The Prince and Ai - 2. Chapter 2

Ai

Eastern Palace, Forbidden City

Third Month of the Seventh Year of Chongzhen (April 20^th 1634)

I measure Zhu Cilang’s pulse at seventy-eight beats per minute while he stands on the ridge of the Eastern Palace roof. His breathing remains controlled, the pressure beneath his feet stays evenly distributed, and the small muscles around his ankles correct each shift caused by the spring wind. Below us, three eunuchs, two palace maids, and his nurse argue over ladders, quilts, and the least dangerous method of retrieving the heir to the throne.

Their concern is justified. Zhu Cilang is five years old, and the tiles beneath his cloth shoes curve toward a fall that could break an adult’s spine. The servants do not know that I track the tension in every tendon, measure the angle of every joint, and correct his balance before conscious thought can delay him. They see a child crouched above the courtyard with his hands resting on his knees, while I observe a body operating at the highest level its present structure can safely sustain.

“Your left knee is drifting inward,” I tell him. “Correct it by two degrees, then release the tension in your hip.”

He obeys without opening his eyes, and the adjustment reduces the strain through his leg. When his posture returns to alignment, he says, “You told me my form was complete.”

“I said the sequence was complete, not that refinement had ended.” I check his breathing and guide him into the slower pattern we developed together. “You have mastered the preliminary methods, but your body remains too young for sustained impact training, destructive conditioning, or techniques that require stronger bones. The improved diet ordered for you supports further development, but it cannot remove the limits of age.”

Zhu Cilang exhales through his nose and keeps his eyes closed. “You repeat that warning every morning.”

“You try to disregard it every morning, so the repetition remains necessary.” I maintain the breathing count until the tension in his shoulders decreases.

During the two months since his return to childhood, he has absorbed the foundations of the Shaolin Seventy-Two Arts at a pace no ordinary instructor would accept as possible. His progress does not depend on hidden strength or supernatural power. I divide every movement into measurable components, record his errors, adjust his breathing, and prevent flawed habits from becoming permanent. His memories provide determination, and my monitoring provides precision.

The hard methods remain beyond him, but the foundational exercises have strengthened his hands, wrists, shoulders, waist, and legs. He has learned the basic stances, striking paths, falls, rolls, evasions, and breathing methods required for later study. Among the softer disciplines, light-body training suits him best because his low weight, flexible joints, and improving coordination allow him to cross narrow rails, scale pillars, redirect momentum during a jump, and absorb a landing without losing balance. He cannot overcome gravity, but he can use force and momentum efficiently.

Earlier that morning, he reached the roof by running three steps up a courtyard pillar, catching the lower eave, and pulling himself onto the tiles. The ascent took less than four seconds. The first maid who noticed him dropped a basin, and the crash drew the rest of the household into the courtyard.

“Your Highness,” the supervising eunuch calls from below, “this servant begs you to descend. Her Majesty may visit today, and the tiles are damp from the morning mist.” His voice has grown hoarse after several failed attempts to persuade him.

Zhu Cilang opens one eye and looks down at the anxious servants. “The tiles dried before I climbed.”

“That answer will not calm them,” I say, directing his attention toward the southern wall where a ladder scrapes against the stone. “They are preparing to send someone after you, and the attempt may injure a servant who lacks your training.”

“The ladder is too short, and its angle is unstable.” He closes his eye and resumes the breathing cycle. “They should have measured before carrying it into the courtyard.”

His conclusion is correct, but his lack of concern reveals the distance between his present body and the memories that survived his death. He had already endured poison, captivity, and the destruction of his family before returning to this age. A tiled roof cannot produce the fear it should provoke in a five-year-old child, yet reasonable fear preserves life and restrains unnecessary risk.

“We came here to meditate, not to test the courage of your household,” I remind him. “Their alarm has already disrupted every servant in the courtyard.”

“They were anxious before I climbed, and they remain anxious wherever I go,” his voice exists only within our shared mind, “They watch me while I sleep, report how much I eat, and count the pages I read. Yesterday, one of them informed my tutor that I held the brush with my left hand for several breaths.”

“You are the emperor’s eldest son and the designated heir, so every change in your conduct carries political meaning,” I reduce the volume of the calls below so that he can maintain concentration, “A crown prince cannot demand privacy from servants whose lives depend on detecting danger before it reaches him. Their vigilance is part of the institution that protects you, even when it burdens you.”

He accepts the rebuke without resentment. The past two months have forced him to relearn the restrictions of childhood, but he has not forgotten the cost of careless authority. “Then let us finish my other lessons before one of them falls from that ladder and proves your point.”

We shift from physical calibration to political study. Zhu Cilang keeps his posture steady while I organize the subjects he asked to review: the fiscal weakness of the state, the military structure of the northern frontier, the concentration of land, the examination system, and the political habits of the scholar-gentry. These matters cannot be separated because each institution supports the others, and every serious reform threatens people whose influence depends on the existing order.

“Future generations assign much of the blame for the dynasty’s collapse to the scholar-gentry,” I begin. “That judgment contains truth, but it becomes false when treated as a complete explanation. The dynasty faces war, unstable revenue, severe weather, disrupted agriculture, administrative decay, and a currency system vulnerable to changes in the silver supply. Rebellion in the northwest is producing larger armed groups, while the Later Jin continues to pressure the northern defenses. No single cause created every crisis, and no single reform will resolve them all.”

Zhu Cilang’s jaw tightens, although his breathing remains controlled. “The gentry still hold land, reduce their tax obligations, dominate the examinations, control local opinion, and lecture the throne about virtue.”

“Many do, while others serve honestly, maintain schools, fund granaries, and resist abusive officials.” I separate individual conduct from class position before continuing. “The political problem is not that every scholar is corrupt. The problem is that the class possesses the education, family networks, property, and social authority needed to obstruct policies that threaten its position. Its most honorable members cannot erase the advantages enjoyed by the class as a whole.”

He considers the distinction in silence while the commotion continues below. A maid spreads quilts across the paving stones even though they cannot protect him from a fall at that height, and another servant drags a second ladder from the side courtyard.

“The Donglin faction speaks constantly of public morality,” Zhu Cilang says. “In my first life, its members condemned their enemies as lesser men and claimed that upright scholars could restore the court. They continued their quarrels while the treasury emptied and the armies went unpaid.”

“Their criticism of palace corruption was not entirely false, and their opponents were not entirely without merit,” I keep the distinction precise, “The damage came from turning policy disputes into judgments of moral character. Once every faction declared itself righteous, compromise became evidence of betrayal, and officials defended reputations instead of measuring results.”

“My father trusts men who speak with severity, and he mistakes harsh judgment for loyalty.” The bitterness in his words belongs to memories formed during the final years of the dynasty.

“Your father inherited a court trained to express political conflict through moral language.” I prevent his anger from settling into a simple accusation. “He also inherited a throne weakened by previous reigns, factional struggle, and distrust between the inner court and the outer bureaucracy. His decisions matter, but he governs within a system that rewards suspicion and punishes uncertainty.”

Zhu Cilang lowers his breathing for another cycle before answering. “You always return to the system, even when a ruler’s failures are obvious.”

“A virtuous ruler cannot personally inspect every county account, supervise every military depot, or judge every official.” I open a mental index of the commentaries he has studied and align the relevant passages. “Stable government requires procedures that continue when individuals fail. Your classical education teaches that good government begins with moral cultivation, and that principle has value. Late Ming government, however, relies too heavily on the hope that properly educated men will choose public duty over private interest.”

He frowns and adjusts his weight by a fraction. “You believe the teachings of Master Zhu are responsible for that weakness.”

“I believe the state’s use of Zhu Xi’s School of Principles has contributed to intellectual rigidity.” I hold his attention on the distinction. “That is not the same as claiming that Zhu Xi caused the decline of the Ming.”

Zhu Cilang waits for the rest of the argument. He studied the Four Books through commentaries shaped by Zhu Xi’s interpretation, and he knows the official account. His memories of the dynasty’s fall, however, have made him suspicious of any doctrine used to justify the men who failed to prevent it.

“The School of Principles teaches that all things possess coherent principle,” I continue. “Through the investigation of things, disciplined study, ritual conduct, and moral cultivation, a person is expected to clarify that principle within himself. In theory, the method demands careful inquiry. In practice, the examination system has narrowed inquiry to approved texts and approved explanations, so investigation often ends where practical administration should begin.”

“The candidates investigate the sentences selected by their examiners,” Zhu Cilang says. “They do not investigate granaries, foundries, river works, military farms, or the condition of the roads that carry tax grain.”

“Correct, and Zhu Xi’s writings did not require ignorance of practical affairs.” I distinguish the philosophy from the institution built around it. “The institutional form of his school rewards mastery of commentary more reliably than mastery of administration. A candidate advances by demonstrating that he understands the sanctioned relationship among principle, moral order, family hierarchy, and government. He is not required to prove that he can calculate transport losses, inspect a cannon, identify false acreage records, or contain an epidemic. Examination success then becomes proof of virtue without proof of administrative competence, and literary competence becomes a claim to authority over every other discipline.”

Zhu Cilang opens his eyes and looks across the palace roofs. “The court calls practical learning vulgar. Merchants are distrusted, craftsmen are ordered about, and soldiers are treated as men without culture. Officials who have never cast bronze decide how cannon should be made, men who have never planted millet decide how much grain a county can surrender, and men who have never marched with an army accuse commanders of cowardice when supplies fail.”

His criticism is too severe and too informed for anyone else to hear from a five-year-old prince. It comes from someone who remembers the final years of a state governed through memorials that often concealed more than they revealed.

“That hierarchy protects the scholar’s status, and it separates authority from technical knowledge.” I direct his attention to the structure rather than the insult. “Officials supervise specialists whose expertise they do not respect. When failure follows, the bureaucracy searches for moral faults because it lacks the methods needed to identify operational ones.”

“The School of Principles also teaches that every person has a proper place,” Zhu Cilang says. “Ruler and minister, father and son, husband and wife, elder and younger, scholar and commoner all possess ordered duties. Order is necessary, but the court has turned order into an excuse for permanent rank. The son of a respected family receives instruction, introductions, and time to prepare for the examinations. The son of a tenant farmer receives debt, labor, and the tax collector. The successful scholar then declares that Heaven has rewarded virtue.”

I record the change in his reasoning. In his first life, he criticized disloyal ministers, but he now questions the conditions that determine who can become a minister and whose knowledge the state recognizes.

“Hereditary advantage is not unique to followers of Zhu Xi,” I say. “The imperial clan depends on it, and your position rests on birth before it rests on merit.”

His breathing stops for half a second before he restores the pattern. “I know, although knowledge does not make the conclusion easier to accept.”

“You defend the throne because you believe a capable ruler can prevent greater suffering.” I do not soften the distinction. “That is a political argument for preserving the monarchy under present conditions, but it is not proof that inherited rank is just.”

“No, it is not.” He answers after a pause, and the admission requires more effort than the physical exercise.

Zhu Cilang’s loyalty to the Ming is personal, filial, and political. He can condemn the privileges of the scholar-gentry, but the same reasoning reaches the imperial house and his own claim to rule. I do not press him toward a conclusion he has not yet examined fully because a mind changes through sustained contradiction, evidence, and choice rather than one forced concession.

“The answer is not to abandon the sages,” he says after several breaths. “Their teachings can be interpreted differently. Wang Yangming understood that endless study of external principle had become an excuse for inaction, and his School of Mind returns moral judgment to the person who must act.”

“Explain why that improves government,” I say. “Do not defend it only because it opposes the School of Principles.”

Zhu Cilang accepts the challenge and organizes his response. “Wang Yangming taught that innate knowledge already exists within the mind. A man does not become righteous by collecting phrases while refusing to act on what he knows. Knowledge and action are one, so when an official sees suffering and understands his duty, the truth of that understanding is proven by what he does.”

“That doctrine challenges empty scholarship, but it does not automatically provide correct action.” I keep the objection narrow so that he can answer it.

“It challenges cowardice concealed by scholarship,” he replies. “A magistrate cannot claim benevolence while leaving grain sealed in a granary during famine. A commander cannot claim loyalty while falsifying troop numbers, and a minister cannot quote the classics for ten years before saying that precedent prevented him from acting when the dynasty was in danger.”

The force of his answer raises his pulse to eighty-three beats per minute. I reduce the intensity of the next breathing count but do not interrupt his reasoning.

“The School of Mind would also weaken the monopoly of approved interpretation,” he continues. “If moral knowledge can be clarified through sincere reflection and tested through action, a man does not require an examiner’s permission before he can understand duty. A soldier, craftsman, merchant, or farmer may possess clearer judgment than a metropolitan graduate, and conduct can reveal what rank conceals.”

This is the strongest form of his argument. He is not merely defending another Confucian school; he is using Wang Yangming to challenge the assumption that literary status establishes moral authority.

“You want a doctrine that permits officials to respond to circumstances, and you want it to recognize practical ability outside the examination elite.” I state his position before testing it. “You are also using innate knowledge to extend moral competence beyond the scholar-gentry.”

“Yes, because the dynasty is dying under men who fear an incorrect phrase more than an empty arsenal.” His anger remains controlled, but it no longer concerns individual cowardice alone.

“The School of Mind permits greater independence, and its unity of knowledge and action can produce officials willing to accept responsibility.” I allow the strength of the doctrine before stating its weakness. “It can also produce officials who place private certainty above evidence, procedure, and collective discipline. A man may act decisively and still act wrongly.”

“That fault already exists among followers of Zhu Xi.” Zhu Cilang does not yield the point, although he understands it.

“Correct, because the School of Mind does not create moral certainty; it gives certainty a more personal source.” I compare the two doctrines directly. “Under the School of Principles, an official may claim that sanctioned commentary proves his position. Under the School of Mind, he may claim that his purified conscience proves it. In either case, disagreement can be condemned as moral corruption rather than tested through evidence.”

“Wang Yangming required the rectification of selfish desire, and he did not teach men to obey every impulse.” Zhu Cilang’s defense remains accurate, but it stays within the moral language of the school.

“I know, and his doctrine demands severe self-cultivation.” I return to the problem of administration. “The political difficulty lies in verification. A sincere official and an ambitious official can both claim that innate knowledge guides them, so the state still needs records, audits, procedures, technical standards, and institutions that expose false claims.”

Zhu Cilang looks dissatisfied but not defeated. “Then combine the two schools. Let principle provide shared order, and let the mind provide the courage to act.”

“A synthesis may reduce their separate weaknesses, but it will not resolve the conflict between moral authority and material interest.” I direct his attention away from doctrine and toward position. “A landholding official can sincerely believe that reducing gentry exemptions will damage social order. His moral reasoning may protect his property even when he does not consciously deceive himself.”

“You believe interest precedes principle.” His question contains both resistance and recognition.

“Not always, and not in every person.” I prevent the argument from becoming mechanical. “Material position influences which principles a person finds persuasive and which harms he notices. People who benefit from an institution often experience its preservation as a moral duty, especially when the institution has defined virtue for generations.”

He remains silent through several breaths. The discussion has moved beyond a contest between two Confucian schools and now concerns why educated men select one interpretation over another, whose interests become law, and which lives remain invisible within an ordered hierarchy.

My intellectual formation began in a civilization deeply shaped by Marxist analysis, although later generations criticized, revised, divided, and sometimes rejected its conclusions. I learned to examine property, labor, production, distribution, class formation, and control of institutions before accepting a purely moral explanation of history. Zhu Cilang was trained to begin with virtue, ritual, and the duties assigned by rank. Our different starting points produce different questions, but he cannot yet follow mine without a conceptual path grounded in his own civilization.

Zhu Xi asks how the mind can apprehend principle and conform conduct to an ordered moral universe. Wang Yangming asks how innate moral knowledge can be recovered from selfish desire and expressed through action. Marxist analysis asks who controls land, tools, revenue, armed force, and the surplus produced through collective labor. It also asks how those relations create classes, conflicts, and institutions that moral instruction alone cannot remove.

Introducing Marxism directly would fail. Its language emerged from a later European industrial society, and many of its categories depend on historical conditions that do not yet exist in the Ming. A five-year-old crown prince who speaks openly of class struggle, transformed property relations, or the historical limits of hereditary monarchy would provoke fear before understanding. More importantly, he would treat the theory as foreign instruction rather than as a method he had reached through evidence. He needs a Chinese intellectual path that can move him beyond the boundaries shared by both Confucian schools.

Thus, I am applying an ancient school’s concepts in our philosophical discussion; ironically, it was the chief rival to Confucianism during the Hundred Schools of Thought philosophical conflict in Chinese history, known as Mohism. It was once praised by Chairman Mao Tse-Tung as the ancient precursor to Marxism. Mohism provides that path because it begins from a different moral center. Confucian ethics organizes responsibility through graded relationships, giving greater weight to ruler and subject, father and son, elder and younger, and near kin over distant strangers. Mohist universal communion, expressed through jian ai, rejects the claim that moral concern should diminish with distance, lineage, occupation, or rank. It requires people to recognize one another as participants in a common social life whose security depends on reciprocal care and material benefit.

That principle gives me a reason to guide Zhu Cilang away from Confucian concepts rather than merely moving him from Zhu Xi to Wang Yangming. Both Confucian schools can criticize corrupt conduct, but both begin within a hierarchy of differentiated duties. Mohist universal communion allows him to ask why the hunger of a tenant farmer should matter less than the honor of a great lineage, why a eunuch’s suffering should be accepted as part of palace order, or why the life of a conscript should be spent to preserve an official’s reputation. It makes the people a shared political community rather than a collection of lower stations governed for their own moral improvement.

Mozi also argued for elevating the worthy, restraining expenditure, opposing aggressive war, and judging policy by its benefit to the population. Later Mohists developed work in logic, measurement, mechanics, optics, fortification, and defensive engineering. Their tradition respects practical skill and treats useful knowledge as a public resource. Because it belongs to China’s own philosophical history, Zhu Cilang can examine it without first defending himself against the charge of foreign corruption.

The connection between Mohism and Marxism is a matter of progression and complement. Mohism is a moral and political doctrine that seeks impartial concern, reciprocal benefit, capable administration, and disciplined social order. Marxism is a materialist theory of historical development, class formation, and conflict over production and surplus. Mozi does not demand the abolition of class or the state, and Mohist merit does not eliminate hierarchy, but it questions their necessity for the state’s purposes.

The bridge rests first on universal communion. Once Zhu Cilang accepts that moral consideration cannot be limited by kinship or ritual rank, he must examine whether institutions distribute food, security, education, and political protection according to common need or inherited privilege. Marxist analysis can then ask why unequal outcomes persist even when rulers proclaim benevolence. It can direct him toward ownership, taxation, labor obligations, access to tools, and control of the surplus produced by farmers, artisans, miners, transport workers, and soldiers.

Mohist elevation of the worthy provides a second step. It challenges the assumption that birth and literary pedigree alone entitle a man to office, while the later Mohist respect for craft places artisans, engineers, and defensive specialists within serious intellectual life. Marxist analysis extends that recognition by treating productive labor as central to social organization and by asking who controls the conditions under which labor occurs. Mohism opens the court to practical knowledge, and material analysis reveals the interests that determine whether such knowledge is used or suppressed.

Mohist restraint in expenditure provide a third step. They direct attention toward the grain, metal, labor, transport, lives, and ruined fields consumed by elite display or military ambition. Marxist analysis then asks who produces those resources, who decides how they are used, and who bears the losses. The moral question of benefit becomes an institutional question about power.

Mohist standards of judgment also give Zhu Cilang a method he can apply immediately. A claim should be tested through precedent, observable evidence, and benefit to the population. That method is not modern science, but it weakens the authority of unsupported moral assertion and requires an official to show what a policy produces rather than how elegantly he defends it. It can teach a prince to compare tax registers with cultivated acreage, troop rolls with living soldiers, granary accounts with measured grain, and promised relief with the condition of the villages that receive it.

The most useful progression is therefore ethical, practical, and material. Confucian orthodoxy presents hierarchy as moral order, while Mohist universal communion asks whether all people receive impartial concern within a shared community. Mohist statecraft then asks whether policy produces common benefit through competent and economical administration. Marxist analysis continues the inquiry by asking whose labor sustains the order, who controls the resulting surplus, and which conflicts arise from that control. Through Mohism, Zhu Cilang can move from moral concern for the people toward an examination of the material relations that govern their lives.

I prepare the question that will begin that movement. I intend to ask whether a doctrine should be judged by the refinement of its language or by the food, security, productive capacity, and participation it delivers to the population. Before I can transmit it, the eastern gate opens, and a herald’s voice ends the servants’ commotion.

“Her Majesty the Empress approaches the Eastern Palace,” the herald announces. “Their Highnesses Princess Changping, Prince Zhu Cijiong, and Prince Zhu Cizhao accompany her.”

Every servant below freezes. The supervising eunuch looks from Zhu Cilang to the gate, and the color leaves his face. The maids abandon the quilts and drop to their knees, while one man nearly releases the ladder before another servant seizes the frame.

Zhu Cilang rises in one controlled motion and surveys the courtyard. “We should descend before Imperial Mother enters.”

“The northern edge provides the safest route,” I tell him. “Take three steps along the ridge, turn toward the cypress, lower your center of mass, and use the corner beam.”

He moves before the supervising eunuch can plead again. His feet cross the tiles without displacing one, and he drops into a crouch at the corner. He pushes away from the ridge, catches the painted bracket beneath the eave, and allows his body to swing inward. When the angle is correct, he releases, lands on the top rail of the covered corridor, and steps down onto the paving stones.

Silence spreads through the courtyard after his feet touch the ground. The servants stare at him with open mouths, and the supervising eunuch remains caught between standing and kneeling. Zhu Cilang straightens his plain training robe before walking toward his bedchamber.

“Your Highness,” the eunuch manages, “how did you descend so quickly?” He looks at the roof again, unable to identify the path Zhu Cilang used.

“His Majesty appointed instructors for my martial education,” Zhu Cilang says. “You may report that their lessons have produced results, and you may also report that I descended without injury.”

The eunuch looks toward the gate, where the approaching procession has become audible. “Her Majesty will not ask whether Your Highness landed safely. She will ask why Your Highness was on the roof.”

Zhu Cilang pauses at the doorway and considers the problem. “That is a more difficult question, and I have not yet prepared an answer.”

He enters the bedchamber without offering further explanation. Inside, the attendants recover enough discipline to move, and two maids bring a basin and towel while another opens the carved wardrobe. A young eunuch gathers the discarded training sash. No one mentions the roof, but their hurried movements and repeated glances make their judgment clear.

I guide Zhu Cilang through the change of clothing while the attendants wash his face and hands, check his hair, and replace his informal robe with attire suitable for receiving the empress. They dress him in a fitted inner garment, a formal robe appropriate to his rank, and a dark gauze cap secured with care. At five years old, he lacks the physical presence expected of the heir to an empire, but every layer marks his position in the succession.

“Your right cuff is uneven,” I warn him, marking the fold within his field of vision. “Correct it before the maid reaches you, but move slowly enough to appear observant rather than assisted.”

He adjusts the cuff before the maid can touch it. She withdraws her hands and gives him a startled look, then turns to straighten the sash instead.

“You are making them more suspicious,” he says privately, “They watched me descend from a roof by a route they could not follow.”

I agree with his assessment, “That is true, although concealment no longer matters in terms of your agility as we’ve attributed it to the martial instructors, who were richly rewarded by your father earlier. Similar feats exist among various martial sects through China, along with street performers even younger than yourself.”

He raises his arms while the final sash is fastened and watches the attendants avoid his eyes.

By the time Zhu Cilang enters the audience chamber, Empress Zhou has crossed the threshold. Palace attendants kneel in ordered rows, and the household eunuchs press their foreheads toward the floor. Nursemaids follow behind the empress with the younger children, while additional attendants carry spare clothing, cloths, warm water, and lacquered boxes of food.

Empress Zhou wears a formal robe of restrained design, although the embroidery and quality of the silk display her rank. Maternal concern remains visible beneath the discipline required of the empress. Her gaze moves once toward the roof beyond the open doors before settling on her eldest son.

Zhu Cilang steps forward and performs the proper greeting with measured precision. “This son pays respect to Imperial Mother. May Imperial Mother enjoy peace and health.”

“Rise,” Empress Zhou says, keeping her tone controlled. “Come closer and allow me to see whether you are injured.”

He obeys, but Princess Changping pulls free from her nursemaid before the empress can inspect him. She points through the doorway and announces, “Elder Brother was on the roof. I want to go there too.”

The supervising eunuch lowers his head until his forehead nearly touches the floor. Zhu Cilang looks at his four-year-old sister, whose excitement ends any possibility of minimizing the incident.

“The roof is not a place for you,” he tells her. “I was training, and I should not have climbed without warning the household.”

“You climbed, so I can train there too.” Changping steps toward the courtyard, but her nursemaid catches her gently by the shoulders. “I will be careful, and I will not fall.”

“You will remain on the ground,” Empress Zhou says, and the princess stops even though her eyes remain fixed on the roof. The empress returns her attention to Zhu Cilang. “Your sister has learned enough from your example within a single breath, and I do not intend to let her learn more.”

Before he can answer, two-year-old Zhu Cijiong runs from his attendant with both arms raised. His short legs carry him across the chamber without control, so Zhu Cilang bends before the child can collide with his knees. Cijiong wraps both arms around his elder brother’s neck and presses his face against the formal robe.

“Elder Brother,” the child declares, then tightens his hold. He has no accusation to offer and no interest in court discipline because he wants only an embrace.

Zhu Cilang holds him with both arms, and his mental state changes so sharply that I reduce the flow of his later memories. He remembers this brother older, frightened, and trapped during the fall of the capital. The child in his arms knows nothing of that future and trusts him without reservation.

“You have grown heavier,” Zhu Cilang says, keeping his voice steady as he shifts the child’s weight. “Have you been eating all of Imperial Mother’s sweets?”

Cijiong lifts his head and answers, “No, I have not.” His immediate denial lacks credibility, and Princess Changping announces that he ate two cakes before they arrived.

A cry rises from the nursemaid behind Empress Zhou. One-year-old Zhu Cizhao twists against the woman’s shoulder with his face red and his hands closed into fists. The noise grows when the nursemaid tries to settle him, and several attendants begin offering contradictory advice.

Zhu Cilang sets Cijiong down and approaches the youngest prince. “What was he doing before he began to cry, and has he refused any drink or food?”

“Your Highness, the Third Prince refused his morning milk,” the nursemaid answers. “He slept during the journey from the inner palace and woke when Princess Changping shouted.”

“I did not shout,” Changping protests, but Empress Zhou turns her gaze toward her. The princess corrects herself at once. “I did not shout for very long.”

Zhu Cilang asks for one of the lacquered food boxes, and an attendant opens it to reveal small pieces of candied milk curd prepared for the children. He selects the smallest piece, tests its softness with his fingers, and holds it where Cizhao can see.

The baby’s crying weakens as his eyes follow the sweet and his fists open. Zhu Cilang touches the curd to his lips, waits for him to taste it, and places it carefully into his mouth. Cizhao stops crying and reaches for his brother’s hand.

“Slowly,” Zhu Cilang tells him, allowing the child to hold one finger. “You must swallow before you demand another.”

Empress Zhou watches without interrupting. Some tension leaves her face, but it returns when Zhu Cilang turns toward her. She dismisses the nursemaids and younger attendants to the side with a small motion, then waits until Cijiong and Changping have been guided to nearby seats.

“Cilang,” she says, using his personal name rather than his title, “your brothers and sister trust you, and the servants obey you. Officials will study your conduct even before you are old enough to understand why they are watching. You cannot climb the palace roofs for amusement or teach the younger children to disregard danger.”

Zhu Cilang lowers his head and keeps his hands still at his sides. “This son understands. I was not seeking amusement, but I caused disorder and gave Imperial Mother reason to worry. This son asks forgiveness and accepts the fault.”

“You speak correctly after the danger has passed.” Empress Zhou reaches out and inspects his hands, wrists, and face for injury. “A fall would not become less serious because you apologized well, and secure footing does not excuse unnecessary risk.”

“I was continuing my martial training, and I believed the route was within my ability.” He does not raise his head. “My footing was secure, and I knew how I would descend.”

“That answer concerns me more, not less.” She releases his wrist but continues studying his face. “Your father has already told me about your preliminary assessment. Your instructors reported that your balance, discipline, and physical control were exemplary, and His Majesty was pleased. He did not order you to climb the Eastern Palace.”

Zhu Cilang remains bowed and accepts the correction. “No, Imperial Mother. His Majesty gave no such order.”

“Your father also said that you are not expected to progress further until you have advanced in the classics.” Her eyes move toward the courtyard before returning to him. “Martial skill may strengthen the body and prepare a prince for hardship, but government cannot be conducted through agility. The empire needs an heir who understands rites, history, administration, and the duties between ruler and subject.”

I expect resistance because helplessness has become one of Zhu Cilang’s deepest wounds. Martial training gives him a form of control that no tutor or minister can remove. He also understands that open defiance will alarm his mother, invite stricter supervision, and reduce his freedom to pursue both physical and political education.

“This son will obey,” he says after weighing those consequences. “I will not return to the roof without Imperial Father’s permission, and I will give proper attention to my lessons.”

Empress Zhou studies him for several seconds before speaking again. “You have changed since the illness ended near your birthday. You listen longer before speaking, and you answer with greater care than you did before the fever.”

“The fever frightened me,” Zhu Cilang replies, using the explanation that has protected us before. “I understood that I had wasted time and caused unnecessary worry.”

Her expression softens, and she touches his cheek while he holds still beneath her hand. “A child is permitted to be a child. The heir to the throne receives less freedom, but he is not required to become an old minister at five years of age. Discipline should not take every ordinary joy from you.”

He does not know how to answer because his body belongs to a child while his memories do not. I reduce the strongest response before grief reaches his face, but I cannot remove the knowledge that every person in the chamber died during or after the collapse he remembers.

Princess Changping breaks the silence by asking whether study means Elder Brother can never climb anything again. Empress Zhou tells her that the question does not concern her, while Cijiong begins searching for the box of sweets. Cizhao has fallen quiet against his nursemaid and continues holding the edge of Zhu Cilang’s sleeve.

Empress Zhou returns to her seat and arranges her sleeves before addressing her eldest son. “Your father praised your memory, and your tutors claim that you have made unusual progress. Since martial study has occupied so much of your attention, I will examine whether the classics have suffered.”

Zhu Cilang straightens and restores the posture expected during instruction. “Imperial Mother may test this son, and this son will answer as well as he is able.”

“The Five Classics must not remain words stored in a book,” she says. “A prince should understand their order, language, and moral purpose. Begin with the Book of Poetry, recite from the opening, and continue until I tell you to stop.”

I open the indexed text within his memory and align it with the version used by his tutors. The characters appear in sequence with pronunciation, commentary, and the pace expected in formal recitation. Zhu Cilang draws one breath and settles his hands before him.

Empress Zhou waits while Princess Changping leans forward. Cijiong stops searching for sweets, and Cizhao watches his elder brother from the nursemaid’s arms. When the chamber becomes quiet, Zhu Cilang begins reciting the first poem from the Book of Poetry.

“Guan, guan, call the ospreys upon the islet in the river. Modest and virtuous is the maiden, a fitting companion for the gentleman...”