Sure enough, they soon brought in five men in black from outside.

When these people were brought in, they were all in a bad state, covered in wounds, and these wounds did not seem to have been caused by any swords or knives.

It's more like they caused it by falling to the ground themselves.

"This..." Qi Sichen frowned and interrogated him, "What exactly happened?"

"Your Highness, we don't know what happened either. When we arrived, they were like this... There was also a corpse there, which seemed to have been killed by their own people."

"Just now, a night watchman said he saw a knife next to a corpse and was frightened, so he shouted," the young guard immediately reported.

Qi Sichen instructed the guard, "Go and interrogate all these people. Also, give the night watchman a reward of five taels of silver."

"Yes!" The young guard accepted the order and went off, but returned in a hurry a moment later.

"My lord, something terrible has happened! All those people are dead!" The young guard ran up, his brow beaded with sweat, his heart filled with anxiety.

"Dead?"

Qi Sichen glanced at him, and then knelt down to explain, "We had just brought the people to the next room, and before we even took those things, they had already rolled their eyes back and committed suicide by poisoning themselves... We just pried open their mouths to look, and that's when we realized that these people didn't have tongues. They must be assassins kept by someone."

"They all had their tongues cut out? What a grand gesture!" Qi Sichen's face was expressionless, but his voice carried a cold laugh.

However, the more he acted this way, the more terrified the kneeling guards became.

The guards who were brought out to escort the emperor were naturally Qi Sichen's trusted subordinates. They also knew that Qi Sichen was a capricious man. Although he appeared indifferent on the surface, he was probably furious inside.

In this era, there aren't many people who can survive having their tongues cut out; they're even harder to find than eunuchs who want to enter the palace!

The difficulty of training these poor survivors into highly skilled assassins is unimaginable. It's probably about as difficult as selecting one in a hundred or one in a thousand.

The fact that the person behind these people was able to send six of them at once is already considered a big deal!

With such a powerful enemy hiding behind the scenes, not yet revealing his true intentions, and now already plotting against him, how could Qi Sichen not be angry?

"Go and invite the princess over to ask her questions, and bring Xie Heng here too!" Fortunately, Qi Sichen remained calm the angrier he got, and said to the guards.

Soon Xie Heng and Lin Wanyue were invited over.

This was the first time Lin Wanyue had ever seen so many corpses lying side by side on the ground. Blood was still trickling from the mouths of these people, which was truly terrifying to see.

"Don't be afraid, my dear." Lin Weiming quickly hugged Lin Wanyue and coaxed her, saying, "Let's ask what's wrong first. If you're really scared, Dad will take you back later."

Lin Weiming was secretly hoping that Lin Wanyue would dislike Qi Sichen, so he would seize any opportunity to say things that would sow discord.

The guards nearby couldn't stand Lin Weiming's sycophantic remarks, so they quickly whispered an explanation to Lin Wanyue.

When Lin Wanyue heard that Qi Sichen had asked her to come over to find the murderer and also to be on the safe side, she mustered up her courage.

"Oh!" Hu Jiuyuan followed Lin Wanyue and took a closer look: "Soul-Stealing Powder, I didn't expect to still see it after all these years? Back then, I used it to kill quite a few people."

Lin Wanyue quickly asked Hu Jiuyuan in a low voice, "Can these people still be saved?"

"Of course not! What do you think it's called? It's a poison that only needs a tiny bit to kill someone. It's the most deadly of poisons!"

"But judging from how fresh their bodies are, they seem to have been dead for less than half an hour. You should keep your distance and avoid getting hurt by the corpse's aura," Hu Jiuyuan reminded him from the side.

As they were talking, the door was pushed open again.

Xie Heng, his clothes disheveled and his face filled with panic, rushed in and knelt down in front of Qi Sichen with a thud, kowtowing and saying, "Your Highness, please investigate! These people have nothing to do with me!"

"Since you know nothing, why are you so afraid?" Qi Sichen said in a cool voice.

Xie Heng swallowed hard and said, "But His Majesty and the Prince are both staying here, and this kind of thing happened in my house. If something were to go wrong, I'm afraid my whole family would be killed. Naturally, I'm afraid I'm scared..."

"Is that so? Then take a closer look. You are the Prefect of the Capital. So many people died in your house. You should indeed bear some responsibility." Qi Sichen said indifferently, seemingly unconvinced by Xie Heng's words and still harboring some vague doubts.

Xie Heng was worried about this, and even though he was terrified, he still had to follow his instructions, crawling over with his head down to carefully identify the bodies.

"My lord, I don't recognize any of these people! They're definitely not my servants! I don't know who leaked the information... My lord, I'll go and investigate right now!" Xie Heng quickly kowtowed.

He was also thinking to himself that Qi Sichen and his group had already disguised themselves before they came.

His household was always very safe. All the servants were firmly under the control of his wife. No one was allowed to hear any rumors from outside, and no one could find out what was going on inside.

But this was only Qi Yuan's first time staying at his house, and this happened...

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