To Meng Yuanqiao, such an understanding and mentality were utterly childish and laughable.
Leaving aside everything else, Meng Zhao's suspicion that his father had been dealt a blow, never recovered, and died in depression because of his eldest uncle—and that it was inseparable from the struggle for succession—was simply reading too much into things. There was no basis for it at all.
Never mind others; as for him and his own elder brother, the former head of the Meng Family, though they disagreed on some matters, he knew his elder brother well. Although he favored his second son, he had long decided to pass both the title and the position of family head to the Eldest Brother, Meng Jizu.
Back when Meng Yuanqiao had not yet left home, Meng Zhengan was still young. Though gifted, he was overly devoted to martial pursuits. Compared with Meng Jizu's skill at maneuvering through every social occasion and his outstanding political mind, he was merely a talented martial man, somewhat lacking when it came to bearing such a vast family estate.
Thus, in his eyes, all the Masked Man's suspicions, resentment, and even hatred concerning Meng Zhao stemmed purely from his youth, lack of guidance, and overly tangled thoughts, which had filled him with so many schemes.
As for deliberately sending him away rather than sending out one of his own sons, Meng Yuanqiao believed that was even less likely to have been Meng Jizu's handiwork. He had merely acted in accordance with the decree from above.
The reason was simple. Even if he had acted under the imperial decree, there were still people secretly criticizing Meng Jizu for eliminating dissidents and not even sparing his own nephew. To a clan leader like him, that was practically pointing at his nose and saying he