Can't a princess ascend the throne?

Chapter 111 Unexpected Accident
Everyone strongly disagreed with Aunt Du's statement. No matter how eloquent she was, she couldn't erase her desire to see others suffer. Such a person, using the pain of others as bait, was utterly depraved!
Immediately, several women whose daughters and children had been implicated and killed by Aunt Du rushed over and beat her severely. Of course, remembering Jiu Que's instructions, they did not kill the people, but their deep hatred was impossible to hide.

Seeing that the situation here had been mostly resolved, Jiu Que met up with Xie Mingchen and took out the token hidden in the official document to prove his identity as an imperial envoy. Reaching a higher vantage point, Jiu Que amplified his voice.

"Gentlemen, His Majesty is wise and decisive. He is aware of the evil deeds committed by Liang Heng, the Prefect of Qianzhou, which is why he sent us to investigate. Now, we have both witnesses and physical evidence. We only need to hand them over to the imperial envoys who are on their way, and Liang Heng will be arrested immediately. But before that, I need your help. There are other adjacent mines around this mine, and we only have information on two so far. If we are discovered before we hand over the evidence, the managers of the other mines will inevitably inform those thieves about the situation here. To avoid this, please remain calm and continue mining and producing. Once we make contact with the imperial envoys, we will be saved!"

"I assure you all that I will definitely get you out of here. I hope you can believe me this time!"

The people standing below were initially quite terrified. They were starving and freezing, and faced the daily threat of death. They had finally found hope of getting out, but they still had to wait. This filled many with anxiety. However, they were not ignorant; they knew the situation was critical. Besides, did rushing out now guarantee their survival? Even setting aside how to escape these endless mountains, even if they did, without overthrowing Liang Heng, how far could they possibly flee within Qianzhou territory? Their bodies had long been damaged by the arduous labor, and lacking in food and silver, how far could they possibly run?

They will still do this simple calculation.

So everyone agreed.

"Miss Ying, we'll listen to you."

"Yes! We'll listen to Lady Ying! She was able to bring down Yang Hui and his gang in such a short time, and she can also rescue us! We need to stay alive to testify. How can we get over this without seeing Liang Heng suffer?"

"that is!"

Actually, everyone's demands are very simple: arrest the culprits who harmed them and their families, kill those who should be killed and imprison those who should be imprisoned. Otherwise, they won't be able to swallow this anger.

Of course, to calm them down, Jiu Que specially arranged for literate scholars to write down everyone's grievances, which also served as physical evidence. This was indeed a good method. The people, who were initially somewhat frightened, gradually calmed down as they recounted their stories, only feeling more grief and hatred for the culprit.

After calming the people at the mine, Jiu Que quickly followed Xie Mingchen up the mountain to make arrangements.

Half a day later, a large mountain near Chunyu Shuang's mine collapsed, and the ore with high-quality cinnabar content fell straight down from the height, hitting the ground and kicking up a cloud of red dust. Everyone was somewhat surprised by the accident, but seeing that no one was killed or injured, they didn't pay much attention to it. This was mainly because similar accidents had happened at the mine before, but none of them had produced such a high and far cloud of red dust.

Those who were concerned did send people up the mountain to investigate, but it turned out to be a simple ore collapse, and since many people had been working at the mine, they gradually let it go. Such accidents had happened before, but even if the red smoke drifted onto the official road, the entire Quanzhou belonged to Lord Liang Heng; who would be so short-sighted as to care about such a minor incident? And believe it or not, someone did!

Cui Zhufeng had been searching frantically for the past few days, and it was only thanks to her exceptional martial arts skills that she had managed to hold on. At this moment, she was using her superb lightness skill to search around when her keen hearing allowed her to hear an unusual noise, as if something had collapsed. This loud sound reminded Cui Zhufeng of the exquisite battle she had witnessed in the capital.

There was a similarly deafening sound back then. When Cui Zhufeng climbed to a high place and saw the drifting red mist, he couldn't help but squint. The commotion erupting now, even if it wasn't caused by Jiu Que and his group, was still related to the mine.

"Senior Cui!"

The guards who had been following Jiu Que and the others at a distance now caught up with Cui Zhufeng, watching anxiously. Who could understand? They were clearly following their master, but before they even reached Qianzhou, Lord Ying had vanished. Before they came, their superiors had repeatedly instructed them to protect Princess Ying. Now, Princess Ying had been missing for several days!

Forget about claiming credit; they might face severe punishment from His Majesty upon returning. The only thing they can do now is to atone for their mistakes with merit. The only one they can rely on now is Senior Cui, given his exceptional martial arts skills; perhaps he can discover what they haven't.

Cui Zhufeng disliked government officials intensely, but with the safety of Jiuque at stake, he could only offer brief instructions and tell them to keep up. The group rallied their spirits, leaving a small group to continue the search and report to the capital, while the majority followed Cui Zhufeng, rushing onward. If they arrived even a fraction earlier, they might be able to save Princess Ying and the other three officials. Heavens! Among the missing officials, besides Princess Ying, whom His Majesty had repeatedly warned, was a favorite of His Majesty, the adopted son of Grand Eunuch Jiufu! The other appeared to be just a minor imperial physician, but was actually a child of the renowned Xie family, a family with three generations of noble titles!
Each of these is incredibly precious; even if they sold ten of them, they still couldn't afford them.

When faced with such an opportunity to redeem themselves, everyone was incredibly enthusiastic.

Cui Zhufeng wasn't the only one who heard the loud commotion; Wei Yuan, who was pitifully digging for gold in the mine, also heard it. Wei Yuan's first thought upon hearing the noise was that it was caused by Ying Jiuque. After all, the thunderbolts she had created earlier made a similar sound to the one just now.

"Brother Wei, is this an earthquake?"

The miners digging for gold in the cave around them tensed up. On the surface, they could find a flat spot to hide, but they were now deep inside a mine shaft, several meters below the surface. If the mine collapsed, they would have nowhere to hide. Even the experienced veteran miners were extremely nervous.

"Why don't we go up first? We can't dig in this situation."

(End of this chapter)