"Disfigured, forced into prostitution?" Qingying raised her eyebrows in surprise.
I never imagined Wei Huaixu's methods would be so cruel...
However, this is indeed something he is capable of doing.
"Let's go see my suffering mother."
Lady Pan was imprisoned in a dungeon outside the palace.
Just as Qingying arrived in her carriage, a light drizzle began to fall.
Yu Yue quickly opened an umbrella and shielded Qingying's head.
The jailer guarding the cell didn't recognize her and immediately blocked her way. Tong Xia promptly presented the jade token identifying Qing Ying, and only then did the two respectfully allow her to pass. The prison officer, having received the news, came to greet her and personally led the way.
This was Qingying's first time entering the prison of the Eastern Lin Kingdom.
Upon entering, a stench assaulted my senses; the putrid and damp air mingled together. The room was dimly lit, with the burning candlelight illuminating only a small area.
This place holds the most vicious criminals of the Eastern Kingdom. Once convicted and imprisoned here, there is almost no chance of survival.
Pan was imprisoned in the second-to-last cell from the inside.
She was disheveled, her tattered clothes stained with blood, her hands and feet bound by heavy chains, and her once well-maintained face was now covered with crisscrossing, ugly scars, with a charred "prostitute" character branded into her cheek.
She will never be able to return to her former position as the wife of the Duke of Zhenguo.
The prison guard who led the way opened the cell door and coldly said to the person inside, "Pan, behave yourself, the Empress has something to ask you."
Then, when he turned to face Qingying, he immediately changed to a fawning expression, "Your Highness, please come in. I will be waiting outside. Please feel free to summon me if you need anything."
"Thank you for your trouble, sir." Yu Yue said, taking out a silver ingot and stuffing it into the prison officer's hand.
"No trouble at all," the prison officer said, bowing as he accepted the silver, his smile wide and his eyes narrowing.
Seeing the prison guard, who was usually so arrogant and bossy towards them, now behaving like a sycophant in front of Qingying, Madam Pan couldn't help but spit and curse, "Pah! You sycophantic bastard!"
Upon hearing this, the prison officer's smile faltered, and he glanced at her indifferently. Pan actually flinched at that single look.
However, the prison officer said nothing and bowed before leaving.
Qingying, dressed in fine clothes, looked out of place in the dirty and shabby prison cell. She looked down at Pan Shi with pity in her eyes.
"Pan, have you realized your fate now that you've ended up like this?"
Pan looked up at her with venom in her eyes, "Don't think I don't know you were involved in all of this! To avenge that bitch, you completely disregarded the years of kindness I showed you in raising you! You're truly an ungrateful wretch, you deserve to be despised by the whole world!"
Her insults did not evoke the slightest sense of remorse in Qingying.
"The debt of gratitude for raising me? You mean imprisoning me, having people monitor me, tampering with my food, bribing doctors to worsen my lung disease, and trapping me in this frail body for the rest of my life?"
Pan was stunned for a moment. "You...so you knew all along..." A malice flashed in her eyes, and she suddenly burst into laughter.
The laughter was hoarse and grating.
Qingying frowned and looked at her without saying a word.
Pan laughed for a while before stopping and coughing. She was too weak to withstand any emotional fluctuations. But she was truly unable to calm down at the moment. She looked at Qingying with a fierce stare and slowly said, "I shouldn't have been so merciful and spared your life!"
Qingying looked down at her with a calm expression. "Even now, you still show no remorse. In that case, I will no longer show you any mercy."
"Have mercy? When have you ever shown mercy? You must be secretly delighted to see my current state, haha, I really raised a good daughter! You and your mistress mother are just as despicable! Just wait, my Shushu is still the Empress, she won't let you get away with this! I'll be waiting for you every day in the afterlife!"
"Oh? That reminds me." Qingying smiled, her voice sweet and gentle: "Do you know why your precious daughter, Liu Shushu, didn't rescue you when you were in such a sorry state?"
"It's all because of you, you vixen concubine, who seduced the Emperor, making it difficult for her to move forward in the palace!"
"But she is the Empress. No matter what my rank is, I am still below her. If she really tries her best to save you, how could the Emperor not give her face? After all, she still owes the Emperor a debt of gratitude for saving her life."
Pan's expression gradually froze. "What... exactly are you trying to say?"
Qingying blinked, her smile innocent. "Do you still remember the time you sent people to kill Ayan?"
"..."
"Later she came back unharmed, but she wasn't with her brother, and suddenly her brother stopped chasing after Ayan. Don't you find that strange?"
"Wh...what?" For some reason, Pan felt a nameless fear rising in her heart, which made her panic.
Qingying spoke slowly and deliberately, "Because the woman you sent to hunt down was actually your precious daughter, Liu Shushu."
Pan's eyes widened in disbelief as she stared at her, stammering, "No, it's impossible! You're lying to me! I don't believe it! How could it be Shushu? They look so different..."
But as she spoke, her voice grew softer and softer.
Qingying smiled, "You finally remembered. That woman knew the art of disguise. She disguised herself as Shuoyue to go on the autumn hunt, but you never saw her true face beneath the disguise."
As Ms. Pan recalled the past, she became increasingly panicked. She shrank back and covered her head in disbelief.
Qingying wasn't going to let her off the hook, and continued, "The woman from the martial arts world you thought was trying to seduce your son is actually your biological daughter whom you've been searching for all these years. And she knew from the beginning that you were the one who sent people to kill her. Do you think Liu Shushu, who has been wandering outside for over a decade and has returned to the Liu family, will be grateful to you just because of some so-called blood connection? Heh, no, she will only hate you!"
“She will hate you for losing her and making her suffer outside. She will hate you for raising me and taking her place for so many years. She will hate you the most because you almost made her lose her life. And your kindness to her will only make her feel that it is compensation, a hypocritical act to make up for the mistakes you made.”
"So, she won't help you, especially since your Pan family has committed a serious crime. She's afraid of being implicated, and she probably hopes you'll die soon."
"No!" Pan covered her ears and roared, trembling, "I won't believe you. Shushu wouldn't be so heartless. She said in front of the palace today that she would find a way to help me. She won't abandon me."
Qingying chuckled and said, "Then you can just wait and see whether she wants to kill you or save you."
Qingying turned around, her back to her, and casually tossed out a sentence: "Oh, right, I forgot to tell you, Liu Chengfeng has never given up on his beloved 'Ayan' girl."
Pan trembled, and by the time she reacted, she saw Qingying had already left the cell. She scrambled over, trying to grab the hem of Qingying's skirt. But just as the cell door opened, a prison guard approached and kicked her in the chest, sending her sprawling to the ground like a rag doll. Coughing in pain, she clutched her aching chest and screamed desperately in the direction Qingying had gone, "Come back! Explain yourself! You slut, you slut… Liu Qingying… Ying'er, come back…"
Qingying clenched her fists tightly beneath her sleeves and left without looking back.
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