Chapter 31: Who is More of a Scumbag

**Trigger warning for rape, death and suicide**

DuYan looked at Shao Lingheng sleeping on the bed, just like yesterday.

His eyebrows were furrowed, and the nightmare energy on his body was so strong that it was almost condensed into substance.

DuYan would not hesitate anymore after he had decided something, and pointed his finger at Shao Lingheng's forehead.

"Enter dream.”

DuYan floated in the air overlooking the world below.

A child of about seven or eight was kneeling on a long, narrow and low bed (1).

The courtyard was exquisite, with carved beams and painted rafters. It was not a place for ordinary people. However, the decorations in the courtyard were so simple, they could only be called crude and incompatible with this place.

After a short while, a maidservant entered with a wooden stand and placed it in front of the child.

"Prince, please have your meal."

There was only one rice bowl and one dish on the stand. Compared to the decorations of the house, it was much more miserable and shabby.

DuYan was a little puzzled as to who this child was. According to his clothes, and the words of respect said by the maidservant, he should not be a common person.

His thoughts whirled and then he appeared outside the courtyard.

The maidservant did not stand by the door and wait to be summoned. Instead, she pulled away the childish looking maidservant to leave.

"Hurry up, or else the food will get cold."

"Sister Luluo, I don’t think this is right. That is the prince’s breakfast…”

"He’s just a hostage from the Cheng-guo. It would just be a waste to give him those precious foods.”

(T/N: guo means country, but it just sounds weird to say Country Cheng or Cheng Country, it just doesn’t roll off the tongue very well. So I kept it as --guo.)

Hearing these words, DuYan finally understood where the strangeness came from.

The source of this dream world was from Shao Lingheng’s ancient conspiracy movie called "The Emperor."

The story of this movie was a bit complicated. In order to not make any mistakes, DuYan specially asked Xiao Ba to play the movie in his mind.

ChengYu, the prince of Cheng, was the protagonist of the movie.

This was an era of the three kingdoms, in which Yuan-guo was the most powerful, Jiang-guo was second, and Cheng-guo was the weakest.

Queen Cheng was not virtuous and had a firm hold on the harem (2). King Cheng loved the queen very much and had no other concubines in the palace except the empress. All the concubines he had before marrying the queen, were all sent to live in the cold palace.

Except for the one son the queen had, the king had no other heirs. ChengYu was not born by the queen. His birth was an accident. ChengYu's mother was an imperial maid. When the queen was pregnant, ChengYu’s mother was raped by the drunk King Cheng, and then she became pregnant.

ChengYu's mother knew that if such a thing was known to the queen, neither she nor the child in her womb would survive. She deliberately made a small mistake and was demoted to the cloth washing bureau to become an imperial maid who did all the hard work and finally secretly gave birth to the child.

The court at this time was not as strict as it was later, and the folk customs were rather simple and open.

It was not unusual for outer imperial maids to marry the guards. ChengYu's mother found a reason to say that the father of the child was dead, so she raised the child.

Only when the child was five years old was ChengYu's existence known by the queen. The queen killed ChengYu's mother and took ChengYu to her side to raise him.

Of course she was not so kind to raise a child she did not give birth to.

Between the two countries, Yuan and Jiang, they always had disputes. Cheng-guo was the weakest and bordered Jiang. Jiang was a little bit weaker than Yuan, so it naturally looked towards the country that bordered it.

In order to avoid disaster and destroy the country, Cheng-guo had to seek asylum from Yuan. In order to show sincerity, every king of Cheng had to send their eldest son to Yuan as a pledge.

Now, King Cheng had only one son and naturally, the queen was reluctant to send him to Yuan. The royal family of Cheng had a special birthmark on their chest so it was impossible to send an imposter either.

The sudden appearance of ChengYu just happened to solve the queen’s urgent need. After faking the date of birth and falsely claiming that he was the eldest son of the king, she sent him away.

At the age of seven, ChengYu was sent to Yuan-guo as a pledge.

Yuan’s folk custom was fierce, and couldn’t stand the weak. They only knew the pleasure of encountering enemies and that a person from Cheng-guo was asking for help. ChengYu was bullied and humiliated in Yuan palace. Up until he was ten years old, when he met the eldest princess, YuanNing.

YuanNing was the daughter of Queen Yuan and was the most favored princess.

YuanNing had a good heart and had been protecting him ever since she rescued ChengYu.

In order to protect himself and hide all his talents, ChengYu began to wander around the

Qin Lou Chu Pavilion when he was a teenager. His promiscuous loitering spread throughout the nation.

In fact, ChengYu was slowly managing his own power. The businesses under his name spread all over the Three Kingdoms, and his subordinates gradually infiltrated the Three Kingdom’s imperial courts.

As his wings grew, he learned of a secret. The prince born to King Cheng was not of King Cheng’s blood, but between the queen and her cousin committing adultery.

After that, King Cheng died suddenly and the queen’s son would have naturally ascended the throne. ChengYu had to rush back to Cheng-guo before the queen’s son ascended, and expose this shocking secret.

Of course, it was almost impossible for the hostage to leave the tightly guarded Yuan-guo, so he could only turn to the princess for help.

The queen of Yuan-guo was born into the Wu Family, a family of generals. Her father was a general, and her older brother was a lieutenant in charge of urban defense.

ChengYu deceived the eldest princess into using the lieutenant’s power to release him from the capital. From then on, ChengYu finally left Yuan’s capital where he had been imprisoned for more than ten years, rushed back to Cheng, and finally succeeded to the throne.

The eldest princess YuanNing harmed the whole family because of privately releasing the hostage. King Yuan was already fearful of the queen’s family’s power, but he couldn’t justify himself to take their military power. Now a handle was brought to his door, and King Yuan was not merciful.

In the end, Queen Yuan was given a cup of poisoned wine, and the Wu family was ransacked and the family destroyed. Only the eldest princess, YuanNing, was left under house arrest.

ChengYu also tried to save YuanNing, but was refused.

After that, the newly appointed King Cheng united with Jiang-guo to destroy Yuan-guo. When they had broken into the capital, the eldest princess was hanged in the palace she had been under house arrest in for ten years.

In the end, Cheng tore up the treaty of alliance, extinguished Jiang-guo, and ruled the world. ChengYu, who had now become the emperor, would occasionally dream of the girl who had saved him when he was a youth.

DuYan watched the movie’s plot line and sighed, "Sure enough, every emperor is a scumbag emotionally. HeJin compared to ChengYu is but a mere trifle.”

Xiao Ba asked, "What do you plan to do? Still going to take the elder line? This time the male protagonist's life experience is quite pitiful. If you become a king and give him a little fatherly love, it should be feasible."

"Now that the male protagonist has been sent to Yuan-guo, but now Cheng-guo repented and wanted him to come back. Isn’t that just slapping Yuan-guo in the face?”

DuYan looked at ChengYu down below, who had already tasted all the sufferings of the world.

"Now, with Yuan-guo’s great general, this is not something that Cheng-guo can compete with. I can’t destroy Cheng-guo when the male lead is still young, otherwise he won’t rule the world.”

Xiao Ba could never figure out DuYan's brain circuit, "Then what do you plan to do?”

"Of course, only a scumbag will know their own scumbag abilities. We will see who is more of a scumbag. I want to deceive him and use him. I’ve decided to replace YuanNing as his white moonlight.”

Xiao Ba was taken aback, "You want to change sex?"

"……You thought too far."

Xiao Ba said, "But the world rules limit that if you want to become County Yuan’s Princess YuanNing, you must be female.”

"It doesn’t matter. I don’t intend on being that character in the play.” DuYan analyzed, "The source of his nightmare comes from his guilt towards YuanNing. He used the other party for his power, causing YuanNing to lose all her family members, and in the end she hung herself in Yuan-guo’s palace.”

"So, we use each other, hurt each other, and no one owes anyone. In this kind of conspiracy movie, you have to have no conscience if you want to live. Use ChengYu, and then in the end, I lift up my dress, tell him I am a man, and break the last traces of emotion in his heart.”

After speaking about the last point, DuYan smiled slightly, "Then I can wait to be killed and exit the world smoothly. ChengYu won't have to feel sorry for anyone on his way to dominating the world. Just excellent.”

***

Yuan-guo’s Queen was born to a good and brilliant family background and had a good reputation all over the nation. Unfortunately she only had a pair of twin daughters. The eldest princess YuanYan, and the second princess YuanNing.

She was also injured by this birth. From then on, it would be difficult to get pregnant. If it weren't for the power of her natal family, she would probably be humiliated in the palace.

Fortunately, King Yuan valued the friendship between husband and wife, still respected the queen and was extremely fond of the queen’s twin daughters.

Speaking of the twin princesses, there were many rumors. Although they were twins, their looks and temperament were quite different.

The Princesses were only seven years old, but the eldest princess YuanYan’s notoriety had already spread throughout the capital. She was said to be extremely domineering.

It was unknown how the innocent and kind second princess YuanNing got along with such an unruly elder sister.

DuYan watched the young child shivering in the snow with interest, as DuYan held onto a white fox fur muff and a gold encrusted heater.

The girl who was about the same size as him pulled at the corner of his clothes and whispered, “Elder sister, that little gege is about to freeze to death.”

DuYan glanced at YuanNing, "Ning'er, he is just a hostage from Cheng-guo, he can't afford to be your brother."

YuanNing pursed her lips, "Elder sister, don't be like that. I just can’t stand seeing those people bully others. You don’t have to care, but I can go over.”

DuYan naturally wouldn't let YuanNing come into contact with her catastrophe. His eyebrows rose, “I remember somebody didn’t finish writing today’s calligraphy. How did they run out? Oh, that’s right, they had BaiLu write it on their behalf…”

YuanNing hugged DuYan's arm quickly, "Elder sister, don't tell mother, I'll go back and write it now."

DuYan watched YuanNing run away, and then he raised his feet and walked out of the corridor.

ChengYu was so cold that he almost lost consciousness, only relying on the breath in his chest to hold on. In front of his eyes, there was a faint shadow.

At this moment, ChengYu saw a red dress embroidered with gold silk in front of him.

"Raise your head." The child's voice could be heard, but it was full of pride and dignity.

ChengYu raised his head when he heard the words. At that moment, he thought he had frozen and was now beginning to hallucinate.

From the ground close to him to the eaves in the distance, and even the sky was all covered in white.

Only the girl in the red cloak in front of him was full of color. Her skin was a bit whiter than the snowflakes in her hair, and her lips were red.

The white fox fur collar was fluffy, and made her face pink. Everything around him was cold but because of her existence there seemed to be a slight scent of fireworks in his world.

"There is no place like home..." ChengYu murmured suddenly.