“Noble Person Mama. Breakfast is served.”
At the maidservant’s urgent call, he opened his eyes to find the day already brightly lit.
Song Wongyeong let out a huge yawn and scratched his belly as he got up. Whether it was because his night outing the previous evening had been excessive, or because he had drunk too much liquor with his younger brother, his body felt utterly sluggish.
Still, he had no regrets about going out last night. After all, he had met such a beauty.
If they had taken off that veiled hat, I would have gotten to see that pretty face at least once.
That graceful carriage, the fragrance that made one’s heart flutter naturally. Down to those dignified fingertips.
Surely, they must be a precious daughter from some prestigious clan. Song Wongyeong smacked his lips as he speculated about the identity of the person in the veiled hat. For some reason, his lower back throbbed dully.
Is it going to rain?
Yet outside the round window, the late spring sunlight was glaring harshly. Song Wongyeong let out a sigh.
This year’s summer is going to be insanely hot too.
And I’ll be wilting away in this heat inside the inner palace.
Forecasting his own future, Song Wongyeong sat in front of the table. As a savory scent brushed past the tip of his nose, a rumbling sound burst from his stomach.
“What is today’s meal?”
“It is porridge with lotus seeds.”
The maidservant waiting on him, trembling like a leaf, opened the lid of the bowl. Song Wongyeong looked at the porridge and a few pickled vegetables, then scowled upon seeing the black pill placed beside them.
“Taeyeongdan? Don’t I not need to take this anymore…?”
He grumbled and looked back, but the maidservant had already bolted out of the room in a flash.
Good grief, as if someone were going to eat her alive. Song Wongyeong picked up the Taeyeongdan and muttered to himself:
“I don’t even put caterpillars in their rooms anymore.”
Though that was an incident caused by power struggles with the maidservants during his early days in the palace, he had been living very quietly ever since. Pouting his lips, Song Wongyeong rolled the pill around in his hand.
Taeyeongdan, huh…
In order for a male to enter the inner palace, it was the law to remove the manhood attached below.
However, forcing a concubine to undergo something that even those wishing to become eunuchs risked their lives for was out of the question.
Therefore, long ago, the ancestors researched far and wide and wracked their brains to create a medicine that could dull a man’s function and allow him to conceive a child without harming his health.
That was precisely this Taeyeongdan.
“The ancients really made something utterly useless.”
Taking this medicine every single time gave him a chilling sensation as if his very self were disappearing. Such was the feeling of one’s masculinity fading after living as a man.
Still, what could be done? It was something crafted and bestowed by the imperial family.
Though dissatisfied, Song Wongyeong squeezed his eyes tight and swallowed the pill. Whether he liked it or not, refusing this would undoubtedly catch him under the crime of ‘deceiving the emperor’.
“Gah, it’s bitter!”
Song Wongyeong instantly lifted the porridge bowl and gulped it down like cold water. With his robe front parted wide, his stance was akin to a general on the battlefield. It wasn’t behavior suited for a concubine, but who cared?
There’s no one to see anyway…
Just then, the door burst open, and the maidservant who had left rushed back inside frantically.
“M-M-Mama!”
“What is it?”
Song Wongyeong wiped his mouth roughly with his sleeve and asked. The maidservant looked at Song Wongyeong’s broad chest, startled twice over, then covered her eyes and pointed outside.
“F-F-From Jeongyang Hall! His Majesty has issued an order!”
“What?!”
No, why on earth was this damned emperor, who had never issued a single order to the inner palace, suddenly pulling a stunt like this?
Don’t tell me my going out was caught?
Having committed a crime, he felt guilty for no reason. Calming his thumping heart, Song Wongyeong asked:
“Right. What did they say from Jeongyang Hall?”
“O-Starting today, he will select a concubine to serve in his bed chambers, so all concubines are ordered to come out to the west garden and wait!”
Clatter!
The porridge bowl slipped right out of Song Wongyeong’s hands.
“B-Bed chambers? The ‘bed chambers’ I know?”
“Oh my, what other bed chambers could there be?!”
The maidservant stamped her feet and paced. Light was fading from Song Wongyeong’s eyes.
Serving in the bed chambers. For the emperor, who hadn’t even shown his face on the day he entered the palace, to finally take a concubine to bed.
For the emperor, who hadn’t cared a whit about an heir, to finally make a move. As a subject, it was something to celebrate, but the problem was that Song Wongyeong was one of his concubines. He was also a target who had to serve in the bed chambers.
I am to be taken by that emperor?
No matter how pretty he was said to be, he was a man. To spread his legs beneath another man.
Just thinking about it made him feel hopeless and gave him goosebumps. He didn’t care who the emperor slept with, but if the target was himself, that changed everything. Furthermore, Song Wongyeong was not even an attractive boy.
What to do?
He knew the possibility of not being selected was far greater. Yet a one-in-a-million possibility slyly raised its head.
“What if I don’t attend the gathering…?”
“It is His Majesty’s order, how could you say such a thing?! If Mama does that, our heads will fly off too!”
From somewhere, an ominous premonition surged like a house-sized wave. It felt as though fate was mocking Song Wongyeong from the other side, just like when he had entered this imperial palace.
N-No, it won’t be like that. He’s just doing this because it’s time to get an heir.
The emperor’s age was already twenty-five.
It was an age well past the prime time for producing an heir. So much so that the court was pestering him, saying, ‘Whether you take an empress or visit a concubine, please produce an heir!’
Though the official line claimed that he ascended the throne at a young age and poured his heart and soul into stabilizing the nation, thus not taking an empress, Song Wongyeong’s thought was a bit different.
He just has no desire to.
A man knows another man’s mind. The emperor either had no sex drive or had no desire for an heir, one of the two.
Or else he’s impotent… Hm, I shouldn’t say this anywhere.
At any rate, the emperor had never held anyone in his arms for many years.
Besides, he had never heard that the emperor liked men either.
It will pass smoothly this time too.
Hadn’t he navigated all the hurdles related to bed duties well until now?
If the emperor had eyes and a manhood attached, he wouldn’t pick Song Wongyeong, a fellow man, as his bed partner.
“Noble Person Mama! You need to hurry up, wash, and change!”
“Uh, huh? Yeah.”
I won’t be chosen anyway, right?
Knowing that, but unable to disobey the emperor’s order, Song Wongyeong hastily received the assistance of the maidservants to wash and drape on a pale yellow silk robe.
The semi-transparent silk robe loosely wrapped around Song Wongyeong’s firm body. Once the changing was complete, the maidservants seated Song Wongyeong in front of the dressing table and began slathering white powder on his face.
Over his high-bridged, handsome face, white powder and rouge were smeared heavily. Looking at his own face in the mirror, Song Wongyeong pouted his lips.
Until now, I only had to do this once every few months…!
Did I commit some sin? Is that why something like this happened? No way. Didn’t I even rescue someone yesterday?
Did I catch bad luck from that person or something?
To receive no virtue for rescuing someone, only misfortune. If I had at least seen that young lady’s face, I wouldn’t feel so wronged.
Judging by the atmosphere alone, she was definitely a beauty, though…
Song Wongyeong smacked his lips and checked the mirror. Before he knew it, the man who was dashing for his age had vanished, and in his place was a ridiculous person wearing fluttering women’s clothes ill-suited for his frame. Now, preparations are complete.
“Let’s go. One of you follow me too.”
“U-Us as well?”
“Then am I to go alone? Where in the world is there a maidservant who sends her master alone to a gathering of concubines?”
Faced with Song Wongyeong’s logic, the three maidservants huddled their heads together with tearful faces. After a moment, they selected a victim through the rational method of majority vote.
“Ja-un. Let’s go.”
“Yes, Mama.”
The maidservant named Ja-un followed behind Song Wongyeong with a face like a cow being dragged to a slaughterhouse. But no matter how much she didn’t want to go, it couldn’t compare to Song Wongyeong.
Why on earth is the emperor doing this all of a sudden?
One may know ten feet under water, but not one foot into a person’s heart; if he didn’t even know the mind of someone he knew, how could he know the whim of a husband he hadn’t even seen?
Song Wongyeong grumbled as he left the palace.
In the west garden of the inner palace, where magnolias bloomed in abundance, a crowd of concubines had gathered.
Every single one of them lingered around the garden draped in extravagant silk robes. The adornment was excessive to be seen as merely showing off to the passing spring season.
“Ho-ho-ho. It seems Chung-won Ye is already feeling the heat. Seeing as her clothes are thin enough for her skin to show through, she looks quite refreshed.”
“So-ui Gyeong’s clothes are no joke either. I’m worried she might catch a cold tomorrow at this rate.”
…It was a bit, very much, excessive.
Mi-in Sa was fanning herself gently among them, chuckling.
“Everyone, stop fighting. If they misunderstand in Jeongyang Hall that you are being jealous…”
At Mi-in Sa’s words, Chung-won Ye and So-ui Gyeong turned around fiercely. What those words meant was…
Falling out of His Majesty’s favor!
Doesn’t that mean becoming the next Empress goes down the drain?!
Catching the emperor’s eye, conceiving an imperial child, and becoming the empress. Wasn’t that the goal of the vast majority gathered in this inner palace?
At the mention that such a goal could be thwarted, the arena of envy and jealousy where sharp words flew came to a temporary halt.
It was at that moment that Song Wongyeong appeared in the west garden.
“Haha! What kind of story are you all sharing?”
Song Wongyeong, draped in chick-yellow silk robes, entered the garden like a triumphant general.
The concubines were startled by the sudden appearance of a tall, dashing male, but realizing he was that very Noble Person Song, they cast their eyes down, pretending not to know him.
“It is nothing special.”
“How could it be nothing special? Mi-in Sa. Wasn’t Jeongyang Hall, where His Majesty resides, mentioned?”
To Song Wongyeong, this was a very crucial matter.
I have to know what the emperor is thinking in calling all the concubines together!
And after the Chief Eunuch, the ones most knowledgeable about the movements of Jeongyang Hall were none other than the concubines.
