The male supporting character was actually myself.

She dared not be careless and stayed close to the fire. Hearing a knock on the door, she casually asked, "Who is it?"

There was no response from outside. The little girl turned her head, looked outside, and saw that it was getting late. Without moving, she raised her voice and replied, "I'm brewing medicine for the concubine!"

Li Dongchen squeezed the medicine bag in his arms, picked up a stone, and threw it into the dead bushes in the distance.

A series of clanging noises finally startled the little girl. She tried to get up to check, but felt something pulling her right leg!

"Don't fall for it!" The fluffy little dumpling used all its strength to grab her ankle and pull her back, its round, furry face turning red. "Please don't go out!"

The little girl didn't see anything, but her leg was definitely being pulled tightly by something. She was terrified and kicked and struggled a few times before she was freed, got up, opened the door, and ran into the yard.

Just then, a dark shadow moved under the south-facing house. There was no one in the courtyard, and the terrified girl, seeing enemies everywhere, screamed, "Help! Help! Someone help me!"

Seeing this, Li Dongchen gritted his teeth and rushed into the kitchen, poured all the powder from the medicine packet in his arms into the medicine pot, and then, relying on his protagonist aura, managed to slip away unscathed from the chaotic crowd.

"What happened?" The steward of the backyard rushed in with the servants and asked.

The little girl, in a panic, recounted the strange situation she had just encountered. However, when the steward went to the place she mentioned where there was a shadow, he found only the swaying shadow of a withered tree. He searched the entire courtyard several times to make sure that no one with ill intentions was hiding there.

"Look how easily you've been startled! There's no one here!" The steward pointed to the tallest building in front of them and laughed, "The guards are all stationed at the top; not even a fly can get in!"

The fluffy little ball of fluff lay on the edge of the stove, panting and blowing on its paws as it meowed, "With the protagonist's halo, no matter how many of you are watching, it's useless. If you say you can't see him, you can't see him even if you're face to face. Anyway, the whole world revolves around the protagonist."

Just as everyone was about to leave after comforting the little girl, they heard her scream again.

"Medicine! This is the concubine's medicine to prevent miscarriage!" The little maid turned around and looked into the kitchen, exclaiming in surprise, "It was placed properly on the stove, how could it have broken on the floor?"

The steward's expression darkened as he looked at the shattered pieces of the medicine pot on the ground, some distance from the stove, and the hot medicine spilled all over the floor. "Are you sure the medicine pot was on the stove when you left the kitchen?"

"Yes, yes!" the little girl cried, trembling all over. "Could it be haunted? Just now... a ghost grabbed my leg!"

Haunted?!

The fluffy ball of fluff, blowing on its paws, suddenly paused, its big, furry ears twitching. "If you're talking about this, I'm not sleepy anymore! I've done this before, I know the whole ghost story process like the back of my hand!"

It immediately became excited, discovering a shortcut that could greatly change its host's fate, and jumped up to kick the jar off the shelf.

"Dangdang!"

The sudden loud noise, witnessed by everyone, startled even the guards.

"Something does seem off. I just saw that can fly up and fall to the ground with my own eyes!"

"Could the shadow she just saw have been something unclean?"

"I heard from the guards that today, the handsome guy's car broke down on his way down the mountain and he couldn't fix it no matter what he did. He even encountered a strange fortune teller."

"Don't talk nonsense, this is the Marshal's Mansion! What kind of ghost dares to cause trouble here?"

……

As everyone was whispering among themselves, the little white cat found something fun again.

It darted to the garlic braid hanging by the kitchen door, grabbed two garlic cloves, and started swinging in various ways.

A group of grown men watched the bizarre scene without daring to utter a sound.

"A ghost!" The little girl screamed as she watched pots and pans flying everywhere in the kitchen. The "ghost" even grabbed her long braid and played with it for a while. She was so frightened that she screamed, her eyes rolled back, and she fainted.

The commotion in the backyard of the eighteenth concubine quickly alerted the head steward and Lieutenant Li.

After listening to the guards' various descriptions, Lieutenant Li's perpetually cold face grew even colder, as if covered with a layer of frost. He drew his pistol from his waist, stood upright in the kitchen, and sneered: "I, Li, joined the army at sixteen, have been on the battlefield, crawled out of piles of dead bodies, killed countless people, but have never seen a ghost."

Is the Marshal's Mansion haunted?

"Ha, perfect, let me see what this ghost looks like!"

The kitchen was so quiet you couldn't hear a pin drop. Everyone stood still, barely daring to breathe, looking around warily.

"Hehehe..." Seeing that it had attracted the attention of eight hundred cunning people, the fluffy ball smiled with satisfaction and sighed, "Luckily, I have my soft and cute little kitten, who risked getting her paws burned and losing fur to preserve the evidence for you."

As it spoke, it lay on the ground, puffed out its cheeks, and blew the powder.

So Lieutenant Li watched as a gust of wind stirred up pale red powder from the scattered fragments of a medicine pot in the empty kitchen.

"What is this?" He walked over, squatted down, and brushed aside the scattered black medicinal herbs. He found a lot of red powder in many of the fragments of the medicine pot. Although most of them were wet from the spilled medicine, it was still clear that there was a considerable amount of powder.

Lieutenant Li collected the red powder on a piece of white paper and asked the little girl who had just slowly woken up, "Is this kind of powder in the concubine's pregnancy-preserving medicine?"

"No." The little girl glanced at it and shook her head firmly. "I'm in charge of brewing medicine to prevent miscarriage for the concubine. I've been brewing it for almost half a month. Those are all large pieces of medicinal herbs. I've never seen this kind of powder before."

"Go and fetch Doctor Yang; also, inform all the courtyards that all the concubines' pregnancy-preserving medicines must be thrown away and they must not be taken anymore." Lieutenant Li, recalling the fortune teller's words from earlier that day, solemnly clasped his hands in thanks to the airborne expert, saying, "I don't know which master has come to my aid; please forgive me if I have offended anyone!"

Lieutenant Li was a very special figure in the Marshal's Mansion.

Just now, his confident shouting with his gun gave everyone a great sense of security, but now he suddenly changed his tone and thanked the unknown person. In the eyes of the onlookers, this was an indirect admission of the ghost story. For a moment, they all turned pale and broke out in a cold sweat.

"Everyone who has been in this courtyard tonight must stay. Not a single one is allowed to leave." Lieutenant Li pointed his gun at the powder awaiting identification and said coldly, "This stuff definitely didn't appear out of thin air. If the medicine pot hadn't been broken, this bowl of medicine would probably have already been swallowed by the concubine. This matter must be thoroughly investigated!"

Everyone fell silent, standing still and not daring to breathe.

Only the head butler dared not look up at the powder; cold sweat streamed down his face. The little dumpling noticed that his hand, which was wiping away sweat with a handkerchief, was trembling slightly.

"Meow~ It wasn't you who did it, why are you so guilty?" The little white cat stretched out its sharp claws and grinned mischievously. "Could it be... that you were bribed by Li Dongchen? That you know his plan? Then it'll be interesting to see dogs fighting each other!"

Chapter Forty-Nine: Why Not Use a Plan Against a Plan?

With Lieutenant Li in charge, it was as if the commander-in-chief were personally present. In fact, due to the strange situation just now, the atmosphere in the backyard kitchen of the Eighteenth Concubine was even more nerve-wracking than when the commander-in-chief was interrogating her.

Apart from the howling winter wind and the occasional crackling of the stove in the small kitchen, the dozen or so people remained completely silent. Many communicated with their eyes, while others simply lowered their heads, keeping their eyes down and waiting for instructions.

Taking advantage of the moment when no one was looking, the head butler slowly retreated to the outermost edge, took out a handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his forehead, and stretched his neck to swallow with some difficulty.

He recognized those red powders!

But what frightened him was not the powder that appeared in the medicine pot, but the ghost that was preventing the bowl of medicine from being served to the eighteenth concubine!

The Marshal's Mansion is always garrisoned by troops and is full of yang energy. In addition, with the domineering aura of the Marshal and others, it has never caused any abnormalities over the years.

Even with one funeral after another back then, everything was handled peacefully. But now, he witnessed the ghost with his own eyes, and even Lieutenant Li's personal intervention couldn't completely quell it. Didn't a gust of wind even magically blew him away to look at the medicinal powder?

Could it be... that the General is getting old and his dragon aura is no longer what it used to be?

The eldest son is a scholar and has no real authority; the young marshal is full of vigor and war god, but he hasn’t lived here for a long time. The marshal’s mansion is too big and there are too many women. The yin energy is too strong and can’t be suppressed.

"Gurgle!"

Thinking of this, the head steward swallowed hard and glanced around furtively, afraid that something unclean might discover him.

"Hmm, I'm sure now, you're just feeling guilty, meow!" The fluffy ball circled around his feet twice, looked up at his sneaky appearance, licked its paws, and decided to give him some pressure.

With a leap, the fluffy ball jumped onto a guard and patted the head steward's shoulder with its paw.

Caught off guard, he was startled and glared at the guard beside him. The guard looked blank and asked in a low voice, "What are your orders?"

Why did you pat me on the shoulder?

"I...I didn't!" The guard was completely bewildered. Who did he think he was to dare pat the head steward on the shoulder?

The two were staring at each other when the fluffy little ball reached out its paw and patted the head butler's shoulder.

Head Butler: ∑(￣□￣;)

Sure enough, it wasn't him!

I clearly saw him with his hands hanging down at his sides... so who could it be?!

The head butler glanced at the empty space behind him and immediately got goosebumps.

"Hehehe~ Ghosts are really fun! The more guilty you are, the more afraid you are of ghosts!" The little white cat scratched his back and tickled his legs, scaring the head butler so much that he trembled but dared not utter a sound.

Doctor Yang quickly arrived with his medical kit. After carefully examining the powder, he said with a grave expression, "This is of utmost importance and must be reported to the Commander immediately! Fortunately, the pot of medicine was broken; otherwise, the powder would have dissolved into the decoction without any noticeable abnormality. If the Eighteenth Concubine had drunk it, she would have suffered a miscarriage at best, and her life at worst!"

"Steward, have someone question all the servants who were part of the first group to enter the courtyard before we arrived. Tell them to think carefully about whether they encountered anything that was overlooked. I will interrogate the maid who is in charge of brewing the medicine. You go and invite the commander-in-chief here!"

Lieutenant Li gave the order, and the head steward, despite his weak legs, gritted his teeth and went to invite the commander-in-chief.

Once outside the courtyard, alone in the narrow, dimly lit, and quiet alley, the head butler felt as if something was following him, and even felt a chill on the back of his neck!

"I don't know which concubine's spirit appeared!" He could no longer hold back and knelt down with a thud, kowtowing repeatedly and pleading in a low voice, "I know you died unjustly back then, but there was nothing I could do!"

That was all what Madam told me to do!

I beg you to have mercy and forgive me! My wife has been dead for many years, so go to the underworld and sue her there. Please stop haunting me!

My life, and the lives of my entire family, are in Madam's hands. I was truly driven to desperation and only did those evil deeds under her orders. I never wanted to kill you! Please, whichever concubine appears, spare me..."

After listening to his muttering as he kowtowed for a while, the little white cat curled its lip in disdain and said, "This is so unoriginal. If you can't beat someone, you harm their child. It's no different from those palace intrigue stories! Li Dongchen has inherited his mother's skills and learned this trick too, hasn't he? Fine, I'll spare you for now. I'll call the old man over later for a public execution!"

After kowtowing and praying for a while, the head steward felt that the eerie atmosphere had really disappeared. He got up and took a few steps and felt much better, no longer bothered by the ghost.

He hurriedly clasped his hands in thanks to the ghost concubine for her magnanimity, and then ran away.

"Where did this news come from? Is it true or false?"

"Of course it's true! Lieutenant Li went first, but he probably couldn't handle it, so the Commander-in-Chief went there personally!"

"I've never heard of this in all these years at the Marshal's Mansion. How could it suddenly be haunted?"

"What kind of wandering ghost is so bold as to cause trouble in the Marshal's Mansion?"

"Shh! I heard someone pass by the abandoned backyard and hear a woman crying."

"Aren't those where the concubines who died before lived? It seems that the second young master's birth mother also lived there..."

…………

After administering the drug and escaping from the courtyard, Li Dongchen took a long detour before returning to his west wing. By then, the well-informed servants had already begun whispering about the ghost story.

"What nonsense are you spouting? What ghost story?" He vaguely heard someone mention Li Jiangchen's birth mother, and he frowned and scolded, "Who's bringing up old news again? Go away, everyone, stop talking nonsense!"

When everyone saw the eldest young master arrive, they quickly dispersed. Everyone knew that the two young masters were becoming increasingly irreconcilable, and no one, no matter how tactless, could afford to offend the eldest young master.

Zhang Ziqiu had just finished dinner and was deliberately trying to annoy him by warming her hands with her fox fur sleeves. "I don't know where the rumor came from, but it's said that the Eighteenth Concubine's courtyard is haunted and the little maid who was brewing medicine fainted from fright. Father-in-law has already gone over to comfort her."

Who knows how the rumors started involving the second branch of the family? Some people say that the second master is now displaying great power and his dragon aura is gathering, making him the chosen one. However, his deceased mother, who died young, has not even received a proper memorial tablet because of her lowly status. Now she is causing trouble at the mansion.

As the saying goes, a mother's status rises with her son's; the father-in-law will probably arrange for a tomb and monument to be erected for the second master's birth mother. If the second master truly unites the country, perhaps his birth mother's memorial tablet will even be enshrined in the ancestral hall!

As expected, Li Dongchen's face immediately fell upon hearing this.

After the old man conquered the country and became a local tyrant, he built a grand ancestral hall to worship his ancestors. According to the old rules, women were not qualified to enter the ancestral hall, not even his own mother, the wife of a great warlord.

Li Jiangchen's lowly mother wants a ancestral hall? Keep dreaming!

But then he thought about it and frowned. The other side was now reporting victories one after another. If he really exchanged military power for additional honors for his birth mother, the old man might actually agree!