I am neither beautiful nor crazy

The smell of blood in the palace is extremely strong.

Jiang Qi sat on the dragon chair, while the Taoist priest stood beside him.His Highness was kneeling with a black-clothed attendant, holding a silver tray in his hand, and the silver bowl in it was filled with sticky flesh and blood residue, as if smashing a piece of meat with a giant axe, and throwing the extract into the bowl at will inside.

The thick and disgusting smell of the entire hall came from it.

"Report to Your Majesty, Daoist Priest. This is the flesh and blood made from the hearts of three young and middle-aged men. All three of them are healthy and vigorous." The man in black kneeling on the ground said sullenly.

But the expressions of the two people in the hall were completely different.

Jiang Qi's complexion was pale, frowning and trying to hold back something, as if he was about to retch immediately; but the Taoist priest's eyes revealed a kind of greedy and satisfied nightmare.

The Taoist priest walked up to the bowl of meat paste. If he looked carefully, it was not difficult to find that his footsteps were a little faster than usual.He put his neck and nose close to the blood-red mass, closed his eyes and took a breath, then narrowed his eyes slightly, and said, "Yes, the taste is good."

As he spoke, he looked at Jiang Qi again, his narrow pupils were squinting in the dark, giving people a sense of creepiness in an instant.

"Then...then listen to Master." Jiang Qi resisted the desire to vomit, his complexion became paler, "Go and call Xia Aiqing... over here."

Hearing the sound, the man in black put the tray aside and bowed back.

"Your Majesty, the king should be benevolent, but he must never be soft-hearted." The Taoist walked back and said softly, "From ancient times to the present, any wise emperor, whether he ascended the throne or stabilized the throne after he ascended the throne, would not be able to avoid it." Seeing blood. To achieve a great cause that will go down in history, someone must sacrifice."

Jiang Qi's expression was still not very good, but he looked away after all.

The Taoist continued to persuade, "In order to make His Royal Highness the Crown Prince enthroned at that time, and to become the Empress Dowager herself, she can abandon any affection and loyalty; in order to sit on this dragon chair, Jiang Chibin can even shoot and kill his own brothers. You can figure it out; even after the first emperor ascended the throne, didn't his hands be stained with the blood of the opposing faction?"

He smiled disdainfully, "How can a king put benevolence first when making a decision? If His Highness wants to achieve great things, he will have to have much more blood on his hands than this."

The door was opened with a bang, and the black-clothed soldier knelt on the ground again with a rare nervous expression.

"Your Majesty!" He said in a flustered tone, "Lord Xia..."

Two hours ago, the prime minister's residence.

Xia Zhixing sat on the side of the bed, trembling all over, his face was as pale as paper, and the beads of sweat oozing from his forehead looked particularly mournful and obvious under the dim candlelight.

His internal organs were as uncomfortable as if he had been devoured, and his sanity was burned to a mess. He seemed to feel that he had woken up from a long-term dream, and the soul that had been forcibly stripped out was gradually returning to his body. The feeling of violent fit broke him down.

He vaguely has some extremely terrifying memories, it seems that Jiang Qi asked him to agree to transfer back to the northern border military power, and...

Jiangyu.

"Bang!"

He tried to lean his body forward to reach the teapot on the table, but he didn't want to feel an extremely strong dizziness, and he immediately lost his strength and fell to the ground with a loud noise.

But there was silence outside the house.

Jiang Qi transferred all the original guards from his mansion, locked the doors and windows, and deployed his own hidden guards around the mansion.

He struggled to crawl forward, muttering something in his mouth.

He finally remembered.

Thinking of what Jiang Qi was going to do to Jiang Yu, remembering why she became like this, and also remembering how she was accidentally used by him before to contribute to this treacherous plan.

Xia Zhixing wondered for no reason that on that day nearly 20 years ago, when Ruoyang was executed, would the look in Ruoyang's eyes be the same as he is now, with so many unfinished worries and wishes, but he had no choice but to entrust his closest relatives to him? go out.

"Jiang... Yu!" He struggled to get to the door, scratching the wooden door panel with his fingernails, making an ear-piercing sound.

The door was suddenly opened from the outside, and a gust of cold wind blew in mercilessly, and he vaguely saw a person's shoes in front of him.The uppers should have been spotless white, but now they were covered with a layer of dirty plaster from the fatigue of travel.

"Where is Jiang Yu?" He suddenly grabbed the hem of the person's shirt, and his speech speed was a little excited, "Call me Jiang Qi, I want to find him!"

In fact, Xia Zhixing didn't expect the person in front of him to find someone for him.But what he didn't expect was that the man didn't kick him away as expected, but made a very low voice.

"Shh..."

Xia Zhixing tried his best to raise his head, but when he saw someone coming, his eyes suddenly widened, and he didn't make a sound for a while.

Jiang Yu put his index finger next to his mouth, made a silent gesture, and at the same time squatted down to pull him up, and there was a bit of broken and suppressed anger in his eyes when he lowered his eyes.

Xia Zhixing has been close to him since he was a child. He is strict and harsh, but always gentle and amiable.He pays attention to his appearance every day, rarely loses his composure, and has never been in such a state of despair.

Jiang Yu opened his mouth, but he didn't know what to say. For the first time, he realized that his words were poor and powerless. After helping the other party to the collapse, he kept silent very appropriately.

"How are you?" Xia Zhixing asked his situation in the first sentence, "I heard..."

"I'm fine." Jiang Yu interrupted softly, "Don't worry, tell me what happened."

Xia Zhixing paused for a few seconds, at this moment he suddenly and strongly felt the changes in Jiangyu over the years.He was no longer the little boy in his impression who needed someone to protect him. At some point, he had erected a straight sword in his heart, which would be irreversible if he bent down and bowed his head.

With a slight sigh, he recounted the only memory he had during this period, and at the same time informed Jiang Yu of the actions of Jiang Qi and his Taoist priest.

"Jiang Qi has now ascended the throne, but the government and the public are in chaos. First, there were serial killers making a big splash in the palace, and then you went to the northern border with outstanding military exploits. It is impossible for him not to be hostile to you." Xia Zhixing took a few breaths and continued. , "But their actions are indeed a little too aggressive, and even a little abnormal."

"Why?"

"Jiang Qi is reserved and timid by nature, and now that you are the king of Wei and he is the king, it is even more impossible to target you with great fanfare, unless..." He raised his eyes, "Some things really have to be done, like It's like Jiang Chibin poisoned your wine cup at the palace banquet. This matter is so urgent that he will take such a big risk to 'condescise' to plot against you."

Unexpectedly, Jiang Yu didn't have any special reaction after hearing this, but his eyelids trembled slightly to signal that he heard it, and then he asked a seemingly casual question.

"Why?"

"Since you want to rediscover the old things, you must be prepared to be targeted." Xia Zhixing said otherwise, "Besides, Jiang Qi's behavior must be inseparable from that Taoist priest, maybe he has something to do with it." He babbled all day long, making up some nonsense to trick Jiang Qi."

"But Jiang Qi just trusts him very much." Jiang Yu smiled, "Just like I trust Master Xia."

Xia Zhixing turned his head and looked at him with an extremely strange look. Just as he was about to speak, there was a sharp sound of an arrow piercing through the air instantly from outside the house, and pierced the paper of the door at a very fast speed. He shot directly between Xia Zhixing's eyebrows.

Xia Zhixing didn't know anything about martial arts, and he was a little slow to realize the existence of arrows. When he came back to his senses, Jiang Yu was completely thrown on the ground by Jiang Yu, and the threatening voice outside the window was also at this time sounded.

"Lord Xia, Your Majesty has a request."

Jiang Yu squatted up, pressed his hand on his mouth, and shook his head slowly.

Xia Zhixing was so anxious that his eyes could burst into flames. Jiang Yu understood all the meanings from that anxious eyes. For example, Xia Zhixing wanted him to hide first, not to get involved in this matter, and to avoid the limelight first. Avoid Jiang Qi's targeting, and slowly think of a way afterward.

This is the principle of dealing with affairs that all civil servants in the ruling and opposition parties adhere to. Learn to bow your head and bend your waist, no matter what time it is.

But Jiang Yu made a move that Xia Zhixing didn't expect at all.

Facing the increasingly cold and hard urging outside the house, as well as the arrows shot in from time to time like venting, he let out a very soft laugh in his throat.That laughter was no longer gentle and crisp like that of a young man, but it sounded very strange at first glance.

He faced the door, stood up slowly, and asked with a smile, "Who is here?"

He has escaped too many times, when his mother and concubine died of injustice when he was a child, when he saw the blood-stained scene in the eyes of the prime minister, when he was sent to the Western Regions alone, when he faced His Highness the Crown Prince and Shen Chen. , including when Xiao Xiangling was forced to examine his own heart in front of Xiao Xiangling.

The golden mean is applicable to all beings in the world, but he is not.

If he had to describe it, he even felt that he was the knife in the assassin's hand, the poison in the palace banquet cup that sealed his throat with blood, and the ice and snow that rolled down bone-piercingly and violently during the avalanche on the day of the expedition.

He didn't care about the blood on his hands, the red eyes, or the harshness and coldness in his heart like a colorful poisonous snake.

He probably doesn't care anymore.

There was a slight commotion outside the house. They seemed to have no idea that there was still a person hiding in Xia Zhixing's tightly sealed mansion, and neither of them moved for a while.

"Who are you?" A cold and cautious voice came from outside.

Jiang Yu laughed again, his cold voice made people feel chills for no reason, "Wei Wang Jiangyu. Is Jiang Qi here? Why don't you come to see me in person."

The people outside the house were stunned for a moment by Jiang Yu's self-reported family name, and then they really became murderous.Not long after, a sharp feathered arrow pierced through the thin window paper again and shot straight towards where Jiang Yu was standing.

"Your Majesty has an order. Wei Wang Jiangyu was suspected of collaborating with Beijiang on his way to Beijiang. I ordered him to withdraw his troops and return to the palace, but he didn't want him to coax General Xiao to return them together, causing the Northern Xinjiang army to be leaderless. The crime of conspiracy and rebellion will be added. The crime of colluding with powerful officials and factions can already be punished."

Jiang Yu didn't respond to this absurd conversation that turned black and white, and looked down at the quivering feather arrow on the ground in front of him, as if he was thinking, but also seemed to be completely empty.

"Lord Xia, find a safe place first, it might be chaotic here later." Jiang Yu turned his head to look at Xia Zhixing until the words fell, "Leave this to me."

The voice is extremely soft, but these words are uttered in such a situation, as if a hard rock is hanging on the calm water, every word is deep and resounding.

At that moment, Xia Zhixing couldn't see in him the shadow of the little prince who went to the Western Regions alone more than ten years ago.

Jiang Yu bent down and pulled out the poisonous arrow from the ground, glanced at the purple black on the tip of the arrow, sneered very lightly, and then finally raised his eyes, the color in his pupils became cold in an instant, as if a splotch had formed on the window sills. A layer of hazy and thick ice flowers.

"I will only say two words once. You'd better remember them, because these may be the last two words you hear." Jiang Yu broke the arrow in half and threw the tail half on the ground.

"brute."

After a pause for a few seconds, the people outside realized that the word "Jiang Yu" was clearly a curse, and the anger came from it, and they were about to shoot poisonous arrows in again.

But at that moment, the door of the room cracked violently as if it had been blasted open.

And the head of half of the feathered arrow was shooting through the hinge of the door panel from the inside at a tricky angle, causing the door panel to collapse, and at the same time turned around and shot straight at them.