Everyone in the palace was concentrating on watching Concubine Diexiang dance. Emperor Zhou was staring at her with his eyes almost popping out of his head.
The woman was only in her early twenties, with a graceful figure and a rich fragrance. As she swayed, the whole palace was filled with fragrance. The musicians plucked the strings and struck the bells more vigorously. As the drumbeats reached a climax, Concubine Diexiang suddenly squatted down and posed in a beautiful posture. There
was a young eunuch waiting in the audience with a big box in his arms. When he saw the opportunity, he opened the small door that locked the box. In an instant, dozens of colorful butterflies flew out in a swarm, and everyone exclaimed!
Some butterflies flew away, and more circled around Concubine Diexiang. The beautiful scenery was like a fairyland. Everyone was silent, and for a while only the sound of drums and music lingered.
Fearing that some blind butterfly might fly into his wine, Pei Yuan threw a handkerchief over the rim of the cup, then laughed and clapped his hands.
He thought to himself, Bao Ning is really smart and clever, how could she have thought of designing such a dance? It was brilliant. Concubine Gao was jealous of Concubine Diexiang's young favor, and now that she had added fuel to the fire, she should be even more angry.
Pei Yuan looked over and saw that Concubine Gao was indeed annoyed. She forced a smile and clapped her hands in agreement, but secretly her teeth were about to break as she cursed, "Fox charm, dead witch!"
Pei Xiao was not present. Gao Feihe was sitting beside Concubine Gao and serving her. Seeing this, she hurried to rub her back, but in her heart she remembered what her counselor Sun Xingye said to her before she left in the morning. Sun
Xingye was planted by Pei Xiao beside her. Gao Feihe knew it very well and did not trust him, but the small fragrant pill he made was very useful, so she looked up to him. Sometimes Sun Xingye said a few useful words, and Gao Feihe would listen.
For example, this morning Sun Xingye had advised her to present this pill to Concubine Gao. Which woman does not like beauty and fragrance? Concubine Gao would definitely be pleased and would reward her.
Gao Feihe was reluctant at first. She was not that generous. Scarcity makes things valuable. If everyone in the harem was a Concubine Diexiang, what would be so rare? She just wanted to keep it for herself. There was no need to use such a precious thing to please her aunt. But now... she said something wrong in the afternoon, which angered Concubine Gao. There was a crack in their relationship, and they were eager to repair it.
Gao Feihe was still hesitating, but the little maid beside her spoke first, asking for credit: "Your Majesty, you don't know yet, right? Some time ago, His Highness got a new conspirator named Sun, who has a top-secret ancient recipe in his hand, which is made into pills. Taking them can make the body fragrant. Mr. Sun once guessed that Concubine Diexiang might have had the fragrance she has today because she has been eating this little fragrant pill all year round. Our Crown Princess has been eating it, and now there is a faint fragrance. If you don't believe me, you can smell it."
Gao Feihe was stunned and turned to look at the maid named Yinling. She realized in an instant that this girl must have been bribed by Sun Xingye and was speaking for Sun, wanting to help him climb up the social ladder of Concubine Gao.
Concubine Gao Guifei was really interested. She pulled Gao Feihe's wrist and put it to her nose, nodding her head: "It really smells good."
She said in a scolding tone: "You are such a good girl. You have such a good thing but you still keep it to yourself. You should have told your aunt about it."
Gao Feihe smiled awkwardly and said: "Aunt, this is the first time I have seen this thing. I dare not give it to you directly, for fear of hurting your body, so I tried it myself. Now I think it is good. I was going to give it to you when I go back tonight, but I didn't expect that the quick-talking girl got it first." Gao Feihe secretly glared at Yinling. Concubine
Gao Guifei asked: "Do you have it with you? Show it to me."
Gao Feihe said repeatedly: "I have it with me, I have it with me." The pill was one pill each morning and evening. She was afraid of missing the time, so she kept it in the hands of the accompanying maid, that is, Yinling.
Yin Ling respectfully took out the medicine bottle. Concubine Gao looked at it carefully and asked in disbelief, "Is it really useful?"
Gao Feihe was already very reluctant, but under pressure, she could only force a smile and said, "It is useful."
Yin Ling interrupted and said, "Mr. Sun said that it is more effective if taken with wine."
Gao Feihe frowned and stared at her, "Why haven't I heard of it?"
Yin Ling nodded and said, "I also heard Mr. Sun mention it by chance." She said everything according to what Sun Xingye taught her.
Sun Xingye promised her that if she did a good job, he would go back and ask His Highness to redeem her slavery and send her out of the mansion to marry. Yinling was already nineteen years old, and what she wanted most was to get married as soon as possible. In addition, Sun Xingye just wanted to show his face in front of Concubine Gao, and it was not a matter of life and death, so she agreed. After all, if she missed this opportunity, she would probably die of old age in the mansion and become an old nanny that no one wanted.
Concubine Gao smiled and said, "There is wine here. It's time for Feihe to take medicine, right? Why not try it now?"
She was already tempted by the pill, but she was still worried about what would happen if she took it. Gao Feihe happened to be there, so she asked her to take a pill with the wine. If she was safe, she would immediately ask Pei Xiao for the prescription.
Gao Feihe naturally agreed. She took the pill from Yinling and picked up the glass of wine. For some reason, her heart suddenly started beating faster, as if something bad was going to happen. Concubine Gao stared at her closely. Gao Feihe forced a smile again, put the pill into her mouth, and swallowed it with the wine.
Pei Yuan watched the whole conversation between them, squinted his eyes, and refocused his gaze on the podium, clapping lazily and drinking.
Concubine Diexiang was almost done dancing.
Gao Feihe thought she might be drunk. Otherwise, why did her head hurt more and more, and her eyes got hotter and hotter? She blinked, wiped her eyelids with her hand, which was wet, and took her hand down to see that it was full of bright red blood!
"Ah!"
Concubine Diexiang's dance was frozen at the last moment. There was a sudden scream from the audience, and everyone looked over. Gao Feihe stood in her seat in horror, her hands and face covered in blood. Concubine Gao Guifei beside her was already stunned. She quickly shouted, "Call the imperial physician!" As soon as
she finished speaking, Gao Feihe suddenly twitched violently and fell to the ground with a tremor.
Pei Yuan watched coldly and drank the last sip of wine at the bottom of the glass.
...
In Changqiu Palace, Baoning watched the queen plant flowers under the moonlight. The sulfur powder from the Imperial Hospital had been taken. According to Baoning's instructions, the queen dug up the chrysanthemums with their roots and put them aside, leaving the flower soil and a small amount of sulfur to mix.
Even outside, the queen would light the plate of red sandalwood incense, and Baoning would feel drowsy and unable to open his eyelids.
Baoning couldn't help asking, "Your Highness, do you like this kind of incense so much?"
"Yes, I have been smelling it for more than ten years and I can't stop. This smell is soothing and makes me feel calm." The Queen tilted her head and asked, "Does Baoning dislike it?"
Baoning smiled and said, "I don't dislike it, I just think it's weird."
The Queen said, "You young people may not be used to it."
She told the old nanny, "Please move the incense farther away."
The package of sulfur powder was placed next to the incense burner, very close to it. When the old nanny went to take the burner, Baoning helped to move the paper package away, but she found something strange at first glance. She was afraid that she had seen it wrong, so she held the paper package in front of her eyes and confirmed that there were actually a few small red particles in the light yellow powder, which looked like the color of bloodstone of poor quality.
She recognized that the thing was called cinnabar.
But how could cinnabar be mixed into sulfur powder? People in the Imperial Hospital would not make such a mistake.
After careful consideration, Baoning's heart skipped a beat, and in just an instant, a layer of cold sweat covered his forehead.
The Queen noticed the change in her expression and asked with concern, "What's wrong with Baoning?"
Baoning recalled that when she first learned medicine with Aunt Ming, she learned a thing called mercury that was both a medicine and a poison. Aunt Ming told her that the medicine was very strong and was mainly used for disinfection. If someone had lice on their head, they could take some and apply it, and the lice would die overnight. If a pregnant woman had a stillbirth, she could take some mercury and the fetus would be expelled quickly.
But in the hands of the bad guys, this is not a medicine to cure the disease, but a deadly poison.
Mercury is colorless and tasteless, so it is hard to tell the difference. It is a patient poison that tortures people for a long time.
At that time, she asked casually, since it is colorless and tasteless, how can we tell it apart? Aunt Ming told her that mercury and sulfur put together, when exposed to fire, will turn into red cinnabar.
Baoning stared at the incense burner, the smoke rose up, and with the wind into strange shapes.
The queen and the old nanny looked at each other blankly, and just when they were about to ask something else, Baoning said: "Madam, I don't like this incense, it makes me dizzy, let's not use it, okay?"
Baoning nervously pulled the queen's sleeve, and acted coquettishly.
She didn't dare to say it directly here, Madam, it seems that someone has added mercury to the incense to harm you. Since this poisonous incense has been burning in Changqiu Palace for many years, there must be spies in the palace. If it is exposed rashly, it will only alarm the snake and even put them in danger.
Baoning's palms were sweating, and she kept thinking, what should she do?
Pei Yuan is still in the Taiji Palace. Judging from the time, the incident on his side should have already started, and it would be difficult for him to come over. But in Changqiu Palace, Baoning didn't know who to trust and who not to trust. Even in the whole palace, good people and bad people are mixed together... Baoning thought, otherwise she should suppress the doubts for the time being and not let the queen use this incense again. The rest can be discussed after seeing Pei Yuan tomorrow.
The queen didn't know what was going on in her heart. Looking at her soft and obedient appearance leaning on her shoulder, she just thought she was cute and wanted to agree to everything she said, so she said "OK".
Baoning continued to plant flowers with the queen.
She was in a state of confusion, worrying about Pei Yuan's situation and who was trying to harm the queen. She was absent-minded and didn't hear the queen talking to her for several times.
Suddenly, a girl's voice came from behind: "Your Majesty, Princess, are you tired? The kitchen has made some new snacks. I have brought them here. Try them. They are mushroom cakes."
The old nanny beside the queen smiled and took them over and said, "Tao Xian is so thoughtful."
Bao Ning looked over. Tao Xian saluted her and smiled shyly. She looked about thirteen or fourteen years old, younger than her.
The queen explained to her, "One year when I went to the palace to escape the summer heat, I saw this little girl on the way. She was almost starving to death. I saw that she was smart and beautiful, and I couldn't bear to see her suffer outside, so I brought her back to the palace. In a blink of an eye, seven years have passed, and little Taoxian has grown up."
Baoning said, "Your Majesty is kind."
The queen smiled and pushed the small plate in front of her: "You eat first, I'll wait a moment."
Taoxian had already walked out, but when she heard the queen say this, she suddenly stopped.
She hesitated for a moment, but still turned her head and said concernedly: "Your Majesty, you have to eat mushroom cakes while they are hot. If they are cold, they will have a fishy smell."
"Oh, is that so." After hearing her, the queen wiped her hands with a handkerchief, picked up a piece with chopsticks and blew it to her mouth, "Okay, then I'll eat it now."
Taoxian smiled and bowed. The old nanny said that she was too weak to blow the wind, and pushed her back to rest. Taoxian had no choice but to leave. Baoning was now suspicious. No matter who he looked at, he thought of the bad guy. Staring at Taoxian's back, he felt that her steps were stiff and nervous, and a little strange. Could it be that there was something wrong with the cake?
But then he thought, which thief would be so bold as to poison the queen openly in the queen's palace?
It was almost impossible.
The hand was one step faster than the heart, and Baoning's mind jumped. She reached out to stop the queen and said, "Your Majesty, do you see any bugs on this cake?"
The queen really stopped and looked at it in suspicion: "Are there any bugs?"
Baoning said affirmatively: "Yes."
She took the cake from the queen's chopsticks and threw it on the table: "This can't be eaten."
"Then don't eat it for now." The queen went to fiddle with her flowers again, "I'm not hungry at all, let's finish the work at hand first."
Baoning smiled and said, "Then I'll try it first?"
The queen nodded, Baoning thanked her, and took a small bite with her handkerchief. The chefs in the palace are really good at cooking. The cake skin is crispy, and the mushroom meat inside is delicious and tender. There is sweet juice on the tip of the tongue. After swallowing it, Bao Ning secretly evaluated it in her heart, it should not be poisonous.
She was slightly relieved, and out of courtesy, she ate the piece she had bitten cleanly before putting down her chopsticks.
The queen was obsessed with her autumn chrysanthemums and had long forgotten about the cake. Bao Ning watched from the side, and it was fine at first, but as she watched, she felt something was wrong with her body. Did she seem to be hallucinating? As long as her sight shifted slightly, she would feel dizzy, and the sky, the earth, the flowers and the plants in front of her eyes all turned into a dazzling blue and purple.
Looking closely, there were dancing figures everywhere, jumping on the petals, running on the ground, twisting their buttocks on her knees, and some could fly and drill into her ears...
Baoning's heart couldn't help but beat faster. It wasn't that she was nervous, but that her heart seemed to have its own life, beating and beating vigorously. Her face turned red, and in a trance, it felt like she was stepping on cotton and was about to fly.
The three words "see the green hand" suddenly popped up and jumped into her mind.
Baoning understood that the cake was indeed not poisonous. The poisonous part was the mushroom inside. It was a poisonous mushroom grown in the deep mountains of the southwest. It would not kill people, but would only make people hallucinate.
If an ordinary person ate it, the discomfort would be relieved after three or four days.
If the queen took it... She was already insane, and under the double effect of the medicine, she might have a flare-up, and it's possible that she would do something extreme.
In the corner of his eye, Baoning caught a glimpse of Tao Xian.
She stood behind the half-open door, her hands clasped together, looking a little anxious. Bao Ning suddenly realized that the man's purpose was to use the empress to commit a crime against her! She could no longer stay in Changqiu Palace. But where else could she go?
After thinking about it, Bao Ning thought of the simplest way - to find the imperial physician.
She could call a few more imperial physicians because she was ill. Even if the man had long arms, he could not control all the imperial physicians in the imperial hospital, let alone commit a crime openly. As long as there were more outsiders, the man would be cautious, and they would be safe.
Baoning's head became more dizzy. There were more and more little people in front of her, like a group of flying butterflies. She took a deep breath, grabbed the hand of the queen beside her, and smiled: "Your Majesty, can we go inside for a while? I want to say something intimate to you."
The author has something to say: The knowledge of agronomy, chemistry, and Chinese medicine involved in this chapter is not necessarily correct. It is just for the plot. Don't try it blindly! Mix sulfur powder with flower soil. Don't blame me if the flower dies... Don't try to rub mercury on your head, and don't break the thermometer at home to do a small experiment with mercury sulfide... And don't try to eat uncooked green onion!