Chapter 182: I’m Still Living In This World, With My Hair White As Snow.

Unexpectedly, Xiao YuAn shakily stood up, wiped his face with his sleeve, and said: “General Xue, can I request two things from you?”

“You want to request something from me?” Xue Yan couldn’t believe it.

“Yes.”

“There’s no harm in asking.”

Xiao YuAn said: “The first request: after tonight, can you send Xie Chungui’s body back to the Xie mansion?”

“The Xie mansion… so is it true that the man just now was the son of the Xie family, who died for the country back then?” Xue Yan murmured. “Loyalty and righteousness should be respected. Alright, I promise you this. What’s the other request?”

Xiao YuAn looked into the distance. The huge Imperial Palace still has the shadow of the Northern Kingdom in every corner. Every plant, every three, every flower, every stone, every sculpture, every painted building, and every pavilion. However, none of them can be reflected in Xiao YuAn’s eyes, because his eyes were empty. “For this closure, can you let me do it myself?”

Xue Yan was stunned, but then he nodded, and handed over his long sword.

Xiao YuAn took the sword, backed up a few steps looking for a high open space full of thick snow, and knelt down. He took a deep breath, placed the long sword in his hand on the side, and then kowtowed thirteen times. Each time, he would say ‘sorry’. At the last kowtow, his forehead was bleeding, dripping down his face.

‘I’m sorry, I’ll let the tiger return to the mountain2. I’m sorry that I couldn’t protect the Northern Kingdom. I’m sorry that even now, I still want to see Yan HeQing ruling over the four Kingdoms. I’m sorry that even though I got this body, I still wanted to be Xiao YuAn.’

‘I’m sorry, I tried my best. But in the end, I was still defeated by the statement of Heaven, that I won’t be able to change this fate.’

‘If that’s the case, then can I make amends with my own life?’

‘Just like how I once took my own life in order to compensate my brother, who hated me so much for abandoning him.’

‘Would it be possible to get rid of all the grudge and hatred this way?’

After kowtowing, Xiao YuAn endured the pain and dizziness he felt, lowered his eyes, and picked up the long sword beside him. As he placed it on his neck, he turned to Xue Yan, and said: “General Xue, I have something that I want you to tell Yan HeQing for me.”

Suddenly, a cold wind raged past them. The whole world felt desolate, and the roaring snow almost covered Xiao YuAn’s voice.

At the same time, Yan HeQing, who was in his bedchamber, slowly opened his eyes. The Physician beside him said joyfully: “Your Majesty, are you awake? How do you feel?”

Because of the blood loss, Yan HeQing’s lips turned white, and his mind was in a trance. It took him a few seconds to remember what had happened before he fainted. Then, regardless of the four people trying to stop him, he covered his wound, and stood up. “Xiao YuAn?”

“Xiao YuAn? Who is this? Ah! Your Majesty! Your Majesty, your wounds!” The Physician was swatted away by Yan HeQing’s arm, the words he shouted were in vain.

Yan HeQing staggered outside and ran away from his bedchamber, holding onto the pillar outside. As he gasped for breath several times, he didn’t fall down. He raised his head, anxiously looking around for Xiao YuAn’s figure. Once his eyes were fixed on the person kneeling in the snow, Yan HeQing’s eyes shone with joy. He tried to shout, but because he had lost a lot of blood, he couldn’t produce any sound. He could only try his best to walk towards that place, leaving behind a trail of blood on the white snow, which was immediately buried under the strong wind and snow.

Not far away, Xiao YuAn, who was kneeling on the ground, placed the long sword on his neck. Then, he turned his head to Xue Yan, and said: “Tell Yan HeQing that he has to live well for the rest of his life. I want to see… I want to see what his prosperous, peaceful and flourishing world, his country, would look like.”

This sentence spread word by word rushed into Yan HeQing’s ears. As he seemed to realize that something was wrong, he wanted to rush over in an instant, but his body was weak, and his footsteps were slow. Everything in front of him seemed to be blurred into the tragic white falling snow. When he pressed on his wound, the wound in his abdomen immediately brought him a sharp feeling of tearing pain, but Yan HeQing only hated that this pain wasn’t painful enough to keep him awake a little bit more. As he stretched out his hand, he shouted madly: “Xiao… Xiao Yu-…”

However, the wind and the snow were too heavy; Yan HeQing’s voice was too weak to reach him. In the end, Xiao YuAn never looked at Yan HeQing’s direction from the beginning to the end. He simply closed his eyes, holding the hilt of the sword with shaking hands.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Then, the silver light cut through the sky, and entered the bottom of Yan HeQing’s eyes.

For an instant, the world turned red and white as Yan HeQing helplessly watched Xiao YuAn’s body falling down. This action occurred very slowly, but when he hit the ground, the impact was so heavy, that the snow on the ground immediately flew up a few inches. Yan HeQing also fell to his knees with him; his chest feeling like it was pierced as his heart was ripped out of his body, and repeatedly smashed on the ground. Yan HeQing murmured the last word ‘An’ as he fainted on the snow because of the blood loss.

As the scarlet penetrated into the snow, and stained the earth, their hands were only a few meters apart.

————————The author has something to say———————–

About President Xiao…

When he was young, he witnessed his mother’s suicide. This event made President Xiao understand from an early age that there existed such a way to die. Later, his brother’s resentment also shaped his character, that he could easily fall into extreme self-remorse and guilt. Therefore, President Xiao is actually a person who is always smiling on the surface, but in fact, he’s extremely fragile inside.

I told y’all these chapters would be heavy 😭😭😭😭゜・．（ｉДｉ）｡：ﾟ

Footnotes

我寄人间雪满头 wǒ jì rén jiān xuě mǎn tóu; From the poem《梦微之》(mèng wēi zhī), “The Dream Of Weizhi”, by (白居易 bái jū yì) Bai Juyi [772-846], a poet from the Tang Dynasty [618-907]. The first verse of the poem points out a meeting with an old friend in a dream, and the melancholy of waking up. The second verse describes that he’s physically ill, and that his old friend has been ‘sleeping underground’ for nearly ten years. The third verse envisions that his old friend’s dead bones have turned into mud, and that he was left behind, growing until old age. The fourth and last verse tells that his old friend, his sons, and sons-in-law, have passed away one after the other. The poem uses the contrast between the pleasure of meeting someone in a dream with the pain of having to wake up, highlighting the longing for the deceased, and the sadness for one’s own misfortune in real life.

放虎归山 fàng hǔ guī shān; Chinese idiom, it means to put the bad guys back to their original place, leaving behind the root of trouble. From《零陵先贤传》by (司马彪 sī mǎ biāo) Sima Biao [?-306], an historian from the Western Jin Dynasty [265-316].