AUBTN -Chapter 29 Evidence Found

Yu Qing watched his departing figure and scratched her head in confusion. “Did he take the wrong medicine? Or is it that time of the month for him?”

Shen Jue looked in the direction Lu Yan had left, the corner of his lips curling into an amused smile.

He turned to the bewildered Yu Qing and said meaningfully, “Looks like our iron-faced, impartial Commander Lu has finally found a weakness he doesn’t want anyone touching.”

A flicker of understanding flashed through Su Hewan’s eyes.

So that’s how it is.

This is what people mean by… when you care, your judgment falters, isn’t it?

The night was as dark as ink. Beneath the corridor of the Jinyiwei, the lanterns swayed in the wind.

Lu Yan walked quickly.

“Lu Yan! Commander Lu! Lord Lu!”

Lifting her skirt, Yu Qing chased after him, panting heavily. In her mind, the comments were flying wildly: 【Is this guy a rabbit or something? Running so fast! Just because he’s got long legs, he thinks he’s impressive!】

Hearing that inner thought, Lu Yan suddenly stopped in his tracks.

Yu Qing couldn’t brake in time and slammed straight into his solid back.

“Ow—!”

Rubbing her reddened nose, tears welling in her eyes, she looked up—only to meet a pair of unfathomably deep eyes.

Lu Yan turned around and looked down at her from above, his voice still cold and hard.

“Go back. This matter is not up for discussion.”

“Why not?” Yu Qing reached out and grabbed his sleeve, gently tugging it as her tone instantly softened, even carrying a hint of coquettish pleading.

“I know Lord Lu is worried about me—afraid my pretty little head might get separated from my body. But think about it carefully: I’m just going to wash clothes, not assassinate anyone. What danger could there be?”

Lu Yan lowered his gaze to the small, fair hand clutching his sleeve. The anger in his chest inexplicably dissipated a little, though his brows remained tightly knit.

“Prince Ning is extremely suspicious, and the palace is full of his informants. You have no background. If you slip up…”

“If I slip up, I’ll run!” Yu Qing immediately raised three fingers in oath.

“I may not be good at much, but I’m number one at running away! The moment something feels wrong, I’ll act crazy or play dumb and bolt. Besides… I managed to survive both you and Shen Jue before. What’s one Prince Ning compared to that?”

She stepped closer, tilting her face up. Her large, watery eyes sparkled with a sly light.

“Besides, won’t Lord Lu be outside to back me up? As long as I know Lord Lu is out there guarding with his Embroidered Spring Blade, I won’t be afraid of anything.”

The tips of Lu Yan’s ears reddened slightly. He turned his head away awkwardly, his Adam’s apple bobbing.

This woman was full of lies—yet he still fell for it every time.

After a long moment, he finally relented. From his robe he took out a specially made signal flare and stuffed it into her hand.

“Take this. If anything happens, set it off immediately. The hidden agents of the Imperial Guard will escort you out of the palace.”

Yu Qing’s eyes lit up. She tucked the flare into her robes, smiling like a cat that had stolen a fish.

“Yes, sir!”

Three days later, the Shangyi Bureau.

Yu Qing, dressed in the coarse clothing of a palace maid, squatted in front of a large wooden basin, vigorously scrubbing a pile of clothes.

Although her hands ached and her back was sore, her ears were perked up like radar.

“Hey, did you hear? Prince Ning recently sent a bunch of wild game into the palace again as tribute to the Empress Dowager! The smell was so good the whole imperial city was drooling!”

An old palace maid responsible for ironing chatted while she worked.

“Exactly! I heard even Xiao Li from the Imperial Kitchen got a bone left over from a noble’s meal. He was thrilled!”

“I’m telling you, the Imperial Kitchen really has plenty of perks.”

“But in this freezing weather, where did they even get wild game?” another maid chimed in.

“I heard it was hunted in the Western Hills.”

The maid frowned. “What? That place is barren—how could there be any wild game to hunt?”

Yu Qing’s hands paused.

【Wild game? But it’s the middle of winter—animals should be hibernating. Where would wild game come from? Unless… rabbits?】

Without drawing attention, she quietly stored this piece of information in her mind.

At dusk, Yu Qing was carrying a basin of freshly washed clothes as she passed through the back alley of the Imperial Pharmacy.

By coincidence, she overheard the young eunuch responsible for purchasing supplies complaining to his companion.

“Ah, I’m exhausted. I don’t know what’s going on these past few days. The higher-ups suddenly doubled—no, tripled—the amount of wound medicine and rice they want. I’ve practically run my legs off just trying to gather it all.”

“That much? I haven’t heard of anyone in the palace getting injured recently.”

“Who knows? They just said to stock it in case of emergencies. They’re even taking old rice—just piling everything into the warehouse.”

Yu Qing’s heart suddenly skipped a beat.

Rice… wound medicine… game from the Western Hills…

That night, after looking around carefully to make sure no one was watching, she slipped the note she had written into a specially hollowed-out bar of soap—the secret method she and Su Hewan had agreed upon for passing messages.

Outside the palace.

Su Hewan read the note in her hand, her gaze sharp and cold like a blade.

“If it’s the Western Hills, then it makes sense. The Western Hills are indeed a perfect place to hide troops. And large amounts of wound medicine and old rice are exactly what an army would need. But the Western Hills are so vast—we still don’t know the exact location.”

“It doesn’t matter. No need to rush,” Shen Jue said calmly as he toyed with the teacup in his hand, his tone chilling. “Since we know what he’s buying, we just need to find out where he bought it.”

Su Hewan nodded and couldn’t help smiling.

“Who would’ve thought Qingqing would be this reliable this time? When she comes back, we should reward her properly.”

Shen Jue then had someone leak the information to Lu Yan. He knew Lu Yan had recently been keeping a close watch on Prince Ning.

As soon as Lu Yan received the news, he immediately began taking action.

However, instead of launching a large, conspicuous search, he disguised himself and investigated shop by shop.

Any store that had recently handled large, suspicious transactions was carefully recorded.

Finally, in a narrow alley in the southern part of the city, he found a lead.

Renxin Hall Pharmacy and Fengyu Rice Shop.

These two stores appeared small and quiet on the surface, with little business. But the deep wagon tracks in their back courtyards clearly showed that heavy goods frequently passed through.

Late the next night, thunder roared and rain poured down.

Lu Yan, dressed in his Flying Fish uniform, stood within the curtain of rain.

Shen Jue appeared slowly from the darkness, holding a black umbrella, with agents of the Eastern Depot following behind him.

“Commander Lu moves quite quickly,” Shen Jue said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

“Likewise,” Lu Yan replied coldly.

“Move in!”

At the command, the Jinyiwei and the Eastern Depot agents burst through the doors of the two shops.

“Who are you people? How dare you—”

The shopkeeper had just woken from sleep. Before he could even shout, a Xiuchun blade was already pressed against his neck.

“Jinyiwei investigation,” Lu Yan’s voice was colder than the rain itself.

At the same time, the Eastern Depot agents were already rummaging through chests and cabinets in the back hall.

“Chief! We found something!”

One of the officers ran out carrying a zitan wood box.

Shen Jue took the box. With a light flick of his slender fingers, the lock snapped open.

Inside was a thick stack of account books.

Shen Jue casually opened one and, by the light of a fire striker, read the entries within. A bloodthirsty smile slowly curved his lips.

“March 18 — Western Hills Camp — Five hundred shi of white rice.”

“April 5 — Western Hills Camp — One thousand bottles of wound medicine.”

Every entry bore, at the bottom, the distinctive private seal of Prince Ning’s residence.

“Ironclad evidence.”

At some point, Su Hewan had also arrived at the scene. She took the ledger and flipped through it quickly.

“The flow of these supplies matches exactly what Yu Qing heard inside the palace. With these private seals as well, it seems Prince Ning won’t be able to talk his way out of this one.”