Dawn had broken, and amidst the shrill whistles, a flock of doves burst forth from a palace, circling the skies above the Forbidden City before flying towards the White Tower at the North Sea.
"To be able to enter this game already marks a player as highly skilled; why would one choose to be an Emperor's consort?" Li Qianxia watched the graceful figure of Cao Duanfei disappear.
"Male players want to sleep with every beauty from all times, and there are women with similar desires—only they sleep with men," Turquoise Pool explained.
She continued, "With such thoughts, plus a suitable 'birth', the game naturally prioritizes similar status assignments for them. That's why Changzhou and I are the Heavenly Emperor and Empress, Qian Xia, you are the sister of the Heavenly Emperor, and Qing Lan is the otherworldly Gu She Divine Woman."
With a single sentence, she implied a perfect match with Li Changzhou, elevated her sister-in-law, and subtly suggested that Yang Qinglan's heart wasn't entirely with Li Changzhou; she still preferred her solitude, detached from the mortal world.
After listening, Li Qianxia didn't care about the first two points, but the last point caught her attention.
Could it be that Qing Lan doesn't really like my brother that much? No, the assignment of identities must consider all aspects, like appearance, skills, and so on.
Yang Qinglan said, "It seems I've done well, properly defying the heavens instead of following the game's arrangement to be detached from worldly desires, a true Black Card."
She drifted along, cradling a Fairy's Ruyi, her white outfit and floating belt graceful as a butterfly.
A palace maid hung a parrot cage under an east-facing veranda.
While the palace maid turned to fetch bird feed, Li Qianxia flicked the parrot's head with her finger.
"Happy New Year! Long live the Empress!" the parrot squawked, stretching its neck—a bird specially trained for the New Year.
Li Qianxia chuckled and teased it some more.
The Jiajing Emperor's birth mother from the Jiang Clan died in 1538; the current Empress Dowager Zhang in the palace was the Jiajing Emperor's aunt.
The Empress and all the concubines, princesses, and some noblewomen led by "Beauty of the Imperial Hand" Empress Fang went to the Grand Empress Dowager's palace to offer their New Year's greetings.
According to palace rules, the Emperor should also present his New Year's greetings to the Empress Dowager, but the Jiajing Emperor didn't have much fondness for Empress Dowager Zhang.
Empress Dowager Zhang had two brothers, one ennobled as Marquis of Shouning, who rose to Duke of Changguo in the early years of Jiajing, was stripped of his title in 1529, arrested in 1533, and died in jail.
The other brother was ennobled as Marquis of Jianchang; but for Empress Dowager Zhang's pleading on her knees, he too would have been dead, though he was still in the dungeon.
Because of these two affairs, Empress Dowager Zhang, already 69, fell ill and never recovered.
When Yang Qinglan and the others arrived at Ciqing Palace, the chattering and graceful troupe was already leaving. Empress Dowager Zhang didn't retain them, and they had no desire to linger in the presence of someone at odds with the Jiajing Emperor.
Dressed in bright, luxurious palace attire and ceremonial robes, the empress, honored concubines, consorts, princesses, and noblewomen flowed through the snow-covered Forbidden City like a vibrant, moving river.
"Zi Sui, go check on this Empress Dowager Zhang," Turquoise Pool instructed one of her tantalizingly shaped subordinates.
"Misha," Bi turned to a Russian female player, "you go too."
"Yes," Misha nodded.
The two leaped into Ciqing Palace; Turquoise Pool didn't wait for them and instead followed closely behind Cao Duanfei, as Yang Qinglan's gaze fell upon the carriage of "Beauty of the Imperial Hand" Empress Fang.
After a while, Zi Sui and Misha rushed back.
Upon closer inspection, they all were holding their heads.
Nearly 70 and seriously ill, Empress Dowager Zhang sat at the top, looking very worn. Holding her own head, she gazed at them, a sight more terrifying than any ghost.
"In such a short time, to kill without a sound..." Turquoise Pool fell into deep thought.
"We must be cautious of this skill," Yang Qinglan said.
Li Qianxia tentatively said, "Could it be—"
Suddenly, she fell silent.
"What's the matter?" Yang Qinglan looked at her.
Li Qianxia pointed ahead.
Everyone looked to see a eunuch at the back of the crowd, who removed his head like a hat and, holding it in his arms, continued to follow the procession.
It wasn't long before a palace maid beside the eunuch also removed her head.
With the procession moving in silence, free of any conversation, the people in the back started removing their heads, one after another.
The people at the front had no idea that the eunuchs and palace maids following behind them had turned into corpses.
Under the bright daylight and rising sun, this Forbidden City exuded a chill, bringing an inexplicable dread that chilled one to the bone.
"What should we do?" Li Qianxia's lips quivered, "Should we take down that Cao Duanfei right now?"
Up to this point, Cao Duanfei was the prime suspect.
"What kind of skill is this? How can it be so eerie?" Zi Sui's complexion was also pale, not from fear of ghosts, but from the worry that she might also end up removing her head.
With that thought, Zi Sui hastily looked back, only to see Shui Xian at the very end of the crowd holding her head in her hands, which made her scream out loud.