Chương 107: Chapter 105

My mother, after pronouncing that last sentence, remains an instant looking into my eyes as though she wanted to verify that I have registered the weight of her words, and then, without haste, takes once again the cup of tea that Lingxi has discreetly refilled for her a moment ago. And while my mother drinks, the first thing that comes to my head, almost without my being able to help it, is when during the reception of the auction Lianhua told me that Sun Chao and Sun Liang shared the same mother.

At that moment, that information seemed relevant to me, yes, since it could lead the first prince to blame Lianhua, and therefore me, for the disappearance of his brother. But after my mother's words, the fact that the first prince and his faction have me as a target is perfectly logical from that angle. It is not only a political matter, it is also a personal one.

Sun Chao disappeared in the Celestial Fragment of the Sands, Lianhua came out of there alive, and even though there isn't the slightest piece of evidence that either she or I had anything to do with his death, for many that suspicion is more than enough. Up to here, everything fits with an almost reassuring clarity.

But then, just when I think I already have the complete picture, there is something in how my mother pronounced the name of Sun Liang, that small nuance that slipped into her tone and that she normally controls to perfection, that tells me there is something more about the matter of the faction that she hasn't yet told me. My mother lowers the cup with care, deposits it on the saucer with a small barely audible clink, and then looks at me fixedly.

"In reality, Wen, speaking of the first prince's faction is an imprecision", she tells me with a more measured tone than before, more careful.

"If I wanted to be exact I would have to call it the faction of Fei Lan, his mother. Sun Liang is the visible face, the candidate, but the hand that pulls the strings is hers, and has been since before either of the two of us arrived at the harem." I nod in silence, since it's clear that when I thought there was something more I was right, and I prefer not to interrupt her.

"And to understand why that faction has us as a target, Wen, the disappearance of Sun Chao is not enough", my mother continues.

"That is only the latest wound, not the first one. To understand what is really going on, one has to go back many years and understand the history of the imperial harem." She makes a brief pause, takes a breath, and on exhaling I have the sensation that she is measuring how much she can simplify and how much she has to tell me in full detail.

"Fei Lan is your father's first consort", she resumes.

"And she is not so by chance. She is so because her family, the Ma, made during his coronation all the right political moves to obtain that position, and they obtained it." Here my mother tilts her head slightly, and in her eyes appears something resembling an old understanding.

"And Fei Lan, from the very first day, took for granted one thing that seemed almost inevitable", she adds.

"That sooner or later the Emperor would name her Empress. She was the first consort, she was the firstborn of one of the great families, she had been educated for that role since childhood. For her, the logical thing, the natural thing, was that that elevation would arrive sooner or later." My mother lowers her voice a little, not from secretiveness but from something resembling contained irony.

"But, to her misfortune, your father had a very different idea", she tells me.

"The Emperor, from the beginning, decided that he was never going to take an Empress. That the harem would function with consorts in equality and that none would be above the rest. And he never, in eighty years, changed his mind about that." I maintain my silence as I try to imagine how anyone like that must have felt when she realized, year after year, that the elevation she had promised herself was not going to arrive.

"As you can imagine, that was a blow to her", my mother continues, reading my mind.

"But Fei Lan is a pragmatic woman and knew how to redirect what she had. If she couldn't be Empress, she would at least be the first among equals. And that position, that symbolic primacy, she defended tooth and nail during those eighty years." Here my mother allows herself a small smile, a smile that is not mocking but isn't entirely cordial either.

"And she defended it well, that has to be said", she acknowledges.

"She gave the Emperor four sons, more than any other consort, which in the harem carries an enormous weight. Sun Liang, Sun Chen, Sun Xuan and Sun Chao. Four male sons, which is the currency by which influence is measured in a place like this."

A small part of me, that part which in my previous life would have been scandalized, registers with coldness the naturalness with which my mother states that the women here are measured by the quantity of male sons they provide, although on the other hand, considering that my father has only had male sons up to my arrival, perhaps that currency is a bit devalued.

"For eighty years, Wen, Fei Lan was the undisputed first among equals of the harem", my mother repeats, and I notice that the emphasis isn't casual.

"Eighty years in which no other consort, no matter how much talent, beauty, or family backing she had, managed to question that position." And here my mother makes a longer pause, a loaded pause, one of those pauses that serves to mark a before and after in a conversation.

"That was so until you were born and we celebrated your Man Yue", she finally says. The end of the sentence makes me hold back a start because I know exactly where the conversation is going, but I want to confirm it.

"Are you referring to when Father granted you the rank of Guifei?" I intervene carefully. My mother nods slowly at my words.

"That is what I am referring to, yes", she confirms.

"On the day of your Man Yue, your father, in front of the entire court, elevated me from a simple Fei to Guifei. And with that gesture he broke with one stroke of the pen the equality among consorts that he himself had instituted and maintained for eight decades." The cup of tea briefly returns to her fingers, but this time she doesn't drink, she only holds it.

"And for Fei Lan, that gesture was not just another concession of the Emperor to some random consort", she continues with a clearly lower tone.

"For her it was, above all, a personal insult." I nod without interrupting when she confirms what I was thinking.

"You have to understand, Wen, how she sees things", my mother tells me, setting the cup again on the saucer.

"I was the last consort who had entered the harem. The twelfth, the most recent, and, what is worse, the only one who did not come from any of the great families. No army behind me, no group of officials, and no commercial network. Nothing. And above all that, my only patronage, that of the Zhang family, was completely superficial." Her voice becomes a little drier as she continues.

"And even so, that last consort, that woman without backing, received a rank that elevated her above the first consort and above the woman who had spent eighty years defending her primacy", my mother continues.

"For her, that was not just losing a rank, that was, according to her reading, that I had stolen the position that by right should have been hers." Here, my mother makes a pause so that I can process what she is telling me. And, as I do, I cannot help thinking about the mess my father has gotten me into, although I know perfectly well that he did not do it with that intention. Because that day, my father did not act on a whim, that day my father was protecting me.

The rank of Zhāohuán that I received, added to the rank of Guifei that my mother received, were not ostentatious concessions, they were shields, they were messages to the entire court that the little princess who had been born disabled was not expendable. But in doing so, in raising my mother and me above the rest, he made appear out of nowhere an enemy who, otherwise, would probably have left us completely in peace, and that is something which, thinking about it in cold blood, I still find difficult to accept.

My mother gives me just enough time to reach that conclusion, because when I lift my eyes again toward her, she is already taking up her words again.

"And to that old resentment, Wen, must be added the more recent aggravation, the disappearance of her youngest son, Sun Chao", she continues with her measured tone.

"And although there are no objective reasons to think that you or Lianhua have anything to do with his disappearance, the facts, seen from outside, draw a different picture." Here my mother begins counting on her fingers, almost with clinical coldness.

"You and he had an argument", she says raising one finger.

"He entered the Celestial Fragment of the Sands and did not come out", she raises another.

"Lianhua did come out", she raises the third.

"And, furthermore, everyone knows that Lianhua knows perfectly well what happened to Sun Chao inside the Fragment, but there is an imperial decree that obliges her to keep silent on that matter", she finishes as she lowers her hand without haste. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

"For Fei Lan, those four facts together are, practically, an accusation", she concludes.

"And added to the old resentment she already held against us, they have raised the animosity to a level it wasn't even close to having before." And here my mother allows herself another pause, a pause that once again gives me just enough time to take in what she has just said before moving on.

"And, apart from everything I have told you, you also have to bear in mind, Wen, that the first prince's faction is not a small faction or a comfortable one to deal with", she resumes.

"Apart from the Ma family itself, to which Fei Lan belongs, they also have the active support of Fei Qiao, who is of the Gao family, and of Fei Xi, who is of the Wei family. That is to say, Sun Liang is the only one of the princes who has, formally, the support of three of the great families of the Empire." The figure makes me furrow my brow a little, because the difference with the other factions is enormous.

"And to that I have to add a suspicion", she continues.

"I believe they have some kind of arrangement, although they have not made it public, with the Zhang family." Here I tilt my head slightly, because that name has already come up several times.

"The presence of one of their men in Prince Sun Chao's retinue was not, I am convinced, any coincidence", she adds.

"Coincidences, in the imperial court, do not exist. And much less in a retinue like that one." I nod in silence without ceasing to process what my mother is telling me.

"And that is why, Wen, as I told you at the beginning, the first prince's faction is not really driven by Sun Liang", my mother insists.

"It is driven by Fei Lan. And Fei Lan does not hide, doesn't even try to disguise too much, what her great personal goal is." Here, without being fully aware of it, I hold my breath a little.

"If she could not be Empress, she is going to be Empress Mother", my mother says with a cutting clarity.

"That is her only goal, Wen, and everything else, everything, is subordinated to it. And to achieve it she is willing to make all the deals, all the promises, and all the concessions necessary." A still more direct look toward me.

"That includes, of course, getting rid of any obstacle in the way", she tells me.

"And, whether you like it or not, you are one of those obstacles, since your title, despite all your assertions, places you at the head of the race." Here her voice becomes a bit more serious, just enough to indicate that she is about to say something that is probably going to shake me more than what she has already said.

"That is why I suspect that both the matter of the book you found on the day of your fifth birthday and your recent poisoning are, both of them, her work", she continues telling me.

"As well as an attempt there was in the city of Xi'An when Sun Chao's retinue arrived, although the Nei Wei managed to intercept the assassin before he could get too deep into the Palace." And unfortunately I am right, since if I add this assassination attempt she has just revealed to me to the one she has told me I had shortly after being born, that makes a total of five assassination attempts in ten years, that is, basically an attempt every two years.

"Although she is too careful, too experienced", my mother continues, ignorant of my thoughts.

"For that reason I have not managed to obtain any evidence I could use to point at her." And after those words, my mother again extends her hand toward her cup, and takes advantage of the sip, this time somewhat longer, to give me time to digest the whole block. While I observe her drinking, I let the pieces finish settling.

Eighty years of resentment, a personal wound with my mother, a fresh wound with her youngest son, a politically and familiarly impressive network of allies, and a single woman at the head of it all willing to do anything to reach the place where she was not allowed to arrive. It is, to put it gently, an uncomfortable panorama. However, there is something that I still don't quite manage to fit together. Something that I have been wondering about for nearly an hour and that I can no longer postpone.

"Mother", I tell her when she finally sets down the cup.

"I am very grateful to you for telling me the reality of the court at this level of detail. I really did need to know it." I make a pause, just enough not to seem abrupt.

"But I confess to you that I don't quite understand what all this has to do with the commercialization of the mop", I continue, raising my eyebrows slightly.

"And since you began telling me all this when we were speaking about that, I intuit that, in some way, the connection exists." My mother finishes drinking and, far from showing any surprise, gives me a small smile that is, almost, the smile of a teacher pleased that her student has asked the right question at the right moment. Then she turns serious again and looks at me directly.

"The connection exists, Wen, and it is very direct", she tells me.

"But for you to understand it, you have to start from a very simple idea. As I have told you, Fei Lan is willing to do absolutely whatever is necessary for her son to sit on the throne and for herself to sit, afterwards, as Empress Mother. And that, in practical terms, translates into a single thing, bribes." I nod slowly.

"She has spent many years, Wen, bribing imperial officials", she continues.

"Some more expensive, others cheaper, but enough to have people well placed in strategic locations. And, much more importantly, she has spent many years bribing Elders of the Sect." Here the word Elders she pronounces with a specific weight, because we both know that the Elders of the Sect have voice and vote in the choice of the next Emperor.

"And the Elders, I assure you, are not cheap", she adds almost with a grimace.

"An Elder of the Sect is not bought with bags of coins, he is bought with treasures, with rare techniques, with spiritual herbs, or with very high-level favors." The idea makes me furrow my brow again, because considering what I have calculated I might come to need for my own cultivation, if we apply it to a group of high-level cultivators, the costs would have to escalate to absurd levels.

"And the funds she obtains from her family and from the families of her allies, however important they may be, are not by any means sufficient to sustain a bribery network of that size", my mother continues.

"They would be if she only bribed a couple of officials or one specific Elder, but Fei Lan needs to maintain several." She makes a brief pause before letting out the key piece.

"For that reason, for many years now, she has set up a network of businesses", she says.

"A network that she has built up, in a very skillful manner, taking advantage of her privileges as a consort of the Emperor. Concessions, exemptions, contacts, and small but highly profitable monopolies. That network is what truly allows her to maintain her web of bribes." Here my mother allows herself, finally, the smile she had been holding back for a while.

"But in her haste, Fei Lan made a mistake", she adds.

"When she built the network, she overdid it. She was too aggressive. She crushed competitors, took over entire market shares, and pressured merchants who had no way to defend themselves. That converted a good portion of the members of the Merchants' Guild into her natural enemies." Here my mother makes a small pause, as if she enjoyed the pleasure of narrating it.

"The only reason those merchants did not manage to clip her wings in time is that the mix of political and financial power of the families that were behind Fei Lan prevented them from acting in time", she continues.

"And, at this point, her network is too well established for only a part of the Guild, on its own, to be able to do much against her." Here my mother diverts her gaze, in a very deliberate manner, toward the corner of the courtyard where Xia has propped the two mops against the wall, beside the silent bucket, and I understand immediately that this gesture is not casual.

"Well, Wen", she resumes without fully turning her eyes back toward me.

"Thanks to Master Mu, and to a very specific favor she once did me, I have obtained something that the Merchants' Guild has spent years trying to put together and has never had complete. A list, as exhaustive as possible, of absolutely all the businesses from which Fei Lan extracts funds in direct or indirect ways. Her own, those of front men, those of partners, and the legal screens. All of them."

The assertion catches me half off guard, not because of its content but because of the cleanness with which my mother enunciates it.

"And, with that list in hand I have made contact, with the utmost discretion, with a selected group of merchants and minor nobles", she continues.

"All of them united in that nothing, absolutely nothing, would gladden them more than to put Fei Lan into serious difficulties." Here, at last, she looks at me again.

"And among us we have prepared a plan", she finishes.

"A plan to attack, in a coordinated manner, her businesses one by one, until cutting the principal source of the income she uses for her bribes." I listen to all that with total attention and, without realizing it, with a small smile that begins to draw itself in a corner of my mouth.

"Because, Wen, there is no one more ungrateful than the one to whom you have been giving food for years and, suddenly, you cut off the food", my mother adds with a small complicit inclination.

"When the bribed Elders, the paid officials, and the fed accomplices begin to notice that the flow is slowing down, they will pressure Fei Lan, and she will be forced to dedicate practically all her time to plugging holes, to reallocating funds, and to putting out fires." Here my mother makes a brief pause.

"And, while she's doing all of that, she won't have time left to conspire against you, nor against me, nor against anyone", she concludes with absolute calm.

"Which is, exactly, what we need." She then looks at me again with that very specific firmness of hers, the one she reserves for the moments when she is asking for something for real.

"That is the plan, Wen", she tells me.

"And, until today, it only had one important flaw."

"The financing", I complete, almost by instinct. My mother nods, satisfied.

"Exactly. We need a stream of capital of our own with which to be able to sustain the first blows and the inevitable counterattacks", she explains as she directs a more explicit look toward the mops propped against the wall.

"Your invention, Wen, with the right promotion and a well-chosen commercial company that takes charge of manufacturing and distributing it, can help, in a couple of years, generate more than enough capital to begin the plan in earnest and manage to put the first prince's faction into real trouble", my mother continues, breaking down her plan further. She makes a pause as she thinks about how to tell me the next part.

"But, for that, the profits would have to be allocated, during those first years, to sustaining the plan", she finally adds.

"And that means, I'm telling you with all the clarity in the world, that you would have to renounce practically the totality of the personal income that mop would provide you." Once she tells me that she remains in silence, looking at me with the expression of someone who has presented a complete case and is waiting for an answer, and I remain looking at her without answering immediately.

For a moment, the side of my mind that has spent weeks doing calculations about how much my Pay to Win is going to cost, raises its hand internally and reminds me, without any tact, that renouncing those incomes is not a minor decision, since it implies delaying the opening of my first Gate.

But, almost in the same instant, another side of my mind reminds me of something rather simpler, that this woman whom my mother has just portrayed to me with such patience has already tried to assassinate me three times and that she will very probably try a fourth time, and a fifth, and however many more it takes. And that the opportunity my mother is offering me is not just a cold revenge, it is also, to put it sincerely, the opportunity to truly screw over the person who has decided that my life is expendable.

The balance doesn't take long to tip in light of that. I smile then at my mother, a smile that, I suppose, is not entirely the smile of an eleven-year-old girl.

"I agree, Mother", I tell her with all the clarity I am capable of.

"I renounce the income. And, if you allow me the language, send Fei Lan to hell." My mother, far from scolding me for the expression, allows herself for the first time in the whole conversation a broad smile, real, a smile that reaches her eyes and that tells me, without words, that a very great weight has been lifted from her shoulders. But I have not yet finished. My smile widens a little more while, in my head, an idea that had been turning slowly over a low flame for weeks rises to a new level.

"Moreover, Mother, to help a little more with that plan, I am willing to hand over another idea that I have had in development for some time", I add.

"It is a preliminary idea and is not ready yet, but it has very interesting potential." My mother raises an eyebrow, intrigued by my sudden idea.

"And what exactly is it about, Wen?" she asks me with a tone in which there is already a good dose of curiosity. I settle a bit better in the chair and, looking at her fixedly, let out my next plans.

"In a preliminary way I have given it a name", I tell her.

"I have called it the printing press."