When Suzhen woke up, the blue-robed man and his group were already gone. The assassination under the night sky seemed like a dream. Leng Xue stood by the bed, quietly watching her.

She had known Leng Xue for ten years and had never seen him with such an expression.

His eyes were deeply bloodshot, revealing a trace of grief.

Seeing her awaken, he was about to help her sit up when she suddenly broke free, staring at him intently. “It’s too late, isn’t it? Tell me, what exactly happened to my family?”

Leng Xue closed his eyes. Ignoring her struggling, he forcibly helped her up. “I’ll take you there.”

Suzhen was stunned. Go there? Had they returned to Huai County? This was no longer the inn where they had previously stayed—

Outside, the sky was still early, with dawn just beginning to break.

This was not Huai County.

Along the way, she saw many common people and shops… much more prosperous and lively than Huai County. It must be a higher-level prefecture.

She asked Leng Xue where this was.

Leng Xue said, “You’ve slept for five days. This is Qiongrong Commandery.”

Her heart kept sinking. She didn’t ask him anything more. For some reason, she suddenly didn’t want to ask anymore.

Upon reaching the marketplace, Leng Xue stopped.

Something must have happened here—people had abandoned their business and were surging toward the city gate. She looked at Leng Xue, but he slowly turned his face away, saying softly: “Zhen’er, what you want to know is over there. Go and see, go look…”

By now it was already winter, with bone-piercing cold wind howling in her ears. The weather wasn’t good today—the sky was overcast and gloomy, as if an even more bone-chilling cold could arrive at any moment.

She suddenly shook off Leng Xue’s hand and plunged into the sea of people.

There, dozens of layers of common folk stood in dense crowds, their voices creating a thick buzz.

“Do you think the new emperor’s ascension will bring any benevolent acts?”

“Who knows? I heard this lord shows neither joy nor anger on his face, but his political achievements as Crown Prince were quite remarkable.”

“How dare you discuss such matters publicly?”

Several scholarly-looking men passed by her, initially speaking with high spirits but then suddenly falling silent. Suzhen only heard someone ask in a lowered voice: “But what about the matter in Huai County?”

Huai County?

She trembled slightly, her heart burning with anxiety. Despite several fierce attempts, she still couldn’t squeeze through the human wall.

Her waist tightened as a familiar presence suddenly arrived. Amid cries of surprise from the crowd, the person holding her had used lightness skills to leap over the masses, placing her at the very front.

Suzhen finally knew what people were looking at.

Two imperial proclamations were posted at the city gate.

One contained many formal phrases, which could be summarized as: The king has died, the new ruler has ascended the throne.

The other, however, read: “Upon investigation, Minor Minister Feng of Huai County in Xunyang Commandery was a member of Prince Jin’s old faction. All four members of his household have been executed. Their corpses are displayed at Huai County’s city gate for three days as a warning to others. Anyone found in rebellion, once discovered, shall be punished ten or a hundredfold more severely, with the punishment extending to nine generations of their clan.”

Prince Jin was the emperor’s… no, the late emperor’s elder brother, who had launched a rebellion years ago and was ordered to death by the late emperor.

And Minor Minister Feng was precisely her father’s name.