Denghuaxiao

Chapter 223 In the Palace

 The autumn wind blows and the grass and trees turn yellow.

 The long steps of the courtyard are deeply moss-marked.

In the Grand Master's Mansion, white gauze lanterns swayed in the wind under the eaves, and rows of dark tablets in the ancestral hall stood neatly like inverted coffins, with long shadows hanging in the dim candlelight.

 Qi Yutai was buried yesterday.

The legitimate son of Taishifu was buried, but the funeral was extremely simple. It is a bad omen to die during a ceremony, so the cause of Qi Yutai's death was not publicized, and discussion of the matter was prohibited in the palace. As for the outside world, it was only said that Qi Yutai suddenly fell ill and died of a serious illness.

Although the matter of the festival has not been spread, people are inevitably suspicious. Qi Yutai was in his prime, and he had never heard of any serious illness in the past. It was inexplicable that he suddenly fell ill and passed away. However, the previous incident of the Fengle Building fire was talked about by ordinary people in the streets. The truth is confusing.

 There was a low coughing sound in the room.

 Qi Qing was sitting in the room.

Caring about Qi Yutai's funeral caused his already old body to weaken rapidly, and his skinny and shriveled body became more and more rotten and lifeless.

Qi Huaying has gone to rest. Qi Yutai has passed away. As the only daughter of the Qi family, she also has to receive the guests who come to express their condolences, which is quite tiring.

Emperor Liang Ming thoroughly investigated the cause of Qi Yutai's death, but the third prince obstructed it. How Qi Yutai died was not important. In comparison, the failure of the ceremony and the ominous omen became a greater sin. The people who came to express their condolences all had expressions of mourning, and their faces were all different. They were pitiful, gloating, and adding insult to injury, like a performance painted with oil paint at a funeral.

 He looked at them one by one.

The surroundings became even quieter. The pale lantern was blown wildly by the wind. The green moonlight fell on the ground and fell on his face, like a ghost sitting alone in the hall that suddenly appeared.

 He suddenly spoke in this silence.

 “Where is the convoy of accompanying medical officers going to Sunan?”

The steward bowed and replied: "Yesterday I heard that we were about to cross the Guangyun River. The continuous rain delayed us for some time. Once we cross the Guangyun River, we will arrive at Mengtai."

 Qi Qingqing’s eyes.

 The medical convoy heading to southern Jiangsu set off a few days ago.

On the last day of the list of medical officers responding to the epidemic, Lu Zhuo's name was suddenly added.

Chang Jin dared to go against the will and was so daring that Pei Yunying was certainly responsible for this. However, Qi Qing, who was busy with Qi Yutai's funeral and dealing with the difficulties of the third prince, was not able to do anything at all, so Lu Yun was forced to withdraw his salary and completely fly away.

Now that Qi Yutai’s funeral arrangements are over, it’s time to settle old accounts.

He said calmly: "Find someone to follow her, and find an opportunity on the way to kill her."

The housekeeper was stunned: "Yes." Then he was worried, "But Pei Yunying's side..."

Last time, Pei Yunying came to threaten me, but his words were still ringing in my ears. If something happens to Lu Zhuo, he will not let Qi Huaying go.

Qi Qing said coldly: "Shu Zi is arrogant."

The young commander in chief of the palace, after winning several times in a row, he doesn’t know where the sky is from the sky. He only has two children. For the dead Qi Yutai and for the living Qi Huaying, Lu Zhuo must die too.

 Whether she is in Shengjing or Sunan.

 No matter whether the Qi family wins or loses in the end.

The steward did not dare to say anything, as he was ordered to do so.

 Qi Qing was silent for a moment, then suddenly said: "Wait a minute."

 The old man lowered his eyes and slowly turned the beads on his wrist.

Pei Yunying is concerned about this woman and will arrange for someone to follow her and protect her secretly along the way. Taking action now will inevitably scare the snake.

 After a moment, he said: "We will take action after we get to Sunan."

 “Yes, sir.”

 …

 The cold night is dim and lonely, and the lonely lamp is like a ghost. The moonlight tonight is even more desolate than in the past.

 There are no windows in the secret room of the Privy Council. The lamps on the table and the torches on the wall reflect each other, illuminating the stone walls of the old cell.

 Xiao Zhufeng walked down the stone steps and placed a silver pot in his hand on the table.

Pei Yunying glanced at it: "Tea?"

"Life is hard enough, drink some wine." Xiao Zhufeng said: "Let your ugly sadness go away."

Pei Yunying smiled and watched Xiao Zhufeng pour a small cup of wine and push it in front of him.

He picked up the wine cup, played with it between his fingers, and said "tsk": "Drinking before leaving, why does it sound like drinking with one's head cut off?" After a pause, he added: "Isn't it a bit unlucky? "

"No." Xiao Zhufeng sat down opposite him and said calmly: "If you are frustrated in love, you will be proud of the casino. If you are frustrated in love, you will fail miserably. Our plan will go surprisingly smoothly..."

Pei Yunying: “…”

He sneered and brought the wine cup to his lips. Pei Yunying frowned slightly when the wine was spicy and pungent.

 “Fragrant wine?”

 Xiao Zhufeng shrugged: "The teacher took it."

The two of them worked under Yan Xu when they were young, Xiao Zhufeng was the first, and Pei Yunying was the latecomer. After all, they had some friendship with fellow disciples.

Yan Xu was harsh, and his martial arts training often forced the two of them to fight each other, and they were beaten until their noses were bruised and their faces were swollen.

At the age of age, he couldn't eat hard. Yan Yan had to wait for the lamp oil to burn the whole party to release him from the prison. At that time, I only regretted that there was too much lamp oil and it was difficult to survive the long night. Looking back many years later, I lamented the lack of lamp oil and regretted the wasted time.

At that time, after every fight, Yan Xu would ask the two of them to drink a pot of fragrant wine. The fragrant wine was spicy and unpleasant, but it had a miraculous effect on healing. Both of them frowned and drank it.

　　　It has been a long time since I drank.

After a while, Xiao Zhufeng laughed: "Do you still remember, the first time you and I fought? You were beaten to the ground and you were in such a state of embarrassment."

Pei Yunying sneered: "You remember wrongly. When I was choosing the palace commander, you were almost hacked to death by me."

 The two were silent for a while again.

 Xiao Zhufeng is an orphan.

 He grew up in the Salesian Church and was taken away by Yan Xu when he was five years old and became Yan Xu's apprentice.

Before Pei Yunying came, Yan Xu valued him the most. After Pei Yunying came, the situation changed.

 When I was young, I always had a strong desire to win. Xiao Zhufeng hates Pei Yunying, but Yan Xu wants to choose one of them to be the thorn in the palace.

There was a lot of competition at that time, and they both disliked each other and fought openly and secretly. Until one time, the two of them were performing the same mission and alerted others. Xiao Zhufeng was ambushed and Pei Yunying had escaped, but turned back at the last moment and took him with him to escape.

Both of them were seriously injured that time. After that, Yan Xu scolded Pei Yunying severely, but asked him to enter the Palace Commander's Mansion by name.

Later, Pei Yunying became the commander and he became the deputy commander.

The torches on the wall illuminated the room, making the light in the room chaotic.

Xiao Zhufeng said: "Did Duke Zhaoning come to see you?"

"found."

“Want you to save the Pei family?”

"It is clear."

 Xiao Zhufeng was not polite: “Shameless.”

Pei Yunying sighed.

“You are an orphan without a father, and I am worse than an orphan if I have a father. I really don’t know who is more unlucky.”

As soon as he finished speaking, a voice came from the cell: "You still have your mind to gossip. I think the person implicated by you two is the most unlucky."

The two of them turned their heads and Yan Xu walked down the stone steps.

He was dressed in black, with the golden embroidery of the goshawk on his robe. He wore wrist guards, a long sword, and light armor all at once. The scars at the corners of his eyes were extremely hideous under the light.

 “Are you all ready?”

 The two of them responded.

"I have arranged for someone to hide your sister and Baozhu, so there will be no worries." Yan Xu glanced at Pei Yunying, paused, and said, "Since you have been abandoned, there is nothing you can't let go of. Cheer up for me. . Just learn from your sweetheart."

Pei Yunying was speechless.

 Lu Zong has already left, which is indeed quite easy. Before she went to Sunan, she was locked up in front of the Palace Commander's Mansion. He received a letter from Yin Zheng at night. It was written by Lu Zhuo himself.

 Everything written in the letter was to ask Pei Yunying to protect everyone at Renxin Medical Center after her death. Many of them used their past friendship as a reference, and the words were full of emotion and every word was carefully considered.

I am afraid that Qi Qing, who lived a long life, would not have been more thoughtful and straightforward in his last words before his death.

It was precisely because of that letter that he made up his mind not to stop Lu Zong from going to southern Jiangsu.

He got a glimpse of Lu Zhuo's death wish in this letter. She was a person who wanted to die. If she was left in Shengjing with Qi Qing, something would definitely happen.

Yan Xu looked him over and saw that his eyes were dazed and squinted slightly, as if he didn't look down on her: "You really like her."

Pei Yunying twitched the corners of his lips.

 He has met many women.

As gentle and graceful as his mother, as kind and open-minded as his sister, he had received a lot of sincerity and admiration, but he never thought that he would eventually fall in love with such a person.

 A woman who can frame him in full view of the public, a woman who looks calm and calm on the face, but secretly holds poison in the palm of her hand, ready to die with her enemies at any time.

 A woman who doesn't like him very much.

The heartbeat that cannot be escaped, the feelings that cannot be denied...

Like the crumbling wood on the top of the wooden tower in his study, with just a slight touch -

There was a loud bang, and the defense line collapsed.

“What should we do?” He smiled lazily: “We are three masters and disciples, and all of us had bad relationships and were abandoned. Maybe it’s because the feng shui here is not good, so things always go against our wishes.”

 Xiao Zhufeng: “…”

Yan Xu didn’t want to pay attention to him: “Get the knife and get out of here.”

The two of them got up, picked up their knives and walked out. When they reached the door, they were stopped by Yan Xu again.

"You two," he said after a long silence, "be careful."

 “Long-winded.”

The two of them walked out of the secret room, with Pei Yunying in front of them. Xiao Zhufeng said, "I want to ask you something."

"explain."

"When we were competing for the position of former secretary of the palace, you obviously escaped, why did you turn around to save me?"

Pei Yunying was startled and laughed: "Why do you still remember it?"

"Do not talk nonsense."

He said nonchalantly: "I am a hero. Seeing how badly you were beaten, I felt so sorry that I did something good."

"Oh." Xiao Zhufeng took a step forward and said over him: "Hero, then you should be more careful tonight."

 “If you are hacked to death, I will never come to save you.”

Pei Yunying clicked his tongue several times: "He has a heart of stone."

He held the silver knife on his waist again, looked into the thick night in the distance, and said with a smile: "Okay, I will kill as many as I come tonight -"

 …

"when-"

 The sound of distant bells drifted along the night wind, and in the Qinzheng Hall, Emperor Liang Ming was suddenly startled.

On the imperial desk, a bowl of brown soup was steaming slightly.

“Your Majesty,” the **** in charge said in a low voice, “The medicine is almost cold.”

 Diary Liang Ming stared at the silver medicine bowl in front of him, his eyes gloomy.

In the royal family, all bowls, cups and utensils were made of gold. After the death of the previous emperor, Emperor Ming of Liang ordered all the utensils he used to use to be replaced by silver. For this reason, he was impeached by the imperial censor, saying that it violated the rules of his ancestors. .

However, the rules are set by people. After he dismissed several old censors from their posts, no one mentioned this matter again.

Emperor Liang Ming pushed aside the pile of memorials on the imperial desk, reached out to take the medicine bowl, raised his head and drank the medicine in one gulp.

The medicine was bitter, and after drinking it, there was still a sour and bitter taste in his throat. He raised his hand and wiped the medicine marks from the corners of his lips with a silk handkerchief.

"In the evening, the Queen Mother came and bumped into the Imperial Concubine outside the door. The two had a dispute." The steward looked at the emperor's face and spoke cautiously, "The Queen Mother came in the evening, and the Queen Mother and the Imperial Concubine returned to the palace respectively."

 Emperor Liang Ming rubbed his eyebrows.

 The Queen is here for the Crown Prince, and Concubine Chen is also here for the Crown Prince.

 The prince has been grounded for a long time, and he can't bear it anymore.

There were early signs of his intention to establish a crown prince. There were endless disputes between the two factions in the court, but the emperor's mind never changed. Yuan Yao was the one he considered to inherit the throne from the beginning.

Yuan Yao is the most similar to him in terms of intelligence and bravery.

 Just as he resembles the late emperor.

Because of this resemblance, the late emperor favored him so much that even though his elder brother, Prince Yuan Xi, was elegant, far-reaching, and talented in both civil and military affairs, his position in the heart of the late emperor was still inferior to his.

 Some courtiers who supported him said that the late emperor might have the intention of changing the throne to a prince. He had high hopes in his heart, but was disappointed in the end.

The father who talks about partiality still wants to leave the country in the hands of his brother. So Yuan Xi died in that autumn flood. The late emperor died of a serious illness, and all his brothers died. He ascended to the throne and became famous.

 Destiny is like a roulette wheel, spinning endlessly. When he had Yuan Yao, he favored Yuan Yao the most.

Yuanzhen was reckless and mediocre, not an emperor's talent, and he didn't like the queen. What he was most afraid of was the Qi family, the grand master who had supported him to ascend the throne and now supported the crown prince's succession.

However, Qi Qing is old after all.

 The old tiger is nothing to be afraid of, and his only son has died in the ceremony. There is no need for him to take action. Qi Qing has no fighting spirit, so there is nothing to be afraid of.

Emperor Liang Ming looked at the empty silver bowl on the table, with a hint of murderous intent flashing in his eyes.

He will never imitate the ignorant and hypocritical emperor. Whichever son he likes will be the emperor. The imperial power is supreme. Now that it has reached a high place, there is no need to be afraid of others. Naturally, everything goes as planned. There is no need to exercise restraint or rely on ancestral rules.

He will clear all obstacles for Yuan Yao—

 “Can you leave a message for the Queen Mother?” Emperor Liang Ming asked the manager.

"No." The general manager said, "Your Majesty, I forgive you. I saw that the Queen was very angry, so I didn't dare to report it for fear of upsetting the Emperor."

 Emperor Liang Ming waved his hands impatiently.

 The queen came simply to plead for Yuan Zhen. Now the overall situation has been decided. Of the two sons, he will choose Yuan Yao.

 The Queen Mother worships Buddha all year round and never visits the court. This is the reason why she has been safe and sound all these years.

 Emperor Liang Ming was willing to play out the drama of loving mother and filial piety to the end with her.

 There’s just one other person—

“Is there any movement from Prince Ning?”

"Your Majesty, Your Majesty, His Highness Prince Ning has not left the palace for several days and has found nothing unusual."

 Emperor Liang Ming's face turned gloomy.

King Ning was the only brother he left. Because he returned to Beijing that year, he had boarded Dadong, and his hands and feet happened one after another.

He spared Prince Ning's life and treated him as a joke. He looked down on him and was wary of him.

However, he has been feeling a sense of crisis recently.

 After so many extra years, it’s time to get rid of the last useless chess piece.

The night outside the window is heavy, and the thick ink color is like a bottomless pit. The howling night wind makes a faint scream, accompanied by some chaotic exclamations.

 Emperor Liang Ming suddenly raised his head.

"what sound?"

Tomorrow I will enter the last Sunan dungeon. The main focus of the Sunan dungeon is Liutong's self-salvation and Xiao Pei's emotional line (no long-distance relationship for up to two or three days). You can wait and see again! The function of the comment area is under maintenance and I can’t post a reply, so I’ll reply here again. I’m a dear, I’m getting married, don’t worry, I’ve got everything~