Chapter 133

The slight irritation lingering in Fan Changyu’s heart instantly vanished.

She looked at Xie Zheng, then at the middle-aged man with one arm and one leg missing who had come out to greet them from the estate.

Though confusion still lingered in her heart, she pushed open the half-closed courtyard gate and stepped inside with some hesitation.

Watching Fan Changyu’s retreating figure, Xie Zhong noticed her steady gait and long, controlled breathing. She clearly did not resemble an ordinary noblewoman raised in a secluded household.

A thought immediately occurred to him.

Turning to Xie Zheng, he asked,

“Marquis, could this young lady be the descendant of the Meng family?”

Still…

The relationship between the Marquis and this young woman seemed somewhat unusual.

Xie Zheng neither confirmed nor denied it.

The setting sun hung low in the west, coating half his face and eyelashes in a layer of golden light.

His eyes reflected Fan Changyu’s gradually receding figure, yet the emotions hidden within them were too deep to discern.

After a moment, he said,

“Later, personally escort her back.”

Xie Zhong froze briefly.

Remembering what day it was, a trace of sorrow appeared in his eyes.

“Then take more men with you when you go there. I’m worried Wei Yan might—”

“I know what I’m am doing.”

Xie Zheng interrupted him.

After one final look at Fan Changyu’s figure bathed in the glow of sunset, he turned and left.

The setting sun stretched his shadow long across the ground.

Against the endless sea of crimson clouds, he seemed all the more solitary and forlorn.


—

As soon as Fan Changyu entered the courtyard, she heard noisy voices coming from a room whose door stood half open.

“I’m not drinking this bitter medicine! Bring me some liquor!”

“General Zhu, please don’t make things difficult for me. Your old injuries are severe. The doctor repeatedly warned that you absolutely must not drink.”

“My dear heavens! I’ve been locked up for seventeen years! If I don’t get a taste of strong liquor soon, my tongue is going to rust!”

Following the voices, Fan Changyu approached and looked through the half-open door.

Inside sat a square-faced, heavily bearded man leaning against the headboard.

A young servant stood beside him holding a bowl of medicinal soup.

Because Fan Changyu was standing where she blocked some of the light, the people inside soon noticed her.

The bearded man turned his head toward the doorway.

His eyes suddenly reddened.

As if unable to believe what he was seeing, he called out tentatively,

“Sister Lihua?”

Fan Changyu did not recognize the name he had spoken.

She remained standing by the door without answering.

After studying her carefully, the man suddenly corrected himself.

“No… your features aren’t quite like Lihua’s…”

“Lihua isn’t alive anymore…”

His expression shifted between joy and grief.

Almost afraid to believe it, he asked in a trembling voice,

“Are… are you Changyu?”

Hearing him call her by name, and remembering why Xie Zheng had come to the capital and how he had suddenly brought her here today, Fan Changyu guessed this man must be one of her grandfather’s former subordinates.

Excitement and sorrow surged through her heart simultaneously.

Pushing the door open, she entered.

“You know me? May I ask who you are?”

The man nearly burst into tears.

Covering his face, he choked out,

“Heaven has eyes! To think that I, Old Zhu, would live long enough to see a descendant of General Meng!”

Seventeen years of injustice, imprisonment, and separation weighed heavily upon him.

Even a sturdy man like Zhu Youchang could not stop himself from breaking down when he saw the daughter of old friends.

Looking at Fan Changyu, he said,

“I’m your Uncle Zhu. I joined General Meng’s army at fourteen years old. I rose from an ordinary foot soldier to become a Tiger Vanguard Commandant. Your mother was like a sister to me.”

Now that she knew he truly had been her parents’ old acquaintance, Fan Changyu could hardly contain her emotions.

Yet as she approached, she noticed the shape of the legs hidden beneath his blanket.

They were far too thin.

Nothing like the legs of a grown man.

Her throat tightened painfully.

Suppressing her emotions, she asked,

“Uncle Zhu, what exactly happened back then? And your legs… what happened to them?”

Pain filled Zhu Youchang’s face as well.

“The accusations against General Meng over the grain transport failure were entirely fabricated by that dog Wei Yan!”

“As for these useless legs…”

He patted the thin limbs beneath the blanket and forced a bitter smile.

“They were injured on the battlefield at Luo City all those years ago. There’s no point talking about it. They’ve been numb for over a decade anyway. At least that spared me some suffering while I was in prison.”

Remembering what she had heard at the gate—that his legs could never be healed—Fan Changyu felt a deep sadness.

“You were imprisoned by Wei Yan for seventeen years?”

At the mention of Wei Yan, Zhu Youchang immediately clenched his teeth in hatred.

“As long as the military tally remained unfound, that dog wouldn’t know peace. So he imprisoned all of us who wanted to clear General Meng’s name and avenge General Xie and Crown Prince Chengde.”

Fan Changyu was shocked.

“General Xie’s death and Crown Prince Chengde’s death were also connected to Wei Yan?”

Zhu Youchang then recounted in detail how Wei Yan had used the military tally and a handwritten letter to deceive Meng Shuyuan into turning back to Luo City to rescue the Sixteenth Prince.

He also explained the conclusions he and Xie Zheng had reached.

Grinding his teeth, he said,

“That dog had ambitions long ago. He must have wanted to place a puppet on the throne and seize control of the government himself. Otherwise, why was it that after Crown Prince Chengde and the Sixteenth Prince both died, and after the late emperor passed away, Wei Yan immediately used the influence of the Wei and Xie families in the military to force through the succession of the Nineteenth Prince, who had no power base whatsoever?”

After learning the true reason behind the grain transport disaster and the injustice her grandfather had borne, Fan Changyu remained silent for a long time.

Beyond grief and anger, however, she felt there was still more hidden beneath the truth.

Her father had spent more than a decade in Qingping County.

Though he had been quiet and reserved, he had always been a kind and honest man.

When selling pork, he would intentionally charge poor families less.

Whenever someone faced hardship, he did whatever he could to help.

Even beggars received charity from him.

It was because of that character that when Old Scholar Song died and his widow and child knelt on the street begging for money to buy a simple coffin, her parents had immediately stepped forward to help.

Since her father had once been one of her grandfather’s trusted generals, he would certainly have understood the consequences of delayed grain transport.

For the Meng family.

For Jinzhou.

For Great Yin itself.

Fan Changyu could not believe he would betray her grandfather for power, help Wei Yan frame him, burden him with the infamy of a traitor for all eternity, and make him bear responsibility for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians.

Furthermore, Yu Qianqian had once said that Qi Min hated the Sui family.

The Crown Princess’s decision to choose the Sui family to help Qi Min escape back then likely had its reasons.

The replacement troops her father had sought to escort the grain had been none other than the Chongzhou Army of the Sui family.

Something else must have happened.

Suddenly, Fan Changyu raised her head and looked at Zhu Youchang.

“Uncle Zhu, Wei Yan may truly be the great villain everyone believes him to be, but I don’t believe my father would help him commit such monstrous crimes! If my father had truly betrayed my grandfather, my mother would never have forgiven him. How could she have spent sixteen years in seclusion with him?”

Upon hearing that Meng Lihua had lived in retirement with Wei Qilin, Zhu Youchang angrily exclaimed,

“Then Wei Qilin must have deceived your mother!”

But Fan Changyu shook her head.

“If my mother knew nothing about what happened back then, she wouldn’t have chosen death after my father was forced to commit suicide.”

Zhu Youchang’s eyes instantly reddened.

His voice changed.

“Your mother died because of your father?”

Fan Changyu lowered her eyes to conceal the pain within them.

“Or perhaps… she died to protect me and my younger sister.”

Anxiously, Zhu Youchang asked,

“What happened?”

The dust-covered memories were reopened.

For a moment, Fan Changyu seemed to return to that bleak winter in Lin’an Town.

White funeral paper fluttered through the snow-filled sky.

A government cart had brought back the bodies of her parents along the snow-covered road.

In a hoarse voice, she said,

“Sixteen years ago, my parents were only able to settle in Qingping County because Uncle He Jingyuan helped conceal their identities and forge household registrations.

“The handwritten letter Wei Yan sent my grandfather remained in my parents’ possession all those years.

“Last winter, He Jingyuan was ordered by Wei Yan to take my parents’ heads.

“Uncle He intended to secretly warn them and help them flee with me and Ningniang.

“But my parents feared implicating him. They also knew that with Wei Yan’s methods, he would never let me and Ningniang go.

“So they chose to take their own lives.

“They placed the letter inside a box and entrusted it to Uncle He, asking him to hand it over to Wei Yan when Wei Yan searched our home, in exchange for sparing my sister and me.”

Even now, speaking of those events made her throat ache.

“My parents must have known more of the truth. That’s why Wei Yan silenced them.

“And my father definitely never betrayed my mother or my grandfather.

“The only people who may know the full truth now are the members of the Sui family.

“Unfortunately, the Prince and Princess of Changxin are both dead.

“The only option left is to interrogate the Sui family’s servants and see if we can uncover anything.”

Others who did not know Meng Lihua’s character might not consider this convincing evidence.

But Zhu Youchang had been as close to her as a brother.

No one knew her better.

“I don’t trust many people,” he said. “But I trust your mother.”

“She seemed gentle on the surface, but she was fiercely strong at heart.”

“When General Meng fell victim to a diversionary tactic and a group of Northern Beidi soldiers attacked the camp, your mother was alone in the tent.

“Despite being a woman, she killed two invading soldiers through her own wits.

“If your father hadn’t arrived in time afterward, she would have slit her own throat rather than allow herself to be captured and used as a hostage against your grandfather.”

As he recounted these memories, loneliness filled Zhu Youchang’s face.

Seventeen years.

All those people now slept beneath the earth.

Everything had changed.

Looking at Fan Changyu, he said,

“You’re right. If Wei Qilin had truly betrayed the old general, and your mother knew about it, she would have been the first to kill him herself.”

Fan Changyu fell briefly into a daze.

The mother she remembered had always been gentle and kind.

She rarely even raised her voice.

Yet the woman Zhu Youchang described possessed a brilliance and courage she had never seen.

A faint smile appeared on her lips.

She felt proud of that mother.

At the same time, sorrow filled her heart because no matter what kind of person her mother had been, she would never see her again.

Zhu Youchang continued,

“I’ve heard about the Sui family’s rebellion. If they really knew the truth, then they held evidence against Wei Yan. If that’s the case, they should have exposed everything to the world when they raised their banner in rebellion.”

His words pulled Fan Changyu from her thoughts.

“They did spread rumors shortly after the rebellion began,” she replied. “Rumors claiming that Wei Yan was responsible for the Jinzhou massacre.”

It was precisely because Xie Zheng had heard those rumors and investigated the events of that year that Wei Yan had nearly gotten him killed on the Chongzhou battlefield.

As she reflected on everything, Fan Changyu felt as though countless scattered clues were finally beginning to connect.

Immediately, Zhu Youchang asked,

“Those rumors came from the Sui family?”

After a long moment of thought, Fan Changyu shook her head.

“We can’t be certain yet. We’ll have to interrogate the Sui family’s servants before reaching any conclusions.”

Zhu Youchang’s earlier observation had reminded her of something.

If the Sui family truly knew the truth and possessed solid evidence, why hadn’t they simply revealed everything publicly and exposed Wei Yan’s crimes?

Why rely on rumors instead?

Combined with what Yu Qianqian had told her before, Fan Changyu could only arrive at one tentative conclusion:

The Sui family themselves might have been implicated in the Jinzhou tragedy.

As for why Wei Yan had tolerated such a dangerous loose end for so many years, she had no answer.

Wanting desperately to verify her suspicions, Fan Changyu wished she could immediately return and interrogate the Sui family’s servants who had been brought to the capital.

After bidding farewell to Zhu Youchang, she hurried out of the courtyard.

Only the one-armed, one-legged middle-aged man remained beside the carriage.

Unable to perform a full salute due to his missing arm, he merely inclined his head.

“I am Xie Zhong, a retainer of the Xie family. By the Marquis’s order, I have been waiting here to escort General Fan back.”

The words “retainer of the Xie family” alone were enough for Fan Changyu to refuse to view him as a mere servant.

Seeing that he had lost an arm and a leg on the battlefield only increased her respect for him.

She nodded in return.

Since Xie Zheng was nowhere to be seen, she could not help asking as she climbed into the carriage,

“Where has the Marquis gone?”

Xie Zhong, who was holding the reins with one hand while leaning on a crutch, paused.

After studying Fan Changyu for a moment, he hesitated.

For the first time, he did something that could be considered overstepping his bounds.

“Today is Madam Xie’s death anniversary. The Marquis has likely gone to the Xie family cemetery.”

Because Xie Zheng had returned to the capital in secret, visiting the cemetery during daylight risked attracting attention from spies.

That was why he had chosen to go at dusk.

Fan Changyu’s hand froze on the carriage curtain.

At last, all of Xie Zheng’s strange behavior made sense.

He had never spoken a single word about Madam Xie.

But after hearing Zhu Youchang describe the imprisonment and Madam Xie’s death, even an outsider like her felt heartbroken.

How much more painful must it be for Xie Zheng, her son?

The reason he had hidden it from her was likely because he did not want her to witness those moments of weakness and grief.

Fan Changyu’s fingers tightened unconsciously around the thick curtain.

After thinking for a while, she decided she should respect his wishes.

Perhaps it was better to return to the Official Couriers’ Residence first.

As if reading her thoughts, Xie Zhong continued,

“The Bloodclad Cavalry rescued General Zhu, so Wei Yan already knows the Marquis is hiding somewhere in the capital.

“I’m afraid Wei Yan may take this opportunity to set an ambush at the Xie family cemetery.

“I urged the Marquis to bring more men with him, but every year when he goes to pay respects, he insists on going alone.

“I can’t persuade him.”

Fan Changyu’s expression changed.

Her lips pressed together.

After two moments of silence, she asked,

“Can you take me to the Xie family cemetery?”