The best ring

"Back to Your Majesty, I noticed that just today, except for the eldest prince, strangers visited the residences of other princes." Hou Zhong replied.

"Strangers? Do you know their identities?" the old emperor asked.

It is normal for someone to visit the prince. After all, the princes have high status and status. It is normal for some people to want to curry favor with them. But for Hou Zhong to specifically bring it up, it shows that the identity of those strangers is unusual.

"They are secret agents of the Shuiyue Kingdom." Hou Zhong said: "A prince later arrested the people who visited them and sent them to prison. From their mouths, Wei Chen learned their identities."

Having said this, Hou Zhong paused and continued: "The Eighth Prince is one of the princes who arrested people."

Obviously, Hou Zhong had also heard about the Eighth Prince.

The assassination of the Eighth Prince was by no means a trivial matter. This matter had spread throughout Yanyang City in a very short period of time, and Hou Zhong naturally heard about it.

The old emperor's eyelids twitched and he asked, "Why did those spies from Shuiyue Kingdom take the initiative to visit us?"

"Seeking cooperation." Hou Zhong said: "Those spies from the Shuiyue Kingdom took the initiative to come to the door because they wanted to cooperate with the princes to help them ascend to the position of prince. This news was obtained from the Ninth Prince's house. There should be no lie. The Ninth Prince was also one of the arrested princes. Obviously, the secret agents of Shuiyue Kingdom were so active in order to cause trouble while the crown prince's position was pending. They dispersed to find the princes. The princes said similar things, but the princes may not know this. They just thought that the secret agents of Shuiyue Kingdom only selected them. "

The old emperor's face became even more ugly, and he said in a low voice: "Apart from Lao Ba and Lao Jiu, who else has rejected the people of Shuiyue Kingdom?"

"There are also five princes." Hou Zhong said.

"No more?"

"No more."

After hearing this, the old emperor was so angry that he almost vomited blood.

He had many sons, but in the face of the temptation of the Shuiyue people, only three princes resisted the temptation. Such a result really disappointed him.

"A bunch of bastards! With how they are, how can I trust them with this country?!" the old emperor said angrily.

Hou Zhong said nothing and waited silently.

After a while, the old emperor slowly calmed down and said: "So, what happened to Lao Ba was probably done by spies from the Shuiyue Kingdom?"

Although the old emperor did not like him very much as the eighth prince, and indeed he had never regarded him as the candidate for the crown prince of the Yanfeng Kingdom, he was his son after all, his flesh and blood, and now he died so tragically, the old emperor It's impossible not to be angry.

"They are the most suspect." Hou Zhong said, "However, we still need to wait for a clear investigation to know what happened."

Indeed, the Eighth Prince had just refused to cooperate with the people of Shuiyue Kingdom, and something like this happened. The people of Shuiyue Kingdom must be the most suspicious, but it must be the people of Shuiyue Kingdom who did this thing, but It's still too early. After all, now is the critical moment to determine the crown prince. The situation is very complicated and anything can happen. Especially for someone like Hou Zhong who is used to seeing all kinds of dark sides, he has many speculations in his mind. .

The old emperor nodded, but at this time, he still believed that the possibility of Shuiyue Kingdom doing this was very high, and he undoubtedly hated Shuiyue Kingdom even more.

"Before, I asked you to investigate the affairs of the ministers in the DPRK. Is there any progress?" the old emperor asked.

At the court meeting in the morning, the old emperor was almost forced to give a half-month deadline in public. Although he had already decided to determine the candidate for the crown prince as soon as possible, he took the initiative to make a decision and was forced to make a decision. Decisions are completely different. In the old emperor's heart, he had great opinions and thoughts about the behavior of his ministers.

Therefore, after the incident, he immediately ordered Hou Zhong to investigate the matter. He always felt that the attitudes of those ministers seemed to have changed in the recent period.

"Your Majesty." Hou Zhong replied: "According to Wei Chen's investigation, the ministers have not done much unusual behavior recently."

"Really?" the old emperor said.

A flash of hesitation flashed in Hou Zhong's eyes, but without any pause, he replied: "That's true."

"That's strange, why do I think they are a little strange." The old emperor said to himself.

The old emperor frowned slightly and thought secretly. Hou Zhong in the palace had fine beads of sweat on his forehead and seemed a little nervous in his heart.

At this time, someone suddenly asked to see the old emperor outside. The eunuch's voice also interrupted the old emperor's thoughts. The old emperor was not dissatisfied and said directly: "Let him come in."

The reason why the old emperor was not dissatisfied was, firstly, because he did not doubt Hou Zhong's words, nor did he doubt those ministers. Secondly, it was because the people outside who asked to see him were people from the Ministry of Punishment and Yan Yang. The people in the city government office were responsible for investigating the murder of the eighth prince. They came together this time, presumably because of the eighth prince's affairs.

After hearing the old emperor's words, Hou Zhong was secretly relieved.

Soon, two people walked into the main hall. They were the heads of the Criminal Department and Yanyang City Yamen.

"How is the investigation going?" the old emperor asked.

"Your Majesty, the captured prisoners quickly confessed that they were..." Guanzhuo, the Minister of Punishment, hesitated a little.

"Who are they?" the old emperor asked.

"They have the second prince's people, the fourth prince's people, and the sixth prince's people." Guan Zhuo replied.

"Bang!"

The old emperor slammed the table with a gloomy face: "These rebellious sons! Do they want to piss me off to death?!"

Although there had been speculations in this regard before, when the old emperor heard Guan Zhuo's report, he was still very angry. He even felt stuffy in his chest and couldn't breathe because he was too angry.

"Your Majesty, among the people who have been killed, people from the third and seventh princes were found." Li Hu, the head of the Yanyang City Yamen, said.

The old emperor's face became even uglier, "Okay, the people are all there. Did the eighth prince do something to offend them? Do they need to work together to assassinate him like this?!"

The few people in the hall didn't speak. In fact, they all knew in their hearts why those princes sent people to assassinate the eighth prince. Wasn't it because of the position of the crown prince?

There is only one position of crown prince, but there are many princes. One less prince means one less competitor. It is obvious that those princes attacked the eighth prince in order to eliminate their competitors. The only thing that surprised everyone was that those princes would attack at the same time.