What Bad Intentions can the Yandere Crown Prince have?-Chapter 417 - 413: The Crown Prince Has Rebelled

The delicate brushwork of the small script adorned with floral patterns wrote a piece in spare.

A signature, sealed away.

Zhen Su, in front of Tang Xiaobai, casually handed the letter to a guard outside the hall: "Please deliver it to the Imperial Court."

The guard looked at Tang Xiaobai somewhat nervously.

Fortunately, the Crown Princess Consort said nothing, brushed off her sleeves, and departed.

On the way back to the Eastern Palace, Tang Xiaobai recalled points from Liluo Palace and felt something was amiss.

But after thinking it over along the way, she couldn’t pinpoint it.

When she returned to the Eastern Palace and mentioned it to Li Mu, speaking of the letter, Li Mu furrowed his brow and asked, "She wrote a letter right in front of you?"

Tang Xiaobai nodded, "I watched her write—"

She stopped abruptly.

Tang Xiaobai looked up, surprised, and said, "She was guarding against me?"

The entire process of writing and sealing the letter was completed right under Tang Xiaobai’s nose.

Since the letter was to be sent to the Palace, Tang Xiaobai had intended to oversee it, so she didn’t feel anything was particularly wrong at the time.

Reflecting on it now, there were indeed slight anomalies in the details.

For instance, when Zhen Su entered the room to write the letter, she proactively invited her in.

Another instance was when Zhen Su initially proposed to write a letter for the Crown Prince to testify, and later changed it to seeking restored favor.

These various details revealed two key points—

Firstly, Zhen Su was eager to send out this letter;

Secondly, Zhen Su was wary of her intercepting this letter.

The caution stemmed from distrust.

Zhen Su suspected she wouldn’t allow the letter to be sent.

Why?

"What was written in the letter?" Li Mu asked.

Tang Xiaobai recalled and shook her head, "It was nothing..."

Indeed, it was nothing.

Zhen Su’s delicate brushwork in small script with floral adornment was beautifully done, but the prose throughout was extremely plain.

As a letter from a fallen concubine to the Emperor, it neither carried the "withered and solitary" sort of lamentation, nor the "empty sigh and covering face" type of grief, not even any mention of "deep affectionate reminiscence" and its beautiful memories.

It merely offered brief greetings, then talked about the Capital City’s weather and the squirrels of Liluo Palace, so plain it was indifferent.

While she watched, she almost felt an itch to help add and amend a few lines.

"How much do you remember?"

Since the Crown Prince pressed on, Tang Xiaobai thought about it and, realizing it contained no inappropriate content, decided to roughly transcribe the letter’s content with pen and paper.

She remembered about seventy to eighty percent.

The ability to recall so much was because the letter was not long to begin with.

"Just this?" After reading, Li Mu also felt it was overly brief and plain, even somewhat perfunctory.

However, Tang Xiaobai had already reasoned it out: "His Majesty is accustomed to Zhen Su’s indifference; excessive enthusiasm would seem unlike her," seeing Li Mu’s indifference, she added, "Even though the content is trivial, the letters you wrote to me also mentioned trivial things like hares, roe deer, foxes, didn’t they?"

The Crown Prince silently lowered his gaze, holding the letter in one hand, while asking again: "What else did she say?"

"She said the secret about the Yan Family was heard from elsewhere, and since she promised to keep it confidential, she can’t tell me."

"Where did she hear it from?"

Tang Xiaobai’s expression shifted, suddenly standing up: "Summon Minister of Rites Xue Shaojian!"

She finally knew what was wrong!

"She admitted to having correspondence with Xue Shi!"

She only admitted to having correspondence but didn’t say the secret of the Yan Family was told to her by Xue Shaojian—

...

"The Yan Family?" Xue Shaojian, unsurprisingly, displayed no sign of surprise, "I do not know, Your Majesty."

Li Mu’s gaze turned cold: "Mo Ji!"

"Intercept the Liluo Palace correspondence!"

...

The setting sun cast over a thousand miles, layers of purple halls.

Atop the embroidered ridge of Lishan, a person dressed in Imperial Guard attire looked down from the heights, watching a single rider tread through the snow from afar.

As the rider neared the base of the mountain, suddenly a shadow on the snow moved like a flying swan, swiftly darting toward the rider.

The horse neighed and abruptly stopped.

The person on the mountain’s expression changed, turning to run down the mountain...

...

The Hot Spring Palace located at Lishan is only 60 to 70 miles from the Capital City, reachable within an hour by fast horse.

The letter from Liluo Palace was naturally sent with urgent dispatch.

By the time Mo Ji chased out, more than the time for incense burning had passed since the letter was dispatched.

Even with Mo Ji’s exceptional Qinggong skills, he barely caught up with the courier at the base of Lishan.

The courier was merely an ordinary Imperial Guard, powerless against a master like Mo Ji; before he could even raise his hand, the letter was easily seized from him.

The envelope, entwined with floral patterns, tinted with a light red, was a type commonly used by the women of the imperial harem.

After verifying its correctness, Mo Ji left.

The exhausted courier slumped over the horse’s back, allowing the steed to idle a few steps before hearing the sound of approaching hooves from the direction of the Palace.

He pushed himself upright with effort.

A group of Imperial Guards came riding toward him.

Upon seeing the leader, the courier narrowed his eyes slightly, his face showing no trace of regret for losing the letter.

The horses halted ahead.

"Who goes there?"

"Under the command of Right Guard General Ge Xing, by the order of Beauty Shu from Liluo Palace, to deliver a letter to the Imperial Court!"

"Where is the letter?"

Slowly, the courier reached his hand into the mailbag slung over his back.

At this moment, the leader of the Imperial Guards maneuvered his horse to the courier’s side, suddenly bending low over the saddle.

From a hidden angle unseen by those behind him, he discreetly pulled a letter from inside his left sleeve.

The letter was enveloped with entwined floral patterns, dyed in light red, a type commonly used by women of the imperial harem.

He grasped the envelope, making a swift feint, and lifted it before the courier.

"This one?"

The courier lifted his eyes, showing delight: "Exactly!"

Not long after, at the mountain’s palace gates, successively opened.

When the letter reached the Emperor’s hands, the cold fragrance lingered, instantly evoking memories of the icy beauty from Liluo Palace.

Unparalleled favor in the harem, even the former Liu Shufei had never experienced.

Someone placed delicately on the heart, isn’t easily let go.

The Emperor eagerly tore it open to read.

The paper adorned with delicate floral small script, though seldom seen by him, was recognized as the handwriting of Beauty Shu.

The Emperor couldn’t help but smile.

Once coaxed innumerable times, Beauty Shu refused to say a word more.

After leaving her be for a few months, she finally wrote a letter.

However, upon reading further, the Emperor’s expression changed.

"Slam!"

The letter was slammed onto the table, tearing a corner.

"Summon Zheng Shidao, Wei Du, Xue Qiao, Liu Tai—" After listing the names of several major court officials, the Emperor paused momentarily, "And also the Tang Shigong and his son!"

...

The fastest to arrive were Prime Ministers Zheng Shidao and Wei Du.

Wei Du, over seventy, hurried into the hall, nearly stumbling.

Before he could stand firm, he saw the Emperor, with hands behind his back, turning around before the throne, his face clouded over like a storm brewing.

Wei Du’s heart sank, and just as he was about to pay homage, he was hit with a shockingly explosive announcement:

"A secret report from the Capital City, Crown Prince Li Mu, has rebelled!"