The Empress’ Livestream

Glancing out of the corner of his eyes, Feng Zhen looked at the document made out of bamboo slips on the table, then at Li Yun’s dull expression. Inexplicably, his mood improved.

“Hanmei, what’s that expression on your face?”

He was such a beautiful child on the outside but was just so stupid and dull on the inside. What a waste of his natural good looks.

Li Yun recovered his mental faculties and said in a bewildered manner, “Mister Feng, am I dreaming right now? This dream feels too real.”

Feng Zhen was silent as he thought about teasing him a little.

“Why do you say that you’re dreaming? Come here, stretch out your arm and let me pinch you to see if it hurts.”

Li Yun complied obediently. He stretched out his strong and muscular right arm. The firm muscles that were revealed when he pulled up his sleeve made Feng Zhen feel envy, jealousy, and hatred.

Feng Zhen thought about the soft and undefined flesh on his own arms as he looked at the tight biceps of this kid. The more he thought about it, the more irritated he felt.

“Ouch! It hurts, it hurts! Mister, you pinch too hard!”

Li Yun almost burst into tears. Feng Zhen wasn’t pinching with his fingers, he was obviously using his fingernails. It was so painful!

“Do you still think you’re dreaming?”

Feng Zhen had resumed his serious demeanor. No one would be able to tell that there had been anything intentional behind what he’d just done.

“Mister Feng, if I’m not dreaming, why are people outside saying that our lord is a woman? Even you believe this absurd news?” Li Yun let his sleeves fall, feeling aggrieved. He felt his brain becoming groggy; it was stuffed with a lot of information that he couldn’t digest.

If Li Yun knew what a sex change was, he would probably have suspected that his lord had a sex change when he woke up that morning.

Feng Zhen laughed involuntarily. “Our lord is a woman, but had to dress as a man because of some necessity. Do you understand?”

Li Yun nodded blankly, still looking like his spirit had not returned to his body.

After a while, he remembered something.

“Mister, I think I’ve seen our lord in women’s attire before, but he didn’t look like a woman then.” Li Yun clenched his fist nervously. He still found it difficult to accept this reality. “How could a tall and imposing man like our lord be female? To speak very disrespectfully, I think I’d look more like a woman than he did if I put on some women’s clothing, full makeup, and tidied myself up. Mister, what do you think?”

Feng Zhen nearly bit his tongue.

Li Yun was like a silly child. Why was he always so honest?

However, looking at the handsome man in front of him with his red lips and white teeth, Feng Zhen thought that Li Yun’s words were not unreasonable.

“When did you ever see our lord in women’s clothing?”

Feng Zhen had been with Jiang Pengji for quite some time, yet he had never seen her wear anything else besides men’s clothing.

Li Yun said honestly, “It was when our lord had just set up the Women’s Battalion. The people of Xiangyang County suspected that it was an indecent prostitute camp. Even the soldiers in the men’s battalions thought so. To change the impression of the Women’s Battalion in the peoples’ minds, he wore the attire of the Women’s Battalion and carried all the new recruits from men’s battalion. By the way, I remember that Vice-captain Dian was also one of those recruits. He should have some memory of it too…”

Thinking of this, Li Yun’s face suddenly paled and the healthy flush on his face faded.

Feng Zhen was really immersed in the gossip. When he noticed Li Yun’s strangeness, he quickly asked, “Hanmei, what’s the matter? Your face looks so bad. Do you feel sick?”

Li Yun slowly shook his head and stammered out a sentence. “Mister Feng… I suddenly remembered something. When our lord said that he was going to dress up as a woman, I said without any filter, ‘my lord, a tall and imposing man like you acting like a woman; you won’t even look as good as me…’ At that time, I said it without any real meaning… With our lord’s character, he couldn’t have possibly remembered it after all this time, could he?”

Some time passed but Li Yun still didn’t get a reply from Feng Zhen. He looked up and observed Feng Zhen carefully, realizing that he was looking at the area behind him with a half-smile… Wait! Behind him? Li Yun’s back stiffened suddenly. He turned his head with a creak.

Yeah…

Jiang Pengji had her arms folded over her chest and was looking at Li Yun and Feng Zhen with great interest. She even had Yang Si behind her.

“My- My lord!”

Li Yun was not completely stupid. He promptly put on a stern face and sat up straight. But his heart rabbited in a dense drum beat.

I’m going to die, I’m going to die, I’m going to die…

“I never knew that this was how I appear in Hanmei’s mind. I would never hold a grudge for so long!”

Jiang Pengji walked into the main hall with a smile, then she knelt at the chief position. Li Yun’s head hung even lower.

The audience felt very distressed upon seeing the darling of the group, Li Yun, being bullied by Jiang Pengji.

Beauty Zhenmi: You’re trash. You said that you don’t hold grudges, so you’d better not bully that little angel Hanmei.

Trash Cao Pi: Yeah! Look at how you’ve scared my Hanmei. He’s so much paler than usual.

The livestream viewers were outraged on behalf of Li Yun. But how could he know that?

He knew that he was guilty. As such, he lowered his head and admitted that he was wrong. “My lord, you are magnanimous. Naturally, you would not be calculative and petty.”

Jiang Pengji held back the urge to laugh and waved him away. “Forget it, I’ll stop teasing you. Look at you, it’s as if I’m bullying you.”

Now that the alarm had been lifted, Li Yun breathed a sigh of relief.

He quickly threw the peril that he had just faced to the back of his mind. Raising his head, he looked straight at Jiang Pengji’s face, saying nothing.

Jiang Pengji rested her cheek against her hand and said, “I’m really a woman. I’ll not become a man no matter how you look at me. Instead of being all flustered, why don’t you go back and practice your martial arts? You can’t beat me, a woman, yet you want to build up your achievements to marry Wan’er…”

Li Yun’s eyes widened in terror as he stammered, “My- My lord… I was in the wrong!”

As Feng Zhen listened to their conversation, his cheeks hurt so much from trying to hold back his laughter.

Wasn’t his lord holding a grudge by the way she acted?

She was threatening Li Yun both implicitly and explicitly. He could forget about marrying Shangguan Wan if he couldn’t beat her in a fight…

If this didn’t show that she was holding a grudge, what would?

Li Yun was regretting having ever encountered such a lord.

Li Yun drifted back to the camp outside the city. He suddenly thought of something as he started to practice with a spear…

Shouldn’t he continue to be shocked or doubt that his lord is a woman? Why had he come back to practice with a spear?

After thinking for a while, Li Yun thought that he couldn’t possibly be the only one who was dumbfounded.

“Vice-Captain Dian, have you heard the groundless rumors in the city?”

Dian Yan was someone with a rather pragmatic disposition. He usually liked to cultivate in silence in his free time. He was one of those people who talked less and did more.

“What rumors?”

Li Yun said, “It has spread throughout the imperial city. Everyone says that our lord is a woman.”

Dian Yan snorted disdainfully when he heard the words and immediately threw his twin axes to the ground.

“Which blind *ss would dare to vilify him like this? I’ll cut him in half!”

Meng Hun, who had just finished with drills, happened to come over at that moment. Hearing these words, he echoed in agreement, “How can you believe such a ridiculous thing?”

Li Yun was silent for a moment.

“What… what if it’s true?” Li Yun asked quietly.

Dian Yan and Meng Hun were both more straightforward warriors. Honest and candid people were more likely to speak openly with each other.

They had a good relationship with Li Yun and knew that Li Yun was not a chatterbox who told tales. They frowned at the same time.