His Majesty's Hostage Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Upon hearing it, Zi Li was scared silly!

Several Imperial Guards came in, and positioned themselves on both sides of Zi Li ready to execute their orders to drag him out.

Zi Li was suddenly alarmed. He shouted: “Wa-w-wait! Even though a punishment is due, won’t you at least tell me what kind of offence I committed? Punishing a person this way just because of your mood swings, that I cannot accept!”

Hong Xu coldly snorted: “Mood swing you say! Of what kind?”

“You’re servant is here.” The palace head servant Lin promptly stepped forward and bowed.

“Kindly explain to this third prince of Bei Ling what crime he had committed, so that he’ll be convinced.”

“As you ordered!” Then Eunuch Lin turned around and faces Zi Li as he harshly explained it to him shortly, “The third prince of Bei Ling An Jin Yu ordered an a.s.sa.s.sin to a.s.sa.s.sinate my monarch, the evidence is conclusive. The punishment should be by beheading, but because his ident.i.ty is special, therefore the punishment only ended up with imprisonment.”

“Me? Ordered an a.s.sa.s.sin? To a.s.sa.s.sinate? “Zi Li was confusingly stared blankly, then he could not contain his anger anymore and shouted: “I didn’t understand at all! And that’s impossible! I at most only spoke rudely, how did I became a manipulator of an a.s.sa.s.sination behind the scenes? I don’t even know if that a.s.sa.s.sin is a man or a woman, tall or short, fat or thin. So how can it be me who ordered that a.s.sa.s.sination, all of you are practically spitting slander! What conclusive evidence? I only see the blame being pushed on me to make me suffer!”

“Outrageous!” The emperor haven’t spoken yet, when that fat stern eunuch at his side actually trembled in anger and said with his sharp loud voice: “How dare you who is just a small prince hostage to make a racket in front of his Majesty and talk back? Come[1] and hit him!”

T/N: [1]Basically summoning people and ordering them, Hong Xu calls his men the same way in previous chapters.

“So you won’t allow people to speak out? This sentence is unjust, and the punishment is inappropriate. Just because I spoke loudly, I will be hit. Then all of you who firmly making fabrications to blame a person of so called-a.s.sa.s.sination should be punished as well.”

“Such impudence!” Hong Xu who was merely watching, slammed his writing desk as he yelled.

“This lowly slave pleads his Majesty to calm your anger!” Eunuch Lin and the crowd of Imperial guards immediately kneels on the ground terrified. Only Zi Li who was angrily gasping remained standing, the expression on his face daring and unyielding. Zi Li is a person that is easy to coax but hard to coerce. One someone angered him then he will absolutely not back down to that challenge to the end, he don’t care at all if it’s against the emperor or someone important!

Zi Li kept his stand with his back straight and defiantly faces Hong Xu’s cold gaze, the two of them silently in a standoff for a short while. Hong Xu’s eyes suddenly narrowed, he said: “The third prince wanted to see evidence, that’s easy. Come, and bring that a.s.sa.s.sin from last night.”

“As you ordered!”

Few of the imperial guards withdraw, and not for long they came back and threw a dying man in front on the ground. He saw that man’s clothes were tattered, and could not cover the his skin filled with b.l.o.o.d.y open wounds caused by whipping as well as dark burned marks. All of his limbs were broken twisted, and his face was badly mangled. It appears that he was tortured a lot last night! There were still blood suds on his mouth that hasn’t stop bleeding till now. He even left a trail of dripping blood on his tracks he was dragged in.

Zi Li instinctively staggered back as he had never witnessed a b.l.o.o.d.y scene like this.

“Wh-What is the meaning of this? Anyway, I don’t know him!”

“Heh! You don’t know him, but apparently he knows you.”

“N-n-nonsense!” A fishy stench of blood invaded Zi Li’s nose that it made him feel ill.

One of the imperial guards pulled back that man’s head to face Zi Li. And when that man clearly saw him, his rigid and blurry dull eyes suddenly cleared up and gained its thirst to survive.

“Y-your H-higness, h-help! Sa-save me!”

Zi Li can’t help but feel frantic fear inside. To hire an a.s.sa.s.sin to kill the emperor, it’s difficult to escape death with this kind of accusation, and what’s more, its a kind of death that is done in an awful method. This a.s.sa.s.sin seems like as if he really knows this body’s original owner. Could it really be An Jin Yu’s doing? Then again, it doesn’t seemed like it. From the accounts of Ming Yue and the rest of the palace servants, Zi Li had a rough idea that this third prince of Bei Ling is not that kind of person. Is he capable of doing that? Would he even dare to do something like that?

But regardless of who actually did it, what’s most urgent right now is to clear his connection in this case! Since he don’t want to become An Jin Yu’s scapegoat! ——