“Below Beiming Peak on Wangchuan Road, Brother Yue was being pursued and assassinated. At that time, he had a blade wound in his back and a spear wound in his abdomen. Only an elder surnamed Mo was by his side protecting him.” Ye Qi said, “Back then, I was on my way home…”

Hearing the character “Mo,” Changling asked, “Are you speaking of East Sword Mo Daoyun?”

Seeing her grasp the point immediately, Ye Qi was slightly surprised. “Miss, you know him?”

Mo Daoyun, foremost of the Four Sword Saints of the jianghu, claimed to have no sect or school—one person, one sword. He had only met her elder brother by chance in the jianghu. After drinking a few cups of wine, on a whim he followed him to Taixing. Changling didn’t know much about this person—she hadn’t even fought with him.

Seeing her lost in thought, Ye Qi didn’t ask further and continued, “I once received kindness from the Yue family. Seeing Brother Yue in difficulty, there was no reason not to help. Fortunately, at that time, a loyal servant by my side possessed strong martial skills. Together with Elder Mo, they eliminated all the pursuers one by one, then brought Yue Changsheng into a mountain cave to heal his wounds. Actually, thinking back, though his injuries were severe, with a good physician at his side, they weren’t necessarily incurable…”

“Did Yue Changsheng say who injured him?”

“Yes,” Ye Qi nodded. “He said the one who wounded him from behind was his left vice-general Wei Xingyun, now the Grand General of Western Xia. The person who stabbed him from the front was the then-leader of Feiying Sect, Kong Buwu.”

The three characters “Wei Xingyun” hadn’t yet made her grit her teeth in hatred when Changling heard the second half of the sentence and couldn’t help but freeze. “Kong Buwu?”

She had personally witnessed how Kong Buwu mutually protected the Yue family army unto death. At his dying moment, his eyes had reddened as he urged her to flee quickly. How could he instead have become the chief culprit who secretly harmed her elder brother?

“Impossible. Kong Buwu was loyal to the Yue family. He absolutely couldn’t have done such a thing.”

“This is what Yue Changsheng told me personally.”

Changling hesitated. “Then did he say who betrayed the Yue family army?”

“Didn’t I just say? It was Wei Xingyun.”

“What else?” Changling’s breathing quickened. “Didn’t he say… Jing Wuwei… Shen Yao?”

Hearing Changling call Shen Yao directly by name, Ye Qi’s gaze sharpened. Changling grasped his shoulder with one hand, urgently asking, “He didn’t know… that it was Shen Yao who betrayed the Yue family?”

“How, how could it be Shen…” Ye Qi was bewildered by her abnormal behavior. “Although the current… may not be a good… but back then he devoted full effort to revitalizing the Yue family army and issued imperial edicts summoning righteous warriors throughout the realm to avenge the Yue family—this is known to all… Did you get something wrong somewhere?”

This time Changling didn’t rush to refute.

Her heart was desolate as wasteland.

Shen Yao had become the heroic leader who revitalized the Yue family. Was there anything more laughable, more absurd under heaven than this?

“Are you… alright?”

Changling’s lowered long lashes trembled slightly. “What happened after?”

“Someone brought troops in pursuit and completely sealed the mountain cave inside and out. They set fire to dead branches, wanting to smoke us to death. Guan Bo… my family servant discovered there was a small hole in the cave that led to an outer river. It was just large enough for a child to squeeze through, so he had me escape alone…”

Ye Qi paused here. He sensed Changling’s back stiffen slightly.

“The eldest young master knew he couldn’t escape this calamity. Trusting me, he gave me this ring-jade and the half broken fan… What happened after, you already know.”

Big Brother… was smoked to death alive.

Many memories churned inside her with nowhere to go. Changling’s eyes trembled, finally landing back on Ye Qi. “So, after you escaped, you didn’t even verify who killed Yue Changsheng. You just gave the things he entrusted to you to Fu Liujing?”

Ye Qi’s heart suddenly jumped. No matter how oblivious he was, he could hear the reproach in these words.

“At that time I…”

Before the words could leave his mouth, two “knock knock” sounds came from outside the door. Seventh Uncle said carefully, “Marquis, something happened at the banquet hall. All the sect leaders are waiting for you to go over.”

“Oh.” Ye Qi responded vaguely.

During the conversation just now, some sentence seemed to have sparked fragmented dissonance, stirring his thoughts into a tangled mess. Before he could sort them out, he first stuffed the ring-jade in his hand into Changling’s. “I’ll go handle things first. I’ll come back in a bit to continue talking.”

He stood up and walked two steps, then turned back uneasily. Seeing her sitting there quietly, he finally turned and left.

The ring-jade in her palm still carried a thread of residual warmth.

Changling reviewed every sentence Ye Qi had just said over and over—almost every one was too incredible.

With Wei Xingyun’s skills and Big Brother’s trust in him, if he wanted to strike from behind, one blade would be enough to kill.

Yet Big Brother said it was Wei Xingyun and Kong Buwu who attempted to kill him.

Setting aside whether Wei Xingyun had betrayed, the Kong Buwu that Big Brother saw was most likely not the real person.

So from the very beginning, Big Brother had been kept in the dark.

And not only was he kept in the dark—he was also rescued by Mo Daoyun.

Even if Shen Yao was a novice who couldn’t even stab properly from behind, Fu Liujing would never make such a low-level mistake.

Unless they deliberately let Big Brother “leave.”

A suffocating feeling that was about to envelop her rose up.

Changling left the hot spring pool with a splash and paced to the window, letting the cold wind blow directly at her face. She took two deep breaths.

Back then, the Shen family had prestige but insufficient military force. Even if they killed her elder brother, the Yue family army wouldn’t necessarily pledge allegiance to the Shen family—but if they raised the banner of seeking justice for the two young masters of the Yue family, just the righteous warriors in the jianghu who hated the northern barbarians would rise up and follow, not to mention the old Yue family subordinates far away at the Jiangdong main camp.

Mingyue Zhou had once said, “The Shen family army escaped by luck and, holding Yue Changsheng’s handwritten letter, rallied the troops of the Yue family’s four Bashu commanderies in the name of revenge to counterattack Taixing, nearly annihilating all of us Yan army…”

Handwritten letter.

In this long sentence, Changling seized upon the key words.

Then her own speculation sent goosebumps all over her body.

…That Big Brother was kept in the dark until his death was probably all part of a scheme.

A perfect scheme laid out by Fu Liujing together with Shen Yao.

When Ye Qi rushed to the banquet hall, the “leader” of Western Xia’s Tianxin Sect, Huo Deng, lay face-up on the ground, foaming at the mouth, unable to move.

Inside the hall, Eastern Xia and Western Xia each stood in separate groups. The weapons in their hands had already been drawn, looking ready to come to blows at any moment.

As soon as Elder Feng of Tianxin Sect saw the young marquis return, he immediately shouted, “To damage our Western Xia martial world’s vitality, you Eastern Xia people actually worked with the marquis residence to do such despicable things. Today, even if my Tianxin Sect must sacrifice this life, we absolutely won’t let this rest!”

As soon as the words fell, the whisk in Elder Feng’s hand swept toward the opposite table. Everyone present instinctively moved aside, but saw the white silk threads on the whisk suddenly detach from the handle in a flash, like pear blossom needles, attacking straight toward Marquis He’s direction.

Before anyone could cry out in alarm, the whisk threads pitter-pattered against the young marquis’s body, then fell limply to the ground.

Ye Qi stood in place without moving. Seeing Elder Feng’s expression of “this is impossible,” he casually picked up a white thread from his body and waved it. “Elder Feng, before the banquet started, I accidentally broke your whisk, so I had the steward quietly replace it with a new one. It’s probably not as good as your original. My apologies.”

“Elder Feng!” Lu Tianlan sensed something wrong. “Just now, were you planning to attack our young marquis?”

Elder Feng threw down the empty stick. “So what if I was? Our Tianxin Sect came this time because we heard Marquis He had driven away the northern barbarians. We respected his loyalty and righteousness, so we came to Eastern Xia for martial friendship. Never did we imagine… you would poison the food and drink… Such scum are truly the shame of the martial world, deserving of death!”

At these words, the other Western Xia sect leaders all showed angry expressions. Ye Qi stepped forward. “Sect leaders, do you feel uncomfortable anywhere? If not, there’s no need to listen to this Elder Feng’s alarmist talk.”

Elder Feng pointed at Huo Deng on the ground. “After my sect leader drank wine, he became like this. How do you explain this?”

The Western Xia sect leaders’ expressions suddenly changed.

“Oh?” Ye Qi walked forward, hands tucked in his sleeves. “You just said Sect Leader Huo drank what?”

“I said wine…”

“But at today’s banquet, this marquis didn’t prepare fine wine for everyone. What’s in the wine pots is chilled snow pear juice. Didn’t Elder Feng taste it? Or perhaps, you didn’t drink it at all?” Ye Qi smiled grimly. “Or rather, you simply didn’t drink anything at all?”

When Changling came out of the young marquis’s “boudoir,” she took a somewhat roundabout route before finding her way to the corridor leading to the banquet hall.

Inside the hall, lights blazed brightly. There were no guards outside the door—probably all busy feeding each other rod strikes.

She leaped onto the roof and heard Lu Tianlan’s alarmed shouting from inside: “They’re not from Tianxin Sect? Then which dog bastards are they?”

Ye Qi said, “Tianxin Sect was attacked and injured on their way to Eastern Xia and had already returned home. The three elders look physically healthy. I wonder which of the Seven Kills Hall’s elders you are? Now that you’ve entered my Eastern Qi Marquis residence, do you plan to leave alive?”

As soon as these words fell, the sounds of fighting immediately rang out. Without even thinking, she knew what scene was unfolding—Changling sighed, thinking: So he’d already seen through Seven Kills Hall’s scheme.

She had waited in the room for quite a while without seeing Ye Qi return. Fearing Seven Kills Hall might pull some other trick, she slipped out to take a look. Seeing the young marquis enjoying himself in the performance, she had no intention of going down to join in. Instead, she simply sprawled on the beam to watch the excitement.

After about the time to drink a cup of tea, things finally quieted down inside. Ye Qi said to someone unknown, “Sect Leader Wang, Sect Leader Shen, I’ve long heard that disciples of your noble sects have died at the hands of Seven Kills Hall. Since you’ve traveled from afar this time, consider these three Seven Kills Hall elders a meeting gift from our Eastern Xia. Please accept them.”

“Young Marquis… this…”

Ye Qi said, “This banquet was originally His Majesty’s idea. Our Eastern Xia martial world truly wishes to befriend Kunlun Mountain and Hewu Sect. Moreover, Seven Kills Hall originated from Western Xia. Returning them to you for disposal is naturally more appropriate.”

Hearing this, Changling’s form stiffened.

His Majesty? What did that mean? Could today’s events all be Ye Qi helping Shen Yao win over the Western Xia martial world?

Sure enough, upon hearing these words, the two sect leaders from Kunlun Mountain and Hewu Sect thanked him repeatedly. Ye Qi then perfunctorily said a few flattering words on behalf of the court. The more Changling listened, the worse she felt. Wind grew beneath her feet, and she disappeared from the rooftop.

Ye Qi kept Changling in his thoughts the whole time. Before affairs at the banquet hall were even finished, he rushed back urgently.

In the distance of three corridors, he went from worrying whether she’d feel stuffy in the room, to whether she’d faint from hunger, to whether she’d fall into the pool—the one thing he didn’t consider was the possibility she might leave.

After pushing open the door, his leaping and jumping heart stuck halfway. Ye Qi stood dumbly in the doorway for a moment, then called for Seventh Uncle.

Seventh Uncle was busy as hell, of course he had no spare time to manage when a young lady had left. Unfortunately, the young marquis never cared about the big picture. After confirming she wasn’t in the marquis residence, he had Seventh Uncle personally make a trip to the Jing residence.

“Go to the Jing residence for what?”

Ye Qi said, “Miss Jing broke through the gate today. This matter will most likely reach Jing Wuwei’s ears. With his suspicious nature, he’ll definitely become suspicious of her. You go and explain now. Say that previously our gatekeeper Old Chen got drunk and offended Miss Jing, so in her anger she broke in to settle accounts. You’ve already investigated this matter clearly. Oh, you must also make the attitude clear—say that although this matter was our residence’s fault, tonight’s banquet for the Western Xia martial world was of great importance. Jing Nanxu nearly disrupted major affairs, and this marquis is quite displeased about it.”

Seventh Uncle didn’t quite understand. “Am I going to explain… or am I holding the marquis accountable on your behalf?”

Ye Qi was so anxious he wished he could go himself. “Naturally, you’re using the guise of accountability to explain things clearly.”

Now Seventh Uncle understood. With oil on his feet, he vanished in a puff of smoke.

Outside the marquis residence, the streets and alleys were brightly lit. Even after nightfall, it was still “precious horses and carved carriages fragrant on the road,” the muddy darkness invisible.

Changling led her horse forward aimlessly, watching the coming and going people, all sorts mixed among them. She only felt that their laughing chatter had nothing to do with her at all. Those enemies related to her were all living more carefree and unrestrained than she’d imagined.

No one cared whether that mortal flesh concealed filth and corruption.

Even Ye Qi was the same.

Changling rarely sulked. Generally when she got angry, others would quickly kneel and beg for mercy, or blood would splash on the scene.

So much so that she hadn’t even realized now that she was venting her anger on others.

Even though she knew Ye Qi had been misled by Changsheng. Even though she knew Ye Qi had always done his utmost for the Yue family.

But thinking about how he addressed Shen Yao as sovereign and subject, how he actually worked for Shen Yao—she couldn’t swallow this resentment.

Changling knew that to seek revenge, at least… to see Shen Yao, Young Marquis He was an excellent shortcut. But now… she had no confidence about “whether he’d stand on her side against the current emperor if she revealed her identity.”

This step was critically important. How should she take it, and toward whom?

Changling walked the entire way without managing to smooth out that resentment.

By the time she reached the Jing residence, night had deepened further. She pushed the horse back into the stable and walked toward the north wing with her head down when someone blocked her path.

It was Jing Wuwei.