Returning after a three-year escape from death, the tyrant has turned evil.

Chapter 272 Investigating the Murderer
Seeing this, Song Yi was startled and quickly grabbed his wrist: "What are you doing?"

Jiang Lanye smiled and said, "If you don't dare to eat it, I'll eat it to show you."

Song Yi was taken aback.

"See, nothing's wrong. Have something to eat. From now on, I'll always eat a bite of whatever I give you first, okay?"

Song Yi glared at him: "Don't talk nonsense, what if there really is a problem?"

Jiang Lanye reached out and gently stroked the corner of her eye, his voice exceptionally gentle: "There won't be any problems. Xichun just said that this thing has been tested for poison. You're just too scared, so you're hesitant to eat it right now."

Song Yi pursed her lips, picked up a pastry, and took a bite.

Seeing that she had started eating, Jiang Lanye felt relieved.

Soon, the eunuchs from the imperial kitchen arrived.

They had also heard about this, and they were all terrified.

Upon entering the hall, everyone knelt down in unison.

"Greetings, Your Majesty; greetings, Imperial Concubine."

Jiang Lanye casually glanced at everyone, his voice somber: "The chilled bayberry drink that Consort Yun wanted to drink today was poisoned. And this drink was brought by her personal maid, Xichun. In other words, it couldn't have been poisoned on the way, but rather in your imperial kitchen."

Before he could finish speaking, the head eunuch hurriedly explained, "Your Majesty, these bayberry drinks were all made uniformly today. The masters of each palace should have all drunk them by now, but nothing has happened to them."

Jiang Lanye coldly rebuked, "You mean that the thing was poisonous, and it wasn't the fault of your Imperial Kitchen? Could someone possibly have poisoned it in the Qingliang Palace?!"

The crowd trembled and stammered, "Your Majesty, that's not what we meant. But how could we, as servants, have the guts? This stuff was all made by us. Who would poison it? Doesn't this clearly mean we are the murderers?"

Song Yi also felt that the head eunuch made sense. She said softly, "The Imperial Kitchen is bustling with people every day, not just these eunuchs. Palace servants from various palaces also go there. Perhaps they are taking advantage of this time."

Xichun immediately replied, "Before me, many people have already gone there."

Jiang Lanye looked at the head eunuch, his coldness undiminished: "Even so, you shouldn't be so careless. Does this mean that the food in the imperial kitchen can be poisoned at will? Today you harmed Consort Yun, so will you harm me tomorrow?"

Everyone kowtowed in unison: "This servant dares not!"

He scoffed coldly: "Dare not? I think you've all let your guard down. With such a big incident, if anything had happened to Consort Yun, none of you would be alive to see me now."

"Tell me, who were the people who went to the Imperial Kitchen today?"

The group looked at each other, racking their brains for a long time before finally coming up with a few names they could recall. Jiang Lanye immediately sent someone to bring the palace maids over.

There were two or three others, but they couldn't remember them.

Because there were so many palace maids coming and going in the imperial kitchen, they couldn't keep an eye on everyone, so they really couldn't remember.

Jiang Lanye frowned and said directly, "Go and see which palaces have the same bayberry drink, and then bring all the palace servants from those palaces over."

Seeing this, the head eunuch knew that Jiang Lanye was truly angry. He racked his brains for a moment and suddenly remembered something.

"By the way, Your Majesty, there was a palace maid who wanted to take the bayberry drink that was exclusively for the Imperial Concubine. But the Imperial Concubine's things are always kept on the west side. I saw her pacing back and forth for a while. I thought she was picking and choosing what to take, but now I think she was the most suspicious person!"

Jiang Lanye immediately asked, "Do you remember her face?"

"This servant remembers!"

"very good."

After a while, a large group of people gathered outside the Qingliang Hall.

Song Yi originally wanted to go out and see, but she had just been frightened and her lips were still a little pale.

Seeing this, Jiang Lanye simply stopped her, forbidding her to leave, and told her to sit on the dragon throne and rest for a while, with Xichun accompanying her.

She stopped insisting and, watching Jiang Lanye's departing figure, suddenly smiled. Xichun asked curiously, "Your Highness, what are you laughing at?"

She followed Song Yi's gaze.

The sunlight outside the palace cast a long, slender shadow of the emperor, and the hem of his dragon robe billowed sharply in the wind.

He stood at the top of the steps, surrounded by a dense crowd of palace servants bowing their heads, which made his back appear all the more aloof.

"I suddenly felt that as long as he was there, it seemed like I wasn't afraid of anything."

Jiang Lanye missed those words. He walked outside the hall, looked down at everyone, and casually raised his chin: "Go."

"Yes."

The head eunuch hurriedly went down to check, but after looking through row after row of palace maids, he couldn't find the person!

He immediately felt a sense of unease and hurriedly returned to Jiang Lanye's side: "Your Majesty, this is really strange. There's definitely something wrong with that person! She's not a palace maid who serves the master, yet she went to the imperial kitchen to get some bayberry drink. She's not here."

Jiang Lanye didn't speak again; he narrowed his eyes slightly.

So it seems that someone else instructed a palace maid from another palace, such as one from the Laundry Department or the Imperial Wardrobe Department, which would make it impossible to find out who instructed her afterward.

Jiang Lanye closed his eyes briefly: "Have them leave, and summon all the palace maids from the other palaces."

Eunuch Cao was startled by these words: "Your Majesty, that's quite a lot of people."

"go."

".yes."

Everyone could see that Jiang Lanye was determined to find the person who poisoned him, and even though the matter was extremely troublesome, no one dared to say anything.

Fortunately, there were fewer palace maids in the temporary palace than in the imperial palace, and everyone arrived an hour later.

When the head eunuch went down to check again, he spotted the palace maid standing at the very back of the crowd, head down and body hunched over.

"Your Majesty, it's her!"

Jiang Lanye raised her hand to silence him and walked downstairs.

The palace maids, unable to move quickly, spontaneously stood on both sides, making way for Jiang Lanye.

Jiang Lanye walked straight up to the palace maid and said, "Look up."

The palace maid raised her head in fear, but the moment she met his eyes, she fell to her knees with a thud.

"Your Majesty, calm down!"

Judging from her reaction, she was the one who poisoned her.

"Who ordered you?"

"No one was directing them."

Jiang Lanye stopped wasting words with her and summoned two guards: "Drag her away and torture her severely."

"Yes!"

Two guards immediately stepped forward, but the palace maid struggled wildly, nearly biting the two guards. They then kicked her in the stomach, and when she couldn't get up, they drew their swords, pointed them at her, and shouted:
"Behave yourself! Otherwise, you'll regret it when you get into the Censorate!"

Unexpectedly, she endured the pain in her abdomen and lunged straight at the blade, letting the tip pierce her heart. Her body went limp, and she collapsed to the ground, saying intermittently:

"Since I'm going to die anyway, I might as well die a quick death."

(End of this chapter)