The Deposed Crown Prince had Three Lifelong Regrets - Chapter 31

Chapter 31

The cycle of day and night continued. The extended deadline that Madam Zhao had secured for her was running out. And her father’s expressions when they occasionally met were growing more and more cynical.

All of this made Comrade Chengmei anxious, leading her to run around the courtyard every night for several consecutive days.

Even when a light rain began to fall this evening, transitioning from dusk to night, she did not abandon her plan to run at night.

The guards patrolled ceaselessly, and the servants hurried back and forth. Relying on her familiarity with the terrain, Lu Fengmian specifically chose secluded and desolate areas, barely encountering anyone.

She unconsciously sped up, her legs pumping back and forth, the mottled shadows of trees alternating across the top of her head.

Suddenly, a pair of warm hands covered her mouth, dragging her toward the bushes. Lu Fengmian had just clenched her fist, preparing to execute a low horizontal chop, but was halted by the whispered words, “It’s me.”

“Mo Xianghao?” Lu Fengmian tested.

The person, concealed in the darkness, trembled slightly at the name, nodding hesitantly. A moment later, realizing she couldn’t see, she quickly let go.

The moonlight struggled to peek out, threads of light landing on Lu Fengmian’s clothes. Coincidentally, she had been wearing a dark purple dress recently, and she glittered in the silver light.

She also took advantage of that sliver of moonlight to clearly see Mo Xianghao’s face. After a long absence, the person looked much more worn and her expression was strange. Her eyelids were half-lowered with fatigue, revealing unease, yet subtly mixed with a hint of excitement.

“I feel like you are exuding a kind of decadence from the inside out, and then from the outside in.” Lu Fengmian was always outspoken with her friend.

Mo Xianghao remained silent.

This confused Lu Fengmian. “What’s wrong? You look windblown and very depressed.”

“Do you still remember the Qilu plague case?” the other person finally asked.

“I don’t remember it, but I’ve heard people talk about it.”

Although she could tell the person was hesitant to speak and could be coaxed into revealing the answer, since she came to talk to her about this matter, she wouldn’t abandon the topic just because of one or two honest words from her.

But people propose, and the heavens dispose. Hearing her friend’s denial after traveling so far, the other person fell silent again.

Lu Fengmian: “Why are you asking me this?”

Silence was her only reply.

“Hiss, what exactly do you want to say?” She spoke again after a long pause.

Silence was still her reply.

A chilling silence.

Lu Fengmian: “???”

“I…” The person sighed deeply, first leading her to leap onto a branch of the flourishing tree, away from the clamor of the guards’ patrols. “His Highness Wenchang plans to have a grand wedding in July, marrying a noblewoman from her mother’s clan.”

Rumors had long circulated in the capital that His Highness Wenchang was fond of women, and the Emperor must have been aware of this as well.

Now that the person had lost her status as heir apparent and was no longer held to high expectations, it was not surprising for her to act out of jealousy and madness.

Lu Fengmian was not interested in who she married. “The Gu Pan’er we met at Tuo Liang Mountain was Her Highness.”

Suddenly, several sharp cat meows rang out in the distance, startling them. However, the mating season in spring was often like this, so the two continued their conversation, unconcerned.

“I know.”

“You knew all along? That shouldn’t be the case,” Lu Fengmian smiled playfully, making a move as if to playfully punch her. “I heard Her Highness is investigating the Qilu plague case. I have no memory of what happened a few years ago. Now you’ve come to talk to me about the plague case. You can’t blame me for being curious.”

However, before Mo Xianghao could speak, several stern shouts suddenly erupted not far away. Lu Fengmian’s heart tensed. What would happen if she, having just been reprimanded by her father, was discovered secretly meeting someone else?

She quickly pushed Mo Xianghao out. The other person seemed to understand her predicament, gazed at her intensely for a moment, and then slipped away cleanly.

The wind caused by her departure carried a faint scent of herbs. Lu Fengmian vaguely heard the other person ask her to wait for her, so she silently kept it in mind, carefully sliding down from the tree canopy.

She took a few quick steps, wanting to leave this troublesome place, but then bumped into the housekeeper head-on.

“Miss, you…”

She focused her eyes and saw it was the steward. Her face immediately flushed with awkwardness. She said hesitatingly, “Strolling, ha.”

The housekeeper had run over, panting and trembling all over. The hand holding the umbrella was unsteady, swaying from side to side. The other hand held a night-watch lantern, which looked somewhat old and worn.

“Miss, allow this old servant to speak. Don’t be angry with the Master anymore. He is doing it for your own good,” he said, offering the hand holding the umbrella. “Take the umbrella and go back quickly, or you will catch a cold tomorrow.”

Lu Fengmian was puzzled for a long time before she understood what he meant. She quickly waved her hand and moved a few steps away, cupping her hands over her head, bowing to politely refuse the kindness, and hurriedly ran off.

The rain was light, but her long skirt still got wet.

The calls from behind were stretched far and distant in the rain and mist. When she reached the low-lying bluestone slab, she stumbled carelessly, the sound of splashing water indicating that her socks and shoes were completely soaked.

The branches had previously shielded her from the rain, but now, having left her hiding place, she truly felt the downpour.

She felt both close to and distant from the housekeeper deep down. She didn’t remember any conflict between them, but a subconscious impression made her intentionally keep her distance.

Although she always felt a sense of reluctance when leaving, her hairs would stand on end whenever they met face-to-face.

Fortunately, after leaving, she saw a few maids and guards arguing. The previous shouts had come from that direction.

In that case, they probably hadn’t noticed the anomaly on the tree canopy.

Although Lu Fengmian saw Congji there, she did not stop to avoid causing further trouble.

Just as someone had told her on that rainy night, the next day, when the sun was high, she did indeed fall ill with a high fever, a mixture of new ailments and old sicknesses.

The physician made repeated visits, informing the household that Miss Lu still had residual toxins in her body. She must have taken an antidote when she was poisoned, but the root of the illness had not been removed, and getting caught in the rain was just the trigger.

Thus, Lu Fengmian was forced to drink bitter medicine for over half a month before she was allowed out of bed. She had tried to resist during this period, but the toxins bit fiercely, and the illness was severe, leaving her powerless to fight back.

The feeling was like having bones scraped from her flesh, then having her skin surface intensely roasted in a steamer.

She didn’t even dare to mention which kind of spider had bitten her, for fear of a new round of scolding. She deliberately indulged in the pain, waiting for the doctor’s diagnosis.

The waiting period for the kneeling punishment was greatly prolonged. Lu Enzhuo probably thought she was deliberately feigning illness to avoid punishment and never came to visit her once.

Her uncle and aunt, however, visited frequently, acting like her biological parents. Initially, they wore stern faces of disappointment, but later, unable to maintain the facade, they cried and offered comfort and care.

In this strange home where the closeness of kinship was inverted, Lu Fengmian did not feel the oppression of living under someone else’s roof, but there was always a barrier. Although it was utterly wrong for her to “ignore” them, the kindness she reciprocated was mostly born out of feigned morality and upbringing.

She naturally should be close to her uncle and aunt, just as she would with biological parents, but the love she constructed was somewhat artificial.

Lu Fengmian had never been at peace with herself in this grand garden. At first, she simply thought she was a sensitive girl who loved to overthink.

She felt no sadness at the indifference Lu Enzhuo showed, because she had never held any hope for him, so there was no disappointment.

Only after the secret of her mother’s death gradually surfaced did she replace the self-assessment of “overthinking” with “meticulous thinker.”

Lu Fengmian did not feel she was cold. She had passion and love for her family, but this love was somewhat subtle.

She needed the main perpetrators to pay with their lives and to sever ties with the remaining accomplices, parting ways forever.

This was both a repayment for years of upbringing and an unknown pity for whom—was it truly for others, or was she pitying her own distant family ties?

“Aunt, I don’t hate Father. You don’t need to counsel me anymore. If Father wants me to return to Shangdu with him, I think I am willing to go,” Lu Fengmian said sincerely. “After all, the blood relation is still there. I can always feel the kinship, even though our relationship is not good, and we dislike each other.”

The implication was that she couldn’t see the same sense of kinship in them.

Even though they were very good to her, so good that Lu Fengmian was “indebted,” that feeling could not be substituted. They felt the same to her as countless other distant relatives.

Closeness and distance were distinct. Blood was thicker than water.

She needed to covet the Zhao family’s wealth and glory, but she didn’t want to entirely pretend and deceive them.

“Why, why don’t you like us…” At this moment, only a group of maids and her aunt were present, and the latter was clearly choked by the reply.

“No, no. You have always been very good to me, and I am very grateful. My love for Uncle and Aunt once surpassed that for my biological parents, but I have bothered you too much these past years.” Lu Fengmian did not want to see her wallow in self-pity and interrupted her without regard for etiquette.

“Don’t be like this, my daughter. It hurts my heart to see it. This home will always have a place for you.” Madam Zhao shed tears upon hearing this, stroking her cheek.

“Besides, after all these years, it’s time for me to pay my respects to my mother,” Lu Fengmian couldn’t help but sigh.

Madam Zhao fell silent. She was referring to her birth mother, whose grave was still in Shangdu.

The originally harmonious atmosphere was dampened by the heavy topic, becoming subdued. Her aunt forced a smile, seemingly missing the deceased, enduring the melancholic feeling for half an incense stick’s time before rushing away, unable to bear the gloom any longer.

After the illness subsided, Lu Fengmian went to kneel in the ancestral hall as agreed.

Initially, she had been waiting for the person surnamed Mo to come find her, but four days had passed from convalescence to kneeling, and the person had not appeared, which inevitably disappointed her.

By the dusk of the fifth day, she had given up hope. The dim yellow light streamed in through the wooden door. She assumed it was the servant checking if she was slacking off, and immediately asked impatiently, “What is it?”

The person gasped, rushing over and smacking her head.

Lu Fengmian squinted, realizing something was wrong, and suddenly turned around.

It was Mo Xianghao, the person she had been longing to see.

Regardless of whether anyone noticed, Mo Xianghao immediately darted into the space under the altar table, speaking to her from behind the curtain.

Lu Fengmian: “…” She was competing with a rat.

“Our family was the main culprit in that plague case. The former Vice Sect Leader colluded with the Prince of Liaodong, intending to overthrow the Crown Prince and establish the fourth prince, the adopted son of the current Prince Zhao, to build his prestige.”

“He wanted to choose a new heir apparent.”

The person’s speech was rapid, with a slight gasp, and her voice was not kept very low. Lu Fengmian was startled. She quickly coughed a few times, which triggered her fragile lungs, making her unable to stop.

Swallowing the saliva that had choked her, she got up and pressed herself against the door panel, listening to the movement outside.

Because of the thick door panel, very little sound reached her ears. Coupled with the fact that the ancestral hall area was inherently quiet, there wasn’t even a faint clamor.

Lu Fengmian knelt back on the cushion, quietly waiting for the other person to speak.

But after a long silence, she hadn’t said anything, to the point that Lu Fengmian’s scattered thoughts had been sorted out.

Lu Fengmian: “Why don’t you continue?”

Did she change her mind again?

A moment later, the weary voice sounded again.

“Why aren’t you surprised?”

A person with memory loss would always imagine extraordinary events to fill their empty mind.

In her perception, she could be an impostor of Miss Lu; her birth mother could have been killed by her uncle and aunt; and the current Crown Prince could also be infatuated with her.

At this moment, Lu Fengmian’s heart was shaking and her hands were trembling, which was the greatest respect she could give to this piece of news.

“So, you came here to tease me.”

The air froze again.

“I am telling the truth. Creating a plague case without leaving an antidote, the unique antidote would be sent to the Prince of Liaodong. At that time, he would send someone to drink the antidote.” Her voice was full of sorrow. After half a month of brooding, it had become more composed and world-weary.

“The person who drinks the antidote, by letting their blood drip into the water, can cure the plague in the city.”

Consequently, the person with the sacred blood would be supported by the people. If this person belonged to Prince Zhao’s faction, the people would naturally gravitate toward Prince Zhao.

Thus, the day of selecting a new heir apparent would not be far off.

Lu Fengmian had no words to reply, only managing a simple “Mm.”

“I went back to the Mo family. My father told me that the Crown Prince, who had come to investigate, noticed something amiss in the Qilu plague case and intercepted the antidote that was being sent,” Mo Xianghao rarely lowered her gaze. “Having no choice, they had to switch sides midway to save their lives.”

“You knew none of this before,” Lu Fengmian stated, not as a question, but as a certainty.

Her voice began to tremble more and more. She had to open her mouth to breathe, trying to stabilize her breath.