"My lord, I heard that the Prince of Yong has arrived?"
In the back office of the He County government, Cui hurriedly ran to find Xie Ze.
"Yes! I just received the news too! I heard that the King of Yue came to greet us personally."
Xie Ze is writing something.
Upon seeing Cui enter, he spread the written paper on the desk and waited for the ink to dry.
These past few months haven't been easy for Xie Ze.
On the surface, he is currently the only local official in He County.
However, the entire old town of He County had been renovated by the Prince of Yue's Mansion, and he, the county magistrate, had no say in it at all.
Vast tracts of land were all transferred to the hands of the King and Queen of Yue.
The new town of He County was also renovated from the inside out and from top to bottom, according to Xie Yuan's wishes.
Only the Hexian County Government Office remained unchanged. This place, which originally symbolized the power of Hexian, has become the most dilapidated and oldest building in the entire county.
Xie Ze: ...
What a Xie Yuan!
What a shrewd man, Helian Jue!
They were clearly doing it on purpose.
They are showing contempt for the imperial court and humiliating Xie Ze!
But what's the use of anger?
In Yuezhou, far from the emperor's reach, Helian Jue, relying on his military power and his status as the Prince of Yue bestowed by the imperial court, acted arbitrarily and unilaterally in Yuezhou.
Xie Ze, in the end, was just a minor county magistrate of the seventh rank.
There are still several ranks between him and Helian Jue, a first-rank prince.
Xie Ze could only secretly write secret memorials and send them to the capital one by one.
Over a period of three or four months, he wrote dozens of secret letters, but they all disappeared without a trace.
"Does the imperial court really intend to allow Helian Jue to act so arrogantly in Yuezhou?"
Xie Ze's heart began to pound.
Subsequently, the emperor issued an edict ordering the fourth prince, the Prince of Yong, to take up his fief.
Upon receiving the news, Xie Ze didn't know whether to be happy or angry.
Logically speaking, he should be happy: the imperial court sending the Prince of Yong meant that the emperor had not abandoned Lingnan.
With two vassal kings in Lingnan, King Helian Jue of Yue could no longer hold absolute power.
However, Xie Ze was both angry and worried—his daughter was the concubine of the Prince of Yong.
Xie Ze initially married his daughter to the fourth prince as a concubine because he didn't want her to suffer in Lingnan with them.
And the result—
No matter how you go around in circles, you can't escape Lingnan.
Xie Ze couldn't help but mutter to himself: Is this Arou's fate?
"Where is Arou? Did she come with Prince Yong?"
Cui came to find Xie Ze because of her daughter.
She asked eagerly.
However, she realized she had made a foolish mistake as soon as she asked the question.
The emperor sent the Prince of Yong's family to assume their fiefdom, and Xie Rou, as a concubine, naturally had to come along.
In an ordinary family, if the husband were "exiled" to Lingnan, the wife could choose to divorce him to escape this calamity.
But Prince Yong is no ordinary family. In the royal family, there has never been such a thing as divorce.
What's most heartbreaking is that Xie Rou wasn't the Prince of Yong's legal wife; she was a concubine, just a secondary wife!
Princess Consort Xu of Yong is coming to Lingnan with her, so what right does Xie Rou, a mere concubine, have to refuse to come?
"My poor daughter. Why is her life so miserable?"
After all the fuss, the outcome is still the same.
If I had known this would happen, I shouldn't have called off the engagement in the first place.
If Arou had married Helian Jue directly, then she would now be the Princess Consort of Yue, who could get whatever she wanted in Lingnan.
Thinking of this, Cui felt both regret and a little tempted.
"Alright, stop crying. Let's go see Arou first."
While Xie Ze was talking to Cui, the memorial he had just written had already dried.
He carefully folded the memorial, put it in an envelope, and sealed it with sealing wax!
After doing all this, Xie Ze got up, pulled up Cui's sleeve, and the couple left the back office of the county government office together.
Following the information they had heard, they found their way to the foot of the city wall.
The Fourth Prince and Princess Xu had already followed Xie Yuan up to the city gate tower.
Meanwhile, the large entourage of carriages and horses from the Prince of Yong's residence stood by at the foot of the city wall.
The steward beside Xie Ze rushed to the motorcade to inquire about the news before Xie Ze and his wife could.
The manager was quite observant and found someone who looked like a manager.
"Concubine Xie?"
Upon hearing this name, the steward of the Prince Yong's residence had a slightly subtle expression.
He looked the Xie family servants up and down. "Are you from Magistrate Xie's household?"
Magistrate Xie?
There's nothing wrong with this name.
Xie Ze is indeed only a county magistrate at present.
But many of Xie Ze's close friends, acquaintances, or relatives would not touch Xie Ze's heart like this.
Instead, they would address Xie Ze more affectionately as Xie Shizhong, which was Xie Ze's former official position—Shizhong of the Secretariat.
Or, people would politely address him as Mr. Xie.
The words "Magistrate Xie" may be true, but they are incredibly hurtful.
If the steward of the Xie family heard the title "Magistrate Xie" clearly carrying a mocking tone from an enemy like Xie Yuan, he wouldn't have thought anything of it.
But ironically, these three words came from the mouth of the steward of the Prince Yong's mansion.
The Prince of Yong is my young lady's husband.
Xie Ze could be considered half a father-in-law of the Prince of Yong.
How could he possibly look down on Xie Ze like that?
The title alone cast a shadow over the mind of the Xie family steward.
Regardless of whether this is a case of "what the superiors do, the inferiors follow," or whether Princess Xu is deliberately targeting the concubine's family, it shows that Xie Rou's life in the Prince Yong's mansion is not easy!
Come to think of it, wives and concubines have always been natural enemies.
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