The harem is too complicated; the empress, a lazy bum, wins by doing nothing.

Chapter 169 No one can be missing

Emperor Yuanwu paused in his teacup, his brow furrowing slightly. He looked up at Consort Zhen with a puzzled expression and asked, "I'm fine, does that mean I can't come to your palace?"

Consort Zhen was taken aback, then curtsied, "That's not what I meant. I just overheard His Majesty telling Wan Ying..."

Emperor Yuanwu:...

He didn't tell Jiang Wanying that he had something to say to her mother. Was he going to tell her that he was going to sleep with her mother and ask her to go home early?
Emperor Yuanwu was speechless.

What exactly are the concubines in his harem thinking?
"Your Majesty, did Wanying do something wrong that displeased you?" Consort Zhen, wondering when Emperor Yuanwu had arrived and how much of their conversation he had overheard, cautiously explained, "Wanying is just a child. What she said was unintentional. Children are playful. It was just a potted plant; Your Majesty needn't take it to heart. As for the chrysanthemums, there was no need to have the flower shop send them over. What kind of flowers would a child know how to grow..."

Emperor Yuanwu tapped the teacup in his hand repeatedly with his fingertips.

The rhythmic sounds as her fingertips touched the porcelain made Consort Zhen's heart tremble.

"Could it be that in Consort Zhen's heart, this is really just a matter of a pot of flowers?" Emperor Yuanwu's eyes were dark and unreadable.

Consort Zhen was taken aback.

This is certainly not just a matter of a simple potted plant.

But that was Consort Xian, the most favored concubine in the entire harem.

She couldn't afford to offend him, nor did she dare to.

Let alone the flower-gathering servants being unwilling to pluck even one of the flowers meant for Consort Xian for Jiang Wanying, even if the flower-gathering servants wanted to move all the flowers from her palace to Consort Xian, she probably wouldn't dare to stop them.

However, she dared not say such things to Emperor Yuanwu's face.

She feared that if she spoke out, not only would she fail to support Jiang Wanying, but she might also be branded as jealous.

"Your Majesty..." Consort Zhen paused, "I have learned a lot from Her Majesty the Empress. I believe that only with peace in the harem can Your Majesty handle state affairs with peace of mind. Moreover, Wan Ying has never mentioned this matter to me before, and this is the first time I have heard Wan Ying mention it. Since Wan Ying has not taken this matter to heart, I do not need to take it to heart either. The fewer problems in the harem, the fewer worries Your Majesty and Her Majesty the Empress will have.

Emperor Yuanwu stared at her blankly for a long while before standing up. Consort Zhen hurriedly stood up as well, asking, "Is Your Majesty leaving already?"

"Does Consort Zhen want me to leave?" Emperor Yuanwu asked rhetorically.

"Of course not." Consort Zhen was taken aback, her eyes stinging with tears. "I look forward to Your Majesty's visit every day."

Emperor Yuanwu stopped speaking, but instead took Zhenpin's hand and led her towards the palace.

Emperor Yuanwu and Consort Zhen went to sleep, but Wu Jixiang couldn't sleep.

He went to the flower room that very night. Huang Zongxiao, the eunuch in charge of the flower room, scrambled off the bed, his clothes and hat not even properly put on, and knelt before Wu Jixiang.

Although Wu Jixiang was not the chief eunuch of the harem, he had been by the emperor's side since childhood. In the entire harem, not to mention the servants, even the concubines had to show him respect.

"Eunuch Jixiang, is there something you need to tell me since you're so late? If you want any flowers, just let me know and I'll have someone deliver them to you right away. Why did you come all the way here in person?" Huang Zongxiao knelt on the ground, bowing and scraping, his face full of flattery.

"I heard that your greenhouse has cultivated green chrysanthemums, which is quite novel. Is that true?" Wu Jixiang picked up the tea that Huang Zongxiao had brewed for him, flicked the tea leaves, and took a sip.

Huang Zongxiao was taken aback, wondering why Wu Jixiang would suddenly stay up in the middle of the night to ask him this.

"Replying to Eunuch Jixiang, last year, the Imperial Medical Academy gave me a packet of medicine, saying that if I mixed it into the soil for growing flowers, it would make the flowers bloom with unusual colors. I was skeptical at first, but I just randomly tried it on two pots. To my surprise, they actually bloomed green chrysanthemums! The color was truly novel. However, it only bloomed on two pots. After that, no matter what I did, the chrysanthemums never bloomed green again. I was thinking of trying again when the weather gets warmer. In this cold weather, the flowers have all withered, and it's not easy to cultivate them..."

"Is it cold?" Wu Jixiang looked around the greenhouse. "I see your greenhouse is very warm, like spring all year round. Are you trying to be lazy, or are you just trying to fool me?"

Huang Zongxiao was so frightened that he couldn't help but shudder. "What are you saying, Eunuch Jixiang? Even if you gave me the courage, I wouldn't dare to be so perfunctory with you."

Wu Jixiang scoffed and put down his teacup. "Tonight, the Emperor went to Consort Zhen's palace to watch the eldest princess embroider. The eldest princess happened to be embroidering a green chrysanthemum."

The eldest princess?
Green chrysanthemums?
Huang Zongxiao's eyelids twitched involuntarily. These green chrysanthemums had just bloomed when they were sent to Consort Xian's palace.

Consort Xian and Consort Zhen rarely interacted, so how did this eldest princess know that there were green chrysanthemums in the palace?

"Eunuch Jixiang, please speak your mind. Please stop torturing me. I really don't know what I did wrong..." Huang Zongxiao knelt on the ground and kowtowed several times, his voice trembling with tears.

"Even if Consort Zhen is not favored, the eldest princess is still the emperor's daughter, our current princess. In this harem, is there any princess who has to be subservient to the servants in the flower room if she wants a flower?"

Huang Zongxiao trembled with fear. "This servant is innocent! This servant really didn't know about this. If this servant had known that the eldest princess liked these chrysanthemums, this servant would definitely have sent them to the eldest princess. We servants, even if we had ten heads, would not dare to show disrespect to our masters. Eunuch Jixiang, this servant is truly innocent!"

"Whether you are wronged or not, you know better than anyone else. As for the chrysanthemums, you don't need to send them. The Emperor will decide. He just gave the order, saying that the eldest princess wants to embroider flowers, and asked you to send two pots of different chrysanthemums so that the eldest princess can compare them when embroidering."

what?
If you send one of every color, does that mean that it also includes those two pots of green chrysanthemums?
Huang Zongxiao's face turned ashen. "Eunuch Jixiang, if the eldest princess likes chrysanthemums, then we should send her every single one we have in our flower shop. But these green chrysanthemums..."

"What about Green Chrysanthemum?" Wu Jixiang asked sullenly.

"To be honest, Eunuch, I only cultivated two pots of these green chrysanthemums in the first place, and now they are all in Consort Xian's palace. What am I supposed to do?" Huang Zongxiao was so anxious that his face turned pale, and large beads of sweat rolled down his cheeks.

"Since there were two pots, why didn't you break off a branch for the eldest princess when she asked you for one? Who are you crying for now? Tomorrow morning, those two pots of green chrysanthemums, and that servant who gave the eldest princess a hard time, not one of them will be missing!"

(End of this chapter)