My wife has a secret

Chapter 157 Seven Stars Slaying Dragon
Considering that his aunt's temperament and methods were very similar to those of Wu in the previous life, Xu Qing also wanted to put some effort into this fiefdom and develop it into a town with rich tax revenue.

If this is the case, I can live a leisurely life independent of others without having to worry about food and drink.

"As the name of Marquis Guangping suggests, his fiefdom is Guangping."

Seeing that Xu Qing was somewhat interested in the fiefdom, Zhang, the head official, began to introduce the fiefdom's system and the surrounding situation of Guangping to him in a serious manner.

"Mr. Xu grew up in Suzhou and has never been far away. He may not have heard of Guangping... Guangping is in the land of Jingchu, where many local barbarians live and use dogs as their totems."

"Although Guangping is not a small place, the barbarians in the area basically obey the orders of the local chieftain, which is somewhat similar to the situation in Yunnan and Dian."

Another chieftain, Zhao, continued, "But at least Yunnan is governed by the King of Yunnan. The relationships among these chieftains are complicated and they have feuds with each other. They often fight or rob passing merchants, and their relationship with the imperial court is not very good."

After hearing this, Xu Qing gradually understood that the territory bestowed by the court was only a superficial reward and the taxes there could not be counted on.

Zhang Zhushi also understood the intricacies of the title and reward, and said in a friendly manner, "Mr. Xu can hand over Guangping to the Ministry of Revenue and the Ministry of Justice for management, so that he can save the trouble of governing it himself."

"Ah."

Xu Qing responded and realized that this acting governor was equivalent to a disguised enfeoffment order for the lords.

When they got used to the luxurious life in the capital, people from the six ministries took care of the government affairs of their fiefdoms and provided corresponding taxes every month.

The lords who did not have too many concerns would naturally agree to the court's request and hand over their fiefdoms.

Although all his power now comes from his aunt, and he has no worries about food and drink, and can be considered second to none, the Empress Wu of the previous dynasty was only emperor for fifteen years.

If my aunt had the same fate as Mrs. Wu, I would have to find another way out.

"Mr. Xu, I have already told you about the fiefdom. You can make your own decision when you receive the fiefdom tomorrow. I will not bother you any more."

When Chief Zhang saw Xu Qing frowning and thinking, he knew that the newly promoted marquis was thinking about something else.

The three officials had been working in the Ministry of Revenue for many years and were considered to be very capable people. They bowed and said goodbye to Xu Qing.

Xu Qing also thanked them calmly, "Thank you for your hard work, three masters."

……

After simply tidying up the mess in the room, Xu Qing called the female official to clean the bedroom.

The ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven was held for three consecutive days as if the little emperor had never happened. The scene every day was extremely grand, and the empress dowager herself offered gifts and prayed for blessings.

Xu Qing did not attend the ceremonies of the next few days. After receiving the imperial edict while wearing the brocade blue marquis's attire, he stayed in the palace and began to deal with the aftermath of the turmoil.

In just three days, the intelligence collected by Chengxuanfang was gathered by carrier pigeons and imperial guards at night, directly filling up the already small house.

Xu Qing looked at the pile of books and letter papers and sighed helplessly. For the first time, he realized how difficult it was for Shen Shuang to write the preface.

In order to find out the conspiracy behind the White Lotus Sect and the possible clues that the other party might reveal, Xu Qing almost stayed up all night to read all these letters.

Except for Empress Gongsun who came to ask for seeds every night, Xu Qing refused to allow anyone to visit him.

"This White Lotus Sect is really cunning."

After three days of searching, Xu Qing gradually discovered a problem.

There are obviously masters in the White Lotus Sect who are well versed in this field and are giving advice. The other party is also aware of Chengxuanfang's methods and knows that if they cause trouble, they will leave clues and evidence.

Therefore, this group of people deliberately created various tricks before and after the grand ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven in order to confuse the eyes and ears of the court.

For example, the White Lotus Sect once intentionally spread the news that the Prince of Dongwan had been resurrected in nearby villages, and was making serious preparations.

When Chengxuanfang received the news and sent troops to suppress the rebellion, they discovered that it was a member of the White Lotus Sect who pretended to be the Prince of Dongwan and led a village of White Lotus believers in the suburbs of Beijing to rebel.

Because this incident happened in the suburbs of the capital and just before the grand ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven, most of the attention of the people in Chengxuanfang was diverted by this case.

There are many such incidents. Although most of the intelligence is related to the White Lotus Sect, and some even personally participated in it, none of them has a direct connection with the chaos during the Heavenly Sacrifice Ceremony.

These disasters appeared one after another near the capital city, like independent incidents that did not interfere with each other.

"Where will the little emperor reveal his true colors?"

Xu Qing scratched his head helplessly. The moment he was lying in the pile of letters, his eyes glanced at the map he had made earlier.

The capital city is vast, and he has only lived in the palace for a month, so he is not familiar with the conditions of the various markets in the city.

In order to clearly see the White Lotus's intentions, he deliberately marked the locations of each case with cinnabar.

Now he lay on his side and took a quick look, and he noticed something strange about the picture.

The previous markings were a bit confusing, with the White Lotus Sect appearing and intervening in the southeast, northwest, and northeast of the capital. But when Xu Qingping looked at the map, he vaguely discovered that the points where these events occurred seemed to be a straight line.

Xu Qing didn't understand why this insignificant idea was so strong, but he still forced himself to get up, found a new map, and marked the locations where several events took place.

"This is Laojun Mountain. This is the White Lotus village where the Dongwan Prince caused trouble... Well, we also have to include Xiangshan, where the Dongwan Prince caused trouble."

Xu Qing looked at the old map and marked the key points of the case by following the same pattern.

But apart from the fact that the distances between the first few locations were the same, the last two cases were farther away from the previous ones, perhaps because of the distance between the imperial city.

"You don't look well, is there something I missed?"

Xu Qing frowned and thought for a moment, then suddenly an idea came to his mind. He marked a point on Suzaku Avenue in front of the Noon Gate of the Imperial Palace, because it was here that the Prince of Dongwan withdrew his troops after the riot in the capital.

Then, he found the location of the Ministry of Justice and added another stroke.

It is reasonable to say that this was the beginning of the White Lotus Cult's actions, and that after the White Lotus Cult's Four Seasons Envoy was kidnapped, he had been controlling everything from behind the scenes.

From then on, the points on the entire map are clear.

"Straight line? No, there's a curve."

Xu Qing lowered his head and looked straight ahead for a long time. The map stripes in his eyes gradually blurred, and the marks on them became lighter and lighter.

These points converge together under the guidance of a thin line.

It was at this moment that Xu Qing finally realized why he was so concerned about the pattern in front of him, because this was not an ordinary crime at all, but a star map.

There were exactly seven locations where the White Lotus Sect caused trouble, corresponding to the positions of the legendary Big Dipper.

"Is it so mysterious?" Xu Qing looked at it in disbelief and touched the maps with his fingers.

Among the seven cases committed by the White Lotus Sect, except for the prison break by the Ministry of Justice to rescue Chunsheng, the others were unsuccessful.

But the White Lotus Sect, which has been so deliberate and patient for so many years, must have its own reasons for doing things. They did these things according to the positions of the Seven Stars Map, and it was definitely not just for the sake of looking good.

Could it be that the White Lotus Sect has bigger plans?
The moment Xu Qing hesitated, a snow-white carrier pigeon flew in from the open window and landed lightly on the windowsill.

The feathers of this carrier pigeon are pure white, but the tail feathers are a little bit black.

When Xu Qing saw him appear, he knew that this was the message sent by Shan Yongpei from Beijing.

In Chengxuanfang, except for the abbot, everyone has his or her own natal carrier pigeon, which is used to convey messages to the abbot at critical moments.

After all, Chengxuanfang has a strict hierarchy. If reports are submitted layer by layer in the usual way, the speed will not be slow, but it will definitely miss key information and affect the current situation.

Therefore, Chengxuanfang specially made a perfume powder. As long as a little bit of it is sprinkled on it when bathing, the owner of the shop will have a special smell on his body that cannot be smelled by human mouth and nose.

This smell can attract trained homing pigeons, allowing them to deliver messages directly to them.

But what puzzled Xu Qing was that Chengxuanfang had a ban that natal carrier pigeons should not be used unless it was extremely important. Now that the White Lotus Sect was dormant, was there anything else worth using natal carrier pigeons to deliver messages?
Xu Qing opened the pigeon's leggings in confusion and found that the pigeon was carrying only a very short piece of paper.

"Open the duty records of the military department sent today."

This font...

Xu Qing stared at the beautiful words on the note in silence for a moment, and then he could tell at a glance that this thing was written by Shen Shuangxu.

It seems that Shen Shuangxu borrowed Shan Yongpei's natal carrier pigeon in order to send a message to himself.

Once such illegal behavior is discovered, both of them will face the punishment of being dismissed from their posts, investigated, and imprisoned in a water dungeon in the capital city without seeing the light of day.

"It's so messy."

Even if the former abbot has a good reason, he should not get involved in the current affairs of Chengxuanfang.

Fortunately, he is the owner of Chengxuanfang, and Xu Qing also hopes that Shen Shuangxu will take over Chengxuanfang again in the future and wipe out the White Lotus Sect, so naturally he will not say anything more.

Moreover, Xu Qing was also somewhat curious. What kind of information was it that would be worth Shen Shuangxu breaking the rules and using such a special method to send a message to him?

He searched carefully in the book delivered today and finally found what Shen Shuangxu had told him to do.

The ink on this duty record is all new ink that has not yet dried. All of it is the data of the past two days that the people from Chengxuanfang went to Wucheng Bingmasi to copy down, and then worked overtime to deliver it to Laojun Mountain.

"Why are you letting me see this crap?"

Although Xu Qing admitted that Shen Shuangxu was smarter than himself, he carefully checked every page of the book and found no noteworthy information.

And the duty records of the Five Cities Military Department should be looked at before the incident, right? Two days before the ceremony, the little emperor had an incident, and the imperial guards and the city guards were strictly governing. Although there was no curfew in the capital now, anyone suspected of having problems was not allowed to leave the city.

So although this book looks quite thick, the content is very concise and can be read in a short time.

Ok?
After Xu Qing impatiently flipped through a few pages, he suddenly realized that the touch of the paper on his fingers was a little strange.

In doubt, he took out the previous duty record for comparison and obviously found that the paper of today's record was a bit thick, just like... two pieces of paper stacked together.

"Could it be that there is something hidden on every page of this book?"

In order to verify his judgment, Xu Qing tore open the duty record books one by one.

Sure enough, he found a piece of letter paper among the folded pages of the book. When he pieced the pieces of letter paper together, it happened to be the letter that Shen Shuangxu wanted to hand over to him.

Moreover, this letter was just like Shen Shuangxu's cold and straightforward character. There was no courtesy or greetings, and he just stated his guess right away.

"I have heard about what happened on Laojun Mountain. Since that incident ended, the White Lotus Sect has been causing trouble in seven locations in the capital, shaped like a dipper. According to the White Lotus Sect's habits and style of doing things, these locations correspond to the seven stars of the Big Dipper."

When Xu Qing saw this, the corner of his mouth curled up subconsciously.

His mood at the moment was indescribable, but frustration and helplessness were inevitable.

I have been researching for several days and just found the key information to crack the problem, but it was figured out by a shut-in who was locked inside the house.

This guy's brain is really too good, isn't it?

"Thinking carefully back to the day when the turmoil in the capital broke out, when the Prince of Dongwan started the rebellion, no Star God of the White Lotus Sect participated in it. I just listened to Shan Yongpei's report and learned about Emperor Xuan's actions at the Heavenly Sacrifice Ceremony, and no Star God showed up either."

This is true.

Xu Qing followed Shen Shuang's instructions and carefully recalled the whole process.

He suddenly discovered that apart from the hostage-taking of the Prince of Dongwan in Xiangshan, the White Lotus Sect had sent a star god to help. In other events planned by the White Lotus Sect, there had never been any trace of these star gods.

"Therefore, it can be concluded that the things symbolizing the Big Dipper were just tests by the White Lotus Cult in the chess game in the capital. They have been controlling the situation from beginning to end and did not want these plans to succeed."

what?
Xu Qing frowned slightly, but after thinking about it carefully, he understood the meaning and thoughts in Shen Shuangxu's mind.

If the White Lotus Sect really wanted to rely on something here to seize power, they would not need to go through so much trouble to design so many things. They only needed to bet their proud seven star killers on the Prince of Dongwan, help him succeed in his rebellion, and overthrow the rule of the Demon Queen.

Even for such a big trump card as the little emperor, they only sent a group of people with better skills to help.

Although it looked like a carefully planned rebellion and there was a real danger of threatening my aunt's rule, these forces alone were not enough to overthrow my aunt's ruling position in the palace.

What exactly went wrong?

What are these White Lotus sect members thinking?
"Assuming that the capital is regarded as a star map, and these seven incidents are judged as seven stars, the White Lotus Sect's true thoughts can no longer be concealed. They are intentionally imitating the plot of slaying the dragon."

Kill the dragon?

Xu Qing continued to look down.

"The legendary Seven-Star Sword is inlaid with seven copper nails. It originated from Taoist scriptures and was recorded in the Longquan County Annals. Legend has it that an ancient man once used its power to cut off a dragon's tail and killed a hundred-meter-long dragon."

When Xu Qing saw this, he thought that this thing was not written by Shen Shuangxu.

He never imagined that this extremely intelligent and clever girl would one day seriously recount the legends of the county annals.

(End of this chapter)