139 Parricide with One's Own Hands?

Standing behind Mu Zhijin, Zhu Xishi suddenly turned her face away. She had clearly seen how the man in front of her, who was putting on such an arrogant facade, was actually clenching his fists tightly behind his back.

It was a clench that looked less like showing off and much more like some kind of painful, repressed agony!

Zhu Xishi looked at Xu Zhenglin, but her mind was filled with Mu Zhijin. This was definitely the very first time in her memory that Mu Zhijin had so blatantly displayed his personal emotions! Even back in Pingcheng, when the identity of his birth mother, Mother Mu, as a courtesan was laid bare for all to see, he had never been this emotionally agitated. So why now? Because the other person was Xu Zhenglin? What did Xu Zhenglin have to do with him?

Xu Zhenglin was stunned for a moment, then threw his head back and laughed loudly, "The Minister's Manor was given to you? You're dreaming! Just by virtue of some stolen token you dare to spout such nonsense here? Men, seize him..."

Mu Zhijin interrupted him, "Where are the Crown Prince's guards?"

"Present!" a response echoed from within the courtyard.

In Mu Zhijin's peach-blossom eyes, curved like crescent moons, was reflected Xu Zhenglin's incredulous shock. "Lead the way and clear the manor, Minister Xu."

"Understood!"

With that command, the heavy gates were kicked open with a loud crash, and a squad of guards surged in. The estate's guards instinctively retreated around Xu Zhenglin.

Looking at those familiar uniforms and formations, Xu Zhenglin's hand holding the token involuntarily began to tremble. "No! Impossible!"

Mu Zhijin followed right behind the guards, walking forward step by step. "These stone lions are too ugly, smash them! Tomorrow I'll ask the Crown Prince to bestow a better pair."

Two guards swung their long spears down, and the heads of the stone lions on either side shattered.

Xu Zhenglin's body swayed. Those were carved by the finest craftsmen in the Yaotian Kingdom, and the artisan had passed away not long after finishing them. Countless high-ranking officials in the imperial court had begged him for this pair of lions, and he had never been willing to let them go, yet today they were destroyed by Mu Zhijin...

As the guards advanced, the estate guards retreated.

Mu Zhijin tilted his head to look at the corridor on one side. "Black? Too gloomy, it will put the Crown Prince in a bad mood. Men, destroy it! Tomorrow I'll ask the Crown Prince to have the palace artisans paint it red."

Three or five guards leaped forward, their official sabers flashing up and down in the air several times. By the time they sheathed their blades and stepped back, the black-painted pillars had all revealed their original wood color, leaving a thick layer of wood shavings on the ground.

Xu Zhenglin felt a sudden darkness before his eyes. The paint applied to those pillars was rare lacquer tribute from Nanthai; if he hadn't won the Crown Prince's favor, he, the Minister of Rites, would never have been granted such a luxury. And now, it was being ruined by Mu Zhijin...

Mu Zhijin came to a halt beneath the steps of the main hall. "The eaves are too sharp and upturned; what if they fall and injure the Crown Prince? Destroy them!"

"Every step is too high; the Crown Prince will get tired lifting his feet, destroy them!"

"What kind of door is that? Opening it so small, is it for mice to crawl through? Destroy it!"

"And there, there, and there! Destroy everything, smash it all to pieces!" Mu Zhijin stood in the middle of the courtyard plaza, pointing up and down, spinning in a circle. He was as picky as a newly favored favorite, eager to destroy everything left behind and replace it with his own.

Xu Zhenglin felt a surge of hot blood rush through him. If not for an estate guard who was quick-witted enough to steady him, he surely would have lost his footing and collapsed headfirst, having been forced backward all this while.

"Mu—Zhi—Jin!" he ground out, teeth clenched in absolute hatred.

Mu Zhijin used his hand as a fan, his posture leisurely. "Thank you, Minister Xu, for personally overseeing the work. When daylight comes, I will certainly report to the Crown Prince and have him bestow a new manor upon you. Oh, and my Chu Pavilion—it feels rather nice after the remodeling. Shall I give it to you instead?"

Exchange a filthy house of pleasure for his grand Ministerial Manor?

Xu Zhenglin felt a sweetness rise in his throat. He instinctively clamped his mouth shut and swallowed hard, forcefully gulping back the blood that had welled up to his throat.

This family fortune he had painstakingly accumulated over a lifetime—he would never allow anyone to destroy it by any means whatsoever!

He shoved the guard in front of him. "Go on, beat them out! Beat all these people out of here!"

The guards were shoved forward unsteadily, their footing giving way, and with loud thuds, they actually dropped to their knees right in front of Mu Zhijin.

Mu Zhijin let out an exclamation of surprise. "Such a grand greeting, how could I be so embarrassed? Well, politeness costs nothing. Men, escort these brothers to the courtyard to drink tea and cool off."

The guards swarmed forward, grabbing one by the scruff of the neck like a chick and tossing them out of the courtyard.

Xu Zhenglin retreated three steps in terror. How could he have forgotten how his own estate guards could possibly match those imperial guards?

Mu Zhijin raised an eyebrow, their gazes locking. With every step he advanced, Xu Zhenglin retreated. Until the back of Xu Zhenglin's foot tripped over a piece of stone from the smashed steps, and his body tilted, causing him to fall heavily to the ground.

To steady himself, Xu Zhenglin instinctively put his hand down on the ground. The moment his palm touched the earth, a sharp pain made him knit his brows. He lifted his hand; his palm had been pierced by the jagged rubble.

Mu Zhijin smiled like a ghost, resting his elbows on his knees as he leaned down to look at him. "Xu Zhenglin, why aren't you speaking anymore? Where are all those exceptional, ungrateful, wife-abandoning, child-deserting, self-seeking schemes of yours? At this very moment, shouldn't you immediately put on a fawning, servile expression and beg for mercy on your knees? Come on, kneel! Who knows, if I'm in a good mood, I might put in a good word for the Crown Prince so you won't have to move out of the Ministerial Manor after all!"

Not far away, Zhu Xishi felt a shock run through her heart upon hearing this. Abandoning his wife and children? Xu Zhenglin? Who was the wife? And who was the child?

Xu Zhenglin clenched his fists around the shattered stones embedded in his palm. "You, a mere courtesan ridden by thousands and slept with by ten thousands, actually expect me, the dignified Minister of Rites, to beg you? Keep dreaming! You've merely bewitched the Crown Prince temporarily with your filthy, sordid bedchamber tricks. What qualification do you have to live in this Ministerial Manor? I advise you to wake up early. Otherwise, when daylight comes and I go to court to report all your past filth to the Crown Prince, do you really think you'll live to see tomorrow's sunset?"

Zhu Xishi rather unnaturally averted her gaze, which had been fixed on this scene all along. She could vaguely guess that Mu Zhijin showing up here in the guise of a favored courtesan must have his own reasons, but hearing him openly mocked and insulted as a "courtesan" to his face still felt a bit too much for her to bear. The man who stood tall and mighty in her own eyes was viewed by others merely as a courtesan who traded his body for favors—this made her feel a lingering, awkward reluctance to keep watching.

The moment she shifted her gaze, Mu Zhijin felt it. Originally unaffected emotionally by Xu Zhenglin's words, he now began to feel a stifling tightness in his chest after Zhu Xishi shifted her gaze away with that absolute awkwardness.

Could it be that she couldn't bear to hear others talk about him this way? Or could she not bear the way others saw him?

A pang of pain shot through Mu Zhijin's heart. He raised his wrist and delivered a sharp slap across Xu Zhenglin's face.

Xu Zhenglin was entirely unprepared; the force of the blow lifted him into the air, spinning him backward a full circle before he hit the ground.

Upon landing, two front teeth fell out.

Xu Zhenglin raised his head angrily, blood streaming from his full mouth. "Mu Zhijin, how dare you strike your own biological father! You unfilial, rebellious wretch! You..."

Zhu Xishi could no longer hear the words that followed. At this moment, her mind could only hold four words: "biological father."

She turned her head back in a panic to look at Mu Zhijin. His father was Xu Zhenglin?

Mu Zhijin slowly stood up. Was she looking back at him again? What kind of gaze was that? Disgust? Or pity?

Though his heart ached all the more, he stepped toward Xu Zhenglin. He felt disgusted by a father like this too! He even felt pity for himself for being such a person!

*Bang!* With a single kick to Xu Zhenglin's chest, the half-prone Xu Zhenglin was sent flying backward once more, slamming into the wall with a loud crash before sliding down, leaving a large smear of blood on the wall.

Xu Zhenglin clutched his chest with one hand and propped himself up with the other. "Mu Zhijin, you... dare to commit patricide? You will incur divine retribution!"

Zhu Xishi took a step back.

Mu Zhijin heard it. He closed his eyes, then stepped forward again.

He hadn't intended to resort to physical violence at first. Back in Pingcheng, his birth mother had talked to him, saying she didn't hate Xu Zhenglin for abandoning her and the child. It was her own wrong choice, and she would accept the consequences. For the rest of her life, she wouldn't let Xu Zhenglin waste another shred of her emotions, not even hatred. Her mother had also advised him that some things should be let go when they end; if you can't let go, the only one who suffers is yourself.

He understood that everything his mother said was right, but he couldn't achieve her level of detachment. Before he was eighteen, he worked hard toward goals that would allow his mother to leave the Hundred Flowers House and live a peaceful life, and so that his father would no longer refuse to acknowledge him out of shame for his tainted origins. After he turned eighteen, he was betrayed by his father, and just one day after placing first in the imperial examinations, he was demoted into the Chu Pavilion. Cursed by a birth stigmatized by others, still suppressed despite all his efforts—and experiencing all this at the hands of his biological father—he simply couldn't remain detached.

He had thought that as long as he didn't resort to violence himself, he would at least stay true to his eighteen-year yearning for a father. However, when Zhu Xishi's strange gaze landed upon him, he suddenly realized that even if he let go, others would never let go of hearing or talking about it.

Since matters could never be washed clean and swept under the rug simply because he chose to "let go," why should he cling to the last shred of moral restraint against committing patricide? Did he really think that showing restraint could allow him to wash himself clean, reinvent himself, and start anew? It was far too hypocritical, to the point of disgusting even himself!

How was he, harboring such inner sin while revealing not an ounce of it on the surface, any different from his shameless father?

How could such a disgusting version of himself ever be worthy of the pure and straightforward Zhu Xishi?

Everything was because of him—Xu Zhenglin!

Without him, there would never have been himself!

Mu Zhijin abruptly raised his arm—