Your Majesty the Empress, I am really not a traitor!

"Wait a minute."

Xia Yuxiao suddenly stopped him.

"What else is going on, Your Majesty?"

"This is a piece of advice from me to Qing: Siyue is a good boy, Qing knows what Qing has done, it is best not to embarrass me."

When Xia Yuxiao said this, it seemed as if she was deliberately avoiding Qin Ji's gaze.

"I understand that I will take good care of Siyue."

Qin Ji raised his eyebrows and said calmly.

"You... well, well."

After Xia Yuxiao finished speaking, she waved her hand: "Go down, I'm tired today, I want to rest for a while."

"Yes."

........................

"Xia Yuxiao has changed."

Walking out of the palace, Qin Siyue said thoughtfully.

"Oh? What changed?"

"Getting a little...restricted."

Xia Yuxiao has never been a pure and kind person, Qin Siyue knows this very well, how many people who can sit on the throne are really stupid and sweet?

However, in Qin Siyue's eyes, Xia Yuxiao, apart from the determination and scheming that an emperor should have, also makes people feel that she doesn't fit her identity.

It's too restrictive - or, Xia Yuxiao is showing a sense of restraint now.

"Of course, hands and feet are bound, the emperor, not to mention, she has me under her control."

Qin Ji smiled wryly.

This is the truth, without him, Xia Yuxiao would definitely be able to reprimand Fang Qiu.

Chapter 23 Nanban Poison

Qin Siyue naturally knew what Xia Yuxiao was like before.

After all, Qin Siyue also inherited the memory of her "predecessor", but that memory is only a vague memory, a bit like a revolving lantern.In Qin Siyue's memory, although Xia Yuxiao showed her scheming beyond her age when she was very young, she was at least a little naive and wild as a child, but now... ....

This old brother of his own family is really guilty of serious crimes. Sooner or later, His Majesty the Emperor will suffer from mental illness if this continues.

"Next, what are you going to do? Are you going to investigate the case she asked you to investigate?" Qin Siyue asked.

As for the black hands behind the gang of dead men who assassinated Qin Ji and threatened His Majesty, His Majesty originally entrusted him with the investigation power. It's just a favor that didn't exist in the first place.

"Check, and I must check clearly. Even if I can't find anything now, at least I have to take corresponding actions. Otherwise, His Majesty will be suspicious again. Tsk, I'm not very old, and suspicion is better than that." Old men are old."

Qin Ji complained with some displeasure.

On the one hand, he has to be responsible for military mobilization and coordination, and on the other hand, he has to investigate internal problems. In this case, it is clear that he wants to use Qin Ji alone as several people.This is the shortcoming of centralizing power to the central government: everything has to be handled by the emperor and the central ministers. Once something goes wrong, he will be exhausted immediately. Qin Ji is a better captain, at least he is a big official and responsible. Many of them are general policies and strategies, but some of those civil servants are really tired.

"No way, who made you threaten others now? You can be content, this girl still knows that you can't touch you. An official like you is placed in the game. I will take a look at your stats and what you have done, and I will immediately block you." You let the Lord of Glamorgan do you a favor."

Qin Siyue said gloatingly.

"Don't think that I don't know what the Earl of Glamorgan is." Qin Ji tapped her on the head, "Let me tell you first, I can't accompany you to paint tonight, I have to be busy with military affairs."

"Hey, I know, I know, brother, you make it sound like I can't do without you."

Qin Siyue waved her hand easily.

However, Qin Ji stared into her eyes, and then asked with a half-smile: "Isn't this the truth?"

"..." Qin Siyue choked on this sentence, then turned her head away, "That was before, not now!"

"Because there are servants at home now, you can order them directly." Qin Ji pointed out her careful thoughts.

"I...you..."

Looking at Qin Siyue who was speechless, Qin Ji laughed hahaha for a while, and then patted her on the shoulder: "Okay, don't worry, if you need anything, just go to me directly , I’m in my study, I’m afraid I’m going to stay up late tonight.”

"Understood, get out."

At his sister's request, Qin Ji rolled away mellowly.

Lingyan was already waiting by the side.

"Master, the previous corpse has been prepared. I checked it myself and confirmed it is safe. You can go and have a look."

"Let's go, we have to take a good look at who dares to do such a big thing behind."

Qin Ji nodded, and then he and Lingyan walked towards the black prison where the corpses were placed. This place had been sealed up before. After all, the current An Guogong Mansion basically does not need such a place, and now it can only be used as a utility room and a morgue. up.

The corpse was assisted by Lingyan's aura, and there was no sign of decay, but the complexion was a little blue. Qin Ji walked over and looked at the clothes on the corpse.

"I have investigated. The night clothes they use are very common black cloth. They have not undergone any treatment and are not expensive. They can be seen everywhere on the street."

Judging the opponent's origin from the material is a very important part. Dead soldiers are rare combat power, so most of the people who train them will equip them with many useful things.Some even tattoo specific patterns on the night clothes to promote the operation of aura.

From these clues, the source of the dead can be judged to a large extent, and the scope can be narrowed down. For example, some dead soldiers wear soft armor under their clothes, and the craftsmanship on these soft armor may be able to reveal the opponent's information.

However, it is clear that the black hands behind the scenes did not intend to show their tails at all during this operation. Except for the weapons and night clothes made of black cloth that can be seen everywhere, the dead soldiers have no distinctive features to judge their origins. He didn't even wear armor, and he completely sacrificed his combat effectiveness in exchange for secrecy.

Qin Ji took off the other party's shirt, and then carefully observed the upper body of the corpse.Regrettably, there is nothing unusual on the upper body, only a few deep scars can be seen.

It's a pity that he didn't study forensic medicine in his own world, so it was difficult for him to judge from the scars what the weapon that injured this person looked like, otherwise he could deduce what war he had participated in.

"This is the poison I got from his mouth."

Lingyan put the poison wrapped in paper in front of Qin Ji.

"This kind of poison is poisoned very quickly, almost in a few seconds. Judging from the traces on it, it should have been hidden in their mouths long ago. Once the situation changes, they will bite through it immediately and die from the poison. It is very powerful. The seed poison seems to have been collected from the Nanban area."

"The Nanban area..."

Qin Ji looked at the poison carefully. Unexpectedly, the powder didn't look like poison at first glance, but it looked like flour, white and fine.Qin Ji looked at it carefully, and then pried open the mouth of the corpse to have a look. Indeed, there were powder-like residues in the mouth of the corpse, which showed that there was basically no problem with Lingyan's judgment.

The poison from the southern barbarians is quite interesting. The common poisons in the empire are basically taken from the central plains, and the artificial poisons that have been calcined are commonly used. However, the poison used by the person in front of him is actually from the southern barbarian area. In terms of words, it is probably extracted naturally.

Is it snake venom?Scorpion venom?Although these poisons are very powerful, they are not enough to be poisoned in a few seconds.

The poison of witchcraft, only this kind of thing mixed with magic can make the poison so fast.

That being the case, the other party may have specially raised a group of Nanban people who practice witchcraft. In this case, it is not a problem to be able to spread the poison so quickly.

"Lingyan, if you have time, help me to find out, among these people in the court, who has had in-depth contact with the Nanman area, I think this person should be hiding here."

"Yes."

Lingyan nodded.

Chapter 24 War Begins

north.

King Dingbei sat in his palace, tasting delicious beef stew.

In the bitterly cold place in the north, the wind blows through the bones in winter, and the family can hardly do without the stove, and the family often cooks around the stove. Therefore, some stews that can keep out the cold have been studied in various ways Among them, beef stew is a famous dish.

The stewed beef in the northern border is not the domestic cattle breed in Daxia, but the beef cattle imported from the Holy Church in the West. The beef used for farm work is the local cattle with stronger muscles and slightly worse taste. ox.Beef cattle from those western countries are very popular in the northern border, and the dish of beef stew has really become one of the delicacies in the northern border.

King Dingbei put a piece of beef in his mouth and chewed it contentedly.

King Dingbei is a big man with a height of 1.9 meters. From his appearance, it is difficult for you to connect him with the pampered prince.He is muscular, and his two heavy eyebrows seem to add a bit of majesty to him, and those eyes often burst out with chilling anger-in fact, King Dingbei is not a reckless man, on the contrary, he Among the princes, they are the most familiar with the book of sages. Many people in the palace believe that if King Dingbei was not born in the royal family, then he will definitely be a powerful saint in the future, the kind with both civil and military skills.

But he is the prince, so his life is destined not to be so easy.

Now, freed from the power struggle, he enjoys the beauties and delicacies in his palace every day.When I have nothing to do, I will invite a group of martial arts masters to discuss martial arts together. Sometimes, after studying more martial arts, I will invite some university scholars to recite poems and fight together. Life is boundless and happy, so happy.

However, King Dingbei is not so happy now.

Just now, an urgent report was sent from the court, ordering King Dingbei to immediately mobilize all available military forces and materials to prepare for General Bai.

Dingbei King Xia Ling was very clear about what the other party meant. He had known about Hanyin City for a long time. In fact, without him, it would have been at least one night before the court knew about it. The official received him and completed all the procedures along the way for him at a fast speed.

Xia Ling knew how serious the matter in Hanyin City was. He was just not good at power struggles, and he wasn't an idiot who didn't know anything. The situation there was completely wrong.However, he does not have much military power in his hands. At this time, the surrounding cities of Hanyin City have not been moved, which means that the corresponding officials may not have the same heart with the court. He is a king of Dingbei who does not have much military power. If it is not done well, it is easy to be reversed.

So he just asked the envoy to report to the court as soon as possible.

But now, Xia Yuxiao personally ordered him to mobilize all the forces he could, which was a big headache.You said that there is no problem with adjusting food and equipment, and he doesn't have many troops. Why is this adjusted?

Thinking of this, King Dingbei's mind turned as he ate.

He doesn't have troops in his hands, but he has always held the right to control the surrounding cities. What's wrong with not having troops?Conscript some soldiers, don't worry about him, let's conscript first, anyway, His Majesty's order is probably because he is worried that the army will be hindered and the number of troops will be insufficient, and he probably intends to use these soldiers under his command as a reserve force.

Thinking of this, King Dingbei immediately made up his mind to let his servants take his orders to the surrounding cities as soon as possible, and dispatch personnel in time.

The rest is to do a good job of defense.

The Northern Territory is going to fight a battle of tens of thousands of people. Since this is the case, there will inevitably be strategic mutual transfers. If this is the case, the main city leading to Hanyin City will be regarded as the main focus of attack .He didn't want the city he worked so hard to manage to be wiped out by the flames of war, so he had to prepare in advance.

Therefore, the city under the jurisdiction of King Dingbei began to dig pits and various defensive measures outside the city early, and the city was full of large stones, rolling logs, and oil.He also specially invited a dozen mercenaries composed of people from the Jianghu to protect the city to improve the city's defense capabilities.In addition to conscription, the king of Dingbei asked all the young and old to start production, and built a lot of horses and spear chariots...

Therefore, a magical scene appeared.

When General Bai led [-] soldiers to the northern border, King Dingbei had already prepared everything. The army had just arrived and hadn't found a place to be stationed yet. King Dingbei had already selected all the places to be stationed. Yes, even the camp tents have been set up, the food and vegetables prepared in advance are also ready, the city defense has been repeatedly strengthened, and there are people patrolling everywhere.

All in all, he had thought of everything that General Bai had thought of and never thought of.

Seeing this scene, General Bai burst into tears. He thought that when he came to the northern border, it would take a little effort to settle the 5 people, but he didn't expect that he had a god-level assistant in his family. Rest and rectify.

Moreover, King Dingbei sent people to survey many terrains in advance, and by the way, he released a large number of spies to find out the movement rules of some of the enemy's troops.

...............................

The day of war is coming.

Fifty thousand soldiers took advantage of the dark moon and high wind to walk silently among the mountains and rivers in the northern border.

The military discipline of Daxia's soldiers is extremely strict. In order to ensure the absolute concealment of their actions, all soldiers wrapped their weapons with coarse cloth before marching to avoid making noise during the march.The armor is all blackened with grass ash, coal ash, etc. to prevent reflection at night.Since the topography of the northern region had already been surveyed clearly, the troops didn't even use much lighting during their march, so they came to the vicinity of Hanyin City in the dark.

Then, 5 people launched the raid.

The barbarians in the city didn't realize what happened at all, they fired all their weapons, and countless cultivators climbed up the city wall in no time and started killing.

It took less than two hours for the city to be destroyed, and in order to gain an advantage, the barbarian iron cavalry quickly began to break out of the siege, trying to use the cavalry's ability to break through the siege.