After Yun Lianqing looked at the woman who had thrown herself on top of him, he carefully examined her face, which seemed somewhat familiar…

After a moment, Yun Lianqing finally remembered who this woman was. Wasn’t she the Prime Minister Mu’s daughter? Called Mu’ai or something? She had accompanied her father to several banquets before, so he had seen her a few times.

However, what was she playing at?

A sheltered daughter from an official’s family—where did she get the audacity to send assassins to ambush him…

From the looks of it, she seemed intent on playing out a scene with him, but he had no interest in playing along. Qinghuan was still waiting with an empty stomach!

To the side, when the men in black saw this scene, they stepped back. The leader muttered, “Not good, there’s blood. Run!”

With that, they prepared to leave one by one.

Seeing them about to flee, Yun Lianqing grew anxious. If these people ran away, the situation here would be difficult to explain!

Immediately, he used his strength to push Mu’ai, who was lying on top of him, away.

…

…

“Ouch…” Mu’ai’s back had been cut by the knife, and now, being pushed by Yun Lianqing, her wound tore further. As misfortune would have it, she landed on her back, making her whole body tremble with pain, feeling as if she might faint at any moment.

“Crown Prince…” After a painful cry, Mu’ai looked pitifully at Yun Lianqing. Before coming, she had deliberately applied a lot of white powder on her face to make herself look weaker and pitiful when injured.

She stared at Yun Lianqing so earnestly, but he completely ignored her, his face stern as he took out his folding fan again and aimed it at the men in black before him.

“Committing crimes in broad daylight—none of you will escape.” As he spoke, his wrist flicked lightly, and silver needles shot out from the fan again, targeting the legs of the men in black.

Those men in black had originally thought Yun Lianqing was just for show and couldn’t withstand a fight, but as these silver needles swiftly embedded themselves in their calves, they finally felt a chill run down their spines.

Seeing them lose their balance and fall to their knees one by one, Yun Lianqing couldn’t help but give a cold laugh. “With your level of skill, you’re probably the cheapest kind of assassins in the business, right?”

“Who hired you? No money yet playing at murder for hire—too much free time?” After saying this, Yun Lianqing’s gaze slowly fell on Mu’ai.

Mu’ai was caught by Yun Lianqing’s cold and profound glance, making her shudder involuntarily. Her lips gradually turned white as she unconsciously clutched the weeds beside her hand.

“Speak, who sent you?” Yun Lianqing used his fan to lift the chin of one of the men in black, his voice revealing anger.

The man in black shifted his eyes, his confidence not as high as before, and instinctively looked toward Mu’ai…

“Why are you looking at me? I didn’t tell you to kill anyone. Don’t slander me!” Seeing the man in black looking at her, Mu’ai immediately spoke up excitedly, supporting her injured body to sit up from the ground.

“Speak!” Yun Lianqing tapped the man’s head with his fan again. These people were dawdling—if Qinghuan went hungry because of this, he would dig up their ancestral graves.

The man in black was also a bit flustered and pointed at Mu’ai…

To be honest, they weren’t professional assassins but just some street thugs from the city who knew martial arts. If it weren’t for Mu’ai giving them a large sum of money and claiming that the Crown Prince wasn’t skilled in martial arts—that they just needed to cut her and then retreat—they wouldn’t have actively undertaken this task.

Now it seemed they had all underestimated this Crown Prince.

This Crown Prince appeared idle and frivolous in daily life, but unexpectedly, his martial skills were extremely refined. Just with the hidden weapons in a folding fan, he had taken them all down…

“No, no, no, it wasn’t me. You cut me with a knife and now you’re slandering me!” Mu’ai’s eyes flashed with panic. This was something she absolutely could not admit to.

As for the men in black, they naturally dared not take the blame themselves. Attempting to assassinate the current Crown Prince was a capital offense!

“This is the bank note Mu’ai gave us, a total of five hundred taels.” The man in black took out the bank note and shakily handed it to Yun Lianqing.

Yun Lianqing reached out to take it, and after seeing the seal on the bank note, raised his eyebrow with a playful smile on his lips. He waved the bank note in his hand and looked toward Mu’ai.

“Five hundred taels—Miss Mu is quite generous. However…” Yun Lianqing dragged out the last syllable, turning to examine these men in black before addressing Mu’ai again, “To spend five hundred taels hiring these people and then having them cut you with a knife—you’re boundlessly stupid.”

Mu’ai trembled more and more, curling up into a ball, too panicked to know how to explain.

She should have known better than to listen to Meng Wei.

Meng Wei had made it sound so simple, making her think the plan would be flawless. Who knew it would be so easily seen through? Now, now…

Thinking of her current predicament, Mu’ai felt as if a bucket of cold water had been poured over her. She instantly sobered up and quickly changed to a kneeling position. “Mu’ai was momentarily confused. Please forgive me, Crown Prince…”

“Then first tell this Crown Prince, what was your purpose in doing this?” Although Yun Lianqing could guess somewhat, he still wanted to hear the reason firsthand.

“I, I…” Mu’ai was somewhat troubled. After all, she was an unmarried lady. How could she speak of such things?

Yun Lianqing grew impatient and shouted at Mu’ai, “Speak quickly!”

“Yes, yes, yes.” Mu’ai was so frightened that she shuddered, tears streaming down her face. “I wanted to marry into your Crown Prince’s mansion, so when I heard that the new Crown Princess had a marriage contract with you because of a life-saving favor, I came up with this idea…”

With this explanation, Yun Lianqing understood perfectly. No wonder she had immediately taken a knife for him.

Fortunately, he had noticed something suspicious here. Otherwise, if this woman’s plan had succeeded, he might have been forced to marry such a woman.

“Oh?” Yun Lianqing raised his eyebrows, then sighed. “Prime Minister Mu is upright and dutiful, and is also my father’s most valued minister. If people knew that his daughter hired assassins to harm the Crown Prince…”

“Crown Prince, Mu’ai knows her mistake. Please spare Mu’ai this once!” Before Yun Lianqing could finish, Mu’ai quickly kowtowed to Yun Lianqing repeatedly, completely disregarding the deepening wound on her back.

If her father found out, even if the Crown Prince forgave her, her father would request to deal with her according to the law.

Yun Lianqing coldly watched this scene and shook his head helplessly. Of course, he wouldn’t tell Prime Minister Mu about this matter, nor would he let it spread.

It was just a young girl’s trick after all. Having taught her a lesson was enough. Making a big deal out of it wouldn’t be good for anyone, especially since this Prime Minister Mu was a loyal minister hard to come by.

“Then about that wound on your back, if the Prime Minister asks…” Yun Lianqing glanced at the wound on Mu’ai’s back, which was bleeding profusely.

“I accidentally fell and hurt myself. It has nothing to do with the Crown Prince.” Mu’ai replied with a shiver.

Yun Lianqing smiled. “That’s good then. Since this Crown Prince wasn’t injured, I won’t pursue this matter further.”

“But if there’s a next time…” Yun Lianqing narrowed his eyes, his tone becoming more serious, “This Crown Prince won’t be so lenient. Whatever punishment or penalty is appropriate, nothing will be spared.”

With that, Yun Lianqing left the grass patch.

Back on the path to buy food, thinking about what had just happened, Yun Lianqing still found it amusing. How stupid must Mu’ai be to orchestrate such a thing?

Now she had taken a knife for nothing—it was laughable.

…

On his way back to the small village with the food he had purchased, Yun Lianqing passed that small path again, and the grass patch was now empty.

At this moment, Yun Lianqing suddenly had an idea.

…

“Qinghuan, you’ve been busy for so long, please eat something first.” When he returned to the village, Bai Qinghuan had finished seeing patients and was now brewing medicine for several villagers.

After Yun Lianqing brought the food, Bai Qinghuan looked at him and then frowned. “What happened to your hand?”

“It’s nothing. You eat first, don’t worry about me.” After placing the meal on the table with his right hand, Yun Lianqing turned his back and covered his left arm.

Bai Qinghuan approached him, making a move to pull his left hand. “Don’t move, let me see.”

“I’m fine…”

“Don’t move!” Bai Qinghuan pulled his left hand and found that his left sleeve had been cut by a sharp object, with blood stains all over it. After pulling up Yun Lianqing’s sleeve, she discovered a cut on his left arm, seemingly inflicted by a dagger or similar weapon.

Seeing that the wound was quite deep, Bai Qinghuan looked up at Yun Lianqing. “What happened? How did you suddenly get injured while everything was fine?”

“Nothing much, just encountered some mountain bandits. The food is still hot, please eat first. I’ll go bandage this myself.” Yun Lianqing gestured for Bai Qinghuan to eat first, then walked to the side.

Bai Qinghuan sighed and followed behind Yun Lianqing, pulling him to sit on a chair. “Don’t move. Let me put some medicine on it for you.”

“You eat first…”

“I won’t starve to death.”

In the end, Bai Qinghuan still helped Yun Lianqing apply medicine first.

During the process, Bai Qinghuan kept her head down, extremely focused, sprinkling the medicinal powder bit by bit on Yun Lianqing’s wound, then using a handkerchief to clean the blood from his arm.

Yun Lianqing had been holding back laughter the whole time. Several times he almost couldn’t hold it in, causing his body to shake involuntarily. Bai Qinghuan thought he was in pain from the wound, so while applying the medicine, she even gently blew on Yun Lianqing’s wound.

Yun Lianqing suddenly felt that cutting himself had been worth it.

“All done. Be careful not to get it wet.” After bandaging, Bai Qinghuan instructed Yun Lianqing.

Yun Lianqing nodded. “Go eat now, don’t worry about me.”

“Hmm.” Bai Qinghuan stood up and walked to the table, opening the food Yun Lianqing had bought. The aromatic smell that wafted up increased her appetite.

As she picked up her chopsticks and was about to eat, she seemed to remember something and glanced at Yun Lianqing. “You haven’t eaten either, have you? Come join me.”

After speaking, Bai Qinghuan handed another pair of chopsticks to Yun Lianqing.

This was exactly the moment Yun Lianqing had been waiting for. He quickly nodded, walked over, and sat down beside Bai Qinghuan, taking the chopsticks from her hand.

Bai Qinghuan gave Yun Lianqing a box of rice and then began to eat methodically.

Yun Lianqing picked up his chopsticks and also began to eat slowly.

After eating a few bites, Bai Qinghuan suddenly spoke in a rather teasing tone, “It’s fortunate that you injured your left hand. If it had been your right hand, I might have had to feed you.”

Yun Lianqing thought: If only I had known, I would have cut my right hand instead…