"My lord, is it really you?"
Aunt Liu took off her human skin mask, and a face full of scars appeared in front of everyone. Jiu Qingzi turned around when he heard the voice and recognized the person in front of him at a glance.
"Mother Zhou."
Aunt Zhou thought she would never see her master again in this life, but she didn't expect that not only did she see her now, but he also recognized her. She looks like this, sometimes even she herself despises such a face...
"Mother Zhou, haven't you died a long time ago?" Although Jiu Qingzi left the palace, he had always inquired about the people in the concubine's courtyard. He heard that she died in the second year after the death of the concubine. There was a fire.
But how can a person who has been dead for many years stand here and still use Miao Jiang's poison to poison people in the palace in the name of Aunt Liu?
"I didn't die in that fire." Aunt Zhou recalled what happened that year with deep hatred in her eyes. However, there were so many people here that she didn't go into details. She only talked about how she crawled out of the mass grave. , how to return to the palace to take revenge.
"I didn't mean to harm the queen. It was just an accident." Aunt Zhou explained again, "Your mother-in-law watched the queen grow up, and I have a good impression of her.
So when she came to Leng Palace, I took great care of her, but her life was too miserable. Later, she asked me if there was any way to make herself forget the pain.
She wanted to die, but she couldn't let go of her child, so she wanted to find a less painful way to live. "
"So you gave her a poison that controlled her thoughts?" Jiu Qingzi frowned.
Xie Lan stood aside and said nothing, but his face was unusually solemn. Tao Yaoyao saw this and walked over worriedly, "Don't worry, I will find a way to save your mother."
"No need." If this was really what his mother meant, then he was willing to fulfill her wish.
At this time, the right envoy of the Royal Forest Army rushed over with people, "The Emperor knows that you have found the person who poisoned you. Now let your subordinates take the person over."
"No." Jiu Qingzi refused directly. Based on his understanding of the emperor, if he knew the identity of Grandma Zhou, he would definitely kill her.
Aunt Zhou's crime could not lead to death, not to mention that she must have had her own reasons.
"Master Pei, can you wait a little longer?" Xiao Shuo saw that Aunt Zhou had something to say to Jiu Qingzi, and was going to take people out to free up the yard for them.
Aunt Zhou suddenly stopped him, "I'm going to see that dog emperor." After saying that, she looked at Jiu Qingzi, "Even if I don't talk about it now, I'll have to talk about it later. In this case, it's better to talk about it in the past."
Jiu Qingzi still disagrees. As of now, he doesn't care about the truth at all. He has no one close to him in this world. Aunt Zhou is the person his mother and concubine trusts most, and she is also the person he is closest to in the world.
If possible, he would rather give everything to take her out of here.
Xie Lan saw what he was thinking and reminded, "There is nothing in the world but the Kingdom. And since Your Majesty already knows about this, her identity will not be a secret. If you leave like this, the truth will not only be distorted, but also the truth will be distorted." You may all die."
Although Xie Lan's words were a bit harsh, they were true. Then everyone present looked at Jiu Qingzi.
"Senior, you are not the one who did the wrong thing, why did you run away?" Tao Yaoyao persuaded Jiu Qingzi, and Aunt Zhou also insisted on going there, and finally they went to the imperial study room together.
The emperor has been waiting here for some time. Seeing so many people coming, he frowned and said, "The imperial guards, Mr. Xiao, and Mr. Zhang, please step back."
Several people looked at each other and turned to leave.
The emperor originally wanted Xie Lan to leave, but he guessed that if he did, Jiu Qingzi would definitely stop him. His younger brother was becoming more and more unruly.
In order not to bring trouble upon himself, the emperor gave up the idea.
"Who are you and why are you poisoning the palace?" The emperor looked at Aunt Zhou.
Aunt Zhou stood next to Jiu Qingzi. She probably hated the emperor too much. She kept her head down from the moment she came in to Xianza, so the emperor didn't see her face clearly.
It wasn't until the emperor spoke to him and Nanny Zhou raised her head that the emperor could clearly see this person's appearance.
At first, he thought this person looked familiar, but then he looked carefully and finally recognized her, "Are you...Mother Zhou?"
The popular person in front of his father's favorite concubine was known to everyone in the harem back then. He grew up in the harem and naturally knew her, but wasn't she dead?
What happened to her face?
"Why does my face look like this? You have to ask your mother, the Queen Mother." What Aunt Zhou hates most is the emperor's duplicitous appearance.
Why did the Queen Mother, who was still the Queen at that time, deal with her master, and it wasn't because of him?
And it was impossible for him to know nothing. In her opinion, he had acquiesced in the Queen Mother's frame-up and was also the murderer of his master.
"How dare you, the Queen Mother, to arrange it at will." The Emperor frowned and opened his mouth to call the guards in. Jiu Qingzi stepped forward to block her, and then looked at the Emperor with a wary look, "Since you think the Queen Mother is innocent, why not invite her here? When confronted face to face, what is true cannot be false, and what is false cannot be true."
The emperor frowned, but did not say anything to ask the queen mother to come over.
When Aunt Zhou saw this, the sarcasm on her face became more intense, "Your Majesty, you should remember how I died. There was a fire in Anyang Palace, but with so many people living in Anyang Palace, why did so many people die in that fire?" Are you from my master?"
The emperor said nothing, while Jiu Qingzi's face turned dark.
"Originally, I was going to die in that fire. The night the palace officials carried me to the mass grave, there was a heavy rain. Maybe God couldn't bear to see me and wanted me to come back to avenge my master, so he let me live. .
But my face was ruined. Since then, although no one can recognize me, no one dares to take me in.
Later, I accidentally saved a Miao person, and she taught me how to poison me. When I was about to go to the palace to take revenge, Grandma Liu happened to be out of the palace to buy vegetables. So I killed her and sneaked in.
Do you know how angry I am when I see that one of my enemies is the emperor and the other is the queen mother? If you hadn't harmed my master, the person sitting in this position now is the King of England, and the person living in Cining Palace is also my master.
What do you think? He is just a thief who steals other people's lives. "
"Shut up." As the king of a country, how could he bear it when a servant pointed his nose at him and called him a thief? "My throne was passed down to me by the late emperor himself. There is a succession edict that can prove this, and civil and military officials can also help me prove it.
As for what you just said, what evidence do you have to prove that it was really done by the queen? "
If Aunt Zhou had evidence, would she still need to risk her own life and go to the palace to take revenge? She originally thought about looking for evidence after returning to the palace, but that incident had been in the past for too long.
After the emperor ascended the throne, he must have destroyed all the evidence, so that she could not find any clues in the palace for five years.
"If you don't want others to know, you have to do nothing yourself." Grandma Zhou dared to tell this matter today, but she didn't want to leave here alive.
So when the emperor called people in to arrest him, she pushed Jiu Qingzi away and said, "Your Majesty, leave me alone, leave here, and never come back."
If it hadn't happened tonight, Jiu Qingzi might still be able to live the same life as before.
But after Nanny Zhou said these things, even if Jiu Qingzi was willing to let go of her hatred, the emperor might not be able to sleep in comfort.
So when the Royal Forest Army rushed in, Jiu Qingzi once again stood beside Grandma Zhou.
"Why is the emperor so anxious? Or does the emperor want to kill people and silence them?" Jiu Qingzi looked at her provocatively.
The emperor was very angry and said, "The reason why I indulge you is because I feel ashamed of you back then, but you should not push yourself too far. My tolerance is limited."
"Your Majesty, you don't have to be like this. From the time when Nanny Zhou talked about the death of my mother and concubine, we were destined to be enemies." Jiu Qingzi broke up with the Emperor.
"But what happens in this matter is not up to you alone."
The emperor sneered, "You see clearly, the person sitting here is not my father, but me. My father dotes on you and goes along with you in everything, but I don't.
And you'd better realize one thing clearly. Your life and death are now in my hands. If you keep messing around, I don't mind letting you and Aunt Zhou keep you company. "
Grandma Zhou looked at Jiu Qingzi worriedly.
Jiu Qingzi reassured her, "He has already said that my father loves me the most, so even if he dies, he will find a way to protect me." After Jiu Qingzi finished speaking, he took out a token from his waist.
The people present did not know the meaning of this token, but the emperor knew it.
This is also the reason why he was willing to let him go that time, because as long as this thing was there, he couldn't kill him at all. If he had to pester him, he would be the only one who would be embarrassed in the end.
He was so anxious just now that he forgot about it. Now when he saw Jiu Qingzi taking out this thing, the emperor's eyes were full of hatred.
"Why, the emperor wants to resist the decree?" Jiu Qingzi reminded him after seeing the killing intent in his eyes.
The emperor did have this idea and was ready to do so. At this time, Eunuch Liu came in and said that King Xin and King Zhou were here. They came here so late, so they probably knew what happened in the palace.
However, they don't know Jiu Qingzi's identity, could it be...
"Did you call them here?" The emperor looked at Xie Lan in disgust.
Xie Lan neither admitted nor denied. The emperor saw that he and Jiu Qingzi were just as arrogant, and felt angry in his heart. He couldn't kill Jiu Qingzi, so he couldn't kill him?
"Come here, take King Dingbei out and hit thirty boards again."
The imperial guards were all puzzled. What did King Zhou Bei do? The emperor was so angry. Only Mr. Pei understood why the emperor was so angry.
Although he also felt that Xie Lan was innocent, he could not disobey the emperor's order.
So he stepped forward to take him out. Tao Yaoyao stepped forward to block Xie Lan, and then looked at the emperor, "May I ask, Your Majesty, what did King Dingbei say or do wrong? Do you want to punish him like this?"
"Whisper, this is the palace, he is my son, I can do whatever I want, do I need you to give me advice?"
"Even if you are the emperor, you must be reasonable and follow etiquette..." Tao Yaoyao tried to reason with the emperor. Xie Lan stretched out his hand to pull her behind him and said with a mocking smile, "He is right, he is the emperor, he Do whatever you want. Don’t worry, he can hit me dozens of times at most, but he won’t dare to beat me to death.”
Xie Lan turned around expressionlessly, thought of something, and said, "If I die, the innocent souls of the Xie family will have to go find him."
"presumptuous."
The emperor was furious, and in a fit of rage, he took the inkstone on the table and smashed it over. This time, Xie Lan did not just stand there obediently, but knocked the inkstone flying over with his hands.
There was a thud, and the birds on the trees outside were startled, and then disappeared.
Everyone in the hall was too frightened to move.
Xie Lan walked out directly, still looking calm and calm as before. Tao Yaoyao saw this and followed him. When they came outside the door, a gust of cold wind blew by, which also awakened the anger in Tao Yaoyao's heart.
"Have you forgotten that we have been poisoned by the lover's poison? If you die now, don't I have to be buried with you?" Tao Yaoyao didn't believe that he had no way to escape.
Just like he had revealed the emperor's weakness without any scruples just now.
Even the third prince who was most favored at the time probably didn't dare to talk to the emperor like this, but he just said what he wanted to say.
However, why did he talk about the innocent souls of the Xie family, and why did the emperor's attitude become so strange when he heard this?
She had heard him say before that the Xie family's affairs were related to him, and that he was unusually indulgent of Xie Fei because of the Xie family's affairs, but she didn't know the specific reason.
I can’t guess what kind of tragic truth it is that makes so many people reluctant to mention it again.
The Queen would rather be a madman or a fool than live soberly.
"I'm sorry, my lord."
Lord Pei was worried that the imperial guards would lose their strength for fear of being punished, so he prepared to take action himself, but Xie Lan refused, "I have committed enough sins on my behalf, so I ask Lord Pei to enforce the law impartially."
Master Xiao Pei couldn't resist him, but in the end he played according to the rules.
Tao Yaoyao stood aside and watched quietly as he was beaten thirty times. After the guards dispersed, she went to help him. At this time, King Xin and others also came over.
The two of them knew what was going on just by looking at him, so they bypassed him and went directly into the study room.
At this time, the atmosphere in the hall was still solemn. The emperor did not dare to be cruel to Jiu Qingzi. Jiu Qingzi insisted on investigating the matter thoroughly, and neither of them would give in.
After King Xin and King Zhou stepped forward to salute, they glanced at Jiu Qingzi.
They were old men in the court, so they had naturally seen Jiu Qingzi when he was young. After many years, they thought he was dead, or was living in seclusion somewhere, watching the sun rise and set, looking carefree and carefree.
When they received the news from Xie Lan, they were all shocked.
Seeing him now, it still feels unreal.
"King of England, long time no see."
