The wicked imperial concubine is courting death again; the comments section teaches her how to win w

Li Fengyao: "Of course, if I hadn't had someone gag him in time, he might have been shouting until everyone knew about it."

Although Xie Jingyu's appearance didn't seem fake, Li Fengyao had countless lives on his hands and never believed in such supernatural or bizarre things.

Seeing Xie Ling's somber expression, he asked curiously, "Your Majesty, you don't actually believe it, do you?"

Xie Ling naturally didn't believe in these things either.

Just two days ago, Tangtang had that nightmare, crying and saying that she was very, very bad and had killed him.

At the time, Xie Ling took it as a joke, but when she thought about what Xie Jingyu had said about his previous life, it seemed absurd, but it was like two pieces of mortise and tenon fitting together perfectly.

Could it be... that was their past life?

Xie Jingyu used Tangtang to his advantage in his quest for the throne, which ultimately led to his death—but what happened to her afterward?

He died, but did her family protect her properly?

Xie Ling originally intended to slowly torture Xie Jingyu to death, but at this moment, he changed his mind.

"Go to the Imperial Prison."

Li Degui was taken aback. "Your Majesty, that place is extremely unlucky. How could someone of your stature...?"

But the emperor's tall figure had already left the palace gate, so Li Degui and Li Fengyao could only hurry to catch up.

"Your Majesty, please wait for me!"

……

The Imperial Prison was a place where serious criminals of the imperial court were imprisoned, and it was heavily guarded.

Extending several meters underground, the passageway is bitterly cold in winter and sweltering and humid in summer. It is narrow and long, allowing only one person to pass at a time, making a prison break virtually impossible.

The water dungeon is at the bottom.

An iron fence separated a murky pool of water, its depth unknown, with green moss and unidentified debris floating on the surface.

Every few steps, a small niche is carved into the wall, inside which a venomous snake, as thick as a thumb, coils, hissing and flicking its tongue, its scales gleaming coldly in the dim light.

This is the cruelest cell in the imperial prison, where one can neither die nor survive.

Soaking in cold, dirty water day and night, being gnawed by snakes and insects, and tormented by despair.

"Splash—" Xie Jingyu was dragged out of the water dungeon.

"Kneel down!" Two jailers pressed down on his shoulders from both sides, forcing him to the ground.

The bluestone slabs were cold and hard; my knee hit one with a dull thud.

He was soaking wet, his hands and feet were bound by chains, his lips were blue from the cold, his wounds were white and chapped from being soaked, and pus and blood mixed with dirty water were dripping down his trouser legs.

He looked up and his gaze fell on the large armchair opposite him. The person there was wearing a black dragon robe and was none other than the person he hated most.

A deep-seated hatred surged in Xie Jingyu's eyes, his teeth grinding together. "Xie Ling... it really was you..."

"How dare you! How dare you call His Majesty by his name!" the jailer shouted coldly.

Xie Ling raised his hand, and the jailer stepped aside.

"Your Majesty, your life is coming to an end. I have come here to see you off on your final journey."

The word "朕" (zhen, meaning "I, the imperial emperor") seemed to provoke Xie Jingyu. He struggled violently, the chains rattling, and hissed, "朕? You, a defeated opponent, dare to call yourself that? The throne clearly belongs to me!"

Li Fengyao felt that either this person had developed hysteria from taking medication, or he had been released without taking any medication at all.

"Prince Gong... oh no, Lord Xie, may I ask you, when did you sit on the dragon throne?"

"Was this position ever truly yours, even for a fleeting moment?"

Li Degui wholeheartedly agreed, saying that wanting to sit on the dragon throne here was something he could only dream of.

Xie Jingyu gritted his teeth and sat down.

In his previous life, he sat there for many years, much longer than Xie Ling.

As expected, he should be a wise and virtuous emperor who will be remembered for all time and praised by all generations—it's all that crazy woman's fault. He gave her the honor of empress and unparalleled favor, and she dared to betray him!

He thought he was dead, but he never expected to be able to come back to life after death.

The problem is that he was reborn too late; his forces were scattered, and he himself ended up in prison.

Xie Jingyu didn't understand why the trajectory of his life in this life was completely different from that of his previous life.

After much thought, all the changes started with that palace banquet. He clearly gave Qi Yitang poison, but somehow it turned into an aphrodisiac, which inadvertently brought Xie Ling and her together.

From then on, she avoided him like the plague, distancing herself from him and never looking at him directly again.

Could it be... that Qi Yitang has also been reborn?

Xie Jingyu was very arrogant. Having been an emperor for so many years in his previous life, he absolutely did not believe that a woman's change could stir up the whole game.

That idiot Qi Yitang was devoted to him in his previous life, so why did she change her mind in this life?

Someone must be sabotaging this, it must be—

"Xie Ling." Xie Jingyu raised his head, a twisted smile on his lips. "Don't you want to know if what I'm saying about the previous life is true or false? Don't you want to know how you died?"

His voice was hoarse, carrying the chilling aura of the water prison, "Beg me."

"If you kneel down and beg me, I might reluctantly tell you what happened to Tangtang, whom you cherish so much."

The jailers didn't dare to breathe.

Li Fengyao's fingers were already on the hilt of his sword, and his expression was almost like that of a dead man.

……

Inside the Grand Tutor's residence, however, the scene was quite different.

This was Zhou Jingyi's second pregnancy, and it was another girl. Logically, she shouldn't have had a difficult delivery, but the baby was in an abnormal position and she couldn't give birth for several hours.

Everyone in the room turned pale with anxiety.

Fortunately, Qi Yitang acted quickly, bringing over the most experienced physician, Physician Feng, from the Imperial Hospital, along with two experienced midwives from the palace.

A group of people rushed into the Grand Tutor's residence to help.

"Young Madam, please push harder!"

"Mmm... Ah—"

Outside the delivery room, Qi Yitang's face turned pale as she listened to Zhou Jingyi's cries of pain.

She wasn't married when her eldest and second sisters-in-law had their first child, and the adults in her family wouldn't let her get close, so she just waited from afar and never really felt anything.

Standing outside the delivery room, separated by a thin door, the stench of blood and muffled groans from inside could be heard piercing her ears.

Giving birth is so scary... Will my second sister-in-law die?

Since it was inconvenient for male relatives to watch during childbirth, Qi Wenyuan and a few younger relatives waited in a side hall.

However, their family didn't have those rigid rules, and as the husband, Qi Zhongheng stayed with the mother during childbirth.

Qi Yitang bit her lip and asked, "How much longer?"

"It might take a few more hours," Ning Wanrong knew she had little experience and was afraid of this, but she couldn't stand her pacing back and forth at the door like a headless fly, peeking through the crack in the door every now and then, feeling as if the soles of her shoes had worn the blue bricks smooth.

She pinched the bridge of her nose. "Tang'er, go find a place to rest for a while. You're making this old lady dizzy."

"Several more hours?" Qi Yitang was so scared she was almost frightened to death.

Giving birth is terrifying. She wants a child, but doesn't want to give birth herself... Could Xie Ling give birth instead?

Ning Nishang noticed that Qi Yitang was trembling, so she put her arm around her and patted her shoulder. "Tangtang, don't worry. Second cousin-in-law is a lucky person. She'll be fine."

"Would you like to sit in the side room for a while and have some sweet soup?"

Qi Yitang shook her head.

I don't know how much time passed.

Qi Yitang's legs were numb from waiting, when finally a loud cry came from inside: "It's born! It's born!"