AUBTN -Chapter 336 The Past of a Noble Young Lady

Yu Qing casually brushed his hand away and continued, “Why is everyone so quiet? Wanwan, what do you think?”

Hearing this, Su Hewan picked up her teacup, took a sip, and let out a soft laugh.

“You’re right. Xiao Yuyao is highly suspicious.”

“The Prince of Zhennan was murdered, the military tally disappeared, and A’Wu died tragically. On the surface, it looks like the work of external enemies or political rivals, but outsiders could never carry out murder silently inside the heavily guarded royal estate!”

Shen Jue listened to Su Hewan’s analysis and nodded. “Mm. Right now, all the clues point toward her, but they’re still only suspicions.”

“So we need evidence,” Lu Yan continued.

“I suggest we investigate from two directions at the same time. First, uncover the truth about her past. Second, find a way to test whether she actually knows martial arts.”

Yu Qing frowned. “But didn’t you say Southern Xinjiang is so far away? Will news even arrive in time?”

【If only there were mobile phones! One phone call would solve everything!】Yu Qing grumbled inwardly.

Suppressing the urge to ask what exactly a “mobile phone” was, Lu Yan coughed lightly and explained:

“Southern Xinjiang may be remote and mountainous, but the Jinyiwei has hidden agents stationed there. As long as we use urgent messenger pigeons, within two days we’ll be able to dig up every detail of her past in Southern Xinjiang.”

Shen Jue shot his rival a cold glance and mocked, “Then Prince Jing had better move quickly. If the Jinyiwei’s pigeons lose their way halfway, this Governor’s Eastern Depot agents won’t hesitate to snatch the credit.”

“A eunuch faction will always be a eunuch faction. Besides stealing credit, what else can you do?” Lu Yan snorted coldly, and the two exchanged another round of unwilling barbs.

With a flick of his sleeve, Lu Yan turned and walked out.

“We’ll know the truth in two days.”

In the turbulent undercurrents of the capital, two days passed in the blink of an eye.

The Emperor’s seven-day deadline hung above everyone’s heads like a sword.

At dusk on the fifth day, a gray-black carrier pigeon landed precisely on the windowsill of the Yuyuan study.

The four people, who had been waiting there early, immediately gathered around.

Lu Yan strode forward, skillfully calming the pigeon before removing an extremely thin strip of silk parchment from the bronze tube tied to its leg.

The silk was densely covered with tiny characters, all written in the Jinyiwei’s unique coded cipher.

Lu Yan rapidly deciphered it line by line.

As his gaze moved downward, his expression shifted from shock to sudden understanding.

“What exactly does it say? Lu Iceberg, say something already! You’re killing me with suspense!” Yu Qing was as anxious as an ant on a hot pan, stretching her neck to peek at the silk.

Lu Yan took a deep breath, suddenly turned around, and slammed the decoded message heavily onto the desk.

“See for yourselves.”

Shen Jue slightly raised a brow, his well-defined fingers picking up the secret letter as his eyes swiftly scanned through it.

Gradually, astonishment flashed through his eyes before turning into a low, complicated cold laugh.

“What a proper young lady indeed.”

Su Hewan snatched the letter away, while Yu Qing hurriedly leaned in beside her.

After only one glance, both of their pupils shrank sharply at the same time.

The contents of the secret report were practically a blood-and-tears tale of a resilient female protagonist enduring hardship!

Xiao Yuyao was absolutely not some weak, delicate woman.

On the contrary, from a very young age, she had displayed extraordinary military talent.

She learned to read at three years old. By seven, she could already recite The Six Secret Teachings and The Three Strategies by heart. At ten, during war-game exercises on the sand table, she could defeat her three useless older brothers so thoroughly that they were left in complete disarray.

But the most shocking incident happened the year she came of age.

The southern barbarians launched a massive invasion, and the vanguard of the Xiao Army suffered a crushing setback.

Xiao Yuyao secretly drugged the guards unconscious, disguised herself as a man, adopted the alias Xiao Yao, and infiltrated the vanguard camp alone.

Not only did she fight bravely on the battlefield, but with her exceptional understanding of terrain, she led fifty death-squad soldiers on a nighttime raid against the enemy supply camp. One fire burned away three months’ worth of military provisions for the barbarians.

She became famous overnight and earned tremendous military merit.

By the time Yu Qing reached this point in the report, her eyes had already reddened with emotion.

“Holy shit! She’s basically Hua Mulan! A heroine who outshines men! That’s so damn cool! This is straight-up war god protagonist material!”

However, the second half of the secret report took an abrupt dark turn.

When the commanding general, Prince Zhennan Xiao Zhengnan, discovered that Xiao Yao was actually his illegitimate daughter, he felt not even the slightest pride or gratification. Instead, he flew into a furious rage.

He believed that a woman showing herself publicly and mixing among men was a disgrace to the family and a violation of feminine virtue.

To cover up this “family scandal,” Xiao Zhengnan actually ordered the severely wounded Xiao Yuyao — who had just achieved extraordinary merit — dragged into a hidden tent and beaten with thirty strokes of the military rod.

That was not all.

He forcibly stripped Xiao Yuyao of all her military achievements and shamelessly claimed the credit for himself.

Using her birth mother’s life as leverage, Xiao Zhengnan also forced her to consume a slow-acting poison for years — one that gradually weakened the body.

He had forcibly transformed a tiger daughter born to a military family into a frail invalid who would gasp for breath after taking only a few steps.

From then on, Xiao Yuyao was brought back to the manor and kept under strict surveillance.

Yu Qing was so furious that she directly overturned the teacup on the table, splashing tea all over the floor.

“What kind of ultimate scumbag father is this?! A rotten old patriarch obsessed with sons!”

“She risked her life to earn those military accomplishments, and he just stole them for himself? Is it really that hard to admit his daughter was better than him?!”

“I’m so pissed off! I seriously want to charge into the mourning hall right now, rip open that old bastard’s coffin, drag him out, and whip his corpse ten thousand times!”

Lu Yan lowered his gaze and tightened his grip on the embroidered spring saber at his waist, murderous intent filling his eyes.

As a military man, he despised nothing more than people who stole military merit and destroyed talented generals — even if that person was a prince.

Su Hewan stared at the intelligence report, her own emotions surging violently.

“This is textbook extreme family psychological abuse,” she said after taking a deep breath, her voice as cold as a blade dipped in ice.

“Long-term emotional suppression combined with physical torment is enough to twist anyone’s psyche.”

She lifted her head and calmly analyzed the situation for the three men.

“Think about it. Why would Xiao Zhengnan lower his guard and get his throat slit inside a locked room? Because he was too arrogant. He was convinced he had completely broken and tamed this daughter of his. He believed that Xiao Yuyao — weakened by years of poison and too frail to even care for herself — had no ability to resist.”

“But in reality, Xiao Yuyao had been pretending the entire time. She was never poisoned at all.”

Yu Qing sneered coldly as well.

“Where there’s oppression, there’s resistance. So from beginning to end, this was the bloody revenge of a genius whose life had been destroyed… against a demon of a father?”

Hearing that, Shen Jue suddenly let out a low laugh.

“Good. Very good.”

“The longer someone suppresses themselves, the more terrifying the explosion when they finally snap. Now I truly want to meet this ‘improper’ Fourth Miss.”

“Now that the motive is clear, there’s only one final step left,” Su Hewan said coldly as she tossed the secret report into the brazier and watched it burn into ashes.

“We need to prove that she is the highly skilled murderer capable of killing with her bare hands.”

Yu Qing sighed.

“It really is tragic…”

Who would have thought that such a delicate noble young lady had such a past?