Ming Dynasty: He was ordered to give lectures in prison, but Lao Zhu eavesdropped and made people nu

Chapter 727 Phoenix Nirvana
“Stand back!”

Zhu Yuanzhang picked up his wife's body and retreated three steps. The crimson centipedes did not pursue him; instead, they surrounded the Crimson Sky Sword and began gnawing at its blade. Even more terrifying, black water gradually seeped from the crack in the ground beneath the sword, its surface covered with a layer of glistening, multicolored film—exactly the same poisonous oil that had floated on the lake when Chen Youliang's flagship caught fire.

"Geng Bingwen!" the emperor roared.

His response was the clanging of armor. The real old general had finally arrived with his troops, soldiers pushing ten modified "Fire Dragon Emerging from Water" tanks behind him. When he saw the scene inside the hall, Geng Bingwen gasped: "The vengeful spirit of the Bingchen!"

“Shoot!”

At Zhu Yuanzhang's command, ten fire dragons were unleashed simultaneously. Arrows, trailing fiery tails, pierced the ground, but instead of sparks, they burst forth with the golden-red flames characteristic of Empress Ma. The black water instantly boiled, and countless twisted human figures struggled to their feet—each a vengeful spirit of the soldiers whose ships had sunk!

Suddenly, the Crimson Sky Sword leaped out of the ground, its tip pointing southeast. Zhu Yuanzhang looked in that direction and saw the "Mu" banner in the direction of Quanzhou transforming—the banner faded to reveal its true form: it was Chen Han's dragon banner! And the figure standing beneath the flagpole, though a hundred miles away, was instantly recognized by the emperor as a familiar figure.
"Chen Li?!"

Chen Youliang's son, who should have been executed in the fifth year of the Hongwu reign, was now raising his bow and arrow towards the Forbidden City. The blue silk wrapped around the arrowhead was exactly the same as the one on Empress Ma's heart!
Zhu Yuanzhang instinctively turned to the side, only to see that the arrow was not aimed at him, but at the phantom of the fire phoenix circling in the air. The moment the arrow pierced the phoenix, Empress Ma's body suddenly convulsed violently, and black water with a fishy smell gushed from her seven orifices.

"So that's how it is." The emperor suddenly realized, "They used the wreckage of the Bingchen ship as a medium and the blood of the phoenix as a catalyst." He suddenly tore open his dragon robe, and the spiderweb-like blue pattern on his chest had turned into the shape of chains, which were slowly tightening.

Geng Bingwen suddenly knelt down and wept bitterly: "This old minister is guilty! Someone has infiltrated the Imperial Hospital!"

His words were interrupted by a deafening explosion. A mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke rose from the direction of the Meridian Gate, and the outline of a ghost ship could be vaguely seen in the smoke—it was the Bingchen, magnified a thousand times! The prow of the ship looked like a gaping maw, revealing a dense array of teeth.

Zhu Yuanzhang smiled. He gently set his wife down, picked up the Crimson Sky Sword, and cut his palm. This time, the blood that flowed out was no longer purplish-black poison, but a pure golden liquid that ignited into golden-red flames upon landing.

"Xiuying, watch closely." The emperor smeared blood on the sword, and the inscriptions lit up one by one. "Just as we burned Chen Hanlong's ship back then, today we'll burn this ghost ship the same way!"

The Crimson Sky Sword suddenly flew from his hand, shooting towards the ghost ship like a meteor. At the same time, all the crimson centipedes on the ground stood upright, transforming into streaks of fire that followed the sword's light. Most astonishingly, the golden blood from Empress Ma's chest suddenly flowed upwards, drawing a complete phoenix totem in the air!
On the ghost ship, Chen Li finally showed a look of terror. He hurriedly tore off the jade pendant from his waist and crushed it, but what poured out was not the expected black mist, but Mu Ying's iron arrow! It turned out that the real Mu Ying had already seen through the conspiracy, and the arrow was tied with the talisman that Zhu Yuanzhang had given him back then.

The moment the arrows clashed, the entire ghost ship distorted like a bubble. The Crimson Sky Sword seized this fleeting opportunity, piercing through the bow and exiting at the stern. Countless vengeful spirits shrieked and vanished into nothingness, leaving only Chen Li standing alone on the deck. His body began to crack, revealing not flesh and blood, but ship planks inscribed with curses. "Zhu Chongba," Chen Li's voice mingled with the wails of dozens of the dead, "You think this is over? Look at your empire..."

Another explosion came from the direction of Xiaoling Mausoleum. This time, nine plumes of black smoke rose, twisting in the air to form the four ferocious characters "Nine Generations Slain." Zhu Yuanzhang suddenly remembered that ancient curse—Chen Youliang had indeed sworn a poisonous oath before his death to "destroy nine generations of the Zhu family."

Empress Ma's phoenix fire had now spread throughout the entire Forbidden City. All those controlled by the Gu worms screamed inhuman agony amidst the flames. Jiang Huan suddenly leaped up, ignoring the flames engulfing her, and frantically lunged at the Emperor: "Your Majesty, run! The underground palace is about to..."

The ground suddenly collapsed. A huge cavity was revealed beneath the Wuying Hall, inside which was half of a real sunken ship! Hundreds of skeletons were neatly stacked on the decaying deck, each skeleton wrapped with blue silk threads, the other end of which was connected to the birth dates and times of the current officials of the Six Ministries!
Zhu Yuanzhang finally understood everything. The Lin family's so-called "maritime business" over the years had actually been salvaging shipwrecks. They used these bones to create magical artifacts, and with the resentment of Chen Han's former subordinates as a catalyst, they planted a curse within the bodies of all the officials in the court!

"Geng Bingwen!" The emperor grabbed the swaying old general. "Issue my imperial decree: effective immediately."

Before he could finish speaking, countless skeletal hands suddenly emerged from the wreckage, grabbing Zhu Yuanzhang's legs and dragging him down. Even more terrifying, those blue threads, like living things, climbed onto the Crimson Sky Sword and began to erode the inscriptions on its blade.

At this critical moment, Empress Ma, who had been dead for some time, suddenly sat up! The brand on her chest shone brightly, transforming into a real fire phoenix that plunged into the cave. Wherever the golden-red flames passed, bones turned to ashes. But with each skeleton burned, Empress Ma's body withered a little more.

"Chongba," the empress, barely recognizable as human, uttered her last words, "Remember. The year of Bingchen, the twelfth month."

The blast wave sent Zhu Yuanzhang flying several feet. When he struggled to his feet, the cave had collapsed, and the Crimson Cloud Sword lay upside down in the ruins, its tip piercing half a charred piece of ship plank—a fragment of Chen Youliang's dragon throne from years ago!
The false flags from the direction of Quanzhou had vanished without a trace. The real banner bearing the character "Mu" was finally raised, and cavalry galloped in under its banner, carrying the victory report of "the pirates annihilated." But Zhu Yuanzhang knew that this was far from over. As he bent down to pick up his sword, he noticed a line of small characters added to the blade:

"In the twelfth month of the Bingchen year, the phoenix rose from the ashes."

The emperor suddenly remembered that in the twelfth month of the eighth year of the Hongwu reign, Empress Ma had secretly gone to Poyang Lake. At the time, she said she wanted to settle a karmic debt, and when she returned, her sleeves were stained with foul-smelling black water.
"Draft an imperial edict." Zhu Yuanzhang's voice suddenly became eerily calm. "Effective immediately, the 'Veritable Records of Emperor Taizu' will be revised." He stared at the hastily arriving historian. "The date of Empress Ma's death will be changed to the fifteenth day of the twelfth lunar month of the Bingchen year."

The historian's pen trembled—that was the very day Chen Youliang died! But as he looked up to inquire, he saw the emperor carrying the withered body of the empress towards the Fengxian Hall. The Chixiao sword dragged on the ground, leaving not blood, but burning golden flames.

The real revenge has only just begun. And the curse that began thirty-five years ago at Poyang Lake will finally be settled in the next Bingchen year.
(End of this chapter)