Volume 3, Chapter 338 – Open the Grave

Golden dragon-script runes shimmered faintly in the hidden chamber.

Wei Qingyu finished her report to the languid Human Empress.

“Ha… so it has finally begun.” The Empress let out a soft laugh.

“What a pity. Those tiresome old ministers at court are being a nuisance. I cannot get away in time to watch this play unfold with my own eyes.”

Wei Qingyu lowered her head slightly.

She thought she could hear a trace of gleeful amusement in the Empress’s words.

It puzzled her.

If things continued down this path, Chi Family’s position would become very precarious.

Lu Guan was the senior disciple of Jiang Hongliang, Sect Master of Lingxiao Sword Sect. If Lu Guan had truly died at Chi Family’s hands, Jiang Hongliang would not let it go so easily.

Yet from the Empress’s current attitude, she did not seem the least bit concerned about Chi Family’s situation.

Could her earlier assumption have been wrong? Was the Empress’s southern tour to select a consort not for the sake of Chi Family after all? And not for Chi Xiyan either?

“Inspector Wei, what do you think?”

The Empress’s idle question pulled Wei Qingyu back from her thoughts.

Wei Qingyu quickly bowed her head. “Your Majesty! This official does not know!”

“No need to be so tense.” The Empress continued: “I simply want to hear your thoughts.”

“…” Wei Qingyu considered in silence.

She could not quite read the Empress’s intent.

The Demon Suppression Bureau answered directly to the Empress, and she, Wei Qingyu, was the Empress’s blade and hound.

A blade and hound needed only to obey their master’s commands. They did not need thoughts of their own.

A hound that thought for itself was a dangerous thing.

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Wei Qingyu drew a quiet breath and ventured carefully: “Your Majesty, this official feels there is something strange about this matter.”

“Strange in what way?” the Empress asked.

Wei Qingyu said: “Lingxiao Sword Sect and Chi Family have long had a betrothal agreement. By all reason, both sides should have understood long ago the advantages and disadvantages this union would bring.”

“Yet ever since Song Shixuan arrived in Beihe Commandery, the relationship between the two parties has become extremely odd.”

Wei Qingyu gathered her thoughts and chose her words carefully: “Whether Lingxiao Sword Sect or Chi Family, both seem to be doing everything they can to push the other toward becoming an enemy.”

“Two forces that should have become allies through marriage are behaving more like they are bent on making enemies of each other.”

“If they had no wish to be joined through marriage, then why did they agree to the betrothal contract in the first place.”

“Your Majesty, this official’s humble mind simply cannot work it out.”

Wei Qingyu finished sharing her thoughts and fell quiet, waiting for the Empress’s response.

A moment passed before she heard the Empress’s quiet laughter.

“Inspector Wei, is that truly what you think right now?”

Wei Qingyu answered quickly: “Yes, Your Majesty.”

“Inspector Wei, you are a bystander. How is it that you too have let this fog cloud your eyes, just like those caught up inside it.” A note of teasing had crept into the Empress’s voice.

“Step outside the board and look at the game from there. You may find something you had not noticed before.”

Wei Qingyu felt a small chill run through her. She said steadily: “Your Majesty’s meaning is?”

“No rush. Think it through before you answer me.”

“…” Wei Qingyu was quiet for a moment.

The Empress had already pointed her this far. If she still could not work it out, she truly would be hopeless. After a brief pause, Wei Qingyu followed the thread the Empress had given her and continued: “Your Majesty is suggesting that within the conflict between Chi Family and Lingxiao Sword Sect, there is a third party at work?”

“And that it was not a Chi Family member who killed Lu Guan?”

But if it was not someone from Chi Family, who else could hold such a deep grudge against Lingxiao Sword Sect?

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While Wei Qingyu was still turning this over, the Empress’s voice came again: “Inspector Wei, think further. In all the recent incidents surrounding Chi Family, is there not one person who is connected to them, more or less, across the board?”

Wei Qingyu felt a sharp clarity cut through her.

The face of a certain young woman flashed through her mind at once.

“Yu Lizhi?”

“The second young miss who was only just brought back into Chi Family?”

So many of the things that had recently unfolded around Chi Family were connected, in some way or another, to that girl.

She had been present when Lingxiao Sword Sect’s Pheromone Detection Stone was destroyed.

She had been the hostage when the Wolf Clan princess seized a captive and fled.

She had been the victim when an accident occurred at Chi Xiyan’s betrothal banquet.

Even Chi Family’s own head, Chi Jingwen, was suspicious of that girl.

Wei Qingyu had of course had someone investigate the girl’s background.

Yet the results of that investigation had shown a remarkably simple past.

A few sparse lines on paper laid out her history with perfect clarity.

An orphan taken in by a common farming family, who had once served as a handmaiden for a noble household, then found herself caught in some misfortune, and eventually drifted to Beihe Commandery together with her mother.

With the reach of the Demon Suppression Bureau, uncovering all of this had not been difficult.

Even the local government offices held the contract documents from when the girl had served as a handmaiden at that noble household.

Chi Jingwen was convinced that Yu Lizhi was hiding something, and had shared his suspicions with Wei Qingyu as well.

Yet Wei Qingyu had found nothing suspicious in that girl’s past, not a single point that gave her pause.

“Your Majesty is suggesting that so many things have occurred around Chi Family because that girl has been quietly driving all of it from behind the scenes?” Wei Qingyu’s brow drew together. “But why would she do that?”

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“And this official examined her constitution. She has no cultivation. Her body is even more fragile than that of an ordinary mortal woman.”

“How… exactly is she doing any of this?”

The Empress gave a soft laugh. “Inspector Wei, as the Demon Suppression Bureau’s Inspector, you should understand better than I do. A clever hunter will often disguise itself as something completely harmless.”

“Naive. Pure-hearted. Frail and powerless. All of these can become the most disarming of disguises.”

“And who is to say that beneath a sheepskin, there is not a wolf waiting underneath?”

Wei Qingyu bowed her head and considered for a moment. “Your Majesty, do you need this official to bring the girl in directly?”

“No. That will not be necessary.” The Empress’s voice came through, unhurried. “You have no evidence.”

“She is Chi Family’s second young miss. Without evidence, the Demon Suppression Bureau cannot simply detain an innocent young lady of a noble household.”

Something shifted quietly in Wei Qingyu’s chest.

No evidence. The Empress’s concern was the lack of evidence. Too difficult to make a convincing case?

She bowed. “Your Majesty, this official knows what to do.”

“Ha, Inspector Wei truly puts my mind at ease.” The Empress laughed softly. “Unlike those few old ministers at court.”

“Honestly! One trip out of the palace and there are so many rules to follow, all that dragging of feet and drawn-out fussing, it is enough to try one’s patience.”

“At this rate, who knows when I will actually reach Beihe Commandery.”

The Empress clicked her tongue in displeasure.

Wei Qingyu said steadily: “Your Majesty, this official will get to the bottom of everything as quickly as possible.”

***

Outside the hidden chamber, Wei Qingyu drew a long breath.

Trying to read the Empress’s mind was itself a precarious business.

Before, she had only suspected that the Empress’s southern tour might have something to do with Chi Family’s daughters.

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Now, Wei Qingyu was entirely certain.

The Empress’s true target was Yu Lizhi.

“What secret is that girl hiding?”

Wei Qingyu had no way of knowing.

But as the Empress’s blade and hound, now that she understood what the Empress wanted, she knew perfectly well what she needed to do.

Wei Qingyu went to the Demon Suppression Bureau’s offices and summoned her two most trusted subordinates.

“We looked into this before. That girl called Yu Lizhi, her adoptive mother was killed at the hands of Sin Moon Tower assassins, correct?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“Where is that woman’s grave?”

“In Lin Family Manor.”

“Lin Family Manor?” Wei Qingyu turned this over for a moment. “Good. Take me there.”

“Yes, my lord.”

It was deep into the night.

Wei Qingyu followed her informant, slipping through the cover of darkness to the outskirts of Lin Family Manor.

With a Sixth Realm martial cultivator providing cover, their arrival stirred no one.

It did not take long before they found the simple burial mound.

It was a mortal’s grave, yet Chi Xiyan had placed a protective formation over it.

Wei Qingyu stood before the grave and was quiet for a moment.

“Open the grave.”