CHAPTER 1283: CHAPTER 1278: SHE IS SUPERFLUOUS

After giving her instructions, she walked out. Xiao Jinfei stared at her departing figure, dazed, feeling that something was off.

Jin Fengzhao returned to her residence and gazed blankly at the white silk placed on the table.

Having lived to this day, she was filled with confusion.

At this point, did she have any reason to exist? Everything at home had been arranged; there was nothing for her to worry about.

Her existence brought difficulty to the Emperor.

The Emperor might feel guilty about how he treated her but still couldn’t bring himself to face her. Ultimately, her presence was merely a burden to his conscience as a ruler.

And to Xiao Jinfei, this woman who had suddenly emerged was like an awkward melon growing in the middle of a cabbage field—jarring and out of place.

He loathed her, even hated her, yet due to the Emperor’s unclear attitude toward her, he hadn’t dared to divorce her.

Her existence also brought difficulty to him.

So... she felt that there was truly no need for her to continue living. Without her, everyone would be better off.

She stood up and grasped the piece of white silk in her hands.

The next morning brought the tragic news of Jin Fengzhao’s suicide.

Xiao Jinfei was shocked—she killed herself?

He had thought that someone like her, even if she stirred up storms in this household, would never choose suicide. And yet, she did?

He threw on his clothes haphazardly and rushed to her courtyard.

In the secluded, dilapidated courtyard, three feet of white silk had hung her from the beam of the room.

Inside the house, there was a simple table holding an ink slab, a brush stained with ink, and a sheet of blank paper with not a single word written on it.

Perhaps before threading her neck into those three feet of white silk, she wanted to leave him some words. Maybe there were too many words bottled up within her, so many that she didn’t know where to begin, and at the end, she wrote nothing at all.

Looking at her cold, lifeless corpse, Xiao Jinfei’s mind buzzed as if exploding. At this moment, he finally realized that she was truly gone.

He had been forced to marry her at twelve years old. They had lived together for twenty years, taking up the majority of his life.

For him, she had been something more than just detestable—she had been a habit.

Perhaps he had grown accustomed to her strutting around the house, or perhaps he genuinely only felt hatred toward her.

But all of that, with her sudden death by hanging, seemed irrelevant now.

After a long daze, he murmured, "Dead is fine... I treated you poorly, and I hated you so much. Dead is fine, dead is fine..."

The servants lurking outside the courtyard saw Xiao Jinfei staggering out, his face pale beyond belief.

Returning to the study, he spotted the bowl of soup on the table.

She had said it wasn’t poisoned. She had told him to drink a mouthful even if he didn’t want to, saying she would never make soup for him again.

After twenty years of marriage, this had been the only thing she ever made for him.

Gripping the edge of the table for support, he picked up the bowl of egg drop soup, which had long since turned cold and even tasted slightly off. His fingers trembled as he tightened his grip on the bowl and drank it in one gulp.

In the twenty-sixth year of Changqing, the Princess Xiao Jin of the Jin Family met a sudden death. Before her passing, the Emperor had ordered the Zongrenfu to remove Jin Fengzhao’s name, yet after her death, her identity was reinstated.

She was supposed to be buried in the Imperial Mausoleum as the Princess, but General Xiao Jinfei petitioned the Emperor to personally bury his wife within the Xiao Family ancestral tomb. Ultimately, the Emperor granted the request.

Fate had brought her full circle. In life, she had fought tooth and nail to marry into the Xiao Family, and in those two years within the Xiao Family, she had suffered endlessly. In death, she was destined to remain with the Xiao Family for eternity.

The eunuch Wan sighed, "Why did the Emperor agree to General Xiao’s request? General Xiao has always treated the Princess poorly."

The Emperor let out a faint sigh, "It was her own decision."

"The Princess’s own decision?"

"Yes, she chose to hang herself within the Xiao Household and never came to the Imperial Palace to seek me."

...