Building a Harmonious Song Dynasty

Chapter 36

"Second brother," Yelü Yanxi asked him privately as the two brothers sat down to talk, "Do you have someone you love?"

"Brother...I..."

For the first time, Yelü Huan showed hesitation. After considering for a long time, he said, "I want to marry Xiao Xiao, but not now..."

"Xiao Xiao?"

Xiao Xiao was the daughter of a military doctor and often treated their wounds after the war. When Yelü Yanxi heard his younger brother say that he wanted to marry Xiao Xiao, he was somewhat surprised, but he did not feel that there was anything wrong with it.

"If you want to marry, then marry! What are you hesitating for? I will bestow the marriage upon you tomorrow!"

"Brother!"

Looking at his younger brother's worried eyes, Yelü Yanxi was puzzled. They had now avenged their great enemy and the entire Liao Dynasty was theirs. He had already decided to make concessions, so what was there for his younger brother to hesitate about?

Although Yelü Yanxi knew his younger brother had no interest in power, he still showered him with various honors. At the banquet celebrating Yelü Huan's promotion to Prince of Wei, Xiao Xiao was summoned by Yelü Yanxi, solely to arrange a marriage between them on the spot.

The palace was filled with officials, and Yelü Chun and Yelü Huan were surrounded by people. Some congratulated the father and son on their reunion, while others congratulated Yelü Huan on his early success.

Yelü Yanxi, seated at the head of the table, found the smiling father and son irritating and couldn't bear to look at them any longer. He excused himself, saying he was too drunk to continue, and went to rest in the back room. He had just lain down when he was surprised to see Xiao Xiao burst in.

Xiao Xiao ran to Yelü Yanxi's side, hugged him tightly, and cried her eyes out.

"Why? Why did you give me to him? You knew...you knew perfectly well!"

Faced with Xiao Xiao's questioning, Yelü Yanxi suddenly realized he had made a clumsy mistake: Xiao Xiao loved him! The hidden hatred in his heart was stirred by the beauty's tears. He thought of Yelü Chun and his son, and he also thought of his mother and fourth uncle who had betrayed his father. That night, he impulsively committed a mistake he would regret for the rest of his life…

Passion filled the room, and the two embracing each other were unaware that a pair of phoenix eyes were watching them.

Xiao Xiao was eventually given to Yelü Huan, and neither she nor Yelü Yanxi mentioned what happened that night. Life seemed destined to continue peacefully and happily. Yelü Chun looked contentedly at his happy son, while Yelü Huan gazed blissfully at Xiao Xiao's growing belly.

This happiness continued until that letter arrived...

Yelü Huan, without telling anyone, rode alone to a small village a hundred miles outside the city. In a thatched hut, a haggard peasant woman sat with her back to the door.

"Mother……"

The peasant woman's back twitched, then she shouted sharply, "You unfilial son, kneel down!"

Yelü Huan knelt down as instructed, and was immediately met with a powerful slap from his mother!

"Have you forgotten? Have you forgotten everything? What did I tell you when you were little? You actually coveted the wealth and status before you, and threw all your hatred to the back of your mind!"

Yelü Huan raised his head unwillingly and looked at his mother, who was blinded by hatred, and argued, "I don't understand! Why must I kill my own father to avenge someone else's father? I can't do it!"

"Shut up!"

The former Crown Princess still retained her authority, and she angrily rebuked, "You have no father. That treacherous Yelü Chun is not worthy to be your father! He framed his own brother for the throne, and later he humiliated me. How could you possibly acknowledge such a person as your father?"

Yelü Huan bit his lip hard and said, word by word, "Father is not that kind of person."

Another slap landed, and blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. The Crown Princess, heartbroken, pounded her chest and cried out, "Get out! I don't have a son like you! Get out!"

Yelü Huan stormed off in a huff. As his horse galloped to the village gate, a bolt of lightning struck him. He turned around abruptly and was astonished to see flames shooting into the sky from his mother's thatched hut!

It was too late. By the time he rushed back to the house, it had already collapsed. The Crown Princess's sacrifice had solidified Yelü Huan's resolve to take revenge. That day, he knelt in the village all night; that day, he made his painful decision!

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Side Story 1: Deep Courtyard (Part 3)

Back at the palace, no one noticed Yelü Huan's unusual behavior.

He went to his wife Xiao Xiao's room, embraced her from behind, and gently stroked her high, swollen belly. Yelü Huan asked Xiao Xiao, "If I weren't a prince or a general, would you still stay with me?"

Xiao Xiao was stunned for a moment, then simply said, "I am your wife."

Yelü Huan hugged Xiao Xiao tighter, his cold heart warming slightly. This was his wife, someone no one could take away! Xiao Xiao, nestled in his arms, smiled coldly. Yes, she was his wife; "he" had commanded her to be his wife!

The following year, right after Xiao Xiao gave birth, a dramatic change occurred in the Prince's mansion. The imperial court dispatched heavy troops to surround the mansion, and Yelü Chun was arrested for allegedly plotting a rebellion and taken away in chains. The rest of the people were confined to the mansion, awaiting further punishment.

Yelü Huan sat beside his wife, holding his newborn daughter, and happily played with the baby in his arms, as if nothing outside mattered to him.

With a loud crash, the door was pushed open. He frowned and looked towards the entrance. Yelü Chun's principal wife, Princess De, stormed in, her composure completely gone. Princess De threw herself at Yelü Huan, clutching his robes tightly and sobbing, "Spare the prince! Please spare him! He is still your father!"

Yelü Huan handed the child to Xiao Xiao, then asked Princess De with a cold smile, "What's wrong with you, Princess? If your father is innocent, he will be sent back after being taken away by the Emperor. What can I do?"

Princess De looked at him pleadingly and said, "I know, I know she sent you back to seek revenge, I know she hates me and the prince, but it's not true, it's not true!"

The incoherent language left Yelü Huan bewildered. What did Princess De mean by that?

"What are you talking about? I don't understand."

Princess De calmed down a bit and said, "I know who your mother is. What happened back then was all my fault. I was just talking nonsense. It really wasn't the prince's fault!"

Explain yourself!

Yelü Huan felt increasingly uneasy. Princess De was so frightened by his roar that she calmed down and gradually began to tell him about the past.

Crown Prince Zhaohuai had a very good relationship with his brother Yelü Chun. After the Crown Prince was framed by treacherous officials, Yelü Chun did his best to rescue the Crown Princess, and their son was safely sent back to the capital under his secret protection.

Yelü Chun hid the slightly poisoned Crown Princess in a temple and frequently visited to care for her. Over time, the feelings he had buried deep in his heart began to resurface. Princess De watched all this coldly; she had known all along that her husband loved the Crown Princess, and that he had given his heart to her even before she became Crown Princess!

Princess Consort De initially thought the two would restrain themselves due to the memory of the deceased Crown Prince Zhaohuai, but the development of their relationship was completely unpredictable. The heartbroken and desperate Crown Princess was gradually moved by Yelü Chun's sincerity, and eventually even became pregnant with his child!

Princess De had been patient and tolerant because she knew she was infertile, so she never interfered with Yelü Chun's visits to other women. But now she could no longer bear it; she could not watch her husband descend into the abyss of depravity!

"That's your sister-in-law, you can't do this!"

Yelü Chun, who was about to become a father, completely ignored the advice of Princess De and did not consider the consequences if his emperor uncle found out that he had secretly rescued the crown princess!

In desperation, Princess De secretly went to see the Crown Princess and told her a lie she would later deeply regret. She told the Crown Princess that Crown Prince Zhaohuai had actually been murdered by Yelü Chun, and that he had done so only to win her over.

Having finally recovered from the grief of losing her husband, the Crown Princess was struck down again. She never imagined that the man she had fallen in love with again would be her husband's murderer. In her despair and rage, the Crown Princess, six months pregnant, completely disappeared from Yelü Chun's life…

Princess De finished recounting the events with tears of regret in her eyes. Just as she looked up at Yelü Huan, he angrily pushed her aside.

"You drove my mother away, you ruined her later life and my entire life!"

Yelü Huan was like an enraged lion, seemingly ready to tear Princess De apart at any moment.

"It's my fault, it's all my fault, but your father is innocent, please let him go!"

He recalled his father's gentle and refined face, and his heart ached terribly. He had already lost his mother and could not bear to kill his own father with his own hands!

With his red-tasseled spear in hand, Yelü Huan charged out of the palace, which was heavily surrounded by the imperial guards, and headed straight for the inner palace.

No one knows what the three most honorable men of the Liao Kingdom said that day, but Yelü Chun was safely brought back to the palace, and everything seemed to have returned to normal.

However, this is only what it seems...

Princess De gazed at her husband with heartache, and at her illegitimate son standing by with a gun, speechless. Yelü Huan could not forgive Princess De's lie. It was that lie that had caused her mother a lifetime of suffering in hatred, and had led him, from birth, down a path of destruction with no future!

A flash of silver light, and the next moment, the gleaming silver spearhead was aimed at Princess De's throat. Yelü Chun anxiously stepped forward and grabbed the silver spear, looking sadly at his son who was filled with pain.

Yelü Chun, who was in his prime, suddenly looked very old. He said slowly, "All the grievances started with me. Don't blame her. It's my fault. Kill me and let me join your mother."

With a long, drawn-out roar, Yelü Huan looked at the two people before him and sneered, "What a loving couple! But what about my mother? She hated, resented, and suffered her whole life! Who should repay her for the life she spent in hell?"

All three wept silently, Yelü Huan's heart filled with inner turmoil. He struggled incessantly, yet found no way out. His mind was filled with the raging flames of his mother's death, while before his eyes lay his father's aged, remorseful tears. Who was to blame for all of this? Who was ultimately responsible?

Just as the three were struggling in agony, the steward of the Prince's mansion rushed in, trembling, and cried out, "The young princess... the young princess... she hanged herself..."

Yelü Huan didn't know how he ran back to his room, but the white silk and the corpse hanging above it deeply wounded his already broken heart!

With tears streaming down his face, he lifted Xiao Xiao down from the roof beam, desperately asking "Why?" But no one could answer him. The person he thought no one could take away had been taken by death and would never return.

"ah!"

A piercing scream echoed throughout the palace, waking the sleeping infant. Yelü Huan sadly picked up his daughter, only to unexpectedly discover a letter tucked inside the swaddling clothes.

That was Xiao Xiao's suicide note. After reading it, he could no longer control his trembling hands, grabbed the red-tasseled spear, and rushed out.

"Your Highness, stop him at once!"

Princess De shouted loudly to Yelü Chun, but before he could react, Yelü Huan had already rushed out. At this moment, Yelü Chun still did not understand what was going on!

Yelü Chun looked at Princess De in confusion, and Princess De cried anxiously, "He will kill the Emperor! He will kill the Emperor!"

"What? What is it?"

"Xiao Xiao and the Emperor, those two..."

It turned out that on that night, Princess De had inadvertently witnessed the erotic scene unfolding in that room...

Upon hearing this, Yelü Chun was greatly alarmed and immediately spurred his horse to rush to the palace.

In the cold, desolate palace, crimson tassels dangled from the spearhead, gently landing on Yelü Yanxi's dragon robe. Yelü Huan, his eyes bloodshot, gripped the silver spear with trembling arms, and roared hoarsely, "Why?"

Yelü Yanxi was speechless. He kept regretting his impulsive decision. Why did he touch Xiao Xiao? Was it just because he was jealous that Yelü Huan still had a father, while he himself was truly all alone?

A demon dwells within him, and he cannot control himself.

He lowered his head, giving up the struggle. He had never known the meaning of his existence: was it to kill his grandfather to avenge his father? Or to ruin this great Liao dynasty? He didn't know…

"You saved my life on the battlefield, and you helped me seize this throne. Now I'm returning it all to you... Kill me, I won't resent you. You'll always be my good brother who was willing to bleed and fight for me!" Yelü Yanxi sobbed.

The red-tasseled spear plunged an inch into Yelü Yanxi's right shoulder, but it did not go any deeper.

"Hey!"

Yelü Huan drew his silver spear and shouted, and the spear snapped in two in his hand!

He couldn't bring himself to do it; the person opposite him was his brother, the "most beloved person" Xiao Xiao had written about in her letter!

When Yelü Chun arrived at the palace, he only saw the emperor, bleeding and weeping, and a broken red-tasseled spear on the ground. From that day on, no one ever saw Yelü Huan again, nor his child who was not yet a month old.

From then on, the red-tasseled spear and General Chenglie became taboo topics among the court officials. That year, Yelü Huan was only twenty years old.

Two years later, an elderly wandering monk, wearing a straw raincoat, walked into a fishing village in the Bohai Bay. The autumn drizzle mixed with the raging sea wind constantly assaulted the monk's thin body.

The monk walked against the wind to the beach, adjusted his wide rain hat, and saw a blurry figure kneeling on the sandy beach not far away. The waves, whipped up by the sea wind, pounded wildly against the figure, but he stood motionless on the shore like a statue.

The monk put his hands together, chanted a Buddhist prayer, and slowly walked towards the man until he stood behind him, experiencing the baptism of the waves with him.

"When there is light, there is no darkness; when there is darkness, there is no light. Why should you cling to your present troubles and not find liberation?"

The "statue" moved slightly, turning its head to look at the monk behind it, revealing a face covered in stubble. It was none other than Yelü Huan, who had been missing for two years!

Yelü Huan said in a hoarse voice, "Master, you've come again..."