Quickly wear salted fish, she won by lying down

Chapter 1716 The Country Girl Looked Down Upon 37
Of course, the King himself bears some responsibility for how things have developed to this point. When the Queen was ill last time, he could have simply let the Crown Princess manage the household affairs, but he insisted on letting Consort Liu manage them, which made the Queen suspicious.

If you like another concubine, just give her plenty of money in private. Why let her have the power to manage the household and make the Princess of England wary? Isn't that just making things more complicated?
But Linlang knew that the King of England had no intention of removing the eldest son of the main branch from his position as heir apparent, at least not at the moment. After all, removing the eldest son of the main branch from his position as heir apparent would require him to submit a memorial to the royal family to discuss the matter, and the royal family would not agree immediately. It would take a long time to come, so why would the King of England want to go through that trouble?

—If the Princess Consort truly understood the King's dislike of trouble and his reluctance to appoint another heir, she wouldn't have done anything foolish.

However, if he were to find out now that the Queen Consort had killed his beloved concubine, the King might actually be willing to go through the trouble and could very well strip the eldest son of his position as heir apparent in retaliation.

Although the King of England did not intend to depose the eldest son of the main wife from his position as heir apparent, the Queen Consort of England could not believe it, so it was normal for her to take such action. In the end, it was because the example in the capital was too bad. Just as Sima Yi's long life led to later emperors being wary of their old ministers, and people said that Sima Yi set a bad precedent, the case in the capital of promoting a favored concubine to the position of heir apparent and then deposing the heir apparent would also have the same effect.

Because the Princess Consort of Ying was unwilling to come forward and admit that she had killed Consort Liu, the Prince of Ying was furious that no one would admit it, so he immediately reported the matter to the Imperial Clan Court and the Court of Judicial Review.

When the Imperial Clan Court and the Court of Judicial Review heard that someone had killed the Prince of Ying's concubine, they naturally took immediate action.

Just as Linlang had predicted, Princess Ying quickly became a suspect due to her conflict of interest with Consort Liu and her previous act of letting the murderer's family go. After a thorough investigation by the Dali Temple and the capital's government, it was quickly determined that Princess Ying was the murderer.

If it were anyone else, the Dali Temple would have arrested them immediately. However, because she was the Princess Consort of England, whose status was special, the Dali Temple still told the Prince of England about the matter and allowed him to handle it himself.

After all, imprisoning the princess would cause a huge uproar and lead to gossip about the royal family, which is probably not what the royal family wants. Even ordinary families know that family scandals should not be aired in public, let alone the royal family.

Of course, the reason why the Court of Judicial Review was so understanding and entrusted the handling of this matter to the Prince of Ying was also because it listened to the advice of the Imperial Clan Court.

Just as the Court of Judicial Review had thought, the Imperial Clan Court did not want this matter to get out, lest the news of the Princess Consort killing the concubine spread and cause a stir among the outside world about the royal family. This was naturally not what the Imperial Clan Court wanted to see, after all, the royal family still had a reputation to uphold.

In fact, given the current situation, if the emperor found out, he would probably reprimand the King of England for his neglect of his duties, which led to such a scandal.

When the King of England heard that the person who murdered Consort Liu was the Queen of England, he was stunned.

He knew it was likely done by the women in the inner quarters, because Consort Liu only had conflicts of interest with the women in the inner quarters, which was why they had the motive to kill her. But he never expected it to be the Princess of Ying. He thought it was someone who wanted to compete with Consort Liu for favor, so they killed her. He even speculated about several other people who were favored but not as favored as Consort Liu, thinking that they wanted to kill Consort Liu so that they could become the most favored concubine.

Unexpectedly, it was the British Princess, whose position was fundamentally unshakeable.

Even if Consort Liu was favored, Princess Ying was still a princess; it had nothing to do with her. Why would she want to kill Consort Liu? Why did she do this? It almost caused a scandal that spread throughout the capital. Hearing Prince Ying's question, Princess Ying, seeing that her scheme had been exposed, was completely desperate and said angrily, "You still ask me why! You should ask yourself first, why did you let Consort Liu manage the household when I was sick? Did you just want to wait until I died, make Consort Liu the second wife, and then let her son become the heir, just like in Prince Jin's mansion!"

The Prince of Jin's mansion is the one that helped the concubine rise to the position of heir apparent and then seized the position of the former concubine's son.

Upon hearing the Queen Consort's question, the King of England finally understood what she was afraid of and why she was targeting Consort Liu. He immediately retorted, "I had no such intentions at all!"

"Who knows? Ever since that incident at the Prince of Jin's residence, which prince's residence isn't wary of women who might rise to power? You say I'm bad, but isn't it all because of you men? If you didn't have three wives and four concubines and had so many children, why would I need to worry like this!"

The King naturally didn't want to be scolded like that. After all, he felt he had no such intentions and shouldn't be scolded by the Queen. The Queen herself killed someone and was now blaming him, which was unreasonable.

Besides, what powerful man in the world wouldn't have three wives and four concubines? Even a country man, if he harvests a few extra bushels of rice, can have thoughts of finding other women. If he can't take a concubine, he'll go to the city to find a brothel for some pleasure. What man in the world doesn't do that? He didn't do anything outrageous, so it's really unreasonable for the Princess of Ying to scold him like this.

Moreover, he had given her a chance to turn herself in before, but she pretended to be stupid and refused to do so. Now that things have blown up and she's been found out, she's still so self-righteous. It's really incomprehensible. He must have been incredibly unlucky to marry such a wife. After all, there are so many noble families in the capital, and I've never seen any head wife do something like this.

So when the King of Ying heard the Queen Consort's insults, he felt she was being unreasonable and didn't want to waste any more words with her. He simply said coldly, "I've already said I didn't have such thoughts. Otherwise, given your actions, even if you killed Consort Liu, I could still strip the eldest son of his title as heir..."

Upon hearing that the King was going to strip his son of his title of Heir Apparent, the Queen Consort finally became frightened.

When she killed someone before, she only thought that she was old and that it would be worthwhile to die together with Consort Liu. She never thought that what she did would be discovered by the Prince of Ying, that the Prince of Ying would be angry and take away her son's position as heir apparent.

Well, she was just being stubborn. She had considered that if the King of Ying found out that she had killed Consort Liu, he would be angry and take away her son's position as heir apparent. However, she already hated Consort Liu so much that she had lost her mind and only wanted to kill Consort Liu, without considering anything else.

When the Queen heard the King say that he would strip her son of his title of Heir Apparent, she finally became frightened and began to plead with the King, begging him to spare her son with tears streaming down her face.

"It's all my fault. I'll die right now. Please spare my son and don't take your anger out on him..."

The King of England sneered as he read this, saying, "Now you know you regret it? Too late! How many chances have I given you? I asked you to turn yourself in before, but you didn't. If you had turned yourself in then, my anger would have subsided, and I wouldn't be as angry as I am now."