The peasant girl has a private space, and her husband is handsome.

Inside the Xuanwu Hall, discussions were taking place regarding how to receive the Queen of Western Xia and her entourage, and the entire hall was in complete chaos.

Duke Anguo suggested, "Your Majesty, the Western Xia Kingdom is deliberately delaying its annual tribute, which is clearly disrespectful to the Great Qi. In the spirit of reciprocity, we don't need to be too polite to the Western Xia."

Prime Minister Feng offered a unique perspective: "Your Majesty, we must curry favor with the Queen of Western Xia. We absolutely cannot allow Western Xia to side with the Prince of Huainan. I've heard that the Prince of Huainan's people are currently lobbying in Nanyue. If the Prince of Huainan were to unite with Western Xia and Nanyue to attack Great Qi in the future, Great Qi would be in grave danger."

Emperor Jing of Qi learned the ways of the emperor from a young age, which taught him that no matter when or where, he must put the face of the Great Qi Dynasty first.

Moreover, Emperor Jing of Qi felt that what Prime Minister Feng said made a lot of sense.

"I believe that face is still very important. I will entrust the task of entertaining the Western Xia Kingdom to Minister Xue of the Ministry of Rites and Minister Lin of the Ministry of Revenue. The budget for the entertainment is tentatively set at 50,000 taels of silver."

Emperor Qi Jing originally intended for Prime Minister Feng to entertain the distinguished guests from Western Xia, but Prime Minister Feng's leg was still not healed.

\

The emperor's decision quickly reached Su Qianqian's ears.

She was tasting the newly made cream when she suddenly realized it wasn't sweet enough.

Su Qianqian decided that she would never donate a single penny to the imperial court again.

The emperor didn't contribute a single penny to the resettlement of retired and wounded soldiers, yet now the Western Xia Kingdom, an enemy state that killed hundreds of thousands of people in the Great Qi, has allocated a budget of 50,000 taels of silver solely for entertaining guests from the Great Xia Kingdom.

It's truly disheartening.

The massacre of the Qi people by the Western Xia Dynasty had only been a few years ago, yet the court had already completely forgotten about it.

Su Qianqian felt that all the money she had donated in the past had gone to feed the dogs.

According to the latest intelligence, the Queen of Western Xia was disfigured after being bitten on the face by a snake, so Su Qianqian could guess why the Queen of Western Xia was in such a hurry to come to Daqi to find her.

It was Su Qianqian who healed Miss Xuanyuan's disfigured face. The Xuanyuan family has a good relationship with the Western Xia royal family, so it is possible that the Xuanyuan family sent the news to Western Xia.

Su Qianqian decided that she would earn back the 50,000 taels of silver wasted on the imperial hospitality by getting it back from the Queen of Western Xia.

Thinking of this, she finally felt better and ate a small cup of cream in a few bites.

She went to her aunt Qin's courtyard and instructed her, "Aunt, the plum garden is temporarily closed to visitors. Don't send skin care creams to the officials' families for now. Just say that the formula is very precious and we are temporarily out of stock."

Su Qianqian was afraid that the Queen of Western Xia would obtain skin care cream through those officials' wives and improve her damaged face, which would make it impossible to get 50,000 taels from the Queen of Western Xia.

"Xiangming, I heard that the Five Cities Garrison is raiding shops everywhere today. Let's go check out the Guose Tianxiang Clothing Shop."

Not long after Su Qianqian went out, she saw the people from the Five Cities Garrison arresting beggars.

I heard it was because beggars were affecting the image of the great Qi state.

Screams filled the streets as captured beggars had their necks bound with thick, heavy chains.

A beggar boy of four or five years old had an iron chain around his neck that was thicker than his own. He hadn't walked more than a few steps when he was crushed by the heavy chain and dragged on the ground by the soldiers, his face bleeding from the friction.

The passersby all felt sorry for the child, thinking, "What a tragedy, such a young child."

He'll probably die before he even gets to jail.

Good heavens, what kind of world is this? She has lived for over sixty years, and the beggars in the capital have always lived well.

Why are they taking me to jail today?

Good heavens, why don't you open your eyes and look at this filthy world?

An old woman, kind-hearted and out of pity for the little beggar, knelt down and kowtowed repeatedly to the soldiers, pleading, "Sir, please spare this little beggar! He's too weak; if you drag him any further, he'll die."

As a result, the old woman was whipped by the soldiers and fell to the ground.

The other people were so frightened by what they saw that they knelt on the ground, not daring to look at it anymore.

Xiangming walked over and stopped Lord Yang, the deputy commander of the Five Cities Military Command.

"Deputy Commander Yang, there is no law in the imperial court that states that beggars are guilty."

Lord Yang smiled contemptuously, "His Majesty is the law. I, Lord Yang, am ordered by His Majesty to improve the appearance of the capital in order to welcome the distinguished guests from Western Xia."

Lord Yang deliberately raised his whip and lashed it at the nearest old beggar.

The old beggar was knocked to the ground and spat out a mouthful of blood.

Lord Yang became even more smug, his chin practically pointing to the sky.

Some officials, within the limits of their power, will make things as difficult for the people as possible.

Lord Yang was that kind of person.

He knew that Xiangming was Su Qianqian's person, and turned his head to look at Su Qianqian provocatively.

"Miss Su, even though you were once a female warrior, you could only watch helplessly, unable to do anything. How does it feel? Aren't you heartbroken? Aren't you in so much pain you can't breathe? Hahahaha—"

Lord Yang disliked Su Qianqian the most. This young girl had such a calm demeanor that it made one want to shatter her composure.

And this little girl's eyes are even sharper than the eyes of the leader of the Embroidered Uniform Guard; it's really unsettling.

Today he's going to teach this little girl a lesson and make sure she can never be arrogant again!

The officials in the imperial court were terrified when they mentioned this little girl, so if he could subdue her, wouldn't he have a lot of face?

Lord Yang's face lit up with a smile when he thought of this.

But his smile quickly faded.

"Deputy Commander Yang, let me remind you of your glorious deeds. The day before the Dragon Boat Festival last year, you accepted a bribe of three thousand taels of silver. The briber was the Marquis of Shun'an, and the location was the Earth God Temple in the west of the city..."

Su Qianqian secretly investigated many officials in the capital, especially Deputy Commander Yang of the Five Cities Garrison.

When the Guose Tianxiang Clothing Shop first opened, it was extorted by Lord Yang.

Therefore, Su Qianqian specifically asked someone to investigate the criminal evidence against Lord Yang.

Lord Yang was terrified. He never expected that Miss Su would know all these secrets, including the time, place, and quantity.

He accepted money from the wife of the Earl of Shun'an and found a beggar to take the blame for the rape and murder committed by the Earl's heir.

This was done very discreetly; I never expected that this Miss Su would find out.

Lord Yang was extremely guilty. "Miss Su is trying to plead for these beggars, right? I will release them today. But if I don't arrest them today, someone else will arrest them tomorrow. Our Five Cities Garrison alone has four deputy commanders."

Lord Yang left after he finished speaking.

Moreover, he planned to flee the city directly and live in Western Xia or Southern Yue, otherwise the things that Miss Su exposed would cost him his head.

After Lord Yang fled, all the kneeling people around him got up and rushed forward to help remove the thick iron chains from the beggar boy's body.

Su Qianqian gave each of the two captured adult beggars five taels of silver.

"Take this money, change into clean clothes, and you won't be mistaken for beggars and arrested anymore."

Prices in Daqi were not high; five taels of silver was enough for an average person to live on for at least two years.

Su Qianqian instructed Mo Xiaobei to take the little beggar to the orphanage. She had previously donated a large sum of money to the orphanage, so the orphanage would not refuse her request.