Chapter 78

Having thoroughly dealt with Cheng Qingyao, Cheng Ruyi spared her no further attention. Time was a precious commodity; who would willingly waste it on someone like her?

Aside from eating and eating some more, Cheng Ruyi didn’t have a single bit of entertainment to pass her days. Everyone else was completely swept up in the ice-harvesting frenzy. Watching the best friend duo of Cheng Yu and Rong Ting head out cheerfully every single morning to cut ice and haul back cartloads of lively, thrashing fish, she had to admit they were living incredibly fulfilling lives.

Unable to sit idly by, a highly enthusiastic Cheng Ruyi officially joined their ice-harvesting squad.

Despite the biting, freezing winds, the Grand Canal on the outskirts of the capital was a scene of bustling, white-hot activity.

The moment Cheng Ruyi arrived, she was greeted by the sight of the frozen canal completely packed with ships. Each vessel flew sails of different colors, displaying various family surnames and official military ranks.

Soldiers were stationed along the riverbanks to maintain order. The common citizens were concentrated in a single designated sector to harvest their ice, while the remaining stretches of the winding, sprawling river had been systematically carved up by various prominent clans and wealthy households. Dense crowds of people lined the edges of the massive waterway.

No one was happier than the common folk who had come to cut ice, as they were managing to harvest an abundance of fish every single day.

Had it not been for this year’s grand, roaring ice-harvesting campaign, they never would have known that one could pull so many fish from a frozen river in the dead of winter. Even though they were shivering violently from the cold, their faces remained plastered with wide smiles.

In truth, a major reason these citizens dared to risk the freezing waters to harvest fish was the complimentary warming tonic provided by the local authorities. However, lacking large vessels, they only dared to cut ice a short distance from the banks.

Cheng Ruyi felt a surge of pure excitement witnessing this spectacle. No wonder nobody seemed to notice the biting cold; the sheer density of the crowd created a remarkably vibrant energy.

“This river is so incredibly long and wide, surely it won’t ever dry up, right?” Cheng Ruyi gazed out across the vast icy expanse of the canal, murmuring a curious, contemplative remark.

In the original novel, the source of this Grand Canal completely dried up, which ultimately forced the entire population of the capital to migrate toward major oceans and rivers that were immune to the drought. Along the way, countless disasters and casualties had occurred during that grueling migration.

Naturally, that narrative had been written entirely from the female lead’s perspective—designed specifically to highlight her brilliant intellect, foster her romantic bond with the male lead, and boost her public prestige along the way.

“Of course it won’t dry up. In truth, everyone is harvesting ice simply because they fear the weather will be completely unbearable during next year’s drought, so they want ice blocks on hand to beat the heat,” Li Fan explained to the side-consort with a respectful smile.

This Grand Canal hadn’t dried up once in hundreds of years. Even during a severe drought, it would at most shrink a little. As long as there was flowing water, they had nothing to fear from a dry spell.

Cheng Ruyi merely offered a mysterious, knowing smile: “Personally, I believe it’s always best to be prepared for any eventuality. This Grand Canal is indeed remarkably long and wide, and it certainly looks like it could never run dry—but who can truly predict what the future holds?”

This was a living, breathing reality now. The plot points detailed in the novel were merely the tip of a massive iceberg. The capital was the core battlefield of the original text, and when the narrative demanded the Grand Canal to dry up, it would do so without a single moment’s delay.

Li Fan didn’t particularly take the side-consort’s philosophical musings to heart, though he politely nodded in agreement regardless. Seeing his reaction, Cheng Ruyi simply smiled and dropped the subject.

The surrounding crowds were thoroughly astonished by Cheng Ruyi’s arrival. No one had anticipated that a dignified royal side-consort would personally join the ice-harvesting labor. Then again, considering her notoriously eccentric reputation, it somehow felt entirely par for the course.

Ignoring the covert, assessing glances from the surrounding crowd, Cheng Yu enthusiastically followed Cheng Ruyi and Rong Ting aboard a massive vessel belonging to the Prince Rong Estate.

The ice-harvesting territory allocated to the Marquis of Changle’s estate was situated right next to theirs, but Cheng Yu preferred cutting ice alongside Rong Ting, so he routinely nested himself on Prince Rong’s ship. Neither the Marquis of Changle nor Prince Rong harbored any objections; the relationship between the two households was exceptionally close. Furthermore, with the elite royal guards securing the perimeter, the Marquis felt infinitely more at ease.

Operating aboard a massive vessel on the icy expanse was exceptionally secure.

“Big Sister, are you going to pull up some ice blocks with us?” Cheng Yu asked excitedly, hauling over a tightly woven, heavy-duty fishing net.

Rong Ting was also lugging a massive net, his face a picture of absolute eagerness: “Sister-in-law, want to join in?”

“…Weren’t we supposed to be cutting ice? Why does it look like everyone is simply using fishing nets to scoop it up?” Cheng Ruyi observed the surrounding workers; every single one of them would smash the frozen surface open first before deploying massive nets to haul the blocks aboard.

And along with the ice blocks, they routinely dragged up massive hauls of fish…

She was entirely dumbfounded by the sight.

Ice blocks that have been rubbed all over by thrashing fish are going to reek of a fishy odor!

“Big Sister, scooping the ice out with nets is infinitely safer than hacking it out block by block. At any rate, these ice blocks are strictly intended for cooling environments, not for human consumption, so it doesn’t matter,” Cheng Yu scrambled to explain.

Cheng Ruyi offered a deeply brooding remark: “…Mark my words, when the water supply runs completely dry later on, and people melt these ice blocks just to wash their garments, everything is bound to reek of a distinct fishy odor.”

Cheng Yu scratched his head, offering a highly uncertain response: “…Surely it won’t be that bad?”

“Of course it will. If you don’t believe me, just wait and see,” Cheng Ruyi huffed, rolling her eyes.

The mere realization that the contents of the several massive ice cellars back at their estate had been harvested in this exact manner made her feel thoroughly unsettled. Fortunately, she had personally cast a substantial volume of pure ice blocks using custom molds and stored them in a completely separate reserve.

The nearby crew members who had subtly pricked up their ears to eavesdrop on the side-consort’s words: “…”

Cheng Ruyi didn’t waste any more breath on them. Since everyone else was operating this way, she casually grabbed a massive net and flung it toward a colossal sheet of ice, effortlessly hauling the massive block onto the deck all by herself.

Compared to the neighboring teams of two or three men straining violently just to pull in a single net, her execution was absurdly effortless. Fortunately, everyone present was well aware that Cheng Ruyi possessed a legendary, monstrous strength, so they viewed the display with absolute nonchalance.

Cheng Ruyi’s harvesting speed was blindingly fast. Within a brief window of time, the icy waters surrounding the massive vessel were completely cleared out, forcing the ship to advance a short distance forward. Cheng Yu stared listlessly at the meager collection of small ice chunks and a handful of tiny fish he had managed to pull up, letting out a silent, defeated sigh. When he glanced over at Brother Rong Ting’s haul, he noted that the older boy’s results were infinitely superior to his own.

As noon approached, the ice-harvesting labor was largely winding down for the day, leaving a massive expanse of open water across the canal’s surface, which would freeze solid again by tomorrow morning.

Right at that moment, a sharp, blood-curdling shriek suddenly pierced the air: “Help! A great white shark is coming! Run for your lives!”

A great white shark…

Cheng Ruyi’s eyes widened to the size of saucers.

“Did my ears just deceive me? This is the Grand Canal, not the open ocean! Where on earth would a great white shark even come from?”

“It really is a great white shark! Big Sister, we need to run, fast!” Cheng Yu’s legs began to tremble violently with absolute terror as he spotted a colossal shark slicing through the water at blistering speed in the distance.

The entire crew aboard their vessel was pushed to the absolute verge of collapsing from sheer fright, wanting nothing more than to immediately turn the ship around and flee the coordinates.

Cheng Ruyi focused her gaze on the approaching target, and sure enough, it was a colossal shark. Its monstrous, moisture-gleaming head exuded pure ferocity, and its gaping maw exposed rows of razor-sharp teeth that glinted with a chilling, deathly light—a sight guaranteed to make anyone’s scalp tingle with raw dread.

What made the situation infinitely more terrifying was that it wasn’t a solitary beast; there were several of them traveling together.

The surrounding vessels began fleeing frantically toward the riverbanks. Piercing shrieks and panicked cries echoed across the water in a chaotic chorus, everyone terrified of lagging a step behind and transforming into shark bait.

Amidst the pandemonium, Cheng Ruyi remained completely, utterly unbothered. In fact, her eyes lit up with a brilliant, predatory gleam, as if she were gazing upon a collection of premium, top-tier delicacies.

It’s just a handful of sharks.

This is a perfect opportunity to slaughter them and stock up on our meat reserves.

“All of you hold on a minute, stop scrambling to flee for your lives. Just wait a second until I slaughter these great white sharks,” Cheng Ruyi commanded, her eyes burning with pure excitement as she locked her gaze onto the targets.

“Side-consort, great white sharks are notoriously vicious apex predators. It is infinitely wiser for us to steer clear!” Li Fan’s soul nearly leaped out of his skin from pure fright. The side-consort actually wanted to hunt sharks; wasn’t this an explicit act of seeking her own death? He immediately scrambled to persuade her.

Seeing that almost every other vessel had safely reached the banks while their own ship remained anchored in deep water, Li Fan looked as though he were on the absolute verge of tears as the great white sharks drew closer.

The personal guards and servants aboard the deck had turned completely pale, a singular, grim resolve settling into their hearts: They would sacrifice their literal lives to protect their self-destructive side-consort.

Cheng Ruyi waved her hand with absolute nonchalance: “Don’t fret, this will only take a quick jiffy.”

Once the words left her lips, she ducked into the cabin and emerged with a handful of small, smooth pebbles, tossing them lightly in her palm to gauge their weight. In reality, these stones were nothing more than a physical prop to camouflage her true, fatal mental energy strike.

Witnessing his sister’s absolute composure, the suffocating terror consuming Cheng Yu’s chest dissipated substantially, replaced by an aura of calm. Big Sister is incredibly powerful; she should be more than capable of handling a few sharks.

Within a fraction of a heartbeat, the great white sharks were right upon them.

Under the collective, wide-eyed gaze of the entire crew, the pebbles launched from Cheng Ruyi’s hand flew with flawless precision, every single stone striking the skulls of the approaching beasts. Simultaneously, she covertly deployed her mental energy to systematically pulverize the internal brain matter of the sharks. The massive creatures let out agonizing, muffled screeches as the surrounding river waters erupted into violent, churning waves. Within moments, the open water was stained a vivid, deep crimson.

Just like that, the several great white sharks ceased all movement.

Whatever happened to the legendary, terrifying leviathans of the deep ocean?

To think they died just like that… you’ve got to be kidding us, right?

Cheng Ruyi clapped the dust from her hands with immense satisfaction, ordering joyfully: “Alright, the great white sharks are thoroughly dead. Li Fan, dispatch a team to haul these massive sharks to the riverbank. These are officially our premium food reserves; we are having a feast of shark meat tonight!”

The entire population standing along the riverbanks was completely rooted to the spot, their jaws dropping in absolute, speech-defying disbelief.

Having experienced a dizzying roller coaster of extreme emotions, Li Fan was left in a thoroughly dazed, catatonic state. He had never anticipated that the side-consort could be so terrifyingly powerful—to think she had brought down apex predators using nothing more than a few random pebbles, cleanly resolving a massive crisis.

Because Cheng Ruyi’s slaughter of the sharks had been executed with such blistering speed, the crew members didn’t even register a lingering sensation of having survived a brush with death. One second they were prepared to swear a solemn vow to protect the side-consort with their literal bodies; the next second, the monstrous sharks had already been cleanly snuffed out.

Even after the operatives of the Prince Rong Estate had successfully retrieved the massive carcasses and hauled them away, the entire populace remained thoroughly trapped in a state of profound shock. The apex predators of the open ocean had been dealt with as effortlessly as swatting flies; the gazes the crowd directed toward Cheng Ruyi were akin to looking at a literal monster.

Witnessing a woman possess such terrifyingly dominant power, everyone silently shed a tear of profound sympathy for the Heir Apparent of Prince Wei.

When Prince Rong received word that his daughter-in-law had once again transformed into the most sensational topic of conversation across the capital, and factored in the servants’ detailed descriptions of how she had effortlessly brought down sharks with casual stone throws… the corners of his mouth couldn’t resist twitching violently.

Compared to the terrifying leviathans of the deep ocean, it appeared his own daughter-in-law was the most vicious apex predator of them all.

The moment Rong Mo learned that his little wife had slaughtered several sharks, he felt entirely overwhelmed. He had initially assumed his little wife was merely capable of dominating the terrestrial landscape; who could have foreseen that she could effortlessly conquer the open oceans as well? At this rate, she was practically on the verge of ascending to the heavens.

Once the estate’s master chefs processed the shark meat, the flavor turned out to be spectacularly delicious. The entire household of the Marquis of Changle was cordially invited over to the Prince Rong Estate to partake in the massive shark feast. The Marquis of Changle ate with the absolute highest level of joy—after all, this was a shark personally slaughtered by his precious daughter.

The following morning, the atmosphere along the Grand Canal was exceptionally desolate, with practically no one turning up to harvest ice. Having lived through the great white shark incident, and seeing that a massive stretch of the river water had been dyed crimson with blood, who on earth knew whether the newly formed ice blocks had been contaminated by the gore?

Thus, the populace collectively decided to bring a premature end to the ice-harvesting campaign; even the common citizens refused to venture out. It was simply too perilous. Heaven only knew whether another pack of great white sharks might suddenly materialize out of nowhere.

The general public was entirely speechless over the fact that Cheng Ruyi had managed to spark such an earth-shattering commotion during her very first ice-harvesting outing. Fortunately, there were barely a handful of days remaining before the winter season officially drew to a complete close.

Cheng Ruyi found it a trace peculiar that the general public didn’t seem overtly shocked by the bizarre appearance of deep-sea predators inside an inland canal. When she privately questioned Rong Mo regarding the matter, she learned that the capital’s Grand Canal was actually directly connected to the open ocean, and a similar incident involving great white sharks had occurred roughly a century ago.

Cheng Ruyi: “…”

Listening to her husband’s explanation, Cheng Ruyi suddenly recalled a subtle detail she had initially overlooked: those great white sharks had actually seemed to be harboring pre-existing injuries before she even attacked them. With that realization, she completely cast the matter from her mind.

If this Grand Canal was destined to dry up entirely down the line anyway, the fleeting appearance of a few sharks was hardly a matter worth losing sleep over!

The Prince Rong Estate and the Marquis of Changle’s estate had remained feverishly occupied for nearly forty days, successfully packing their respective underground ice cellars to the absolute brim. Precisely forty days later, coinciding perfectly with the arrival of the New Year, the skies finally began to clear as the ambient temperature experienced a steady rise.

By this point, however, the populace was thoroughly prepared.

Aside from their underlying anxieties regarding the future, the common folk felt an immense, silent wave of profound gratitude. Fortunately, the grand monks had accurately foreseen the arrival of this natural disaster well in advance; now that they were thoroughly prepared, they simply needed to grit their teeth and endure these next two years.

“How on earth did winter pass by so incredibly fast?”

Cheng Ruyi murmured listlessly, nibbling on a strip of dried meat as she watched the snowman she had constructed in her courtyard slowly dissolve into a puddle of water, her mood thoroughly depressed.

Moxiang stepped into the courtyard lugging a beautifully crafted, massive lacquered box, only to find her mistress looking completely drained of spirit. A row of dark lines slid down her forehead; her mistress was mourning the melting snowman yet again.

“Miss, the young master explicitly purchased a vast assortment of pastries from the Wuwei Pavilion.”

The moment her ears caught the mention of pastries from the Wuwei Pavilion, Cheng Ruyi’s spirit experienced an instant, dramatic surge of vitality, her fleeting sadness evaporating into thin air without a trace. She rapidly gobbled down the remaining strip of dried meat, swiftly snatched the lacquered box from Moxiang’s hands, flipped the lid open, and pinched a pastry to pop into her mouth.

As she chewed happily, she questioned: “MExiang, where is Mo right now?”

“The young master has a mountain of official duties to oversee, so he won’t be returning to the estate to partake in luncheon today,” Moxiang replied, pouring a cup of hot tea for her mistress.

“I heard the Emperor has recently been deploying military forces to various prefectures and commanderies. Mo operates directly under Prince Pingnan’s jurisdiction; surely he won’t be dispatched out of the capital, right?” Cheng Ruyi suddenly recalled the political movements, a sliver of worry blooming in her chest.

She harbored absolutely no desire to depart from the capital.

As long as they successfully weathered this year’s severe drought, they would be in the clear; as for next year’s catastrophic floods, the capital wouldn’t be affected by the deluge at all. At worst, the entire Great Zhou Empire would simply suffer a total crop failure for these two consecutive years. Given that the empire had enjoyed over a decade of flawless weather and bumper harvests, paired with the fact that they possessed an early warning system and had successfully utilized the deceased, fraudulent Consort Rong as a convenient scapegoat, navigating these next two years safely wouldn’t pose an issue.

Otherwise, if events unfolded according to the original text of the novel—where the Emperor became the target of public wrath, societal order collapsed entirely, chaos erupted across the lands, and casualties reached astronomical numbers—it would be a truly horrific tragedy.

Cheng Ruyi felt immensely satisfied that her accidental, chaotic interventions had managed to secure such an incredibly positive, stabilizing effect for the empire.

Moxiang was a trace startled, offering a highly hesitant response: “Surely it won’t come to that…”

To speak the absolute truth, Moxiang had zero desire to depart from the capital either. The master and servant were entirely of one mind on this matter.

“I’ll question him directly once Mo returns tonight.” The pastries, which had initially tasted spectacularly delicious, suddenly lost a bit of their flavor the moment Cheng Ruyi contemplated the harrowing possibility of being forced to leave the capital.

Lately, however, her appetite had expanded to an extraordinary degree; she found herself needing to consume food continuously throughout the entire day, her stomach growling with intense hunger the moment she stopped eating.

Cheng Ruyi heavily suspected that this phenomenon was a direct byproduct of her special ability experiencing another breakthrough.

That’s right; barely two days ago, Cheng Ruyi’s mutated wood-element ability had officially broken through to Level 4.

Back during her days in the post-apocalyptic wasteland, it was an established fact that awakened ability users possessed massive appetites, as higher ability tiers demanded a substantially greater volume of raw energy to sustain themselves. The sole exception to this rule was wood-element users; they typically sustained themselves by absorbing and channeling the abundant life-force energy of surrounding forests and vegetation, meaning their physical appetites rarely expanded alongside their ability upgrades.

Consequently, Cheng Ruyi found herself a trace perplexed by her current situation.

Nevertheless, food that needed to be consumed still had to be eaten. Parallel to her massive meals, Cheng Ruyi had personally ventured out into the surrounding mountain ranges to hunt down several massive dens of hibernating wild boars and colossal pythons.

Her return to the capital had been a spectacularly grand parade, drawing an absolute mountain of envious and jealous stares from the populace. The Prince Rong Estate wafted a rich, intoxicating aroma of roasted meat every single day, leaving the imperial relatives residing in the neighboring manors completely salivating with intense craving.

Rong Mo finally returned to the estate late that evening.

And he had explicitly brought a senior imperial physician along with him.

His little wife’s food consumption had expanded to an absurd degree lately, and she would occasionally even wake up in the dead of night from intense hunger pangs just to gnaw on dried meat. Rong Mo heavily suspected that his little wife might very well be pregnant.

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