Huang Xiao smiled slightly and said, "Your Highness, in my humble opinion, the purpose of this ambush was never to kill you."
"Hm?" Zhao Yuankan paused in surprise. Quite a few people wanted him dead now, so they could take his place.
"I think they probably just wanted to take Your Highness down a peg and display the might of Khitan," Huang Xiao said.
"Take me down a peg? Could it be that simple?" Zhao Yuankan asked in considerable surprise at Huang Xiao's words.
Naturally, he found it hard to believe. Had this ambush merely been meant to take him down a peg?
"Your Highness, I also believe Lord Huang's analysis is correct," Lord Gu, who was driving the carriage, chimed in.
Now Zhao Yuankan had to give it some serious thought. Both great experts thought so. Even if he still found it somewhat hard to believe, he had to lean toward Huang Xiao's opinion.
"Actually, Your Highness needn't think too much about it," Huang Xiao said. "The strength of the men they sent to ambush us alone shows that this wasn't a genuine assassination attempt at all."
"That's true!" Zhao Yuankan nodded. If they had truly wanted to assassinate him, they certainly would not have sent just those three experts, all of them merely at low peak.
"Besides, Khitan probably wouldn't harm Your Highness. As Yelü Xi Jue's son, Yelü Mengya certainly wouldn't make a mistake on that point. But he might resort to petty tricks, like this attempt to take you down a peg," Huang Xiao said.
Whatever the case, Khitan and Great Song had been at war for years. Hostility between the two countries was perfectly normal.
Expecting Yelü Mengya to welcome Great Song's envoy calmly and amiably was clearly somewhat unrealistic, especially given his considerable standing: