Chapter 298: What a Pity, the Empress Doesn’t Like Her Own Kind

With his father’s official position secured, Jiang Zhou finally had time to visit his brother.

But his brother was far more relaxed than he was. Even locked in a prison cell, he was carefree, sprawled out on a wooden plank and in the mood to hum a tune.

As Jiang Zhou approached with a food box, he realized Lu Ling wasn’t humming a tune, but counting.

"Three, two, six, one..."

Jiang Zhou asked, "What are you counting? It’s all out of order."

Lu Ling laughed. "I’m counting heads."

Jiang Zhou was speechless. "Can’t you just be normal for once?"

His brother had always been a bit unhinged, but before, it was just that his way of thinking was unconventional. Now, he was terrifyingly mad.

Lu Ling glanced to the side. "You’re the one who’s not being normal. I’m talking about the people who’ve been locked up in here recently."

The realization dawned on Jiang Zhou. He looked at the surrounding cells. "It does seem like they’ve locked up quite a few people."

Lu Ling had only been here for a few days, and the place was already almost full. It was quite lively.

Lu Ling asked, "What has the Empress been up to these past two days?"

Jiang Zhou replied while clearing the table, "She’s just been meeting with a few governors and interrogating them."

Lu Ling tilted his head, letting it hang off the edge of the wooden plank. "So, did she mention me?"

Jiang Zhou was exasperated. "You’re reading too much into it."

’The Empress doesn’t want anything to do with you.’

Jiang Zhou set out the food and went to help him up. Seeing the marks on his body, his brow furrowed instantly. "You can save Rong Qing, but you can’t save yourself?"

Lu Ling was unconcerned. "I’ve been dealing with this Corpse Gu for years. It can’t do anything to me. Besides, doesn’t it look cool? I might just become the one and only immortal."

Jiang Zhou had no interest in hearing him boast. Even if he were immortal, what was the point of living if he was neither human nor ghost?

"Even immortals have to eat. Get up."

Lu Ling got up and looked at the three dishes on the table. They were all his favorites, and he could tell just by the smell that Jiang Zhou had made them himself.

A stiff smile touched Lu Ling’s lips. "This Corpse Gu may not be able to kill me, but it’s certainly uncomfortable. Why don’t you help me bear some of it? Then we can be immortal together."

Jiang Zhou took him seriously and immediately replied, "Forget immortality, but I can help you bear the burden."

"How do we split it? By sucking blood? Do I bite you, or do you bite me?"

Lu Ling suddenly clutched his stomach. "HAHAHAHA..."

Jiang Zhou was completely baffled. "What are you laughing at? Is the poison acting up?"

Lu Ling’s laughter grew even more exaggerated. He started rolling on the floor, frightening Jiang Zhou into protecting the table. ’Seriously,’ he thought, ’feeding a lunatic is exhausting.’

Lu Ling finally laughed his fill and got up to eat. Seeing Jiang Zhou pour him some wine, Lu Ling asked him, "Jiang Zhou, do you remember how we became brothers?"

Jiang Zhou said, "How could I forget? It was raining that day. I’d skipped out of the academy to go play and fell down by the riverbank. That’s when I saw you crawling out of the river. We were both covered in mud."

"I kindly offered to pull you ashore, but you just dragged me down with you. We got into a fight on that little river shoal, and by the end of it, we’d washed ourselves clean."

After that, Lu Ling would occasionally show up at that same shoal. At first, they’d just fight. Then, they started grilling fish together after their fights. One time, Jiang Zhou discovered that Lu Ling was quite learned, so he started bringing his homework for Lu Ling to do.

As this happened more and more, they became friends through a tacit understanding. Then Lu Ling disappeared, only to return three years later. When they met again, it was as if they had never been apart, and they immediately became close once more.

Over the years, Lu Ling would come to see Jiang Zhou once a year, or once every two years. Worried Lu Ling wouldn’t have a comfortable place to stay, Jiang Zhou bought a house specifically for him. Whenever Lu Ling came to visit, Jiang Zhou would drop everything to keep him company. They were truly the best of friends.

Lu Ling said, "Actually, back then, I was planning to drag you into the river and kill you."

Jiang Zhou looked at him in surprise. "Really?"

Lu Ling nodded. "Really."

Jiang Zhou feigned fear. "So it wasn’t just my imagination! You really did want to kill me, huh?"

Lu Ling let out a laugh. "Now that’s a reaction I didn’t expect."

Jiang Zhou asked, "What reaction were you expecting?"

Lu Ling didn’t answer. There was no need to say anything anymore.

Jiang Zhou continued drinking without pressing the matter. He knew Lu Ling was no saint, and he wasn’t a fool either. But friendship was about a feeling.

In any case, they had been friends for years. He had long since stopped caring about what happened back then.

Having eaten and drunk his fill, Lu Ling went back to lying down. Jiang Zhou, who had only recently started slogging away like a beast of burden, found himself envious.

"No, seriously, you’re not just going to lie here forever, are you?"

"You clearly saved General Rong and had earned a bit of Your Majesty’s trust, but now you’ve thrown it all away. I don’t even know what your game is."

"Jiang Zhou, what kind of person do you think the Empress is?" Lu Ling asked suddenly.

Jiang Zhou thought for a moment. "It’s hard to say. Intelligent, decisive, powerful, and calculating. In short, she’s formidable."

But Lu Ling shook his head. "Then you don’t understand at all. The Empress..."

He smiled. "The Empress is the same kind of person as me."

Jiang Zhou figured Lu Ling was still half-asleep and talking nonsense.

Lu Ling knew he didn’t believe him, but it was the truth.

"The Empress is, at her core, a madwoman. A sober madwoman. I like her very, very much. That scent of a kindred spirit... it’s simply intoxicating to me."

"It’s a pity. The Empress doesn’t like her own kind."

He was filled with regret.

In his eyes, he and the Empress were the ones who should be together. The Empress was lucid and powerful but secretly insane, while he had always been mad but possessed a fiery passion that could melt ice and snow. They were a perfect match!

Jiang Zhou was speechless.

’It’s over. My brother’s gone completely mad.’

However, when Jiang Zhou came back the next day, he found Lu Ling was no longer in his cell. He thought Lu Ling had finally broken out, but it turned out the Empress had taken him away.

’So, did they go mad together? Or did the Empress dispose of him for good?’

-----

In the dead of night, a group of figures moved in silence.

Arriving outside a dilapidated temple, they saw a single flame flickering within and halted.

"Master, he is inside."

The black-clad figure in the center of the group was none other than Xiao Li.

Xiao Li had only ever had one purpose for coming to Yanping State: to eliminate Xu Nianqing.

Her intuition told her that she would not be able to kill Xu Nianqing, just like with Liu Xueyin before. But she refused to give up and had sent people to intercept and kill him along the way.

Over the past few days, there had been seven separate groups of assassins. Xiao Li was certain that their martial arts were all superior to Xu Nianqing’s; any one of them could have killed him with ease.

But they either just happened to miss him, or Xu Nianqing just happened to be rescued by someone. To this day, Xu Nianqing had only suffered minor injuries, while her own people had suffered heavy losses.

Xiao Li knew it was the world’s consciousness protecting Xu Nianqing. As long as he was still the one it recognized as the male lead, no one would be able to kill him.

But she, Xiao Li, refused to accept it. If her subordinates couldn’t kill him, then she would do it herself.

If she couldn’t kill him the first time, she would try a second. If a second time failed, she’d try a third. Just like with Liu Xueyin, she was determined to make Xu Nianqing disappear completely.