Moonlight was like silver, falling onto the blue-brick ground, as if a layer of frost had formed.
Shu Changyu sat upright in a corner, facing the only window in this prison cell. His expression was calm as he tilted his head back, looking at the waning moon outside that small window.
Moonlight poured down, illuminating his face into a ghastly pale white.
This prison cell had never seen sunlight year-round, damp and cold to the extreme. Even the straw beneath him was wet and soggy, moisture seeping into his bones.
Though he had only been here for a little over three days, the pain from his right leg—from knee to ankle—was already like flesh being scraped off bone, throbbing every single day. In a daze, it felt like he had returned to ten years ago. The same straw in the same imperial prison. Back then, his right leg had just been broken. If he trembled and touched it, his palm would come away red.
Thinking of this, Shu Changyu seemed to recall something amusing, and he curved his lips into a faint smile.
He thought that, by all rights, he should have died back then. He had stolen ten extra years from the King of Hell, living on in vain. Truly, he had already taken more than his share.
At that moment, the heavy iron chains on the prison door rattled. Then with a creak, the door was pushed open from outside.
Shu Changyu acted as if he heard nothing, still calmly gazing at the crescent moon.
Only when the rustling footsteps outside stopped did he slowly sigh with a hint of amusement: “People of the past and present are like flowing water; all together they gaze upon the same moon.”
He savored those two lines of poetry as if tasting wine, then turned his gaze toward the newcomer and spoke with faint complaint: “Eunuch Li, tonight there is moon but no wine. Truly unrefined.”
The man at the doorway wore a bright red eunuch uniform, with a whisk resting on his arm. On both sides stood several small eunuchs in dark blue uniforms, heads bowed, a posture like wolves and hawks with their attendants.
This man was Li Renshan, the chief eunuch of the current emperor Jing Mu’s imperial court. Hearing Shu Changyu’s words, he let out a cold snort: “Prime Minister Shu is truly in good spirits. To recite poetry in the imperial prison—there is no second person like you.”
Shu Changyu inclined his body slightly: “Eunuch flatters me. Merely making the best of a bad situation.”
Li Renshan looked at his smiling demeanor and could not see even a trace of “misery.” Even his supposedly broken leg of ten years showed no sign of pain. He looked as elegant and bright as a star in the sky, making even this prison seem faintly radiant. This only made Li Renshan more irritated, as if his full force had landed on cotton.
Just a treacherous minister who used the emperor as a puppet—where did he get such clean and noble bearing?
Li Renshan spoke again, now with anger: “Unlike Prime Minister Shu, who is so idle, this old servant has imperial orders. I have come today with the emperor’s decree to execute a traitor and take your life.”
He emphasized the words “traitor” heavily, as if savoring the authority of victory.
“Imperial decree?” Shu Changyu remained unmoved. He slowly raised his head, his clear peach-blossom eyes scanning Li Renshan’s empty hands. “Where is it?”
Of course there was no decree. The emperor, confined in the Golden Hall, was desperately trying to save him—how could he issue an order to kill him?
Hearing this, Li Renshan grew even more embarrassed and furious. He did not answer, instead turning to scold a nearby eunuch: “Didn’t the prime minister want wine? Go fetch it! Since the prime minister wishes to die so elegantly, how could we fail to fulfill him?”
A small attendant hurriedly left and soon returned with a prepared cup of poisoned wine, placing it on the table before Shu Changyu.
Shu Changyu sat there quietly, watching the attendant move about, accepting it with ease. When he took the cup, he even thanked them softly.
“Thank you, Eunuch Li,” he said.
Holding the cup, he swirled it like tasting wine, examining the clear poison within. He smiled: “Since you grant me this favor, I shall also offer you a word—do not think those ministers in the court are your allies now. Once I die, your peaceful days will also end. They eliminated a power minister; next they will kill a corrupt eunuch.”
“You—” Li Renshan’s eyes bulged in rage. But the words caught in his throat, unable to form.
“Me? Am I wrong?” Shu Changyu laughed lightly, his tone mocking. “They cannot accomplish great things. If they do not kill us, how will they make a name in history?”
At that, before Li Renshan could respond, he laughed aloud. His voice was like clear spring water flowing through this dark, filthy prison: “You and I are both villains everyone wishes to execute.”
With that, he laughed freely again, and without coercion drank the entire cup of poison.
His calm acceptance of death, his composed elegance, stunned Li Renshan into silence.
Shu Changyu placed the cup back on the table with proper composure, as if after toasting an emperor at a banquet. Then he looked at Li Renshan: “Eunuch Li, if you were to die now, what regrets would you have?”
Li Renshan did not answer, only gritted his teeth: “May the prime minister have a safe journey.”
“Of course I will go safely,” Shu Changyu replied. “Forgive me, but since there is no one else here, I must trouble Eunuch to listen to me speak.”
Then he continued on his own, certain the man would wait until he was truly dead before leaving:
“In any case, I have no regrets left. Everything that should be done has already been done. If you do not kill me today, I would only be waiting for death.
My Shu family had generations of loyal heroes, yet because of imperial suspicion, my father and eldest sister died trapped in a border city, and my elder brother was executed under false charges of rebellion. My entire family—except me—was wiped out. I barely survived, trading one broken leg for my life, lingering on until now. All for settling these debts.
And now you see it—the emperor killed my parents and siblings; I destroyed his great empire. The court is now chaotic, eunuchs in power, borders in war. I have nothing left to do.”
He smiled as he spoke, yet his eyes turned red. He had to look back up at the moon to hold back the moisture gathering in his eyes.
He thought: regret? No regret. This ending was, for him, perfection.
Yet even as he thought this, tears still surged upward. Fortunately, blood came first, spilling from the corner of his mouth.
The words “eunuchs in power” clearly enraged Li Renshan. He let out a cold snort: “They say a dying man speaks kindly, yet Prime Minister Shu still speaks such vicious words at death’s door.”
Shu Changyu smiled faintly but said nothing more. The poison was already tearing through his organs, forcing him to lean back against the cold, damp wall to stay upright.
His vision blurred, his hands trembling uncontrollably.
Regret? There was regret.
Everything he said earlier was not for Li Renshan, but for himself.
In his youth, he had known only splendor and ambition. But when the dynasty collapsed and his loved ones died one by one before his eyes, he was powerless. Later, imprisoned and barely surviving, he believed he was biding his time. Yet in truth, over these ten years he had become what he once hated—a corrupt manipulator, a national traitor who had betrayed all kindness and deserved a miserable death.
He claimed he had endured all this to settle accounts with the former emperor, but even he did not fully believe it.
A man of the Shu family should stand upright and serve as a blade of the nation—not a weapon of slaughter, but a spear protecting the realm.
Perhaps because of the poison, his heart twisted painfully, making it hard to breathe. A surge of grievance rose with the pain. He closed his eyes, his lips no longer able to curve.
He thought: in the end, he had betrayed his own integrity, betrayed the bright heavens above.
At that moment, a flash of red burst before his eyes. Li Renshan’s eyes widened, a cold blade piercing through his chest.
Before Li Renshan could see who struck him, he collapsed.
Behind him stood the young emperor Jing Mu, who should have been confined in the palace.
Since Shu Changyu first met him ten years ago, the emperor had always been soft and quiet—but today, he was sharp as a blade, his eyes soaked in murderous red.
Dressed in a bloodstained dragon robe, disheveled hair, he threw aside the sword and Li Renshan’s corpse, then rushed to Shu Changyu’s side.
Shu Changyu vaguely saw fear and despair in Jing Mu’s eyes. The emperor’s hands trembled as he carefully avoided his broken leg, reaching instead for his hand.
Shu Changyu thought: foolish.
He said he was guilty to all people under heaven, but the one he owed most was Jing Mu.
Back then, he had raised Jing Mu as a puppet emperor. Yet Jing Mu once saved him in prison, cleared the Shu family’s injustice, and later made him prime minister. After that, he had completely ignored the emperor, openly hollowing out his authority, leaving him a puppet for ten years, and finally giving him a broken and chaotic empire.
“Prime Minister… I’m late,” Jing Mu’s trembling voice said. “Please open your eyes… look at me.”
Shu Changyu wanted to laugh bitterly. You are indeed too late. I am beyond redemption—you should have killed me yourself.
His consciousness grew hazy. His eyelids grew heavy, and he simply let them fall as Jing Mu’s desperate voice echoed around him. Before his eyes, memories surfaced like a lantern show.
Finally, they stopped at the day he passed the imperial exam and rode through the streets of Chang’an.
Back then, he was still young, in fine robes, riding proudly, his future bright and untouched by blood. His parents and siblings were still alive. He rode a tall white horse while citizens cheered all around him.
He thought: how good that time was.
Gradually, the faint cheers became real, close to his ears. The straw beneath him turned into a decorated saddle. The prison walls faded like wind.
He opened his eyes in a daze.
Before him was brightness—bustling streets, a prosperous scene. He was actually riding a horse through Chang’an Street, just like in his memory after becoming top scholar.
Stunned, he looked at the surrounding crowd, their faces filled with admiration and joy.
Then a ripe peach was thrown from a young woman’s hand, landing squarely in his arms.