The contents of Bai Jinxiu’s letter revealed the investigation into the connection between Prince Liang’s mansion and the Wang family of Jiuqu Lane—it turned out Prince Liang’s mansion was trading in children with the Wang family. Bai Jinxiu had been having people watch both the Wang family of Jiuqu Lane and the stewards of Prince Liang’s mansion.

The secret guards sent by Bai Jinxiu personally witnessed the two parties meeting. They heard Prince Liang’s mansion steward say that from now on they wanted boys and girls under ten years old, and that next time they needed ten boys and ten girls. Then they quietly brought the five boys and five girls that the Wang family had brought into Prince Liang’s mansion.

Bai Qingyan lit the letter on fire, and only when it had burned almost completely did she place it in the brush washer.

What did Prince Liang’s mansion want with children?

The Emperor had already sent secret guards to protect Prince Liang’s mansion—the Emperor couldn’t be unaware that Prince Liang had brought ten children into his mansion.

Could it be… related to alchemy?

Bai Qingyan’s palm tightened as she sat in her chair, pursing her lips in silence for a long time.

Ever since Ji Langhua had caused such a commotion in the capital with his resurrection elixir, the Emperor seemed to have taken an interest in such matters, and Prince Liang had been using this to curry favor with the Emperor through elixirs.

A surge of anger rushed to Bai Qingyan’s head, making her ears buzz.

If her suspicions were correct, if Prince Liang truly dared to do something as beastly as using children to refine elixirs to please the Emperor…

If the Emperor knew about it and actually dared to consume them, or even if the Emperor had ordered it…

Then, the fate of the Jin Kingdom’s Lin family imperial power was truly finished.

“Is Uncle Liu at the mansion?” Bai Qingyan turned to ask Nanny Tong.

“He should be!”

“Nanny, have someone fetch Uncle Liu and Steward Hao to wait for me in the front hall!” After Bai Qingyan spoke, she picked up her brush to write a reply to Bai Jinxiu.

Bai Qingyan told Bai Jinxiu to continue having people watch the Wang family, not to alert them, and to carefully send someone to investigate the situation at Prince Liang’s mansion. Within their capabilities, they should try to ensure the safety of those ten children.

Some matters were no longer suitable for the pregnant Bai Jinxiu to handle, but the Crown Prince would be perfect for this.

After finishing and sealing the letter to Bai Jinxiu, she picked up her brush to write another letter to the Crown Prince.

Bai Qingyan informed the Crown Prince that Prince Liang might be secretly refining elixirs behind the Emperor’s back, and moreover, he was disregarding human life by using children in alchemy. If the Crown Prince could find a way to expose Prince Liang, he could surely remove this mortal enemy.

Now, Prince Liang was about to marry Liu Ruofu, and behind Liu Ruofu stood the Idle Prince, who held military power—the Crown Prince was more anxious than anyone.

If the Crown Prince also learned that Prince Liang was secretly refining elixirs, he would use this as leverage to deal with Prince Liang.

Even if the strategists behind the Crown Prince guessed that Prince Liang was refining elixirs for the Emperor, when choosing between preventing the Idle Prince’s only daughter from marrying Prince Liang and offending the Emperor, the Crown Prince would choose to prevent the Idle Prince’s only daughter, Liu Ruofu, from marrying Prince Liang.

Even though the Crown Prince was confident he had brought the Bai family army under his control, the Bai family army was far away in Nan Jiang—the Crown Prince must have been afraid in his heart.

Moreover, as long as Prince Liang’s path to the throne was blocked, aside from those few young ones, the Emperor would only have the Crown Prince as a son capable of great responsibility, leaving no one else to compete with the Crown Prince.

In terms of weighing pros and cons, Old Fang beside the Crown Prince… would never disappoint.

Bai Qingyan sealed both letters and brought them to the front hall.

Steward Liu and Steward Hao were already waiting for Bai Qingyan. Seeing Bai Qingyan enter and dismiss the attendants, both men realized the seriousness of the matter.

“Uncle Liu, send two reliable people to deliver these two letters to the capital with all haste. This one is for Jinxiu!” Bai Qingyan also handed over the other letter marked “For the Crown Prince’s Personal Attention.” “This one goes to the Crown Prince’s mansion!”

“Yes!” Steward Liu responded and went out.

“Steward Hao, I’ll trouble you to personally make a trip to the Prefect’s mansion and tell Shen Yancong… I want to inspect the training grounds early tomorrow morning! Also, casually inquire about this area plagued by bandits… how many families have reported missing children!” Bai Qingyan said.

Although Steward Hao didn’t know Bai Qingyan’s purpose, he knew that their eldest miss had her reasons for everything she did. He nodded in agreement: “Eldest Miss, rest assured.”

On the way back, Bai Qingyan had heard about many missing children incidents. It was quite a coincidence that Prince Liang’s mansion had taken ten children from the Wang mansion in Jiuqu Lane—Bai Qingyan found it hard not to connect the two incidents.

Steward Hao represented the Bai family, which was well known in Shouyang. If Steward Hao went to the Prefect’s mansion, the Prefect would naturally tell Steward Hao everything he knew if he wanted to curry favor with Bai Qingyan.

Seeing Steward Liu and Steward Hao leave one after another, Chun Tao finally entered the main hall.

The curtains and light gauze hanging on both sides of the carved and gold-decorated ebony pillars were gathered up with silver hooks. The flames of the sixteen-headed, branched copper lamps flickered high and low, their yellow light illuminating Bai Qingyan sitting thoughtfully to one side, like a beautiful painting.

Chun Tao felt sorry that Bai Qingyan hadn’t rested since returning. She stepped forward with small steps and asked in a low voice: “Eldest Miss, now that you’ve finished your business, please go rest early! This servant just heard… Fourth Miss went to rest as soon as she returned. Just now, when everyone dispersed from Shaohua Hall, Fourth Miss was so tired she couldn’t keep her eyes open and had to be carried back by the nanny who serves Third Madam.”

Only their eldest miss had barely closed her eyes except when bathing since entering the door, working continuously without stopping.

Hearing this, Bai Qingyan nodded to Chun Tao and rose to follow her along the covered walkway toward Boyun Courtyard, her mind still on the matter of bandits kidnapping children.

Although Lu Ping hadn’t yet returned from Ji Tingyu, Bai Qingyan had a feeling that these child-kidnapping bandits had probably chosen the area near Shouyang precisely because banditry was rampant here—they even dared to rob things belonging to the Crown Prince and the Princess of Zhenguo.

Whether these child-kidnapping “bandits” were the Wang family’s people or Prince Liang’s people, since they had come… they shouldn’t expect to leave with all their limbs intact.

After all, Bai Qingyan’s matter of training troops to suppress bandits for the people was known from the Emperor down to the common people. This was a perfect opportunity to use these so-called bandits as an example, which would also serve as an explanation to the Emperor.

Tomorrow, Bai Qingyan would go to the training grounds to see if the troops had been trained to some standard. If so, she could take them out for a trial, which would also let those who came with thoughts of just eating, drinking, and collecting silver know that this food and silver weren’t given for free. In the future, anyone else wanting to join the camp would have to consider their limits.

When Bai Qingyan returned to Boyun Courtyard, she didn’t rest but had Chun Tao help her strap on weighted iron sandbags to practice with her silver spear. Chun Tao and Nanny Tong felt terrible about this, but their miss was always decisive—no one could persuade her otherwise, so they could only accompany her while she stayed awake.

It wasn’t until Steward Hao returned from the Prefect’s mansion that Bai Qingyan inserted her silver spear back into its stand, wiped her sweat with a handkerchief, and had Nanny Tong invite Steward Hao to speak in the courtyard.

“The Prefect says that within his jurisdiction, including the seven reported today, a total of twenty-one children have gone missing. Of these twenty-one children, sixteen were taken by bandits.” Steward Hao stood beside Bai Qingyan, bowing his head as he spoke.

Bai Qingyan nodded: “I understand. Thank you for your hard work, Steward Hao. Please go rest!”