Chapter 448: Those Who Achieve Great Things do not Bother with Trivialities
Translator: Pika
“Agree to what?” Yun Yuqing took a while to recover from her shock.
King Wu hesitated a little, but he still said it in the end. “Agree to his condition, of course.”
“What?!” Yun Yuqing’s complexion instantly lost all of its color. She stared at her husband with a blank expression.
Zu An had already taken advantage of her earlier. That already made her feel like she had let her husband down, and was causing her to suffer endless guilt. Who would have thought that her husband would actually make her accompany another man?
Since he’d already said it out loud, there was no point for King Wu to mince his words any further. “Yuqing, you know what this opportunity signifies for me. You also know what it means for your demon race if I’m able to take the throne.”
Yun Yuqing bit her lip and didn’t utter a single word. Even though she understood his reasoning, she couldn’t help but feel hurt. Her husband was pushing her onto another man for the sake of all this... she felt her entire body go weak.
King Wu was equally pained by his wife’s reaction. However, he quickly collected himself. Those who achieve greatness didn’t bother with trivialities. Compared to obtaining the imperial throne, this amount of sacrifice was nothing.
He continued, “There’s something else I’m worried about. From our previous information as well as your most recent experience, it seems like Zu An is quite cunning. Even if he really does reveal to us the Phoenix Nirvana Sutra, we have no way of verifying if it is the real deal.”
“That guy is indeed cunning.” Yun Yuqing agreed. She still remembered how he had pretended to be under her control, and then gave her the fake chants.
“That is why I need you to verify it.” King Wu looked at his wife. “From what I know, your demon race has a technique that allows you to sense another party’s ki flow while the two of you are joined together. This way, even if he gives you a fake chant, you can obtain the real one.”
Yun Yuqing’s face paled. The imperial household of the demon race did indeed possess such a technique. She just never thought that the day would come when she would have to use this skill herself.
King Wu’s own feelings were extremely complicated as well. On one hand, he felt great pain that his beautiful wife was going to become the plaything of another man. On the other hand, however, he felt a strange sense of excitement at the prospect of obtaining the chance to fight back against the injustice he had suffered..
However, even he himself wasn’t sure if this was the only thing that he was excited about.
When he saw that his wife still wouldn’t say anything, King Wu changed his strategy. “Yuqing, we’ve already been married for many years.”
Yun Yuqing grunted in agreement. She didn’t know what he was getting at.
King Wu continued, “I know that you’ve always wanted a child, but there’s something I’ve never revealed to you. In my earlier years, I tried all sorts of cultivation methods in an attempt to prove to my father that I deserve the throne more than my brother. In the end, my cultivation deviated. Even though I was able to survive, my body suffered irrecoverable damage.”
“I know that. Your condition has always been poor, and you start coughing if the weather becomes even slightly cold.” Yun Yuqing felt a wave of pain overtake her when she thought about her husband’s illness. She had looked for doctors everywhere, and even employed some secret methods of the demon race, but nothing was effective in treating him.
“It’s not just this cough.” King Wu looked embarrassed, but in the end, he still chose to tell her. “I’ve already lost my ability to reproduce. I cannot have a child in this lifetime.”
“What?!” Yun Yuqing was horrified. She stared at her husband in shock.
“This matter is too important to me. The royal family will never choose an infertile prince to become the new emperor, so I silenced everyone who knew about this matter. You are the only one who knows about this. You are my wife, which is why I trust you with this secret.” King Wu gazed quietly at his wife’s stunning face.
Tears were already streaming down Yun Yuqing’s face. She held her husband’s hand. “Dear, I don’t care about any of that! We can still adopt a child.”
She couldn’t remain angry at him, knowing that her husband had been shouldering such a heavy secret all this time. She was filled with pity and compassion.
King Wu shook his head. “That won’t work. It would only expose my inability to have a child, and I will lose my right of succession completely. I cannot accept that! That is why, if I want a child, you must give birth to one. Only then will no one suspect anything.”
Yun Yuqing remained silent.
“I wanted to find a chance to talk to you about this matter, but we can kill two birds with one stone this time.” King Wu felt much more relaxed. Speaking about this seemed to have massively unburdened him. “Not only are you helping me obtain the imperial throne and change the fate of the demon race, you can also obtain his seed. We can kill three birds with one stone.”
Yun Yuqing felt extremely conflicted. She was both embarrassed and angry. “How can you describe this in such a manner?!”
King Wu sighed. “I know that I am letting you down, but we really don’t have any other choice! Yuqing, I cannot think of any other way. You have to help me!”
Yun Yuqing stood up and flung his hand away. Her face was entirely red. “How am I supposed to help you with something like that?!”
King Wu was confused. “From what I know, members of your demon race are more open-minded than us humans! Why is this so hard to accept?”
“Not all members of the demon race are like that!” Yun Yuqing stamped her foot and stormed off.
“Ahem, ahem...” A burst of intense coughing came from behind her. When she turned around, she saw that King Wu’s face was red. He spat out a mouthful of blood.
“Dear!” Nothing else mattered to Yun Yuqing. She rushed over to examine his condition.
It took King Wu some time to catch his breath. “I’m fine. I know that this matter is very troubling to you. Forget it, then. I’ll just accept my fate and serve as a king. I will try to protect as many of your clansmen as I can. Later on, I’ll find a chance to adopt a child. I won’t need to fight over the imperial throne anyway, so if everyone wants to laugh at me, then let them laugh.”
Yun Yuqing bit her lip when she heard how discouraged he was. They had lived together for so many years. How could she not understand what the imperial throne meant to her husband? All of his preparations these years had been for the sake of gaining the imperial throne, and even his illness was a result of his desire to succeed the throne. Giving up on this now was the same as severing whatever hope he had left in his life.
Her husband always cared about appearances and honor. If he took in an adopted child and exposed the fact that he was infertile, then living on might be even worse than death.
She definitely couldn’t bear to see him suffer like that. She would still end up finding another man to give him a child later on anyway, so she might as well make use of this opportunity. She could obtain the Phoenix Nirvana Sutra, and at the same time sacrifice herself for the sake of the demon race...
“Dear, please don’t be discouraged! I’ll do it!” Yun Yuqing’s eyes were misty, as though tears might fall out of them at any time.
“Really?!” King Wu was overjoyed. “Thank you, Yuqing!”
Yun Yuqing took a step back, refusing his hug. In that instant, she felt as if her husband seemed somewhat unfamiliar.
It took her a while to finally calm down, after which they began to discuss the details of the plan. “There’s still a problem. In such a short time, I might not be able to... be able to get pregnant.”
Just thinking about how she would need to find another man if this plan failed was enough to drive her crazy.
“It’s all right. I already have a plan,” said King Wu. “I will find a way to stall King Liang and Liu Yao for an entire night. You and Zu An can feel free to... ahem, ahem. In any case, the Phoenix Nirvana is incredibly powerful. You might need some time to take it all in.”
Although he felt both furious and aggrieved as he pictured the various scenes in his head, his entire body somehow still felt like it was about to burst from excitement. He had no idea why.
Yun Yuqing stared at him quietly.
She hadn’t expected her husband to have thought things out that thoroughly. Her heart immediately grew ice cold.