Chapter 858 - 765: Sweet Talk
Meng Zhang and Luo Jia had come up with a fine plan, but they did not have to wait until the next day.
Just as the two of them thought they had already found a method and could proceed directly to carry it out, so they left the teahouse in high spirits, they suddenly heard many people discussing something.
The Seventeenth Princess had broken out in malignant sores all over her body; her face was like that of a fiend, and even the Imperial Physicians could not cure her!
When they asked around, they learned that this rumor had not started today; people had already known about it two days earlier, only no one had dared to speak much of it. Later, as more and more people talked about it—after all, this was a Royal Princess they usually never saw—she had actually grown the same kind of malignant sores common folk might get, and in such a ghastly, fiendlike state?
Wasn’t it said that the Princess was like a Fairy from the heavens, both noble and beautiful? How could she also suffer from malignant sores?
Even more people began to discuss it; in this way, not only did many commoners in the city learn of it, even the East Tang Envoys staying at the Royal Post heard about it.
The East Tang Envoys had come to seek a marriage on behalf of their own Third Prince, and had long since heard that, although the Seventeenth Princess’s temper was unknown, her looks were outstanding; being of Royal blood, she was said to be very beautiful.
But no matter how beautiful a woman is, once her face is covered in malignant sores, how much beauty can possibly remain?
Moreover, such malignant sores, when they break out on the face, are not so bad if cured quickly; but if cured slowly, eight or nine times out of ten they will leave the face disfigured.
Even if their Third Prince was not the Crown Prince, he would in future be a Prince, a Vassal King of one region. He absolutely could not take a principal wife with a face full of pits and hollows, ugly and scarred.
Where would that leave the Third Prince’s dignity? Where would that leave East Tang’s face?
However, the East Tang Envoys still kept a wary mind.
At present, these words had spread only among the common folk.
By reason, how could mere commoners know what happens within the Imperial Palace? Unless this Seventeenth Princess was truly gravely ill, to the point that the servants in the palace had already lost their sense of propriety.
Thinking of this, the East Tang Envoys grew all the more anxious.
Still, they had only heard street people gossiping about it; what was the real truth of the matter? They had to clarify that before anything else.
But the Seventeenth Princess was a woman of the inner chambers; even if the East Tang Envoys submitted a memorial into the palace, the Emperor would never allow them to see the Seventeenth Princess.
They inquired and learned that Princess Zhaoyang would be celebrating her birthday in two days’ time; as it was her fiftieth year, she would be hosting a grand banquet of guests. Princess Zhaoyang was the Emperor’s full younger sister, of exalted status; if the Seventeenth Princess were unharmed, she would for the most part attend.
If the Seventeenth Princess did not appear at such an occasion, then there truly would be a problem.
Having settled on this plan, they found a way to obtain an invitation and, on the day of Princess Zhaoyang’s birthday, hurried to the Princess Mansion to send people to inquire.
The Seventeenth Princess, of course, did not go.
The East Tang Envoys felt that the rumor was, for the most part, true, yet the Emperor of Nanxia had not said a single word; they had no idea what this Emperor of Nanxia meant by this silence.
The East Tang Envoys felt this diplomatic mission had become troublesome.
The envoys smiled wryly. Ten years ago the Third Prince had still been a child; he had once come to the Nanxia Imperial Palace and seen the Seventeenth Princess, who was then only six years old. Children so young naturally had no concept of separation between men and women, and no one knew what the two little ones had said to each other. After returning to East Tang, the Third Prince had kept the Seventeenth Princess in his heart.
This year the Third Prince was eighteen.
Women reach their hairpin ceremony at fifteen, men their capping ceremony at eighteen; only then can marriage be formally discussed. The Third Prince looked down on all the great noble ladies of East Tang; he insisted that he must marry Nanxia’s Seventeenth Princess.
In truth, the envoys themselves could not quite understand. This Third Prince was refined and elegant, with a graceful bearing; in letters he could enter the Hanlin Academy, in arms he could draw a great bow, making many girls of the inner chambers blush and their hearts race at first sight. But while others did not know, they, at least, did.
The Third Prince was by no means some tender-hearted lover of beauty; ever since his mother, the Concubine, passed away five years ago, the Third Prince’s outward manner had grown increasingly gentle and handsome, but his nature had in fact grown increasingly violent. He had beaten several of the concubines in his residence to death; the two Concubines, though unharmed, lived in constant terror like startled birds. Their days could not have been easy.
Could such a man truly care about some childhood promise?
Still, this was not something we, his ministers, had any business meddling in.
They were only responsible for seeking the marriage on his behalf.
On the condition, however, that what they brought back was a normal young woman, not an ugly freak with a face full of pits and craters.
Just as the East Tang Envoys were pondering how they might catch a glimpse of the Seventeenth Princess’s true appearance, a piece of news suddenly came out of the Imperial Palace: the Emperor had openly posted an imperial proclamation, announcing to the whole realm that the Seventeenth Princess was gravely ill and seeking famous physicians under heaven. Whoever could cure her would be allowed to enter the Imperial Hospital as an official and be lavishly rewarded!
The East Tang Envoys, who had all along wanted to ferret out the true situation, suddenly saw this announcement and, for a time, were all the more puzzled in their hearts.