Chapter 227 A Heartless and Treacherous Thing
Li Shengyuan wanted to deliberately smear Pei Yanchuan, but he was so used to enjoying himself that he was unwilling to cover it up completely.
Li Shengyuan smiled awkwardly, "Your Highness is too kind. I know nothing about rosewood. This was just something I bought on the street."
"Oh? I wonder how much it cost?" Jiang Wan Ning asked, as if she really believed it.
Li Shengyuan was stunned for a moment, not expecting Jiang Wanning to ask such a question. He could only hold up three fingers, then changed it to four.
"Four ounces?"
"Ah...yes, forty taels."
Jiang Wan Ning nodded and took out forty taels of silver from her waist. "Then I'll trouble Lord Li to help me buy a set of the same table and chairs."
Li Shengyuan was completely stunned. This rosewood couldn't be bought for even 40 taels of silver, let alone 40 taels. Where was he supposed to buy it?
“Your Highness, you may not know this, but that craftsman is a skilled artisan,” Li Shengyuan said. “He’s not someone you should mess with.”
"That's alright. Just give me this set first, and I'll get myself a new one later."
"I wouldn't mind if it's secondhand. Peony, go and give the silver to Lord Li."
Peony picked up the silver on the table. "Your Highness, since it's secondhand, you should give me a discount. Twenty taels is enough."
As he spoke, he took twenty taels of silver and handed the remaining twenty taels to Li Shengyuan.
Li Shengyuan moved his hand slightly, but still took it.
Unexpectedly, before the show even started, they had already ruined a set of rosewood tables and chairs for nothing. Fortunately, they were stuck in the room.
Thinking of this, Li Shengyuan felt much more at ease.
"Your Highness, Your Highness, we've traveled a long way, shall we begin the banquet soon?" Li Shengyuan gestured for them to join him.
He then raised his wine glass and said, "Your Highness and Princess have come from afar, I toast you."
Jiang Wan Ning picked up her wine glass, smelled it, and nodded gently.
Li Shengyuan seemed to sense Jiang Wanning's worries and immediately sent someone to test the poison to prove that he had not poisoned her.
“I understand that Your Highness and Your Highness are worried. You can eat with peace of mind now,” Li Shengyuan said with a smile.
Pei Yanchuan, Jiang Wanning, and the others then picked up their chopsticks and began to eat.
Li Shengyuan watched this scene and smiled sinisterly.
After taking only a couple of bites, the group collapsed onto the table, revealing Li Shengyuan's true colors. "Hmph, you want my rosewood table and chairs?"
"You'll have to live up to that fate, pshaw!"
As he was talking to himself, footsteps came from the back of the hall.
Li Shengyuan immediately stepped forward and knelt down to greet him, "Princess, Your Excellency."
Princess Ping'an looked smugly at the people who had fainted on the table, "Well done."
"I dare not take credit. It was all thanks to this gentleman's excellent plan to smear the poison on these chopsticks. Otherwise, they would have been really difficult to deal with."
Princess Ping'an tilted her head and looked at Pei Anqing, "Well done."
"Once I return to the capital, I will have my mother explain to my cousin the Emperor that I will reinstate your position as heir apparent, or rather, your position as the Prince of Langya."
Pei Anqing clasped her hands in a fist and bowed, "Thank you, Princess. It is my honor to help you kill these people."
Princess Ping'an turned around proudly, "Lord Li, go and kill them all. They will be your innocence for promotion in the future."
"My mother likes people like you who are efficient and meticulous."
Li Shengyuan rubbed his hands together excitedly and quickly kowtowed to express his gratitude, "Thank you for your appreciation, Princess."
"Men, drag them away and kill them all."
"Yes." Someone stepped forward and nudged Tuoba Yan'er, but Princess Ping'an scolded, "Wait!"
Why is she here too?
"Why didn't you tell me that she was among these people?" Princess Ping'an asked Pei Anqing, pointing at Tuoba Yan'er.
"This...this...is there anything different about this person?" Li Shengyuan quickly ordered his men to stop.
"She is a princess of Western Xia. If I kill her, and Western Xia starts a war, wouldn't I be a sinner!"
Cangzhou borders Western Xia, and Li Shengyuan knows Western Xia's fighting strength best. Those people are all warlike, and in recent years, only Dongling has been able to contend with them.
"This...this...Young Master Pei didn't tell me there was also a princess from Western Xia."
Pei Anqing was also surprised. Jiang Wanru only told him that she had killed everyone, but did not tell him that Princess Tuoba Yan'er of Xixia was among them.
What on earth is Jiang Wanru up to?
"What should we do now, Princess? If we don't kill them all, you will be a witness, and I will be in danger of losing my life."
"If we kill them, what if it gets discovered..."
"Shut up!" Pei Anqing said. "What's the panic!"
He then turned to Princess Ping'an and said, "If you ask me, let's go all the way and kill them all!"
"Anyway, no one knows it was us. Letting a tiger return to the mountain isn't a good thing. We might even be able to frame someone else for this..."
Pei Anqing did not explain, but Princess Ping'an naturally knew.
He wanted to frame Emperor Xiao Yu so that the Grand Princess could cooperate with Western Xia to get rid of Xiao Yu.
Seeing that Princess Ping'an was still hesitant, Pei Anqing urged, "Princess, if we don't act soon, they will all wake up."
"It will probably be difficult to deal with then."
Princess Ping'an let out a long breath and ordered, "Move out! Leave no one alive!"
"Let's do it!" Li Shengyuan waved his sleeve.
The guard's hand had just touched Pei Yanchuan's shoulder when Mo Ran slammed it onto the table.
At the same time, everyone who had been lying unconscious on the table woke up.
"This...this is impossible!" Li Shengyuan was so shocked that he fell to the ground with a thud. "When did you guys wake up?"
"With your meager skills, you think you can harm my prince and princess?" Peony mocked. "We weren't even unconscious."
"The princess anticipated your scheme long ago. We took the antidote beforehand to see who was behind you."
"So it was this heartless bastard."
Pei Anqing blushed slightly after being scolded by Shaoyao, but quickly regained his composure and said, "Hmph."
"Sir, don't just keep whining! What do we do next?" Li Shengyuan was so frightened he had lost his mind.
“What are you afraid of? They are just a few people. You are the one who calls the shots in this entire Cangzhou. Send a letter to summon a troop of soldiers and tell them that there are thieves in the city.”
Upon hearing this, Li Shengyuan thought, "Yes, I'm in charge here, so naturally I have the final say."
Others don't recognize the Prince of Langya and his wife, let alone the princess of Western Xia; they'll just think of them as a few thieves.
"Send a signal flare to the nearest military camp to call for help!" Li Shengyuan ordered.
The servant standing at the door should have turned around and left quickly.
Princess Ping'an remained completely calm. "Jiang Wan Ning, today I will clear away this obstacle for my mother, and that will also be my revenge!"
"When Li Shengyuan spoke so frankly about the person behind him, I thought he was deliberately trying to make us suspicious. I didn't expect that the person behind him really is related to the Grand Princess."
"However, I'm afraid the Grand Princess is unaware of what you've done today."
The Grand Princess would not order the killing of Tuoba Yan'er and Shen Ruzhi, clearly because neither of them knew Zhizhi's true identity.
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