Brian Clark was so angry that he laughed out loud, his chest tight with rage. Samuel Grant cried out in alarm, stumbling over to help him sit down.

The hall was in chaos. The assassin hadn’t expected things to turn out this way; his eyes were wide as he watched a crowd gather around the emperor.

“He knows I won’t tell David Smith,” Brian Clark’s hand was white from gripping so hard. “He knows I have to spare his life for the sake of his father.”

Samuel Grant said anxiously, “He tried to assassinate Your Majesty—this is enough to wipe out his entire clan!”

“That’s my Grand Tutor!” Brian Clark gritted his teeth. The young emperor’s ascension to the throne had depended on David Smith’s help, and the emperor was close to David Smith. What’s more, the boy was clever and bold—he’d insisted from start to finish that he was just a flower thief, never even got close, so where was the assassination?

A full quarter of an hour passed before the imperial physician arrived to take the emperor’s pulse. The assassin lay on a stretcher, anxiously peering into the crowd.

He truly couldn’t move; his whole body ached. Seeing this scene, he couldn’t help but feel uneasy—he was starting to regret it.

The assassin gathered his strength and shouted, “If Your Majesty is still angry, then keep punishing me! I, Charles Smith, have a worthless life—I can endure any punishment!”

Someone kicked him hard and barked, “Shut up!”

After the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, Brian Clark finally waved everyone away, his face pale.

Charles Smith looked at his expression and swallowed the blood in his throat.

That day, Charles Smith had gone for a spring outing by the river with a courtesan. While playing with her, they both fell into the water. There were reeds in the river, allowing them to breathe, and the thrill of flirting underwater was even more exciting, so Charles Smith wasn’t in a hurry to bring the woman up. When he finally surfaced for air, he happened to catch sight of the emperor walking toward the riverbank.

Charles Smith immediately sank back underwater. The river was murky; he grabbed the courtesan and hid in the reeds. The dense reeds blocked their view, and he was afraid the woman would make a sound, so he covered her mouth, pinned her limbs, and peered through the gaps at the people on the shore.

The person on the shore looked down at the water, unaware that someone was watching him from the reeds.

Charles Smith wasn’t really underwater, but he held his breath as if suffocating. Only after the emperor left did he drag the woman ashore. Because of his nervousness, he’d nearly caused someone’s death.

Who could have known that the person that day was the emperor? That he’d actually seen the imperial face?

After a while, Brian Clark’s eyes darkened. He asked coldly, “Who let you into the palace?”

Charles Smith opened his mouth, but stayed silent.

“Whether you say it or not, I don’t care anymore,” said Brian Clark. “Who knows if what you say is true or not? I’ll investigate myself. Once I find the source, I’ll invite young master Smith to the palace and see if I’ve caught the right person.”

The emperor spoke each word calmly, without emphasis, but Charles Smith felt a chill down his spine.

Brian Clark then smiled and said, “Someone, escort Young Master Smith to the Grand Tutor’s residence, bring the finest medicines, and have a hundred palace attendants follow behind. Make it a grand, lively procession to deliver him to the Smith residence!”

The chief guard straightened and said, “At your command, Your Majesty.”

“If the Grand Tutor asks,” Brian Clark said, “just tell him the truth. If he wants to come to the palace to plead for forgiveness, let him wait until his son has recovered.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Charles Smith was carried out of the palace with a bitter smile. Such a grand display—probably even the emperor himself wouldn’t get this treatment when leaving the palace.

The emperor felt that punishing him for two days wasn’t enough to vent his anger, and wanted to make a show of it. Charles Smith had thought the emperor wouldn’t tell his father, to spare him from dying of rage.

He hadn’t expected that, in the emperor’s heart, there was indeed affection for his father, but even if his father died of anger, it was less important than letting the emperor vent his fury.

Now, even if his father died of anger, everyone in the world would say it was this unfilial son who killed him. Not only that, they would praise the emperor’s mercy and his kindness to the Smith family.

From now on, his father would never again be able to shamelessly claim closeness with the emperor.

“Sigh,” Charles Smith let out a long sigh and said to the man beside him, “Brother guard, if my father doesn’t ask, please don’t tell him on your own.”

The guard’s face was expressionless, with a hint of anger.

Charles Smith was silent for a while, then suddenly opened the fist he’d been clenching. Inside was a strand of black hair, which he struggled to tuck into his robe, gazing absentmindedly at the sky.

The Son of Heaven, with the appearance of a celestial.

Status, power, the world itself—all belonged to that one person. The emperor, raised by the land of the great Heng, even his hair was as smooth as silk.

Next time he wanted to see the emperor, he’d have to wait until his injuries healed.

*

After Charles Smith was sent back, the Grand Tutor David Smith did indeed try to enter the palace to plead for forgiveness. Brian Clark refused to see him and had him sent back home. After three days of this back and forth, David Smith, who had previously seemed so vigorous, suddenly looked as if he’d aged into a seventy-year-old man overnight.

Everyone who needed to know about David Smith’s three failed attempts to enter the palace knew. Except for those with inside information, outsiders had no idea why, overnight, David Smith had fallen out of the emperor’s favor.