Qiu Yizi sneered and said, "This is the residence of the traitor Zheng Xin. I told you to knock on the door, so just go ahead and knock on it. Why are you so long-winded? I don't accept cowards here. If you are afraid, take off the skin I gave you and leave the city now."
Provoked by Qiu Yizi, Meng Hong stopped talking. He looked up and saw a wooden stake lying beside the door. He relaxed his muscles and bones, picked up the stake and slammed it against the door.
Meng Hong was born with supernatural powers. Even the door bolt of the palace could not withstand his powerful impact and was cut off in the middle at once, and the whole door burst open.
Zheng Xin intended to cause chaos in Jiangnan, and the mansion in the capital must have been closely guarded according to common sense. However, he was instigated by Tianzun Sect Leader Wen Honghui, and he suddenly decided to rebel. In addition, the capable guards in the palace were all with him, so he was not strong enough. Therefore, the defense in the palace was very lax. He had originally forged an imperial edict to close Tongguan, and sent Zhao Maiji to kill Zheng Miao and Qiu Yizi under Tongguan, but he did not expect Qiu Yizi to break through Tongguan, capture Zhao Maiji alive, and kill him in front of the palace, catching him off guard.
Therefore, when Qiu Yizhi saw the door of Zheng Xin's mansion was wide open, he led his troops to rush in. The few guards of the palace thought that it was a robbery and hurriedly took out their weapons to stop them. However, although these guards had some martial arts skills, they were far from being the opponents of Qiu Yizhi's experienced warriors, and they were killed without any suspense.
Qiu Yizi had been to Zheng Xin's palace several times before, and was very familiar with the terrain. He led his men and horses along the path and went deep into the palace. When he arrived in front of a small building, he called a few of his men, pointed and said, "Zheng Xin's two sons live inside. Catch them and follow me."
Zheng Xin had two sons, one named Zheng Chao and the other named Zheng Qi. Zheng Chao was already a teenager. When he was dragged off the bed, he did not lose his composure. He acted like a grandson of the emperor and angrily yelled, "Who are you? Kidnapping the prince is a capital crime. Aren't you afraid of death?"
"Shut up!" Qiu Yizi said loudly, "Zheng Xin even killed your royal grandfather, what crime have I committed?"
When Zheng Chao saw that it was Qiu Yizi who came, he hurriedly bowed and said, "It's my uncle. There must be some misunderstanding here..."
"Humph, misunderstanding?" Qiu Yizi sneered, "If you want to know what the misunderstanding is, just follow me. We will clarify it naturally."
"No... I won't leave. Although my uncle is my father's sworn brother, he is still a subject after all. I won't accept your unreasonable orders!" Zheng Chao twisted his neck stubbornly.
Qiu Yizi didn't have time to reason with him. His facial muscles twitched and he ordered, "This prince can't walk anymore. Put the knife on his neck and see if it will help a little bit."
As soon as he finished speaking, one of his personal soldiers drew his sword and put it on Zheng Chao's neck, which immediately deflated half of his anger. He said, "Where are you going? Lead the way. I can walk by myself."
Zheng Xin's youngest son, Zheng Qi, was only ** years old. He had never seen the world and was far from having the courage of his elder brother. He was frightened by the sudden scene and burst into tears.
His crying made Qiu Yizi feel irritated. He took two steps forward and scolded, "You are almost ten years old. At this time, I have followed the emperor to the north to fight against the Turks. Why are you crying? Show some dignity as a descendant of the Zheng family!"
After hearing this, Zheng Qi's nose shrank, but he couldn't help it and started crying loudly again.
When Qiu Yizi saw that he was crying and snotting, he found that he looked a bit like his father Zheng Xin. He suddenly felt disgusted and slapped him in the face.
Zheng Qi had never been beaten so badly by an outsider before. He was stunned for a moment, and just covered his swollen and painful face, and even forgot to cry.
So Qiu Yizi took Zheng Xin's two sons and continued to walk deeper into the palace.
After a cup of tea, Zheng Chao had already figured out Qiu Yizi's plan. He quickly stepped in front of Qiu Yizi and said, "Uncle, maybe you have some disagreement with my father. My brother and I are enough as your hostages. Why bother mother?"
Qiu Yi was startled and replied, "You are quite smart, but you have no right to speak here anymore. Shut up!"
Zheng Chao wanted to argue again, but a cold blade appeared at his throat again, making him unable to make a sound.
However, Zheng Chao's words still reminded Qiu Yizi - if he really wanted to go to Zheng Xin's wife, Madam Daqin, he naturally didn't have to worry about Zheng Xin's face, but Madam Daqin was the younger sister of Zheng Miao's wife, Madam Xiaoqin, so this relationship could not be ignored.
Then Qiu Yizhi walked a little further, stopped in front of a palace door, and said loudly: "Madam Daqin, I am Qiu Yizhi, and I have something else to say to you."
He repeated it several times. After a commotion in the house, he finally answered, "It's your uncle. It's not proper for you to visit me in the middle of the night when my husband is not at home. What's the matter, uncle? Please talk to my husband in detail. Please go back today."
Qiu Yizi was not going to be put off by her words, so she said, "Madam, please listen carefully. Zheng Xin committed the heinous crime of regicide and teacher slaying in Jiangnan, and also killed the Third Prince Zheng Miao. This is an unforgivable crime, and I am going to punish this thief Zheng Xin in accordance with the will of heaven. I am afraid that the sword will have no eyes and hurt innocent people, so I specially sent people to guard him, and I even brought the two princes with me."
There was another silence in the room, and after a long while, a response came: "Uncle, could it be that you made a mistake? My husband has always been loyal, filial, chaste and righteous, how could he do such an inhumane thing? There must be something wrong..."
Qiu Yizhi had other important matters to attend to, so he had no time to argue with Madam Daqin. He turned around and called the two brothers Zheng Chao and Zheng Qi, pushed them into the door, and said, "Your mother is a woman, and now is the time for you brothers to show your filial piety. Why don't you go in and comfort her?"
Seeing that the two men had obediently entered the room, he sent someone to call Iron-Headed Dragon over and asked, "How is it? I asked you to guard the gates of the palace. How are you doing?"
The Iron-Headed Dragon quickly replied, "Your Excellency acted quickly and carefully, and did not alert many people. Only a few cowards heard the news and tried to escape, but I caught them all. May I ask your Excellency, how should we deal with these people?"
Qiu Yizi replied, "Why ask me about such a small matter? You can lock up those you like and kill one or two of those you don't like as a warning to others. You can get another fifty brothers to light torches and search the palace. Drive all the people in the palace out of the houses, gather them together and keep them under unified supervision. I have other things to do, so you need to do this quickly."
This is equivalent to searching Zheng Xin’s palace.
Since it was a "search" and had to be done "quickly", there was naturally no need to pay attention to etiquette and decency - "Iron Head Dragon" led people to search the palace for more than an hour, and only then did they gather all the men and women, young and old in the palace together.
So Qiu Yizi divided the group of people into men and women and concentrated them in two houses. He also selected ten reliable people to be responsible for looking after them, and then led the rest of the people away from Zheng Xin's palace.
As soon as he left the palace gate, Qiu Yizi did not delay at all and led his troops to the left and headed straight for the imperial city.
The imperial city's defenses were naturally stricter than the royal palace, so they couldn't force their way in this time. But Qiu Yizi had no other way to go, so he could only use the scabbard of the Western Regions sword in his hand to slam the gate of the Forbidden City.
After knocking a few times, a gruff voice came from the door: "Are you looking for death? Where did this drunkard come from? You came to the Imperial City in the middle of the night to act wildly. Aren't you afraid of death?"
When Qiu Yizhi heard someone reply, she immediately shouted, "Who is in there? Come out and answer me quickly. I am Qiu Yizhi. I have something urgent to tell you and need you to come to the palace immediately."
As soon as he finished speaking, the city gate slowly opened, and a man walked out of the gate. He bowed to Qiu Yizi and said, "It turns out that it's Yidian who came down. It's the middle of the night. What's the matter that requires you to go to the palace? Can't you wait until daytime?"
"Oh, it's Zhu Xilie. I didn't expect you to be on duty here." Qiu Yizi said, "Is it something urgent that can be postponed until tomorrow morning? Open the door quickly and let me in."
Although this Zhonglangjiang named Zhu Xilie was an old guard of the Youyan Palace and recognized His Highness Qiu Yizi, he kept saying, "This is a bit difficult. The Forbidden City is a forbidden area. No matter how urgent the matter is, without the emperor's decree, even the princes cannot enter or leave. What's more, it is already the middle of the night..."
Qiu Yizi raised his eyebrows, glanced at Zhu Xilie, and asked, "The emperor is currently on a personal expedition to the south of the Yangtze River. According to what you said, does that mean no one can enter the imperial city? Then let me ask you, can we enter with the order of the regent prince?"
Zhonglang Jiang Zhu Xilie nodded quickly and said, "It should be possible, right?"
"What do you mean by 'should'?" Qiu Yizi asked, "What do you mean by 'it's ok'?"
Zhu Xilie hurriedly replied: "Before the emperor went south, he had issued an order, saying that it was an order from the regent. If it does not contradict the imperial edict, its effectiveness is equivalent to the imperial edict. But when the Third Prince was the regent, he did not issue an order for anyone to enter the palace..."
"It's coming down now, don't worry." Qiu Yizi said as he asked someone to bring pen, ink, paper and inkstone. He wrote an edict on the street, stamped it with the regent seal, and handed it to the General of the Household.
Zhu Xilie was dumbfounded, but what he held in his hand was indeed stamped with the seal of the Regent, and it was the most authentic edict of the Regent. He really could not find any reason to stop Qiu Yizi outside the Forbidden City.
So Qiu Yizi smiled triumphantly, waved forward, and said, "Come on, follow me into the palace."
Zhu Xilie interrupted quickly, "Your Highness Yi, this decree only says that you can enter the palace alone, but it doesn't say that you have to bring troops in..."
"What's so difficult about this?" Qiu Yizi snatched the order from his hand, the ink of which had not yet dried, added a few words on it, handed it to the Zhonglang General, and said, "Is this enough?"
Zhu Xilie, the General of the Central Army, took it and saw that the words "soldiers" were added after the three words "Qiu Yizhi" between the characters, and he could lead his soldiers into the palace. The General of the Central Army felt that he was being teased and that he had done something ridiculous, but he couldn't stop it or expose it, so he had to let Qiu Yizhi lead his group of disheveled soldiers into the core of the imperial city.
Qiu Yizhi had not been to many palaces in the imperial city. Apart from a few large palaces in the imperial city, he only knew the "Shuli Palace" where the emperor worked daily and the "Lizheng Palace" where the empress lived.
However, this was enough. Qiu Yizi glanced around the palace, and after finding the passage, he went to the "Lizheng Palace" where the queen lived.