ITVCFITB CHAPTER 92

 Chapter 92 — A Twinge in the Belly

A quiet Mid-Autumn feast? Not likely. Thankfully, the palace “tea” earlier had taken the edge off Luo Shuyu’s hunger. Guests kept drifting over; he was constantly in conversation.

Until Li Mingjin started glowering at the over-eager, and people politely retreated.

Since he’d smoothed over that quarrel at the previous banquet, Luo Shuyu’s stock among the ladies had soared. They’d hoped for a Third Prince house gathering to curry favor, but then he’d gotten pregnant, and the window closed.

The Fourth had at least raised his son well. The little boy recited poems for the Emperor, earning showers of praise and trinkets. Perhaps cowed by the crowd, he behaved adorably.

In their last life, before the Fourth and Shen Mingyun had even married, Luo Shuyu and Li Mingjin were dead. Seeing their child with his own eyes felt… odd. The boy was too pretty, almost unreal. With those parents, shouldn’t he be less… ethereal?

While music and dance held the room, Luo Shuyu murmured, “Your Highness, doesn’t the eldest grandson look overly exquisite? He hardly seems real.” It was only a suspicion, with no proof.

Li Mingjin glanced from the boy to his father’s retreating hairline. “Fourth’s looks used to be decent. But yes, this one outshines the palace brats and seems quick besides. Father said the other day the child knows a thousand characters at three, with fine handwriting.”

“At dinner he demanded his father take him to the privy,” Luo Shuyu said, skeptical.

“He’s a boy,” Li Mingjin murmured at his ear. “Might not want to go with the ger. Naturally he clings to Fourth.”

“Three years old and that brilliant? A prodigy?”

“Or,” Li Mingjin breathed, “a little help from Shen Mingyun’s ‘magic’?”

Luo Shuyu thought of the System in Shen’s head. If he wanted to secure favor for the Fourth, he would certainly spend on the grandson. His Majesty would have no guard against a clever, cute, obedient child. Who wouldn’t love that?

“Highly possible,” Luo Shuyu said. Perhaps the System had even burnished the boy’s looks, polishing him into a little celestial.

Well, then he wanted a good look. He’d never seen System-made “effects” up close. If the child wore some of its handiwork, it was worth observing.

“Any way to strip it off?” Li Mingjin asked.

Luo Shuyu had no easy answer. In the book, the System guided Shen through princes and missions, dispensing props; no weaknesses given. He suspected it needed to anchor to Shen Mingyun to function.

If this world truly existed because of a book, why only Shen? Did it live in him or his soul? If Shen Mingyun ceased to exist, would the System? Would it jump hosts?

He should test them. If Shen lost consciousness, would the System act to preserve him? In the book, it could use emergency props and deduct points later. But what if Shen had no points left, would the mall still respond?

They needed a plan, one aimed at Shen and the System.

Across the room, Shen felt a chill prickle his back. With so much insulation, he chalked it up to a draft and missed the warning.

As for mooncakes: His Majesty quietly had Li Mingjin’s offerings put away, never reaching the tables, Luo Shuyu exhaled. Then he saw the other novelty flavors and inhaled again.

“Is everyone in your family genetically predisposed to ‘innovative’ mooncakes?” He’d just bitten orange; the sweet-sour was… confusing.

“The fruit ones are weaker,” Li Mingjin judged. “If mutton kept, I’d have ordered mutton mooncakes.”

“You’d eat meat-filled mooncakes?”

“Next year.”

“…How is that different from a mutton shaobing?”

A pause. “You’re right. We’ll buy shaobing on the way home.”

“Don’t say that where Father can hear.”

“He can’t hear our whispering.”

Fair point.

Their aside ended when the room turned toward the Fourth’s table. The “perfect” grandson had choked on a mooncake, coughing and tearing up until the Emperor’s heart squeezed.

“Summon a physician,” His Majesty ordered, though the imperial doctors were already lingering nearby.

The Fourth hurried the boy to a side chamber. Complaints of “feeling awful” turned into a high fever that climbed and climbed. The Fourth’s eyes stung; his one treasure had always been robust, why this, and why now?

Shen Mingyun hovered, but the child clung to his father and barely tolerated him.

With the spectacle ruined, the Emperor sent the crowd out to watch fireworks while he checked on the boy himself.

Luo Shuyu and Li Mingjin bowed out early, unwise to jostle in a crowd, citing delicate health, and received permission to leave.

Back at home, news traveled fast. The boy burned through the night; more physicians were summoned; His Majesty thundered that any failure to cure him was punishable by death. The pediatric specialists among them could find nothing wrong.

Someone overheard Shen crooning at the bedside: “Be good, baby. Just hold on till morning. You’ll be fine at dawn.”

Which fit Luo Shuyu’s guess: Shen had used a prop on the child.

Using the System on himself was one thing; deploying it on others always had some rebound, usually a night’s sleep would clear it. But on a three-year-old? A child’s body couldn’t bear the shock like an adult.

Luo Shuyu winced. This wasn’t Consort Mei’s slow poison to keep a doomed son alive. This was selfish and cold. As an expectant father himself, he felt a stab for the little boy.

He also couldn’t help thinking of the child he’d lost in another life, and the ache returned.

“Mm?” Li Mingjin asked when he heard a sigh in the dark.

“Shen Mingyun will even use his own child,” Luo Shuyu said, nestled in his arms. “Too ruthless.”

“Human nature is selfish,” Li Mingjin murmured. “Don’t dwell on it. It’s their house’s affair. And Shen wouldn’t do it without an escape plan for the boy. Stop worrying.”

“You’re right,” Luo Shuyu said. If the System was involved, the boy clearly served a purpose. It wouldn’t let the piece be removed.

Still, life was precious. To use it like this…

Plenty of famous names had been as hard. Wang Mang had his son who killed a maid hang himself for “virtue.” Wu Zetian strangled a daughter and destroyed sons and grandson. Ruthlessness had precedent.

Shen wasn’t killing; merely using.

Comforted, they slept.

The next day, Shadow Three, newly flush with three months of high hazard pay, brought updates: by morning the fever broke. The boy now slept peacefully in the palace.

But the Fourth and Shen had quarreled so fiercely the night before that faces flushed. From the fragments overheard, the Fourth had accused Shen of overstraining the child. Outsiders might think he meant careless parenting; Luo Shuyu heard the truth: a prop deployed.

Sin upon sin.

The Fourth took the child home that afternoon. Three days later, he and Shen had another blazing fight: after this illness, the boy had become slow, no longer the preternaturally quick, clever darling. The Fourth hurt to look at him.

“Shen’s really botched it this time,” Luo Shuyu sighed when the news reached them.

A week later, the boy “bounced back” and returned to normal.

By then pregnancy-rest had grown boring, so Luo Shuyu sent a message to Shen Mingyun. If Shen was this dull, perhaps a nudge would help.

The next day, Shen learned that the gentle lady who’d been discussing childcare with him was pregnant with the Fourth Prince’s child.

Lightning. Betrayal. Shen swooned; with three highs developing in his body, the fainting was dramatic.

The Fourth, when informed, kept his head. He had Shen’s attendants beaten, then sat by Shen’s side with soft eyes until he woke, murmuring that someone had maligned him, that the messenger was malicious. Shen, reassured, and a protagonist, after all, believed him at once.

With Shen soothed and the boy recovered, the Fourth made his next move. No more instability at his side.

Soon after Double-Ninth, the pregnant lady left “to run an errand.” She never returned. Word came she’d fallen in a quiet alley, miscarried, and bled out.

Shen, feeling secure in love again, pitied her. “Poor thing.”

The Fourth didn’t smile. He valued bloodlines…and had just ordered the death of his own unborn child. The sadness sat like a stone.

The plays at the Fourth’s mansion rolled on one after another, and the year turned. Luo Shuyu’s belly grew heavier.

Most years, he and Li Mingjin pasted couplets together. Now he could barely walk; he braced his back and directed, left, a little higher; right, straighten it while Li Mingjin did the climbing.

Just as Li Mingjin was about to head to the palace for the New Year’s banquet, Luo Shuyu caught his sleeve. “Your Highness, don’t go.”

A start. “What’s wrong?”

Calmly, he said, “My belly… hurts a little.”

Li Mingjin’s head snapped up. He shouted to the roof, “Shadow Three! Bring Doctor Lin, now!”

---

Author’s Note

Third Prince: aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Luo Shuyu: Shut up.

Third Prince: …

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