The Deposed Crown Prince had Three Lifelong Regrets - Chapter 26

Chapter 26

The next day, the setting sun stained half the sky, a brilliant red, as if a bowl of blood had been poured into it. Golden light spread over the mountains and rivers for thousands of miles, and the edges of the ridges took on a slight dark purple hue when viewed from a distance.

Torches were lit one after another. After a survey, they discovered a statue of the Mysterious Lady (Xuan Nü) worshiped inside the dilapidated ancient temple.

One of the bodyguards, who had seen the Crown Prince’s portrait for years, recognized a nine-tenths resemblance to Wenchang. Within moments, he had loudly announced it to everyone.

Jiang Nan brought a large amount of liquor. After the bonfire was lit, she distributed it all to the others but didn’t touch a drop herself.

Only she, with three or four guards, escorted Her Highness to the ancient temple. Her other colleagues had to deal with other matters and were not qualified to follow.

“When Empress Zhu was young, the Crown Prince Wenchang was merely a Noble Consort. At Wenchang’s birth, she was only a Noble Lady. If it weren’t for the unusual celestial phenomenon at the young Highness’s birth, signifying great auspiciousness, perhaps…”

Mo Xianghao sat by the fire, occasionally taking a swig from his wineskin.

His lips carried a self-mocking smile. Not drunk, yet he dared to speak so audaciously, causing fear among those around him.

A large portion of the ancient temple’s eaves had collapsed, and the enshrined deity statue was embedded in the wall. The broken eaves and crumbled walls offered no shelter from the wind and rain.

“Later, Zhu Lingwei pleaded for the entire Sun family and resisted the decree to change her surname. The Emperor was furious and immediately dismissed Zhu Lingwei.”

Calling the royal family by their given name was a major taboo.

“But don’t you think it’s strange? Six months later, Her Highness eagerly changed her name and surname. After the Emperor learned of this, he specially issued an imperial decree bestowing a name, but for several years, there was no intention to reinstate her.”

“Isn’t it laughable? Why did she endure such hardship in the first place?”

Lu Fengmian quietly poked the fire and wrapped her clothing around herself. Li Qinghuai sat with her knees hugged, chin resting on them, blinking with an innocent expression. The man surnamed Mo, however, couldn’t listen anymore, coughing twice as he choked on his wine.

How could Lu Fengmian not suspect Zhao Pan’er’s identity? A person wearing the Flying Fish Robe personally intercepted them, instructing them to seek refuge in the ancient temple on the mountain and not interfere with their mission.

Then, people wearing the same uniform escorted them here.

And Zhao Pan’er received the most preferential treatment, carried over on Jiang Nan’s back.

Cleaning the dust and laying out the straw mats was complicated. Night fell in an instant, a dark, moonless night.

Before Wenchang left the palace, the Mo family received a letter from the Elder Princess’s Residence, filled with thinly veiled threats. With heroes scattered and families facing ruin, the family could only comply for the sake of survival, collaborating to use fame and fortune to support Wenchang.

They had agreed to consult on their actions, but now the Jinyiwei were protecting a woman, giving him reason to overthink.

There was no trust in this collaboration whatsoever.

Li Qinghuai was squatting closer and closer to the fire. Unaware that her clothes were about to catch fire, she remained lost in thought, resting her chin on her knees.

Once past this village temple, there was no other place to stay. Leaving meant walking at least thirty li to see any sign of human habitation.

Excluding them, some of the bodyguards who sensed something was wrong were also anxious, their emotions deliberately ignored until they were on the verge of a breakdown.

Lu Fengmian couldn’t be bothered with Li Qinghuai, and Lu Fengmian was busy ingratiating herself with Jiang Nan, having no time to manage her.

But Li Qinghuai knew that if things continued this way, there would be no good outcome. An uneasy state of mind was a variable. Even if they didn’t actively provoke trouble, it would become a weakness for their enemies to exploit, often leading to tragic, irreversible mistakes.

God knows how tiring it is to be forced to mix with a group of people I don’t want to deal with. Li Qinghuai was so frustrated at the time that she wanted nothing more than to finish the task immediately and return to the palace.

The wind rustled the vegetation. The bonfire was extinguished without warning.

Shadows leaped into the temple one after another, and commotion erupted. In no time, a warm liquid was splashed over her head.

The buzzing sound of blades being drawn was constant. Li Qinghuai was in the center of the crowd. Aside from a few clumsy people who kicked her while escaping, no one dared to stab her.

After all, a single stab when she was severely injured could be fatal.

As she was preoccupied with blowing on her tinder, a face pressed close to hers.

Dry, sparse hair hung on both sides of the face, revealing a pale yellow and fragmented countenance. The thing crawled on the ground, lifeless. After an initial movement, it froze in place like a stone carving.

Exactly as it looked in her dream.

It could no longer be considered human…

As Li Qinghuai retreated a short distance, the thing seemed to come alive. With a few sou sou sounds, it leaped up, its blood-soaked sharp nails hooking onto a wooden pillar, suspending it in mid-air.

It then swiftly darted toward the bodyguards.

Blood splattered instantly. The others were limited even when using all their strength; protecting themselves was already a struggle.

After a few rounds, others were covered in large and small holes, lying on the ground, bleeding profusely.

“Your Highness, you are relying on Heaven’s bestowed blessings to commit evil! After three cycles of reincarnation, endless blessings await you. Are you not afraid of gambling your own life away?” someone discarded all formality and shouted at her.

Li Qinghuai belatedly realized this was an auditory hallucination. The memory was likely too profound, causing her to recall the Master’s words every time she encountered a scene of slaughter.

Seeing that the place had turned into a murderous Asura field, Li Qinghuai vaguely sensed someone in her arms amid the clanging vibration of gongs and drums. The person in her arms desperately trembled a few times but couldn’t wake up due to severe injuries.

She reached out, soothingly stroking the person’s soft hair, tracing a path from the back to the waist.

The scent on her nose was fresh, very similar to the morning dew, yet inexplicably carrying a faint scent of cosmetic powder.

Logically, merely running through the mountains shouldn’t result in this smell.

Yet, Li Qinghuai distinctly smelled it. She was well aware that this was likely a hallucination.

In her childhood, she loved the scent of her mother’s cosmetic powder. Even when her mother went without makeup and spent days fasting and praying, she could still smell that scent.

But others couldn’t detect it at all.

It was a warm, sweet fragrance, very similar to the atmosphere in a hall filled with song and dance, making one want to eternally fall asleep in this never-ending dream of beauty.

But the person in her arms was cold, so the sweet fragrance was reduced to just the scent of cosmetic powder.

After gently tidying the person’s messy hair, she had the Fox Half-Immortal help her up.

“Reincarnation, the path to immortality, or the animal realm—they are all the same to me,” Li Qinghuai said indifferently, completely ignoring the person in her hallucination whose face was so gloomy it seemed to drip water. “Merits and faults are judged by others; what I do must be decided by myself.”

Her voice was soft. Before she finished speaking, someone lunged to kill her.

These people knew nothing of any ‘Your Highness.’ Few people understood the previous conversation.

The people of the Imperial City naturally stayed in the Forbidden City. Why would they run to this desolate mountain to kill them? It was illogical and impossible.

So, someone, risking the charge of great disrespect, decided to capture the leader first.

Li Qinghuai braced her back against a wooden pillar, dodging sideways by pushing off the ground.

The attacker used too much force, and the blade embedded deep into the wood. He needed considerable strength to pull the blade out.

Li Qinghuai unconscionably pulled Su Wushuang over again, pushing her onto the reckless attacker. Since they were teammates, he hesitated to strike and stumbled when hit.

In those one or two seconds, the demonic entity flipped over and slashed his throat.

Su Wushuang fell to the ground with a moderate impact. She had already suffered internal injuries before coming to the ancient temple. Subjected to another blow, her internal organs were surely shaken.

Li Qinghuai couldn’t be bothered to help her up, stepping two paces further away from her.

The relationship between the ruler and the commoner between them amounted to ashes. Her personal visit this time was not only for Lu Fengmian but also for the plague case many years ago and the recent resurgence of rampant drug trafficking. Secret reports indicated that Song Xuan Ye, the second young master of the Song family, was instructed by the Fourth Prince to search for an underground passage in Luo Mountain.

The underground passage was a secret known only to successive emperors.

Although her father had taken Li Qinghuai and another prince there in their childhood, that prince had died prematurely and posed no threat to her.

Yet now, someone dared to search for the hidden passage, defying the imperial command.

In her memory, the area below was a large sacrificial ground, and the cave entrance could only be opened with specific mysterious stones.

However, the Fourth Prince did not send assassins but rather allowed Song Xuan Ye to scout the path for him, intending only to test her reaction.

He likely wanted to test three things: first, if Li Qinghuai’s forces could gather intelligence; second, how she would react; and third, the Song family’s loyalty to him.

Since Song Xuan Ye had accepted the commission from another, and the rest of the Song family hadn’t explicitly expressed their allegiance to her, the pledges of loyalty she had heard in the past were rendered meaningless.

Upon meeting again, they were either allies or enemies.

The Emperor had specially permitted her to privately observe her mother’s memorial day at the imperial tomb. The people in the palace likely still believed she was at the Eastern Qing Tombs. No one dared to trespass where the royal family was buried, but a one-month delay was the absolute limit. If a mishap occurred, the only person to bear the responsibility would be herself, the one who acted covertly.

“Jiang Nan, tie her up first.” Li Qinghuai looked away coldly.

The hemp rope, like a leather whip, was sharply snapped and wrapped around Su Wushuang’s waist as if it were alive. With a forceful pull back, her entire body and limbs were bound.

Torches were lit one after another. The rebels had been cleared out.

Li Qinghuai sighed almost imperceptibly and spoke quietly, “This situation was not set up by me. I am not the one who harmed this person.”

Lu Fengmian frowned. She pointed at the monstrous entity crawling on the ground beside them, indicating that Li Qinghuai was mistaken.

“By the time I knew about it, she was already like this. Everyone knows that Heaven has blessed me. Just like during the palace coup, when powerful figures came to the palace to eradicate demons, I was originally powerless to resist those ghosts.”

“But they seemed afraid to kill me.”

“I think the reason this one doesn’t come near me can also be explained. However, she still has some sentience. In the past few days, I have brokered a deal with ‘someone’ concerning her. Having been reduced to this state, she will likely not have a peaceful end and may not enter the cycle of reincarnation. However, helping a ghostly entity achieve enlightenment is not a difficult matter for me.”

Li Qinghuai let out a deliberately sorrowful laugh:

“Pitiable and lamentable.”

Not many people heard this statement, although the reason was simply that the two were close, providing a sense of stability amid the chaos.

The scene was too chaotic. It was so chaotic that others had no mind to listen to their conversation, so chaotic that they could neither see nor hear clearly.

“You lunatics! You will all face retribution someday! Die early and be reborn early! Why live like a pile of rotting mud… Ugh…”

Li Qinghuai helped Lu Fengmian sit down. She had been fighting earlier and had slipped carelessly, forcing her to grab the tip of a blade with both hands. Her hands were now bloody and quite unnerving.

The moment she sat on the straw mat, her shoe was yanked off.

Lu Fengmian was completely stunned, not understanding why this person would grab her shoe, only to see the cloth shoe folded in half and stuffed into Su Wushuang’s mouth.