Chapter 51

The Emperor felt as though he was being played for a fool, but after recalling that he had just spent two full quarters of an hour answering one hundred and seventy-two questions, he could not simply let the matter drop.

Had Xue Jin'an known what was passing through the Emperor's mind, he would certainly have enlightened him about a modern economic concept known as sunk cost—the expenditure of resources that has already been made and cannot be recovered. Due to various reasons, when the initial investment of energy, money, and other composite costs is substantial and yields no return, human beings often find it difficult to make rational choices, choosing instead to sink even more into the venture, though the outcome is rarely satisfactory.

The Emperor, trapped by the weight of his sunk cost, let out a cold laugh. "Very well, I shall see what this so-called sixteen-personality type truly is!"

As he spoke, he picked up a red jade paperweight carved in the likeness of the mythical beast Bai Ze from his desk, and addressed the voice in his mind, "This paperweight was carved from a single piece of natural red jade and is of immense value. Can this object of mine offset the fifty pieces of gold?"

Xue Jin'an made it clear that fifty pieces of gold meant fifty pieces of gold, refusing to open any auxiliary pawnshop services: [Insufficient balance. Order payment failed.]

[This order will be reserved for you for a quarter of an hour. If payment is not received within this period, the order will be cancelled by default. Please be advised.] The moment the words fell, a glowing red countdown timer materialized above the payment interface.

The Emperor did not recognize those Arabic numerals, but he was far from stupid. Knowing the initial duration was a quarter of an hour, he observed them closely for a moment and soon discerned their correspondence. Almost instantly, he realized the immense value concealed behind such simplified forms of numbers.

To put it simply, if such numerals were used for bookkeeping, the thickness of the account ledgers could be reduced by two-thirds!

A sudden surge of curiosity toward this entity capable of voice-transmission gripped the Emperor. Previously, he had merely maintained his guard and precautions, guessing at the instructions of whoever stood behind the scenes; but now, he wished nothing more than to drag this person out and make him serve his own ends.

That being the case, he could by no means abandon this opportunity to establish a connection. Thinking thus, the Emperor put down the paperweight and reached instead for the two pouches hanging from his belt. Yet, as the master of the imperial palace whom everyone else needed to grease with wealth, he was the sole person who required no money of his own.

Consequently, the Emperor's pouches served a purely decorative purpose: one contained a tiny golden scale, and the other a small jade *ruyi*, symbolizing smooth and wish-fulfilling fortunes.

Both trinkets had been consecrated by the Abbot Master of Wanfu Temple as spiritually potent items. Setting aside their exquisite craftsmanship, they even had the Emperor's name and birth characters engraved upon them, meaning they absolutely could not be allowed to fall into the hands of outsiders.

Without hesitation, the Emperor summoned Li Hechun to his side.

Li Hechun had been observing the Emperor's facial expressions for some time. Watching the Emperor mutter to himself, stare intently at the paperweight, and finally fish out pouches he hadn't touched in ages... it truly looked as though he had been possessed by an evil spirit.

However, when called upon, Li Hechun snapped out of it instantly. His aged eyes darted craftily around the room, and he lowered his voice to ask, "Your Majesty, could it be that you are hearing that voice once more?"

The Emperor nodded with dignified restraint, reclaimed his pouches, and felt their heavy, bulging weight in his palm. He gave them a light toss, casting a look that was half-smile and half-sneer at Li Hechun. "It seems your pockets are lined quite well on a regular basis."

Li Hechun wore an obsequious smile like a blooming chrysanthemum, currying favor immediately, "Everything this slave possesses is a gift from Your Majesty, sustained entirely by Your Majesty's boundless grace."

"A smooth-tongued rogue," the Emperor rebuked him mildly, though he thoroughly enjoyed the flattery. He unfastened the pouch in his hand, and his eyes were instantly dazzled by the unique, resplendent radiance of gold and silver treasures within.

Aside from those, there was also a luminous night pearl and... a handful of copper coins?

At the sight of these items, the Emperor instantly recognized them as the pouch Li Hechun used for everyday tips; his own truly private pouches should be tucked away in his sleeve pocket, which meant these copper coins had originated from ordinary rewards.

"Who bestowed these?" The Emperor counted them—there were only fifty cash. Throughout his entire life, this was the first time he had ever used such a minuscule denomination of currency, which felt utterly incongruous with the aesthetic of the entire pouch.

Li Hechun was equally surprised to see the coins. Ever since he had ascended to the post of Head Eunuch of the Qianyuan Palace, the smallest tips he ever accepted came from minor, out-of-favor concubines in the inner harem who wanted him to place their bamboo tally slips closer to the front when the Emperor was selecting a companion for the night—and even those started at a minimum of five taels of silver.

Truth be told, Li Hechun had not laid eyes on a single copper coin in his personal purse for a very long time.

He could not help but trace back the origin of these fifty cash, vaguely recalling they had been received on the day of the assassination attempt at the Imperial Academy. Surely he hadn't accepted money he ought not to have taken, or leaked information he should have kept secret? Terrified by his own alarming thoughts, Li Hechun grew instantly too guilty to let his mind wander further down that path.

"This old slave cannot recall for the moment. No doubt it was some trivial commission, perhaps a token of filial piety from a minor eunuch," Li Hechun glossed over the matter with a forced, casual tone.

The Emperor did not press the issue further. Instead, he piled the gold and silver ingots together and asked, "Should this suffice?"

[Payment successful!] With a flick of his wrist, Xue Jin'an materialized fifty taels of gold out of thin air. Having secured the funds, his administrative efficiency was brisk, and he immediately transmitted the test results.

The Emperor had imagined various methods by which the other party might collect the money, but he never anticipated that the wealth would vanish straight from his hand into nothingness. The Emperor could not help but curl his fingers into a fist, yet Li Hechun stood nearby without betraying the slightest trace of surprise, as if the manner in which the money had disappeared was entirely commonplace.

Despite the bizarre and supernatural nature of the scene, the Emperor inexplicably felt no inclination to investigate further, right up until the stack of memorial memorials piled upon his desk suddenly collapsed.

The memorial right at the top—the one Prince Ping had asked Li Hechun to deliver, which had subsequently earned the latter a severe reprimand—unfolded entirely on its own as if pulled by an invisible hand, displaying its densely written front side downward and exposing the blank back.

Then, the Emperor watched with his own eyes as neat, utterly devoid of spiritual aura characters manifested out of thin air across the paper surface. The first four bizarre symbols that appeared were ones he had never laid eyes on before.

The Emperor sprang up with a sharp motion, gazing in mingled awe and apprehension at the memorial that had filled with writing in the blink of an eye.

"Your Majesty, take care! Protect the Emperor!" Such a miraculous and uncanny spectacle chilled Li Hechun to the marrow, and he instantly threw his arms wide to shield the Emperor behind him.

Hearing the shouts, the imperial guards rushed inward, but before they could draw their weapons, the Emperor waved a hand to dismiss them.

[The results have been sent to your account. Please check them carefully. If you have any questions, you may consult your exclusive mentor. Simply call out "Little X, Little X" to awaken.]

Without changing his expression, the Emperor folded the memorial and gripped it in his hand, his long sleeves sliding down to conceal his hands completely. It seemed as though nothing out of the ordinary had occurred, yet the very instant his hand dropped, the memorial had already been swapped.

Li Hechun quietly slipped away with the substituted memorial, intending to examine the paper and ink thoroughly to see if they had undergone any chemical treatment requiring specific methods to reveal hidden text.

Such methods were hardly rare; the Bureau of Imperial Garments occasionally employed them when transmitting messages—writing with sugar water on paper, letting it dry until the words vanished, and holding it near a fire to make them reappear.

Suspecting this to be an elaborate plot, the Emperor pretended not to notice anything amiss and steadied the voice within his mind. "Little... Fork Mentor, what are the sixteen personality types?"

Naturally, Xue Jin'an had witnessed their petty maneuvers, but he cared little. After all, he hadn't tampered with the memorial itself; humans invariably sought logical self-consistency and would eventually find a rational explanation for everything.

[The sixteen personality types are...] Xue Jin'an outlined the background of the test, but finding the lore too cumbersome, he simply dumped the characteristics of all sixteen personality types directly into the Emperor's account for him to read on his own.

Thus, the Emperor watched as several more memorials on his desk unfolded in the same miraculous fashion, their blank backs becoming occupied by text appearing out of thin air.

Unable to mask the astonishment on his face any longer, the Emperor relaxed his grip, causing the memorial to slip from his sleeve and hit the floor with a crisp slap.

He paid no mind to whether the dropped memorial would reveal that it was no longer the original document. Instead, he began rapidly flipping through the other memorials bearing text, confirming that they originated from different people and had been dispatched at entirely different times.

If a single memorial malfunctioned, one could argue that human hands had tampered with it; but when multiple unrelated memorials simultaneously exhibited such anomalies, the probability of human manipulation diminished drastically.

Perhaps he had been wrong from the very beginning—this voice echoing inside his mind was not some martial arts master transmitting his voice over a distance.

Of course, human agency remained a possibility, except—the Emperor reviewed the owners of those memorials, the majority of whom held pivotal positions at court. Had the adversary truly controlled so many high ministers, his own imperial throne would have been abdicated long ago.

Therefore, after eliminating every other possibility, only a single explanation remained, and no matter how absurd it seemed, it was the correct answer.

This was no work of mortal hands, but divine might! He had been blessed by the gods! A brilliant light flashed suddenly in the Emperor's eyes, and he felt overwhelmed by ecstatic joy.

Indeed, precisely so! The imperial secret service had ransacked the Qianyuan Palace from top to bottom yet found nothing; despite such glaring vulnerabilities, he had never once suspected intrusion—that was the work of divine power!

The deity was unwilling to reveal his identity or presence, which was why they were made to treat anomalies as commonplace. Perhaps the youthfulness of the voice was no act either, but a reflection of his actual tender age—he was merely a divine child.

And precisely because of his tender age and volatile temperament, he spoke without restraint... Thus, everything fell neatly into place!

Yet since the divine child had no wish to expose himself, the Emperor still needed to pretend ignorance and play along.

Convinced he had uncovered the truth, the Emperor suppressed his racing heart and trembling hands, eager to converse properly with the divine child.

A dynasty and an emperor blessed by the gods—the Emperor felt as though he could already behold a brilliant, radiant future illuminating the world.

Choosing his words with utmost care, the Emperor pondered how to converse with the divine child, build rapport, and subtly fish for information beneficial to himself.

However, Xue Jin'an had no interest in chatting with the Emperor; he had already spotted Zhou Yushu entering the camera frame.

Still, since he had taken the money, Xue Jin'an gave it some thought and simply summoned the intelligent voice assistant.

He modified a portion of its code, integrated all the psychological test data into its system, and imported big data analytical learning capabilities to make it appear more intelligent—at least ensuring that casual conversation wouldn't instantly provoke humans into cursing it as artificial stupidity.

Xue Jin'an changed its wake-word to "Mentor Little X," bringing a fresh professional planning mentor into existence.

And while he was busy with all of this, the Emperor and Zhou Yushu met face-to-face.

Initially, the Emperor had no desire to see Zhou Yushu, assuming he, like everyone else, had come to demand severe punishment for Baoning. Yet Zhou Yushu had sent word through Li Hechun that he was here to confess his crimes.