The elderly eunuch Feng Yao, who was attending to them, served tea and then stepped aside quietly to wait upon them.
Murong Yu looked at Bai Qingyan with a smile, her gallant and heroic demeanor like that of a man, and said, "This time, I must thank Miss Bai for extending my life."
"Emperor Yan is too kind..." Bai Qingyan took a sip of tea before asking, "I wonder what brings Emperor Yan to meet with me today?"
"Miss Bai claims to be ill but still comes to see me... It shows that you do not see me as an outsider. If Miss Bai doesn’t mind... you can call me Brother Yu. I will boldly regard Miss Bai as my own sister and call you A Yan. Is that all right?"
Murong Yu did not use "We" when speaking to Bai Qingyan but instead used "I," indicating that he did not wish Bai Qingyan to treat him as the emperor of another country.
Seeing Bai Qingyan’s slight astonishment, Murong Yu smiled and said, "I have a younger brother, named Yan... I call him A Yan. Since I regard Miss Bai as a sister, I thought of calling you A Yan. Is that offensive?"
Bai Qingyan did not pretend to be reserved. She shook her head, saying, "Brother Yu specially asked Yue Shi to invite me here. I assume it’s for another matter. Please go ahead."
"I have a reason for seeing A Yan!" Murong Yu’s slight smile revealed a gentleman’s demeanor. "My health cannot be hidden from A Yan. I am not long for this world. The Yan... my son Murong Li is intelligent but not enough to bear the burden of the Yan. Therefore, I wish to pass the throne to my younger brother Murong Yan. I hope A Yan... will not reject this and can marry my younger brother, becoming our Empress Yan."
As he spoke, Murong Yu straightened his back and bowed to Bai Qingyan with cupped hands.
His mother was long gone, and his elder brother was like a father. Before his departure, Murong Yu wanted to arrange a lifelong matter for A Yan.
Murong Yu firmly believed that only with Murong Yan on the throne could the Yan unify the world, fulfilling their mother’s dying wish, and bring peace to the people.
Murong Yu had learned that during the Jin Kingdom’s examination cheating scandal, someone had maligned Bai Qingyan, calling her a national traitor. Bai Qingyan’s mentor, Mr. Guan Yongchong, personally defended her, saying Bai Qingyan had described the battlefield as... mountains of bones exposed to the wilderness, graves scattered everywhere with no place to bury, thousands of acres of good farmland left untilled, and bodies strewn for miles with birds vanishing.
She vowed to dedicate her life to bringing peace to the land for the people’s sake.
Such magnanimity and such ambition were identical to his younger brother Murong Yan’s.
The rarest thing in life is to find someone who is both a lover and a confidant.
Bai Qingyan was both A Yan’s confidant and his beloved. Therefore, Murong Yu had to make this trip.
But Bai Qingyan knew very clearly what she wanted and did not seem to be weighed down by emotions. freewёbnoνel.com
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: Rebirth: The Journey of an Heiress