“The Prince of Qin…” Lady Wan slowly repeated these two words, her fingers gently twisting at her sleeves as she said coolly, “His life or death originally has nothing to do with me, but to prevent the Crown Prince from being pleased, if something happens to him, I will certainly try my best to protect him.”

Zhaixing’s eyes flickered slightly as she said in a low voice, “I’m afraid it will be like before – the Crown Prince will strike secretly, and even if we want to protect the Prince of Qin, we won’t have the opportunity.”

“No.” Lady Wan said firmly, “The Prince of Qin is not like the young and inexperienced Zhiyun of those days, with no resistance. It won’t be so easy for the Crown Prince to assassinate him secretly. By my estimation, he should use the power of the court to deal with the Prince of Qin.”

Zhaixing nodded, “Now that Consort Ji is unharmed and hasn’t fallen from favor, should we…” Before she could finish, Lady Wan raised her hand, “This matter has just passed. It’s not appropriate to act again. Acting too hastily would arouse Ji’s suspicions.” After a pause, she said, “Tomorrow, ask the Crown Princess to come to Shangyang Palace. After this incident, she must be filled with hatred for Jirong, believing everything was Jirong’s deliberate frame-up. As long as I say a few timely words, I believe that from now on, she will become my best ally in dealing with Jirong and even Li Jiancheng!”

“The Crown Prince?” Zhaixing and Chuyun exchanged surprised glances, “Lady Zheng is the Crown Princess. It’s possible she would deal with Consort Ji, but to deal with the Crown Prince, I’m afraid…”

Lady Wan picked up a piece of silver thread pastry but didn’t eat it, merely examining it carefully, “The human heart is like this silver thread pastry in my hand. Once broken, it can never be put back together.” With these words, she applied slight pressure with her fingers, and the originally crispy and distinct silver thread pastry was instantly crushed to powder, becoming a pile of crumbs that scattered to the ground as she released her hand.

Seeing that Zhaixing and the others still looked puzzled, Lady Wan clapped her hands, “Think about it – in the matter of Jirong’s false pregnancy, whom did the Crown Prince trust from beginning to end, and whom did he wholeheartedly want to depose?”

“He trusted Consort Ji naturally, and wanted to depose the Crown Princess.” Hearing Chuyun’s words, Lady Wan smiled slightly, “That’s right. In the matter of Li Chengzong and the false pregnancy, Lady Zheng, as the principal wife, has consistently been suspected by Li Jiancheng, who even wanted to strip her of her Crown Princess position. With Li Jiancheng being so heartless, Lady Zheng’s affection for him has probably been worn away.”

Zhaixing said with sudden understanding, “Not only that, although she kept her Crown Princess position this time, as long as the Crown Prince still favors Consort Ji, her position remains unstable.”

Chuyun continued, “His Majesty is still here and can suppress the Crown Prince, but if one day the Crown Prince ascends the throne, then no one in the world can restrain him anymore. Deposing or establishing would be at his whim.”

Lady Wan’s eyes shifted, her expression half-smiling, “So then, what reason does Lady Zheng have to continue following Li Jiancheng with wholehearted devotion?”

“This slave understands. Tomorrow morning this slave will go deliver the message.” Speaking thus, Zhaixing smiled, “Being an enemy of Your Ladyship is probably the most unwise thing the Crown Prince has ever done in his life.”

Lady Wan rose and walked into the palace courtyard, gazing toward the direction of the Eastern Palace, saying coldly, “Regardless of whether it was wise or not, he has already done it. He is destined to be in a fight to the death with me for the rest of his life!”

Neither Li Jiancheng nor Jirong could have dreamed that the mastermind behind all this would be Lady Wan, having nothing to do with Lady Zheng at all.

As early as when she guessed that Zhiyun was harmed by Li Jiancheng, Lady Wan began plotting her plan to deal with Li Jiancheng, and the first person she targeted was Jirong, who had betrayed her.

The Wan family were wealthy magnates of Jiangnan, naturally with profound resources. Finding several loyal people to serve Lady Wan was naturally an easy matter, the first being A’yue, whom Li Jiancheng and the others had searched everywhere for but couldn’t find.

Lady Wan inconspicuously arranged for A’yue to work at the Li residence. The latter had been looking for an opportunity to strike, and upon learning that Qiulin prepared bean curd for Li Chengzong daily, the physician secretly brought by the Wan family suggested to Lady Wan to mix honey with the bean curd. Though this wouldn’t take Li Chengzong’s life, it could make him deaf. In a situation where he couldn’t speak well yet, suddenly cutting off all sound from the outside world would inevitably affect his future speech. In other words, Li Chengzong would not only be deaf but also mute.

Making Jirong watch a deaf and mute son daily and suffer endless torment – wouldn’t this be more satisfying than killing him with one blow?!

Everything went as Lady Wan had arranged. A’yue claimed to be Lady Zheng’s servant and persuaded Qiulin to use honey to flavor the bean curd. Li Chengzong liked it very much and ate it daily. By the time Jirong discovered it, it was too late.

She had arranged for A’yue to leave Chang’an beforehand, so although Li Jiancheng searched everywhere, he never found any trace of A’yue. Later, Lady Zheng, implicated in this matter and seeking to clear herself, used Zheng An’s hand to pin the blame on Nanny Tong, who had nothing to do with it.

Although Li Chengzong caused Jirong unbearable pain, it was still far from enough, so she immediately began preparing another matter with great urgency – making Jirong falsely pregnant.

In the entire affair, except for her, Zhaixing, Chuyun, and the physician and several trusted aides transferred to her by the Wan family, everyone else was kept in the dark, including Jirong herself.

Gao Qi was the first person she chose. At that time, the Zheng residence happened to have a house for sale, so she arranged for it to be sold to Gao Qi. The sale price was one hundred strings of cash, but what was given to the Zheng residence was twelve hundred strings, so Zheng An had no knowledge of the inside story and only thought it was an ordinary transaction.

At that time, though Gao Qi worked at the Imperial Medical Academy, he wasn’t yet an imperial physician and had no qualification to make house calls. Lady Wan secretly arranged this, naturally using the Zheng residence’s name.

At the same time, she arranged for people to work at both the Eastern Palace and the Zheng residence. The person who went to the Zheng residence was assigned to serve Zheng An’s fifth wife, secretly administering drugs to make that fifth wife unwell. After seeing several physicians with no improvement, she then arranged to mention Gao Qi’s name in front of her, claiming that though he was young, his medical skills were better than those who had been imperial physicians for decades, and with his treatment, she would surely recover.

This fifth wife originally had no qualification to request an imperial physician, but relying on her favor, she made a scene before Zheng An daily. Unable to bear her harassment, he had someone go to the Imperial Medical Academy specifically requesting Gao Qi. Zheng An was the Crown Princess’s uncle and a current marquis – the Imperial Medical Academy naturally didn’t dare refuse this favor.

According to Lady Wan’s plan, she would wait until Jirong was well into her pregnancy before leaking the news to Lady Zheng, having her expose it and making Li Jiancheng think Jirong was falsely pregnant to gain favor, thus punishing her.

However, with Jirong’s favor, completely eliminating her with just this matter was obviously impossible, so Lady Wan’s ultimate goal was to make Jirong and Lady Zheng fight to the death while she slowly enjoyed this drama and slowly avenged her son’s murder!

This plan was originally seamless, but who knew Jirong would detect it and follow the clues she left to trace it back to Lady Zheng, leading to today’s scene.