Xiao Jinyi said nothing, only took Emperor Jingren’s hand. As if afraid the young emperor would shake him off, he held on very tightly.

But Emperor Jingren didn’t shake him off. He allowed Xiao Jinyi to lace their fingers together and bowed his head to look at their clasped hands. Gravely, he said, “We think that you cannot say. Since there is incense that can make a specific person have a specific dream and a means to keep people from feeling pain when the pain is too great, it also ought to be possible to render a person incapable of revealing a secret. When we ordered Yan Xu’s death, before the execution was carried out, Jing Xixian refused to give in and tormented Yan Xu again. He used his pits of snakes and caves of leeches and what-have-you. It seems Yan Xu was out of his mind with fear, but he still said nothing. Jing Xixian expressed great admiration for his former commander, but we thought that Yan Xu was simply incapable of saying anything.”

“There’s only one thing I can say.” Xiao Jinyi picked up the young emperor’s hand and pressed a gentle kiss to the back of it. “I’m real, and my feelings for Your Majesty are real.”

Xiao Jinyi wanted to make Emperor Jingren believe in his sincerity; he was trying desperately to guarantee something, but Emperor Jingren only said very confidently, “Naturally. If you were insincere, we wouldn’t have trusted you. Xiao Jinyi, the reason we love you is that we can see your sincerity.”

“Your Majesty is wise,” said Xiao Jinyi, in all earnestness. This young emperor could not be fooled by anyone’s false affections.

But it was precisely because of his wisdom that Xiao Jinyi worried about him. The saying goes that being too smart will only hurt you, and affections that are too deep rarely last. He would rather have spent a lifetime lying to conceal the truth from the young emperor, but Emperor Jingren was unwilling to live among lies. He insisted on finding the truth. Even realizing that the truth might be something he couldn’t endure, he still continued to investigate.

“Your Majesty,” Xiao Jinyi said earnestly, “please do not investigate any further. Your Majesty will always be this realm’s emperor. None of us will hurt anyone in Xia, and we won’t influence anyone. At most…at most they’ll have some inappropriate intentions toward Your Majesty, but Your Majesty is so brilliant that you are certain to find them out and send them far away, so that they never have a chance to hurt Your Majesty, all right?”

He would rather the young emperor lie to himself all his life than have him live being so clear-sighted.

Emperor Jingren looked steadily at Xiao Jinyi, then at last averted his gaze from Xiao Jinyi’s earnest expression. “It’s too late.”

These words were like a pair of scissors snipping through the ropes above Xiao Jinyi’s head: the boulder hanging over him fell at last, crushing all his expectations into mud.

“We have already guessed what you said. Especially on the eve of our departure from the capital, when the people we had ordered to be kept under watch disappeared simultaneously from their homes and reappeared where they had been an hour later. It was as if they had vanished into thin air. That was when we knew that your existence might truly have a magical component that mere mortal force cannot contend against. And with this power, had you people truly wanted to harm Xia, we would have been unable to prevent you. But all of you had done nothing, only toiled steadily through your lives. We knew then that the power that prevented us from learning the truth also constrained you, rendering you incapable of performing feats that surpassed ordinary mortal strength; at worst you would use some incense. At that time, we did not wish to investigate any further, and we no longer wished to think about it.” Emperor Jingren’s face was filled with weariness. He seemed so very, very tired.

Though it seemed that he would collapse if he spoke another word, Emperor Jingren still went on. “Without this battle between you and Huyan Xi, perhaps we would forever have hidden these suspicions in our heart, treating everything as the result of our paranoia. We wouldn’t have considered it again. But your fighting abilities and Huyan Xi’s, which are insurmountable by ordinary mortal strength, sounded warning bells in our mind. If these people only had inappropriate intentions toward us, we have faith we would be able to foil them and would be willing to let it go. But what Huyan Xi threatens is our realm, is Mobei City—is everyone living at the border. We cannot let it go.”

It was his young emperor who was so dedicated. Xiao Jinyi buried his heartache as deep as he could and calmly asked, “What further views does Your Majesty have?”

“We came to the proper conclusion long ago. We were only unwilling to acknowledge it.” Emperor Jingren closed his eyes in exhaustion and leaned against the headboard of the bed. Quietly, he said, “Huyan Xi not only sees the people of Xia as insects, he can even abandon his own army. To him, these people mean nothing. This went directly to the thought we had previously not dared to think. His manner made it impossible for us to continue lying to ourselves.

“W-we…” Emperor Jingren’s voice was so quiet it could scarcely be heard, but with the empress’s abundant internal force, he still heard what Emperor Jingren said. “We and our realm must be false. Perhaps some unknown god has used some power to give awareness to people in a novel or a legend. But ultimately…we are not real.

“Our memories are false, our familial ties are false, our realm is false, even we ourself… In this nation, even we ourself are fake.” Emperor Jingren opened his eyes. Though it hurt, though he was weary, he still spoke these words.

Xiao Jinyi couldn’t breathe from pain. He embraced the young emperor who seemed so frail, clasping him tightly in his arms. “You aren’t fake. If you’re fake, what becomes of me!”

Though he had known all along that this world was constructed out of data, who was to say for certain that the young emperor was fake? He lived so truly, more clear-sighted than anyone. He might be composed only of many clusters of data, but this world had been operating for four years. During these four years, all the NPCs had lived in this fabricated world. How could they be fake!

“Then tell us—this body of ours that feels pain, that aches, that bleeds, is it real? Your body, which doesn’t feel pain and has unsurpassed martial skills, is that real?” Emperor Jingren asked.

Xiao Jinyi could not respond. He couldn’t give Emperor Jingren such a cruel answer. But neither could he explain an electronic world to Emperor Jingren, explain a fabricated two-dimensional reality. Must one have flesh and blood to be truly alive? Then what were all those movies about artificial intelligence having emotions talking about? Who said that data with sufficiently high processing power couldn’t think for itself!

Any being that had thoughts was alive.

“Your wounds have reopened, Empress. Even if you don’t feel pain, we feel it on your behalf.” As if regaining a bit of strength, Emperor Jingren struggled free of Xiao Jinyi’s embrace, removed his bandages, then reapplied salve to stop the bleeding.

Cold water dripped onto Emperor Jingren’s hand as he worked. His hand paused briefly, but he didn’t raise his head. He didn’t want to see a grown man cry, and he didn’t want to cry along with him out of pity for himself.

There was nothing to pity. He, Shen Junrui, was emperor of the State of Xia, possessor of a vast territory, bearing responsibility for millions of people on his shoulders. Even if all of this was false, as long as he existed, as long as he could think, everything was real.

“To judge from your condition, while you don’t feel pain, the damage is still done. Yan Xu did not come back to life after he was decapitated. Even if he didn’t truly die, he still seems to have been limited in some way and unable to return,” Emperor Jingren said calmly. “We do not know what you came here to do, but we do not believe that you have attained your goal. Don’t die, then, and don’t let yourself become disabled and restricted in your movements just because you aren’t afraid of pain.”

“I will let my wounds heal,” said Xiao Jinyi. “Huyan Xi was unexpected. I don’t know what his goal is, and I must take him alive and learn from him what became of a certain person.”

Emperor Jingren was silent awhile, then removed the pendant that had hung around his neck all this time and placed it in Xiao Jinyi’s hand.

“This is the only present you have given us. We have always worn it. But remembering your expression at the time, you must have taken us for the wrong person?” Invariably calm, Emperor Jingren said, “We are not the person you are looking for.”

Holding the pendant still warm from Emperor Jingren’s body, Xiao Jinyi’s hand, which seemed to be made of iron, trembled. His well-behaved, sensible young emperor, occupant of the throne, this world’s golden child, so treasured this completely unremarkable little item, carrying it with him always. The way he cherished this pendant clearly reflected the way he loved and cherished Xiao Jinyi, yet now he wanted to return it to him in its original condition?

Was the mission more important, or was love more important?

In a conflict between intellect and emotion, Emperor Jingren chose to bury everything at the bottom of his heart and continue to be an earnest and responsible emperor, as prescribed by convention. He chose to return the pendant, hiding his feelings in his heart forever. Emperor Jingren was always rational. He could control all his desires and do what he ought to do.

But it was precisely this that made one’s heart bleed for him.

Emperor Jingren’s gaze held no emotion as he looked at the pendant, but Xiao Jinyi could still feel the sadness and reluctance in the young emperor’s heart.

Everything was an illusion. This was the only thing that might be true. Yet he wanted to give back the only reality.

For Xiao Jinyi, reason would never have the upper hand.

As he raised the pendant and hung it around Emperor Jingren’s neck once more, Xiao Jinyi said, “This is an heirloom of your subject wife’s family, more precious than my life. Your subject wife gave Your Majesty my most precious possession. Please accept this gift as I intended it.”

When the pendant once again hung around Emperor Jingren’s neck, Xiao Jinyi understood: in his heart, his mission came before his life, but Emperor Jingren came before everything.

He couldn’t even bear to let the young emperor frown. All he wanted was to shelter him in his embrace.

Emperor Jingren touched the pendant on his chest. His expression remained unchanged, but his fingers wouldn’t leave the pendant. Quietly, he said, “You said just now you wanted to find somebody through Huyan Xi. We think that you once believed that we were this person, and this pendant is the only token by which you may identify that person, which you meant to present to us?”

“No,” Xiao Jinyi lied readily. “I only wanted to give Your Majesty a present.”

Holding the pendant, Emperor Jingren said, “Xiao Jinyi, there is no need for you to look at us so guiltily. You have done nothing wrong.

“You have done no wrong. None of you people have done wrong. This whole realm has done no wrong.

“It is we who are wrong. We ought to have kept to our role, doing what we ought to be doing instead of digging to the bottom of things trying to understand.

“Life is such a rare, bewildering thing. We shouldn’t be so wide awake.”