Chapter 53 - 2#

Otherwise, how could she trace the clues?

When the Empress Dowager thought of the stupid things Consort De had done, she couldn’t help covering her forehead. She originally thought Consort De was good, but now it seemed that the reason Consort De was steady in the past was just because she had her backing, so naturally everything went smoothly.

But once she lost the Empress Dowager’s help, Consort De was still too immature.

Consort De’s lips were pale and trembling slightly: “It was concubine’s fault. Empress Dowager, concubine was just… too angry after being calculated against, that’s why…”

“Enough, this matter, This Dowager will handle it.” The Empress Dowager impatiently interrupted Consort De’s plea.

Angry?

Could she be angrier than her?

When the Empress Dowager heard the news that Emperor Jingyuan won the battle, she felt worse than eating shit.

This madman avoided the Grand Secretariat and actually transferred Prince Ping, secretly supplying provisions to Stone Tiger. Prince Ping, without a sound, actually colluded with Emperor Jingyuan. They are all birds of a feather.

Whenever the Empress Dowager thought of this, her chest hurt.

Prince Ping was the third son of the Late Emperor.

He was mediocre among the Late Emperor’s children, not attracting attention. Even the title he received was “Ping” (Peace/Mediocre).

From top to bottom, there was only the word “ordinary”.

After Emperor Jingyuan ascended the throne, except for a few princes who remained in the capital, the rest returned to their fiefs. Before Prince Ping left, he asked for nothing, only hoping that Emperor Jingyuan would let him take away the grand consort.

Prince Ping’s mother was a concubine with ordinary looks. The Empress Dowager didn’t even have much impression of her, only remembering a woman with a vague face and no temper.

Among so many brothers, Emperor Jingyuan only agreed to Prince Ping’s request.

So, from that time on, Prince Ping had already secretly hooked up with Emperor Jingyuan?

The Empress Dowager rubbed her eyebrows, only feeling that many things were beyond her expectations. Whether it was Emperor Jingyuan or her good son Prince Rui…

Especially Prince Rui.

Back in the capital, he was obedient to the Empress Dowager in everything. But now that he left the capital, he refused to listen.

Even saving people, he was so indifferent.

That was his maternal relative.

If Prince Rui really cared, how could he only save Huang Fu? Since people were saved, he could protect one small one, but not the rest?

The Empress Dowager was angry in her heart, which was why she had been depressed for a while.

Now that she survived it and finally cheered up again, the Empress Dowager already knew that the mistake she made before was the same as Consort De’s.

Too impatient.

She didn’t listen to Old Madam Huang’s words, didn’t suppress the indignation in her heart, and used the card of Huang Yijie when she shouldn’t have.

She should have waited for a more suitable time.

The Empress Dowager’s face darkened. Emperor Jingyuan holding the Huang family was not to keep Huang Qingtian in suspense. His move to lure the snake out of the hole… lured out her.

In this round, she indeed lost.

…

Rustle, rustle—

The breeze blew, and the withered yellow branches and leaves made a fragmentation sound. Those about to wither were rolled to the ground by the wind.

Jingzhe waved the broom, sweeping these fallen leaves into one place.

This was Chuxiu Palace.

Even closed palaces still have dedicated people watching them, but the cleaning is not as meticulous as elsewhere.

Every once in a while, maybe half a year or a year, it will be thoroughly cleaned for maintenance.

Jingzhe recovered just in time for this round.

His foot injury forced him to lie in bed for half a month. Finally, it was fully healed, but he was a bit overwhelmed by the smell of medicine.

The room still smells like this even now. Thanks to Huiping for enduring it.

Just in time for this matter at Chuxiu Palace, Jingzhe added his name to the list this time.

He wanted to take this opportunity to retrieve the things left in Chuxiu Palace.

Things went quite smoothly. After all, he now had some authority in the Zhidian Department, and people would listen to him when he spoke. Jingzhe asked them to sweep the front yard first, while he went to the backyard alone and took out the bricks from the wall.

This time, Jingzhe prepared in advance, so naturally he had replacements.

After he deftly replaced the things and put them away, his keen ears heard a faint footstep.

Jingzhe raised his eyebrows. How similar this scene was.

Back then, it seemed there was also such a time.

Jingzhe calmly grabbed the broom, piling the fallen leaves together again, indirectly covering the brick fragments underneath.

Then, Jingzhe looked up and accurately caught sight of Xinsheng.

Xinsheng was slightly stunned, obviously not expecting Jingzhe to look up suddenly. panic flashed across his face, then he returned to calm.

“So you are here.”

Jingzhe said lightly: “Didn’t you come here specifically because you knew I was here?”

Xinsheng: “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

He looked calm, but for some reason, there was a hint of nervousness in his voice.

Jingzhe suddenly said: “Where did I offend you?”

It’s impossible for a person to be liked by everyone. He naturally understood this principle. But when Jingzhe first came to the Zhidian Department, Xinsheng’s attitude towards him wasn’t as strange as it is now.

Xinsheng’s expression changed slightly, and his eyes became complicated: “You came to the Zhidian Department from the North Room only a little over a year ago, but you are already favored by the Chief. Now you are a second-rank eunuch and have received rewards from Qianming Palace. Your future is boundless, but what about me?”

He has been in the Zhidian Department for a full eight years!

But he is still just an ordinary third-rank eunuch.

How unfair is this?

Xinsheng didn’t think he was lacking compared to Jingzhe. Jingzhe could read and write, and so could he. What Jingzhe could do, he naturally could too.

Why did everyone gather around Jingzhe? Even the Chief abandoned him mercilessly after Jingzhe returned. Why on earth?

Jingzhe: “Since it’s like this, there’s nothing to say.”

He shook his head and ignored Xinsheng.

For someone like Xinsheng who was openly jealous, although somewhat unpleasant, it was easy to guard against.

Jingzhe didn’t care much. After returning to the Zhidian Department, he found a gap to separate and throw away the bricks and tiles, leaving only the box and ring hidden inside.

The ring was taken out by Jingzhe and put away again.

There was nothing in the box; it was pressed under the big chest.

This thing was useless now. Jingzhe wanted to retrieve it, firstly for safety, and secondly to leave something to remember.

The next day, palace servants everywhere received the news that their monthly allowance had doubled. Naturally, they also knew about Heyin’s defeat.

Inside the Zhidian Directorate, smiles were on the faces of the palace servants. Besides the money in hand, it was also for this great good news.

People like Jingzhe and Liao Jiang who had been to Shangyu Garden were naturally surrounded.

Jingzhe could vaguely hear Liao Jiang’s words.

“…No, I served the Shanyou envoy. That Yueyu envoy…”

“I haven’t seen much of the Heyin envoy, but the person is dead…”

There were fewer people around Jingzhe. When he broke through the siege and returned to his room, his clothes had been pulled a bit messy. He straightened them helplessly.

Jingzhe didn’t expect that a few months ago, he was still discussing with Rong Jiu who the assassin was, but now, Emperor Jingyuan had already acted with lightning speed and killed Huying Huda.

This undoubtedly differed a bit from the system’s rhetoric.

Emperor Jingyuan seemed to show no mercy to foreign tribes. He didn’t look like the kind of person who would cause the country to be destroyed and families to be ruined because of self-immolation due to serious illness.

Isn’t this very iron-blooded?

However, Jingzhe guessed at the beginning that the Heyin envoy might have been framed. After all, any rational person wouldn’t try to assassinate Emperor Jingyuan under those circumstances…

But Rong Jiu said Emperor Jingyuan didn’t care.

Jingzhe didn’t understand this sentence at first, but now he knew what Rong Jiu meant.

Emperor Jingyuan indeed didn’t care.

It didn’t matter who the assassin was; he just needed a reason.

After all, no matter how crazy the Emperor was, on such major national affairs, he couldn’t send troops without reason. No matter how obedient the border generals were to imperial orders, they couldn’t do such nonsensical things.

But if Emperor Jingyuan was assassinated, that would be different.

Reasonable and fair.

After this battle, those foreign tribes would have to weigh the thoughts of the Helian Emperor if they wanted to have ideas again.

This one is not as weak as the Late Emperor.

It’s just that no one knows how this Emperor Majesty did it. Without a sound, no one heard any rumors.

Such extraordinary control, while awe-inspiring, also inevitably makes people somewhat afraid.

Jingzhe just finished changing clothes when Huiping came back, tired enough to fall onto the bed.

Jingzhe hurriedly pulled him: “Don’t, don’t. If you lie down like this, how will you sleep tonight?”

After the fire in Yongning Palace, it naturally had to be repaired. The collapsed palace buildings needed manpower to clear the site before craftsmen could build.

Huiping was drafted to help.

These few days, Huiping always came back covered in dust. However, there was extra money for the work.

Although Huiping was tired, he was willing.

Jingzhe told Huiping about the doubling of the monthly allowance for these two months. He was so happy that he sobered up a bit: “This is good. This way, I can scrape together enough money.”

Huiping needed a sum of money.

Jingzhe knew that his frugality was to save dowry for his sister at home.

Huiping was originally from Tongzhou, not very far from the capital.

Later, the family was so poor that there was no way out, and by coincidence, he entered the palace.

The family members were still there, knew the address, and there were fellow villagers, so Huiping could occasionally contact his family.

About half a year ago, Huiping received news that his sister at home was getting married, and the dowry required a hundred taels of silver. They wanted to ask if Huiping could lend a hand.

For Huiping, saving a hundred taels was not easy. Over so many years, he had only about eighty taels on hand. The rest of the money was earned desperately in this small half year.

Actually, Jingzhe didn’t think highly of it.

This one hundred taels was almost Huiping’s entire fortune. If he gave it away, he would really have nothing left.

If his family was good, that would be another matter. But Huli had quite a few complaints, implying there were conflicts.

Since this was Huiping’s family matter, Jingzhe didn’t interfere, but just dragged him up and pushed him to wash up.

“Your body is the foundation. If you exhaust yourself, the gain is not worth the loss.”

Pushing the person to the bathroom, Jingzhe rolled up his sleeves to clean the room.

[Congratulations Host. After this battle, the morale of the Heyin people has dropped significantly. For a short time, they are not to be feared.]

A sound from the system made Jingzhe pause his cleaning action.

“You are a bit too late in realizing this.”

Jingzhe had received the news long ago, why wait for the system notification? However, would the system specifically informing him mean that in the “future” it spoke of, these Heyin people were also one of the masterminds of the invasion?

Jingzhe: “Didn’t you say before that after Emperor Jingyuan had an accident, foreign tribes would invade? But looking at it now, His Majesty the Emperor has amazing means. Even if something happens suddenly, foreign tribes wouldn’t dare to offend immediately.”

[Host, the future needs to be changed in the present to have a transformation. In the future “seen” by the system, Emperor Jingyuan never sent troops to attack foreign tribes.]

Jingzhe was slightly stunned, somewhat strange.

He didn’t like Emperor Jingyuan that much, but he could more or less feel that the one in Qianming Palace still cared about the people’s livelihood and grand plans, unlike his crazy actions.

Why is there such a big gap between the present and the system’s “future”?

Was it really the change he caused?

Jingzhe wrinkled his nose, thinking it was unlikely.

His missions had failed so many times, and the ones he could accomplish were few and far between.

Sometimes, Jingzhe felt that these missions were designed for him to fail?

The system declared solemnly: [The system never retaliates. The host is slandering.]

Jingzhe smiled superficially. Then you admit you want to retaliate?

In short, the system liked the current progress and requested Jingzhe to complete more missions.

As soon as Jingzhe heard Kangman’s name, his head grew big.

“Can you give some missions within my ability in the future? At least, something I can reach.” Jingzhe rolled his eyes, “What relationship have I had with Yongning Palace?”

The system was quiet and obedient, [But the host also did it.]

Jingzhe hehed. What did I do?

If Rong Jiu hadn’t intervened, he would have had to take risks.

Although he had no connection with Yongning Palace, there was a Mama Chen in the North Room who had just come from Yongning Palace.

Mama Chen was demoted to the North Room because she was implicated in the affair between a palace maid and a eunuch in Yongning Palace.

This seemed logical.

Yongning Palace, North Room, this seemed to be a coincidence.

But there were too many coincidences around Jingzhe.

Most coincidences are, in the end, human arrangements.

He learned from Wuyou that shortly after Mama Chen arrived, Lidong became Mama Chen’s pawn again.