The Grand Secretary has no heir? His concubine gives birth to triplets.

The moment the thought crossed his mind, Pei Yan immediately suppressed it.

impossible.

How could a woman from the Wujiang tribe, who was illiterate, possibly know that the book contained the Queen's love poems?

Unless... she isn't Jiang Guo'er at all.

Pei Yan felt as if a thorn had been stuck in his heart; he wanted to pull it out, but dared not.

After hesitating for a long time, he finally leaned close to her ear.

"Guo'er, can you...read?"

no respond.

His gaze was deep, and his fingertips unconsciously touched a stray strand of her hair, tucking it behind her ear.

"Are you... really called Jiang Guo'er?"

Jiang Guo'er was fast asleep.

Pei Yan sat by the bed for almost half an hour.

Her breathing was long and steady; she didn't even turn over, let alone talk in her sleep.

He sighed softly, tucked the blanket around her, and got up to leave.

He paused as he passed the bat-patterned hidden compartment of the canopy bed.

He had two brass keys made for the hidden compartment in the study; he carried one with him and kept the other in the hidden compartment by the bedside, just in case.

Pei Zhang barged into the study today and ransacked it; he also needs to check things out in the inner room.

He probed the hidden compartment with his fingertips and carefully felt around it.

Pei Yan's face instantly turned cold.

The key is missing.

Pei Zhang barged into the study today and rummaged through it for so long; he certainly wasn't looking for any documents.

He deliberately drew everyone's attention to his study, while secretly sending people to search his inner rooms.

What a brilliant feint!

Pei Yan's fist clenched silently.

Suppressing the murderous intent surging in his chest, he stepped out of the inner room.

"Xiao San".

The shadow fell silently to the foot of the courtyard wall and knelt on one knee.

"Keep an eye on Pei Zhang. Report every single person he meets, every letter he writes, and every trip he takes."

"Your subordinate obeys."

Xiao San disappeared into the night.

The following evening, Xiao San returned with a report.

"This morning, the Third Master sent his personal servant out of the mansion to buy medicine, but the servant did not return to the mansion after leaving the pharmacy. Instead, he went into a teahouse in Yongning Ward and handed a secret letter to Huang Deshun, an eunuch in Qianqing Palace."

Pei Yan's eyes changed, and a chill ran from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

Huang Deshun was a disciple of Wang Zhi, the Grand Eunuch, and one of the emperor's most trusted confidants!

Pei Zhang was secretly seeing him, so he searched his own house...

There can only be one reason.

When did the emperor finally control Pei Zhang?

He was promoted to Left Councilor of the Court of Judicial Review...and then what?

It's ridiculous that he, who has always been loyal to the emperor, is being monitored by his own cousin!

"What do we do next?" Xiao San asked.

Pei Yan paced back and forth in the study, his whole body shrouded in a dark and menacing aura.

"We must not alert the enemy."

"Since the emperor has become suspicious of me, removing Pei Zhang will only lead to him replacing him with someone even harder to identify. Keeping him around is more controllable."

After a while, he curled his lips into a mocking smile.

"Move everything from the hidden compartment in the study tonight."

"Let him keep the key. I want to see what kind of expression he'll have when he opens an empty box!"

Xiao San stepped down.

When Pei Yan walked back to the inner room with a dark face, Jiang Guo'er had already woken up and was having Lü Yi change her dressing.

A thin white cotton cloth was wrapped around his forehead, and the swelling on his cheeks had subsided considerably, revealing bruises of mixed blue and purple underneath.

Upon seeing him enter, Jiang Guo'er quickly got out of bed and bowed.

Pei Yan raised his hand to stop her, without saying anything more, and looked up at the table.

On the table was a red lacquered box with gold trim, containing New Year's gifts prepared for Xue Lingyi.

A set of red gold filigree headdress, a piece of pine-colored gold-woven brocade, and a daughter's classic text woven with gold thread.

Pei Yan turned to look at Jiang Guo'er and suddenly asked a question casually.

"Guo'er, if you were to marry, besides a generous dowry, what would you most like to do?"

Jiang Guo'er was rolling up the old bandage she had just taken off when she paused for a moment.

To get married.

Those two words are too far removed from her.

So far removed from her memory that she had almost forgotten that she too had once been led by the hand by her mother, standing on the embroidered tower to watch the city lights.

She said with great enthusiasm that she would definitely marry a man who would love her to the bone for the rest of his life.

She lowered her eyes and thought about it seriously.

"If I were a servant... I would certainly hope that my husband would write the marriage certificate by hand."

"Um?"

"No matter how much the betrothal gifts are, they are all external things. Only those few lines of text are his own handwritten promise."

Pei Yan remained silent for a moment.

"Come here and help me grind the ink."

Jiang Guo'er followed his instructions and walked to the inkstone. She rolled up her sleeves, rotated her wrist, and evenly spread the ink stick.

The astringent aroma of pine soot ink spread out.

Pei Yan wrote very quickly.

The regular script, stroke by stroke, is both upright and graceful.

The wedding letter was a full page long, and it ended with the following signature:

"With this letter as my pledge, Pei Yanjin wishes to marry Lady Xue and stay with her until our hair turns white."

Jiang Guo'er put down the inkstone, looked at the line of words, and her eyebrows curved into a smile.

"Your Excellency wrote it so well; Miss Lingyi will surely be delighted to see it."

"If Your Excellency has no other instructions, I will take my leave. There is still work to be done in the embroidery room."

She was clearly smiling, but the smile didn't reach her eyes.

He turned and walked out of the study, his steps unhurried, his back ramrod straight.

It's fine.

This was exactly what she had expected.

Only after Lingyi entered the door did she have a backer and could take the next step.

She touched the doll in her arms and walked steadily toward the embroidery room.

Time flies.

After New Year's Eve, and after paying New Year's visits on the first day of the Lunar New Year, the entire Prime Minister's residence was bustling with activity early on the second day.

Early on the third day of the Lunar New Year, before dawn, the Pei residence was decorated with red silk and red lanterns, and even the threshold was adorned with large red "double happiness" characters.

Jiang Guo'er was assigned to stay in the inner room to look after the nuptial wine, dragon and phoenix candles, scales, and auspicious knots.

This is the most inconspicuous job, but the one where mistakes are absolutely unacceptable.

She went through everything.

The two wedding bowls were without cracks, the nuptial wine was sealed perfectly, the wicks of the dragon and phoenix candles were straightened, and the red rope on the scale was tied firmly.

Just after Chen Shi (7-9 AM), the first round of firecrackers went off in the front yard, signaling that the wedding procession was about to set off.

Lotus suddenly darted in and sneakily whispered in her ear.

"Guo'er, I feel like something's not right."

"What's wrong?"

"Cuiping has disappeared."

Jiang Guo'er's heart skipped a beat.

Cuiping, ever since she was demoted by the Prime Minister to clean the chamber pots, she's been behaving herself. Why has she suddenly disappeared?

"When did it disappear?"

"She was here last night, but she didn't show up for roll call this morning. I asked a few people, and they all said they hadn't seen her."

Jiang Guo'er clenched her fingers.

Unfortunately, news also came from the Xue family that the Empress had sent a eunuch from the Directorate of Ceremonial Affairs to deliver additional dowry early that morning.

Five bolts of palace satin, two pairs of jade ruyi scepters, and three gold hairpins.

Empress Xiao Yuzhen's act of adding to the bride's dowry was a great honor for the bride.

But why did they have to choose this particular time?

According to the rules, the Xue family had to formally accept the imperial decree and express their gratitude, a process that would take at least half an hour.

The time for the wedding procession was therefore delayed by a quarter of an hour.

It's no wonder she was suspicious; the events just happened too coincidentally.

Jiang Guo'er's unease grew stronger.

"Lotus, you stay here and don't touch any of these things. I'm going out for a bit."

Where are you going?

Jiang Guo'er didn't answer, but quickly left the inner room, lifting her skirt.

She carefully walked along the route the bride had taken after entering the house.

From the main gate, past the screen wall, through the front courtyard, through the main hall for the wedding ceremony, into the long corridor, and finally to the inner courtyard bridal chamber, which is the prime minister's inner room.

I walked very slowly on every stretch of road, my gaze sweeping from above my head to both sides, and then down to my feet.

When she reached the three steps in front of the main hall in the front yard, she squatted down and lifted a corner of the brand-new red carpet.

Several small red creatures were wriggling in the cracks between the bluestone bricks.

Jiang Guo'er immediately lifted the carpet even wider, and upon closer inspection, the hairs on her body stood on end.

There were more than a dozen red centipedes, densely packed in the cracks between the bricks, their tentacles twitching incessantly.

Highly poisonous!

If this thing crawls out when Lingyi passes by and takes a bite...

Jiang Guo'er hurriedly lowered her voice and called over the servant next to her.

"Go and fetch Steward Zhao immediately! Quickly!"