Chapter 264: Meeting Consort Yan
After speaking, Jiang Ruanxi slightly lowered her head, appearing very guilty.
The Empress looked at her like this and felt very irritated.
She already didn’t like her to begin with, pretending to be a little white rabbit.
She didn’t want to continue feigning civility with her here anymore, enduring the anger in her heart as she said, “It’s not your fault either, you haven’t served anyone before. You can go down first, this palace will have Liu Ye feed it.”
After speaking, she gave Liu Ye a look.
Liu Ye hurriedly stepped forward and snatched the bowl.
“Crown Princess, let me do it? I’m used to serving the Empress, and she is more familiar with my serving.”
Jiang Ruanxi looked at her now empty hand and didn’t refuse, directly accepting it.
“Then I’ll trouble Aunt Liu.”
“Crown Princess is too polite.” Liu Ye smiled and said.
After exchanging polite words, Jiang Ruanxi went straight out.
As soon as she left, the Empress’s face immediately darkened.
She raised her hand and directly knocked over the bowl in Liu Ye’s hand.
“Bitch, she just wants to harm this palace. This is a warning to this palace. She thinks that by killing Sun Tina, this palace can’t reach into her Crown Prince’s Manor anymore. She is too naive.” The Empress said angrily.
Liu Ye was accustomed to the Empress’s unpredictable temper and showed no reaction.
After Jiang Ruanxi left the Palace of Compassion and Tranquility, at the corner, Consort Yan was standing there alone, as if waiting for someone.
Jiang Ruanxi went up, “Consort Yan.”
Consort Yan looked at Jiang Ruanxi with a serious face, “Who gave you the token from Nameless Valley?”
Jiang Ruanxi didn’t hide it, “Master Bian Du.”
A smile appeared on Consort Yan’s face, as if she had long expected it, “It really is him.”
The matters between Consort Yan and Bian Du, Bian Du had already told her, so Jiang Ruanxi didn’t ask more.
“Tell him that the matter he asked me to investigate, I will investigate it properly. As for the Empress’s matter, I will also help you, but as to what extent I can help, I don’t know.”
After speaking, without looking at Jiang Ruanxi once, she directly left.
Jiang Ruanxi looked at her back, her gaze becoming distant.
* *
Imperial Study Room.
As soon as Emperor Qin returned to the Imperial Study Room, his face turned ashen, and he swept all the memorials on the table to the ground.
“This poisonous woman is actually so ruthless, even killing her own maternal family members.”
His personal eunuch kept his head low, pretending not to see or hear.
Emperor Qin seemed not yet calmed, stepping on those memorials several times, but while stepping, his foot stopped.
“For so many years, I thought that as long as I didn’t go to Lingnan to find her, that poisonous woman wouldn’t know, but in the end she still let that poisonous woman kill her. If I had known it would be like this, when I knew she was still alive back then, I would definitely have desperately kept her in the palace, not letting anyone bully her…”
Emperor Qin’s voice grew lighter and lighter.
Before his eyes involuntarily appeared the woman from back then, with porcelain-white skin and a slender, gentle figure.
Back then when she came from Lingnan, he fell for Madam Yu at first sight.
But because the Empress had a better fate, for the national fortune, he didn’t dare act rashly, but every time he saw her, his heart itched.
Finally, one time when the Empress was not in the palace, she came to find the Empress, and saw Madam Yu lowering her head, embroidering a sachet, revealing her porcelain-white neck, quietly and gently stitching.
At that moment, he couldn’t hold back anymore and went forward to embrace her.
After threatening her, she finally compromised.
Afterward, they also met several times, but all secretly. He really couldn’t endure it; as a majestic emperor, seeing the woman he loved still required sneaking around.
He directly conferred her as a consort.
Later, after she became pregnant, he was overjoyed.
He accompanied her every day.
But against all calculations, that poisonous woman actually targeted her child, using the civet cat for the crown prince trick.
The stillborn child she gave birth to back then, he was heartbroken and grief-stricken for a time, so he busied himself with state affairs to numb himself.
But unexpectedly, after he finished being busy and adjusted his mood, a big fire took her life.
He was decadent for a period, always investigating the origin of the fire.
After secretly investigating for about five years, he found out it was the Empress who sent people to set the fire, wanting to kill her.
At that time, he was so furious he wanted to directly kill the Empress. Seeing the child she gave birth to, now in a weak state, he thought that no matter what, the Empress was her blood sister and would treat him well.
It was also because it related to the national fortune that he endured it.
But he didn’t expect this woman to be so vicious, actually killing her again in the end.
Thinking of that woman as beautiful as a painting, just leaving him like this, Emperor Qin’s eyes immediately reddened.
He slumped on the ground, his speech choked with sobs, “Go get wine, I want to drink today. No one is to disturb me.”
“Yes.” The eunuch kept his head low and went out.
* *
When Jiang Ruanxi returned to the Crown Prince’s Manor, Grand Tutor Ling was already waiting for her there.
Seeing that she was fine, he breathed a sigh of relief.
“It’s good that you’re alright.”
“Father, don’t worry. The Empress fell ill from a guilty conscience as a thief. But I saw that she was just pretending; she didn’t look ill at all.”
Jiang Ruanxi told Grand Tutor Ling everything about feeding medicine in the imperial palace.
Grand Tutor Ling frowned tightly, “She didn’t rise to the Empress’s position easily; she’s not that easy to deal with.”
Jiang Ruanxi nodded.
“We need to think of other ways. Father, do you know how the Empress became Empress back then?”
Although Jiang Ruanxi had lived two lives, in her previous life she was in the back residence of Lin Manor and didn’t pay much attention to palace matters.
Grand Tutor Ling told Jiang Ruanxi all the folk matters about the Empress, and the dirty things she did in the palace that he knew; he told everything.
“Folk legends?” Jiang Ruanxi muttered to herself, falling into contemplation.
Suddenly, as if thinking of something, she smiled and said, “Since that’s the case, let’s also use folk rumors to debunk that noble fate rumor of hers. Then she won’t have prestige anymore. With her attention on the rumors, we’ll have more time to deal with her.”
Grand Tutor Ling, upon hearing this, felt she made a lot of sense and smiled, “Why didn’t I think of that? I’ll go arrange it now.”
Grand Tutor Ling thought that he could make the Empress suffer and avenge Ling Lin; he couldn’t stay a moment longer.
He hurriedly left.
Jiang Ruanxi also knew what was on his mind and didn’t mind his attitude.
Thinking of what Consort Yan said in the palace, Jiang Ruanxi called Yushui and had her go pass a message to Bian Du, telling Yushui all of Consort Yan’s words.
Yushui had just left when Wan Qing arrived at her courtyard.
Seeing her, Jiang Ruanxi could tell that Wan Qing was just sharp-tongued but soft-hearted, with no malice. Plus, they were now in a cooperative relationship, so upon seeing her, she couldn’t help saying, “You’re not resting well to nurture your pregnancy; what are you doing coming to my place?”
