Farewell Flower Festival

When Mu Tianling came to the Jiuxing Division that day, Captain Yu said that today was his birthday and he wanted to invite Mu Tianling to his home for a drink.

Mu Tianling felt a little strange. Captain Yu had never talked to him about private matters before, but now he suddenly wanted to invite him to his home for a drink. There must be something else.

Captain Yu said that his home was in the ghost market, and Mu Tianling was a little surprised.

In the afternoon, Mu Tianling asked Qianfeng to go back and tell Chaoyan.

When Chaoyan heard that today was Captain Yu’s birthday and that he had invited Mu Tianling to his home for a drink, she found it a bit strange. For a moment she had a wrong idea: Captain Yu might have some thoughts about her husband...

In the evening, Mu Tianling changed into casual clothes and went to the ghost market with Captain Yu.

A figure was following them stealthily. Both of them noticed it but neither tried to shake the other off.

After entering the ghost market, Chao Yan found that she had lost him. She looked around and Mu Tianling's voice suddenly sounded behind her, which scared her.

"Who are you looking for?"

Chao Yan turned around and gave him a harmless smile. Seeing that she was dressed as a man again, Mu Tianling sighed helplessly.

Captain Yu walked over, bowed to Chaoyan, said his home was just ahead, and took the couple to the front.

Chaoyan kept an eye on the vendors setting up stalls around, but didn't see the weird old man who performed with monkeys last time. She didn't want to run into him again, but she also wanted to find him and ask him what medicine he gave Mu Tianling. She still remembered the way to the Lantern Hall. If she wanted to find him, she would have to find an expert to help her, as that weird old man would definitely know some weird tricks.

She thought of the Jade Dust Priest in the palace, who had helped her last time. She changed her mind and thought that instead of going to find the weird old man, she might as well ask the Jade Dust Priest to help Mu Tianling. But how should she invite him to the palace, or should she and Mu Tianling go to the palace to find each other?

"We're here." Mu Tianling glanced at Chao Yan, "Do you remember this place?" Chao Yan collected her thoughts and looked at the tavern in front of her. She recognized that this was the place she stayed last time. At that time, the boss had asked the waiter to call a doctor for Mu Tianling. The doctor who came was an old woman who looked like a fortune-teller. She grabbed something from a clay jar and sprinkled it on Mu Tianling's face, choking him awake.

Looking back now, Chao Yan can hardly remember what the boss and the waiter looked like.

When Mu Tianling woke up, he only saw the waiter but not the boss.

Captain Yu led the two men into the tavern and asked the waiter to buy a jar of wine. Then he led the two men to the backyard, went out from the back door, and took the two men through many twists and turns, and finally arrived at his home.

He called out "godfather", and after a while a girl came and opened the door.

Chaoyan had heard Captain Yu say that he had a younger sister before, so she guessed that this girl must be his sister. She looked about the same age as Captain Yu, with her hair tied high in a ponytail, and she looked heroic and dashing.

Chaoyan remembered that her brother had said before that he didn't like delicate girls. This Miss Yu didn't look delicate at all. She wondered if she was the type her brother liked.

"Your Highness, your godfather wants to see you alone." Captain Yu said.

Miss Yu saw that Chaoyan was a woman dressed as a man, so she asked Chaoyan to sit in her room for a while. Chaoyan saw that Miss Yu spoke cheerfully and was not a cunning person, so she nodded to Mu Tianling, indicating that he should rest assured.

After Captain Yu brought Mu Tianling into the house, he said, "Godfather, the prince is here and has brought you some good wine." He put the wine on the table. Mu Tianling's eyes fell on the person who walked out from behind the door curtain. When he saw that face, he felt a little familiar.

The other person looked to be in his thirties or forties, but his temples were already gray and wrinkles were deeply engraved into the eye sockets, as if he had been through a lot and had long lost his youthful vigor.

"Your Highness, I am Liu Lei, your subordinate, here to see you." He tried his best to suppress the trembling in his voice with every word.

"You," Mu Tianling paused for a while, his expression changed several times, and he helped him up first, "Sit down and talk."

"Over the years, Zhao Zhong has been sending people to look for my adoptive father, trying to wipe out the root of the problem." When mentioning Zhao Zhong, Captain Yu's voice turned cold, his eyes filled with hatred.

Mu Tianling talked about the portrait he had found in Wei Chang's study before.

Liu Lei sneered, "He is guilty and afraid that I will tell the world about his good deeds."

"What exactly happened back then?" Mu Tianling's tone sounded a little urgent. He had been pursuing the truth, and now the person who knew the truth was right in front of him. He really couldn't remain calm.

Liu Lei said with a firm look, "The general is innocent." He said angrily, "It was that villain Zhao Zhong who framed him!"

Next, he told Mu Tianling everything he had seen and knew that year.

When Prince Ning was captured, it was Zhao Zhong who proposed holding a celebration banquet. That night, Zhao Zhong had Prince Ning's wife and daughter brought over to entertain the soldiers, but was stopped by Xu Hai. The two had an argument and parted on bad terms.

Afterwards, Zhao Zhong brought two jars of wine to talk to Liu Lei. Normally, Liu Lei would not get drunk even after drinking two jars of wine, but that night he felt sleepy after drinking only half a jar of wine.

At that time, he was responsible for guarding Prince Ning.

Xu Hai did not tie up Prince Ning like a prisoner, but let him live alone in a tent.

The next day, after Liu Lei sobered up, he found that he was not in the military camp, but in a forest. He did not suspect Zhao Zhong at that time and thought that something had happened in the military camp. He wanted to rush back to the military camp but could not find the direction of the military camp. He planned to get out of the forest first and then ask someone for directions. As soon as he got out of the forest, he met a group of people. He recognized them as Zhao Zhong's men. He thought they were looking for him, but he didn't expect that they were here to kill him.

But these people were no match for him. He stole a warhorse and prepared to rush back to the military camp, but he didn't expect that there were assassins lying in ambush in the dark. He was forced to retreat to the edge of a cliff, and the other party wanted to kill him.

He pretended to jump off the cliff, waited for the right moment to grab a vine and swing into a cave, thus escaping the disaster.

It was three days later when Liu Lei found a way to climb out of the cave.

By the time he got news about the army, it was already too late.

Xu Hai committed suicide after being framed with a false charge.

Only then did Xu Lei realize that everything was a trap set by Zhao Zhong.

At the celebration banquet, Zhao Zhong deliberately asked people to invite Prince Ning's wife and daughter to come and dance to liven up the atmosphere, in order to provoke Xu Hai to argue with him in front of everyone and make everyone think that Xu Hai favored Prince Ning's family.

Then he took advantage of the dispute to talk to Liu Lei, put drugs in his wine to make him unconscious, fabricated the incident of Prince Ning's disappearance, and then framed him and Xu Hai with the crime.

In the end, in order to wipe out the root of the problem, they even had the general's mansion set on fire.

After hearing this, Mu Tianling’s fists clenched so tightly that they creaked.

Captain Yu uncorked the jar, took a big gulp of liquor from it, put it on the table, and said, "Good deeds will be rewarded in the end, and his retribution will come soon."

Liu Lei found out that Zhao Zhong was privately casting weapons, but he had not yet found out where his private soldiers were hiding.