Chapter 176 The Truth
Pang Shi personally led a hundred cavalrymen to surround the small farm.
The sound of horses' hooves startled the villagers. The timid ones kept their doors tightly shut and dared not come out, while the bolder ones secretly peeked over the walls, watching in astonishment as these people, whether bandits or soldiers, suddenly visited at night.
After a long and careful examination, I finally managed to make out that the people on horseback were wearing armor. I breathed a sigh of relief; they seemed to be regular soldiers, not bandits.
Pang Shi dismounted and led the way, with Zhao Jian close behind. Several guards stood on either side, their hands on their swords. As they reached the courtyard gate, just as they were about to knock, Li Xiaoxiao called out, "Zhao Jian? You've arrived?"
Zhao Jian hurriedly replied, "I came with General Pang."
Li smiled and said, "Come in."
The wooden door was kicked open, and Pang Shi glanced over to see Li Xiaoxiao and a middle-aged scholar standing in front of the thatched hut. In the center of the courtyard was a coffin, and to the right was a carriage with a person lying on it. Several guards stood close to the middle-aged scholar, watching Pang Shi and the others warily.
Pang Shi was taken aback. What was going on? Why was Li Xiaoxiao standing with that person?
Li Xiaoxiao had already come up and pointed to the unconscious person in the carriage, saying, "This is Minister Wang. Take him back and lock him up..." She then pointed to the middle-aged scholar and said, "This is Zheng Mian. He wants to come back to the palace with me to see the Crown Prince."
Pang Shi was surprised: "Returning to the palace to see the Crown Prince at this time? Shouldn't we lock him up first and then slowly interrogate him after His Highness ascends the throne?"
Li smiled and said, "Take your time to interrogate him? There's no time for that. I'm taking Zheng Mian to see the Crown Prince. You don't have time to waste here. You have a very important task to do."
Pang Shi asked, "What kind of job?"
Li Xiaoxiao said, "I found out that there are explosives on the altar at the coronation ceremony. I'm afraid that if it's lit, it will blow up the whole place. You should immediately take people to check all the places where the crown prince might go during the ceremony. In addition to those jars and pots that could hold bombs, you should also be careful of the beams overhead and the bricks on the ground. Dig three feet into the ground and find these explosives."
Explosives? Explosives were planted at the coronation ceremony? Pang Shi felt his hair stand on end: "You, you're not kidding, are you? How could there be explosives? The coronation ceremony was prepared jointly by the Imperial Household Department, the Ministry of Rites, the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, and the Court of Imperial Stud!"
How could Zheng Mian possibly have such great power to command so many departments?
Li Xiaoxiao gave a half-smile: "The mantis stalks the cicada, but the sparrow is behind. There's a hidden hand behind Zheng Mian, whose goal is to blow up His Highness's family during today's enthronement ceremony... Instead of wasting your time talking nonsense, why don't you take some people to confirm for yourself when I've ever played such a big joke on you?"
Even if she was joking, Pang Shi had no choice but to confirm the news. His expression turned serious: "I will immediately take people to confirm it. I will search every inch of the land to ensure the safety of the enthronement site."
Li Xiaoxiao said, "Take more men to investigate the altar. If anyone tries to stop you, take them all down. Once you find the explosives, those who dare to stop you will all be finished. Leave me two horses, and send two more men to take Minister Wang with them. I'll take him and Zheng Mian to find the Crown Prince."
She then instructed Zhao Jian: "Go home and tell Meng Guanqi to come to the palace immediately to meet me."
Zhao Jian accepted the order and immediately urged his horse to hurry home.
Li Xiaoxiao led a horse to Zheng Mian: "Lord Zheng, please, come with me back to the palace to see the Crown Prince."
Zheng Mian mounted his horse, and the assassins surrounded him, shouting, "My lord!"
Zheng Mian said in a low voice, "You still have one more task. Two of you stay behind to cremate Uncle Jingwen's body and collect the ashes. I will go back with General Li to see the Crown Prince. The rest of you, stay in the alley in front of Prince Chun's mansion. If anyone comes to report, intercept them all. Don't let a single mosquito fly into Prince Chun's mansion. Do you understand?"
The assassins' eyes were bloodshot: "My lord!"
Zheng Mian patted the leader on the shoulder: "This matter concerns the life and death of our Zheng clan. We must not be careless. Go."
Li Xiaoxiao sent Pang Shi away without dealing with the assassins, clearly intending to let them go. So when Zheng Mian let them leave, no one stopped them.
Several assassins bowed deeply to Zheng Mian, and then disappeared into the night.
The Crown Prince barely slept for two hours last night. It was as if he had just closed his eyes when Wan Quan woke him up. The Crown Princess personally came to help him dress. The couple had dressed in their formal attire early and were waiting for the appointed time.
Before the appointed time arrived, Li Xiaoxiao and Meng Guanqi arrived one after the other.
Li Xiaoxiao actually brought back Zheng Mian and Vice Minister Wang.
Wang Shilang is one thing, but Zheng Mian? The Crown Prince frowned. Zheng Mian has actually come to the capital?
The Crown Prince originally intended to discuss everything after the coronation ceremony, but Wan Quan insisted that Li Xiaoxiao absolutely had to see him.
The crown prince glanced at the water clock; there was still an hour and a half left. He decided to see him then.
He thought Li Xiaoxiao was eager to take credit for him.
When he entered the main hall in formal attire with measured steps, Zheng Mian glanced at him only once before bowing deeply and saying, "Greetings, Your Highness the Crown Prince."
Before he ascended the throne, he was still the crown prince.
The crown prince walked coldly to Zheng Mian, then suddenly kicked him to the ground.
He was also a martial artist, and that kick was really heavy. Zheng Mian was almost kicked away and lay on the ground for a long time before he got up, coughed, and spat out a mouthful of blood.
The Crown Prince wanted to step forward and give him another kick, but Li Xiaoxiao stood in front of Zheng Mian.
The crown prince frowned: "Why are you stopping me?"
Li Xiaoxiao said, "Your Highness, please don't hit him yet. There are other hidden reasons for this matter. It's not too late to get angry after you have interrogated him clearly."
The Crown Prince said, "What other secrets could there be? The fact that a high-ranking official of the second rank appeared in the capital without being summoned proves Zheng Jingwen's relationship with him. What else can he possibly argue about?"
Meng Guanqi, who arrived around the same time as her, also looked at Li Xiaoxiao and Zheng Mian with confusion.
Li Xiaoxiao looked at Zheng: "You tell me."
Zheng Mian, clutching his chest, forced himself to speak: "Your Highness, please allow me to report. Zheng Jingwen was indeed my father's loyal servant. The year after my father's accidental death from freezing, he resolutely castrated himself and entered the palace to avenge my father. To be honest, the accidental deaths of my father and uncle devastated our entire family, and we harbored resentment towards the late emperor for not helping us. Therefore, no one stood up to stop Uncle Jingwen from entering the palace... Moreover, my grandfather, unable to bear the blow of losing two sons he had carefully raised, soon fell ill and died in office. The Zheng family was devastated and had to retreat to their hometown to recuperate, and soon lost contact with Uncle Jingwen."
"After I became the top scholar in the imperial examination, I spent three years observing affairs in the Hanlin Academy. Every day, I tried to find him, because I was only a little over a year old when he left home, and there was no portrait of him at home. It was very difficult to find someone in the harem who had even changed his name. I searched for three years without success. Then, in the twenty-fourth year of Jian'an, when I was serving as the prefect of Bingzhou, I suddenly received a letter from him. He apologized to me, saying that he had actually known I was looking for him for a long time, but he had been avoiding me because he had been in the palace for more than twenty years without any advancement and was ashamed to see me..."
At this point, tears streamed down his face. He held back for a long time before speaking: "He suddenly wrote to me because he had finally succeeded in being transferred to the late emperor's study. He believed he would soon find an opportunity to make his move. He told me to do a good job as an official and, after he had avenged himself, to remember to find one of his old clothes and bury it next to my father's grave... I was extremely anxious and hurriedly wrote back to him, but the letter ended up in the hands of an unexpected person."
The crown prince was stunned. Could it be that someone else was involved in this matter?
He asked in a deep voice, "Who is it?"
Zheng Mian said, "Prince Chun."
Prince Chun? He was Emperor Jian'an's younger brother, five years younger than him. Because the Empress Dowager only had two sons, she was reluctant to let her younger son go to his fiefdom and kept him in the capital despite the objections of her ancestors. He had a very good relationship with Emperor Jian'an, and Emperor Jian'an had even entrusted him with the management of the Imperial Household Department for a long time.
He had a good relationship with the prince and his brothers, and was a very kind elder.
At this moment, Zheng Mian suddenly mentioned Prince Chun, and the Crown Prince's heart skipped a beat: "What happened to Prince Chun?"
Zheng Mian said, "Prince Chun found me and said that he already knew about Uncle Jingwen's plans. He also mentioned that when my father passed away, he had sent an imperial physician to secretly follow Uncle Jingwen in an attempt to save my father's life. However, because my father had been dead for a long time, the imperial physician was powerless to help. Uncle Jingwen had mentioned this to my family. Prince Chun not only wanted to save my father, but he also helped save many scholars who had been frostbitten in the past. Many of these scholars later became Jinshi (successful candidates in the highest imperial examinations) and maintained a very good relationship with Prince Chun."
“I thought that Uncle Jingwen had been discovered by Prince Chun, and there was no hope of revenge. I was about to beg Prince Chun to spare his life, but he proposed that he could help us get revenge, but we also had to help him do something.”
The Crown Prince asked in a deep voice, "What is it?"
Zheng Mian looked at him: "He said you are too weak-willed and not suitable to be the heir to the throne. He has his eye on a prince and hopes to use my family's power to help him ascend the throne..."
The Crown Prince sneered: "Li Chengyao?"
Zheng Mian nodded: "His reasons are somewhat far-fetched, but Uncle Jingwen's life is in his hands, and he has promised to avenge my father and uncle. I only need to lend a little bit of the family's power to help him succeed, so I agreed."
Meng Guanqi suddenly interjected, "What kind of help did you give him?"
Zheng Mian said, "Money, and two henchmen secretly raised by the Zheng family."
Meng Guanqi exchanged a glance with the Crown Prince and nodded. According to Zheng Mian's current explanation, it was still plausible.
The Crown Prince gradually became more and more menacing: "You've said so much just to tell me that it wasn't your intention to harm me, right? But my children did die at your hands. If it weren't for the poisonous stones you sent to the capital, how could my children have died one by one from poisoning?"
Zheng Mian suddenly raised his head: "No! It is true that I sent the poison stones to the capital, but my original intention was to have Prince Chun find a way to put them in the late emperor's room. Over time, the late emperor would gradually weaken and die without anyone noticing, and no one would find out that he died from these poison stones. I just didn't expect that Prince Chun would actually send the stones to you together with Li Chengyao!"
The prince shouted, "You're lying!"
Zheng Mian shouted, "I didn't lie! What need would I have to lie at a time like this? My family has been telling me that the late emperor's inaction caused the deaths of my father and uncle, but after I studied and became more sensible, I know that their deaths cannot be generalized. The late emperor's inaction was certainly wrong, but the cold weather and their frail bodies were also reasons why they couldn't survive. They just happened to meet, which led to this tragedy... I am already restless day and night because of the revenge for the late emperor. I am also a person who has studied the classics, so how could I possibly harm innocent children?!"
The Crown Prince's eyes reddened: "So all of this was done by Prince Chun and Li Chengyao?"
Zheng Mian gasped for breath: "Prince Chun told me that these methods were necessary to put the Sixth Prince on that throne. If I couldn't bear to watch, he wouldn't pass on the information to me. So we lost contact for a long time. But I was cautious and placed a few people in the capital to gather information. After learning that the Sixth Prince had been imprisoned by the late Emperor, I felt that this matter was doomed to fail. So I wrote a letter to Uncle Jingwen, telling him to give up and leave the palace immediately to reunite with us. But the letter didn't reach him. Prince Chun intercepted the letter and even forged my handwriting, ordering him to assassinate His Highness the Crown Prince..."
Because of Prince Chun's intervention, Zheng Jingwen was transferred to the Jing Army just as he was getting close to Emperor Jian'an. On the surface, he was helping Zheng Mian, but in reality, he was helping Prince Chun pass on messages. It wasn't until Zheng Mian noticed something was wrong and wanted to take Zheng Jingwen away, and Li Chengyao was also granted the title of Prince Xin and left the palace, that this pawn became useless. Prince Chun then arranged one last task for him - to assassinate Li Ke.
He never intended for Zheng Jingwen to leave the palace; there was only one path for him—death.
Zheng Mian said, "Because I couldn't get through to Uncle Jingwen, I risked going to the capital to check the situation. That's when I discovered that Prince Chun had broken his promise and sent him to assassinate the Crown Prince. Prince Xin had already fled, and his character was flawed, so it was impossible for him to ascend the throne again. What reason did Prince Chun have to kill the Crown Prince?"
He looked at the Crown Prince and said, “I only have one thought: from the very beginning, he never intended to genuinely support Li Chengyao to ascend the throne. He was just using him to eliminate you first, and then eliminate Li Chengyao. Once your direct lineage is wiped out by infighting, the remaining princes will be without men or money, and will be no match for him, who has been scheming for decades. Then he can rightfully become the next emperor.”
The crown prince unconsciously took a step back, his eyes wide with shock.
Zheng Mian glanced at the unconscious Minister Wang on the ground: "The truth of this matter was told to me by Minister Wang. Prince Chun planted explosives on the altar during the enthronement ceremony, just waiting for you to place the burning yellow candles on the altar. Once the bomb exploded, you and the Crown Prince would definitely not be able to escape in time..."
The Crown Prince murmured, "Yes, at that time, Ke'er and the Crown Princess will surely stay close to me, and the three of us will not escape the fate of death..."
Having already evaded so many assassination attempts, who could have imagined that a final killing intent was lurking on the altar of the coronation ceremony? The Crown Prince gave a bitter smile. Prince Chun, what a Prince Chun.
It seems he started planning decades ago, rescuing the scholars who were suffering from frostbite and winning their hearts. When he was about to take the throne, he raised his arms and called on those who had benefited from his kindness to stand up and spread his benevolent deeds everywhere. Who would say that his ascension to the throne was illegitimate?
A series of hurried footsteps approached, and everyone instinctively looked towards the palace entrance. Pang Shi, accompanied by several guards, rushed over and bowed upon entering the hall, saying, "Your Highness! Your subordinates have indeed discovered a large amount of explosives on the altar. Moreover, not only on the altar, but also in the floor tiles and flower beds beneath it, many hidden wires have been found. Wu Zisang is severely torturing the eunuchs and palace servants responsible for setting up the site, and they have implicated Wei Dexin, the chief steward of the Imperial Household Department."
Wei Dexin?! Recalling that Prince Chun had once managed the Imperial Household Department for a long time, this must be one of his men. The Crown Prince sneered, "How many explosives were found in total?"
Pang Shi lowered his head: "Seven places."
The Crown Prince was furious: "Seven locations! They were afraid they couldn't kill me in one blow, so they buried seven! Did you even ask if there were explosives planted in my bedchamber? The entire palace has been riddled with holes by termites, and I only found out now that I'm in dire straits! Where in this palace is there any safety left?"
Meng Guanqi suddenly exclaimed softly, "You've captured the head of the Imperial Household Department. Did you send anyone to the palace gates to stop anyone from leaving the palace?"
Since Wei Dexin is Prince Chun's man, he would definitely send someone to inform Prince Chun as soon as he is discovered. Once Prince Chun receives the news, he will surely flee. He has been lying low for decades and has the financial support of the Zheng family. He has won over countless people's hearts. If he launches a coup, the capital will surely be engulfed in war.
Pang Shi was both shocked and furious: "I'll send men to stop them immediately!"
Meng Guanqi said, "It's too late. General Pang, just lead the Imperial Guards to Prince Chun's mansion and arrest them. If the messenger only arrived at Prince Chun's mansion a little earlier, they shouldn't have gotten far."
The Crown Prince was furious and immediately ordered Pang Shi: "Go and summon three hundred Imperial Guards to capture Prince Chun and bring him back to me. If you don't see him, you will bring me your head!"
Pang Shi's heart skipped a beat, and he immediately accepted the order and was about to leave when Zheng Mian said, "General Pang, please calm down. Before entering the palace, I sent guards to intercept people at the entrance of Prince Chun's residence, instructing them not to let any suspicious persons approach Prince Chun's residence. Prince Chun may not have received the message yet..."
Everyone in the hall looked at Zheng Mian with surprise. As expected of a top scholar, his mind was indeed meticulous.
Zheng Mian said, "Prince Chun has been lying low for decades. He must have made some preparations to escape. Perhaps there is a secret passage in his mansion leading out of the city. A cunning rabbit has three burrows. General, you are not familiar with the layout of his house. Once he sneaks into the secret passage, the chances of catching him will be slim."
The crown prince asked, "What are your thoughts?"
Zheng Mian glanced at the sky: "There is less than an hour left before the ceremony. If we haven't received any unusual news, Prince Chun should be preparing to go out to attend the enthronement ceremony. Instead of making a big show of arresting him, we should ambush him on the way and catch him off guard."
The Crown Prince and Pang Shi exchanged a glance, but before they could speak, Li Xiaoxiao praised, "Great idea! Pang Shi, hurry up and do it. Prince Chun can't have gone far sitting in the carriage. You can bring him back with ten men. Are you going or not? If not, I will."
If Li Xiaoxiao hadn't said those words, Pang Shi would have slapped her across the face. This was a huge achievement, and she was trying to steal it as soon as she opened her mouth.
He glared at her and gritted his teeth, saying, "Of course I'll go! Please wait here, Your Highness, I will definitely bring Prince Chun back."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com