The carriage drove away from the gate of Jinling City. Linglong looked at the distant city gate and put down the carriage curtain she was holding in her hand.

Qiu Shui on the side looked at his master's expression, squeezed Linglong's hand, and said in a gentle voice: "Master, don't be afraid, when we go further, the situation will be calm, and when we return to Yunzhou, everything in Beijing will be over.

"

Linglong lowered her eyes and said nothing, pursed her lips and thought.

What happened in Beijing?

Why is the city gate so bloody?

Not long ago, the carrier pigeon sent by the imperial concubine's people from Yangzhou to the third prince's residence in the capital flew into the study of the third prince's residence.

The letter carried by the carrier pigeon stated that the emperor was seriously injured and in a coma after being assassinated. When the third prince received the carrier pigeon, he realized that the emperor had been assassinated and the situation in the capital was about to change. Then he dismissed the little boy who was waiting in the study and called him

The waiting spies entered.

In the past, most of the arrangements made by the third prince and the noble concubine were planned by the noble concubine. The third prince himself was actually a bit like a helpless Adou. He always thought that if his mother and concubine were favored, she would plan for him and do everything by herself.

Not willing to take it seriously.

But after receiving the news that the emperor was in trouble, he rarely became alert.

After the spies waiting outside came in, they truthfully explained the situation in the East Palace, and also mentioned casually that the third prince's brother went to the East Palace today to ask for an audience.

The three princes knew that the princess's maid had gone to her mother's house to complain, but he did not take it to heart.

He thought about how a small official family that relied on the support of a noble concubine could have any confidence. He also knew clearly that if the third prince's mother-in-law's family revealed her death, it would ruin the third prince's chance of winning the heir apparent.

Hope, this also cut off the promotion path of their own family members. The third prince knew how corrupt his father, the weak prince concubine, was for officials and money, so he acted without any scruples.

But he didn't expect that among the mediocre people in that family, there was actually a strong person.

Since the prince's brother dared to go to the East Palace to ask for an audience, he must have told Qi Zhen the truth about the prince's death.

Now that the emperor was assassinated and passed out, this matter will naturally not be heard by Datian, but once the emperor wakes up, Qi Zhen will definitely report it to the emperor with the witness in his hand. Once the emperor knows about this, even if the three people are not involved,

The prince had lost a layer of his skin due to grooming, and he was determined not to consider choosing him as the crown prince again.

The already slim hope of ascending to the throne may be extinguished.

The third prince thought of this, listened to the report of the spy below, and clutched the secret letter sent by the imperial concubine in his hand.

He must not let the emperor know about this.

"Does Qi Zhen have an elder brother who is meeting the princess?" the third prince asked the first spy.

When the spy heard this, he quickly replied truthfully: "No, the prince's brother knelt in the East Palace for a long time. The guards of the East Palace stopped him because the prince ordered the door to be closed to thank guests. It was Ning'an Marquis Shen Luan who brought the medicine.

After sending it to the East Palace, I saw him when I came out, and then Ning'an Marquis received a letter from him and sent it to the East Palace."

Hearing this, the third prince looked puzzled. The princess's brother was the witness who could prove that he doted on the mistress and forced her to kill the princess. Qi Zhen had used the matter of his back house to assassinate her as early as the day he was restored to the throne.

He wanted to bring this matter to light, but he lacked evidence. Now that the witness was delivered to him, how could he not see it?

Something is wrong, really something is wrong.

Unless something happened to Qi Zhen and his condition was so serious that he could no longer see anyone, he would never let go of such an opportunity to overthrow himself.

The third prince was thinking this, and then remembered that Qi Zhen suddenly ordered the city to be closed, and that Marquis Ning'an, who had just been reported by the spies, went to the East Palace in person with the medicine. Then he also remembered that the Queen also went to the East Palace twice in one day, which was extremely rare.

There was a vague guess in my mind.

"Qi Zhen and my father were both seriously injured and unconscious after being assassinated?" He murmured in a low voice.

If this is the case, then this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

The emperor and the prince were both assassinated, and there was no better opportunity to take advantage of the chaos and make a comeback.

The third prince thought that something might have happened to Qi Zhen, so he wanted to take advantage of Qi Zhen's trouble to mobilize troops to attack the East Palace and the Imperial City. He hurriedly called several generals in charge of the defense of the capital city gates to come over and informed the imperial concubine's secret message.

them.

The troops commanded by the generals who were summoned by the third prince to be responsible for the defense of the capital city were mostly stationed not far from the capital city gate on weekdays. They were not the same as the large number of defenders stationed at the foot of the mountains on the outskirts of the capital.

In these years, Qi Zhen took the lead in the war in the DPRK, strongly advocated strengthening the defense of the capital, and focused on expanding the army.

The large number of garrison troops stationed at the foot of the mountains on the outskirts of Beijing were the troops he had acquired from his military expansion over the years, and were led by Zheng Jingyan, the eldest son of Zheng Guogong.

The soldiers and horses stationed not far from the gate of Jinling City were those who were originally responsible for the defense of the capital in the old days.

Because Qi Zhen concentrated on expanding his army and established a separate army with the troops and horses after the expansion, which was not under the control of the generals stationed near the city gate, the number of men and horses was more than twice that of the old defenders. The old defenders

The generals were forced to decentralize their power, and naturally they were hostile to Qi Zhen, the prince.

And Qi Zhen, because of what happened in his dream, always felt that these old garrison generals were mediocre and incompetent. If the emperor hadn't stopped them, he would have dismissed them and investigated them long ago.

At the beginning of Qi Zhen's expansion of the army, when he was punishing corruption in the army, he found out these people. He originally wanted to remove these corrupt people from their posts and raid their homes, but the emperor was wary of Qi Zhen's actions and stopped him. Therefore, Qi Zhen

That's why we didn't get rid of these people from their posts and ransack their homes.

But in the end, they had caught evidence and the evidence was conclusive. Even though Emperor Shou was restrained and these people were not completely dismissed from their posts, they were all demoted to three ranks and lost their property to become the new army after the expansion of the army.

Due to these old grievances, these generals stationed outside Jinling City and the newly expanded garrison inside Jinling City who were close friends of Qi Zhen have always been at odds with each other, and they have long had resentments in their hearts.

When Qi Zhen was deposed, this group of people also collaborated with the imperial concubine and others, secretly playing tricks on Qi Zhen.

Due to the emperor's constraints, Qi Zhen could not deal with this group of people even if he restored his reserve position, but he has allowed these troubles to remain until now.

Today's actions in the East Palace, all the people from all walks of life have faintly noticed that something is wrong.

The East Palace ordered the city to be sealed off to search for people, and even invited a large number of imperial doctors from the palace to come there. From all these factors, it was not difficult for them to guess that the prince was probably assassinated.

These people secretly speculated that the prince must have been seriously injured in the assassination this time, but they did not know how seriously he was injured, whether he could still survive, and whether he was still conscious at the moment.

They were already suspicious of this, so the third prince invited them over and mentioned that the imperial concubine had sent a letter saying that the emperor was seriously injured and in a coma due to an assassination. There was a hint in his words that the emperor would probably not wake up this time.

means.

These people guessed this meaning from the third prince's words, and naturally they were panicked and had other thoughts.

After all, if the emperor really dies and goes west this time, and something happens to Qi Zhen at this time, the situation in the future may be rewritten.

No ambitious minister would want the power of the dragon.

In addition, these generals had already received many bribes from the imperial concubine, and they had never been on good terms with Qi Zhen. They knew that if Qi Zhen succeeded to the throne, they would be the first to suffer. At this moment, they all wanted to give him a try and help him.

The third prince ascended the throne.

Their thoughts coincided with the third prince's plan.

In the middle of the night, several guards from Jinling City Gate returned to the city gate. They took a large number of troops from the guards at the city gate and took advantage of the silence of the night to move troops to the East Palace.

Because this group of people could not fully mobilize the guards stationed near the Jinling City Gate, and the person responsible for guarding the Jinling City Gate tonight was not one of their close friends, in order to lead troops into the capital, they took advantage of the night to kill at the Jinling City Gate.

A group of city guards wanted to stop them.

The corpses Linglong and Shen Qinliu saw when they left Beijing were the evil done by these people.

Unfortunately, these people's actions were still too late.

When they launched their troops, most of Qi Zhen's eyes had recovered. If the Third Prince and the others had acted earlier, before Qi Zhen's eyes recovered, even if they could not guarantee to take Qi Zhen's life, they might have been able to take advantage of the situation and injure him.

Qi Zhen is blind.

The third prince only asked the guards at the gate of the capital to lead troops to the East Palace. He himself stayed at the prince's palace with a group of close secret guards. He also asked spies to hide outside the East Palace to contact the few who were sent into the East Palace by the imperial concubine.

Palace maids, ask them to spy on the news about the East Palace and report back in time.

This change was not hidden from Qi Zhen.

He had originally arranged for spies to be at the Third Prince's Mansion. After he woke up from the dream in his previous life, he even ordered the spies to keep an eye on the Third Prince's Mansion. If there was any abnormality, they must report it in time.

Ever since the general of the Jinling Guard secretly opened the city gate late at night and entered the Third Prince's Mansion, the spies noticed something was wrong and reported it to Qi Zhen.

Qi Zhen promptly mobilized the troops at the foot of the mountain in the suburbs of Beijing to rush to the East Palace to protect them. This group of troops was the same group of troops that Linglong and others knew about going to the East Palace when they were at the villa.

The defenders at the foot of Jingjiao Mountain arrived in time and killed the generals who were leading the rebellion in front of the steps of the East Palace.

At this time, Qi Zhen stepped out of the East Palace from the study room in the main courtyard.

Seeing him leaving the East Palace on the blood of the rebels, the spies from the Third Prince's Mansion hurriedly sent a message back.

After receiving the news, the third prince immediately panicked, fearing that Qi Zhen would turn around and take advantage of the chaos to take his life, so he ran out of Jinling City without stopping and took advantage of the chaos.

Qi Zhen led his troops out of the city, chasing the third prince who was causing trouble.

At the city gate, Qi Zhen and his troops were about to leave the city. The carriage Shen Qinliu was in bumped into him as soon as it entered the Jinling city gate.

When I entered the city in the middle of the night, the city gate was still full of dead bodies, and their movements were very strange.

Qi Zhen glanced at the carriage and immediately stepped forward to stop it.

The general moved very quickly and opened the curtain of the carriage before the people on the carriage could react.

The general held the torch in his hand and held it in front of the carriage.

The firelight reflected on Shen Qinliu's face, and Shen Qinliu in the carriage appeared in front of Qi Zhen.

Since Qi Zhen was involved in the conspiracy case, he has not seen his childhood fiancée for three years.

But when he saw her three years later, Qi Zhen didn't think anything else. He just glanced briefly and thought to himself, the face of Shen Qinliu in front of him was particularly sick. Doctor Jiang said that she was not going to die soon, and she depended on the decoction to survive. I'm afraid there are no lies.

Zheng Jingyan, who was beside Qi Zhen, also saw the people in the carriage. He frowned and asked immediately: "Miss Shen? Why are you here?"

Shen Qinliu in the carriage also followed the light of the torch and looked at the people on the horse in front. The faces of Zheng Jingyan and Qi Zhen came into view. Shen Qinliu clenched his palms tightly, gritted his teeth, and his mind was racing. I'm thinking about how to answer.

Qi Zhen, on the other hand, looked at Shen Qinliu's expression, raised his eyes and looked in the direction outside the city gate, and understood something.

He pursed his lips without saying a word, suddenly waved his riding whip, and the horse crossed the city gate.

Seeing this, Zheng Jingyan and others behind him hurriedly followed, and they only had time to order his subordinates to send Shen Qin and Liu Haosheng back to the Marquis of Ning'an Mansion.

Far outside the city gate, the carriage where Linglong was sitting was swaying forward.
Chapter completed!