Dingjiangshan

Ning Huaijin turned around suspiciously and looked at Ning Yan.

Jiang Xiaohan's thoughts moved slightly, and he guessed that Ning Yan might have something to say to Ning Huaijin alone.He pulled Xie Jue's arm from behind indiscriminately, pulling him away for the time being.

Ning Yan's eyes fell on the quilt, looking at the chaos, without any focus.Ning Huaijin looked at him suspiciously for a while, and just as she was about to reach out and wave her hand in front of his eyes, she heard Ning Yan speak again.

"Uncle Emperor." Ning Yan said suddenly, "Is Linglong back yet?"

--exquisite?

Ning Huaijin heard that these two prefaces did not match the latter, and wondered if it was because Ning Yan fell asleep and hadn't woken up yet.

"I don't know very well." Ning Huaijin said patiently, "He Wenting is outside, let him come in and ask."

Ning Yan just woke up from a dream, feeling exhausted, Ning Huaijin consciously shouldered the burden for him, and called out He Wenting.

He Wenting stayed outside for most of the night, dozing off when he was suddenly woken up by Ning Huaijin, and subconsciously shivered.

"The slave is here." He wiped off the whisk dust stained on his body, hurriedly pushed the door in, and said, "What orders does the lord have?"

"Is Linglong back?" Ning Huaijin asked.

"Not yet." He Wenting said: "The servant has been guarding the door, and Miss Linglong has not come back."

He Wenting looked at Ning Huaijin's face while talking, and tentatively said: "Is the prince in a hurry? Then the slave asked someone to look for her?"

Only then did Ning Huaijin remember that he had ordered these servants before, and if Linglong came back, he would call her back.Things were too messy tonight, and half of his heart was on Ning Yan, so he forgot about such a trivial matter.

Ning Huaijin seemed to realize that she was in a hurry, and she was secretly annoyed for a moment.

"There's no need to look for it." Ning Yan turned his head to look out the window, and said in a low voice, "Go down first."

He Wenting glanced at the two people in bewilderment, and retreated as he said.

The night outside was still dark, and Ning Yan didn't know what time it was, but felt that the rain outside seemed to be getting heavier.

The raindrops hit the window edge, making a sound like a heavy impact, which was endless.

A white-headed kite with black wings flew silently from the east corner of Renshou Palace under the cover of the rainy night, fluttered its wings over the low eaves in the pouring rain, and soon disappeared into the night.

The sound of the rain became its best cover. Ruan Yin stood inside the palace wall, squinting her eyes and struggled to identify its figure in the night, until she confirmed that it had gone away safely and was indeed not discovered by the imperial guards outside. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Standing a few steps behind Ruan Yin, Linglong looked away from behind her, subconsciously wanting to look down at her dirty embroidered shoes.Her gaze flicked across the well-groomed grass of Renshou Palace, but she accidentally collided with Shili under the corridor.

The two of them looked at each other blankly for a moment, then looked away at the same time.

A thunderclap pierced the sky, big raindrops hit the ground, and a stream of rain was formed in the drainage ditch under the palace road. Seeing that the rain fell even heavier.

"I just dreamed about my father." As soon as there were no outsiders in the room, his self-proclaiming changed back: "I dreamed about when he was still around."

As Ning Yan said, he lowered his head, looked at the hand he was holding with Ning Huaijin, and cherished the back of his hand with his thumb.

Ning Huaijin was already ready to reject his "getting an inch", but she didn't want Ning Yan to look at it for a while, and then reluctantly let go of her hand.

Ning Huaijin: "..."

Ning Yan was having a fever, and the palms of his hands were also very hot. When he let go of his hand suddenly, Ning Huaijin felt as if a ray of cool wind was blowing over the back of his hand, which was cold and itchy, and also had a subtle sense of loss.

He retracted his hand uncomfortably, and patted the hem of his clothes with that hand to cover up, before asking: "What did you dream about?"

Ning Yan moved back, leaned on the soft pillow, and adjusted himself to a more comfortable position.

"Uncle Huang, do you still remember that something happened before my father gave me a birthday banquet?" Ning Yan said: "At that time, a waiter in the dining room poisoned my food, and he was taken out and killed with a stick. gone."

"I remember." Ning Huaijin said: "At that time, there was no proof of the man's death after he was killed with a stick. It took a lot of effort to find out that it was Wen Guifei who did it. It's just that the noble concubine had passed away at that time, and the Wen family had also collapsed. It's over."

"What?" Ning Huaijin was worried that he remembered the past because of lingering fears, so she softened her voice and said, "Is it what happened today that disturbed His Majesty?"

"No." Ning Yan shook his head and said, "I just suddenly remembered that when my father asked me to go over to ask the case, he once said something to me——"

It is not easy to find such trivial memories from a long time ago. The scene in the dream is mixed with too much "Ning Yan"'s own thoughts, and some details are not accurate.

He paused, tried his best to recall for a while, and then said: "Father once said that he left me a gift——as his congratulatory gift for my enthronement."

——A congratulatory gift for enthronement?

Ning Huaijin subconsciously thought of his "elder brother" who had no plans to spare. Ning Huaijin thought about Ning Zongyuan's style of doing things, and always felt that this was not a good "gift".

Just because Ning Zongyuan used Ning Yan's birthday banquet to force Ning Yu to rebel, and Ning Yan, who was only six years old at the time, watched the bloody storm outside with his own eyes, Ning Huaijin had no expectations for Ning Zongyuan. .

But then again, the "way of being a king" that Ning Zongyuan taught Ning Yan in that short half month, really benefited Ning Yan a lot in the past ten years.

So Ning Huaijin couldn't say anything, so she could only follow Ning Yan's will and said, "Your Majesty mentioned this matter now, is there any speculation?"

"Back then..." Ning Yan didn't know what to think of, and paused for a moment before continuing: "I thought that the 'gift' that the father mentioned was the fourth brother. But now that I think about it, it's not .”

Ning Yan sighed, and said: "Uncle, tell me, Anqing Mansion is located in the hinterland of the Central Plains, next to it is the domain of the king, and behind it is a land of fish and rice, and it is closely connected to a fortress in the hinterland like Jiangzhou. The land was sealed to the third brother—is it just because He Liuyun, the former governor of Anqing Prefecture, is the third brother's confidant?"

Ning Huaijin was suddenly startled.

"Although I didn't grow up by my father's side since I was a child, I can probably get to know him a little after sitting on the throne for so many years." Ning Yan said: "He is definitely not a person who will dispose of the country at will."

"Perhaps..." Ning Huaijin said slowly, "The king of Changle is the gift from the late emperor."

Ning Yan didn't speak, obviously because Ning Huaijin also thought of a place.

"At that time, my father said that this gift was left to me by him." Ning Yan whispered: "He said that this is a good gift that will make me open and smooth in the future."

——Nonsense, Ning Huaijin thought.

Born in the royal family, with the surname "Ning", Ning Huaijin has seen too many quarrels in the royal family and brothers turning against each other.

The reason why Ning Zongyuan called Ning Zheng a "gift" was actually to use him as a sharpening stone for Ning Yan.If Ning Yan can pass this hurdle, it proves that he really has the wrist and the ability to stand firm, and he will naturally be able to be smooth and magnanimous in the future-but then again, what if he can't pass.

If Ning Yan was a mediocre child who couldn't compete with Ruan Yin internally and Ning Zheng externally, he could only be cut off by this whetstone, thrown off the dragon chair, and replaced by another child. A kind of "smooth and magnanimous".

——As expected of an imperial brother, Ning Huaijin thought.

Even though Ning Yan had been set on Ning Yan back then, it was still because of his young age that he wanted to add one last layer of protection to this country, so that the person sitting on the dragon chair would not be a waste of a corpse.

"Father wants to test me." Ning Yan said.

"At the beginning, the third brother and the fourth brother fought to the death, the sky was dark, and in the end I took advantage of it for nothing." Ning Yan said: "The world says that you have to break out of a cocoon to become a butterfly, so now the father wants to make up for it. The third brother will fight again—"

Ning Huaijin was a little reluctant: "Your Majesty."

"Uncle Emperor." Ning Yan smiled suddenly, and said with a relaxed tone: "Tell me, is it possible that the father found me in the spirit of the sky, and thought I was ridiculous, and regretted it again, and wanted to change before the battle?" -"

"I will help you." Ning Huaijin interrupted him, and said bluntly: "The late emperor had a deep mind, and his intentions were beyond my ability to guess back then, and even more so now. Whoever you are helping, I will stand by your side."

Ning Yan was taken aback.

"The first emperor is already the first emperor, and now the one who sits on the throne is your majesty." Ning Huaijin seemed to want to reassure him, and his tone was extremely firm: "Your majesty is the real dragon emperor, so there is no need to mess with yourself for ghosts and gods." mind."

To Prince Gong, these words were almost shocking, and it would not be an exaggeration to say that he was disrespectful.Ning Yan originally just wanted to chat with Ning Huaijin, but he didn't expect him to have such a big reaction. He was stunned for a long time before he smiled dryly, reached out and patted the back of his hand.

"I was joking with Uncle Huang, why are you so angry?" Ning Yan glanced at his expression, and said out of breath, "Okay, Uncle Huang doesn't like to hear this, so I won't mention it in the future."

However, Ning Huaijin obviously believed that Ning Yan was really shaken for a moment, and gave him a worried look.But because of Ning Yan's face, he didn't say anything.

"It doesn't matter whether it's the test deliberately set up by the predecessors, or whether Ning Zheng's own mind is active." Ning Huaijin said: "Soldiers come to cover up the water and the earth. This world is His Majesty's world, even if it is really Zhang. Your Majesty also wants to answer the examination papers for the world to read, not for the late emperor."

——Prince Gong racked his brains and used everything to try to solve Ning Yan.

Ning Yan opened his mouth. He wanted to explain something, but felt that it was troublesome, so he simply followed the sentence by mistake, nodded his head, and said, "I know."

"Then put these aside, does His Majesty still not want to issue an order to deploy troops?" Ning Huaijin asked.

"I don't transfer troops, not because of these things, nor because I'm afraid of my father's plan." Ning Yan turned his head to look outside at the thick night, and said, "I want to give third brother one last chance."