"Why are you suddenly paying attention to him?" Hu Tang glanced at the Seventeenth Prince from a distance and said with some disdain, "He is no match for me."

Jiang Rao listened to Hu Tang's tone and asked in surprise, "Have you competed with him?"

Before she set off, although she and Hu Tang were not inseparable, she knew a lot about Hu Tang. She had never heard her say that she had any intersection with the Seventeenth Prince.

"I won the competition once."

Hu Tang pointed his finger at Adanu again, "That Qiang warrior over there is born with great strength. I know I can't beat him just by looking at him."

Jiang Rao followed her words and thought about it, and finally understood what Hu Tang meant.

She was using herself as a reference, telling her that the Seventeenth Prince should not be able to defeat the foreign warriors.

Jiang Rao held her cheek slightly and thought carefully. Although she felt it was strange, she couldn't figure out what method the queen used. She had just returned to Jinling from Rui County and had not even gone to Ning'an Marquis's Mansion. She listened to Rong Ting's words and entered the palace first.

Rong Ting arranged it this way, and she believed him and came.

When I arrived, I caught up with the martial arts test.

It was really a torture to watch the seventeenth prince soar into the limelight.

Hu Tang stayed beside her and was quiet for a rare moment.

She knew that Jiang Rao went south to Huaizhou, but she came back so early. She must have encountered something on the way and was unable to go.

There was no sign of unhappiness on Jiang Rao's face at the moment. All she could do was not to mention Jiang Rao's sad story or the Ninth Prince.

Otherwise, bringing it up might make her sad, as she doesn’t know how to comfort people.

Hu Tang sat bored to the side, quietly watching the figures coming and going in the center of the martial arts field, and suddenly frowned, "I'm afraid we can't have this competition today."

Jiang Rao followed Hu Tang's gaze and looked over there.

The Qiang warrior Adanu was helped down.

"Are you hurt?" Jiang Rao asked.

"It looks like that." Hu Tang turned back and asked, "What happened in the palace just now?"

Hu Tang held his chin in his hand and said with some regret: "I heard that we were going to the martial arts arena this time, so I thought I would have a chance to see a hearty competition. It's really disappointing that we finally cleaned up the arena but didn't use it."

"Who won the competition in the palace just now?" Hu Tang had been in the martial arts field and did not see the competition in Qingluantai, so he asked Jiang Rao anxiously.

Jiang Rao said calmly: "Seventeenth Prince."

Hu Tang was stunned for a moment, "Him?"

“

Did he really win? ”

Jiang Rao could tell that Hu Tang was excited and looked up at her.

Her eyes looked at people quietly, which made people want to talk. Hu Tang said, "Last time I competed with him in whip skills, he lost, and he kept pestering me to compete again. I said that if he could beat the Qiang warriors, I would accompany him to the end." She lowered her head, her tone a little annoyed, "I feel that it is not worth it to say one more word to him. His cat almost scratched you. I feel that it is not worth it to say one more word to such a person."

She pulled her hair in frustration, almost breaking down. Jiang Rao held Hu Tang's hand and said softly, "Didn't you say that you defeated the Seventeenth Prince once, and that the Seventeenth Prince defeated the Qiang warrior? Doesn't that mean that you are better than that Qiang warrior?"

"Hehe, you're right." Hu Tang thought about it and realized that this was really the case. He turned around and smiled at Jiang Rao, looking a little shameless. She pointed at herself proudly and said, "Hu Tang Hu Tang is the best in the world."

"Yes." Jiang Rao laughed along with her, her eyes curved like stars and her smile like a painting, "Tang'er is the best in the world."

Hu Tang looked at Jiang Rao's smile and felt it was rare and precious.

She thought that Jiang Rao had returned empty-handed and would burst into tears.

It was really beyond her expectation that he was smiling so beautifully.

Hu Tang wanted to ask Jiang Rao what she had experienced when she went south, but he didn't dare to ask in front of Jiang Rao. When Jiang Rao turned to ask the palace servants when she would return to the palace, Hu Tang grabbed Ming Shao and asked, "Where did your girl go to when she went south this time? What happened to her?"

Ming Shao picked up what she could answer and answered, "I walked back from Rui County."

But he refused to say anything more.

Hu Tang was slightly disappointed, standing there with a gloomy face. When Jiang Rao came back, she saw her unhappy expression and thought she had remembered the bet between her and the seventeenth prince. Just as she was thinking about how to coax her, Ming Shao stepped forward and said hesitantly, "Miss Hu wants to know what happened when you went south."

Jiang Rao laughed immediately.

She was thinking about Hu Tang's talkative personality. Why was he so quiet and didn't even ask her how she came back from Huaizhou? She was puzzled for a while.

She knew that the people around her loved her, protected her, and took her feelings into consideration, so she said softly to Ming Shao, "Let me say it."

Hu Tang raised his eyes, feeling a little depressed and regretful. He clearly resisted asking Jiang Rao, but he couldn't resist asking Jiang Rao's maid. The result was the same, and he would hit Jiang Rao's sore spot.

She had too few friends in the circle of noble ladies and was afraid of making Jiang Rao unhappy.

“There are a lot of people here

There are some things I haven't explained to you clearly. ”

Jiang Rao could see that Hu Tang's eyes were sad. She leaned close to Hu Tang's ear and said to her, "I have to go to the palace in a while. When I come back, I will find a time to look for you tomorrow."

…

The carriage returning to the palace stopped in front of the palace gate. Jiang Rao got on the sedan chair and headed north and returned to Concubine Yun. She had nothing to do, and since she had doubts in her mind, she investigated the matter that made her suspicious.

She still felt that there must be some hidden agenda behind the Seventeenth Prince's victory over the foreign warriors.

The maid who went to inquire came back and said to Jiang Rao, "Adanu seems to have caught a cold and is weak all over. He can't fight anymore. The imperial physician has already gone to see him."

Jiang Rao asked: "Did the Queen arrange for the imperial physician?"

Jiang Rao always worked seriously as long as she was not asked to do anything with needlework or writing. Her attitude made Concubine Yun serious as well. "Niannian, do you really think that the foreigner named Adanu fell into the trap of the Queen?"

"It's just a hunch, don't take it seriously."

Jiang Rao lowered her gentle brows and thought, even if Empress Jiahe really had arranged something in this matter, it would probably take some time to investigate further. But the envoys who came to pay tribute would leave the capital in seven days. If he pursued the matter thoroughly just for a vague thought of hers and found nothing in the end, wouldn't it be a waste of effort?

But when she thought that the person was the queen, she wanted to check it out even if it was a waste of effort.

Jiang Rao knocked his head and felt a little headache.

A team of black-robed guards passed by. Jiang Rao heard the sound and looked over there. She caught a glimpse of a figure in white. She frowned and thought that figure looked like Rong Ting.

When they separated in Jinling, he asked her to enter the palace and told her that he had some things to deal with and would also go to the palace. If it weren't for his words, she would have gone straight back to the Ning'an Marquis' Mansion just now after coming out of the martial arts field.

When we arrived at the Shuxiang Palace, a palace servant hurriedly handed us a message, "Fourth Miss, the Emperor wants you to come to the Golden Throne Hall."

Jiang Rao and Qin Yun looked at each other, both a little surprised.

Usually when Emperor Zhaowu came to the Shuxiang Palace to invite someone, he would only invite Concubine Yun. Why would he invite Jiang Rao?

Concubine Yun wanted to go with Jiang Rao, but a maid in a grey padded jacket came over. Concubine Yun recognized her as the maid from the Ministry of Internal Affairs who was in charge of fabric expenses for each palace. She felt even more strange in her heart.

She has not been favored by the emperor in the past six months, and these two maids are rarely seen in Shuxiang Palace.

The gray-coated nanny came to Concubine Yun and said, "This is the new satin from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The Emperor saw that Your Majesty was wearing simple clothes today, so he ordered the servants to take Your Majesty to choose."

Concubine Yun thanked him but her brows furrowed slightly. She didn't know what Emperor Zhaowu was up to and her steps were a little hesitant. Jiang Rao had a vague guess in her heart, so she leaned close to Concubine Yun's ear and said, "Aunt, you can go ahead."

The white-clothed figure I just saw among the Black-robed Guards might be Rong Ting. He might have already met Emperor Zhaowu and said something to the emperor.

She followed the palace maid all the way to the Golden Palace. She thought she could see Rong Ting, but she only saw Emperor Zhaowu and Empress Jiahe.

In exchange, there were envoys from foreign countries.

The foreign envoy looked at Jiang Rao with a sullen face.

Jiang Rao looked at the people in the hall with suspicion, and for a moment he couldn't figure out what was happening in front of him.

Her face remained calm as she kowtowed to the emperor and empress.

Then he raised his eyes and looked at Empress Jiahe who was sitting next to Emperor Zhaowu.

Empress Jiahe had tears on her face as she leaned against Emperor Zhaowu's side. "She was the one who ordered people to slander me. She wanted to ruin my reputation."

Jiang Rao was confused. Emperor Zhaowu said in a deep voice, "Someone just gave me a secret letter saying that Adanu was defeated by the Seventeenth Prince because someone put drugs in his food."

"But the imperial physician has already found out that Adanu's sudden weakness is just a symptom and has nothing to do with the medicine."

The queen's eyes were filled with tears, and she was determined to throw the dirty water on Jiang Rao, "She is the one who wants to frame me."

She was very cautious in this matter. Not to mention that the person who gave him the drug was a assassin from the Xu family. The drug would not affect his pulse. Even if the imperial physician was not from her side, and a physician she was not familiar with was used to diagnose Adanu's pulse, he would only say that he was running around for a long time and his body was exhausted, which caused the sudden fatigue. No one would be able to tell that someone had put drugs in the food he ate.

It takes seven days for the effect of the medicine to wear off, and seven days... it will be time for this group of Qiang people to leave Beijing.

But she didn't expect that someone would notice her actions.

She looked at Jiang Rao with disgust, but she cried to Emperor Zhaowu, "The palace maid next to me saw it just now. It was Fourth Miss Jiang's people who passed the secret letter to Your Majesty through the Black Guards."

The Queen said as if she was deeply distressed: "If people really misunderstood my use of medicine, I don't care about myself, but I am worried that the envoys will misunderstand our Dazhao and damage the diplomatic relations between the two tribes. It's okay for a little girl to use such means at home, and let her parents teach her a lesson. How can we allow her to mess around in state affairs?"

Just now she saw the palace maids from Shuxiang Palace peeking over here, as if they wanted to find out something. The person who wrote the secret letter to complain must be Jiang Rao.

She underestimated this girl. In such a short time since she came back, she had already figured out that she had drugged him.

The envoy listened to the queen's words, shook his head, and looked at Jiang Rao with a bit of annoyance in his eyes.

Jiang Rao clenched her fingers, patiently waiting for the opportunity to speak.

She thought that the fact that Emperor Zhaowu asked the maid from the Imperial Household Department to take her aunt to see the fabric meant that he had finally changed his mind.

But looking at his current appearance, it is clear that he is favoring the Queen.

A palace servant handed the letter to Jiang Rao.

"Is this letter written by Miss Jiang?"

Emperor Zhaowu's voice was so cold that Jiang Rao felt cold all over.

Jiang Rao frowned, not even looking at the letter, gritted her teeth, and said frankly, "It's not my daughter."

She felt that there was something fishy about the fact that the Seventeenth Prince had defeated Adanu, but she said it was just her intuition and should not be taken seriously, so how could it be slander?

The letter paper was instead stuffed in front of Jiang Rao.

Jiang Rao accidentally saw small words in the corner of the letter paper. Looking at the handwriting, she suddenly trembled, raised her eyes, and followed the words all the way until she finished reading the entire letter. She was stunned.

That handwriting...

It is clearly Rong Ting’s name.

So, she was not wrong. It turned out that Queen Jiahe had done something to help the Seventeenth Prince defeat Adanu.

But she quickly raised her eyes to look at Emperor Zhaowu again. His hand was on Empress Jiahe's back, with a soothing and intimate gesture.

Emperor Zhaowu was facing Empress Jiahe.

The person who wrote the letter would be convicted of slander.

Jiang Rao snatched the letter in one go, but fearing someone might snatch it away, she bent down and tore the rice paper into pieces with trembling fingers.

No more people can be asked to recognize the handwriting on it.

"Yes, I am your servant." She lowered her head, her fingers trembling, but spoke loudly.

"Yes, my son."

At the same time as she spoke, a voice came from outside the hall.

Outside the Golden Palace, a tall and slender figure slowly walked up the white jade steps.

The steady and powerful footsteps are getting closer and closer.