Chapter 821: Fight for the Position of the Empress

In this case, why did Madame Ping send the jade annuluses here?

“Madame Ping intended to murder Young Master? I… I don’t think it possible. Madame Ping’s son, the Fourth Prince, is on good terms with Young Master, and Madame Ping offered timely help to Madame several times. Logically speaking, I don’t think she harbors evil intentions toward Young Master,” Baisu said in puzzlement.

It was not because she did not believe Lin Mengya’s judgment, but because Madame Ping did not look like a treacherous person.

“You have a point. We’d better go and check it out in person when at leisure,” Lin Mengya said.

It seemed that they could only take what they saw as true.

Seeing that the poison had almost come out of the jade annuluses, Lin Mengya instructed Baisu to pick up the jade annuluses and take them back to Xiaoyu’s room.

It was strange. What on earth was the pair of jade annuluses sent here for?

The morning exercises prevailed in the imperial palace, and Ningqiu’s successor was considerably capable.

In recent days, Lin Mengya had learned all the gossip in the imperial palace.

She managed to gather a lot of information by carefully sorting out the gossip and making a painstaking analysis.

Each of the three Mesdames, who had been Yao Lu’s followers, had her own plan.

Although they took different measures, their only common goal was the position of the Empress.

They were quite sharp-eyed. Although Madame Jingrou was now favored by the Emperor who was at the height of his enthusiasm, she was the least likely to be the Empress, for no other reason than that she didn’t have support from her family.

Meanwhile, all of the three Mesdames came from aristocratic families, and they had children or there were suitable candidates for the prince among their forces.

But given the Emperor’s personality, he was unwilling to give the position to Yao Lu, let alone anyone other than Madame Jingrou.

It was not that they misjudged the situation, but that they had long been blinded by power.

Early in the morning, Madame Jingrou sent someone to inform Lin Mengya that she wanted to talk something over with her.

“Miss, Madame sent me to invite you over for a discussion,” right after lunch, Ningqiu appeared at the gate of the Fengyu Court and said.

“Okay, I’ll be right there,” Lin Mengya said, supposing it was time to go.

Lin Mengya went to the resting palace of the Emperor with Baisu and Ningqiu. She had not met Madame Jingrou for only a few days, but she found Madame Jingrou looked particularly radiant as if more than a decade younger.

Sure enough, love was the best nourishment.

“My greetings of peace to you, Madame,” Lin Mengya said softly with a smile.

Madame Jingrou, who certainly knew what her smile meant, blushed and glanced at Lin Mengya with a little embarrassment.

“There’s no need to stand on ceremony. I want to express my gratitude to you properly,” she held Lin Mengya’s hand intimately and said.

By now, Madame Jingrou had apparently treated Lin Mengya as a young member of her family.

She did not expect Lin Mengya would help her get over the load she had on her mind over the years. In addition to her admiration for Lin Mengya, she was also grateful to Lin Mengya.

She pulled Lin Mengya to sit down on the soft couch. Then Lin Mengya turned her head to look at her tenderly.

Madame Jingrou was dressed in a palace costume made of cloud gauze, a kind of smooth and soft cloth. Although her palace costume had a pale red color that was dull, it brought out the girlish charm in her.

She had her thick and beautiful hair done in a high bun, and her demure and graceful ornaments had gradually been replaced by delicate and charming ones.

She could not hide the joyful look in her eyes. At the sight of her look, Lin Mengya couldn’t help praising in secret that the Emperor did have good taste.

“Madame, all of these are the blessings you gathered. I just made use of the favorable trend to push matters through. In fact, you should have gotten over that long before, but it was not the right time back then,” Lin Mengya said.

Others might be unable to see through this, but she had long sorted things out.

Apart from anything else, despite the various misunderstandings between the Emperor and Madame Jingrou as well as their concerns, Madame Jingrou was still the most beloved woman of the Emperor, which was a widely recognized fact in the Lieyun Empire.

It was impossible to fake true love, let alone for two people who were together from morning to night.

Madame Jingrou sighed. Lin Mengya was right. Come to think of it as a bystander, she found she had done a lot of silly things.

Fortunately, it was not too late to change.

“You do have a good point. In fact, today I summon you here to talk over one thing with you,” Madame Jingrou said.

Lin Mengya nodded, thinking Madame Jingrou probably had made the decision.

After all, Madame Jingrou was not a simple woman.

“I suppose you’ve heard about what happened in the imperial court a few days ago. After Shaoshi Yao’s sudden death, those people began to cast their covetous eyes on the position of the Empress and can’t hold back their desire for the position any longer. Some of them have openly suggested His Majesty appoint one of his concubines as the Empress,” Madame Jingrou said with a slightly serious look.

In fact, Lin Mengya had heard about this.

Strictly speaking, Yao Lu was not exactly the Empress.

But given her status and family background, no one dared to act rashly.

With no one in charge of the imperial palace at present, although Madame Jingrou had long been the mistress of the imperial palace without being appointed, she was not exactly the Empress.

“Madame, what do you think of the position of the Empress?” Lin Mengya asked with a slight smile, revealing no emotion in her eyes.

“I… I should be the person in the imperial palace who cares least about that. Therefore, you don’t have to worry about me being stupid enough to compete with those people,” Madame Jingrou answered, remaining her expression.

It seemed that she was telling the truth.

In fact, Lin Mengya had expected this answer. Madame Jingrou was right. She was probably the only person in the entire imperial palace who did not care much about that position.

Nevertheless, no woman did not want to be the legal wife of her beloved man.

Madame Jingrou desired for that out of love, while the others for their interests.

“Madame, I appreciate you think so. But in my opinion, you are the only person competent at the position as well as His Majesty’s first choice.” Lin Mengya changed the topic.

The determination in her eyes indicated that she was definitely not joking.

“Uh… no, His Majesty has been deeply troubled by this recently. Besides, as long as I have His Majesty’s favor, I don’t care about the title.” Madame Jingrou declined decisively, seeming to have made up her mind, which surprised Lin Mengya.

“Madame, you got me wrong. I don’t mean that you should fight for the position now. As the saying goes, the mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind. In the imperial palace, if anyone other than you gets the position, it will cause turbulence in the current political situation. So you must keep the position in your hands,” Lin Mengya said.

She was indeed an ambitious woman. Nevertheless, she intended to prevent more people from suffering such grievances rather than to gain any benefits.

She could not bear the misery of watching her husband marry other women and have children with them.

Although Madame Jingrou appeared to be fine with that, the grief Lin Mengya saw in her eyes when Lin Mengya first entered the imperial palace was true.

Seeing that Madame Jingrou was still hesitating, Lin Mengya added fuel to the fire.

She said, “Madame, you should know better than me what those people are up to. If they fail to get the position, their families will send other girls into the imperial palace. Even if His Majesty won’t appoint any of them as the Empress, he has to sleep with them. Do you really want to see more women like Madame Hui in the imperial palace?”

Every word of Lin Mengya, an expert in fanning the flame, distressed Madame Jingrou like knives piercing her heart.

Madame Jingrou was stunned, with no idea how to respond.

Was she really going to let that happen to her again?

No! Definitely not!

“Madame, you probably have had the answer, so I don’t want to talk any more nonsense. I think someone as wise as you has come up with a solution. Let’s carry out your plan. As for whether it will work, it depends on those people’s efforts,” Lin Mengya said.

According to Madame Jingrou’s idea, she presumably had chosen a candidate qualified to be the Empress.

Since she couldn’t be the Empress, the person she chose would be the target of all the aristocratic families.

The tangled fight for the position of the Empress would cause the aristocratic families to play all kinds of creative tricks and to split or unite.

In fact, all the aristocratic families would be locked in the titanic fight in the end. As long as the Emperor refused to appoint any imperial concubine as the Empress, none of those imperial concubines they elected could be the Empress.

In the end, all those imperial concubines standing a chance would lose the chance during the fight among those aristocratic families.

It was like hanging a piece of meat in front of a group of mad dogs.

Only the mad dog winning the final victory could have the meat.

However, the meat had been poisoned long before, and whichever mad dog that ate it would get killed.

This plan seemed crazy and vicious, but in fact, they asked for it.

“Alright, I’ll talk it over with His Majesty. Maybe what you said before is right. After putting up with all this over the years, I should quit doing so for the sake of His Majesty, Yu’er and myself,” Madame Jingrou said with a different look in her eyes.

At the sight of this, Lin Mengya had a grasp of the situation.

She was not to be blamed for adding fuel to the fire, and she had to do that because there was no room for a soft heart in the imperial palace.

In fact, if Yao Lu had been more ruthless and cruel back then, she wouldn’t have ended up in living alone for the rest of her life.

Lin Mengya would rather turn into an Asura to kill her enemies and win the final victory than fall into the abyss of misery and regret it.

“Madame, you are exceedingly wise. I believe you can definitely handle it properly. As long as you need any help from me, just tell me,” Lin Mengya said.

Madame Jingrou must take the lead in this battle, while Lin Mengya only needed to act as her assistant.

After thinking for a moment, Madame Jingrou made up her mind.

She said, “I have to trouble you with nothing other than this task. Xin Luan is still in the imperial palace. I think His Majesty is going to keep him here for a long stay. I’m wondering if you can persuade him to help me and Yu’er.”

Madame Jingrou, who was indeed an expert in this, instantly entrusted the crucial task to her.

After thinking for a while, Lin Mengya could only accept this task.

It was not difficult to persuade someone, but it was difficult to persuade Xin Luan who was not an ordinary person.

“Rest assured, Madame. I’ll handle it properly,” Lin Mengya said smilingly with a well-thought-out plan.

This task had to be entrusted to her indeed.