Chapter 2232: Spies

When Sang Qien saw his dumbfounded expression, she started laughing so hard that she couldn't even keep her mouth closed anymore. Zheng Dan also had a weird expression as she exclaimed, “Ah Zu, you really are good at hiding things! You actually quietly slept with the two most influential women in the entire empire!”

Zu An was completely caught and thrown for a loop now. “Is anyone going to tell me just what exactly happened?”

Judging from the current situation, it seemed they weren’t saying this just to mess with him, and that his relationship with the empress really had been exposed. But he really couldn't understand it. It was one thing if his relationship with Liu Ning had been exposed after what happened to the Liu clan. Now that the Bi clan had become so powerful and Bi Linglong was still the empress, why would they permit rumors like this to spread?

“During the court session the morning after the event, that stupid emperor denounced you for bullying the empress in front of all of the civil and military officials. There were so many people there, so the empress couldn't keep it a secret even if she wanted to. By now, the entire human race probably knows about your relationship with the empress,” Sang Qien explained to him.

Zheng Dan said with a sneer, “There are books titled ‘History of the Regent’s Romance’, ‘Empress’ Secrets’, ‘Ah Zu Dominating Linglong’, and many others now. I've heard that they’re quite popular too.”

Zu An was stunned. He exclaimed, “What kind of madness is that Zhao Ruizhi experiencing?”

He quickly calmed himself down. With Zhao Ruizhi’s intelligence, there was no way he would know about that. As such, it meant that someone had definitely instigated all of this. But his relationship with Bi Linglong was a great secret that almost no one knew about. Why did the people responsible know?

Could it be that Rong Mo told the Bi clan and the Bi clan divulged the secret?

No, this isn’t in line with the Bi clan’s interests.

The Bi clan was able to achieve their current position by relying on their daughter becoming the crown princess, and then the empress. Any rumors of Bi Linglong being with another man would only tarnish their authority.

Sang Qien gave Zheng Dan a look.

Dandan really is amazing. When I first heard it, I thought that it was definitely false, but Dandan was so confident that it was true.

Judging from big brother Zu’s reaction, it seems to be true, as expected!

She then explained, “Those people were probably just throwing baseless accusations, as splashing some dirty water on you and the empress would help them achieve their goals easier. They just never expected the shot in the dark to be the truth.”

As she spoke, she couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t so often that she could see Zu An in such a sorry state.

Zu An immediately understood when he listened to her analysis. It was likely not far from the truth. Still, this really was a bit ridiculous. He and Linglong had kept the secret so well, and there was no way anyone could have found out, and yet it ended up being exposed because of this kind of reason.

Linglong is pretty sensitive. She's probably felt terrible all this time, right?

He couldn't help but ask about Bi Linglong’s situation. Sang Qien replied, “According to the news father brings back each time he returns from the court session, the empress is still handling governmental affairs like before, as if nothing happened. There were a few subjects and maids who ended up being caught discussing this rumor, but she didn’t get mad and punish them. That doesn’t seem to resemble the way she did things in the past.”

“What is so difficult to understand here?” Zheng Dan said with a sneer. “She probably felt a bit embarrassed when this was first exposed, but soon realized that it was better to just get the pain over with rather than prolong the agony. She was probably wondering how she could ever publicly announce her relationship with Ah Zu, but isn’t this a readily available way? She thus decided to just not refute it and let everyone get used to it. After a few years, she could then announce her relationship with Ah Zu, and it wouldn’t really create that much of a commotion then.”

Sang Qien had a ‘so that was what was happening’ expression. She was better at analyzing the conflict between the various forces in the court, but Dandan was better at understanding the interpersonal feelings between men and women.

When he heard that Bi Linglong was fine, Zu An sighed in relief. After some hesitation, he asked, “What is the empress dowager’s current situation?”

“Are you asking how your relationship with the empress dowager was exposed?” Zheng Dan immediately saw through his intentions. “Don’t worry, this isn’t something everyone knows about. Only we know about it.”

Zu An was stunned. That secret was exposed, but only they knew about it? How?

“The reason is that after the events of that night, the empress dowager jumped into our courtyard after being heavily injured,” Sang Qien explained.

Zu An suddenly got up. “What? Where is she right now?”

At first, he'd thought that with Liu Ning’s cultivation, she would at least be able to protect herself. He hadn’t expected her to be injured and run all the way to them for help. That meant she'ddefinitely had no other way out.

“Look at how worried you seem right now.” Zheng Dan rolled her eyes. “Don’t worry, with our meticulous care, the empress has already recovered. But you can’t meet with her right now.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s because she suddenly went missing.” Zheng Dan sighed. She was clearly a bit annoyed by this as well.

“Went missing?”

“Don’t worry,” Sang Qien said to comfort Zu An when she saw how alarmed he was. “The empress isn’t in any danger. She left a few days ago on her own.”

Zu An was a bit puzzled. The two women had saved Liu Ning’s life, so how could she just leave without even saying anything?

Sang Qien explained, “It was probably because there are rumors of your relationship with the empress everywhere, and she knew that even if you came back, you would be torn between the two of them. That was why she decided to leave first and find her own way to get revenge.”

“It’s all my fault for not thinking of this. I didn’t take good enough care of her,” Zheng Dan said, feeling a bit apologetic.

Sang Qien immediately responded, “How is that your fault? Back then, the court searched everywhere for traces of the Liu clan’s remnants and followed the trail all the way up here. If not for the fact that you sorted out the capital’s underground forces and had the ability to move her to a safer place, our entire Sang clan might have been done for.”

Zu An was a bit surprised.

𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

Zheng Dan really still has a lingering passion for being an underground gang boss. She was like this in Brightmoon City, and it’s the same here in the capital.

“Because the empress was staying outside and there are spies hidden everywhere, we couldn’t just leave that easily. That’s why we weren’t able to immediately stop her once she left,” Sang Qien was a bit apologetic.

Zu An said in consolation, “It’s not your fault. She's a powerful grandmaster. How could the two of you stop her if she wanted to leave?”

He placed his daughter into Sang Qien’s arms and asked, “Who do the spies outside belong to?”

The two women both shook their heads in confusion. “We suspect that they might be here to search for the empress’ whereabouts. After all, the empress headed in this direction before she disappeared.”

“In that case, we can just ask them.” Zu An vanished as soon as he said these words.

...

Meanwhile, outside the Sang manor, there was an incredibly dark place that resembled the inside of an attic. Inside, someone dressed completely in black was secretly monitoring the Sang manor’s activity. Even though the Sang clan did seem suspicious, he hadn’t been able to find anything concrete. Furthermore, he hadn’t seen any traces of that person’s return.

Suddenly, his body went rigid. He turned around in disbelief, discovering that another person had suddenly appeared in the room.

And there was probably no one in the entire capital who didn’t know who that person was. He was the killer of a prince, the culprit behind the eradication of the Meng clan. The one who had dominated an earth immortal, the dragon slayer, the lover of the queen, the collector of beautiful women, the regent Zu An!

There was a terrifying presence just from Zu An standing there. The spy couldn't produce even the slightest thought of resistance. As such, he didn’t hesitate to end his own life at all.

Zu An was stunned. He had been about to ask where the spy came from. How could he have anticipated that the latter would do something like this?

Sang Qien and Zheng Dan both rushed over. When they saw the scene, they were frightened, as it was just too strange. The moment the spy died, his body quickly began to rot.

Zu An’s expression turned cold. “This seems to be a corpse ghost controlled by malicious arts.”

If one died without a soul, their corpse would quickly rot. That was, unless someone paid a great price to preserve the corpse. Additionally, there were some malicious arts that controlled departed spirits. The user would put a strand of their own divine will into such corpses to control them. To a certain degree, it was similar to controlling a body with a Heart-Devouring Demon Spider.

“Then it seems as if it’ll be really hard to find the main perpetrator behind the scenes.” Zheng Dan had once come from the world of warriors, so she had heard about corpse ghosts too.

For those malicious cultivators, corpse ghosts were nothing more than consumables. Even if they were lost, they wouldn’t feel that brokenhearted over them. The greatest benefit was that they could retract their divine will from such corpse puppets at any time. That way, even if something happened, there would be no way of tracing them.

In the past, when the various forces of the capital fought against each other, it had still been founded upon some basic principles. There was no way they would use such sinister techniques, as they would easily become the target of public criticism. Now, however, they were completely unscrupulous in their methods.

Zu An said indifferently, “Don’t worry, he won’t be able to get away.”

With his current cultivation and the fact that he now grasped the authority of the world, it would be a real joke if he let this person escape from right under his eyes. In that time, his divine will had already covered the entire city.

Normally, even though he could potentially find someone, he would also have been sensed by others. It was like a radar. Even if he located your target, even a third party would sense his powerful divine will.

But now that he had merged with the will of the world, everything was silent and untraceable. Who would still pay attention to the natural energy around them?