Finally reaching the palace, Peng Mingzhu and Wei Li were greeted by a eunuch who led them to the building for coroners where body examinations took place.
Throughout the entire time that they were walking, silence permeated the atmosphere as the group walked towards the buildings that they needed to be at. At the same time, each person was checking each other out. The exception being Peng Mingzhu who was more focused on the architecture and the materials used to build the old and grand palace.
The palace was definitely ancient and something like she expected to see. However, if there was anything unexpected that she did not think she would see in the palace, it would be the phoenix carvings that were placed everywhere just like the dragons that signified the emperor.
In her world, the palace did not have carvings of phoenixes aside from the places that the empress frequented or places that were designated to the empress. If phoenixes were placed in a location where only the emperor could frequent, the empress could potentially get dethroned, divorced, or even killed for treason.
The eunuch was secretly taking sneak peeks at Peng Mingzhu, trying to guess who this miss was that was walking with Wei Li, their crown prince. Urgently, the eunuch tried to remember if there were any young misses from a noble family that looked like her, but the eunuch could not remember seeing anyone who looked like her. At the very least, not someone who gave off the same aura as her.
The aura that Peng Mingzhu gave off was elegant, mature, and calm. When she wanted to be gentle, she would give off that aura. When she wanted to be cold, she would give off that aura.
In other words, her default aura was elegant, mature, and calm, but she seemed like someone who could easily manipulate her aura into something different. The eunuch just happened to be able to sense this by taking sneak peeks at her.
Even though the eunuch thought that he was being secretive at looking her up and down, Peng Mingzhu could notice his secretive looks. After all, she was trained to be sensitive to the stares from people.
As for Wei Li, he was also staring at Peng Mingzhu trying to just see through her, wanting to find just who she was. Unfortunately, she was such a closed person that unless she wanted someone to know about her, they would be unable to guess what her real personality was.
"We are here," the eunuch announced, gesturing his hand while bowing at a huge entrance.
"He won't be entering with us?" Peng Mingzhu asked as she looked at the building that seemed to be almost empty.
Turning to Peng Mingzhu, the eunuch informed, "This servant has no right to enter as there may be discussions of private information."
Understanding what the eunuch was telling her, Peng Mingzhu nodded and hummed a sound to demonstrate her understanding before entering the building with Wei Li.
When they entered the building, Peng Mingzhu realized that the inside was just as dark as she thought it would be. From outside, she could already see that there were very little light sources, with only a few candlesticks lit out of the many that were placed in the hall that they were standing in. Though, she did not understand why, she did not feel the need to question it, so she did not ask Wei Li.
"Your Highness, Miss Peng, please follow me," a man came from nowhere and said.
Confused at how the man knew her surname, Peng Mingzhu asked Wei Li, "You told them my name?"
"I told them that I would be bringing you along with me, so I gave them a paper with some information about you," Wei Li confirmed her suspicions. "Though, there was little to no information on your paper that I give out to them aside from your name."
Sighing, Peng Mingzhu internally thought, 'That's good because I would've burned the paper.'
Bringing them to an underground room that was filled with the putrid smells of dead human bodies, the man announced, "We are here. The elders and seniors are already examining the bodies."
Nodding, Wei Li entered the room and so did Peng Mingzhu as she followed him.
While they entered, Peng Mingzhu could hear the discussions going on.
"Elder Kang, please draw them accurately. We need to identify these people." an elderly voice kindly asked.
"Yes, yes, don't worry about it. You have no trust in my people?" another elderly voice, most probably the Elder Kang being addressed responded.
Then, a sigh could be heard while complaining, "What is the emperor thinking? Telling us to examine these bodies. Other than dying from stab wounds, there are no other reasons. Not only that, it would be easier to identify the bodies if they just hung up the body at the front of the palace. What is the use of telling us to draw their faces and maintaining their dead bodies?"
Hearing his complaint, Peng Mingzhu decided to pitch in for no reason other than the fact that she was bored, "The emperor is trying to maintain a good reputation for the imperial family by showing the importance of a mass murder; basically saying that even if this is not a plague, he as the emperor would still show compassion and kindness. As for why he would tell you guys to draw their profiles, naturally it is also to maintain the integrity of the imperial family. If they showed the bodies to the public, there would be an outrage claiming that the imperial family was disrespecting dead people."
Not expecting someone to come in, the elder was shocked and whiplashed his head to stare at the female voice that just spoke at the entrance.
Despite the surprise on his face, the elder soon calmed down and asked, "Miss, you are?"
Too lazy to introduce herself, Peng Mingzhu stared at Wei Li, 'You did drag me here after all. And for such a boring thing too.'
"This is Miss Peng Mingzhu," Wei Li introduced. "Hopefully you guys have remembered the paper I ordered my subordinate to give you guys?"
"Ah, so it is the famous Miss Peng," the elder claimed with a satirical smile. "Your Highness, is it fine to have Miss Peng here? A place where the dead are placed?"
"You should ask Miss Peng that question if you are curious," Wei Li avoided the question as he did not want to answer something he had no answer to.
Sensing that Wei Li was slowly learning about what type of person she was, Peng Mingzhu answered, "Merely bodies with stab wounds. I've seen worse."
Indeed, she has seen worse, dirtier, uglier...so much worse than any other human has witnessed.
She has seen bodies that have been dismembered. Bodies that have been poisoned. Bodies that have been torn apart by animals.
There was not a single scene that she has not witnessed, so seeing a body that was killed from stab wounds did not scare her. In fact, she considered them normal.
Besides, she received quite a lot of stab wounds herself. So much that she has grown so used to the pain they were now painless to her.
[A/N: If anyone is supposed to feel pain but is not feeling pain, please go visit a doctor. Don't do what Peng Mingzhu is doing. That's just suicidal. Your body is supposed to have feelings, not numbness.]
A bit startled by her answer, the elder was unable to hide his expression when he saw no change on her face. Actually, he was wrong. There was a change.
Her face was incredibly cold. Incredibly cold and empty.
Her face sheltered an expression of ruthlessness towards the living, something that a normal person would never hold. However, that face disappeared just as soon as the elder saw it, almost making him believe he was hallucinating.
"Well, why don't you look at that?" Elder Kang remarked. "A young miss knows even more than you Elder Xiao."
Hearing that remark, Elder Xiao blushed from embarrassment, raising his voice in shame, "Ha! Are you making fun of me?! I'm sure this young miss knows how to draw even better than you!"
"Oh," Elder Kang mumbled plainly. "That's good. I've been looking for a successor for a while now."
Seeing their bicker go back and forth, Peng Mingzhu frowned. However, at the same time her eyes were staring at the hands belonging to Elder Kang.
Even while he was actively engaging Elder Xiao, he was also drawing the profiles of the dead bodies. That meant that he was multitasking - separating his attention on three different things: Elder Xiao, the canvas, and the bodies.
"Elder Xiao, will you not be maintaining the bodies?" Peng Mingzhu asked as she saw that the elder was not showing any actions in the least like Elder Kang.
Elder Kang scoffed at her question and answered for the old man, "Old Xiao is such a lazy bastard. You really expect him to do his job at this early of a timeline? He probably won't do it until the body is already about to breakdown."
"Oh…" Peng Mingzhu muttered with a hand on her chin. "This is boring. I'm leaving."