After saving the Empress, I became the top scholar in the imperial examination.

…………

Inside the room, lit by a few dim yellow oil lamps.

Ning Nan frowned, somewhat puzzled, as he looked at the two women who had suddenly become hostile.

Xu Xiyin took a step closer to Zhen Susu with the short blade in her hand, and a faint red line could already be seen on the other's fair neck.

Zhen Susu pursed her slightly pale lips and said, "I did go into his room."

"Then why didn't you make a move?"

"He recognized me." The woman's voice lowered slightly.

The 32-year-old Taoist nun's gaze froze for a moment.

I glanced at this young girl, who was in her early twenties and had a pale complexion.

Zhen Susu said softly, "I hesitated for a moment and lost the initiative. His steward heard the noise, and the guards outside came in. I had no choice but to run."

The woman, with only a wooden hairpin in her hair, had a calm expression, but her eyes held a hint of struggle.

The lights in the room flickered.

The dim, yellowish light danced erratically on her profile.

The tiny downy hairs on the side of the face are faintly visible in this light.

Zhen Susu's complexion was plain:

"Aunt Xu, after returning to Beijing to report, I will discuss the matter with the altar master. The deaths of Huang Shulin and the others are my responsibility, and Zhen Susu is willing to handle the matter according to the sect's rules."

Xu Xiyin sneered: "You think you can return to Beijing alive?"

Zhen Susu lowered her head, remained silent for a moment, and then said:

"Aunt Xu, then... after you collect my body, please bury me in the south of Beijing, next to my mother's grave."

After saying that, she closed her eyes.

Darkness enveloped everything.

Based on Xu Daogu's character, she shouldn't kill me... Zhen Susu felt uneasy and made a gesture as if she was about to be executed.

Thinking about it this way, she couldn't help but laugh at herself, feeling that she was really too bad.

A gentleman deceives others with principles, but what do I call this? Deceiving my aunt with a soft heart?

The woman chuckled inwardly.

Then I thought again, shouldn't the daughter of a lowly prostitute and a man ridiculed as "Beggar Li" be just as bad? Wouldn't it be wrong if she wasn't bad?

At this moment, she suddenly remembered Huang Shulin and the others... and her feelings became complicated again.

He immediately regretted not showing mercy and not immediately killing Li Wei, letting them die in vain.

He then regretted his recklessness in coming to kill Li Wei himself, which led to their tragic deaths.

Her eyelashes fluttered for a moment as she imagined returning to Beijing and how she could beg Chen San to save her life... Chen San was not interested in women and was a taciturn man. His two protectors were even more insane than the other, and she didn't even know if they were men... It would be very difficult to beg them.

For a moment, her heart raced slightly, and she couldn't stop thinking about what kind of merit she needed to make to atone for her mistakes and save her life...

Unbeknownst to Xu Xiyin, the woman, who considered herself a "bad seed," had one thought after another forming in her mind.

After carefully observing the other party for a while, Xu Xiyin's initially angry expression gradually returned to calm.

The thin blade was removed from the other person's neck.

Feeling the pressure on her neck disappear, Zhen Susu slowly opened her eyes, suppressing the joy on her face. She let out a soft breath, glanced at the kind Taoist nun, and then smiled sweetly:

"Thank you, Sister Xu, Susu..."

Xu Xiyin merely glanced at her indifferently, then turned to face Ning Nan, who was sitting on a stool deep in thought, and knelt on one knee, saying:

"Zhen Susu has failed in her mission, her assassination attempt on Governor-General Li Wei of Jiangnan has gone awry! Your subordinate, Xu Xiyin, humbly requests Your Excellency's instructions on how to deal with this vile woman!"

The female Taoist priest's voice was cold and hard as iron. She raised her hands above her head and presented Ning Nan with the sharp blade in her hands.

Although the house was heated, the winter weather was still extremely cold.

The female Taoist priest suddenly brandished a knife at Zhen Susu, and then abruptly knelt down.

While asking Ning Nan for instructions, he also revealed the identity of the man in front of him to Zhen Susu, who had made a grave mistake.

"Master..." The woman's eyes widened in surprise.

A chill ran from her ankles all the way up to the top of her head.

The woman suddenly turned her head and looked at the young man sitting across the round table, whose expression was slightly serious.

"The leader?!" Her warbling voice rang out in the room, sharp and even grating.

She realized that this person must have close ties with the church.

Either they are members of our religion.

They either need to cooperate with our sect and want our members to help them disrupt the Northern Dynasty in Liang.

But never expected.

This person was actually the cheap cult leader she had only learned about a few months ago?!

The woman, whose hands and feet were handcuffed by the cult leader, felt numbness in her hands and feet.

His already pale face turned even paler.

"Did Aunt Xu send this person to deal with her?"

She was suddenly startled.

The image of that person smiling and aiming a crossbow at him in the darkness flashed through his mind. A chill ran down his spine.

She recalled how the other person had grabbed her ankle and taken off her shoes and socks, and her face flushed red again.

"Master..." Her mouth felt dry.

But then, a sense of resentment inexplicably rose in my heart.

"Why should this person be the leader?"

The old cult leader has really lost his mind.

This resentment had actually been going on for several months.

A person who suddenly appeared out of nowhere became their leader, and their life and death, the rise and fall of their sect, were all decided by this person who suddenly appeared. Isn't that too unfair?

but now……

The woman, whose life and death were now truly in the other party's hands, looked dejected, her heart filled with unbearable sorrow.

A moment later, she quickly concealed all the displeasure on her face.

With a sweet, soft voice and a gentle expression, she looked at her beloved leader and said:

"Master... Your subordinate, Zhen Susu... I didn't recognize your true form before and offended you... Ugh... I truly deserve to die, I deserve to die..."

She looked at Ning Nan with soft, watery eyes:

"Before you punish me, Master... how about... you slap me first?"

Ning Nan glanced at her, his expression momentarily blank.

In that moment of surprise, Zhen Susu's eyes immediately lit up... It worked!

Ning Nan asked, "Hmm... have you combed your hair?"

Although he only exchanged a few words, he managed to guess most of the other person's identity.

He even knew why Xu Xiyin knelt down and revealed his identity—it was simply because she hoped he could save her life.

Hmm... comb it?

Zhen Susu's face froze.

As a famous courtesan in the capital, backed by the Third Prince's mansion, she was a veiled dancer who discussed poetry and literature with her guests, but she naturally knew what those two words meant.

Zhen Susu forced a smile: "Master...Master, rest assured...this subordinate...is still a virgin..."

"That's good." Ning Nan nodded.

Zhen Susu was stunned, her heart leaping into her throat, but after a few breaths, she calmed down and lowered her eyelids.

She would always get married eventually, and this day would always come... She smiled self-deprecatingly to herself. Ha... She wanted to avenge her mother... but... did she still have to live like her mother?

"How about this," Ning Nan said after considering for a moment, "I am your acting leader now, and even if I am no longer the leader, I will still bring up these two rules to your former leader."

Xu and Zhen paused for a moment.

"First," Ning, the Grand Master, held up one finger, "is to stop doing assassinations and other such things, and... stop using your looks to seduce people."

"Undercover agents, spies... well... they just need to gather intelligence, nothing else."

"Assassination is pointless. Even if we kill Li Wei, there's always Zhang Wei, who might even be more capable. We'll be in trouble then, with incompetent people occupying high positions. It's good that talented people can't rise to the top. Building an overwhelming force that can crush them is the key."

"As for using one's looks to seduce someone... well, that's generally not an option either. It doesn't work with either men or women. If you use your looks to seduce someone and have children, it's very difficult for us to determine whose side the other party is on, or whether the information is true or false."

"second,"

Ning Nan raised his second finger, gave a wry smile, and gestured towards Zhen Susu with his lip.

"Like this young lady, beautiful women and men alike should not be used as spies; it's inappropriate..."

Not much was explained.

Almost instantly, Ning Nan looked at Zhen Susu and said, "As for you—"

He took a breath, spread his hands, and, just as Xu Xiyin had hoped, and which was also what he himself had in mind, delivered his verdict:

"It's so good that you're still a virgin."

Ning Nan looked at her and said frankly:

"Your abilities are average; you're no good as a spy, and you'd easily get your subordinates killed. How about this... well... your dancing skills are impressive; you must be a top-notch dancer, otherwise you wouldn't be so famous in Beijing."

He smiled sincerely,

"Go to Nanjing, become a dancer there. Then I'll ask a matchmaker to find you a respectable family to marry into, and you can live a peaceful life from then on..."

"Hmm..." He seemed satisfied with his arrangement, nodded, and said, "That's settled then..."

I'll find a decent family... get married... and that's it...

Zhen Susu's eyes narrowed slightly.

"Find a decent family..."

A look of confusion flashed across her eyes.

"Your abilities are average... Go to Nanjing... and find a respectable family..."

Good family...

The woman's mind was racing, a strange emotion surging through her head.

It shattered her self-esteem, her rambling thoughts, her longing for her mother, her guilt towards her subordinates, and her ambition towards the cult leader... into pieces.

Her stunningly beautiful face flushed red from her cheeks to her neck.

His veins bulged and his whole body trembled with anger.

"Bang!"

She suddenly stood up.

My knee hit the table leg.

Adding to the pain, her left arm injury reopened, causing her to grimace in pain.

But at this point, there was no time to care about anything else.

The woman, who had always considered herself about to become the leader of the sect and would one day be able to compete with the other for the position of sect leader, felt a deep-seated humiliation.

His eyes and face were both red with anger.

"By the Lord!"

The woman practically roared out a sentence through gritted teeth:

"Your subordinate, Zhen Susu... swears to kill Li the Beggar!"

The woman raised her eyebrows and spoke in a clear, resonant voice, like an iron hammer forging a sharp, cold sword.

A resounding statement!

Snapped!

It was at this moment.

Perhaps the movements just now were too fast, too violent, or too exciting.

Something fell out of the woman's arms...

This caught the attention of the three people.

Ning Nan turned his head to look.

"what?"

A memorial covered in red stripes!