[TCFO] Arc 1 — Chapter 68.4

Big Brother’s Epilogue IV

Seeing that Lan Ziyu, who was called the “Eternal Emperor”, talked to himself stupidly, all the servants around him were alarmed.

They didn’t know about what Lan Ziyu muttered.

The person was frozen in time.

Over and over, his throat choked, bitterness spread in his heart, and he grinned. He tried to speak but found that he couldn’t.

“Your Majesty, the Imperial Physician, said that you have not slept for seven days. If you don’t sleep anymore, how can your body survive? Please take care of your body for all the people of Lan Kingdom!” The Grand Steward suddenly knelt, his face full of tears. He was the one who saved Lan Ziyu from death.

“Sleep?”

“Yes!” The Grand Steward nodded and began with a flourish, “Your Majesty is tired. Just take a nap. Once you’ve had enough rest, Your Majesty will still be the same man like the gods...”

Lan Ziyu smiled bitterly, “I’m afraid I will never remember what sleep is, hahahahaha..., get out, get out of here...”.

The dozens of servants were frightened and ran out of the room because he held a three-foot cold blue blade that he suddenly pulled out from the wall!

He hacked and killed for a while in the palace. The blade trembled slightly. In the cold light and the brutal force, the sword was so powerful that it showed how many people’s blood had been stained on it!

Lan Ziyu, with his thin lips closed as he murmured, “I love you...” Those three words were repeated over and over again.

Only those three words ... were clear and unmistakable.

It was like a magic spell...

“Why? Why are you punishing me so much...? Do you know... that my love for you is overflowing to the point of madness... Do you know that what keeps me alive is my memories of you, do you know that... those memories are the only thing I have to hold on to and breathe...?”

“I love you...” He murmured.

Suddenly, his body tensed slightly, and then his hands covered his head, his face full of pain.

“The headache has returned. Get the doctor!” The maid outside the door cried out as she observed from inside.

“Get out of here!” Lan Ziyu gritted his teeth and squeezed out a few words with a chilling solemnity.

No one stepped inside the palace in fear.

In the darkness... he was left alone again.

As lonely as a solitary soul ...

”Why! Why, why did you disappear, why did your body disappear, why did you take away even my memories. Do you really hate me that much? Why? Why do you have to disappear so clean and completely! Why did you wipe out the world’s memories of you... How can I find you in the mirror of reincarnation on the road to Yellow Springs? Lan Min, you are so cruel!!!”

He put the wooden hairpin on the table and held his head, shouting.

The only thing that remained in the empty room was his painful roar.

Suddenly, the wooden hairpin seemed to have been corroded and gradually turned into a circle of dust, and the wind blew in through the window, sending the dust flying with the wind...

“No!” Lan Ziyu was shocked. Suddenly, he shouted in a flurry.

“Close the window! Close the window!”

But...

The powder had disappeared ...

“Your Majesty! Your Majesty, what’s wrong!” Outside the door, someone rushed in.

Lan Ziyu turned to look at them with a slightly frightened look on his face, “Do you ... remember the Eldest Princess?”

“The Eldest Princess?” The people looked at each other.

“Father, you are the only son of Emperor Lan Zhizong, and you don’t have a sister?” The young Prince asked when he came in.

“No! No!” Lan Ziyu shook his head, “Where is Lan Min? How can you not remember Lan Min, the only Princess of the Lan Kingdom!”

“Who is Lan Min ...?” They were all confused.

“Get out.” Lan Ziyu gritted his teeth.

The crowd looked fearful and withdrew.

“Lan Min ... Lan Min ...” Lan Ziyu slammed his fist into the wall. Dark blood flowed slowly from the cracks in the wall. He whispered and cried blood like a child.

It was as if ... he was trying to incorporate that name into his bones and blood.

“Why... won’t you even leave me with a memory of...”

“Why ...”

The people outside the door listened to the blood-curdling roar of anguish from Lan Ziyu inside. And suddenly, their hearts began to ache in intractable pain as if they had really forgotten something.

Suddenly, they heard a shallow sigh, seemingly helpless and seemingly regretful ...

Lan Ziyu was shocked. He raised his eyes, which were blood red.

At that moment, he was no different from a ghost crawling out of the devil’s den.

“Lan Min, I will not let you go. If you take my heart, you have to stay with me for the rest of your life, no matter what the cost, I will find you... Lan Min!!!”

A desperate cry with the power to destroy the earth penetrated across worlds and time.

...

I always knew I was a stand-in.

Ever since I entered the palace, the nobleman often looked at me in disbelief. Occasionally, when he looked at me, he would call out the name of another woman.

Sometimes awake, sometimes confused, but the only thing that remained the same was to look for another woman in my body.

He never touched me, the whole harem was full of beauties, but he looked for only that woman with her brows and eyes! The taboo that cannot be uttered.

The taboo that everyone was unfamiliar with was why that nobleman fought on the battlefield and insisted on unifying the Three Kingdoms in the final battle in which corpses were scattered all over the land. The taboo that turned the Eternal Emperor into a madman was the woman who never existed but inexplicably became the trigger of the war.

The magnificent palace, with its hordes of servants, exquisite carvings, and gorgeous blues - all the best could be seen in this place. But the woman under the lamp, full of light mockery and bitterness, knew that none of this belonged to her, but instead, it belonged to that person. The woman that no one knew but could not mention.

In the light veil, the woman under the lamp was reflected in the blurred bronze mirror. Her eyes were like dead water. After uniting the three kingdoms together, she had inadvertently seen that nobleman laugh insanely, madly, unclothed, painting the same picture. At first glance, their faces were similar, but the woman in that picture had eyes of astonishing beauty!

Once, she had loved the face that made that noble man’s eyes linger, but now, how envious she was. She now hated his gaze because it let her know that it wasn’t for her!

Not only she, but all the women in the harem added up to nothing more than a collection of eyebrows and eyes to be used as a reference to piece together a person who did not exist ...

How sad. He never touched anyone in the harem. Instead, he imprisoned them in the harem together to reminisce about the person who didn’t exist ....

A tragedy to all.

I knew that at this point in time, that man was coming, as he had been for months.

The wind and rain never changed, appearing at this palace, this palace, like a golden cage.

But I didn’t know why, but tonight, I had a strange feeling that something was about to change.

As I drifted off, I heard the sound of Lan Ziyu’s footsteps coming down the corridor into the palace.

I looked up and watched him approach me.

”Why are you up so late?” Lan Ziyu asked.

I didn’t answer, but he seemed different today. The madness and sadness and love I once felt were gone from his eyes. So, I wanted to see him more clearly. I looked at him more intensely.

”Why are you looking at me like that?” Lan Ziyu asked gently as he sat down in front of me.

”Do you... remember whom the Hall of Simin was built for?” Looking at him, I wondered if he had realised that his memory was fading. That was why he was so eager to have so many women piece together Lan Min’s jigsaw puzzle. He even went so far as to leave behind me, me, who only had the same name as her.

“Simin Hall?” Lan Ziyu raised her eyebrows and smiled softly, “Silly, isn’t named after you?”

“Where is Lan Min? Do you remember?” The name, I continued to ask, was the name I heard Lan Ziyu keep reciting when he was drunk once, each sound carrying endless thoughts and sorrow...

“Hehe, isn’t Lan Min you?” Lan Ziyu laughed.

“I have the same name as your Majesty’s Lan Min...”

His hand froze slightly, his eyes constantly intertwined with entanglement, contradiction, pain, struggle...

He didn’t remember. He didn’t remember...

He didn’t remember the woman called Lan Min ... He didn’t remember the woman for who he once painstakingly collected jigsaws...

The woman with the same name as me, the one called Lan Min...

“Lan Min~” With a hand on my face, Lan Ziyu’s eyes were suddenly shocked, and he ran away embarrassed.

Outside was the exclamation of the servants and the panic and anger of Lan Ziyu!

Suddenly I was so weary that I asked the servants in the palace to remove my make-up and lay down on the bed. I closed my eyes, not wanting to speak.

For I knew that that man, I fear he would not let them live.

He, himself, would not live. For that time when he was drunk, he said it would be better to die with what little memory of you he had than live in a world forgetting you.

While he had those women who were like you, no, none of them was like you, for there was no one to compare with you, no one ....

The next day, rumours circled of the death of the Eternal Emperor, who died in the palace overnight.

His hair was white, and the last decree was to abolish all the concubines in the harem.

The history books are not allowed to leave any name of any harem woman except the Phoenix Empress …