that the more obstinate and single-minded such a person became once he fixed on one goal, the more extraordinary the result might be. Was this not the proof?
The battle report was unmistakably urgent. More than fifty thousand Song troops had crossed the river in a single night, and Jiangning Prefecture had become the front line. Fan Ruoshui’s method of crossing by pontoon bridge might indeed be remembered for a thousand years.
The Young Elder knelt before the golden Buddha and bowed. “Amitabha.” He raised one of the ever-burning lamps from the shrine and brought the battle report toward the flame.
Now that the Song army had crossed the river, he no longer feared anything.
The false ordination marks on the top of his head could no longer conceal the hair growing beneath them. Li Yu could not see clearly anyway, so in ordinary days he simply wore a monk’s cap. The Ruler had noticed nothing, and no one else could say anything.
The Young Elder burned a single sheet of military intelligence, and with it burned Li Yu’s country.
Pan Mei led the infantry and cavalry across the pontoon bridge from the northern bank and joined Cao Bin. Together they pressed toward Jinling. Having never seen the report, Li Yu assumed that cold weather and swift water still prevented the Song armies from joining and that the two banks remained locked in confrontation. He had no idea that by late that month Song forces had already surrounded their way toward Jinling, taking Xinlin Stockade, Bailuzhou, and Xinlin Harbor to the southwest in succession.
At the moment Zhao Kuangyin could see the distant lights of Jinling from the army, the deep imperial compound in Bianjing lay silent. Zichen Palace was dark, and Yunjie still had not recovered.
Several new palace servants had recently been assigned to Zichen Palace. Wang Ji’en’s shrill voice carried from far away as he instructed them. “The ones before you were all useless idlers. Remember to serve the Empress properly. If any of you dares be lazy again…” The sharp sound of slaps cracked through the air. Ling’er shivered involuntarily. Eunuch Wang’s temper had grown steadily worse lately. She had only complained a few days ago that no one even swept the fallen leaves in Zichen Palace. Somehow he heard about it and immediately replaced everyone, terrified that His Majesty might see the neglect and punish him. Servility offered as goodwill could be irritating in its own way.
Ling’er curled her lip and carried the medicine to wait outside. From afar she could see Huanfang Palace still blazing with lights without pause. Lady Huarui had always loved such conspicuous splendor.
Wang Ji’en hid far away in the shadows before the entrance to Huanfang Palace. Seeing palace attendants raise lanterns and wait, he leaned out and edged one step closer before slipping behind a cedar. Soon Lady Huarui came out in all her graceful finery. Two or three maids followed, all dressed in crimson, each with golden bells sewn to her skirt. Their chiming fell against the heart, a vision of seductive beauty.
“Your Majesty, Lady Huarui has come to visit again. Will you refuse her?” Ling’er glanced toward the door, certain the woman would have nothing good to say.
Yunjie always felt she should not put on the haughty manner of an Empress. It would be terrible to let others think the central palace harsh and jealous. Though she felt extremely unwell, she still pushed herself upright. “Invite the lady in.”
Ling’er lifted the soft gauze curtain. “Ling’er, you may leave first.” Ling’er could only remind the Empress to take her medicine, set the bowl on the table, and withdraw.
Lady Huarui’s crimson skirt trailed behind her as she entered the inner chamber with graceful poise. Beneath the lamplight her beauty was striking. She began with a relieved smile. “The Empress looks much better today.”
Yunjie smiled as well. “Winter is almost here. A wind-cold tends to linger in this weather.”
In truth they were both simply too empty and bored. The weather had grown colder, the days shorter, and time seemed to pass almost too easily. Lady Huarui was no saint, but after enough time in the deep palace even her spoiled temperament had dulled. Besides, it now seemed that only Zichen Palace kept lamps burning at night. Everywhere else in the rear palace lay in darkness, oppressive enough to make the heart panic.
With nothing else to do, she had come simply to sit for a while, and the two exchanged idle pleasantries.
In the end, they were merely people bound to much the same fate.
They spoke quietly for a while. Seeing that Yunjie was growing tired, Lady Huarui rose to leave. She had actually begun to pity the Empress. Once she had treated Yunjie as an enemy, only to discover that Zhao Kuangyin did not seem to place much of his heart on her either.
Such an enormous Zichen Palace. At night the wind turned cold and there was no one truly watching over her, yet the Empress had become this ill. Perhaps she too had simply been pushed onto a shrine and left there as an empty object of reverence.
Lady Huarui shook her head from afar, sighed, and returned to her palace.
After Lady Huarui left, bitterness rose in Yunjie’s heart and she began to cough softly. She could see the pity in Huarui’s eyes, and the feeling was deeply unpleasant.
She had never been treated this way in her entire life. Now she had finally fulfilled her parents’ long-held wish and become Empress, only to receive such looks from others.
Yunjie steadied her breathing against the couch. Night had fallen. The wind had blown a narrow gap open in the window, and she was just about to call Ling’er to close it when a pair of hands suddenly emerged from behind the gauze.
Someone had entered.
They were clearly not Ling’er’s hands. On the clean blue-stone floor, candlelight suddenly cast a narrow shadow where none had been before. The flame twisted grotesquely, making the shadow on the ground look especially terrifying.
Yunjie was startled. “Who?”
Those were the last words Yunjie ever spoke.
She struggled up from the couch. She saw the intruder clearly but did not even have time to react.
The candle went out.
A muffled sound. Her eyes had not even closed when the plain-clad figure silently collapsed to the floor.
It happened in a flash, no more than a single brief instant. After days of fever, she could barely even lift a hand.
Suddenly she remembered Zhao Kuangyin’s back as he hurried away that day. It had become the last image she would ever see.
The dark figure relit the candle, pushed open the window slightly, and clapped. Outside, palace servants had bound Ling’er. The person inside remained concealed and never revealed a face. Ling’er began screaming like a madwoman. The figure by the window surveyed the surroundings. In the entire rear palace, only the central palace and Huanfang Palace still held any sound of life.
Outside, Ling’er’s struggling cries tore open the dead silence. Her eyes remained fixed on the lights still burning in Huanfang Palace. Several people restrained her. All wore crimson skirts, golden bells trembling at their hems.
The person inside the window said nothing and suddenly tossed something out. It struck the ground with a cold, hard sound that startled everyone.
When they saw that it was a dagger, they understood the order.
One of them picked it up. “Hold her down. Cut out her tongue. Quickly.”
“Yes.”
The golden bells fell silent.
Someone reached out to touch the bowl of medicine on the table. It was still warm, filling the room with rising medicinal fragrance. The person lifted it and smashed it onto the floor. The liquid spread dark and damp across the stones, soaking into the pink skirt beside it. The finest palace gauze was soft and thin; in an instant a whole patch had absorbed the medicine. Yunjie’s eyes remained open and empty.
He had told her to wait until he returned.
The broken pieces were stuffed into her hand, arranging the scene as though she had convulsed, struggled, and shattered the medicine bowl herself.
Dark venom seeped in a fine drizzle; once it deepened to the extreme, the scene turned grotesque, scattering into rotten flowers.
Before now, perhaps no one had noticed just how beautiful the Empress was. A pair of palace boots stepped across the waterfall of her black hair without hesitation and silently departed.
The next day, astonishing news spread through the rear palace: after several days of wind-cold and persistent high fever, the Empress had suddenly suffered a stroke in the night at Zichen Palace and could not be saved.
Empress Wang had died.
Chancellor Zhao Pu, shocked by the news, immediately sealed it off so the Song army fighting outside would not be distracted. More than anything, at this moment His Majesty absolutely could not be allowed to know.