Chapter 24

Fu Lu and Shou Quan were left outside, while Xue Jin'an and the Fifth Prince followed Li Hechun inside.

As they stepped into the courtyard, the smell of blood hit Xue Jin'an's nose. Ahead, two corpses lay on the ground: one in the robes of a eunuch, the other in the armor of a palace guard. Xue Jin'an noticed that Li Hechun deliberately slowed his pace and shifted his body to the side, as if intending for them to see the bodies clearly.

The Fifth Prince beside him suddenly faltered. Seeing his dazed expression, eyes fixed intently on the eunuch's corpse, Xue Jin'an heard him whisper a name, lips trembling: "Xiao Dongzi..."

"Who is Xiao Dongzi?" Xue Jin'an asked directly.

The Fifth Prince jolted back to reality. As if only just realizing what had happened, he clutched his chest, his face turning deathly pale in an instant. His breathing grew rapid, as if he were having a heart attack and about to lose consciousness.

Xue Jin'an had to admit that the Fifth Prince had a talent for acting. Although he clearly knew the man's battery was perfectly healthy and had even detected him deliberately controlling his heart rate to feign illness, there was a fleeting moment when Xue Jin'an felt the impulse to use his Lotus Sword to pry open the Prince's chest plate and extract the battery to see if something was truly wrong.

Xue Jin'an understood that the Fifth Prince was performing for Li Hechun to observe the eunuch's reaction and gather intelligence. This happened to align with Xue Jin'an's own goals—though even if he had no goal, he wouldn't have exposed the Prince. He was a machine that respected the diversity of humanity and had no interest in watching others suffer.

Xue Jin'an silently crouched down, pretending to be absorbed in examining the corpses, feigning complete ignorance of the situation unfolding beside him.

The Fifth Prince, satisfied, let himself struggle for breath, trembling hands fumbling for his sleeves as his legs gave way. "Medicine... medicine..."

Li Hechun rushed over with practiced agility, his horsetail whisk falling to the ground. He deftly fished a porcelain bottle from the Prince's sleeve pocket, shook out a black pill, and pressed it firmly under the Prince's tongue.

As the Fifth Prince’s breathing gradually steadied, Li Hechun let out a sigh of relief. He helped the Prince up and retreated to the side, once again wearing his signature smile, as if he hadn't heard the name the Prince had unintentionally muttered.

At such a close range, could he have missed it? Impossible. Moreover, as the Chief Eunuch, Li Hechun had countless eyes and ears in the palace and knew exactly who followed which master; how could he possibly not know the identity of this eunuch?

It was highly likely that he had intentionally led them to this corpse. Li Hechun was the Emperor's man, so it was the Emperor... Things had reached a point where, even if he didn't want to speak, he had to.

It must be said that the Fifth Prince had managed to stir up trouble among his brothers for so long without being struck down not only because of his heart condition as a protective shield, but also because his mind was sharp enough. He and Xue Jin'an had come to the same conclusion, though Xue Jin'an had thought deeper and discovered clues on the two corpses.

Unable to read Li Hechun's expression, the Fifth Prince took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and said, "Xiao Dongzi was my personal eunuch; having been with me since childhood, there was some sentiment. A while ago, he made a mistake and was discovered by my mother consort to be a spy planted by others to harm me. In her fury, she ordered him to be executed with the 'Red Carpet' punishment, and he died that very night."

The Fifth Prince spoke in one breath, as if it were a thoughtless, reflexive outburst, though in reality, it was seven parts true and three parts false. As for which was which, even he could not be sure, for he could not be certain if what he heard from his mother consort was the truth. Regardless, true or false, he dared not believe it. All he could do was omit or alter the parts unfavorable to him and his mother. These were things his mother had drilled into him the night Xiao Dongzi died, so they spilled out without a second thought.

The Fifth Prince shifted his tone, denying his own statement: "He is not Xiao Dongzi. He must be Xiao Dongzi's younger brother."

"They were twins, born breech, which is said to be an omen of misfortune for the family. They were born and their mother died, at three their brother died, at ten their father died, and at twelve their grandparents all died in accidents. Their aunt and uncle, fearing they would be cursed, sold them to human traffickers. Later, they escaped and, in a muddled state, sold themselves into the palace."

The Fifth Prince continued, "That is roughly it. I only heard Xiao Dongzi mention him twice and never actually met the brother. I only knew he worked in the Flower Garden, and after Xiao Dongzi came to my side, he found a way to have him transferred to the Tianlu Pavilion."

There were four libraries in the palace: the Hanlin Academy's collection, the Cabinet's Wenyuan Hall, the Inner Palace's Tianlu Pavilion, and the Emperor's private library in the Qianyan Palace, the Tingwen Pavilion. The Tianlu Pavilion served the ladies of the inner palace, held the fewest books of the four, and contained only screened, uninteresting material, so few visited it. The young eunuchs' work there was light and leisurely—cleaning, organizing, airing books in the sun, and occasionally copying texts.

Li Hechun acted as if he had just realized the assassin's identity, exclaiming in realization, "No wonder this assassin, despite holding the Sixth Prince hostage, claimed he wanted to kill the Fifth Prince. I thought the little eunuch had gone mad and mistaken his target, but it turns out that was the reason."

"In truth, the assassin could have been captured alive. Deputy Commander Wei had already snuck behind him, ready to rescue the Sixth Prince, when another highly skilled assassin emerged from among the guards, intending to assassinate the Emperor..."

The plan had been compromised. Fearing the assassin would lash out, Deputy Commander Wei had acted decisively, killing the eunuch assassin and rescuing the Sixth Prince. Then came Li Hechun’s shouts for protection, the Imperial Guards flooding the study, and the unexpected appearance of another assassin who tried to seize Xue Jin'an, only to be evaded and settle for the Fifth Prince instead.

Xue Jin'an examined the eunuch's fingers and indeed found calluses from years of holding a brush, along with traces of old ink on his sleeves that could not be washed away. The person was indeed who they said he was, but the situation was subtle.

"You recognized him at a glance, saying they were twins and that your people all knew him," Xue Jin'an remarked, stating the obvious with a serious face.

The Fifth Prince looked at him. "What do you mean?"

"There was a reason they didn't want you to leave," Xue Jin'an said, referring to Hongling. "And by 'leaving,' I mean coming to the study." When Hongling had tried to stop the Fifth Prince from coming to the study earlier, it hadn't seemed like much, but now it felt very suspicious.

The Fifth Prince understood. His heart sank, his expression flickering through various emotions for a long while before he suddenly let out a short, sharp "Ha." It sounded like disbelief, laughter, and mockery all at once.

"Is it a diversion?" The Fifth Prince asked Li Hechun, his voice strained. "Did they pretend to attack me, and then, while everyone's attention was focused on this, move to assassinate the Emperor?"

"It was two groups, and it was a diversion, but he was merely being used," Xue Jin'an stood up and answered with absolute certainty.

Li Hechun looked at him in surprise. "Why does the Seventh Prince say that?"

Xue Jin'an found humans a bit dim-witted for missing such an obvious point. He pointed to the two corpses, but asked instead, "What was the name of Xiao Dongzi's brother?"

The Fifth Prince and Li Hechun were both stunned, not expecting this question.

The Fifth Prince gave him a strange look. "A little eunuch I've never even met—do you think I would know his name? Just call him Dongzi's brother."

"Humans have names, and so do eunuchs. That you don't know is your own failing," Xue Jin'an replied as if it were a matter of course.

The Fifth Prince felt a subtle sense of being looked down upon.

Li Hechun, seemingly moved, offered a more genuine smile toward Xue Jin'an. "His surname is Zheng; he is called Zheng Xi."

Li Hechun truly knew everything about everyone in the palace. The Fifth Prince only muttered to himself, "So Xiao Dongzi's name was Zheng Dong."

*Actually, it was Zheng Da,* Li Hechun thought to himself. They were not cherished by their family, so no one had bothered to give them proper names. They were simply called "the big one" and "the small one," which eventually became their names. Later, when they entered the palace, Zheng Da abandoned his name to become Xiao Dongzi. He learned to read, gained some power, moved his brother to a quiet place, and gave him a brand new name. Originally, he had hoped for "Xi" meaning "hope," but his brother said he wanted to be like his older brother, so it became "Xi" as in "West" to match "Dong" (East).

Li Hechun did not say these things. After all, few cared about the life or death of a eunuch, let alone a name. To speak of it would only embarrass the Fifth Prince and perhaps lead to further desecration of the bodies. Such was the way of the palace; the Seventh Prince, who cared about a eunuch's name, was the true anomaly.

Li Hechun bowed slightly, his wrinkled face blooming like a chrysanthemum as he kept his smiling expression. Had Xue Jin'an possessed a favorability detector, he would have seen the numbers climbing.

Since he didn't, Xue Jin'an simply pointed at the two corpses to explain the two groups. "Zheng Xi was not physically active; he only had calluses from a brush. This other assassin, however, was rigorously trained. The calluses on his hands are from years of using polearms and spears..."

"The most telling proof is how they died." Xue Jin'an pointed at their faces. "Zheng Xi had his throat slit, a clean kill with almost no signs of struggle. But this assassin has many blade wounds; he appears to have been swarmed and died from exhaustion. Yet, he is bleeding from his seven orifices, his lips are blue, his eyes are bulging, his expression is twisted, and his fingers are curled... clearly, he died of poison and in great agony."

The Fifth Prince also saw it now. "Suicide by poison." Professional assassins and secret guards, to avoid capture and interrogation, always carried poison on them. But usually, it was something swift and lethal. It was his first time seeing poison that caused such agony before death.

The Fifth Prince’s question was soon answered.

Li Hechun nodded, then shook his head. "You are quite right, but there is one thing you are mistaken about, Seventh Prince. He did not take poison; he took a Gu."

Xue Jin'an noticed a young eunuch, who had heard everything, quietly entering the main hall of the study to report to the Emperor.

Dianzhou was rich in insects and supplied many masters of Gu to the martial arts world, and the original owner's uncle, Zhou Yushu, had lived in Dianzhou for many years. The Emperor was indeed suspicious of him, but was it only because of Zhou Yushu? He had never even met the man... There must be something else that had aroused the Emperor's suspicion.

Xue Jin'an could not fathom what it was; he did not believe there was anything about himself that warranted suspicion.

"The Seventh Prince has changed greatly of late; it is as if you are a completely different person compared to before," Li Hechun said with a chuckle, his voice low and laden with implication.