About ten miles from the capital, in the middle of nowhere, there is a villa.

In the evening, pedestrians passing by can always hear the cries of children and screams of people coming from here.

For several days now, the nearby villagers, feeling fearful, have been hiding in their homes at night, rarely daring to step out.

As the daughter of the eldest princess, Fukang had countless secret guards left to her by her mother. She only needed to conduct a discreet investigation to locate these people.

That night, she was dressed in black, blending herself into the darkness.

In the distance, only a few rooms in the villa were lit up, and figures could be seen moving around from time to time; these were probably the guards.

The guard who went to gather intelligence returned and knelt on one knee before her. "Princess, we have found out everything. All the elderly and children who were arrested in the village are inside. The guards are not people they hired from outside; judging from their conversation, they are probably servants of some noble family."

"They really have a lot of nerve," Fu Kang couldn't help but sneer upon hearing this. In all her life, she had never seen such a high-ranking official so blatantly using his own people to kidnap others.

In the quiet of the night, in the deserted countryside, not even the barking of dogs could be heard.

Fukang stared intently in the direction of the villa. "Do you know where those elderly people and children are locked up? How are they?"

The guard's expression was grave. "I know, the situation is rather bad. Some of the elderly are already unconscious. There are charcoal fires for warmth in the detention area, but very few. If it gets any later, most of them will probably die."

He had barely lifted the tile when he glanced at it before turning his head away.

More than a dozen people lived in one place, and apart from the winter clothes that were not even sure if they could keep out the cold, they weren't even given a blanket. The children could only hide in the old man's arms and sob quietly.

Everyone's faces were red from the cold, and some of the elderly people looked dazed, making it hard to believe they would survive the winter.

As Fukang listened, his face grew cold. These people were truly despicable. Oppressing the people, abusing children, they were utterly lawless!

“You, deal with those guards. The men below, come with me, we’re going to rescue them.”

The pitch-black night perfectly concealed everyone's presence. In another room in the courtyard, where the lights were on, several rounds of drinks had already been consumed.

The food stains, peanut shells, and sunflower seed shells were scattered all over the floor.

The servants were all drunk and staggering about, the fire in the stove was burning brightly, and their faces were as red as boiled shrimp. Judging from their food and drink, it was hard to believe they had embezzled the funds allocated to the elderly and children.

Anyway, Fukang and his men didn't care about that. After knocking out the guards outside, they climbed in through the window, causing quite a commotion.

She quickly made a shushing gesture, "I was sent by Xu Nian to rescue you. Come here quickly and come with me." As she spoke, she rushed to the door and broke the lock.

Seeing this, the elderly and children who were still able to move rushed out without suspicion.

The remaining guards carried or shouldered the items as the group marched out of the courtyard in a grand procession.

Wang Er had drunk a bit too much today, and was relieving himself in a daze in the middle of the night. Suddenly, he heard a noise in the front yard, swayed as he walked over and took a look.

Several people were carrying the things locked inside the house out, and the effects of the alcohol were instantly dispelled!

He rushed back into the house, yelling, "Get up! Stop sleeping! Everyone's gone! Stop sleeping! If we keep sleeping, we'll both be dead!"

The drowsy group was jolted awake by his shout and sat bolt upright in bed. They glanced out the window at the scene outside, grabbed their weapons, and rushed out of the yard.

"Stop!" someone shouted. "Don't run! Who gave you permission to come?!"

Fukang's men had no intention of fighting them. They threw out several hidden weapons and, taking advantage of the moment when the men dodged, hurriedly carried their men away. The paper figure that had been covering Fukang stirred at that moment.

Just as those people were about to get close, it was carried by the wind and floated into someone's arms.

"You guys go! I'll hold them off here!" Gu Zhan, dressed in black and masked, hurriedly gave a brief instruction to the men in Fukang after receiving Xu Nian's message, and then led his men to charge forward.

Not far outside was the carriage he had prepared long ago.

These servants in front of us, though called servants, were more like thugs trained by wealthy families. But they were no match for Gu Zhan and his men, who had fought on the battlefield year after year.

Remembering that not all the people outside had evacuated, Gu Zhan didn't leave. Instead, he led his men to search the area, sensing a familiar presence in the paper figure.

Wrapped in something, it slowly crawled out of the man's arms and floated onto Gu Zhan.

"General, when did you get a paper figure on you?" Gu Zhan, who hadn't noticed before, looked down after hearing his subordinate's words and saw a small white figure hanging on his waist.

The token it was wrapped in was clearly quite heavy; as it fell to the ground, its body swayed in the wind, as if it were about to be carried away at any moment.

In the entire capital, probably only his quirky fiancée has this ability.

The subordinate blinked, wondering if he was just seeing things in the darkness. Otherwise, how could he have imagined his general smiling just now?

As soon as the sign was taken from the paper figure, blue flames automatically ignited on the small white thing.

Everyone was startled for a moment, but when they saw that the flames were only burning around the paper figure and couldn't ignite Gu Zhan's clothes at all, they breathed a sigh of relief.

"This, isn't this the Chen family's token?" Someone leaned over and took a look at the token in Gu Zhan's hand. The three big characters "Prefectural Governor's Order" really surprised him.

In the Xuan Dynasty, high-ranking officials and nobles would have tokens in their homes to prove the identity of their servants, who could only enter and leave the mansion with the tokens.

Every household's token was different; those with official positions wrote their official titles, those with noble titles wrote their noble titles, and those with neither wrote their own names.

The Prefect's Decree was Chen Weisheng's family's token!

"Hmph, this Lord Chen," Xu Nian was stunned for a long time when she learned about this matter. "Why couldn't he be a little more careful when he was dealing with a tiger?"

She was speechless, unable to understand how such a foolish person could become a fourth-rank official!

He was probably afraid that even if he paid them, they wouldn't do anything.

[I don't understand, I don't understand. Even so, you could at least have the servants leave the token in the mansion when they come over. Carrying it with you at all times seems like you're seriously ill.]

"Family members, we must not follow this example," Xu Nian said earnestly. "Whether it's kidnapping, robbery, or revealing one's identity, we must not follow this example."

She did send the paper effigy over to find evidence, but she didn't have high hopes.

To her surprise, they found something so important! Xu Nian was overjoyed and immediately had Gu Zhan hand it over to the Crown Prince.