“This matter, truthfully, is my fault.”
Chai Yingluo looked directly at Wei Shubin, her expression undisturbed as if she had seen through worldly affairs and cared for nothing. Wei Shubin, however, felt anxious, shocked, and afraid. While she wanted to know the truth and see the results of her long efforts, she feared Chai Yingluo’s confession… This was, after all, a relative who had shown her tremendous kindness all along.
“When he left this jade ring as a memento if I had just found a place to keep it in my room, there wouldn’t have been so much trouble afterward. Why did I have to put it in my leather pouch… Ah, that day when Yi Niang was getting married, I was in her room when I suddenly heard the Empress was coming to visit. I felt the room’s smell wasn’t pleasant, so I told her to burn some incense. Yi Niang didn’t have any incense, and I was rushing to handle other matters, so I casually untied my leather pouch and gave it to Yi Niang’s nurse, telling her to use the fragrant balls inside to perfume the room…”
Wei Shubin remembered – it had happened exactly like that, and Lady Hela had mentioned it too. So the nurse had taken Chai Yingluo’s personal leather pouch, and opened it to look for the fragrant balls, but discovered this blood jade archer’s ring inside, and the nurse had recognized its origins.
“The jade ring was involved in such complex and secret matters, Sister Ying, yet you… so casually let outsiders see it?” Wei Shubin questioned.
Chai Yingluo let out a long sigh, closing her palm:
“How was I supposed to know this thing was so significant? I thought it was just an ordinary trinket, something the Crown Prince liked and left for me… By the wedding day, it had been with me for nearly a month, and I had almost forgotten about it. That day was so hectic that when I gave the pouch to Hela, I didn’t even think about what else was inside besides the fragrant balls – even if I had remembered, I wouldn’t have thought it inappropriate. It was just a jade ornament, doesn’t everyone have a few? I’m not an immortal, how could I guess that Hela and Yi Niang, looking so honest, would dare to secretly steal my jewelry?”
Yes, Wei Shubin suddenly understood. Chai Yingluo hadn’t known the history of how the blood jade ring had passed between the Li family brothers, spouses, and mother and son. Li Chengqian hadn’t explained it to her, but Hela and Li Wanxi had known. In her busy confusion, Chai Yingluo had accidentally let them discover this item, and to remember the late former Crown Prince, Li Wanxi or her nurse had stolen the jade ring and hidden it…
Just to remember her father? Wei Shubin suddenly became alert.
“When Hela or Yi Niang secretly took the jewelry from your pouch and returned it to you, Sister Ying, didn’t you notice anything strange?” She looked at the female Daoist and slowly asked, “This jade ring is quite heavy. After it was taken, wouldn’t the pouch’s weight be noticeably different? When you tied it back to your waist, didn’t you feel it was much lighter?”
Chai Yingluo replied somewhat irritably: “Of course I noticed.”
“When it felt so much lighter, you didn’t open the pouch to check carefully if anything was missing?”
“You think I wasn’t busy enough that day?” The Purple Void Temple master rolled her eyes heavenward, “Of course, the pouch was lighter! Don’t you remember I had told them to take the fragrant balls to perfume the room? I’m not a weighing scale – it just passed through my hands briefly, how could I tell if the pouch was missing just the fragrant balls, or the fragrant balls plus a ring? To tell you the truth, it wasn’t until the third day after the incident when we were searching Yi Niang’s room for handwriting samples, and you described the jade ring to me in detail, that I realized it was ‘that one’ and thought to check my pouch, and sure enough, it was gone… Ah, I told you then that thing wasn’t Yi Niang’s, but none of you believed me…”
“You didn’t say it was yours either,” Wei Shubin retorted.
“Nonsense, how could I say it? What was the situation then? The Emperor and Empress had already commanded ministers and princes to lead the investigation. Could I reveal the ring’s origin and openly admit my affair with the Crown Prince? Let the Empress know that I, this White Tiger spirit, had gone to harm her birth son again?”
Everything she said made sense, but as Wei Shubin listened, the chill in her heart grew heavier.
Not knowing how to begin, Chief Minister Wei’s eldest daughter silently watched the beautiful female Daoist before her, frowning without speaking. The fat hunting leopard that had been lying on the brick ground below the bamboo bed seemed to sense something, suddenly standing up with a “whimper” and nuzzling Chai Yingluo with its furry head and round ears.
The female Daoist patted her pet, seeming somewhat relieved, and gave Wei Shubin a bitter smile:
“Don’t struggle with it anymore, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that when Yi Niang and Hela saw the jade ring in my pouch and knew it was from the Crown Prince, they deduced that I might have an affair with him, so they took it to blackmail me for benefits. Driven to desperation, I simply killed Yi Niang to silence her, then found ways to threaten Hela into keeping quiet. You even suspect I might have had a hand in Hela’s death, right?”
…You’ve stated it even more clearly and decisively than I thought it myself, Wei Shubin was speechless.
“Fine then, answer two questions for me.” Chai Yingluo sat up, looking seriously at Wei Shubin. “First, that nurse Hela had lost her entire family – Yi Niang was the only person in the world who cared about her. If I killed Yi Niang, what could I use to move or threaten her, to keep her from exposing me immediately and even help cover for me afterward?”
Well… with your vast connections, Sister Ying, perhaps you suddenly discovered a surviving young son of Hela’s from years ago or something, using that for threats and inducements, it’s not impossible…
“Second, just for this trivial affair between the Crown Prince and me, even if exposed, was it worth killing for? Even if killing a young orphan girl like Yi Niang wasn’t a big deal, how deranged would I have to be to implicate the Empress and Crown Prince? And after the killing, not hurrying to hide the incriminating jade ring, but leaving it for you investigators to find?”
Wei Shubin let out a long breath, her heart suddenly feeling lighter.
This question, she truly couldn’t explain.
Chai Yingluo, bearing the stigma of “White Tiger spirit,” was unwilling to make public her affair with the Crown Prince, even threatening death. But if this matter had truly become public and known to the Emperor and Empress, it might not have led to death.
Given her background and beauty, plus Li Chengqian’s feelings for her, if it had become known, the Emperor and Empress would likely have scolded them both, then allowed their son to officially bring his cousin into the Eastern Palace…
“Did the Crown Prince go to Lizheng Hall to ask the Empress’s permission to take you in?” Wei Shubin couldn’t help asking. Chai Yingluo let out a soft snort: “What else could it be?”
Indeed, even today, Li Chengqian hasn’t given up his foolish dream of staying together with his elder cousin’s sister. Then half a year ago, before all these messy affairs, his parents would have been even more likely to permit it, and Chai Yingluo would have had even less reason to resort to murder. Even if the Emperor and Empress deeply feared the so-called “White Tiger spirit” talk and forbade their son from associating with Chai Yingluo, they wouldn’t have taken their niece’s life.
Her birth mother was a founding princess of the Great Tang and the Emperor’s only full sister, her father was the meritorious Duke of Taiyuan, a great general among the original followers, and half a year ago, her maternal grandfather the Emperor Emeritus was still alive, providing invisible protection. As far as Wei Shubin knew, Chai Yingluo herself had grown up before her Second Uncle and Aunt’s eyes and had always been well-loved by them. Even if the Emperor and Empress prioritized the Crown Prince’s safety and harshly prohibited the young lovers from meeting, they could have demoted her, exiled her, forced her to become a nun, and so on – they had many options, but would almost certainly not have resorted to killing close relatives and giving others cause to criticize.
So Chai Yingluo truly had no reason to kill to cover up the affair, much less actively implicate the Empress and her son after the murder, as if fearing the matter wouldn’t become big enough. It didn’t make sense.