Chapter 122 Fu Chen is imprisoned
Tang Ying slept for two full hours, and when she opened her eyes it was already dusk.
She closed her eyes and rubbed "Yang Huniu" contentedly twice, stretched, and when she opened her eyes she was met with a pair of deep pupils, as if filled with bright starlight, gradually pressing down and getting so close that she couldn't help but hold her breath, suspecting that he would kiss her the next moment.
Tang Ying was a little confused and stuttered: "Where is Hu... Hu Niu?"
Fu Chen didn't seem to have such intention. He just stretched out his hand to straighten her messy hair, as if he was doing something very natural: "Oh, Princess Qing is bored sitting here, so I'll go back first ."
"She's leaving... why didn't she say hello to me?" She pretended to get up from Fu Chen naturally, and talked about other things to hide her embarrassment: "This girl wouldn't run out to play again, right?" Since the other party behaved generously and appropriately, Tang Ying thought of it as taking a nap on her good brother's shoulder. In fact, she almost nestled her whole body in Fu Chen's arms, and her posture was indescribably ambiguous.
Fu Chen stood up as if nothing had happened, secretly moving his legs and feet that were numb from being pressed down: "You have already sent Feng Bao to close down shops everywhere. If Princess Qing continues to play around, she will soon become a scourge to the merchants in the capital. How dare she still play around?"
Tang Ying poured herself a cup of cold tea and drank it in one gulp. She finally woke up completely. She sighed with a mature look, "Uncle Yang asked me to take care of her before he left. This girl is used to living in the border town and has no idea how dangerous the capital is."
"I think she's older than you?"
"Oh, she is two years older than me." Tang Ying couldn't help but laugh: "I can't help it. When we were little, she was defeated by me for a while. She even called me sister for a while. It was a problem left over from that time . She only grows older but not smarter. As a considerate person like me, I naturally want to take good care of her."
"You should take care of yourself first before taking care of others." Fu Chen rubbed her head lightly, turned around and walked out: "Don't make others worry about everything."
"How could I?" Tang Ying wanted to chase him and argue with him, but when she thought of the concern in his eyes just now, she backed off.
Nothing else happened that day. Tang Ying went to the inner prison and checked Chunniang's confession from the interrogation in recent days. He left the Cavalry Department at dusk and finally went home to take a hot bath, have dinner amidst Zhang Qing's chattering, and have a good sleep. Only then did he recover.
The next day, at daybreak, she rode Fu Yingjun to the Forbidden Cavalry Division to report for duty. Before she even stepped into the office gate, she almost bumped into Liu Zhong who was rushing in.
"Master Tang..." Liu Zhong saw her as if he had grabbed a life-saving straw: "Someone informed last night that Master Fu was detained in the palace by the order of His Majesty."
"Wasn't Master Fu on duty in the palace last night? Who brought back the news?"
Liu Zhong mentioned a name, and it was the brother who was on duty in the palace with Fu Chen last night: "He said that someone reported to your majesty that Lord Fu let the son of King Min go. Your majesty hates the ministers to lie the most, so he detained Lord Fu on the spot. It is not easy for me to enter the palace, so I ask Manager Tang to inquire for me."
In order to figure out the emperor's thoughts, Tang Ying even talked about this past with Fu Chen, and happened to know a thing or two.
History always repeats itself in a surprising way. The Prince of Min was the son of the Imperial Noble Consort of the previous emperor. At that time, the current emperor was the crown prince, and the Prince of Min, like the second prince, was favored by the previous emperor because of his mother's status. He had inappropriate thoughts and tried to win over the court officials in an attempt to replace the former crown prince, who was now the emperor.
The late emperor and the late empress once worked together to defeat the Rebellion of the Three Kings. When they were young, they were deeply in love with each other and were the envy of others. However, no matter how deep their love was, it could not withstand the passage of time, nor could it withstand the influx of new people in the harem who were as beautiful as flowers and young willows.
The late emperor was in middle age, his country was stable, and he was skilled in government affairs. He had plenty of energy to dote on new people, and the imperial concubine Bai was the most favored. Bai was also very pregnant, and her first child was a son, Prince Min, who was fourteen years younger than the current emperor.
In the two years before the current emperor ascended the throne, the battle for the throne between the Crown Prince of Beijing and the King of Min reached a climax. In addition, the attitude of the late emperor was not as clear and firm as that of the current emperor, and he even seemed to be trying to smooth things over, which further intensified the fight between the brothers.
When Tang Ying heard this old news, she once said, "Your Majesty has a grudge in his heart, so he pays more attention to the legitimate and illegitimate children. He would rather support the Crown Prince to succeed to the throne than let the Second Prince succeed to the throne. He still hasn't let go of the past." She can understand the current emperor's determination to establish the Crown Prince.
She remembered that it was the coldest time of the year when they were chatting about this. Fu Chen was sitting in the government office, next to him was a small red clay stove brought by a servant. The charcoal fire was burning brightly, and on the stove was a kettle. The boiling hot water created a cloud of mist that blurred his face and made his expression unclear.
He said: "Once bitten by a snake, one will be afraid of ropes for ten years."
That was a rare leisure time after finishing official business. Tang Ying did it on purpose, trying to gather information with ulterior motives, and Fu Chen... probably also did it on purpose, telling everything he knew.
At that time, he even mocked himself: "Master Tang is indeed from the Shadow Department. If he were to use the honey trap, I'm afraid no one would be able to resist him."
She was in a good mood, and there was something in her heart that she hadn't said out loud - that is, you think I am taking advantage of your woman, so you will find my beauty trap irresistible.
But this sentence was too ambiguous and seemed to be crossing the line, so she swallowed it back to avoid giving him unnecessary hope.
King Min is like a thorn in the emperor's heart, a bottom line that cannot be crossed at will, but Fu Chen happened to be involved in this matter.
"Do you know who told the secret?" Tang Ying felt cold sweat on her palms for no reason, and a chill rose in her heart: "Did Master Fu...really let the son of King Min go?"
Liu Zhong was so anxious that he was spinning around: "This... I don't know. But Lord Fu always has his own reasons for doing things. Even if he let King Min's son go, he must have his reasons. I ask Lord Tang to go to the palace to find out the news so that we can have a plan to deal with it."
"Don't panic for now, just go about your business as usual and pretend you don't know about this. Privately contact a few brothers who are loyal to Lord Fu and wait for my news." Tang Ying turned her horse's head and rode Fu Yingjun towards the palace. She touched Fu Yingjun's big head to cheer herself up, hoping that all this was just a misunderstanding.
Seeing the guards on duty at the palace gate from afar, Tang Ying slowed down and rode Fu Yingjun forward with a clattering sound, just like she usually did when entering the palace. When she got off the horse at the palace gate, someone came over to tie up the horse for her. She even joked, "Don't bother. Be careful that this guy will bite you."
After she took office as the head, she appeared in public from time to time riding Fu Yingjun. Gradually, the news that the Wild Horse King was tamed by her spread. Even the Emperor of Southern Qi heard about it and joked that the reward was given to the wrong person. The guards guarding the palace gate were just showing their courtesy, as they were not unaware of Fu Yingjun's bad temper.
"Why else would they say that the master is the descendant of a famous general? We can only sigh at the sight of the horse." The man watched Tang Ying tie up the horse and leisurely stroll to the palace gate. He took out the badge for entering the palace and asked the guards on duty to check it. The other party smiled and said, "Master Tang, there is no need to check it. We brothers just need to recognize your face."
Tang Ying entered the palace with a smile on her face , not showing any sign of panic. As soon as she stepped into the palace, she ran into Liu San, a eunuch beside the Southern Qi Emperor. Seeing her from afar, he was overjoyed: "Master Tang, I was just about to leave the palace. Your Majesty wants you to see me."
"I was just thinking about going to the harem to take over. Your Majesty summoned me for something?" She looked stunned: "Isn't there Master Fu? Is there something that Master Fu can't handle?"
Liu San's face was almost wrinkled into a bitter gourd. He glanced at the eunuch behind him, and the eunuch retreated several steps in fear. He then hurried to Qingliang Palace with Tang Ying, whispering as he walked, "Hey, there will be no Lord Fu from now on. Someone reported the Fu family and he let the son of King Min run away. Your Majesty asked him to confront them, but he admitted it. He has been detained now. Your Majesty urgently summoned Tang, the head official, to try the case. You better hurry up, Your Majesty is very righteous."
"Thank you for telling me, Grand Supervisor." Tang Ying said anxiously, "How about I hide?"
Liu San was even more frightened than she was: "You better leave quickly. If you delay any longer, His Majesty will be even angrier."
The two hurried into the Qingliang Palace. The Southern Qi Emperor had a layer of anger on his face. When he saw Tang Ying, he spoke briefly about the matter, and then ordered her to preside over the case in secret: "I have thought about it over and over again, and there is no one else I can trust. Tang Qing is the descendant of a loyal and righteous man, and has always been loyal to me. I am relieved to hand this matter over to you. You must find a result in the trial and find out the whereabouts of the son of King Min."
Tang Ying knelt in the Qingliang Palace, not daring to raise his head and look directly at the Southern Qi Emperor: "I obey your order."
She took over the case and went to the side hall to pick up the tied-up Fu Chen and the informant who was also tied up. Her eyes met Fu Chen and then left. The other person's eyes were cold, as if he was a different person from the Fu Chen who served as a human cushion in the government office yesterday. She felt uncomfortable for no reason and hardened her heart and ordered: "Take them all back to the Forbidden Cavalry Division and wait for me to interrogate them."
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There were many people in the Imperial Cavalry Division who knew that Fu Chen was interested in her, but since last year when Fu Chen put on a businesslike face to her, the two of them had distanced themselves from each other, and outsiders saw that they had deliberately drawn a line between them. There was another legend in the division. One said that Tang, the head of the department, looked like a woman, but she was a rough man at heart. Lord Fu saw through her true colors and felt that she was not to his liking, so he changed his ways. The other said that she was obsessed with climbing up the ladder. Once she was promoted to head and was given the title of princess, she felt that her status was high, so she lost interest in Lord Fu and rejected Fu Chen, which made Lord Fu discouraged and gave up pursuing her. The two gradually drifted apart.
In short, it was all about the two people's unrequited love affair, which caused a lot of discussion in the office for a while, but gradually the matter faded from everyone's sight. As time went on, and the military pay case made everyone so busy that they had little time to sleep, no one paid attention to the story between Tang Ying and Fu Chen, so the rumors between the two of them died down.
Tang Ying escorted the two men back to the Imperial Cavalry Division, first put Fu Chen in the Imperial Prison, and separated him from the informer. He then called everyone to a meeting to convey the emperor's order to preside over the case.
When Liu Zhong heard this, he immediately objected: "Impossible, Your Excellency doesn't seem like someone who would break the law knowingly.
