Chapter 18 I Will Help You
His voice was cold and hard: "But now, I will no longer trust you, and I will never allow you to leak even the slightest possibility."
"Absolutely not! Ever since we broke up, I've been tossing and turning in regret every day and night. For the rest of my life, I'll regret hurting you at that moment. How could I possibly tell anyone else? And your mother... she's had a tragic fate, and as a woman, I sympathize even more. This wasn't her fault, and she shouldn't bear any stigma for it, either before or after her death."
She raised her hand and gently stroked his tense, fearful cheek, as if comforting a hurt child, and swore softly, "Believe me, Bai Qiandeng. I swear on the spirits of my ancestors in heaven that this matter will rot in my heart forever until the day I die!"
He held her hand tightly, the veins on the back of her hand protruding slightly, but he tried his best to control his strength to prevent her from getting hurt.
"Actually, I don't dare ask you to forgive me. But King Linhuai, I really can't go to Beiting with you right now. I have more important things before me."
She leaned close to him, staring at him intently. "Do you remember? When we first met, you told me that Li Yingshang would definitely help you... I now ask you to fulfill that promise. But I hope you won't help me escape the danger I'm facing, or give me a richer and more glorious life. Instead, I hope you'll help me stand proudly under the Kucha sun, letting everyone in the world know that I, the daughter of the Bai family, will never disgrace the glory of our ancestors!"
The stubborn light in her eyes seemed to capture his mind, causing his breathing to stagnate and he was unable to recover for a long time.
He suddenly remembered that when she first arrived at the Changhua Palace as Ling Tianshui, she was drugged by Meng Lanxi that night, and in her weakness and delusion, she treated him as an imaginary relative and clung to him and relied on him.
She said she didn't want to get married. She wanted to continue the glory of the Changhua Palace and glorify her ancestors, even if it meant staying at home with her hair uncut and cultivating, protecting the Bai family...
He didn't care at the time, and even thought her belief was a little funny. How could a woman realize her ideal of supporting her family? What's more, she was an orphan with no one to rely on.
But he didn't expect that as he watched her approach step by step, she never deviated from her original direction and kept moving towards her goal. Even though the results were minimal, she remained steadfast.
After a long moment, as if resisting being controlled by her, he turned his head fiercely, his voice slightly hoarse: "If I help you, will you still go to others for help?"
This sudden question sounded a bit strange and awkward at first, but Qiandeng looked at his expression and his subtle eyes, and suddenly remembered the glimpse of his figure when she was confined in the Kucha Palace.
But at that time, Daimao said that it was a good thing that the county lady and Cui Shaoqing got together, and she did not refute it. How did she respond...
"Yes, no matter what, I have received the most solemn promise in the world, and I already have someone who is determined to accompany me. There is no need to be tied to the people I missed in the past."
——Then, his figure disappeared.
It turned out that although he seemed to be able to control everything, he was secretly concerned about this matter in his heart and found it difficult to let it go.
Feeling relieved, she changed the subject, her voice becoming lighter: "Then tell me first, why are you here?"
The question caught him off guard, and he had no time to evade the question. He could only say subconsciously: "I'm worried about you..."
Qiandeng raised her hand and gently placed it on the back of his hand, looking up at him seriously: "What are you worried about?"
"I'm worried that you, raised in the love of your family, know too little about the treacherous nature of human nature, the struggle for power, the fratricide, and family feuds." He turned his palm over and held hers tightly. "Your life is too simple, and you've been raised immersed in the love and care of your family. So I'm worried you don't know that when there's a conflict of interest, the struggles between family members are often the most brutal."
Having said this, he paused for a moment.
Qiandeng remembered that Cui Fufeng had once told her that when the old King of Linhuai died, there was great turmoil in Beiting.
Li Yingshang executed the eunuchs sent by the court to monitor the old Prince of Linhuai in the mourning hall. His uncles and brothers used this as an excuse to attack the central army. However, in the end, it was Li Yingshang who quickly controlled the eight armies including Shuofang and Binning, annihilated all the hostile forces, and from then on, he intimidated the northwest and won the submission of all the towns.
Those who disappeared at that time included his uncles, his brothers, and his stepmother.
In reality, he wasn't much older than she was now when all this happened. But having grown up in blood and fire, he worried that she, raised among flowers and the moon, wouldn't be able to face this turbulent life. So when she left Beiting, he, concerned about the conflict between the Kucha royal family and her grandfather, accompanied her to Kucha, secretly keeping an eye on her safety.
"So, you put aside so many important matters in Beiting and followed me all the way. That's why you appeared in all my critical moments so promptly."
He argued somewhat awkwardly, "After all, Anxi borders Beiting. If something happens in Kucha, it will not only affect the situation in the northwest, but it will also be troublesome for me."
But if that's the case—Qian Deng asked briskly, "Why, are you short of people to gather intelligence? Why would you, as the King of Linhuai, come here in person to handle such a trivial matter?"
Exposed by her words, Li Yingshang glared at her with a hint of annoyance.
She knew that he had no experience in relationships and didn't know how to hide his feelings without revealing his concern and nervousness for her.
"Don't hide it, I know you still care about me. Even though we had our differences and conflicts in the past, at least our feelings for each other are still there, and that's good."
Confirming that he had her in his heart, Qian Deng breathed a sigh of relief and held his hand solemnly, saying, "Let's let the past go. I no longer mind that your original intention of entering the palace was to destroy my family and avenge your grandfather. At least you didn't attack our Changhua Palace later. Please don't mind what I did to you in my anger back then..."
His thick eyebrows knitted together, and he interrupted her, "My original intention in entering the palace was to destroy the Changhua Palace and avenge my grandfather. Why do you feel this way?"
Qian Deng stared at his expression, trying to find any trace of his evasion or cover-up. "Have you let go of what happened back then? To control your grandfather, the imperial court not only sent eunuchs to supervise the army, but also ordered my grandfather to station troops to control him. I heard that your grandfather died of depression because of this. As far as I know, after you succeeded your grandfather's power, you executed the military supervisor that night. And my grandfather was ordered to defend Beiting until he died for his country..."
She would always remember that her grandfather came to see her sleeping when he was preparing his army to set out, and mentioned to her father with great concern that Li Yingshang was ambitious and that if he succeeded to become the new King of Linhuai, the northwest would be unstable.
Facts have proven that my grandfather's guess was both right and wrong.
Within a few days of the transfer of power, he killed the imperial military supervisor and subdued two towns and eight armies with swift force. His thundering methods indeed caused a bloody storm in the northwest.
But after stabilizing the situation, he and his troops remained loyal to the Tang Dynasty. Even when the court was in turmoil, they quickly sent troops to support the king and made unprecedented contributions.
No one in the world could guess, nor dared to speculate, his thoughts and future direction. And she was even more unsure of his position.
Therefore, the secret that Lan Xiurong told her before her death was completely consistent with the secret worries and anxieties in her heart, making her unable to distinguish them for a moment and immediately accepting her accusation.
"So..." Looking at his clueless expression, she felt a chill in her heart. "That was a trap he designed, and we were trapped in it without even knowing it..."
Li Yingshang was thinking about who the "he" she was talking about was, and suddenly his mind flashed back to everything that happened that day in the suburbs of Chang'an before their breakup.
He blurted out: "What did Lan Xiurong say to you before she died?"
"She said that the rebel soldiers' benefactor's brother was ordered to come from the Shuofang Army to avenge the Prince of Changhua's suppression of the old Prince of Linhuai, which led to his death." Qian Deng spoke word by word, "He wants to avenge this humiliation, overthrow the Prince of Changhua's palace, and bring ruin to our Bai family!"
The benefactor’s elder brother is naturally Ling Tianshui.
Lan Xiurong and Feng Yi were just a bunch of rioters, and there was absolutely no way they could have known these secrets. The only person who could have conveyed this secret to Lan Xiurong was the one closest to Ling Tianshui.
Meng Lanxi.
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