Jichun smiled, “Madam said this is what Miss Wu deserves, and she also instructed that if you refuse to accept it, she won’t let me return to Cailan Pavilion. Please don’t make things difficult for me, Miss Wu.”

Seeing that she couldn’t refuse, Yunyi had no choice but to say, “Alright then, tomorrow Caiping and I will go together to thank Third Madam.”

Jichun responded kindly, and after she left, Jiang Caiping was so happy that her eyes curved into little crescents, saying repeatedly, “Third Madam is truly a good person. As soon as she learned we were docked wages, she had Miss Jichun bring two strings of coins.”

Speaking of this, she remembered something, “Oh right, when Third Madam pulled sister away earlier, what was it about? Why did Miss Jichun say it was what sister deserved?”

Yunyi lightly tapped her forehead, “You, don’t ask so many questions. Tomorrow hurry and have someone take the money out to your family, don’t delay your father’s medical treatment. If it’s not enough, I have more…”

“It’s enough, it’s enough.” Jiang Caiping said with a grin, “This one string of coins is enough for them to use. If it’s really not enough, I’ll naturally ask sister for more.”

Seeing her say this, Yunyi didn’t insist. After tidying up, she went to bed to rest. Last night she had been thinking sometimes of Li Shimin, sometimes of Chunxiu’s matter, and hadn’t slept all night. Today she was truly exhausted.

Without Chunxiu causing trouble, the days in the music hall were peaceful and tranquil, passing by swiftly one after another. What was unexpected was that Li Xuanba had come to find Jiang Caiping several times, sometimes asking her to dance, sometimes to play the pipa. Each time afterwards, he would find fault with everything, making Jiang Caiping quite angry and unwilling to deal with him anymore. But this young master seemed addicted, always finding new ways to seek her out.

On the twenty-third day of the first month, about half a month had passed since Li Jiancheng left Honghua Prefecture. Under Li Jiancheng’s urging, they had already traveled over six hundred li from Honghua Prefecture. Although there were post stations along the way, to avoid revealing their whereabouts as much as possible, Li Jiancheng had his men stay at inns.

This night, Jirong was changing Li Jiancheng’s medicine when Feng Li walked in. After calling out “First Young Master,” he stood to one side.

After Jirong rewrapped the wound with gauze, Li Jiancheng said, “I’ve been feeling very itchy around the wound these past few days. Could there be something wrong with the medicine?”

Jirong smiled slightly, “This servant just examined First Young Master’s wound, and there’s nothing abnormal. The itching you feel indicates that the bone fracture is healing well. By this servant’s estimation, by the time we reach Hedong, your leg injury should be almost completely healed.”

“That’s good.” Li Jiancheng nodded with satisfaction, then said, “You may withdraw.”

“Yes.” Jirong withdrew as instructed. After the door closed, Li Jiancheng looked at Feng Li, “Is there news?”

Feng Li nodded and carefully related the message he had just received to Li Jiancheng. If Li Shimin were present, he would be very surprised, because what Feng Li was talking about was precisely the Feng Chunxiu case that had occurred in Honghua Prefecture some days ago.

After he finished speaking, Li Jiancheng frowned tightly, “You’re saying that Shimin intervened in the county office’s case investigation without authorization to help Wu Meixue?”

“Yes, and in the end it was proven that Feng Chunxiu died accidentally, not harmed by Wu Meixue.” Before Feng Li finished speaking, Li Jiancheng already said with displeasure, “Such a murder case should be handled by the county magistrate. What business did he have interfering? This just invites criticism.”

“According to the news received, Second Young Master helped County Magistrate Qin solve Feng Chunxiu’s case this time, clearing Wu Meixue’s name, and gained considerable affection from the people of the prefecture and county. There shouldn’t be any problems.”

“What use is affection? As long as someone with ill intentions reports this to the Emperor, it could make the entire Li family suffer!” With that, he angrily slapped the armrest and said irritably, “This Shimin, he’s usually calm and composed, but whenever it involves Wu Meixue, he loses his judgment, becoming more outrageous each time. And Father too, allowing him to act so recklessly in such an important matter.”

That day, when he saw Li Shimin would rather offend Wang Wei and the others than hand over Wu Meixue, he sensed Li Shimin’s attitude toward the latter was extremely abnormal. Although Li Shimin repeatedly stated that his actions weren’t because of Wu Meixue and that he hadn’t fallen for this dancer, he remained uneasy. So before leaving, he arranged for people to monitor Li Shimin’s situation, and if anything happened, they would immediately send word by carrier pigeon. As a result, in less than half a month, such a thing had occurred.

Feng Li suggested, “Why don’t you write a letter back to admonish Second Young Master?”

Li Jiancheng said coldly, “Shimin has already been bewitched by Wu Meixue to the point of confusion. How could he listen to my advice? Instead, it would let him know that I’ve arranged for people to secretly monitor him.” The next moment, he said something that made Feng Li’s face change with horror, “You immediately return to Honghua Prefecture and kill Wu Meixue.”

Feng Li exclaimed in shock, “First Young Master, this… how can this be proper? Although those two incidents were both caused by Wu Meixue, she’s not to blame!”

Li Jiancheng said calmly, “I know, but beauty brings disaster. This woman will harm Shimin sooner or later. Only by killing her can we eliminate future troubles forever.” For him, killing wasn’t difficult – he had been bloodied by warfare since his youth when following Li Yuan on campaigns.

“Moreover, this is the most critical time for the Li family. I don’t want any unstable factors to exist, no matter how small – they must be eliminated immediately!” Li Jiancheng’s face looked particularly cold in the orange candlelight, making Feng Li involuntarily shiver.

Li Jiancheng glanced at him and said lightly, “What, can’t bring yourself to do it?”

Feng Li was silent for a long while, then gritted his teeth and bowed, “This subordinate will immediately set out for Honghua Prefecture!”

Li Jiancheng nodded with satisfaction, then said, “Those dancers leave the manor to return home every first and fifteenth of the month. Wait until Wu Meixue leaves the manor before acting.” Without waiting for Feng Li to agree, he added, “Remember, only you and I know about this matter. No third person must know.”

“This subordinate will remember.” After saying this, Feng Li went to the inn’s back courtyard, led out a horse, and left in the night. Jirong stood at the window, watching Feng Li depart. Strange, what was Feng Li doing going out so late? And… this road seemed to be the one they had come from. Could it be that Feng Li was returning to Honghua Prefecture?

Yunyi didn’t know she had already become someone Li Jiancheng wanted to kill. During this time, she had been trying to find ways to get close to Li Yuan, but unfortunately, since the last attack, Li Yuan had become extremely cautious. No matter where he went, guards never left his side, making it difficult for her to act.

The only fortunate thing was that because of Lin Shi’s intervention, apart from the three-month wage deduction, Wan Shi hadn’t troubled them again.

Worth mentioning was that Zhang Chenyue, unable to endure the torture in the dungeon, had taken advantage of the guards’ negligence to kill herself by running into the wall. As for whether she was really an assassin and whether she had accomplices, it remained unknown.