Chapter 1006: His Wife

　　Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios

　　Rong Xiu picked up a random brush from the table and made some annotations to the documents before tossing them aside with the pile of unread documents. It was clear that he had no intention of continuing to read them. “That’s all.”

　　“Aren’t you going to carefully pick the candidates, Your Grace?” Ming Yao felt somewhat indignant as the documents below were also portraits of women from various clans, and he had spent quite a bit of effort on many of them. His Grace has always stayed away from women, so our previous attempts at convincing him to select a wife always ended up in failure. He has only agreed to it this time because he has no choice. Given his personality, it isn’t likely that he wants to make this matter a big event, so it only makes sense that he would eliminate most of the women here. As long as he opens all the scrolls, he will definitely strike some of the women off the list. But he’s only gone through a couple of them, and yet he doesn’t want to continue looking through?

　　“I naturally trust your choices,” said Rong Xiu in a nonchalant manner.

　　“But… That’s a lot of people, Your Grace,” Ming Yao responded uneasily in hopes of convincing him to strike off more names.

　　Rong Xiu looked up and curled his lips into a half-smile. “You guys were the ones who suggested that I select a wife and submitted these documents to me, yet… you’re now telling me that it’s a lot of people?”

　　Ming Yao was rendered speechless.

　　“Besides, I’m the Saint. Since I’m selecting a princess consort, I naturally have to do it properly. Are you guys… trying to tell me that I don’t have the right to do so?”

　　“We wouldn’t dare!” In a panic, Ming Yao and the others fell to their knees and begged for mercy. “We absolutely have no such intentions, Your Grace!”

　　Rong Xiu quietly looked at them with indifference.

　　The dead silence and the freezing air felt utterly awkward and pressurizing to them, evident by the beads of cold sweat dripping down their foreheads.

　　Things remained like this for some time, and it was only when they thought they couldn’t stand this atmosphere any longer that Rong Xiu finally said, “Leave.”

　　As if they had received great amnesty, they hurriedly thanked him and turned around to leave. But just as they took their first step, they heard him say from behind, “Take these documents with you as well.”

　　They stiffened, and Ming Yao immediately turned around and walked forward with his waist bent. “Sorry, I forgot about them…”

　　“Redo them.”

　　That sentence made Ming Yao freeze to the spot and look up in shock and uncertainty. “Your Grace, you mean…”

　　Rong Xiu looked up slightly, his eyes dark and penetrating as if he could see through everything. Although he wore a small smile on his face, it held no sign of amusement. “The Luoshan clan’s second daughter looks way too different in the portrait from what I remember her to be. Which artist was in charge of this portrait? Fire him and find someone else to replace him.”

　　Despite his light tone, it instantly made Ming Yao’s heart squeeze.

　　He knows… He knows everything! Ming Yao suddenly felt very embarrassed and humiliated as if he had been cut open and exposed in the light. His lips turned pale as he stiffly nodded. “W-will do…”

　　After saying that, he quickly took the documents and left.

　　Upon sensing that something was wrong, the rest of the people hurriedly took their leave as well.

　　It was only when they completely disappeared from the main hall that Rong Xiu leaned back, rubbed his temples, and slowly exhaled. His thin scarlet lips, however, couldn’t help curling into a helpless smile. “She sure didn’t go easy on me…”

　　…

　　“Say… What’s going on with His Grace? Hadn’t he been opposed to the selection of a crown princess? So why did he agree to it this time and even want to make it a huge event?”

　　“He’s an unfathomable person, so nobody knows for sure.”

　　“Is it because he got so annoyed by us bringing this matter up so many times that he decided to make it a huge event to save himself some trouble in the future?”

　　“That might be the case, but what a shame… All our preparations were for naught… Ming Yao, what do you think about this?”

　　It was only after walking a good distance away from the main hall and going to a secluded corner that they started talking about this matter.

　　Ming Yao, however, was in somewhat of a trance, and the person next to him had to call him several times before he responded to them. “Huh? Uh… I have no idea myself… How can I possibly know what’s on His Grace’s mind?”

　　He got even more distraught when he remembered how Rong Xiu seemed to have looked at him with piercing eyes. He had a strange foreboding that things seemed to have spun out of his control and were heading in an unknown direction. However, there was no point in saying anything since things had come to this stage; they could only continue as planned.

　　“We only have a little over a month left, so we should start preparing for the selection! We won’t be able to bear the consequences of failure if any mistake is made! I still have other matters to attend to, so I’ll get going first.” After saying this, Ming Yao hurriedly left, leaving the rest of the people looking at each other.

　　“What’s the meaning of this? There’s no need to flare up at us just because His Grace refused to accept his proposal, right?”

　　“Ignore him. How could he possibly be in a good mood now, especially when it hasn’t been easy for him to get a hold of that artist?”

　　“Hmph, everyone knows what he’s up to! He just wants that young lady from the Ming Division to become the Crown Princess. Unfortunately, he didn’t expect His Grace to take the chance to get all of the clans to submit their own name list! This lowers that young lady’s chances!”

　　“How can anyone possibly win a scheme against His Grace? There’s a reason why he managed to get to his current position… Forget it; let’s just go back and make preparations! Whether or not our clans will be selected, we can’t let ourselves be embarrassed!”

　　…

　　At this time, Chu Liuyue had no idea that the preparation for the selection of Rong Xiu’s Crown Princess was in full swing. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest with one hand tapping her chin as she frowned and fell deep in thought.

　　“Why is there no movement?” she couldn’t help murmuring softly after thinking for a while. “Shouldn’t the holy force be able to do some damage to the seal?”

　　She had tried using the holy force to break the seal on the black pyramid, but it was to no avail. It remained there as if it hadn’t been disturbed at all. The only thing was that the crack seemed to have gotten a tiny bit bigger than before, and this was something that she noticed—just barely—after staring at it for a long time.

　　It was clear how difficult it would be to crack this thing.

　　Chu Liuyue felt a huge headache coming on. She couldn’t help feeling aggrieved when she could do nothing but just look on, even though she knew that a part of her own soul was trapped inside the pyramid. It looks like I’m still not strong enough to break the pyramid’s seal or even pose any threat to it.

　　With a heavy sigh, she finally decided to give up after thinking about it for a while. The attempt to break the seal with the holy force had sapped a lot of energy from her. If she were to do it continuously, it was very likely that she would die of exhaustion before she could even break it open. It seems that I have to get stronger first.. But then again, Hundred Herbs Building’s boss told me that this thing belongs to his wife. How is his wife related to me such that she would keep a part of my soul?