Traveling through the ancient times

Prince Jingyang was brought back to the palace. Faced with the evidence brought back by Lu Mingqian, Prince Jingyang was speechless.

The king was deeply distressed because it turned out that his beloved brother had always wanted to replace him.

The king did not want to kill his brother, so he eventually took back King Jingyang's fiefdom, stripped him of his title, demoted him to a commoner, and imprisoned him in Kyoto. The crown prince and his family were all demoted to civilians.

There was a wave of crackdowns on Prince Jingyang's followers in Kyoto, and the people in the court were in a panic for a while.

In addition to Princess Jingyang's maiden family, the Yu family, being found to have colluded with Prince Jingyang with evil intentions, it was also discovered that Lord Wu, the councilor of the Ministry of Public Administration, Lord Wei, the left vice minister, and Lord Wu, the Hanlin Academy, were all involved.

After reading the memorial, the king was so angry that he smashed several teacups. "These traitors, haven't I treated them well enough? They actually joined forces with King Jingyang to rebel."

When the king said this, the eunuchs and palace maids serving in the imperial study were so frightened that they knelt down in panic, bowed their heads to the ground and dared not even breathe.

Li Changde lowered his head and stepped forward to clear the teacups, trying to appease the king, "King, please calm down!"

"Calm down. Look at these people. How do you want me to calm down?"

Li Changde was just trying to please the king. As a eunuch, he was not in a position to comment on state affairs. "Calm down, king. Don't get yourself hurt by anger, or you'll give those with bad intentions an opportunity to take advantage of you!"

"Hmph... someone, go and take these people to the prison."

At the morning court session the next day, the king announced publicly that all of King Jingyang's followers would be confiscated and executed in order to maintain order in the court.

Yongkang took ten personal guards and went directly to Qunan from King Jingyang's fiefdom.

They disguised themselves as ordinary people and secretly investigated the whereabouts of Lu Mingqian and Qi Muhe in Qunan City.

When they left, the King of Xiliang told Yongkang how to contact the Xiliang spies in Dongyi Kingdom. With more manpower and the King of Xiliang's personal guards being good at gathering information, they soon learned that Qi Muhe was in the Third Prince's Mansion, and Lu Mingqian had returned to Kyoto and was not in Qunan at the moment.

Since Lu Mingqian is not here, although the King of Xiliang said that everything in Dongyi should be under Yongkang's command, their main task is to capture Qi Muhe. Now the target has been locked on the Third Prince's Mansion. Naturally, the King of Xiliang's personal guards will not listen to Yongkang and go to Kyoto to find Lu Mingqian.

Since Lu Mingqian placed Qi Muhe in the Third Prince's Mansion, Qi Muhe must be useful to Lu Mingqian.

They can now capture Qi Muhe while Lu Mingqian is away. When Lu Mingqian gets to know the news, he will definitely rush back to Qunan, so why bother letting him make another trip to Kyoto?

After figuring out the problem, Yongkang no longer worried about Lu Mingqian's problem. He now discussed with his personal guards and the spies lurking in Qunan how to capture Qi Muhe from the Third Prince's mansion.

The Third Prince's Mansion was heavily guarded like an iron barrel, and they couldn't find any gaps at all.

Since he had no idea where to start at the Third Prince's Mansion, Yongkang started to think about the painting he had done at the beginning of the year.

Qi Muhe is the shopkeeper of Nianchuhua, so it is easier to investigate from Nianchuhua's side. According to the information obtained by the spies, the last time Nianchuhua and her friends went out, they had an accident after him. When Qi Muhe came back, he was carried into the Third Prince's Mansion, and he must have been seriously injured.

It has been more than two months since this incident happened. Qi Muhe cannot be unable to get out of bed and walk. He has not been to the shop for such a long time. Yongkang guessed that Qi Muhe must have known that he would bring people to find him, so he hid in the Third Prince's mansion and did not come out.

Since they couldn't get into the Third Prince's Mansion, they decided to use Nian Chuhua's hand to write a letter to Qi Muhe and lure him out.

The spy took the personal guards of King Xiliang to the Nian Mansion, hoping to steal a piece of calligraphy and painting that had been drawn by Nian Nian in order to forge a letter. However, as soon as they arrived near the Nian Mansion, the personal guards keenly noticed that there were many secret guards guarding the surroundings.

With so many people outside, there must be a lot of people inside the mansion. It would not be easy to sneak in and take things.

In order to avoid alerting the enemy, Yongkang decided to go to the shop where he had painted at the beginning of last year to see if he could find something useful.

The account books in the shops were basically kept by the shop owners who managed the shops. The people in Yongkang checked several shops that had been painted at the beginning of the year, but found nothing for the guards to refer to. They could only observe secretly and slowly look for a favorable opportunity.

Qi Muhe is able to get out of bed and walk now. After all, his bones were broken and have not fully recovered yet, so he still walks with a limp.

After coming back, Qi Muhe stayed in the Third Prince's mansion without going out, from the hot summer to the cool autumn.

Qi Muhe, who had long been accustomed to going out every day, felt that these days were like years. He felt uncomfortable lying in the house everywhere and felt that mushrooms would grow on his head if he continued like this.

Chushuhua would come to see him every few days and tell him about the situation in the shop. Now that he could move around slowly, he also wanted to go outside for a walk and get some fresh air, and see how the shop was doing during his absence.

After thinking it over, Qi Muhe felt that he still wanted to go out for a while, not only for the situation in the shop, but also for some situations in Xiliang. His few remaining followers were all outside and did not follow him into the Third Prince's Palace.

Qi Muhe got up early in the morning and had breakfast. Thinking that there might be people from Xiliang outside, he changed his appearance and no longer used the human skin mask.

After Qi Muhe moved into the Third Prince's Mansion, Lu Mingqian had people move all the things from the house he previously lived in. After tinkering around in the house for a while, when he came out again, he was no longer the handsome young man, but a middle-aged man who looked to be in his thirties.

When Qi Muhe walked out, the patrolling guards saw a stranger breaking into the mansion and were about to arrest Qi Muhe. Qi Muhe spoke up in time, "It's me, it's me, don't get excited!"

After Qi Muhe was able to get out of bed, he often walked around the mansion and became friends with the guards. As soon as Qi Muhe spoke, the guards recognized him and said, "Master Qi?"

"it's me!"

The guards in Lu Mingqian's mansion were all trained, and the art of disguise was not unfamiliar to them. "Why are you dressed like this?"

"I want to go out for a walk and get some fresh air. It's safer this way."

"Master Qi is going out?" But the master had ordered that Master Qi should not go out.

Qi Muhe knew immediately when he saw the guard's embarrassed expression, "Is Lu Mingqian not letting me go out?"

The guard quickly explained, "It's not that we can't let you go. The master said that it's best for you not to go out, and your legs are not very convenient right now."

"It's okay, I'm almost recovered. You didn't recognize me dressed like this, and it will be difficult for others to recognize me too." Qi Muhe is very confident in his disguise skills.

That’s right, the guards also admired Qi Muhe’s superb disguise skills.

The housekeeper came over to inquire when he saw the commotion. When he learned that the man was Qi Muhe, he praised Mr. Qi's good cooking skills and asked, "Where are you going?"

"I'm not going anywhere. I'll just go to the shop and take a look and come back. Don't worry, I'll be fine!"

The shop where Chuchuhua was built has people arranged by Lu Mingqian, so Qi Muhe should not have any problems going there. "Then I'll have my servants harness the carriage for you and send two people to go with you."

Qi Muhe thought that if the Xiliang King's men came, they would definitely look for him everywhere. There might be spies guarding outside the Third Prince's mansion. It would be too conspicuous to go out in a carriage. It would be easy to be targeted. "No need. It's too conspicuous to go out in a carriage. I can just go out with the carriage purchased by the mansion."

The housekeeper also thought of this possibility, "Alright! Then I will arrange it for you right away!"