"If it's confirmed that you are indeed the princess, would you like to return to the palace?" Zhu Lin asked this question earnestly.
Xingxing indeed began to think seriously, and then said with great hesitation, "I don't want to. I can't remember anything. Right now, I just want to be with my parents and brothers."
Zhu Lin understood. He took the little girl's hand and said gently, "If you don't want to go back, then don't go back. We'll talk about it when you feel like going back someday."
“Yes, that’s what I think too.” Xingxing wholeheartedly agreed.
Sigh, what could be more important than making the little girl happy? After the sharp-faced man revealed Xingxing's identity that day, Zhu Lin sent people to investigate, and it was confirmed that Xingxing's true identity was that of a princess.
I can roughly guess why she ended up in the south. She has amnesia, which may not be a bad thing. Otherwise, Prince Gong's men might have discovered her whereabouts long ago and then killed her.
After finishing up the affairs of Quanshui Prefecture in Pingzhou Prefecture, and with the people sent by the imperial court taking over the affairs of Shanquan Village, the governor returned to Pingzhou. He still had an important matter to attend to: capturing Prince Gong and his entourage of traitors.
Prince Gong was indeed cunning. The government sent over a thousand men to surround and capture him, but they failed. They did manage to capture quite a few of his underlings, but Prince Gong and his confidants all escaped.
"What are the government officials doing? They can't catch anyone?" Zhu Qiuyu shook his head, feeling that the officials were useless.
"You can't say that. Didn't Prince Gong escape from us last time in Shanquan Village?" Zhu Changge's words were more objective. Prince Gong was skilled in martial arts and had many experts around him, so it's not surprising that he was able to escape.
“These traitors are truly capable. Wu Lianlian has been infiltrating the Gu family for twelve years. She was only sixteen when she first entered the family, and I was only four at the time. More than ten years have passed in the blink of an eye, and it all seems like it happened yesterday.” Gu Yiqiao was momentarily bewildered.
He thought of Master Gu, and then of the son Wu Lianlian had given birth to for his father. Wu Lianlian had fled to Pingzhou Prefecture and escaped with Prince Gong, but Gu Yiyuan had been abandoned.
Gu Yiyuan is Wu Lianlian's son. He is eight years old this year and looks about five-tenths like Gu Yiqiao. He is the fourth son in the family. However, Gu Yiqiao and Gu Yiyuan rarely meet and are not close to each other.
To be honest, when Gu Yiqiao heard the letter from the governor of Pingzhou saying that Gu Yiyuan was in Pingzhou and that the Gu family should go and pick him up, his first reaction was that he didn't want to get involved. Gu Yiyuan was raised and personally taught by Wu Lianlian, so how innocent could he be?
He might be another pawn of Prince Gong. If we bring him back, the Gu family will likely be in turmoil again. But it wouldn't be right not to bring him back, since that boy has Gu's father's blood in his veins.
Just as Gu Yiqiao was struggling with how to deal with Gu Yiyuan, Old Master Gu finally woke up. He already knew what had happened these past few days, and he also knew that Wu Lianlian had poisoned him and wanted to send him to his death and take away the Gu family's property.
"Send Yuan'er to a manor in the suburbs and have someone guard him." This means placing Gu Yiyuan under house arrest.
In the past, Master Gu doted on Wu Lianlian, and by extension, he also doted on Gu Yiyuan. Now everything seems ridiculous. The more Master Gu loved them in the past, the more he hates them now.
"I heard that Prince Gong fled to the north, but I don't know if it's true or not." Old Zhou still feels lingering fear when he mentions Prince Gong. It was the black-clad men under this vicious prince who chased and killed their family for nearly two months, causing them a terrible ordeal.
"It doesn't matter where he runs off to, as long as he doesn't provoke us, or he'll be in big trouble." Gu Qiuyu said with an indifferent expression.
Today is the day Gu Yiyuan returns to the Gu family home. The governor has sent officials to escort him, so everyone is sitting in the main hall of the Gu residence waiting.
Everyone wanted to see what the son born to this traitorous female demon looked like. Master Gu was seriously poisoned and had been lying in bed recuperating, and the doctor had no way to cure him.
It was Zhu Chumo who detoxified him, but the poison had already invaded his internal organs. Even though the poison was detoxified, Master Gu would be plagued by illness for the rest of his life, and he would have to take supplements and medicine without stopping. He was essentially ruined.
Master Gu hated Wu Lianlian so much that he didn't want to see Gu Yiyuan again. He suggested that she be sent directly to the estate instead of returning to the Gu residence.
However, Gu Yiqiao wanted to see his younger brother again. Although he rarely saw him, he felt that his younger brother was not simple. Every time the boy looked at him, he looked at him as if he were an ant.
How could Wu Lianlian, a woman with such a scheming mind and a vicious heart, possibly raise a useless playboy? Her son must have some ability. Gu Yiqiao wanted to test just how capable that kid really was, which is why he always acted so arrogantly.
However, by almost noon, the officials still hadn't brought Gu Yiyuan. They should have arrived an hour earlier. Could something have happened on the way?
Sure enough, a servant hurriedly brought in a government official. The official was disheveled and injured. He gasped for breath as he entered, saying, "Gu Yiyuan was kidnapped on the way. The thief looked young, but he was very skilled in martial arts and ruthless. He killed two of our men..."
"Can you see clearly who is saving people? Is there a woman among them?" Gu Yiqiao's intuition was that Wu Lianlian had come back to save his son. No matter how ruthless that woman was, she couldn't bear to abandon her own son, whom she had raised herself.
The officer frowned and thought for a moment. “Yes, there were several, but they were all wearing veils, so I couldn’t see their faces clearly.”
"It seems that Prince Gong has planted quite a few people in the south, possibly including various merchants and concubines from various aristocratic families. Things are getting more and more interesting," Zhu Qiuyu said with a half-smile.
Upon learning the news, Gu Yiqiao instructed his servants to take the officials to rest and to invite a doctor.
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