Wen Chan could only move his right hand and quickly blocked him, “Take your hand away!”
Liang Yanbei only pulled for a little while, then suddenly let go and turned around to walk away. Wen Chan thought that he had really given up and breathed a sigh of relief.
But who would have known that he would just take the medicine on the other table, turn back, and persuade him patiently, “Your Highness, I really just want to change the medicine for you. So don’t reject it again.”
Wen Chan said, “You leave the medicine that you want to apply. I will let someone else apply it.”
Liang Yanbei said, feeling strange, “I’m obviously standing in front of you now, and you are still going to let others apply it for you. Besides, if I really have any presumptuous desire, I have suppressed it for so long, and I am not in a hurry now.”
This remark was so explicit that Wen Chan blushed, “Stop talking nonsense!”
“I’m not talking nonsense……” Liang Yanbei pulled a chair from the side and sat down next to Wen Chan. “This medicine is really useful. It is much better than what the imperial physician gave you.”
It was not that Wen Chan didn’t believe in the medicine he brought, but rather……
Seeing that he was a little absent-minded at this time, Liang Yanbei quickly pulled the front of his shirt open with quick eyes and revealed the wound.
When his gaze touched the white gauze, it suddenly became dark. He raised his hand to cover the back of Wen Chan’s head and pulled him towards himself. Then he leaned forward, and his lips gently touched his forehead.
“Your Highness, don’t move. It won’t hurt after applying the medicine.” He said in a low voice.
Wen Chan’s body stiffened. His ears were red, and his mind was stuck for a while. He hemmed and hawed for a long time before saying, “Don’t always treat me like this.”
When Liang Yanbei saw him like this, he smiled with his eyes curved, and agreed, “Okay.”
The movements of his hands were very light. He uncovered the gauze layer by layer and sprinkled the medicine evenly on the wound, alternating between the yellow and white medicinal powders. In a moment, Wen Chan started to feel a little hot on the wound.
Liang Yanbei took out a clean white gauze from his sleeve and wrapped it around the wound layer by layer. And at the same time, his gaze swept across his delicate collarbone.
Wen Chan’s skin was the kind of white that was not exposed to the sun all year round, and it had always been pampered. So his skin looked very tender.
Liang Yanbei looked away without a change in his expression and closed his clothes.
“Your Highness, you are too thin. You should eat more meat.”
“Since the medicine has been applied, what are you still doing here?” Wen Chan just wanted him to leave quickly now and then calm down by himself. He turned his head to take a look at the sky outside the window and said, “The palace will be locked down soon. If you don’t leave now, you won’t be able to get out.”
After he said this, Liang Yanbei remembered that there was still this matter. He frowned slightly and clicked his tongue, “I came too late today. I will come a bit earlier tomorrow.”
“Don’t come again!” Wen Chan said, “I want to concentrate on recuperating.”
Liang Yanbei didn’t agree or disagree. He just showed an ambiguous smile before suddenly leaning close to Wen Chan and kissing him loudly on the face, “Then I’ll leave first.”
After speaking, before Wen Chan could react, he walked to the window and left through the same place he had come in.
Wen Chan gritted his teeth in anger when he came back to his senses. He had only pretended to agree just then. In the end, he still turned around and said something dishonest.
Liang Yanbei had just climbed over the window and landed on the ground when Ah Fu exclaimed from behind him, “Young Master Liang?!”
He turned around, not panicking at all about being discovered, but smiled at Ah Fu and said, “Don’t make any sound. I was just leaving.”
Ah Fu subconsciously looked around and lowered his voice, “Young Master Liang, are you here to see His Highness? He specifically said today…… Not to let you in.”
“He said that?” Liang Yanbei raised his eyebrows, “I just came to give him some medicine.”
“Young Master Liang, leave quickly. I have just sent the people in this palace away on some errands, and there happens to be no one here.” Ah Fu said hurriedly.
He nodded, “Be careful when you take care of him. I’ll come back tomorrow.”
Ah Fu hurriedly responded, and after Liang Yanbei left, he suddenly realized, “Come back tomorrow?”
“Ah Fu.” Wen Chan’s voice came from the palace hall at this time.
Ah Fu brushed his sleeves, pushed the door open, and entered, “Your Highness.”
“Were you talking to Liang Yanbei just now?” Wen Chan stood with his back to Ah Fu.
“Answering Your Highness. Yes, it was Young Master Liang. When I was coming here just now, I happened to see him…… Climbing out of the window.”
“I clearly told you not to let him in.”
“Your Highness, aren’t you making things difficult for us slaves? You also know Young Master Liang’s abilities. Even if we slaves risk our lives to stop him, we can at most probably stop his one shoe.” Ah Fu cried out his grievance.
Wen Chan suddenly felt a headache, and he actually felt that Ah Fu’s words made sense. So he didn’t, of course, think about pursuing it further. So he simply turned the matter over and asked, “How are the things I asked you to do today?”
“Replying to Your Highness, the news has been released. Now the streets and alleys of the capital are full of the news of Your Highness’s assassination. This is about the first one.”
“Secondly, this slave took the leftovers from last night to show to Imperial Physician Wang. He found a drug called Night Fragrance in it. This slave gave him some silver and asked him to guard this matter. This is about the second one.”
“And about the third one, as Your Highness expected, all the secret guards of our Xiyang Palace, except for the half that was transferred yesterday, died. The wounds were all on the neck, and they were all ruthlessly killed with one knife.”
After listening to this, Wen Chan pondered for a moment and asked, “You should secretly remember the people who went to the imperial kitchen to get dinner yesterday. So you find a chance to let them come to me one by one to serve me.”
Ah Fu was stunned for a moment and then cottoned on, “Yes.”
“You did a good job today. So you can withdraw for now.” Wen Chan said.
Ah Fu responded and left the hall, recalling who went to receive dinner yesterday.
After Wen Chan heard the sound of the palace hall door closing, Wen Chan looked back, blinked his red eyes, sat on the bed with his shoulders slumped, and began to be lost in thought.
After looking on blankly for a while, he thought of something, and an unexpected smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.
The candlelight was swaying, and the evening breeze was cool. After Liang Yanbei’s carriage left the palace, he went straight to the He Yue house.
As soon as he entered the room, Zhong Wenjin hurriedly came up to welcome him, “Why have you been there for so long? How is His Ninth Royal Highness? Is the injury really that serious?”
Liang Yanbei didn’t rush to answer him. Instead, he glanced at the room and asked, “Why are you the only one here? Where’s Zifu?”
Zhong Wenjin said anxiously, “Something happened at the yamen, so his father called him back. You can tell me first!”
“His injury is not light. But it is not as serious as the rumour that he is only still alive with medicine.” Liang Yanbei walked to the table and sat down, “This assassination was premeditated.”
After Zhong Wenjin heard this, he breathed a sigh of relief and sat down opposite Liang Yanbei, “It was not necessary for you to kill the person in one go. In any case, we could have discovered who was behind it by holding a hostage who could provide information.”
Liang Yanbei was silent for a moment and said, “I have a way to find out who wants to kill the Ninth Royal Highness.”
“What method?”
“Today I entered the palace of His Ninth Royal Highness and found a palace maid who looked very similar to the assassin.”
“Do you suspect that she is in the same group as the assassin?”
“Behind any coincidence, there might be a truth hidden.” Liang Yanbei narrowed his eyes slightly, “But she is in the palace. So it is difficult for me to investigate.”
Zhong Wenjin also frowned, “Inside the palace, we can’t reach in. So we can only let His Ninth Royal Highness check it out by himself.”
“I will go tomorrow and tell him about it.” Liang Yanbei said.
“You still want to go?” Zhong Wenjin asked in surprise, “You are too courageous. There has been an assassin in the palace these past few days. So the palace is extremely heavily guarded now. If you get caught, it will be disastrous.”
Liang Yanbei, with a look of “I don’t want to listen, I won’t listen”, said, “I will be more careful.”
“You……” Zhong Wenjin wanted to persuade him again, but was interrupted by the door that was suddenly opened.
Xie Zhaoxue came in suddenly, quickly closed the door, turned around to see that Liang Yanbei was present, and inquired about Wen Chan’s situation.
Liang Yanbei repeated what he had just said and asked, “Did you find out the identity of the assassin?”
The body of the assassin who was killed last night, together with her head, was sent to the Ministry of Justice under Xie Shengran’s charge. Xie Shengran wanted to train Xie Zhaoxue, so he gave him the task of finding out the identity of the assassin. So Xie Zhaoxue was busy with this matter all day.
At this time, he had a dark face and sat next to the two of them, saying, “I couldn’t find anything.”
“What happened in the yamen?” Zhong Wenjin saw that his face was not good, and he began to worry in his heart.
Xie Zhaoxue said seriously, “Originally, the assassin’s body was left in the special mortuary of the yamen. But when I just went back, the people in the yamen said that the body was gone.”
“Could it be that the murderer behind the scenes was afraid of them being discovered and sent someone to steal it?”
“It would have been easier to deal with it if the body was just stolen.” Xie Zhaoxue’s expression became more and more ugly, “Excluding the small couch where the body was placed, the floor of the entire room of the special mortuary is sprinkled with a layer of fine powder. Anything on it will leave traces.”
“Just now I went to see the fine powder in the room and found that there was only one line of footprints, from the couch to the door.”
Zhong Wenjin felt horrified, “Could it be, could it be that someone jumped from the roof to the small couch……”
Xie Zhaoxue shook his head, “The roof of that house is not tiles, but bricks. If you want to enter, you must destroy it. But I have seen that the roof is intact.”
“And today, layers of guards were guarding the door, and they didn’t see anyone going out or entering.”
“This is really strange.” Zhong Wenjin said in surprise, “Could it be that the body walked out by itself?”
After saying this, he shuddered in fear, “This is impossible……”
Liang Yanbei looked pensive.
“Now that the body has disappeared without a trace, the clue is broken before it can be found out. What should we do?” Xie Zhaoxue asked.
“In that case, we can only start from the palace.” Liang Yanbei said, tapping his fingers on the table. He then said softly, “From the harem, which imperial concubine went to Yanxiang Temple to worship Buddha last night and took away the two guards of His Ninth Royal Highness? What is her identity?”
“Concubine Mei of Xuexia Palace, whose real name is Zhao Jing. She is a sworn relative who has no blood relationship with the Zhao family. Her family lives far away. So it will be difficult to investigate her for a while.” Zhong Wenjin said.
“There is definitely something wrong with her.” Liang Yanbei said, “Let’s start with her and the maid, and then investigate the officials in the court. I think we can find something.”
Zhong Wenjin said, “Even if we really found it, we won’t be able to do anything about it without evidence.”
Court officials were not ordinary people. If you want to touch them, you must go through the emperor’s hands. Otherwise, you will kill one thousand enemies and lose eight hundred of your own.
However, Liang Yanbei sneered, “Evidence?”
“Brother Yanbei, could it be…… You want to take action privately?” Xie Zhaoxue asked suspiciously.
“I am just using the opponent’s own methods to obtain retribution1(idiom, from Song dynasty neo-Confucianist Zhu Xi 朱熹 ).” Light flickered in his eyes, and his voice was mixed with the cold snow of december, “Since they had the courage to touch the Ninth Royal Highness, they must have the same courage to bear the consequences.”
“You are right.” Zhong Wenjin was immediately persuaded.
Xie Zhaoxue said nothing more.
After the trip to Wuyue Island, he could see the status of the Liang family in Jianghu. Even if Liang Yanbei did not do it himself, there were the Dan family or others. So there was no need to worry.
The most important thing in front of them at the moment was to find out who wanted to kill the Ninth Royal Highness, who was neither good at literature nor martial arts and whose mother’s family had no power.
In this way, His Ninth Royal Highness could be prevented from being injured, and the Ministry of Justice could also report to the emperor.
The three of them then chatted a few more words and then dispersed from He Yue house.
The second day.
It got dark early, and when the dinner was delivered, it was already hazy at night. But Liang Yanbei, who said last night that he was coming today, never showed up.
Wen Chan was halfway through eating, and the more he thought about it, the more uncomfortable he felt. So he simply slapped down his chopsticks and said, “I don’t want to eat anymore! Take them away!”
Translator’s corner
Thank you so much for reading the chapter. If you liked my translation and wanna support me, you can comment down your thoughts or send me a Kofi.
KO-FI
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