The maid's road to success

When they arrived at Shou'en Palace, the Empress Dowager's room was burning refreshing spices. The Sixth Prince was quite surprised when he saw the Empress Dowager's appearance. He seldom went to the palace to visit her since he returned to Kyoto. Every time, the Empress Dowager was not in good condition, looked old and listless.

When she saw the Sixth Prince, the Grand Empress Dowager didn't bother to gossip and asked him to talk about business directly. The Sixth Prince then told her everything. However, she still concealed the matter of An Zizhong. After all, the Grand Empress Dowager did not advise her to trust An Zizhong too much. She thought that he was the son-in-law of the Grand Princess after all, and it was possible that he would betray the Sixth Prince one day.

"Go directly to your aunt. I know her. She is not a cruel mother. She treats her children as if they were her own. She plotted so many things only because she is worried about the future of the children a hundred years later. The fourth child dared to attack Baozhu and Bai Shoude, which touched her reverse scale. She can't just endure it. She is looking for a suitable opportunity to completely defeat the fourth child. Maybe she is also waiting for you to take the initiative to find her. After all, if she takes the initiative to find you, she will be at a disadvantage, and your initiative can bring her more benefits. This is her cleverness."

The Empress Dowager felt a little tired after just listening to all this talk, so she drank a sip of tea and forced herself to continue speaking.

"Although your aunt and I are not on good terms, you may be able to use her in the future. She has a grudge against the Queen Mother, and it is even more impossible for the two to cooperate. If she is willing to help you, your hope will be greater. However, I advise you to be careful of her. She is an ambitious woman, and you may not be able to suppress her. Don't blindly trust her, or you will be restricted by her when you ascend to the throne."

As expected, the Grand Empress Dowager began to belittle the Sixth Prince again. The Sixth Prince lowered his head and drank tea, hiding his unwillingness. Why did the Grand Empress Dowager always think that he was incompetent? The Fourth Prince could make the Grand Princess surrender, so why couldn't he?

But in the end, she didn't say it out loud. The Empress Dowager knew what the Sixth Prince was thinking, but the Sixth Prince was already an adult and had his own ideas. How could she control so much as she was old? After getting a positive answer, the Sixth Prince left in a hurry. The Empress Dowager looked at the Sixth Prince and felt very sad.

They all thought that they and the eldest princess were too similar in temperament, and everything could never be harmonious, so it became the situation now. They didn't even speak to each other at the palace banquet.

But only herself and the Grand Princess knew that they were clearly not real mother and daughter.

Yes, the eldest princess was not her biological child. After she gave birth to the late emperor, she became pregnant again. During the ten months of pregnancy, her child was swapped. Her husband, the king, swapped his child with hers in order to please the beauty. The purpose was because the woman was of humble status and was born a dancer. At most, she could be a noble in this life. However, she hoped that her child could have a noble birth, so she came up with the idea of ​​swapping the child. After all, she was the biological mother, so how could she not know whether the child was her biological child or not.

However, the delivery was too difficult and she was in a coma for two days. When she woke up, the eldest princess was by her side. As for her child, it had been sent to that beauty. What could a selfish and vicious woman do to her child? Needless to say, everyone knew.

At that time, she also wanted to take action against the eldest princess and take revenge on her, but her husband threatened her with the glory of her mother's family and asked her to recognize the child. How could she be willing? At that time, the imperial concubine in the palace was also pregnant. She was eyeing her position as the queen and wanted to find her fault to pull her off the high platform, so the Empress Dowager endured it.

Later, the beauty did not live long and died after two years. Of course, she also contributed a lot, but the eldest princess was very favored, more favored than her own son. In order to help her son gain more, she kept the eldest princess.

But in the year she came of age, she suddenly fell in love with a student taking the imperial examination and refused to marry the man she had chosen in exchange for more benefits for the late emperor. She was very angry at the time and privately mentioned that after all, it was impossible to raise a child born by someone else.

The eldest princess overheard it, and after she knew it, she checked the records of children born in the palace that year and immediately guessed who her biological mother was.

At first, because she knew the evil things her biological mother had done, she sincerely helped the late emperor to ascend the throne. But later, she gradually realized that she was just using her, and she also wanted to kill her, so they had a falling out and could no longer live in harmony.

Everyone thought that the mother did not want her to marry a student, and the mother and daughter had a falling out. The actual reason was too shocking. However, both of them were very smart people, and they knew that it was in the best interests of both parties to keep the matter secret, so they refused to reveal the real truth even though they were misunderstood.

The Sixth Prince didn't care about this matter at all. He left immediately after getting the answer he wanted, but at least he was not stupid enough to make the Emperor hate him now, so he still went to apologize to the Emperor.

"Your Majesty, I am here to pay my respects to you. I was reckless and violated the rules today, so I am here to apologize."

The Emperor first sat at the desk and stared at the Sixth Prince's head, his eyes filled with gloomy murderous intent. After just a moment, he returned to his normal state and asked the Sixth Prince to stand up and speak.

"I have trained a lot of people today. I was worried that my grandmother was not feeling well, so I wanted to send her here quickly. But my grandmother insisted that I go to Shou'en Palace first, saying that she was not feeling well. I was worried that I might break the rules."

The emperor waved his hand as if he didn't care.

"It's okay, it's okay. To the outside world, we are the monarch and his subjects, but to the inside, we are just a family. After all, you grew up with the Royal Grandmother, so it's normal for you to have deep feelings for her."

When the Sixth Prince heard this, he did not feel that the Emperor was really expressing his indifference. On the contrary, there was something else behind his words.

While he said that they were monarch and subject to the outside world and family to the inside, he was just reminding himself that he was now the emperor and, after all, he was his monarch and master, and he was the subject. Don't really think that he could do whatever he wanted just because of blood relationship.

Then he said that he grew up with the Imperial Grandmother. This was to remind himself that the Imperial Grandmother was partial to him and thought too highly of him. He was also to remind himself not to be stupid like the Imperial Grandmother and not take him, the master of the world, seriously.

The Sixth Prince felt that he had a bright future, as if the dragon throne with a helpless golden dragon carved on it beneath the Emperor would soon become his own seat. He explained with a very respectful expression.

"My grandmother is old. When my father passed away, she was heartbroken and became ill. She was also worried because of my failure to live up to expectations. Now her health is not as good as before. It's all because of me. I am willing to be punished."

Gong Qisu naturally understood what the Sixth Prince meant. He was simply telling himself the reason for the late emperor's death. Everyone knew it, and the Empress Dowager was severely punished for this matter, which was also the reason why he murdered his own father. In addition, he was worried that the Sixth Prince's health would not be as good as before. It was nothing more than because he ignored the relationship between brothers and insisted on demoting him to a fiefdom because of those things, which made the Empress Dowager what she is now. If he really dared to punish him, and the Empress Dowager was angry, it would be his brother's fault.

Gong Qisu would naturally not really punish him, but the events between Duke Cheng'en and the Queen Mother had had such a huge impact on him that he did not realize that he had been too obsessed with women after boarding the plane, allowing Duke Cheng'en to control the government and the Queen Mother to treat him as a puppet. Now that he wanted to save the situation, he found it was not that easy. There were too few people he could use, and many of them were the royalists whom they hated the most during the previous emperor's time and whom they could trust.

The incident of the Sixth Prince only reminded him of the incident of Duke Cheng'en. One by one, they actually treated him, the emperor, as air and even forgot the rules. He was a little angry at the time and was planning to punish him if the Sixth Prince really behaved like this today. Fortunately, the Sixth Prince still had some rationality and the matter passed.

The two chatted for a while about the previous case of Duke Cheng'en. The emperor listened very carefully. Now he still didn't know where all of Duke Cheng'en's men were. After all, judging from the weapons and military pay that Duke Cheng'en had embezzled, they must be useful, and he had stockpiled a lot of them, so he must really have his own private soldiers. It's just that he hasn't obtained any valuable identities after investigating for a long time. Perhaps the only value of investigating for so long is to find out that his mother had given birth to a healthy child with someone else, and wanted to enter the palace with the identity of his adopted son, and then support that child to become the new emperor.

Therefore, he would pay close attention to the news about Lord Cheng'en, hoping to find some clues that would allow him to truly find out the power of Lord Cheng'en.

"I would have forgotten if you hadn't asked me. During the interrogation, I tortured some prisoners because they were too stubborn. There was a middle-aged man among them. He was a soldier guarding the city gate and also a man of Lord Cheng'en. Under torture, he said the truth and was then shot to death. The arrow was very small. I saw it was a sleeve arrow. The killer was a guard from the Dali Temple. He had committed suicide when we caught him. Now it seems that they were worried that the man couldn't stand the torture and might say something, so they killed him."

The emperor thought about it carefully in his mind, and suddenly seemed to understand something. He pretended to be angry and severely reprimanded Duke Cheng'en, then ordered people to send the Sixth Prince out of the palace.

As soon as the Sixth Prince left, the Emperor came to the geomancy map, stared at it for a long time, and finally circled three places on it with a red pen. There are three place names with the word "Lin" in Chen State, namely Linhaizhou, Linyucheng, and Linjingcheng, which he had never noticed.

Linhai City is close to the sea, in the southernmost part. It is a remote place and is usually where criminals are exiled. Bandits would occasionally invade there, so it is obviously not very realistic to station soldiers there.

Linyu City, the name Linyu is just a very tall mountain called Yushan. The environment there is even more dangerous, with continuous mountains. Besides, Longwei had previously explored the vicinity of Kyoto, so Linyu City is not the best choice.

He had not even thought of Linjing City, which was the city closest to Kyoto. When he was still a prince, he had been in charge of the defense of Linjing. At that time, he had just taken over and was still young. He was worried that he would not be able to do the job well and his father would blame him. After all, it was the first task he took over. At that time, his mother wrote a letter to his uncle, and then when he took up the post, his uncle sent two of his staff to assist him.

One was a scholar who was good at setting up plans behind the scenes, and the other was a soldier who had participated in many battles and knew how to train soldiers. At that time, I admired my uncle to the extreme. It was because of this that he reorganized the city defense army of Linjing City. At that time, the emperor was very happy to praise me. It was also because this matter was handled very well that I successfully took over the affairs of the Ministry of War. The princes fought for soldiers and money the most. When he was in charge of the Ministry of War, his fourth brother and sixth brother were so jealous that they were going crazy.

Later, he gradually had his own people, and the two aides were returned to his uncle. Now it seems that with the two aides accompanying him in the management of Linjing City for two years, it is not difficult for his uncle to control Linjing City. Moreover, if his uncle intends to rebel, Linjing City is the best stronghold. It is close to Kyoto. Once the rebellion is launched, the people there can rush to support as quickly as possible. Therefore, according to his uncle's cautious character, Linjing City is where he raises soldiers.

"Someone, call Long San."

Gong Qisu found the map of Linjing City, marked a few places on it, and then handed the map to Long San.

"Take a few skilled soldiers with you and search these places. If I'm not mistaken, Lord Cheng En's private soldiers are in one of these places. Be careful and be quick."

Gong Qisu clearly felt that there were many new faces in the palace, which was not a good thing. The more new people there were, the more spies were planted in. What's more, his surroundings were not clean. A few days ago, a palace maid who was sweeping the floor was caught eavesdropping and was beaten to death in front of everyone.

It is better to be cautious in everything. Lord Cheng'en has been planning for so many years, maybe he has already made arrangements and is just looking for a suitable opportunity. My body is not healthy now, and I may fall ill one day, which will be dangerous.

The empress dowager was listening to the reports from her subordinates in her palace, feeling very annoyed. The emperor has always been a man who loves beauty more than anything else. He seldom enters the harem recently and has even begun to be more diligent in state affairs. She has mentioned the matter of adoption several times, but he has refused outright. He even often summons the dragon guards, and no one knows what he is doing.

"Empress Dowager, the emperor is now under constant guard by Lord Li and his men. The security is much stricter than before. We servants will be stopped if we approach the study and the bedroom, so there is no useful information to bring."

The empress dowager waved her hand in annoyance and asked them to push it away. She supported her forehead and looked at the small portrait on the table with a very haggard face. This was her and Gong Li's child. He looked very much like the emperor when he was a child, but he was very healthy. Even from the portrait, it could be seen that he was much more energetic than the emperor when he was a child. There was a gleam in his eyes, and he was very dependent on her.

Some time ago, Gong Li sent someone to tell her that the child had been assassinated. Fortunately, he discovered it in time and nothing really happened. But the empress dowager was very uneasy at that time. Her first reaction was that someone had discovered the child's identity. The first person she suspected was the emperor. After all, the child could not be seen in public, and Gong Li had always hidden the child very well. At that time, the emperor was acting very strangely. He did not enter the harem, but searched for someone in the imperial kitchen and kept summoning the dragon guards to do things. So she wondered if the emperor had discovered the child.

At that time, she arranged many people with high martial arts skills to protect the child closely, but the strange thing was that the man only assassinated once and never did it again. She suspected that she was overthinking it. If the emperor knew that the child would not give up, he would definitely let the child die miserably. She also felt that it was not the emperor but someone else.

The second person who suspected him was Duke Cheng'en, his own brother. After all, he knew very well how ambitious his brother was. He had always wanted to persuade him to help him change the dynasty and let Duke Cheng'en's lineage become the masters of the world, but he was unwilling to do so.

The Prince of Cheng'en and I do not have the same mother, and there is no brother or sister in the whole mansion who shares the same mother as me. I remember how mean that damn stepmother was to me, how cold that brother who relied on his status as the eldest legitimate wife was to me, and how black-hearted that lowly wife of the Prince was. I remember all of this. When I was sent to the palace, no one expected me to have a good future. If it weren't for my perseverance and the fact that I had to survive many dangers to climb to my current position, I would have been an abandoned child long ago.

She would give up her job as the Queen Mother and watch that black-hearted couple become the Crown Prince and the Crown Princess? She would watch that ugly and vicious woman become the mother of a country? She would stop dreaming. She wanted to rule the world herself and become the first woman in the history of Chen State to rule the country from behind the scenes. No one could stop her.

The Queen Mother clenched a corner of the statue and gradually made up her mind.

"It doesn't matter. If one son is disobedient, just change him to a younger one that is more obedient and healthier."

She stretched out her hand and called the nanny beside her to come over.

"Bring me the black porcelain bottle from the secret compartment in my bed."

The nanny looked up at the empress dowager's face in surprise. Seeing that she was determined, she quickly lowered her head and went in to get the thing. It was obvious that the old nanny knew what the thing was.

The mother and child Gu from the south are rare Gu worms in the world. When the empress dowager was young, a witch from Miaojiang came to her side and made them specially. After thirteen years, two pairs of them were made and kept all the time. As long as the user soaks them in his or her own blood, the Gu worms can be revived. The mother worm will put itself into the bleeding wound and will drill into the skin by itself. The child worms can be used on the person you want to control.

People with the slugs in their bodies cannot resist the orders of those carrying the mother worm and will do as they are told. However, this insect has a major drawback: the owner of the mother worm can use the insect to control the owner of the slugs up to three times. After three times, the carrier of the slug will lose his mind and become a murderous man. Then, within three days, he will bleed from all seven orifices and the bleeding will not stop until he dies from excessive blood loss.

Now there is only this pair left. The previous pair was used on the late emperor, but at that time the late emperor's body could not hold on for much longer. At that time, it only controlled the insect to make the late emperor write down the disposal of Huaiyuan Marquis Mansion and other people and pass the throne to the second prince. Before he could do the third thing, the emperor was already dead.

Nanny could never have imagined that this only pair would be used by the emperor. They were the Empress Dowager's biological sons.