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Kapitel 35

"Lord Li, I heard you wanted to see me?" Wang Naigong interrupted Li Yuxuan, stopping her from continuing. He had also realized that Li Yuxuan's talent for witty banter was far greater than her actual ability.

"Hehe." Li Yuxuan chuckled, looking directly into Wang Naigong's eyes: "I just wanted to ask, or perhaps predict, my death date and manner. I think since Master Wang wants me to act as the catalyst for revenge, he wouldn't mind telling me about the background of our enemies, would he? So I can have some idea of what's going on. Besides, although I don't have any good feelings towards you, I still feel regret for your daughter, Wang Rou, and I regret that she will die before you."

Wang Naigong stared intently into her eyes: "So you agree!"

"Three days later, you will place Zhan Zhao in front of me unharmed, and I will cooperate with your act. You know I'm not a very reliable person, and I'm capable of anything if you anger me. But if you go along with me, I can sometimes keep my word."

Wang Naigong narrowed his eyes, reminding Li Yuxuan of the way a lion would pounce on its prey. The legendary lion who ruled the entire Northern Martial World, even as a cripple, was still a lion.

Before the lion could speak, his face grim, a soft, delicate voice came from the doorway: "It's been a few months, Lord Li, your eloquence is still as good as ever. I'm truly impressed!"

With Wang Naigong sitting here, who would dare to walk in without being announced? Especially someone they knew? Li Yuxuan and Xu Qingzhi turned around at the same time and saw a woman in white walk in through the door. Her hair was low and she was as beautiful as a spring flower. She was smiling at Li Yuxuan.

"Miss Haitang!" they both exclaimed at the same time.

Haitang walked past them and bowed to Wang Naigong, saying, "Daughter Haitang greets Father."

Wang Naigong remained expressionless, waving his hand at the stool next to him, gesturing for her to sit down.

Seeing that Haitang was seated, Uncle Fang, who hadn't spoken until now, asked, "Miss Haitang, you said you met Lord Li a few times in Bianliang. You've been watching him for so long just now. Is this Lord Li real?"

"Uncle Fang, this is indeed the real Li Yuxuan," Haitang replied with certainty.

So they were still arguing about whether it was real or fake... I've always been a fake, never the real one...

"Is it really true?" Uncle Fang still seemed a little incredulous: "I think it's the same person as that day. Even the tone of voice is exactly the same. Oh, right, the voice is a little different."

Li Yuxuan glanced at him with feigned disdain: "If there are too many fakes, why would I need a professional stand-in? I could just grab any random person to be my stand-in, wouldn't that be enough?"

No one answered her question. Wang Naigong remained silent, and everyone else also fell silent.

Li Yuxuan looked at Wang Naigong, knowing he was considering the credibility of her words or the difficulty of carrying them out. Could it be that Zhan Zhao really had an accident? Were they divided up and eaten?

Thinking of this possibility, Li Yuxuan's face fell. If she were alone, she would definitely cause a scene at the First Manor, either getting Zhan Zhao out or getting herself imprisoned. In short, seeing someone would help her figure out a solution; two heads are better than one.

But what about Brother Xu? Even if Xu Zhu finds out, it won't be a matter of just a day or two before he comes to rescue them, will it? She turned to look at Haitang: "Miss Haitang, if I had known you were the daughter of this Master Wang, I would have tried to curry favor with you back in Bianliang. I wonder if you care about Prince Xin's life or death? You two had a good relationship back then, didn't you? I really regret sleeping on the floor at Pinxiangju that night! I wasted such a good opportunity that Prince Xin had the foresight to give me. Also, did you bring back the incense that Young Master Su made for you? If you did, share some with me. I miss my second brother terribly."

As expected, Haitang looked at her with a murderous gaze: "Lord Li is quite sentimental, isn't he? I wonder how Lord Li plans to save your good buddy?"

"Hehe," Li Yuxuan straightened his clothes, "There is a way, we're just waiting to see if Master Wang agrees."

Wang Naigong stood up: "I agree. You'll see a living Zhan Zhao in three days. Also, all of you can leave now. Lord Li, you'll stay here alone."

Xu Qingzhi looked at her worriedly, and Li Yuxuan nodded: "Master Wang and I are now each getting what we need, there won't be any surprises, don't worry."

Haitang also looked at her, a hint of hatred in her eyes.

Uncle Fang also looked at her, his eyes filled with a distant longing that she couldn't understand.

All three of them went outside.

Wang Naigong sat down again: "You're very curious about how my daughter Wang Rou died, aren't you?"

"Yes." That's normal.

"She was poisoned to death."

"Wasn't she killed by the Corpse Children?" Seeing Wang Naigong's gaze turn cold, she knew she had said the wrong thing: "Brother Zhan told me this. He said he saw Corpse Children chasing Miss Wang. It was the night you robbed the New Year's silver."

"You've been in the military all along, haven't you?" He paused. "The so-called double is you, isn't it? Are you male or female?" His tone was very calm...

"Male!" You wouldn't call someone to strip me naked, would you?

"Don't worry, you won't be in too much danger. Although I need you to lure out your enemies, I will protect you from behind. I don't want the First Manor to make too many enemies with the imperial court."

Only a three-year-old would believe that, right? "You went and robbed the New Year's money, and that feud was already formed."

"The annual tax is the hard-earned money of the people, which the imperial court has exploited. How can it not be robbed?"

Okay, I don't want to get entangled in this chicken-and-egg problem with him: "What are you planning to do?"

"As long as you behave, Prince Xin and Zhan Zhao will be safe. Three days later, you can come with me to the Qingzhou government office to exchange Prince Xin and Zhan Zhao for the eighteen warriors of my manor. I guarantee their lives will be safe."

"Aren't you afraid that this will bring utter disaster to your First Manor? Kidnapping the dignified Prince Xin. Aren't you afraid that the imperial court will send troops to destroy you?" Li Yuxuan really couldn't believe that there were such stupid people and such stupid ideas in this world.

Wang Naigong sneered: "The imperial court? The imperial court is still relying on my First Manor to guard Anxi City. With those soldiers, Anxi would have belonged to the Western Xia long ago."

So that explains why Wang Naigong is so arrogant.

"Deal!" When you're under someone's roof, you have to bow your head. Li Yuxuan finished speaking and was about to leave when Wang Naigong called out, "Don't go!"

Um?

"You at least called me master, so I'll teach you a few of my signature moves so you won't be laughed at later. What do you want to learn?"

Huh? Li Yuxuan was taken aback: "You're really going to teach me? Aren't you afraid I'll learn it and use it against you?"

"If you want to deal with me, there's nothing I can do about it." Wang Naigong's voice suddenly softened. "What do you want to learn? Tell me!"

Li Yuxuan was so startled by his sudden change that he got goosebumps all over. Without thinking, he said, "I want to learn the Lingbo Weibu (a martial arts technique) so that it's easy to escape!"

...

Wild geese fly in formation across the distant clouds.

Wang Naigong stared at her for a while, and Li Yuxuan clearly heard him exhale: "I don't have that." After another while: "I see you don't have the patience to learn, and you won't learn anything complicated in a few days. Since you have my sixty years of internal energy in your body, I'll teach you something simple, a hidden weapon. It's easy as long as you learn how to control your internal energy."

"Hidden weapons?" That's not bad either.

“Yes!” Wang Naigong pulled a gold leaf from his pocket and waved it in front of Li Yuxuan. “You stand by the door and watch!” Li Yuxuan walked to the door and felt his hand move slightly. When he looked again, the gold leaf was gone.

She looked around the room, but there was nothing there.

Wang Naigong walked up to her and said, "Look at you!"

Following his gaze, she looked down at her clothes. She was horrified to see what she was looking at: a golden leaf was stuck in her waist, piercing through her thick cotton-padded coat without actually hurting her skin. The force and accuracy were terrifying! She removed the golden leaf from her clothes: "Master Wang, in the dead of winter, you have to compensate me for my clothes. If my waist catches a cold, it will be a serious problem." The main concern was that if that thing had actually hit her, it would have been truly frightening.

Wang Naigong took the gold leaf from her hand, put it away, walked back to his original position, and circled around a few times: "Lord Li, learning this hidden weapon isn't difficult. The main thing is to train your wrist strength, and also three words: fast, accurate, and ruthless! Tomorrow I'll have someone prepare the weapon for you, and then teach you the way of condensing qi. I'll take you to see something."

Seeing his furrowed brows and solemn expression, as if he had made a great decision to say those words, Li Yuxuan wondered if he was about to tell her about the relationship between Li De, Madam Xiao, Yang Xiao, and himself. She was just about to ask him.

She followed Wang Naigong out the door, and after turning several corners in the darkness, Wang Naigong led her to a small courtyard. The wall was not high, and a somewhat old wooden door was tightly closed. Wang Naigong reached out and pushed open the wooden door. Li Yuxuan saw a light on in a house in the middle of the courtyard. The dim yellow light shone from the window and reflected on the cold snow, creating an indescribable sense of desolation and loneliness.

Wang Naigong walked toward the lit room. The door opened, and a tall, slender man standing with his back to Li Yuxuan appeared in his sight. Hearing the noise, he slowly turned around and was startled to see Li Yuxuan behind Wang Naigong. He looked at Wang Naigong with a questioning gaze, and then at Li Yuxuan.

Li Yuxuan touched her nose somewhat awkwardly. Yang Xiao gave her a really strange feeling. His aloof temperament always felt very familiar to her, a familiarity that came from the bottom of her bones.

Wang Naigong said softly, "Brother Yang, I knew you'd be here tonight. I brought Li Yuxuan with me. You... you should talk to him! Say whatever you want to ask or say. Don't keep it bottled up. It's painful for me to see you suffer. Twenty years have passed, this misunderstanding is over, and that person is dead. What knot can't be untied? Didn't you understand the truth five years ago?"

Yang Xiao's cold gaze swept over Li Yuxuan: "I have nothing to say to her. I don't object to the fact that the Master intends to take her as his disciple. It's the Master's own wish. As for me, the Master can just pretend I don't exist!"

She and Yang Xiao really do have a deep connection... Why was Yang Xiao so excited when he first met her, but now he's so indifferent?

Hearing Wang Naigong sigh, "It's fine if you don't want to say it, but the truth will eventually come out. Xiao Hala has already discovered her suspicious behavior and has been tracking her all along. It's possible that Dadu already knows the news. Although Xiao Nujin is dead, her influence still exists, and we can't afford to be careless about that."

Li Yuxuan was completely confused by Wang Naigong's words. What did Xiao Hala and Xiao Nuojin have to do with her? It seemed like she had absolutely no connection with the Khitans.

She is a native of the Central Plains...

Wait a minute, her mother's surname is Xiao. Could it really be the same Xiao as Empress Xiao? Could it be that, like Xiao Feng, all those with the surname Xiao are Khitans? Could there be a very complicated backstory to her body?

Could this be the reason why Prince Xin and Zhan Zhao refused to tell her about the tragedy? And why the court didn't investigate Li De's case further? Was it a Khitan cover-up? Then how do you explain the "King" character in the blood-written letter?

This news is so powerful; thankfully, she wasn't actually involved but just a passerby. Otherwise, hearing this news might have caused her to suffer from indigestion and suffocate.

She looked at Wang Naigong and asked slowly, "What is my relationship with those people you mentioned from the Khitan?"

Wang Naigong stood with his hands behind his back, gazing at the dressing table in the room. Li Yuxuan noticed a small stone carving on the dressing table, depicting a woman. Yang Xiao's gaze also lingered on the stone carving.

A thought flashed through her mind: "This woman must be Madam Xiao!"

Wang Naigong nodded. Li Yuxuan thought he was going to say something more, but he suddenly turned to look at Li Yuxuan and said, "You are not Li Yuxuan!"

Huh? Li Yuxuan was startled by the sharp look in his eyes.

"If you were Li Yuxuan, would you call your mother Madam Xiao?"

Yes, that's true, but given the current situation, it has to be true, especially since she's getting closer to the truth of the tragedy: "Why can't I call her Madam Xiao? Am I supposed to say that this woman is my mother? What if she isn't? Wouldn't that be defiling two people?"

Wang Naigong was clearly dissatisfied with her answer and snorted.

Knowing that too much talk would lead to mistakes, Li Yuxuan remained silent.

Another unbearable silence followed. It seemed everyone preferred to use silence to pass the time. She looked around the room. Besides the dressing table, next to the cabinet against the inner wall, there was a low cabinet with a large bronze mirror on top, but it was covered with a thick layer of dust because no one had cleaned it.

After waiting for a while, seeing that neither of them intended to speak again, Li Yuxuan chuckled dryly and said, "Master Wang, Steward Yang, if there's nothing else, I'll be leaving now."

Wang Naigong gestured for him to stand properly, then pointed at the stone statue, seemingly asking her, yet also speaking to himself: "Do you know why I have Madam Xiao's belongings here?"

Li Yuxuan shook his head: "I don't know!"

"Because she is my junior sister! She is my master's last disciple."

"I don't understand!" If she's your junior sister, how did she get involved with those Khitan people?

"She was also the daughter of the younger sister of Empress Dowager Rende of the Khitan. That year, twenty years ago, Xiao Nujin, who had been promoted from palace maid to imperial concubine after giving birth to Emperor Taizong of Liao, assassinated Empress Dowager Rende and her sister's family while Emperor Xingzong of Liao was away, in order to become Empress Dowager. She also wanted to exterminate Empress Dowager Rende's family. Although Emperor Taizong of Liao tried his best to stop her, but..." She glanced at Yang Xiao: "Fortunately, Lady Xiao was living at Master's Jiegu Cliff at the time and escaped this calamity." She paused for a moment, then looked at Yang Xiao, who was standing with his back to them: "But Xiao Nujin knew her location and sent people to guard the exit of Jiegu Cliff. When Master returned from his travels, he was unaware of such a big incident and was ambushed at the cliff entrance and killed."

Wang Naigong was lost in his memories of that year, staring blankly at the stone sculpture: "Junior Sister was heartbroken when she found out. Later, one night, she took advantage of our inattention and left Jiegu Cliff, leaving a note saying that Xiao Nuojin's power was too great and she did not want to implicate us. She would find a quiet place to live in seclusion and asked us to forget her."

He glanced at Yang Xiao again: "Back then, I wasn't the master of the First Manor yet. Steward Yang and I were fellow disciples. We never gave up searching for our junior sister, but she seemed to have vanished into thin air. We searched for twenty years without finding her. Until five years ago, we accidentally learned from a captured Khitan warrior that they were going to the Central Plains to assassinate someone—the daughter of the sister of Empress Dowager Rende, who had escaped years ago. We were shocked and immediately mobilized our forces to rush there… When we arrived, all we saw was a raging fire. We heard from others that the entire family of Prefect Li De was massacred that afternoon, with no survivors…" Wang Naigong's voice became very low, the last sentence almost inaudible.

Li Yuxuan also felt a little breathless. This story… was it even a story? Why did it sound so heart-wrenching? It made her sigh deeply? Was the palace intrigue really so ruthless? Twenty years… twenty years of seclusion, yet she couldn't escape her fate of being killed. If this story was true, then how did she explain the "Wang" character in the blood-written letter left by Prefect Li? Did it mean that Li Youying at the time wanted to seek refuge with Wang Naigong?

So he knew all along Madam Xiao's background? How could that be? If he knew, why would he marry a Khitan woman? Wasn't he afraid of being exposed and ruined? It's too hard to imagine. If it's true, what kind of reckless love is that?

Can love really be like this?

Xiao Nuojin, Xiao Nuojin, Xiao Nuojin—is this the woman they're talking about the enemy she's been searching for? She remembers Xiao Feng saying a month ago that Empress Dowager Xiao Nuojin had died and he went back to attend her funeral. Is this the same Xiao Nuojin? No wonder Prince Xin and Zhan Zhao both said her enemy was dead, almost as if they were advising her to give up on revenge and the search for her enemy.

But is she truly a descendant of the Khitans? This is no laughing matter. Given Xiao Feng's example, if she were to also claim to be a Khitan, her dream of a life of seclusion in Jiangnan would be shattered. All her previous dreams would be in vain, and her aspirations to become a top scholar would be wasted. She could forget about Prince Xin, Xu Qingzhi, Zhan Zhao, and anyone else…

no!

They resolutely deny it.

She composed herself and forced a smile: "Master Wang, what are you talking about? I don't understand."

Longing for home, a distant dream

Yang Xiao turned around and glanced at her indifferently, his gaze as deep as an ancient well in the dim light. But it was just a glance before he turned his gaze to Wang Naigong, his voice tinged with obvious fatigue and hoarseness: "Master, let's go back!"