Chapter 108 - 89: You Don’t Have to Try So Hard
The Emperor didn’t just talk—he reached out and took them.
He recognized the blueprints, and he remembered Jiang Xian mentioning Xihua Garden. But what was the connection?
Jiang Xian was left speechless.
’Anyone else would have been frustrated. *Didn’t you bring this up, Your Majesty? How could you forget so completely? If you really don’t remember, maybe you should jump back to Chapter 43 and see what you said!* But Jiang Xian was long accustomed to a boss who would ask for a report one week, forget it entirely the next, and then suddenly demand it the week after as if in a final burst of lucidity.’
She chanted inwardly—
’Don’t get angry, don’t get angry. He’s the one who pays me a salary and even showers me with gold on the side.’
"You and I had an agreement, Your Majesty. We were to go to Xihua Garden to escape the summer heat, and you would let me personally design a small garden for the two of us to enjoy. A little world of our own, where no one else would be allowed,"
Far from being annoyed, Jiang Xian rested her delicate fingers on his wrist. Her gaze was as soft as silk and fluid as water, her cheeks glowed as if rouged, and her limpid eyes shimmered with a captivating, misty light. "Does the promise Your Majesty made me still stand?"
As she spoke, she lowered her body temperature.
Her cool little hand on his wrist felt as smooth and precious as suet-white jade.
"Of course it stands. I remember it well," the Emperor said with a laugh.
Jiang Xian knew he didn’t remember, but a sensible subordinate should overlook their superior’s minor mistakes, and she truly didn’t mind. Women sometimes get bogged down in the trivial details of a relationship because they crave a certain gesture. They don’t just want flowers; they want the man to give them flowers sincerely and of his own accord, to remember their favorite varieties, and, ideally, to have even researched the language of flowers...
Jiang Xian couldn’t care less about any of that.
When she wanted flowers, she just wanted the outcome, and she would get it by any means necessary, regardless of the consequences. She didn’t care if the other party only ordered the flowers in a rush after she reminded them. As long as the arrangement that arrived was lush, magnificent, and grand, that was enough.
If all else fails, a wire transfer for the flower money is also acceptable.
"And here I was, thinking Your Majesty had forgotten."
Jiang Xian put on a perfectly timed expression of pleasant surprise, smoothing things over for the Emperor.
’The moment I ran into the Emperor, the objective of my overtime session changed.’
’Now, it’s all about grinding affection points with the Emperor.’
The Emperor sat down beside her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders.
"Can you not come to the Imperial Garden during the day?"
The Emperor looked at Mian Xia. "Did Noble Lady Gu have a conflict with anyone the last time she came to the Imperial Garden?"
He could tell at a glance that of the two palace maids, the one with the small, round face was the least composed, so he picked her to question. Mian Xia knelt below. Though she tried desperately to suppress her fear, her voice trembled uncontrollably. "Your Majesty, my mistress rarely comes to the Imperial Garden, nor has she ever had a conflict with anyone. But my mistress is as close as a sister to Chen Daying. Last time, Chen Daying was forced to kneel in the Imperial Garden by Guo Cairen, so my mistress became unwilling to visit such a place of strife."
At Mian Xia’s mention of it, the Emperor recalled the incident as well.
He fell silent for a moment before sighing softly. "You are cautious and abide by the rules, yet some people refuse to leave you in peace. But to only dare come to the Imperial Garden in the middle of the night... you are being too hard on yourself."
Just today, the Noble Consort had tried to bad-mouth Noble Lady Gu to him.
The content was even more preposterous—claiming she had hidden a corpse in a clock, and that he had helped cover it up.
The ones who refused to leave her in peace were his own concubines.
’Hearing her boss criticize people from a rival department, Jiang Xian felt not a single ripple of emotion. She had no desire to dwell on it, either—one could never finish striking down all the "colleagues" in the harem, and attacking them was not the current priority.’
"While I was researching the small garden for Xihua Garden, I found myself genuinely falling in love with garden design. It would be wonderful if I could have a small garden of my own someday," she said.
Before him lay the design blueprints she had drawn.
Princes were all learned, and the Emperor himself had dabbled in the study of craftsmanship and the arts. He couldn’t design, but he knew how to read a plan. Every year, for any renovations in the Imperial Palace, the blueprints first had to be submitted for his review. So he could genuinely tell that Jiang Xian had put significant effort into her research—it wasn’t just something she claimed to like.
"Yizhu Pavilion is too small to accommodate a proper garden. In the future, when you become the mistress of your own palace, I shall find a suitable residence for you and let my Xian’er truly spread her wings."
Hearing exactly what she wanted to hear, Jiang Xian smiled, but she also desperately wanted to make the Emperor sign a contract.
’You can’t just offer empty promises!’
’A pity she could only think about it.’
"How could I possibly be worthy?" ’This is what I deserve,’ she thought, ’but I can’t say that out loud.’
"It would be a true pity if my Xian’er’s talents had no place to be showcased."
Jiang Xian leaned into his embrace, feigning shyness. "When Your Majesty comes to visit, I can show you the gardens I’ve designed." ’I want a private villa for my employee housing,’ she mused. ’Once I get it, I can bring Chen Daying over.’ "I truly wish summer would get here sooner. I want to go with Your Majesty to Xihua Garden to escape the heat." ’Don’t leave me out of the company retreat,’ she thought. ’Be sure to take me along.’
The night was as cool as water, and with a warm, soft, fragrant beauty in his arms, the Emperor, lost in a daze of passion, made many promises.
After a long kiss, the Emperor mentioned, "I heard you did something at Changle Palace that greatly surprised the Empress Dowager and even stole the Noble Consort’s thunder."
"Your Majesty heard about that, too? I was only doing my best. I had no intention of competing with the Noble Consort."
Jiang Xian’s expression was placid.
When he compared this to the scene his Mother Empress had described, it was as if she were two different people.
With all these incidents piling up, the Emperor couldn’t help but look down at the thick stack of blueprints. Recalling the Incense Bag Mountain he had hidden away in his private treasury, he blurted out, "Xian’er, sometimes it’s okay not to push yourself so hard. The Empress Dowager only had you accompany her in prayer because she feared I was showing you too much exclusive favor. She wouldn’t have really made you do hard labor."
Hearing this, Jiang Xian froze.
’It’s okay not to push yourself so hard.’
’Some people spend their whole lives waiting to hear those words. They spend the first half of their lives being lectured about studying hard and being ambitious, being told to become someone great... *You have to be number one, you have to get into a top university, find a good job, get married, have two kids in three years.* So when they finally meet someone who lets them relax, they’re moved to tears and think they’ve found true love.’
The words sent a ripple through her heart.
Jiang Xian was not moved.
Not even by the fact that the man before her truly had the means to let her stop trying so hard and provide for her for a lifetime.
’In my previous life, no one had ever pushed me to be ambitious. The people in my village all believed women didn’t need to study and should just marry young. They envied girls for having it easier than boys, free from the pressure of supporting a family. No one told me to be number one, no one told me to get ahead. It was my own survival instinct, carved into my very bones, that warned me not to fall into the "lie flat" trap of indulgent idleness.’
’Every time someone from my home village told me I didn’t have to try so hard, a jolt would go through me, making me want to stay up all night and study until my books fell apart.’
’I had no right to "lie flat"!’
’It was precisely because no one had high hopes for me that I had to be all the more vigilant and self-reliant to pull myself out of the mire.’
"I... I’m not forcing myself,"
Jiang Xian said in a daze, then emphasized, as if to convince herself, "I’m doing this voluntarily."
This time, however, the Emperor did not, as he usually did, lose himself in the heady pleasure of ’she’s so in love with me.’
’Something was clearly wrong with Xian’er.’