My father ordered me to kill the emperor, but His Majesty bestowed a princess upon me instead.

I didn't open my mother's letter until I returned to Lanyi Room.

It's not because I don't want to watch it.

It's because I want it too much.

When someone really wants to do something, it's best to let others watch first.

Otherwise, it's easy to completely forget the rules.

The letter was not sealed with wax when it was handed to my father.

There are three old creases on the edge of the paper.

A row of wheat ears.

A half-moon.

A very shallow inverted point.

The wheat ears are a mark of the mother herself.

The half-moon should come from the old slips of the late empress.

The end point was left by Bai Song after he examined the paper.

All three of them had handled the letter.

I touched it at least eleven years ago.

I asked Bai Zhi to test the paper first.

Gu Shisan served as a witness in the Southwest.

Ge Tong served as a witness for the imperial court.

Lan Yue was too badly injured to get up, so the girl next to her pressed her handprint on her behalf.

The girl's name is Xiaoshuang.

It wasn't a name I acquired through exchange.

Lan Yue said that frost fell in Qingxia on the day she was born.

That's why it's called Little Frost.

This naming method is very casual.

But it sounds much better than Jia 74.

Bai Zhi placed the letter under the lamp.

"The paper was used in the Qingxia granary in the fourteenth year of the Chengxi reign."

There are two kinds of ink.

"The first half of the letter was written early."

"The second half of the seal was delayed by at least three days."

I asked, "Has anyone changed it?"

"no."

"He must have written it halfway through, stopped for a few days, and then continued writing."

She pushed the letter in front of me.

"See?"

The first line should read:

It was even slower than the few lines of account books behind the wall of the Shen residence.

As the letter writer knows, this letter may not arrive quickly.

It might not even be delivered.

An'er:

By the time you read this letter, you'll probably be all grown up.

It's also possible that they haven't grown up yet.

Qingxia is in a state of chaos now.

Your father is cursing people outside.

I was doing the accounting inside the house.

We don't have time to teach you what to do in the future.

So I'll write a few sentences first.

When you were a child, you always asked why the swords in the army had to be stamped with a tiger seal.

I said, because when there are many people, you always have to listen to one voice.

You then asked, what if the sound is wrong?

Now I understand.

If the sound is wrong, the knife cannot be blamed solely on the sound.

The person wielding the knife must also be recognized.

My finger paused for a moment when I saw this.

Did you ever ask this kind of question when you were a child?

I was probably more annoyed when I was a child than I am now.

The letter continues:

The 6,000 shi of grain in Jiangbei was originally intended to help people affected by the epidemic.

The Southwest Army was also hungry.

Your father said that if we don't take the grain, 20,000 people will scatter.

I said, if we take the grain, people will die in Jiangbei.

Neither of us is wrong.

But there was only six thousand shi of grain.

But people want to live on both sides.

In the end, your dad took four thousand.

I wrote the order for him to borrow and transfer grain.

I originally wanted to give this debt a due date.

It was only later that we learned that Wang had borrowed grain to join the army.

Along with the grain came forty-one other people.

They used the names of the dead, wore the clothes of the living, and relayed orders in the capital.

Your father refused to hand over the military register to the imperial court.

I refused to let these forty-one people remain in the camp.

We argued for a long time.

I cursed at him too.

Both of these things are true.

If you see him in the future, you don't have to just listen to what he says.

You don't have to just listen to me.

Find all the accounts.

Then decide who to criticize.

I looked up at Gu Shisan.

It's like I don't want to see it.

The father said at the old post station that the mother would scold him.

That's absolutely right.

The mother did more than just scold.

She even told me in advance not to just listen to her.

This is very troublesome.

I originally wanted to expose all the old grievances to my father.

Now, the letter has first pressed my hand down.

The ink on the second half of the cover is even darker.

The handwriting is also a bit messy.

The person who wrote the letter was already in a great hurry.

An'er:

If I fail to return, do not seek revenge for me.

It saves trouble for Qiu.

Once you've identified someone, stab them in the back, and you feel like you've settled all your scores.

Actually not.

Xiao Jingheng is wrong.

Your dad has one too.

Wang Song, Luo Shi, and others who handled grain stamps were all involved.

I wrote that order to borrow and transfer grain.

Although I did not sign the document, some people in the army still used my name to leave grain behind.

My name is among the dead in Jiangbei.

I will not allow them to portray me as completely innocent.

You're not allowed to either.

Ah Liu stood behind me.

My breathing has become much lighter.

Bai Zhi stared at the table without looking up.

The mother continued writing:

The late Empress Dowager instructed me to preserve the genuine document of the Qing Dynasty.

She said the cards weren't commands.

It's to let the people who receive the cards look at each other.

All six cards are required.

It's not because the door is expensive.

It's because of the lives of the living; we can't let someone open or close things at will.

If someone later presents you with real cards and asks you to commit murder, ask them first:

Where is the other one?

Where is the other pair of eyes?

Where is the other account?

If neither is available.

Even genuine products can be used to commit fraud.

I touched the two genuine cards hidden in my sleeve.

One from Shimen, Yong'an.

One from my father.

My father gave me the cards.

He also repeated his father's instructions.

Kill Xiao Jingheng.

The cards are real.

The father is real too.

But my mother had already reminded me of this in a letter eleven years ago.

Where is the other pair of eyes?

Where is the other account?

I continued reading.

The last few lines were written the slowest.

An'er:

You're afraid of dying.

This is not a bad thing.

When you were a child, you fell into the Salt River and refused to go near the water for three years.

Your dad said you're a good-for-nothing.

I said, "Knowing that water can drown people, that's why we look for a bridge first."

It will be like this from now on.

Fearing a knife, he first checked who handed it to him.

Fearing orders, they first investigated who had built the structure.

Fearing he might make a mistake, he asked someone else to leave a record of it.

Don't be anyone's knife.

Don't turn others into your weapons.

If one day your father orders you to kill the emperor.

You don't have to listen.

If the emperor orders you to kill your father.

You can choose not to listen.

First, ask whether a living person can die.

First, ask if the dead can speak.

Let's settle this score first, whether it's aboveboard or not.

Mother Gu Qinghe.

The letter ends here.

Not a single word from them thought of me.

They didn't say a single word about me going to save her.

She only wrote down my father, the emperor, herself, and me in the account.

It's like they're afraid of missing one person, so the rest can take the opportunity to feign innocence.

Ah Liu sniffed.

"Young master."

"Um."

"The lady is very good at scolding people."

"This doesn't count as an insult."

"Including General Shen, His Majesty, and yourself isn't enough?"

She didn't write about you.

Ah Liu immediately breathed a sigh of relief.

"The younger one is alright."

Bai Zhi glanced at him.

"Because I didn't know you eleven years ago."

Ah Liu fell silent again.

I smoothed out the letter again.

"Make three copies."

Bai Zhi asked, "You copied this too?"

"copy."

Some of them are family letters.

"The family letters are also related to the case."

"Are you willing to part with it?"

I looked at the three characters "Gu Qinghe" at the end of the letter.

"I can't bear to part with it."

"That's why we need to copy even more."

I have the original document in my possession.

A copy was handed over to the outside of Yong'an Stone Gate for verification by Xiao Lingyi and Physician Song.

A sealed old account from Qingxia.

A copy containing only the parts related to the six tablets, forty-one people, and the grain loan order was sent to the emperor in the capital.

Not all family letters should be shown to the emperor.

There's no need to make your mother happy by scolding your father.

Bai Zhi was copying half of the text when Ge Tong came in from outside.

"Lord Shen."

"We found something at the old post station."

"What?"

"A skeleton."

The remains were hidden in the wall behind the brazier in the old post station.

It is not a complete body.

It consists of only the left arm, two ribs, and half a skull.

The rest should be removed.

There was also an iron ring hidden inside the wall.

There are dried black marks on the ring.

People were once locked here.

Gu Shisan squatted down to examine the bones.

"It's not Gu Qinghe."

Why?

"Madam Shen's left arm is uninjured."

"The arm bone of this skeleton was broken."

The military doctor examined it.

The deceased was a woman.

Thirty to forty years old.

He has been dead for at least ten years.

Left arm was previously broken.

There were marks of a heavy blow on the back of the skull.

Bai Zhi found a blue glass bead in the mortar of the wall.

Lan Yue's expression changed after she saw the bead.

"Spring Orchid".

"Who?"

"The people who worked with me in the Imperial Wardrobe."

Which card did she hold?

"Deputy Commander of Clothing Rank"

"Not one of the six genuine cards."

Lan Yue's voice trembled.

"After I disappeared, she should come to Qingxia to take care of Qinghe."

"And then?"

"Later, Wang sent a message saying that she had fled with her tent."

"I believe it."

Yet another person portrayed as a defector.

He actually died inside the old post station wall.

She might be coming to save her mother.

They might also come to collect the list of forty-one people.

Ultimately, they were unable to leave.

I asked Madam Wang.

She only glanced at the skeleton when she was carried outside the partition wall.

"I didn't kill him."

"Who killed him?"

"Shen Lie's people."

Gu Shisan's hand was already on the knife.

Madam Wang looked at him.

"In the fourteenth year of Chengxi, Xu Sandao was not yet a scout leader."

"Du Heng is the one who guards the old post station."

Where is Du Heng now?

Gu Shisan said, "He died in battle nine years ago."

"Where's the body?"

He was buried in the Southwest Military Cemetery.

Madam Wang smiled.

"Then let's dig it up and take a look."

I stared at her.

"Is Du Heng also a dead man?"

"I have no idea."

"You know."

"I know part of it."

"explain."

"When Chunlan came to the old post station, she carried the old token of the late Empress."

"Du Heng forbids her from bringing people."

"Both sides took action."

Chunlan is dead.

"Du Heng was also seriously injured."

Later, Wang gave Du Heng a new name.

"What's your name?"

She looked at me.

"Chen Ping."

Appointed as a minor official in the Ministry of Rites.

Chen Ping, who was written to be dead and then brought back to life in the old files of the Imperial Clothing Bureau.

Chen Ping's name is also found on the wooden identification tags from the Black Stone Kiln.

It turns out that Chen Ping is not a fixed person.

It was the name Du Hengchuan took.

The old post station guard in the southwest became a junior official in the Ministry of Rites in the capital.

A line was finally connected.

I asked, "Where is Chen Ping now?"

"The capital city."

"Is he the one the fourth group of men in blue were looking for?"

"Yes."

"Is he in charge of bringing people into the palace?"

Madam Wang did not answer.

Suddenly, hurried footsteps came from outside the door.

Another official report from the capital arrived at Ge Tong's military post station.

Not before the Emperor.

It comes from the secret agents of the Imperial Guard left behind by Gu Xingzhi in the capital.

The letter contained only one sentence:

Chen Ping did indeed exist in the palace.

The current head of the Internal Treasury's Leakage Room.

Last night, the palace gate guards changed their documents, and he was the one who delivered them.

I handed the letter to Gu Shisan.

"Du Heng has been dead for nine years."

"Chen Ping lives in the palace."

Gu Shisan's face turned pale.

He finally understood.

The person buried in the Southwest Military Cemetery may not be Du Heng.

Those living in the Ministry of Rites and the Imperial Treasury were not necessarily only members of the Wang family.

A number of dead men had already been taken from my father's army.

In the capital city of the Wang family, a group of people dressed in the old military uniforms had long been employed.

I looked at Madam Wang.

"You can't leave."

She leaned against the stretcher.

"My leg is broken."

"It's not a leg."

I said, "It's the road."

"Lan Yue is alive."

"Both books are in our hands."

"Chen Ping has been exposed."

"The girl with missing fingers, Lan Gu, was arrested."

"The Qingxia Guiming Granary has been opened for registration."

"You can send another Lan order later."

"We need to explain first why the previous rule required 109 people to hand over their names."

Madam Wang looked at me for a long time.

She stopped laughing.

This is the first time.

She wasn't afraid when she was arrested.

He finally realized that his role as a messenger was becoming ineffective.

Lan Gu can die.

Even a Lady Wang could be replaced.

But everyone knows how Lan Yi created humans.

The replacement is no longer as useful.

I folded my mother's letter carefully.

"Returning to Yong'an tomorrow."

"Bring a second real card."

"Should we bring her too?"

Ge Tong asked.

"bring."

Madam Wang raised her eyes.

"You want me to see Gu Qinghe?"

"No."

I said, "Let her hear that you're still alive."

"So that when she wakes up, she won't think that she can't find anyone to settle old scores again."