Li Shimin faked his death? Then I will be powerful enough to conquer the world!

In the gilded animal-head incense burner in the Liangyi Hall, the ambergris had long been extinguished, leaving only a few cold ashes flickering in the belly of the burner.

Li Zhi stared at the memorials piled up like a mountain on his desk, his fingertips unconsciously stroking the goat hair of the jade brush. It was specially found last year. He was used to holding the soft hair, and the hard bamboo pen handle hurt his palm.

Outside the window, the shadow of the old locust tree was cut into pieces by the moonlight, just like his confused thoughts at the moment.

He should have been enjoying the company of his grandchildren, but the coffin of his eldest son Li Hong was still there. The white flags made a rustling sound in the night wind, startling the birds perched on the beams and sending them flying by.

He suddenly remembered the day when Li Hong was one month old. Mei Niang knelt before his knees, holding the child, her temples stained with milk, her eyes filled with a light brighter than a candle: "Your Majesty, look, Hong'er's fingers are so much like yours. He will surely be able to shoulder the responsibilities of the country in the future."

The country is still there, but the people who shoulder its responsibilities are gone.

A grain of sand fell from the hourglass on the desk, startling his fingertips.

Ever since Li Hong's sudden death, this kind of daze has often come over me - it's only been seven days, but it feels like seven years.

He looked down at his folded hands. The age spots at the base of his palms were deeper than last year. The calluses on his palms rubbed against the gold threads on the dragon robe, making a slight rustling sound.

Once upon a time, these hands could draw a strong bow and shoot a wolf in the sky, but now they can't stop shaking even when reviewing documents.

"Your Majesty, the Queen Mother did not attend court today and has returned to Lizheng Palace."

Wang Can's voice came from outside the hall. Li Zhi looked up and saw that the hall door was half open. The breeze blew in the fragrance of late spring locust flowers, mixed with the water vapor from the Taiye Lake in the distance, making it chilling to the bone.

He suddenly remembered the phoenix robe that Mei Niang wore yesterday. The phoenix pattern embroidered on the bright yellow satin should have been extremely bright, but it was made a little dim by the dark circles under her eyes, just like the news that she did not attend the court at this moment, which created an empty hole in his heart.

"understood."

His voice was hoarse as if it contained sand. He waved his hand and saw Wang Can hesitate to speak. Suddenly, he remembered something and said, "Let's hold court tomorrow morning... in Hanyuan Hall."

"Tell all officials that I will be here in person."

The moment the palace door creaked shut, Li Zhi heard a sigh from his chest.

Hanyuan Hall was the new court hall proposed by Mei Niang three years ago, saying that Taiji Hall was too small to accommodate the increasing number of officials, nor could it bear the grandeur of the prosperous Tang Dynasty.

But at that time he stubbornly refused, saying that the Taiji Hall was a legacy of the Zhenguan and Qianwu periods, and was the place where his father and brother had sat, and it had its own weight of inheritance.

They had a quarrel over this; she threw the teacup and he overturned the memorial case. In the end, with tears in her eyes, she covered him with a fox fur coat and said, "Your Majesty always misses the late emperor, but the country must move on."

Now he finally relented.

It's not that I'm giving in, I just suddenly understood - when the weight of inheritance makes people breathless, moving forward may also be a form of protection.

The bronze crane leak in the Lizheng Hall made a dripping sound, "tick, tick", which was very similar to Wu Meiniang's disordered heartbeat at the moment.

She stared at the gold-inlaid jade hairpin in her dressing box. It was sent by Li Zhi this morning. He said it was a new tribute from Yangzhou and was carved with her favorite phoenix.

But at this moment, the pearls on her hairpin were shining coldly under the candlelight, just like the tears in her eyes that had not yet dried. They had been scorching hot, but now turned into frost in the wind.

"Queen of Heaven, His Majesty has arrived."

When Shangguan Wan'er's report came, Wu Meiniang was taking off her hairpins and rings in front of the bronze mirror.

In the gilded mirror, she saw the new white hair on her temples.

The sound of the palace door opening was a bit hesitant, just like the atmosphere they had been having together in recent years - they were obviously a married couple, but there was always a thin layer of strangeness between them.

She didn't look back, but saw him in the mirror leaning against the door frame, the jade belt hanging loosely around his waist, and he had actually lost weight since last month. There were still a few spots of ink on his dark uniform - he must have stayed up all night in the Liangyi Palace again.

The young emperor back then was now coughing and wheezing slightly even when he walked. The sound of the corner of his robe brushing against the blue bricks was very similar to the speed at which the white hair on her temples grew, silent but glaring.

Li Zhi's voice was a little hoarse, and his fingertips suddenly touched the loose hair on the back of her neck.

A light brown mole had appeared there at some point. He remembered that when he kissed her there when he was young, she would smile and shrink her neck, saying, "Your Majesty, it's itchy."

Now, what his fingertips touched was slightly cool skin, and a few strands of stubborn white hair were entangled between his fingers. It turned out that without realizing it, they had walked hand in hand for thirty years, from the green lamps of Ganye Temple to the dragon couch of Ganlu Temple, from Zhaoyi to Empress of Heaven, from youth to old age.

Wu Meiniang suddenly remembered the look in Li Zhi's eyes when she was told of Li Hong's death. It was a strange look filled with piercing suspicion, which pierced into her heart like a sharp blade.

She knew the rumors in the court and the country, and knew that the memorial from the Censorate said "The Queen Mother poisoned her son", but she knew even more clearly that this man whom she called "Your Majesty" was her only weakness.

Just like now, when his fingertips wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes, she suddenly thought that compared to the country and power, what she feared more was that the tenderness in his eyes was no longer there.

"Your Majesty always says that the Taiji Hall embodies the spirit of the late emperor, but you personally supervised the tamping of the earth in the foundation of the Hanyuan Hall."

Li Zhi suddenly looked up and met the red corners of her eyes.

When the Ministry of Revenue reported a severe drought in Guanzhong, Mei Niang had secretly allocated her own money to buy grain - it turned out that she knew everything, but insisted on waiting for him to give in.

Just like when she copied scriptures for him in Zhaoyi Palace, her handwriting was obviously better than his, but she insisted that "Your Majesty's handwriting has an imperial air, I can't learn it."

"Tomorrow morning court..." He suddenly leaned close to her ear and whispered softly, as if he was speaking to her in his youth, "I'll ask Wan'er to move your phoenix chair to the right side of the imperial desk."

Listening to his breathless words, she suddenly smiled, and used her fingertips to straighten his crooked bun, touching the new wrinkles on the back of his neck.

That was once her favorite place to kiss, but now it is covered with traces of time.

Li Zhi suddenly remembered that when Hanyuan Hall was being built, Mei Niang had personally selected the stones and said that they wanted to be engraved with the pattern of "sun and moon in the sky" - at that time he laughed at her nonsense, but now he felt that these four words were surprisingly appropriate.

He is the sun and she is the moon. Although they wax and wane, they ultimately illuminate the vast landscape together.

Just like now, she leaned on his shoulder, and the fragrance of plum blossoms from that year wafted from her hair, mixed with a faint smell of medicine - that was what she learned for him, from a girl who knew nothing about pharmacology to a queen who could identify hundreds of medicines.

"Hong'er's matter..." He suddenly choked up, and his fingertips brushed the thin calluses on the back of her hand. "I was wrong. I shouldn't have investigated you. Can you forgive me?"

Before he could finish his words, Wu Meiniang had already blocked his lips with her fingertips.

She looked up at him, saw the red bloodshot in his eyes, saw the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, saw that the young man who once made her heart beat, was eventually worn down by time and became an emperor who needed her support.

Thinking of the day when Li Hong passed away, she hid in Lizheng Hall and cried until dawn, but forced herself to say in front of him, "Your Majesty, take care of yourself." At this moment, she suddenly felt that the grievances that she had not expressed out loud turned into tenderness in his words "I was wrong."

At this moment, their eyes met, and without saying a word, they understood the deep meaning in each other's eyes. Whether it was the country or the authority, it could not compare to the weight of the word "husband and wife".

When the coiled dragon stone pillars of the Hanyuan Hall were gilded by the morning light, Li Zhi and Wu Meiniang stood side by side, his dragon robe brushing against her crown, casting overlapping shadows on the blue bricks like the sun and the moon overlapping.

The wind lifted the copper bell on the corner of the palace, and the crisp sound of "dingling" startled the birds roosting in the locust tree - some things have changed after all, like an aging face, like a newly built court palace.

But some things have never changed, such as the warmth of holding hands, the light in the eyes, and the common expectations for this vast land.

Those glances that alternated between candlelight and morning light will eventually become a footnote in the history of the Tang Dynasty - not the intrigue between the emperor and the empress, but the longest confession written by a couple between the country and the years.