Having many children brings many blessings; the struggle for power begins with marriage.

Murong Xue'er's mind was completely relaxed just now. In her dazed state, someone suddenly appeared beside her, quickly grabbed her waist, ran behind her, and then covered her mouth. How could this not make Murong Xue'er feel panicked?

For a moment, she thought there was an assassin or an enemy trying to kill her.

However, she soon realized something was wrong. Just as she was struggling, she discovered that her internal energy was sealed and she could not use it.

The next moment, a familiar feeling entered her body, and Murong Xue'er realized that it was that bastard who had come.

They had done so many bad things together that she knew him very well, and she believed that only he had the power to drive her crazy.

However, her guess was not wrong; that guy was indeed an assassin who came to kill her.

Murong Xue'er simply stopped struggling, letting the water splash around her. After an unknown amount of time, the assassin's voice rang in her ears, "My dear wife, how come you're not on guard at all? This won't do! And you're not even struggling; what if you encounter bad people?"

Murong Xue'er sneered, "Besides you, bastard, who else in the Prince's Mansion has the ability to seal my power?"

"Even if there are bad people in the Prince's mansion, there can only be one bad person like you."

Lu Chen put his arm around Murong Xue'er's slender waist and slowly sat down beside the bathtub, letting her sit in his lap. Then he said, "I'm here to help you take a bath. How can you call me a bad person?"

Murong Xue'er ignored Lu Chen's words and asked directly, "Your Highness, you've come to see me so late, it must be because of the Princess."

Lu Chen said with a smile, "My Xue'er is so smart."

"You two have been chatting for so long, it seems you really have a lot in common. Tell me what you talked about earlier?"

Murong Xue'er answered directly, "She asked me about the women in the inner courtyard of the Prince's mansion."

At this point, Murong Xue'er turned her head slightly, glancing at Lu Chen behind her out of the corner of her eye, and then said in a low voice, "Your Highness is really capable. She is the eldest princess of Dawu. She has only been in the Northern Prince's Mansion for a few days, but Your Highness has already subdued her. She even has the idea of ​​becoming the mistress of the mansion and having you all to herself."

Lu Chen smiled and said, "Want to be the mistress of the royal palace?"

"You can't have such thoughts in the Northern Prince's residence."

Murong Xue'er asked, "Then how does Your Highness intend to deal with her?"

Lu Chen said, "She wants to have me all to herself, right? That's easy, I'll just stay with her for the next two weeks."

Upon hearing Lu Chen's words, Murong Xue'er was taken aback, and couldn't help but feel a little schadenfreude. She knew that Wu Yunwan was going to suffer for the next half month.

After half a month, Wu Yunwan will probably be thinking about how to escape from the Northern Prince's Mansion.

At this moment, Lu Chen reached out, lifted Murong Xue'er's chin, and gazed at her profile, saying, "Alright, let's not talk about this anymore. This afternoon ended rather hastily, and I haven't had enough."

Murong Xue'er was about to say something when Lu Chen pulled her up and placed her hands on the edge of the pool.

Murong Xue'er felt somewhat helpless. At this moment, she thought to herself, she really didn't know what Wu Yunwan was thinking, that she would actually come up with the idea of ​​monopolizing Lu Chen by herself.

……

The capital city of the Great Xia Dynasty.

The Eastern Palace.

After Qin Feng returned to the capital, he immediately informed Crown Prince Lu Yi of Lu Chen's agreement to their terms. Lu Yi then summoned his faction to the Eastern Palace to discuss important matters.

Zhao Wenhan glanced at Qin Feng. "Minister Qin, did the Prince of the North personally agree to this?"

Qin Feng replied, "I promised it myself."

Zhao Wenhan smiled and said to Lu Yi, "Congratulations, Your Highness. With the support of the Northern King, that position is just around the corner."

Hearing Zhao Wenhan's words, Lu Yi was not particularly happy; instead, his expression became somewhat serious.

He sat in the main seat facing the entrance of the hall, gazing at the starry sky outside, seemingly deep in thought.

Seeing that Lu Yi did not speak, Zhao Wenhan did not continue. After a while, Lu Yi finally spoke, "My father seems to be terminally ill, but with the Imperial Advisor by his side, he may live for another ten years or so without any problem."

"The thought that my father will have to suffer from illness for more than ten years, and that I am unable to help him, fills me with immense grief."

At this point, Lu Yi appeared to be in great distress, as if he were genuinely upset because the Xia Emperor was ill.

Upon hearing Lu Yi's words, the officials in the hall instantly understood why Lu Yi had been looking so worried.

Although the Northern King has agreed to publicly express his support for Lu Yi to become emperor, the Xia Emperor is not dead, so how could Lu Yi so easily ascend the throne?

If Lu Yi wants to become emperor, he must at least wait until the Xia Emperor passes away. As for the idea of ​​the Xia Emperor voluntarily abdicating and passing the throne to Lu Yi and his people, they would never dare to have such a thought.

Putting aside the fact that the royal family's grandmasters would never agree, and the imperial advisor would never agree either, Lu Yi's strength is not enough to force Emperor Xia to relinquish the throne.

If Emperor Xia's illness continues to drag on for more than ten years, the Northern King will probably lead his troops south before Lu Yi even becomes emperor.

Lu Yi knew very well that their efforts to win over the Northern King and offer him so many benefits were merely to temporarily appease him. If the Northern King truly harbored ambitions to unify the world, he would inevitably march south to attack the Great Xia sooner or later.

Therefore, the sooner Lu Yi ascends the throne, the more advantageous it will be for Lu Yi's group, as they will have enough time to carry out reforms and develop their military and armed forces.

After Lu Yi finished speaking, the officials in the hall fell silent. They didn't know how to respond to Lu Yi's words.

After all, Emperor Xia is still the emperor. They would never openly incite Lu Yi to seize power, much less incite him to kill Emperor Xia.

If they incite Lu Yi to kill Emperor Xia now, one day they might incite Lu Yi's children to kill Lu Yi. As long as anyone dares to say that, Lu Yi will definitely be wary of that person in the future, and that person will most likely not be given important positions in the future.

Of course, in politics, you can talk about things but not do them, and you can do them but not talk about them.

Although they couldn't directly say they wanted to kill the Xia Emperor and seize power, since Lu Yi had spoken up at this point, he naturally wanted to pass the problem on to them to solve.

They were all seasoned veterans; they could understand what Lu Yi meant. As subordinates, they had to be good at guessing what their superiors meant.

Lu Yi then changed the subject, saying, "Since the Northern King has agreed to stand on my side, I should also make preparations to fulfill my promise. However, it may not be so easy to cede the land north of Qi to the Northern King."

First of all, Lu Yi is not the emperor and has no right to arbitrarily allocate land to vassal kings. Secondly, the Qi Kingdom already has a ruler. If the King of Qi hears that the court has allocated his fiefdom to the Northern Kingdom, he might be so angry that he would lead his troops south to demand an explanation from Lu Yi.

So ultimately, we still have to wait until Lu Yi becomes emperor before there's room for maneuver.

Zhao Wenhan once again understood Lu Yi's implied meaning: Lu Yi was suggesting that it was time to help him take the throne, and only when he took the throne could the ministers of their group get their share of the spoils.

So what they need to do next is very simple: find a way to make Emperor Xia die and then put Lu Yi on the throne.

At this moment, Zhao Wenhan said to Lu Yi, "Your Highness, please rest assured. I believe that the King of the North is reasonable and will not be in a hurry to ask you for the land north of Qi."

Lu Yi said, "Well, that's true, but I'm still a little worried."

Zhao Wenhan said with a smile, "Your Highness need not worry. Just let things take their course. Some difficulties may not be difficulties after a while."

Hearing Zhao Wenhan's words, Lu Yi finally smiled. "Lord Zhao is right. I was too hasty."

Lu Yi believed that Zhao Wenhan had understood his meaning. Now it was up to Zhao Wenhan and his group to act. If all went well, he would be able to ascend the throne in less than a month.

Of course, this was just Lu Yi's wild idea; they didn't know that the real chess player was actually Emperor Xia himself.

Half an hour later.

Inside the Imperial Palace of the Great Xia Dynasty.

Emperor Xia sat cross-legged on his dragon bed, listening to the report from the shadow guard in front of him with a dark expression.

If Lu Yi were here, he would find that the Shadow Guard was reporting their earlier conversation in the East Palace.

After the shadow guard in front of Emperor Xia finished reporting, Emperor Xia sneered and said, "I didn't expect him to be so impatient."

At this point, Emperor Xia said to the shadow guards in front of him, "Continue to monitor, but do not make any moves for the time being. Do not move their people inside the palace either."

Emperor Xia may not be aware of what is happening outside, but he is very clear about what is happening in the capital, especially in the palace.

He knew perfectly well which prince's faction those people belonged to, and which of them had connections in the palace.

Those rebellious sons, trying to kill him, are simply overestimating themselves and courting death.

What he's most worried about now isn't these rebellious sons in the capital, but rather the one in the north.

Despite the lack of concrete evidence, he firmly believed that Hengyou Daoist and Tongshen Sect Master's assassination attempt failed because the Celestial Being from Xuanyue Palace went to Yancheng, and that the Celestial Being might even still be protecting Lu Chen.

With that celestial being present, it's impossible to get rid of that rebellious son.

This gave Emperor Xia a real headache.

His biggest worry has always been the Xuan Yue Palace. Now that the celestial beings of the Xuan Yue Palace have all descended the mountain, he lives in constant fear and anxiety. The image of the celestial beings of the Xuan Yue Palace chasing down the royal grandmaster when he was a child is still imprinted in his mind, and he often dreams about it when he sleeps at night.

He was always covered in sweat when he woke up.

However, Emperor Xia still has a question: if the celestial beings of Xuan Yue Palace really did descend the mountain, why didn't she come directly to the capital to take back the sacred objects of Xuan Yue Palace?

Did Xuan Yue Palace not know that the thing was with him?

That shouldn't be the case.

Xuan Yue Palace had sent people to the palace to search before. Although they found nothing, they should have guessed that the thing was in the palace.

Without that thing, the royal family wouldn't have been able to cultivate several more Grandmasters in such a short time. Even if the Palace Master of Xuan Yue Palace is stupid, he should be able to guess it.

Emperor Xia's gaze slowly drifted to the window, then to the endless night outside. He muttered to himself, "It seems I need to hurry. If we can activate that weapon on Fengyin Island, perhaps even the Celestials are not invincible."

……

North.

Time flies like an arrow, and half a month has passed in the blink of an eye.

In the early morning, a ray of sunlight pierced through the window and shone into the room, its warm light bathing people and making them feel incredibly cozy. People who were fast asleep were awakened at this time.

Wu Junwan lay face down on the bed, while Lu Chen lay on her back, his arms around her slender waist and his head resting on her fragrant shoulder.

Wu Yunwan asked weakly, "What did Murong Xue'er say to you, right?" (End of Chapter)