When Yinreng woke up, he found that Kangxi had carried him to Cining Palace.

On the warm, cushioned couch, Kangxi held him in his arms while discussing with the Grand Empress Dowager about the matter of sending the First Prince out of the palace to be raised elsewhere.

Seeing how Kangxi clung to Yinreng without letting go, the Grand Empress Dowager's lips moved slightly, but in the end, she couldn't bring herself to say anything to persuade him.

Kangxi had lost his father at a young age, then soon after his mother. Just when he finally secured the throne, the wife who had stood by him through his hardest times died of postpartum hemorrhage.

Yinreng was Kangxi's only legitimate son, the child that Kangxi personally raised.

No matter how many children died in the palace, Kangxi could endure it. But he valued Yinreng's life far too much.

Perhaps in her grandson's eyes, only Yinreng was Xuanye's* child at the moment. (T/N: Kangxi's personal name)

The Grand Empress Dowager forced herself to think with cold and even ruthless rationality.

Kangxi was beginning to act on emotion, so she had to remain rational.

She had to remain cold.

But the moment she saw Yinreng wake up, rubbing his eyes in that adorable, drowsy way, the cold rationality in her heart melted away uncontrollably.

Yinreng was not like Lady Dong'e, who was an outsider. Yinreng was Xuanye's son, her own great-grandson bound to her by blood.

And he was so adorable, so sensible, and so brave. How could she possibly stay cold and rational?

"Baocheng, you're awake? Are you thirsty? Do you feel unwell anywhere?" Before Kangxi had even noticed his son was awake, the Grand Empress Dowager had already asked a string of questions.

She lifted Yinreng, who kept rubbing his eyes, from Kangxi's lap into her own arms, and gently wiped his sleepy eyes with a handkerchief.

"Thirsty, not hungry," Yinreng said, letting out a big yawn. He nuzzled against her hand. "Greetings… great-grandma."

"And me?" Kangxi asked, sounding a little jealous.

Following the sound of his voice, Yinreng tilted his head backward to look and promptly toppled headfirst into the Grand Empress Dowager's arms.

She caught him, laughing uncontrollably. "You silly child! Your father is behind you; just turn your head. Why look at him upside down like that?"

Even Kangxi was so amused by his son's half-asleep silliness that his eyes watered. Wiping his tears, he pointed at Yinreng's little head. "Still half-asleep?"

"I'm not," Yinreng said, already used to being teased. He yawned again. "Greetings, Father."

"Come here." Kangxi beckoned.

Yinreng wriggled like a little caterpillar from the Grand Empress Dowager's arms into Kangxi's embrace.

Gu Wenxing already brought over warm milk. Yinreng held the cup himself and gulped it down in one go.

After finishing, he licked his lips, handed the cup back to Gu Wenxing, and then deliberately wiped his mouth on Kangxi's sleeve. He patted Kangxi's robe a couple of times and comfortably settled into his arms.

Kangxi raised an eyebrow as Yinreng brazenly made himself at home on his lap. Only after Yinreng was settled did he pinch his soft cheek and scold his shameless little son.

The Grand Empress Dowager laughed so hard she nearly choked. Sumalagu patted her back while laughing too.

There weren't many children who grew up in the palace, but they had seen plenty at Yinreng's age, and not one of them had ever been like him. He was an absolute bundle of joy.

They had been discussing the deeply painful matter of the curse, but after Yinreng's antics, all the heaviness in their hearts had laughed itself away.

Once Kangxi finished scolding him, Yinreng nestled in his arms and began to doze.

Meanwhile, Kangxi and the Grand Empress Dowager went back to discussing sending the palace children away to escape the curse.

Yinreng half-closed his eyes, pricked up his ears, and listened for a long time, growing increasingly puzzled.

It seemed that the Emperor and the Grand Empress Dowager didn't plan on moving any of the children out of the palace at all before he had spoken up.

That couldn't be right. From what he remembered, the First Prince and the Third Prince had both been raised outside the palace for a time. Only by the time the Fourth Prince was born were children consistently kept inside.

The Fourth Prince would be born at the end of next year. Since the Fourth Prince hadn't been sent out, that meant the First and Third should already be back by then. Based on this "history", Yinreng suggested sending them out for a year and then bringing them back next year.

Now, Kangxi and the Grand Empress Dowager were discussing the drawbacks of sending children out of the palace to be raised.

The palace had the best imperial physicians, the best food and medicine. If even with all that, the imperial sons couldn't be kept alive, so what minister would dare claim they could raise one?

Any household entrusted with raising a prince would have to belong to one of Kangxi's most trusted men. But if a prince died in such a household, it wouldn't be an act of kindness but rather a calamity.

Even without any curse, the mortality rate of young children was very high. Those ministers themselves had lost children of their own. How could any of them dare guarantee a prince's survival?

Kangxi had already issued an edict to "trap" Garu, the Chief Minister of the Imperial Household Department, with the burden. Garu had practically crawled along the floor, weeping and begging Kangxi to reconsider.

Kangxi was under immense pressure.

Hearing all this, Yinreng nearly snapped his eyes wide open in shock.

He could only bury his face in Kangxi's chest to hide his expression.

Right, of course! If even the palace couldn't keep children alive, how could Father be sure that ministers could? And if the princes were raised in ministers' households during their childhood, would Father really be at ease?

Yinreng realized that he had overlooked something.

The First and Third Princes had indeed lived in ministers' homes, but when they had left, and for how many years, none of that was recorded in history. And in his past life, he had been too young to remember. Even the two princes themselves had no memory of it. They had only heard it mentioned later by people in the palace.

If they hadn't lived outside for an extended period, then when were they actually sent out? And what reason would have driven Father to send the children out of the palace at any cost?

There was only one answer.

Smallpox.

Yinreng arrived at the answer in a flash, breaking into a cold sweat, and his body almost gave out.

Smallpox. There was no doubt about it. Only smallpox would force young princes out of the palace to avoid disaster.

In the eleventh month of Kangxi's seventeenth year, when the Fourth Prince was not yet a month old, Yinreng himself contracted smallpox.

At that time, the First Prince and the Third Prince had been sent to ministers' homes to avoid the disaster, while the Fourth Prince couldn't leave the palace because he wasn't yet a month old.

Only after Yinreng had recovered, and after the palace had undergone several rounds of cleansing, probably when the weather warmed up the following year, did the First Prince and the Third Prince return to the palace.

Didn't that make everything fall neatly into place?

Cold sweat ran down Yinreng's back.

He outsmarted himself.

The First and Third Princes really would leave the palace, but not now. And it wasn't that they were kept alive by being raised in ministers' homes. They had only gone to ministers' homes to avoid acquiring smallpox from Yinreng.

That was also why, after they grew up, the First and Third Princes had no particular attachment to the families they had once stayed with. They weren't raised by those two households because they were only temporarily sheltering from smallpox.

If the First Prince left the palace early now, would something go wrong?

No! I have to fix this. I have to find a way to smooth things over and keep the eldest and the third in the palace. Yinreng was extremely nervous.

He was wrong. If he was going to act on the strength of history, he had to at least act on history that he was clear about! How could he go off on things that he himself didn't even understand!

If this kind of self-righteous cleverness ended up harming the eldest and the third, what would he do? If anything happened to them, the ministers' families fostering them would surely be ruined too.

Yinreng was nearly brought to tears by his own stupidity, racking his brains to figure out how to make amends.

But no matter how hard he thought, until his stomach started growling, he still couldn't come up with a solution.

Hearing the rumbling, Kangxi gave his son's grumbling little belly an exasperated pat. "Time to eat."

The Grand Empress Dowager smiled and smoothed things over. "Perfect timing, I'm hungry too."

The small kitchen of Cining Palace had already prepared steaming hot dishes. At the eunuch's call, eunuchs and palace maids filed in carrying lunch, mostly soups that were kept warm over charcoal.

Unlike other children in the palace, who at three or four still relied on their wet nurses' milk as their main food, Yinreng had begun climbing onto the table to grab food from Kangxi the moment he sprouted two tiny milk teeth.

Once the imperial physicians confirmed there was nothing wrong, Kangxi let him try soft, lightly seasoned foods. Yinreng ate happily with no stomach issues, so Kangxi simply let him keep sharing meals at the same table.

By ancestral rules, an emperor was not to gorge on any one dish, lest his preferences be revealed.

But ancestral rules meant nothing to Kangxi. He would even go out and bring chefs back into the palace, just to eat what he liked.

With a father who treated the ancestral rules like nothing, Yinreng naturally felt free to dig in to whatever he loved.

Right now, he had his head down over a bowl of mutton stewed noodles.

The mutton slices were as thin as cicada wings, while the wide noodles were only as wide as a little finger, perfect for his little teeth to chew on. Wearing a small bib, Yinreng ate without anyone's help, wielding his little spoon and even remembering to wipe his mouth as he went. By the time he finished a bowl of noodles, barely a drop of oil had stained his bib.

Kangxi and the Grand Empress Dowager couldn't help looking utterly pleased.

Look at our home-raised child, so capable.

Forget a child as young as Yinreng; even five-and-six-year-olds in the palace still had to be fed by others.

"Burp." Yinreng let out a satisfied belch. But he wasn't done.

He had just overworked his brain and was very hungry. After finishing the small bowl of lamb noodles, he grabbed a bowl of fish balls and dug in with gusto.

The fish for the balls had been carefully deboned and strained multiple times, so not a single fine bone remained. In an imperial-power society, would the imperial kitchen dare let the emperor find a bone in his fish balls? Do they have a death wish?

Boneless freshwater fish to eat, what a blessing.

Yinreng burped again in satisfaction and reached for another bowl, only to be grabbed by the collar and dragged away from the table.

Kangxi patted his round little belly. "Look down at that bulging belly. No more eating, you greedy little glutton-cat."

Yinreng patted his belly. Fine, no more then. "If I'm a glutton-cat, what are you, Father? Emperor cat?"

Kangxi: "……" I want to beat my son every day, but I can't bear to. So exhausting.

The Grand Empress Dowager laughed so hard that she couldn't straighten up. "Yes, yes, your father is the emperor cat. And I'm just an old cat who worries too much."

Seeing that even the Grand Empress Dowager was making fun of herself, Kangxi could only lower his raised hand.

What else can he do? He'll just wait for another chance to spank his son.

Yinreng burrowed into the Grand Empress Dowager's arms and turned around to make a face at his dad.

Thanks to his dad's imperial meal of mutton noodles and fish ball soup, Yinreng had thought of a way to solve the problem of the early departure of First and Third Princes from the palace.

 

 

 

 

Author's Note:

The story of the eldest and third sons leaving the palace is my own speculation based on historical records, so please don't take it seriously. It's also possible that Emperor Kangxi, because some children in the palace died of young age, disregarded everything and entrusted his children to ministers to raise.

With modern values, Yinreng would be considered an absolute saint in the Qing Dynasty, right? (deeply serious face)