The Emperor's Phoenix

Chapter 40 | Her Memory

刘 映 月

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Liu Ying Yue

How? How was it that people became so twisted by the influence of power just for the sake of possessing it?

In the end, Ying Yue was no different than the two people she ultimately despised. After all, she too was fond of power. However, if she searched far enough in the depths of her mind, she could recall certain memories when everything didn't revolve around that.

"Hello, dear," Tang Jian Yu casually leaned against the side of a food stand, bearing his irritating, arrogant smirk. "It's a pleasure to see your beautiful face this nice afternoon--"

Her eyebrow twitched in annoyance as she gave him a cold smile, copying his posture with crossed arms. "Are you going to loiter here this entire afternoon, or will you make yourself of use by buying something?"

Ying Yue shot him a challenging smirk as he narrowed his eyes and stepped closer. Jian Yu's eyes flashed in amusement as he grabbed her face. "Whatever I feel like, dear."

She had witnessed Jian Yu's fall as he made the wrong decisions and faced the consequences, yet it never occurred to her that she knew nothing about her stepmother's past--about how her choices led her to become the woman she was.

As her stepmother's existence disappeared with the wind, it was either a remnant of her bitterness or resignation which left behind her memories with Ying Yue.

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"Please believe me, Your Majesty!" Consort Sui ignored the shamelessness of the situation as she knelt on the ground, gripping the fabric of the emperor's scarlet robes. She looked up at him with blurry vision from her tears as he glared down at her with unconcealed revulsion. From behind, the court officials whispered among themselves in indifference as they watched the drama unfold.

"I never recalled you to be such a vile woman," Emperor Sui spat, kicking her to the side as she gripped his robes once again. "I've heard and seen enough evidence to make my own judgement of your character."

"Your Majesty, please--!" she futilely continued to beg, suddenly meeting the gaze of that abhorrent woman. Liu Min Mo's lips curled into a victorious smirk, staring down at the consort as if she was nothing but a grotesque insect. "Liu Min Mo! It's because of her--!"

Everything changed when she entered the emperor's harem as his new consort. Because of Liu Min Mo, her husband had reduced her position back to a lowly palace maid for that woman to take her place.

"How much longer will you be in self-denial?" Min Mo threw the vial of poison down by the consort as it shattered. "The First Empress is dead, and that can never be reversed."

A young girl poked her head out from behind Min Mo's robes in curiosity before quickly retreating--the oldest of the First Empress' three daughters. Consort Sui's slight tinge of guilt soon gave way to murderous rage at the woman's pleased expression. Before she could make a further move, two guards ripped her grasp from the emperor and detained her. Emperor Sui stepped closer to her as she shivered in slight fear from the dangerously calm anger within his dark eyes.