Chapter 68
Mrs. Chen has been sleeping very restlessly lately.
Ever since a high-ranking official from the capital came to Lingzhou, her husband has stayed in the military camp for several nights in a row and has not returned home.
"It's just a small official position, but I don't know what the point is of working so hard!" Mrs. Chen was very dissatisfied, especially with the legendary regent.
As soon as this man arrived, he caused chaos in Lingzhou City. He checked the accounts of the dikes and assessed the officials in office. The worst hit was the Mu family army. They lined up in the martial arts field for three consecutive days waiting for inspection. As a result, they didn't show up at all on the first two days, and were two hours late on the last day. When they finally arrived, they threw out the words "the army is in disarray and looks like a mob", which made several deputy generals so angry that they almost jumped up and cursed.
It is said that General Mu was also present at the time. His old face was red with anger, but he said nothing.
Mrs. Chen truly felt sorry for the Mu family army. The people of Lingzhou loved General Mu and the young marshal even more than they loved the emperor whom they had never met.
"You dog official who bullies others by taking advantage of his power, get out of here as soon as possible!" Mrs. Chen turned over and cursed angrily, when she suddenly heard a faint sound coming from outside the house.
Seize, seize, seize.
It sounded like someone was knocking on something, and it sounded particularly eerie in the middle of the night.
Mrs. Chen put on her clothes and stood up. She listened for a while. The sound was sometimes soft and sometimes loud, but it never stopped. She looked out the window in the moonlight. The courtyard was empty, there was nothing there.
Maybe it's a rat...
Mrs. Chen tucked the quilt into the child and was about to lie down when her back suddenly stiffened. She suddenly realized that the sound seemed to come from "that house"!
Just this thought made the hairs all over my body stand up.
At the end of the alley was a long-abandoned house. The family's surname was Huo, and they were military households. The young couple seemed very much in love, and they had a big, fat boy. After the flood two years ago, everyone else had moved back, but the Huo family was nowhere to be seen.
Some people said that the man died on the battlefield and his wife remarried, while others said that the couple escaped during the chaos... Mrs. Chen didn't think much about it at first, but gradually she realized something was wrong.
Normally, after a house has been abandoned for a while, new households will soon move in, but that house remained empty.
Mrs. Chen was kind-hearted and always felt that it was a waste to have a nice house unoccupied, so she helped a fellow villager who moved in with his family to find out if he could buy it at a low price. As a result, two strangers came and claimed to be relatives of the Huo family and bluntly rejected the deal.
Mrs. Chen thought her offer was too low, but her neighbor secretly told her that those buyers who offered reasonable offers were also rejected.
Until one day, her husband got drunk and let it slip, scolding her not to meddle in other people's business and to stop planning to take over the house because something big had happened in that yard!
Mrs. Chen couldn't help but wonder: "Could it be possible that someone died in there?"
"It's much more serious than that..." the man said mysteriously. Mrs. Chen asked again, but the man refused to mention it again.
From then on, this house became a thorn in Mrs. Chen's heart, making her feel itchy from time to time.
But when she thought of her man's secretive expression at the time, she didn't dare to act rashly.
"Go to sleep! Mind your own business!" Mrs. Chen said to herself. She lay down and tossed and turned for a long time, but the sound still continued, as if it was knocking in her ears, making her very irritated.
"No matter whether you are a human or a ghost, I will fight you!" Mrs. Chen got up suddenly, picked up the hatchet, thought for a while, took down a portrait of Zhong Kui from the door, and rushed out in a hurry.
The closer you get, the clearer the sound.
It really is that family!
Mrs. Chen kicked the door open and shouted before entering the yard, "I'm telling you, my husband is on duty in the army. I went into the mountains to hunt wolves in my early years. If you know what's good for you, come out now!"
The sound suddenly stopped.
Grab, grab, grab... Then he started banging with an unprecedented rhythm and strength!
"Hey! You're getting excited again!" Mrs. Chen waded through the knee-high weeds, taking one deep step and one shallow step to the center of the yard, where there was a dry well, which was the source of the knocking sound!
Mrs. Chen's heart began to beat wildly.
It's impossible to say she wasn't afraid at all, but curiosity finally overcame her rationality. She held a hatchet in one hand and Zhong Kui in the other, and with both hands, she stepped over the well and shouted, "I want to see what you are!"
A bright moon peeked out from behind the dark clouds, and silver light immediately flooded the earth. In the dark night without lights or fire, Mrs. Chen could actually see the bottom of the well clearly.
A "female ghost" with disheveled hair was lying at the bottom of the well, holding a stone in her hand and knocking on the wall of the well repeatedly.
Mrs. Chen subconsciously wanted to chop it with the hatchet, but the "female ghost" raised her head, revealing a pretty face full of grievance, and begged weakly, "Sister, help me!"
Mrs. Chen finally understood how the men in those picture books were seduced by vixens in the wilderness. She, for some unknown reason, dropped the knife and blurted out, "Don't worry, sister. I'll go find the rope!"
This... is simply impossible to refuse!
*
After the night watchman's gong struck three times, Zhao Congyun finally raised his head from the pile of official documents, his face showing an unconcealable fatigue.
"Do you want to take a rest... or have a bowl of refreshing soup?" asked Uncle Dong.
"...Wake-up soup, please." Zhao Congyun paused and said, "You don't have to stay up with me. Once you've brought it over, go and rest."
Seeing that Uncle Dong seemed to be hesitant to speak, he added calmly, "I'm fine. I can't sleep anyway. Let's finish checking quickly so we can return to Beijing soon."
Uncle Dong sighed helplessly and was about to go to the kitchen when the door was gently pushed open. It was Li Pingru who came in with a bowl of ginseng soup: "Uncle Dong, I'm not saying anything bad about you, but your refreshing soup is so good that even dogs wouldn't drink it. Your Highness, you should try mine!"
She saw Zhao Congyun's brows furrowed slightly, but he was oblivious and continued teasing, "Your Highness, ever since you came to Lingzhou, you've been up all night, dragging the entire government office and the soldiers in the camp down with you... If you don't think about yourself, you should at least think about us. Uncle Dong and I haven't even had a full night's sleep these days."
Zhao Congyun put the bowl of soup she handed him aside and said coldly, "You took the initiative to come here. Uncle Dong, prepare a car tomorrow morning and send her away. Don't let her get in the way in the mansion."
"I'm not leaving!" Li Pingru's smile froze, and his lips trembled as he said, "...I'm just concerned about you...Do you really not understand, or are you pretending not to understand?"
Zhao Congyun's eyes were even colder than before: "I made it very clear two years ago. It's time for you to give up."
"What right do you have to criticize me? The Yue family doesn't even have a memorial tablet to pay tribute to, yet you're still obsessed with it. How can I give up when you're a living being right next to me?!"
Yes, Yue Mingming still has no tombstone, no grave, and no memorial tablet.
Many people did not understand why Zhao Congyun, given his status, did not even have a cenotaph built for him. Later, rumors began to spread that Zhao Congyun did not like the former princess who was a concubine at all, and that he had no choice but to marry her. Now that he had a noble status and the other party was dead, he naturally did what was easiest for him.
This rumor was once very popular, causing many prospective brides to want to get close to him. However, they could not withstand Zhao Congyun's overwhelming aura, and all the matchmakers in the capital returned empty-handed. In the end, the only one who stayed by his side was Li Pingru, the niece of the late queen and the divorced concubine.
In the past two years, no matter how Zhao Congyun threw things and cursed, Li Pingru just refused to give up.
Zhao Congyun was too lazy to say anything later. He really didn't have the energy to argue with her. In fact, he was even afraid of conflict with her because she could always easily see through his disguise.
Just like now.
Zhao Congyun rubbed his swollen temples, his expression extremely grim. "I have no interest in tangling with you! Uncle Dong, send her away immediately!"
"Even the child in her room...send him away!"
"Okay! Then I will take him to the Mu family army camp!" Li Pingru said provocatively.
"You dare!" Zhao Congyun said.
Huo Lianying's wife, the biological mother of the child next to Li Pingru, has been imprisoned in the camp.
"Li Pingru, I'm warning you, don't even think about this again!" Zhao Congyun said sternly, "Don't challenge my bottom line. If you don't want me to completely destroy the Huo family, then be quiet. I guarantee that both mother and son will live safely until the day I leave Lingzhou."
"Your Highness is truly hard-hearted." After a long pause, Li Pingru suddenly sneered, "I hope you still remember how painful it was when you were separated from your mother."
"Of course I remember. I hope they can suffer as much as I do." Zhao Congyun looked at her indifferently: "This is how my life will be. Why should they live a good life?"
*
After eating half a pot of noodles, the female ghost came back to life.
The person in the well was Yue Mingming.
The moment she was shot, she thought she was dead, and in fact, she was. But luckily, this was a game world, and even luckier, when she was almost drowning in the well, a flash of light actually triggered a save!
The system told her that under normal circumstances, she could quit and start over, but at that time she had not reached the safe exit time. She died in the game and her consciousness could not return to reality, so she could only temporarily stay in the save point and slowly recover.
Yue Mingming thought she had recovered quickly. The system instantly notified her that she could reload her save file and revive. She calmly awoke at the bottom of the well, only to find that the house had long been abandoned and no one knew she was still alive...
She squatted in the well for three days, feeling tired and hungry. She almost wanted to quit the game completely. But every time she wanted to give up, she always told herself to hold on a little longer. She believed that Zhao Congyun would find her!
But Zhao Congyun did not come, and the Mu family army did not show up either.
Yue Mingming was angry and anxious, wondering what was going on. According to the plot, Zheng Rong should have appeared soon... Until just now, Mrs. Chen told her that it had been two years since the flood in Lingzhou.
Yue Mingming didn't have time to think about what two years meant. She immediately asked the question that concerned her most: What was the outcome of the rebellion in the capital? Did Zhao Congyun and Emperor Zhaoming win?
Mrs. Chen was startled for a moment, then laughed and said, "Sister, you must have fallen and lost your mind. It's the Yongxi Dynasty now, and the people who rebelled back then were recently executed by the Regent."
Yongxi Dynasty? Regent?
What a mess...
Yue Mingming's mind was slow to react, and he panicked. He listened to Mrs. Chen's patient explanation, "Emperor Yongxi is the son of Emperor Zhaoming, who was recalled from the common people. I heard he once lived in Lingzhou! As for the Prince Regent...don't dare use his name carelessly! He has a terrible temper. If you displease him, you'll lose your head!"
"Zhao Congyun... is he the regent you mentioned? Is he still alive?" Yue Mingming heard his own voice trembling with nervousness.
"Who else could it be besides him?" Mrs. Chen curled her lips. "Except for the emperor, he is the most powerful person in the world..."
Mrs. Chen stopped talking before she finished, because she saw Yue Mingming suddenly stand up, his eyes red and tears falling.
"Sister, I will repay you for saving my life someday. I'm going to the capital to find him now."
Mrs. Chen's heart moved: "Sister, do you know the Regent?"
Yue Mingming nodded.
Mrs. Chen's expression suddenly became complicated. She didn't like Zhao Congyun, but she had a good impression of the pretty girl in front of her. In the end, she had to tell the truth: "Don't worry, sister, you don't have to go to the capital. The prince happens to be in Lingzhou right now!"
"Really?" Yue Mingming was overjoyed.
Mrs. Chen looked at Yue Mingming's expression and suddenly seemed to understand something. She hesitated for a moment and added in a low voice, "He came seven days ago... He brought his wife and son with him."
Yue Mingming was stunned: "What did you say?"
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