After transmigrating into the book, I helped my mother reconcile with her divorced husband.

The interrogation methods used by the government office were unsuitable for the Duke of Rui. He had grown up on the streets, had connections with human trafficking organizations, and had served as the Duke of Rui for several years, holding a high position. He wouldn't budge, whether approached softly or forcefully. He understood better than anyone that if this matter involved the Crown Prince, he would most likely be dead. If he spoke, his crimes would be firmly established. If he didn't speak, even if he died, there would be people who would speak out for his innocence.

You should know that he only got his title of Duke of Rui because he saved the Crown Prince.

You're saying he's a human trafficker? Where's the evidence? Without evidence, it's a frame-up, a false accusation, and the Crown Prince is deliberately using you and then discarding you!

He's dead, there's no way to prove it!

His death can allow the person behind him to protect the person he wants to protect.

Duke Rui was willing to be a pawn in someone else's hands, and willing to die in the county jail.

Lu Zhiyuan chuckled, and as the Duke of Rui slowly opened his eyes, which held a hint of disdain, she took the Crown Prince's hand and sat down on the ground. Seeing this, Zuo Yi wanted to call someone to bring a stool, but Liu Ying stopped him and shook her head.

Liu Ying knew that the lady must have her reasons for doing this.

Zuo Yi gestured for the jailer to leave, returned to his original spot, and stood guard outside the prison with Liu Ying.

The commotion outside the prison did not alert those inside. Lu Zhiyuan pulled her cloak tighter around herself. The Crown Prince stood beside her, watching the Duke of Rui warily. The Duke of Rui merely opened his eyes briefly before quickly closing them again.

He knew some martial arts, but he wasn't stupid enough to use them in prison.

She deliberately tampered with her hands and feet, making him hear the jingling sound of her bracelets and anklets.

The Crown Prince made a move, but he stood in front of Lu Zhiyuan to protect her.

Duke Rui leaned against the wall, his eyes closed, a mocking smile playing on his lips.

"Even the crown prince of a country has his own weakness."

"Do you recognize me?"

“Of course I recognize you. I am Your Highness’s savior. Even my title of Duke of Rui was obtained for me by Your Highness. If it weren’t for Your Highness, I wouldn’t have been able to live such a life of power and privilege for so many decades.”

The crown prince was furious, but he had to maintain his dignity as the crown prince and couldn't strangle the man to death in the prison.

Lu Zhiyuan looked up and squeezed the Crown Prince's hand: "Ignorance is no excuse. Besides, he is a wicked person with ulterior motives. Crown Prince, you don't need to take it to heart, and you don't need to pay attention to his nonsense."

“Ah Yuan is right, he is a bad person.”

"Ah Yuan, Lu Zhiyuan, are you his short-lived Crown Princess?" Duke Rui opened his eyes and carefully examined Lu Zhiyuan: "As expected of the eldest daughter of the Marquis's family, you are really beautiful."

“I resemble my mother, and it has nothing to do with the Marquis’s mansion.” Lu Zhiyuan looked back at the Duke of Rui: “I wonder if your son looks more like you or more like his mother.”

Duke Rui's eyes darkened: "What do you want to do?"

Lu Zhiyuan raised an eyebrow: "Nothing much, just curious about what your son looks like. The Duke of Rui's mansion has been raided, and all those involved have been temporarily detained. Your favorite concubine and your child should be where they are being held. Zuo Yi, have someone bring that child over so I can see him."

The Duke of Rui became anxious: "What are you going to do? What are you going to do to my child?"

"So you can get anxious too!" Lu Zhiyuan's face darkened. "Your child is a child, but other people's children aren't? Have you seen that carriage abandoned outside the Duke's mansion? A dozen or so children were piled together like cargo..."

Lu Zhiyuan took a deep breath: "Have you ever thought about how heartbroken their parents must be when they see them?"

"I didn't do those things!" Duke Rui struggled violently like a dying beast: "I just..."

"You're just aiding and abetting evil, providing them with a place to live." Lu Zhiyuan stared directly into Duke Rui's eyes. "Do you think you're a good person just because you're saying this? I didn't kidnap your son. I just glanced at him and he was taken away by someone else. Does that mean his disappearance has nothing to do with me? If he were sold to the Southern Frontier or the Western Shu and suffered inhuman torture, wouldn't you resent me? Wouldn't you want to kill me?"

"I......"

“You will!” Lu Zhiyuan said with certainty, “And I am not innocent. I acquiesced to him being taken away. Everything that happened after he was taken away is related to me. You have every right to hate me, resent me, and want to kill me.”

The redness in Duke Rui's eyes faded, and he gradually calmed down.

"You are the legitimate daughter of a marquis's family and the Crown Princess. You wouldn't do anything to a child. You're trying to scare me and trick me into revealing information."

"The eldest daughter of a marquis's family? You probably don't know that my name has never been recorded in the Lu family's genealogy." Lu Zhiyuan hugged her knees. "There are only two people on the Lu family's genealogy: one is Lu Jinyao, the eldest daughter of the Lu family, and the other is Lu Jingyuan, the eldest son of the Lu family. The Crown Princess? She's in the Eastern Palace with the Crown Prince, how come she's here?"

"What do you mean?" Duke Rui's heart skipped a beat.

“You’ve been keeping an eye on the Crown Prince’s palace because you know your status as the Duke of Rui is illegitimate.” Lu Zhiyuan grabbed the Crown Prince’s arm and stood up. “Don’t look at me like that. You were tricked into becoming the Duke of Rui because you were young.”

Young?

The crown prince twisted his neck, lowered his head, and looked at Lu Zhiyuan.

Okay, he was indeed young back then. If he were just two years older, he wouldn't have been fooled by this scoundrel.

Take a deep breath, lift your head, and turn your neck back.

Tired of standing, she leaned against the Crown Prince and spoke softly, "Since you care about the Crown Prince, you should also care about me, the Crown Princess. Even if you haven't seen me, you should have heard about my ways of doing things. I, Lu Zhiyuan, have never been the kind of noble lady that everyone imagines."

Duke Rui's heart leaped into his throat.

Lu Zhiyuan said slowly, "I am capable of doing something like throwing your son to slave traders."

Duke Rui, deflated, gritted his teeth and said, "I can tell you everything I know, just please spare Li Niang and the child. Li Niang is innocent; she was sent here by those people, just like the other children. I forced myself on her; I'm the one who got her pregnant. She only came with me because of the child. She tried to kill herself, more than once, but I, I stopped her. She has no family left; she only has the child. Please, spare her, spare the child."

Lu Zhiyuan said calmly, "Tell us what you know."

"I am a scoundrel, and I do know those human traffickers, but that's not my fault, it's the traffickers' fault." Duke Rui leaned against the wall, wiping his face heavily with his hands.

Like the other children in the carriage, he had also been abducted into the organization by human traffickers. In his memory, he had been resold by those traffickers many times, and each time he was returned.

To put it nicely, it's a gift; to put it bluntly, it's something that's been sold and then sold back.

At first, it was because he remembered who his biological parents were. No matter where he was sold, he always remembered to go home and find them. He was beaten, verbally abused, starved, imprisoned in dungeons, and confined to woodsheds. No matter how the buyers treated him, he refused to submit and remained loyal to them. He became known throughout the human trafficking organization as an ungrateful wretch who could never be tamed.

Children who couldn't be sold ended up staying in the organization, and over time, they forgot where they came from and where they were going. He didn't know the slave traders; he simply couldn't avoid knowing them.

Duke Rui opened his eyes and looked at the low, oppressive, and suffocating roof.