Chapter 989 Touring With a Group Really Is Relaxing!
It might be that the impact of the girls crying was too great, or it was possible that this sort of crying was too sorrowful, as even the Sheng Palace’s servants began to feel saddened upon hearing it. Very quickly, maidservants began to wipe away tears. After a little while longer, even the male servants began to cry.
Aside from the guards with martial abilities, who were not affected, all of the others had begun to cry, and the crying was getting louder and louder. By the end, the servants simply dropped to their knees. With the young misses taking the lead, they loudly shouted: “Your Highness the eighth prince! You’re so pitiful! Your Highness! You have had it so hard!”
Xuan Tianmo went from vomiting to nearly coughing up blood. He almost suspected that Feng Yuheng had given these people some sort of drug, causing them to all cry. In the end, had they come to visit a sick person or to cry at a funeral?
This sort of crying continued for just under an hour before Xuan Tiange finally said: “Alright, alright, stop crying. Eighth brother has not died yet. Crying right now is truly a bit too early. Put your tears away and come back when it’s time to cry!” After saying this, she looked at Xuan Tianmo and said: “Eighth brother’s complexion is not very good. Thinking about it, your body must be weak. Get some good rest! We won’t be disrupting you any further.”
Xuan Tianmo did not want to say a single word and just nodded his head. He had been hoping for these plague gods to quickly leave.
Xuan Tiange went with his wishes and quickly led the people out. It was just that she sighed while walking out: “Hah, eighth brother is good at everything, but his choice of women is too lacking. He truly can’t compare with ninth brother. My older brothers, they really are a cause for concern. I want to feel at ease but cannot. Forget it, forget it, let’s go and visit fifth brother to warn him of eighth brother’s situation. We must have him get along well with the Feng family’s fourth young miss. It would be best if he did not follow in eighth brother’s footsteps.”
Finally, everyone left, and the room fell silent. Only the Sheng Palace’s servants remained kneeling on the ground. With tears on their faces, they finally came to their senses. Why did they need to cry? Why did they kneel? How did they end up crying without even realizing it? What exactly had just happened?
Seeing the confused looks on the servants’ faces, Xuan Tianmo once again wondered if Feng Yuheng had given them some strange drug that would leave them confused. He loudly cursed at these ignorant servants and vented the anger that he had been holding in on these servants. In the end, he still coughed up blood in anger.
As for Xuan Tiange’s group, they said that they would go and visit the fifth prince and really went to find him. The group left the Sheng Palace and mightily headed toward the Li Palace. After arriving, they held onto the fifth prince and warned him exhaustively, analyzing the pain that the eighth prince had suffered for the fifth prince. They repeatedly urged him to get along well with the Feng family’s fourth young miss and not allow the eighth prince’s tragedy to repeat itself in the Li Palace.
At the same time, Xuan Tiange also said: “Women, right! They can’t be made to suffer, nor can they be spoiled. Just that Feng family’s fourth young miss, fifth brother, if you don’t strictly guide her, I fear that things she could do would be even more outrageous than what the Zhu family’s young miss did! Tsk tsk, fifth brother, you have better facial features than eighth brother. You must not let your face be ruined by a woman. Do you understand? I really am worried about you.”
With Xuan Tiange leading the charge, the young misses behind her also began to speak, never leaving room for anyone else to get a word in. All of them stayed in the Li Palace for over two hours, which left the fifth prince’s head in a daze, as he felt that he was on the edge of mental collapse. Only then did they bid farewell.
Feng Yuheng originally thought that this would be the end, but the result was that the young misses had a quick discussion and felt that the previous two visits had negative energy. To only interact with these negative people in a day, it was truly not good for one’s health, thus they decided to visit the eldest and second princes, which would be considered happy places to recover their moods.
Like that, she sat in Xuan Tiange’s imperial carriage while eating seeds, following the group to the two palaces.
Over the course of the day, they had gone from the Sheng Palace to the Li Palace to the Jing Palace then to the Yuan Palace. There were people who made arrangements for things all along the way. When they arrived, there would be people to receive them, and they very humanly lined up to use the restroom. After they arrived in the Jing Palace, the Jing Palace also provided a meal for them.
Feng Yuheng thought that touring with a group really was relaxing!
But while it was relaxing for some, it would be troubling for others. The one to be troubled was the eighth prince’s side. For the sake of preventing things from getting out of control, he continued to think of ways to have his people break into the imperial daughter’s manor to snatch Zhu Kongshan. He even thought of using Zhu family’s life as a threat to prevent Zhu Kongshan from doing something devilish. Unfortunately, the imperial daughter’s manor was so secure that not even a fly could get in. He was completely stumped. What was a residence that did not even have its master living there doing with so much security? As for the Zhu family’s side, Xuan Tianmo was no fool. Even if he did threaten them, it would be pointless. Zhu Kongshan hated the Zhu family so much that she was all too eager to see them all die. This was the same for the Liu family, thus controlling the Zhu family was not a solution.
Before he figured out how to resolve this situation and before he figured out how he would go about doing this, everyone in the capital hated him to the bone. The hated him because of the people who had died in the northern part of the city. The more infuriating part was that the madams and officials’ families also hated him. Because of that previous reason, Hundred Herb Hall’s doctors and best medicine were used in the northern part of the city. This caused a shortage of doctors and medicine. This left them with no place to seek treatment or buy medicine.
Thus the Sheng Palace’s entrance became a disaster area, as a large number of citizens would go each day to throw large amounts of mud and snowballs. There were even some who threw axes. This scared the guards at the gates away from standing outside, as they all hid in the yard.
On the third day, Zhu Kongshan was secretly sent by Feng Yuheng to the Board of Punishments for questioning. Being questioned by Xu Jingyuan, Zhu Kongshan pushed all of her crimes onto Xuan Tianmo, while she became a victim who suffered many grievances. Xu Jingyuan even had a granny from the palace come to inspect Zhu Kongshan’s body. After receiving the response that she was no longer pure, another item was added to the list of crimes committed by the eighth prince.
As for the tailors who had made clothes for Noble Lady Yuan, they spent their days at the Board of Punishments. According to what the shopkeeper of the tailor shop, someone from the palace claiming to be one of Noble Lady Yuan’s maidservants gave them money to have them make winter clothes. They also provided a large amount of materials, but they would need to prepare the cotton themselves. They received the money and prepared to get to work, but on the second day, another palace maid arrived, telling them that the cotton used did not need to be of high quality. It would be fine to just use the old stock that had been left in the warehouse. Each garment did not need very much, and if there was not enough, just fill them up with scrap. In summary, the cost would be dropped, and they said that they would only be used to warm up the cows and sheep. Not only did they say this, but they also took back half of the silver that had been paid the previous day. It was such that it was only enough to make it like that. Not only did they use old cotton, but a large portion of the materials used was waste material that had been recovered from clothes that had been worn by others for many years.
This shopkeeper spoke with righteousness: “Since they were to be used by cows and sheep, the things that we provided were good enough. There were for mere livestock and not to be worn by people!”
Xu Jingyuan felt that what they had said was correct. They had made them using livestock as their guidelines. Who knew that they would be given to people. Of course, he deliberately neglected the fact that they had done this for the sake of profits and only recorded part of what the shopkeeper had said, especially emphasizing that it was Noble Lady Yuan who had ordered for someone to do this.
After three days of questioning, this case was tidied up into a report and given to the Emperor during the morning court session on the fourth day.
Everyone was waiting for the Emperor to make a judgment on this matter. They saw the Emperor read the report for a long time, as a conflicted expression appeared on his face. He was unable to make up his mind for a long time. Xuan Tianming furrowed his brow and cast a glance in Xu Jingyuan’s direction. Xu Jingyuan immediately stepped forward and kneeled, saying: “Your Majesty, there is a witness in Zhu Kongshan, who has already been left to wait outside the hall. She insisted on recounting this case in front of Your Majesty to file her complaint against His Highness Prince Sheng!”
The Emperor had a conflicted expression on his face. Listening to what Xu Jingyuan said, he did not speak for a long time. The officials in court grew anxious from waiting, as Xuan Tianming suddenly said: “Since she’s already come, just bring her in and hear what she has to say!”
With Xuan Tianming having spoken, someone from the outside escorted Zhu Kongshan inside. The Emperor glared at Xuan Tianming but did not say anything. He just coldly looked at Zhu Kongshan kneeling in the middle of the hall, as she loudly cried: “Your Majesty! This humble girl wishes to file a complaint against the eighth prince! I beg Your Majesty to support this humble girl and the citizens of this world!”
Following this, Zhu Kongshan used herself as a starting point to speak on this topic from a different angle. The overall story became: “This humble girl was born in Peng Zhou and worked hard to support the poor folk in Peng Zhou. This point is easily verifiable as long as one visits Peng Zhou and asks around. Before the start of winter, this humble girl came to the capital for the sake of visiting my two aunts in the Imperial Palace but happened to see so many beggars and poor people in the northern part of the city, thus I could not endure and wanted to help them. This humble girl used the money that I had brought to make winter clothes for the beggars, repair a temple and set up a congee stall. I also convinced many friends in the capital to do good deeds with this humble girl, and we were welcomed in the northern part of the city very quickly. At this time, the eighth prince saw the benefits of our deeds and wanted us to tell everyone that the Sheng Palace was providing us with the money to do these good deeds. Since this humble girl was staying at his residence, I had no other choice. I was thinking that regardless of who was doing it, as long as it was done, it would be a good thing for the citizens, thus I did not argue. But the eighth prince never provided a single cent, but he did provide this humble girl with quite a few accessories. This humble girl traded all of them for money to continue supporting the congee stall in the northern part of the city. This humble girl was thinking of continuing this through the winter. This way, the people would be able to stay warm and have some food to eat; however, who knew that the eighth prince would expose his true nature. Not only did he defile this humble girl’s body inside his Sheng Palace, but he also collaborated with Noble Lady Yuan to wickedly produce those winter clothes to freeze the citizens to death. He even put poison into the congee to poison even more people! Your Majesty, please show your good judgment. Everything that this humble girl said was true!”
Everything that had been said matched up with what Xu Jingyuan had written in his report; however, it was completely different from what Xuan Tianmo had done. Zhu Kongshan looked at the Emperor and felt that this emperor’s gaze had a quality that was very similar to the eighth prince’s spirit. It was so penetrating and full of confidence, and it was completely intolerant of any contention.
But she did not come today for the sake of using her mouth to say these words. She definitely did not believe that the Emperor would just listen to the testimony of a little girl like her. She had even considered that the Emperor was smart enough to have this whole matter investigated, and he would definitely discover the truth.
But what of it? She came here for the sake of forcing the Emperor to get angry, force him to become rash and force him to give up on investigating. She had to ensure that the eighth prince was found guilty.
A resolute expression appeared on Zhu Kongshan’s face, as she suddenly stood up and fiercely charged at a round pillar in the hall. The people cried out in shock, but nobody stopped her. They just heard Zhu Kongshan scream while running: “Eighth prince, you violent beast. This humble girl will proclaim his guilt with my death!”
With a “thunk” sound, Zhu Kongshan succeeded in ramming into the pillar. Blood splattered all over, as she perished…