Chapter 225 Conferment of the Crown Princess

In a secluded mansion within the capital of Xiliang, an eerie and dark room exuded a cold, oppressive atmosphere.

A figure dressed in black sat cross-legged on a prayer mat, surrounded by swirling smoke rising from the Buddhist shrine. The shrine was covered with talismans drawn in fresh blood.

“Pfft—”

The person in black felt a sharp, twisting pain in his chest and spat out a mouthful of fresh blood.

“Master.” A young boy, almost merging with the darkness, emerged anxiously from the corner and handed a cloth to the person in black. “Have you been backfired upon?”

The person in black took the cloth, wiped the blood from his lips, pressed one hand to his chest, and raised his head to glare ominously in the direction of the palace, revealing a ghostly mask.

His face looked as if it had been branded with a hot iron, leaving grotesque scars. Black ink spread along the scar patterns, covering his entire face in a dense web that appeared sinister and terrifying.

“The wench’s poisonous Gu has been broken.”

This sentence ground out from between the black-clad man’s clenched teeth, and his crimson eyes were filled with boundless hatred.

“Impossible!” the young boy exclaimed. “Grandmother said that witchcraft had long been lost, and that mother-child Gu was the last pair of the poisonous Gu. No one could break it.”

Back when the two armies clashed, the barbarians went to the southern borders to seek Grandmother’s help and had the Departure Gu planted in Ji Xuan.

They feared Grandmother might lift the Gu from Ji Xuan, so they exterminated her entire clan. Only Grandmother managed to escape with him. It was the man before him who saved them and hid them in the capital of Xiliang.

Grandmother once had a brief encounter with Master Mingjue and intended to entrust the boy to him. However, she heard that Master Mingjue had gone to the Great Zhou to cure someone of a Gu, and Grandmother guessed that it was to save Ji Xuan.

Sure enough, the mother-child Gu devoured the Departure Gu that Grandmother had planted, and she suffered backlash from it. That very night, she passed away.

In order to have their master take him in, Grandmother gave the Gu King to their master.

The mother-child Gu was refined from the Gu King and was controlled by it.

Who would have thought that Master Mingjue had such skill that he managed to suppress the mother-child Gu, preventing the master from having any control over it?

Recently, when he was finally able to exert control, he planned to have Qi Min create an incident on the day of the Crown Princess’s conferment. Yet, unexpectedly, the poisonous Gu was broken.

“Grandmother said it was karma, so she never passed the Gu-raising technique on to me.” The young boy couldn’t think of anyone else who understood Gu techniques, especially since even Master Mingjue couldn’t neutralize it.

“So it was broken—let it be. If not for this mother-child Gu, I wouldn’t have discovered that the current Empress is a fake.”

The man in black let out a series of cold laughs and pushed the boy aside. “There are still two days left until the Crown Princess’s conferment.”

The young boy was stunned and followed his master’s gaze toward the shrine, where three memorial tablets were placed.

The tablets were inscribed respectively with the names: Wife and Master Wei Xinglu, Son Wei Jiuyu, and Daughter Wei Jiu Ge.

The man in black’s expression suddenly softened. He picked up Wei Xinglu’s memorial tablet and gently wiped it clean with a silk cloth, murmuring, “Lu’er, you’ve waited for a long time, haven’t you? Don’t worry, soon I will bring your enemies to accompany you.”

He coughed a few times, swallowing the metallic taste that rose in his throat, kissed the tablet, caressed the name engraved on it, and then placed it back in the shrine.

——

Su Wan learned where Jiuyu and Jiu Ge were staying and instructed Qi Sixteenth to arrange for them to stay at the Siyi Pavilion.

After all, their identities were special, and it was uncertain whether the Empress Dowager and the Empress would tolerate them.

She planned to wait until after the Crown Princess’s conferment to leave the palace and meet with Jiuyu and Jiu Ge to inquire about the situation in the Great Zhou.

After months without seeing Gu Huaizhi, she missed him dearly and wondered if he had received her letters.

Time flew by, and in the blink of an eye, the day of the Crown Princess’s conferment arrived.

Su Wan had just gotten up when a palace maid brought her a set of bright yellow palace attire.