夢中斬龍 Wei Zheng Dozes at the Board
君臣兩個對弈，此棋正下到午時三刻，一盤殘局未終，魏徵忽然俯伏在案邊，鼾鼾盹睡。太宗笑曰：「賢卿真是匡扶社稷之心勞，創立江山之力倦，所以不覺盹睡。」太宗任他睡著，更不呼喚。不多時，魏徵醒來，俯伏在地道：「臣該萬死，臣該萬死！卻才倦困，不知所為，望陛下赦臣慢君之罪。」太宗道：「卿有何慢罪？且起來，拂退殘棋，與卿從新更著。」君臣两个对弈，此棋正下到午时三刻，一盘残局未终，魏征忽然俯伏在案边，鼾鼾盹睡。太宗笑曰：「贤卿真是匡扶社稷之心劳，创立江山之力倦，所以不觉盹睡。」太宗任他睡着，更不呼唤。不多时，魏征醒来，俯伏在地道：「臣该万死，臣该万死！却才倦困，不知所为，望陛下赦臣慢君之罪。」太宗道：「卿有何慢罪？且起来，拂退残棋，与卿从新更着。」
逐句解 Line by line
Ruler and minister played on together, and just as the game reached the third quarter of the hour of wu, with the board's endgame still unfinished, Wei Zheng suddenly slumped forward at the edge of the desk, snoring in a doze.
The clock strikes and the minister falls asleep. 午時三刻, the third quarter of the noon double-hour, is the exact moment appointed for the dragon's execution; 殘局 is the endgame, the board left unfinished; 鼾鼾盹睡 is snoring in a doze; 對弈 is to play against each other. Everything the chapter has been building toward happens inside that snore.
Taizong said with a smile: 'My worthy minister is truly worn in heart from upholding the altars of the realm, and spent in strength from founding its rivers and hills — no wonder he has unknowingly dozed off.'
匡扶社稷, sustaining the altars of soil and grain, and 創立江山, founding the rivers and mountains, are lofty ways of describing a lifetime of service to the state. The emperor deploys them to excuse a nap. He reads the sleep as honest exhaustion and never suspects the errand it is on.
Taizong let him sleep and did not call him.
著 in 睡著, 'to be asleep,' is zháo, and 更 in 更不, 'and did not even,' is gèng. Here is the hinge of the entire plot, and it is an act of kindness: the emperor lets his tired minister sleep on. That is precisely what allows the execution to proceed.
Before long Wei Zheng awoke and, prostrating himself on the ground, said: 'Your servant deserves ten thousand deaths, ten thousand deaths! Just now I was overcome with weariness and knew not what I did — I beg Your Majesty to pardon my discourtesy to my lord.'
慢君之罪 is the crime of slighting one's sovereign, and 為 in 不知所為, 'knew not what I was doing,' is wéi. Read the apology closely. He grovels about the nap and says nothing whatever about what he did during it.
Taizong said: 'What discourtesy is there in you? Get up; let us sweep away the unfinished game and play afresh, you and I.'
拂退殘棋 is to brush aside an unfinished game; 更 is gèng, 'anew,' and 著 in 更著, 'to play again,' is zhāo, a go move. The emperor is all graciousness, and has no idea that the game he is sweeping away has just cost a life.
The execution happens in a gap in the narrative. The two play on until the stroke of the appointed hour, and 魏徵 — his waking body seated at the emperor's own desk, under the emperor's own eye — simply nods off over the unfinished board. Taizong, reading the sleep as the honest fatigue of a hard-working minister, generously leaves him undisturbed; and it is exactly this kindness that lets the dream-execution run its course. The dragon's death is never shown. It takes place offstage, in the mind of a sleeping man, in the space of a doze.
The terrible irony is that every party is doing precisely the thing that dooms the dragon. The emperor keeps his minister close and awake in order to save it, then lets him sleep out of compassion. The minister, apologizing abjectly for the rudeness of dozing, has in that very doze carried out the beheading, and says nothing of it. Taizong's closing invitation to sweep away the unfinished game and play afresh is quietly devastating: the game is over, and its real stakes were never on the board. The passages ahead will show the severed head falling out of the sky, and the emperor's promise of rescue turning to horror.