Wang Ye had said that the Xiao Household, which now ruled the court, possessed the Golden Crow Bloodline, one of the highest-tier bloodlines. Combined with the crown prince's fortune, if that fox demon had already succeeded, it might already be close to its complete form!
The thought alone made Chen Qing shudder.
No one knew better than he did how terrifying the Thousand-Faced Fox would be in its complete form. He had designed that monster specifically to torment players, and now he feared he would have to swallow the bitter fruit himself...
"Where is the vice minister of rites' residence?"
"Well..." Fei Jun frowned. "Do you think Yang Lin's daughter is... impossible!"
"Why is it impossible?" Chen Qing asked hurriedly.
"Yang Lin's daughter and the crown prince already... three years ago... ahem..." Fei Jun looked at the black-armored guard beside him. "I told you not to write that down!"
The guard stared blankly at him, then lowered his head again and wrote: (Fei Jun said: I told you not to write that down.)
Suppressing the urge to burn that paper figure to ashes, Fei Jun explained patiently, "The two of them were already in love three years ago. They could be called childhood sweethearts. His Highness the Crown Prince's bloodline is pure. Before taking third-place laureate Cui Yan's vital essence, that fox demon couldn't possibly have deceived His Highness with illusions."
"Then has it occurred to you, Lord Fei, that His Highness's childhood sweetheart might have been replaced in the last few days?"
"Impossible!" Fei Jun shook his head. "After Wang Ye reported that it might be the Thousand-Faced Fox, His Highness strengthened the protection around the Yang Household's second daughter. The fox demon couldn't possibly have gotten near her."
"You said it yourself, Lord Fei. That fox demon isn't some lone wandering ghost. There must be a powerful hidden hand supporting it!"
Fei Jun fell silent, and the atmosphere throughout the room grew unbearably oppressive. Having waited for a quarter of an hour, Yuchi Peng finally snapped impatiently, "What's there to drag your feet over? Why don't we just go look and find out?"
"I must consult His Highness the Crown Prince!"
"Time is pressing, Lord Fei!" Chen Qing's brow furrowed tightly. "Surely this student doesn't need to explain what it means to beat the grass and startle the snake?"
"It'll be quick!" Fei Jun strode to the window and formed seals with both hands. The next moment, a bird's call rang out, and flames formed a fiery red bird under his hand gestures. It flew out through the window.
Chen Qing's pupils contracted. The Vermilion Bird?
No wonder he had become a third-rank official so young, rising even faster than Wang Ye. He possessed the Vermilion Bird, one of the thirty-six Heavenly Gang!
The Four Spirits were transcendent existences even among the Heavenly Gang and Earthly Sha. In the setting, anyone who mastered one was a sorcerer beyond the first rank. Moreover, the Vermilion Bird belonged to Southern Brightness Li Fire, and its spells countered most sinister evils in the world. Among the humans of High Antiquity, its standing had been even higher than the Azure Dragon's!
About a quarter of an hour later, the fiery bird returned. It circled Fei Jun once, then turned into flames and merged into his body.
The sight astonished Chen Qing even more. Fei Jun had already mastered the Southern Brightness Li Fire Body at such a young age. His talent was extraordinary!
"Let's go!" Fei Jun said to Chen Qing.
Chen Qing nodded. They hurried out of the Yuchi Residence, mounted swift horses, and raced toward the vice minister of rites' residence.
"That little bastard!" In the imperial study, the emperor snatched the jade seal from his desk and was about to hurl it.
Standing below, Liu Yu glanced at it and said mildly, "Your Majesty, that seal is made of ice jade. It's very expensive..."
The emperor stiffened and silently examined the jade seal in his hand. Ice jade was rare, and when paired with a special red seal paste, it offered an extremely effective safeguard against forgery. In this newly built palace, he was so poor that he had only two...
"Bastard!" In the end, the emperor put down the jade seal, picked up the worthless brush holder on his desk, and flung that instead!
"The crown prince was already with someone's daughter three years ago... why did no one report this to me?"
Liu Yu gave a helpless, wry smile. Who would report such a private matter to His Majesty?
Only someone who no longer wanted a future under the heir apparent...
"That fellow called Chen Qing does have some ability..." Liu Yu changed the subject. "He actually identified the target so quickly!"
"Go there yourself. You must not let the fox demon escape!"
"Yes!"
"Doesn't the Capital have anything like a Ghost Horse?" Chen Qing frowned. Though they were spurring their horses onward, the Yuchi Residence was very far from Lord Yang's residence, and unease rose in his heart.
"It does... but we can't use them!" Fei Jun's attitude was much better than before. He turned back and explained, "Using special spirit horses in the Capital requires a palace token. Otherwise, they'll be trapped by the barriers set up throughout the city. That includes Lord Yuchi Peng. If he flies without authorization and without a token granted by His Majesty, the spells will attack him too!"
"I see..." Chen Qing nodded. It seemed the Great Jin court placed considerable importance on sorcerers and was also highly vigilant against demons.
There was certainly no time to apply for tokens now, so they could only travel on ordinary horses. Chen Qing was not a skilled rider and could not keep up with the other two. In his urgency, Yuchi Peng simply grabbed him like a little chick and hauled him into the saddle in front of himself.
Being held in the arms of such a burly, brawny man as they galloped along was an image Chen Qing really could not stomach. More importantly, the fellow had a powerful underarm odor. The experience left much to be desired!
"We're here!"
At last, just before that underarm stench nearly knocked Chen Qing unconscious, they reached their destination, only to encounter someone unexpected at the entrance.
Fei Jun and Yuchi Peng hurriedly dismounted and stepped forward to bow. "Greetings, Your Grace!"
Chen Qing hastily dismounted as well. The man before him was dressed like a scholar, and the other two had addressed him as a duke. However ignorant Chen Qing might be, he could more or less guess who this was.
"This junior pays his respects, Your Grace..."
"You are Chen Qing?" the middle-aged man asked gently.
"I am, Your Grace. Have you also come to investigate the case?" Chen Qing asked respectfully.
The middle-aged man nodded. "After receiving the paper guard's message, His Majesty sent me here. I arrived a quarter of an hour before you..."
Chen Qing froze, and his expression abruptly darkened. He had arrived a quarter of an hour earlier, yet was waiting outside...
"A quick-witted child indeed." The middle-aged man nodded appreciatively. "It is just as you think. This is the worst outcome!"
Yuchi Peng's pupils contracted at those words, and he rushed inside. After excusing themselves, Chen Qing and Fei Jun followed, only to freeze as well.
The courtyard outside the front hall was filled with hanging corpses!
Maidservants, servants, young ladies in luxurious clothes, and, in the very center, the vice minister of rites himself in his official robes.
Not a single person in the vice minister's residence had survived!
Fei Jun hurried to a spot beside the vice minister. A young woman in a plain, pale-yellow dress hung there. Her features faintly suggested a delicate, lovely girl, but her excessively agonizing death had twisted her face until it looked utterly hideous.
Fei Jun's face turned livid. The prospective crown princess... had actually been killed right under their noses!!!
Chen Qing's expression was equally grim. Every hanging corpse had had its heart and liver gouged out, and they had been hung in perfectly orderly rows. This was plainly a show of force!
The enemy was clearly mocking him. Everything was under their control; they had even had the leisure to arrange the corpses so neatly...
"This shouldn't be possible..." Fei Jun said incredulously. "His Highness cared deeply about the Yang Household's second daughter. He even sent his trusted deputy general to protect her..."
"He's missing." Liu Yu's voice drifted slowly in from outside. "Under extremely strange circumstances. Even with my spells, I couldn't find any trace of him. It's as though he vanished into thin air."
"How is that possible?" Fei Jun sounded even more incredulous. In the emperor's own Capital, with its many spells and barriers, someone had not only slaughtered the vice minister of rites' entire household, but had also made His Highness's personal guard vanish into thin air?
Yuchi Peng's brow furrowed tightly as well. He knew that guard of the crown prince's. He was the eldest legitimate son of Hong Lie, the Duke of Qi, one of the eight ducal households. He had inherited the Hong Household's Thunder Elephant Bloodline, and his strength in direct combat was exceptional. Even Yuchi Peng would find him troublesome to deal with. Who had the ability to make him vanish into thin air?
Chen Qing gazed somewhat numbly at the corpses around him, his thoughts going further. In theory, if the Thousand-Faced Fox had successfully replaced this prospective crown princess, it should have waited quietly for the consort selection. It would never have made such a provocative move beforehand. That left only one possibility: they had beaten the grass and startled the snake...
But how long had it been? He had only reached his deduction an hour ago. There had been just two channels through which the information could have gone out: the spirit technique transmitting what the black-armored guard recorded with brush and paper, and the interval when Fei Jun had used the Vermilion Bird spell to send his message.
Whichever of those two had gone wrong, the implications were frightening.
Chen Qing first looked toward the relatively softer target...
Fei Jun froze. Seeing Chen Qing's intent gaze, he understood, and his expression immediately darkened.
Chen Qing moved a little farther away and stood behind Yuchi Peng. Even against a Vermilion Bird sorcerer, a martial warrior with a top-tier bloodline would be stronger at this distance. Besides, Wang Ye's master was outside. However he looked at it, subduing Fei Jun should not be much of a problem.
"His Majesty's decree placed you in charge of the investigation, with me as your assistant. If you suspect me, you may have General Yuchi arrest me for a thorough investigation!"
Yuchi Peng frowned, while Liu Yu merely smiled faintly outside the entrance and said nothing.
"You're taking this too seriously, Lord Fei." Chen Qing smiled. "I only wanted to ask a few questions."
"Ask!"
"Is there any possibility that someone intercepted your spell, Lord Fei?"
"Impossible..." Fei Jun shook his head immediately. "There are many seniors in the royal capital more powerful than I am. But someone capable of intercepting my Southern Brightness Li Fire without a trace? I don't believe such a person exists..."
He certainly is confident...
Chen Qing narrowed his eyes. With such pride, a boundless future, and his relationship as the crown prince's cousin, Fei Jun himself was indeed unlikely to be the inside man.
After some thought, Chen Qing turned toward Liu Yu. "Your Grace, this junior would like to ask whether the paper guard responsible for recording things might have leaked the information."
Liu Yu looked at Chen Qing with a smile and shook his head. "Very unlikely. The person controlling the paper guards has served the imperial family for many years."
Chen Qing nodded, but his doubts only deepened. If it was neither Fei Jun nor the paper guard, who else could have leaked the information? Surely it couldn't be Yuchi Peng?
Or was Fei Jun lying? Or did some mighty sorcerer possess a special method of extracting information from a Vermilion Bird spell?
There was nothing like that in his memory. Fei Jun had used a Li Fire Doppelganger, the equivalent of sending his own flesh and blood outside his body. He could not possibly fail to sense even the slightest disturbance. Stealing information without leaving a trace was indeed essentially impossible.
But who else could it be?
Chen Qing kept turning it over in his mind. Having killed the prospective crown princess outright, what did the enemy intend to do next? The crown prince's consort selection was the day after tomorrow. Would there be enough time to infiltrate another scholarly household as its daughter?
Even if the fox hastily chose someone, could it guarantee that the crown prince would take a liking to her?
After all, something had just happened to the woman the crown prince loved. For a young man to suffer such an emotional blow, his emotions would be extremely unstable during the next consort selection, and at their hardest to control.
How could it guarantee that it would secure the position?
Unless... it did not need to secure the position at all!
Chen Qing's pupils suddenly contracted as an extremely bold and terrifying idea rose in his mind...