The Marquise: I Earn My Own Worship

Soon thick smoke drifted into the hall, and everyone was choking and unable to breathe.

Lin Feng's people outside kept yelling at them to hand over the things. Huai Ming in the hall was anxious and angry. If he hadn't taken his status into consideration, he would have been so angry that he would have cursed them.

Seeing the fire getting more and more intense, everyone felt sad. Many monks began to sit cross-legged and meditate, silently praying to the Bodhisattva enshrined above.

The twelve farmers suffered various cuts, but none of them fatal. Several of them wept, their heads in their hands, saying they had let their families down and that their wives and children would be left without care.

At this time, there was a sound of ping-pong hitting each other outside, and everyone in the room felt their hearts pounding. Could it be that the reinforcements had arrived?

When General Qin arrived with his troops, he saw the fire in the temple from afar. It was just dawn and the fire was particularly dazzling.

Oh no, I’m too late.

General Qin rushed in with his men. There were corpses all along the way, not only monks, but also some men in black.

General Qin walked all the way to the outside of the hall and saw about thirty or forty people surrounding the hall. The outside of the hall was all on fire, and people were throwing some flammable wood inside from time to time.

"You bold thief, surrender now!"

General Qin brought more than a hundred people and quickly subdued Zhao Quan, Lin Feng and his group.

Lin Feng and Zhao Quan were disheartened when they saw that the truth was revealed. The support came so quickly, so there must have been problems with the Right Prime Minister. They were finished this time.

When the people inside saw the reinforcements coming, they cheered and some rushed to the door of the hall to take down the burning green wood.

Soon, General Qin and his men pushed down the burnt and broken gate, and the people inside ran out one after another.

The fire grew more and more intense and could no longer be put out, but the monks kept fetching water to try to put it out, but it was just a drop in the bucket.

Some young monks knelt on the ground, their hands were burned beyond recognition, sobbing softly, their Bodhisattva was still inside.

"Amitabha"

Huai Ming sat cross-legged in meditation and began to recite the secret scriptures.

Some monks started beating wooden fish, chanting something, and then slowly the monks who could still move sat down, took out the wooden fish they had with them, and started beating them. Those who didn't have any started clasping their hands together, bowing their heads, and chanting.

On one side, the fire was raging, and in front of the hall were devout believers.

The scene was so spectacular that everyone present was deeply moved. Looking at the main hall engulfed in flames, they could vaguely see the Bodhisattva sitting inside through the collapsed doorway, his expression of compassion and looming.

After the prayer was over, Huai Ming took the lead and stood up, ordering people to go down and bury the deceased together with the bodies of the rebels and pray for their souls to be reborn.

General Qin had something to do, so he captured Zhao Quan and others and rushed back to the palace to report. Zhang Xueyu stayed in the manor with his group.

After Zhang Xuefeng explained the situation of Qingyun Temple, Song Shengfu and others felt deeply saddened. The place that was still in good condition a few days ago was burned down in the blink of an eye.

The situation on their farm was not good either. Eleven people died, more than thirty people were seriously injured, and the rest were slightly injured.

Many of those who died were the pillars of their families, and the village was in a state of bleakness for a while.

But even so, after Zhuangzi and his neighbors had dealt with the aftermath, he spontaneously asked for leave from Lu and went up the mountain to volunteer to help Qingyun Temple repair the temple.

Lu naturally agreed, and sent someone to donate ten thousand taels of silver to Qingyun Temple early in the morning. This was a decision agreed upon after Song Shengfu and her family discussed it.

After Zhang Xueyu settled down, he explained to Song Shengfu and others. Only then did they know that so many things had happened in the palace in recent days.

That day, Concubine Ning had a bad feeling after hearing what Zhao's grandson said, so she sent Chu Qinling and Duan Chengkang away overnight, but announced to the outside world that they were under house arrest.

In the evening, the Emperor of Chu also came to Lanxuan Palace. Afterwards, he met with the two prime ministers and the ministers of various departments as usual for a period of time. From time to time, he would summon a minister to talk and take a walk.

After the dragon-sucking-water incident, the Emperor of Chu never came out of Concubine Ning's palace again. The eldest prince then intended to rush into the Lanxuan Palace on the pretext that the evil concubine had bewitched him.

Concubine Ning took out the token of the Emperor of Chu and ordered the palace guards to close the palace and not allow anyone to enter or leave.

Now the princes could no longer sit still, and they came to the Lanxuan Palace every day to ask for an audience. However, the Emperor of Chu never saw anyone else except the third prince on the night before the palace was closed.

The fact that the Sixth Prince had left the palace was kept secret, but a little maid in the kitchen of Concubine Ning's palace was a spy. She discovered that there were problems with the meals delivered every day and there was no noise in the house, so she spread the news that the Sixth Prince was not in the palace.

Concubine Ning was caught off guard. Since it was sent by the Ning family, she did not suspect anything. She never expected that there would be a mistake here.

When the eldest prince's faction heard the news, they used the excuse that Concubine Ning wanted to control the sixth prince and disrupt the government, and together with the right prime minister, they tried to win over the six ministers to force the emperor to abdicate.

The eldest prince had long harbored the intention of rebellion, and secretly bribed the guards of the temporary palace. For a time, the guards of the temporary palace were in the hands of the eldest prince.

The Emperor of Chu had long noticed something was wrong, and when he discovered that the power to guard the palace was in the hands of the eldest prince, he was so angry that he overturned the imperial desk.

"I really underestimated him. He actually persuaded the Gao family to work for him."

"General Gao has a sixteen-year-old eldest daughter. I guess..." Concubine Ning was a little worried. She didn't expect the eldest prince to be so quick. If he hadn't noticed something wrong that day, the eldest prince might have succeeded.

"Humph! I'm not dead yet, and everyone is thinking about this position."

The Emperor of Chu angrily slammed the dragon throne. None of his sons were easy for him to take care of.

Fortunately, the leader of the imperial guards was his man, otherwise, the Emperor of Chu’s face would become darker the more he thought about it.

After the Third Prince met with the Emperor of Chu, he showed some intention of winning over the power. The First Prince became anxious and there was a stalemate between him and the Third Prince. For a while, the situation was relatively peaceful.

"So these people are from the eldest prince's side?"

Zhang Xueyu nodded and continued, "The Right Prime Minister saw that Concubine Ning was in control of Lanxuan Palace and wanted to capture the Sixth Prince and force Concubine Ning to open the palace gate. So he sent people to search outside. He went to Ning's house and searched everywhere but found nothing."

The Right Prime Minister wondered whether she had been sent to the Duan family. He was secretly shocked that Concubine Ning trusted the Duan family so much, so he sent someone to the Duan family.

At this time, not long after the news of the Sixth Prince's disappearance came out, the Third Prince "accidentally" revealed that the Fish-mouth Jade Talisman was in Qingyun Temple.

The eldest prince and his faction quickly gathered their men and rushed to Qingyun Temple, one to get the fish-mouth jade talisman, and the other to come to the Duan family to inquire about the whereabouts of the sixth prince.

"Is the Fish Mouth Jade Talisman really in Qingyun Temple?"

Lu was a little curious, but when she saw everyone was looking at her, she realized that she had spoken out of turn. How could she possibly tell them such a secret?

"I'm sorry for talking too much, Master Zhang, please don't take it to heart."

Zhang Xueyu waved his hands, smiled and said it was okay, but what he said next made everyone confused.

"The palace is now under the control of His Majesty, so it's okay to tell you."

Zhang Xueyu then continued to say that before the Emperor of Chu sealed the palace, he summoned the third prince in and mentioned the fish-mouth jade talisman, but did not say that it was in Qingyun Temple.

"what?!"

Song Shengfu and the others were shocked. Why was this happening?

The Emperor of Chu had originally intended to use the news of the jade talisman to attract the attention of the eldest prince's faction, and had already set up an ambush at the Huangfeng Temple, twenty miles away, waiting to lure the enemy into the trap.

The third prince acted on his own, thinking that the Emperor of Chu valued him. Among the princes, the second was dull, the fourth had a bad temper, and the fifth was not favored.

He didn't care about any of these. Only the eldest prince and the sixth prince were his biggest rivals. He didn't think the sixth prince could ascend to the throne. He was just jealous of his favor. He was also a sickly and short-lived person.

The third prince had already heard the news that Duan Chengkang and Chu Qinling were no longer in the palace. At first, he thought that they had gone to the Ning family, but after searching for them many times, he could not find any trace of them. Thinking of Duan Chengkang, he suspected that they might have gone to the Duan family.

He decided to go all out and pretended to leak the information, saying that the Fish-Mouth Jade Talisman was hidden in Qingyun Temple, while he sent people to Huangfeng Temple secretly.

The eldest prince and his faction acted foolishly at this time. They were bewitched by the jade talisman and did not even question anything. They sent their troops out directly.

The Emperor of Chu pretended to spread the news of the jade talisman through the mouth of the third prince, thinking that he would understand that it was a trap and give them a chance to compete.

Who would have thought that these sons of his are dumber than the other, one is clever, and the other is really stupid!