Mei Zhaoyi thought that she had done it seamlessly, but she didn't expect to be caught by Concubine Xia, so she was a little flustered, but she still pretended to be calm on her face, "Sister Xia is really good at laughing, how could my maid go to Zhaoyang Hall in the middle of the night?

Xia Qingqing smiled and replied, "My sister seems to suspect that I did it!"

Then Xia Qingqing kowtowed to Mu Jingyuan and continued: "Your Majesty, Ye Ningxiang said that the key to the library is always with her, and the person who breaks into the library must know how to open the lock, so we might as well do an experiment." ”

Then Mu Jingyuan issued an order to gather Xia Qingqing, Mei Zhaoyi, the Queen Mother and his slaves and maids together, and each equipped them with a lock in front of them, requiring them to open the lock without a key within a quarter of an hour, and if they couldn't open it, they would be dragged out and beheaded.

These slaves and maids were so frightened that they broke the lock desperately for some reason, and most of them ended in failure, and the Yulin Army also dragged the failed slaves out of the palace very realistically. Under such a cruel reality, there was even one person who successfully opened the lock, and that person was the palace maid who Mei Zhaoyi whipped that day.

When Mei Zhaoyi saw that she had successfully opened the lock, her face immediately turned green, but she didn't dare to speak more, just waiting for Mu Jingyuan to give the next instructions.

The palace maid was taken to the main hall of Zhaoyang Palace, and then knelt on the ground in horror, kowtowed her head fiercely, and said in a trembling voice: "Slave Xiaoqian to the emperor and the queen mother." ”

"Your name is Xiao Qian, are you from Mei Zhaoyi's palace?" Mu Jingyuan said coldly, looking at Mei Zhaoyi with anger.

"Your Majesty, Xiao Qian is honest and honest on weekdays, it is impossible to do such a rebellious thing, and I hope the emperor will see it!" Mei Zhaoyi realized the anger in Mu Jingyuan's heart, and preemptively kowtowed to intercede for Xiao Qian.

Originally, letting Xiao Qian unlock the lock made her panic and overwhelmed, but now when she heard Mei Zhaoyi mention the big rebellion, Xiao Qian was so shocked that she sat on the ground, her face became pale, she glanced at Mei Zhaoyi timidly, and couldn't help but speak.

"Xiaoqian, tell me, did you open the door lock of this library?" Mu Jingyuan asked in a deliberately low voice.

Xiao Qian fell prostrate on the ground, and the big tears of beans crackled out, but she never let go, "Your Majesty, the slave has never opened the door lock of the library!"

Without waiting for Mu Jingyuan to continue asking, Ye Ningxiang preemptively said: "I have smeared poison on the door lock of this library, if someone picks the lock, that person's hands will definitely be contaminated with poison powder, and now it should be red, swollen and itchy, and he will bleed to death on the second day." If the person who picked the lock is found now, that person may still be saved, otherwise even the antidote will not be able to save her life. ”

Ye Ningxiang said while observing Xiao Qian's demeanor, and sure enough, Xiao Qian's eyes were obviously frightened when she heard the word poison powder, and she subconsciously looked at her hands, although she found that her hands were not different, she was still unconsciously flustered.

Ye Ningxiang knew in her heart that a slave like Xiao Qian, who had a very low status and seemed to be timid and afraid, would not take the initiative to frame her, there must be someone behind her to instigate her, and the instigator was Mei Zhaoyi nine times out of ten. Ye Ningxiang's nonsense words have already made Xiao Qian panic, and if she asks a few more questions, Xiao Qian's psychological defense line will definitely collapse, and her grievances will be cleared.

Then Ye Ningxiang deliberately sighed and said: "She must have been instructed by others to do this, not out of her original intention, it is really not worth sacrificing her life for others!"

Mei Zhaoyi pretended to be very aggrieved, and even said with a crying voice: "Ye Ningxiang, you don't want to be suspicious here, in my opinion, it is clear that you have destroyed those show girl pictures, and now you are trying to exonerate yourself with your copper teeth and iron mouth!"

At this time, Xiao Qian, who was originally kneeling on the ground, suddenly got up, and when everyone didn't react, she jumped and hit her head on the pillar in front of her, and for a while her originally delicate face was covered with blood, and her face was hideous and terrifying.

Ye Ningxiang was startled, and rushed forward to support Xiao Qian, who slowly slipped to the ground, but Xiao Qian was like a puddle of mud, lying in Ye Ningxiang's arms without half the strength.

She opened her eyes wide and looked at Ye Ningxiang with all her might, and there was boundless regret in her eyes. She swallowed her breath with her eyes wide open, and before she swallowed, a bright red teardrop flowed from her eyes, full of reluctance and helplessness for this life.

Seeing that Xiaoqian was dead, Mei Zhaoyi's heart that she had been holding before was also relaxed, and the confidence in her words was also more sufficient. While crying, she looked at Ye Ningxiang with resentful eyes, and then looked at Mu Jingyuan pitifully, and said: "Your Majesty, you want to be the master of your concubines! Xiaoqian has always been well-behaved and sensible, but now she was forced to death by this Ye Ningxiang just because she knew how to open the lock!"

After speaking, Mei Zhaoyi cried for a while before continuing: "Your Majesty, please make the decision for Xiaoqian, you can't let her die in vain!"

Ye Ningxiang originally thought that she could break through Xiaoqian's psychological defense, and personally admitted the mastermind of the matter, but she didn't expect that this seemingly weak Xiaoqian would choose such a tragic way to end the matter, and she felt very sorry for Xiaoqian's death in her heart, and at the same time, she felt a little flustered because of the sudden change of momentum.

But in a moment, she regained her senses. Soon the guards carried Xiaoqian's body out of the palace, and the slaves wiped off the blood stains left on the palace as quickly as possible, and everything returned to its original appearance.

"Ye Ningxiang, now that Xiaoqian is dead, do you still have evidence to get away with it?" the Queen Mother lowered her voice and asked seriously.

Ye Ningxiang pondered for a while and said, "Queen Mother, it is said that those pictures of show girls are defiled with black ink, can you let the slaves and maids take a look?"

The Queen Mother didn't embarrass her, and sent a little palace maid to unfold the pictures of those defiled show girls one by one and put them in front of Ye Ningxiang. Ye Ningxiang looked at it carefully for a while, then sniffed the smell of black ink vigorously, and then smiled, as if relieved.

Then, Ye Ningxiang said respectfully: "Your Majesty, the slave has evidence that can be exonerated from the crime." After speaking, he looked at Mei Zhaoyi confidently.

"Your Majesty, the ink used to defile the picture of the show girl is not the usual ink, this ink has been on this picture for nearly three days, but it still has a very unique fragrance. ”

Hearing Ye Ningxiang say this, Mu Jingyuan, who had been very nervous, finally relaxed his tightly knit brows, and then walked to Ye Ningxiang's side with concern, picked up a picture of a show girl and smelled it very hard.

"Well, yes, the ink does taste different. But it was a very familiar feeling, as if I had smelled it somewhere, but I couldn't think of it for a moment. ”

"Your Majesty, the slave maid heard that there is a kind of ink called unicorn ink in the country, which can be called the best in ink, and a little orchid pollen is specially added in the production process, so that the ink fragrance can stay forever after writing. ”

"The number of this unicorn ink is scarce, and even in the palace, it is rare. Speaking of this, Mu Jingyuan seemed to suddenly remember something, turned his head and asked Mei Zhaoyi very sternly: "On the day of your canonization, did I give you a lot of Qilin ink?"

Hearing the emperor ask like this, Mei Zhaoyi's face suddenly turned pale with fright, and she replied calmly: "Your Majesty, you gave your concubines a lot of unicorn ink, but that doesn't prove that the concubines defiled those beautiful girl pictures!" Mei Zhaoyi cried as she spoke, and later even her words were a little unclear.

Mu Jingyuan did not show mercy because of her crying, and immediately issued an order to send people to search all the residences in the palace to see if there were still Qilin Mo among those residences.

At this time, although Mei Zhaoyi did not personally admit the guilt, her tearful eyes always stared at the boss, and her hands holding handkerchiefs trembled uncontrollably. Mu Jingyuan saw it in his eyes and probably understood the truth, so he glared at Mei Zhaoyi fiercely with cold eyes, and returned to his seat with a flick of his sleeves.

After about an hour, the guards returned one after another, reporting that they had not found any unicorn ink anywhere else except Mei Zhaoyi's palace.

Hearing this, Mei Zhaoyi couldn't hold on any longer, and crawled to Mu Jingyuan's feet on her knees, kowtowing vigorously while shouting for mercy, "Your Majesty, Your Majesty, your concubine is guilty, begging the Emperor to spare her life!"

Who would have thought that Mu Jingyuan didn't say anything about it, and he didn't even ask about the details of the case, so he immediately pronounced the verdict, "Mei Zhaoyi caused chaos in the palace and deceived the monarch, and was immediately sent to the prison and sentenced to whipping." ”

After that, Mu Jingyuan looked at Ye Ningxiang, and then said with a sly smile: "Ye Ningxiang will supervise the execution, and the execution will be carried out immediately." ”

Hearing such a verdict, Mei Zhaoyi was already so paralyzed that she couldn't move at all, and let the guards rudely set her up outside the palace.

Although it was an immediate execution, it was already night when Ye Ningxiang supervised the execution. The prison was originally dim, and the night was coming, and although a few candles had been lit, everything around them was still vague and invisible.

"Bring a few torches, and then add some candles. Ye Ningxiang commanded.

In this way, the prison became bright. I saw Mei Zhaoyi wearing a thin white undershirt, tightly tied to the torture rack, and after only half a day, the whole person seemed to have collapsed, not only lost her spirit, but also seemed to be a little unconscious.

However, seeing Ye Ningxiang's arrival, Mei Zhaoyi suddenly came to her senses like a return to the light, her eyes widened, and she shouted: "Ye Ningxiang, you can't die well, I won't let you go if I am a ghost!"

Ye Ningxiang snorted coldly, then sat calmly on the wooden stool next to her, and cocked Erlang's legs, and her words were scattered, "Okay, then you just wait for me slowly on Huangquan Road, don't go fast, I estimate that I still have to live for seventy or eighty years!"

Hearing Ye Ningxiang say this, Mei Zhaoyi began to struggle violently like crazy, and even the torture frame was a little shaky by her strength.

Ye Ningxiang saw that she reacted so strongly, revealing regret, "Actually, who can blame you for ending up today, it's not that you have done too much injustice." Then Ye Ningxiang shook her head, sighed again, and continued: "Come on, execution!"

In fact, until the word execution was spoken, Ye Ningxiang didn't know what the so-called whipping was, and thought that it was to use a leather whip to beat the prisoner's body until the prisoner died of pain. She had wondered how many lashes she would have to take to beat someone to death, but the prisoner had not yet been killed, but had exhausted the executioner to death.

However, the next scene shocked Ye Ningxiang into a cold sweat, because the whip used for execution was not a normal leather whip, but a whip that Ye Ningxiang had never seen before. The whip was about four feet long, three times thicker than a normal leather whip, and the most unusual thing was that the leather edges were covered with dense small iron hooks, which would firmly grasp the flesh of the prisoner and tear it off as the whip moved.