Chapter 1212: Exchange of Life

"I said a lot to him righteously at that time, saying that I was a different emperor and I hated privileges the most. If privileges exist, the Ming Dynasty will eventually become the Yuan Dynasty, and no one should have privileges!" Zhu Yuanzhang slapped his thigh painfully and said:

"Finally, I swore to him that if my son kills or burns in the future, I will not forgive him!"

As he said this, he looked at Queen Ma with a painful face and said: "Tell me, the crime of the tenth brother is a hundred times that of Hu Tianci. If we forgive him, won't Hu Weiyong laugh to death again in the ground?"

"..." Queen Ma nodded, and after a long silence, she slowly said: "I understand, although my thoughts will not change..." As she said this, she took a deep breath and forced herself to say:

"But no matter what decision you make, I will not blame you."

Before she finished speaking, Queen Ma lowered her head and covered her face, tears rolling, and she was already heartbroken.

"Oh, Xiuying, don't cry, don't cry." Zhu Yuanzhang quickly raised his hand and wanted to wipe Empress Ma's face with his sleeve. Suddenly, he remembered that he had just wiped her mouth, so he changed his sleeve to the other side. While wiping her tears, he comforted her: "There is always a way, there is always a way. Your body is not good to begin with, you can't be so sad..." As he said this, he sighed and was almost crying: "It's really hard to be an emperor, especially with a few rebellious sons, it's really hard to make people die..." "You are right in this matter, it's us women who caused you trouble." Seeing this, Empress Ma quickly shook her hand back She held his hand, touched his head, and comforted him: "I'm sorry, Chongba, I've made things difficult for you..."

Empress Ma's comfort made Zhu Yuanzhang's bitterness come out, and he beat his chest and stamped his feet and said: "How can I not feel uncomfortable? No matter what choice I make, it's more uncomfortable than killing me!"

The couple was comforting each other, and suddenly there was a hurried knock on the door outside: "The emperor and the queen are not well, Concubine Ning is gone!"

"What?!" Zhu Yuanzhang's face changed drastically when he heard it, and the couple stood up suddenly. Empress Ma felt dizzy, and Zhu Yuanzhang quickly supported her.

"Are you okay?"

"I can't take care of it, hurry to Shouchang Palace." Empress Ma bit her lips tightly and forced herself to walk out.

"Hurry up and bring the sedan chair to the door of the palace!" Zhu Yuanzhang shouted hurriedly.

~~

As soon as the emperor and his wife sat on the imperial sedan chair, they kept urging them to hurry up. The guards carrying the sedan chair trotted all the way and soon arrived at Shouchang Palace where Concubine Guo Ning lived.

As soon as the imperial sedan chair landed, Zhu Yuanzhang helped Empress Ma down and walked quickly inside.

Eunuch Lu, the manager of Shouchang Palace, knelt at the palace gate to greet them.

"What's going on? Didn't I specifically ask you to keep an eye on Concubine Ning?!" Empress Ma asked, holding her forehead.

"Replying to the Queen, I didn't dare to leave my duty tonight. I have been taking people to carefully look after my Queen." Eunuch Lu said with a look of grief: "It was night, and the Queen said she wanted to go to bed. We couldn't sleep next to her, so we asked her to guard outside the palace." "I wanted to insist, but the Queen got angry, so I had to listen to the noise outside the palace, thinking that I would come in and watch after the Queen fell asleep." Eunuch Lu sobbed, "Who knew that after going out for a while and coming back, she cut her wrist with an eyebrow trimmer, and blood spurted out, and it couldn't be stopped..." Eunuch Lu's inarticulate narration, Zhu Yuanzhang and his wife came to Concubine Guo Ning's bed. She liked simplicity and elegance when she was alive, so the bedding was all light-colored, but now it had been stained with a shocking dark red by her blood. She lay quietly in a pool of blood, her face pale... "As a result, when the imperial physician arrived, the Queen had lost too much blood and passed away!" Eunuch Lu said from the side, and then sobbed. Seeing this scene, Empress Ma finally couldn't hold on and fainted.

"Imperial physician, call the imperial physician!" Fortunately, Zhu Yuanzhang had been supporting her and didn't let her fall.

The palace maids hurried forward and took the Empress, helping her to lie down in the outer room.

Zhu Yuanzhang was furious. He looked around with a dark face and found the vent. He pointed at Eunuch Lu and said, "Drag this idiot out and chop him off!"

"Ah?!" Eunuch Lu was horrified and quickly knelt down to beg for mercy, "Your Majesty, spare my life! I have tried my best. What crime have I committed?!"

"Don't you know where you are wrong?" Zhu Yuanzhang snorted coldly and ordered the guards who came in after hearing the order, "Cut off one of his hands first and teach him how to stop bleeding correctly! Then chop off his head!"

"Yes!" The guard responded and dragged Eunuch Lu out. Eunuch Lu wanted to beg, but his jaw was directly cut off and he couldn't make a sound...

Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand again, and all the palace people withdrew.

The bedroom soon became quiet, leaving him alone to watch Concubine Guo Ning.

He slowly sat on the blood-stained bed, slowly stretched out his hand, touched Concubine Guo Ning's cold cheek, and couldn't hold back tears after holding back all night. Drops of it fell on Concubine Guo Ning's forehead.

"How could you be so stupid? Is it worth it for such a beast..."

~~

Zhu Yuanzhang sat beside Concubine Guo Ning's bed, lost in thought. It was not until the fourth watch that he suddenly came to his senses.

He stood up slowly with the help of the railing, took a last look at Concubine Guo Ning, and sighed: "Forget it, we can't let you die in vain..."

After saying that, he turned around dejectedly, lowered his proud head, and his whole spirit was gone.

Coming out of the inner chamber, he went to see Empress Ma. In the second half of the night, the imperial physician reported that she fainted due to great grief and loss of consciousness. She had been given acupuncture and asked to take a long nap. She would feel much better when she woke up.

His movements were gentle enough, but Empress Ma still opened her eyes and looked at him steadily.

Zhu Yuanzhang nodded and said in a hoarse voice: "Rest assured."

Empress Ma closed her eyes with a sense of relief.

~~

When the officials went to court, they saw the plain mourning clothes hung in the palace, and they were all secretly guessing which noble person was gone.

When the emperor took the throne, they found that even Zhu Yuanzhang had changed into a blue robe with a corner belt. They were all shocked and thought, could it be the Empress?

However, Zhu Yuanzhang did not let them guess. He whispered to Guo Ying, who was in the front row of military officers, "Marquis Wuding, your sister died last night..."

Guo Ying fell to his knees, his mouth wide open in shock: "How could this happen?"

"She committed suicide." Zhu Yuanzhang said with deep sorrow in his voice: "Because she wanted to exchange her life for the life of that beast, Lao Shi."

"Ah?!" Even though Guo Ying had been through many battles, he could not accept this shocking news for a while, and stood there not knowing what to say.

The ministers were also surprised and could not help but whisper to each other. They had heard about what happened in Shandong. They heard that the couple of Prince Lu were just escorted back to Beijing yesterday, but they did not expect this to happen...