The Legend of the Concubine in the Harem

"After that day, I didn't see her again for a long time...until one day, when the moon was full..."

Mi Nian told Lu Weiyuan that the moon was very white that night and the river water was very clear. The guests of Tianwu Pavilion and the brothels went to the open-air stage in the center of the building to admire the moon. However, Xiang Xiezhi was booked that night and did not go with them.

Not long after that, a mysterious case occurred that caused Tianwu Pavilion to decline overnight.

"In fact, the first person to discover her body was not the rumored to be a tortoise, but me." Mi Nian said, "I couldn't fall asleep that night. I sneaked out when the maids weren't paying attention, wanting to relax, but I found that the back door of the place where our group of girls lived was opened at some point, so I sneaked out, but I didn't expect..."

Her screams attracted the grunt who was guarding nearby, but before the grunt could notice her, Mi Nian was covered with her mouth by someone and taken away from the scene.

"That man is my godfather. Everyone calls him the leader."

After that day, she never returned to Shuicheng, but was raised in Yunzhou by the leader of Hongyang. As the adopted daughter of the leader, Mi Nian got her current name and slowly gathered a number of followers. Perhaps because the leader of Hongyang always felt guilty about the whereabouts of his biological sister whom he could not find, he used women and money to lure many people into the sect, but he never married. When he was old and about to die, he suddenly had the idea of ​​passing the position of leader to his adopted daughter.

"The Mi family is not only good at carving, but also has a hand in the secret art of mechanical devices passed down from their ancestors. That year, the leader used a mechanical boat to quietly transport the huge stone to the river outside Tianwu Pavilion, allowing her to... die in that way."

"I didn't know this at the time. It was only when the leader was unconscious and talking nonsense before he died that I learned some of the inside information. The death of Miss Xi Fangfei in the Jade Bottle Pavilion seemed to be related to them. But no one in the sect knows what they did."

Mi Nian said, lifting the front of her dress, and suddenly knelt down in front of Lu Weiyuan: "Your Highness, I know that what the Red Sun Cult has done is evil and intolerable, but most of the women in the sect are innocent. They...are either abandoned by their parents, or sacrificed by their husbands and sons. They have been sacrificed and abandoned by their loved ones time and time again. Apart from the Red Sun Cult, they have nowhere to go, and they dare not go anywhere else."

"But living in the church is like hell for these women."

"The Red Sun teachings incorporate many of the Western Indian teachings. Being a woman is a sin. Being born as a woman must be a sin from a previous life, and in this life one must pay for it with the pain of bleeding and childbirth. Only after having suffered enough sin in this world can one become a Buddha or a saint after death, shedding their female bodies and transforming into male bodies. From then on, one can enjoy bliss and freedom in the Red Sun's worry-free hometown..."

"I don't think this is right, but I am indeed powerless and unable to change it." Mi Nian touched the ground with his forehead.

The two masked women following behind her looked at each other, took off the black cloth covering their faces, revealing two faces that were also covered with scars, and then they knelt down.

Lu Weiyuan, who had been leaning lazily on his chair, had stood up.

"People like Qi Shaofeng teamed up to drive me, the so-called 'leader', out of Yunzhou. I took advantage of their desire to establish connections with the powerful people in the capital and went to the capital with them under the pretext of looking for relatives for the old leader, and tried to contact His Highness."

"Do you want to use me to eradicate the Hongyang Sect?" Lu Weiyuan asked.

Mi Nian replied, "Yes, if I leave it to someone else, I won't be able to rest assured, but you... are different from the Queen. Even though I was born on the border of Yunzhou, I can feel the new wind blowing across the land of Dasheng. It is precisely because this wind is getting closer and stronger that the people in the Hongyang Sect have to start seeking change."

"But the changes I want are different from theirs!"

"They intend to contact the officials and dignitaries in the capital, use the old method that has always worked in Yunzhou and other places to infiltrate them, and support the prince who is more inclined to them to ascend the throne..."

Lu Weiyuan chuckled, "What a wild idea, but Sister Xiaochuan said something right, my mother is indeed the most different. Those idiots wouldn't think that it is really their destiny that my mother suddenly wants to travel around, right?"

"This is just a chance for them to expose themselves, and you are much smarter than those people."

Lu Weiyuan bent down and helped Mi Nian up: "By the way, you said before that the excuse you used to go to the capital was to find relatives for the old leader?"

"That's right." Mi Nian didn't act too pretentiously and stood up with the force. She knew that this was Lu Weiyuan's approval of her performance, and she couldn't help but feel a lot more relaxed.

"Then can I ask, is the relative your old leader is looking for surnamed Shen?"

Mi Nian paused and said, "Maybe it's Shen. The old leader found a clue before he died. It said that his fallen sister did go to a brothel near Tianwu Pavilion, but was bought by a traveling merchant a long time ago and disappeared. When the old leader went to look for her that year, she had already left Water City, but she came back not long after. The old leader had already gone to look for her somewhere else, and by chance, they missed each other."

"Then it's almost correct." Lu Weiyuan sighed softly, with a hint of pity on his face.

Mi Nian felt something was wrong - the old leader was indeed not a good guy, and he deserved to be cut into pieces, but he had saved her after all, and raised and taught her. If she could get the whereabouts of his relatives that he missed so much before he died, she would go and find out no matter what.

"Please let me know, Your Highness."

Lu Weiyuan glanced at her and turned his back. "In the past, there was a concubine named Shen Nanliu in the emperor's harem. She was the daughter of a branch of the Yuyang Marquis's family that no longer existed. She was adopted by the eldest master of the Yuyang Marquis's family and sent to the palace. Not long after, she was banished to the cold palace for murdering others. It's hard to tell whether she had gone crazy or finally woke up. In short, she committed suicide after being banished to the cold palace."

"Before she died, she left a blood letter stating that she was not the daughter of a branch of the Yuyang Marquis's family, but the daughter of a prostitute and a merchant."

"Her last wish was to be buried next to her mother."

"But her mother had already been sunk into the river, and her body could not be found anywhere... The late queen sent her ashes and clothes to Tongzhou, and built a tomb and erected a monument for them in a cemetery by the river."

After another sigh, Lu Weiyuan turned around and said, "Ever since you called yourself Luochuanke, I have been wondering what your relationship with her might be, but I never expected that there would be so many twists and turns."