Chapter 124 An Illicit Plan under the Guise of Something Lawful (1/2)
No one would have expected that Lord Zhang would suddenly raise the steel cutlass of the guard standing beside him to kill there and then.
At that instant, Lord Yue covered Yue Qi's eyes, and Baiji and Baishao turned their heads away in one accord.
Lin Mengya and Long Tianhao were the only ones who looked on with expressionless faces on the dead body lying on the floor.
”Lord Zhang's hand motion is quick and clean-cut. You have definitely not lost that quality of being the paragon of a valiant soldier fighting on the battleground years ago.”
As Long Tianhao opened his mouth to speak, he had meant to express his admiration, but somehow it did not sound right.
”I was infuriated by this blind wretch, who had the audacity to offend Princess Yu. He's deserving of death.”
He had meant his words for Lin Mengya, as well as for the rest of the people.
A number of men were seen dripping with cold sweat from their foreheads.
They gave each other a look as they gritted their teeth.
All of them had families and careers of their own. While they could accept the fact of sacrificing themselves, they wished their families would be given a chance to live.
Lord Zhang's expression relaxed just a little when he saw that everyone had regained composure.
”I wonder if Princess Yu is satisfied with this outcome?”
The subjects who were standing around made a unanimous choice to remain silent.
In fact, Lin Mengya had sent for them just so that they could be spectators.
Now that the mission was accomplished, they were expected to remain silent.
”What do you say, Your Highness, Prince Yu?”
Before the spectators, she was merely a demure lady who was the victim in this incident.
The power to make decisions was entirely in Long Tianhao's hands.
However, Long Tianhao knitted his brows, looking somewhat dissatisfied still.
”Forget it, let's just go along with what Lord Zhang deems best.”
All the people breathed a sigh of relief. They were initially afraid that Prince Yu was going to pursue the matter further and create more trouble for them.
”Alright, I guess I will take my leave now. Guards, bring these men out and detain them.”
Lord Zhang, who was full of regrets by now, was the first to leave Lin Mengya's tent.
Not only did he fail to rake up any clues, but he also lost a dozen imperial guards over this matter. What was even more unsettling was the fact that Princess Yu had something on him now.
It seemed to him that he had to report this back to the Crown Prince as soon as possible.
As the court ministers left one after another, Lin Mengya's facial expression was back to normal.
Lord Yue had set up a tent for his two daughters close to Princess Yu's tent.
Prince Yu had specially sent some men to protect Lord Yue's two daughters to make sure that they were completely safe.
By now, all the outsiders had left, so Lin Mengya and Long Tianhao were the only ones remaining in the tent. They both sat down on the chair but did not speak for a while.
”I'm afraid the assassination this time was not that simple.”
Finally, Lin Mengya spoke up with a calm tone of voice. Somehow, she felt that this crisis seemed too straight forward, which was very unlike the Crown Prince's usual style of doing things.
”We've all been fooled. The Crown Prince had employed the tactic of carrying out an illicit plan under the guise of something lawful. These female killers from Peach Blossom Dock have escaped.”
Long Tianhao had come back so he could go to meet the criminals guilty of the crime.
Little did he expect that when he arrived at the tent, there were already a dozen imperial guards lying dead in front of him.
As expected, when he lifted the curtains at the entrance of the tent for storing the firewood, it had apparently been vacated.
Although King Ming was considering to take up his offer to work together, what if something went wrong at this moment?
”Humph, it doesn't matter these girls have been taken captive. They couldn't possibly say anything that works against us.”
Lin Mengya was completely unfazed over the missing girls. On the contrary, a cold, mocking expression appeared on her face.
Could all these be part of what she expected?
”Before Qinghu left, he had given these girls half of a suicide pill each. I suppose they could be imbecile by now.”
In fact, Lin Mengya did not intend to let those girls live right from the start.
It was a matter of time that the Crown Prince would trace his way all the way there. These girls would eventually end up in his hands. All that Lin Mengya had to do was to just sit around and watch the events unfold.
”You mean...”
Long Tiaohao came to a sudden realization and began confirming his guesses with Lin Mengya.
”The Crown Prince loves to take credit for himself. Once he lays hold of the suspect, he would either get rid of him to destroy all evidence or he would bring the suspect out to confront us.”
However, confronting her with a bunch of imbeciles would not be a wise choice for the Crown Prince.
It was more likely that the Crown Prince would kill them after confirming that they were no longer of use to him.
”However, if the Crown Prince was being found out by King Ming's men when he is trying to destroy evidence, then he would be accused of killing those girls in order to cover up evidence.”
Lin Mengya nodded. She realized that Long Tianhao and she were progressively more aligned with each other's way of thinking.
”Alright, I'll start working on this.”
Surprisingly, Lin Mengya had seen through the well-thought plan of the Crown Prince so easily.
Actually, if the imperial guards had found any evidence in her tent, Lin Mengya would simply become a suspect.
Moreover, anyone in the tent other than Lin Mengya could be suspected to be the assassin.
In fact, the only person who could make use of the situation to corner Lin Mengya and thereby threaten her life was the person who murdered Hu Lunan.
The noise outside the tent had gradually died down and all was quiet at this moment.
Lin Mengya sat in the tent with the history book in her hand.
Long Tianhao had been gone for six hours by now.
After a noisy night, daylight had finally arrived.