Chapter 15 — Kneeling before the Queen and Duke

After months of patiently collecting every little piece of evidence, the most important clue in the entire investigation finally appeared, not from the Tu palace, but from the testimony of the physician who sold the poison to Nhuoc Lan. After many times being skillfully questioned by Guard Bang, combined with the evidence of his previous illegal business deals that Bang had grasped, the herbalist finally confessed a detail that he had previously deliberately hidden: the large amount of money that Nhuoc Lan paid him to buy that special poison did not actually come entirely from her own money, but was partly transferred through a mysterious middleman, who periodically visited him. Meet Nhuoc Lan at a deserted temple outside the city every full moon.

That information startled Viet Khoi and Khinh Vu. If Nhuoc Lan had a secret contact other than Bach Quan, then the real motive behind her colluding to poison Khinh Vu was probably not simply jealousy and a secret affair with her ex-husband, but also contained a much deeper purpose. Viet Khoi immediately sent someone to secretly monitor that deserted temple, waiting until the next full moon to see who would appear at that secret meeting place.

As expected, on the next full moon night, a middle-aged man wearing plain clothes, covering his face with a silk scarf, quietly appeared at the deserted temple, waited for a long time and then left when no one came. Perhaps because Nhuoc Lan was recently busy dealing with the chaotic situation in Tu Phu so she could not come to the meeting place as usual. Guard Bang silently followed all the way, finally discovering that the man returned to a small mansion hidden in a quiet alley, which was later verified to be the longtime residence of a trusted butler, serving directly and secretly for Tuong Ba Khiem's palace for many years.

He also had someone carefully check the identity of that butler, confirming that he was the person in charge of Tuong Ba Khiem's entire secret spy network spread throughout the capital, often referred to in the dark circles by the nickname Second Butler, specializing in liaison between the Grand Master and the contacts planted deep in large and small families. This discovery was like the final piece of the puzzle to complete the entire picture of the conspiracy that Viet Khoi and Khinh Vu had been searching for many months. It turned out that Tham Nhuoc Lan was not simply a lucky orphan girl who was taken care of by Sam Dinh Ngan as everyone thought, but was actually installed in the Sam family from a young age under the orders of Tuong Ba Khiem himself, with the task of silently monitoring all changed in this family, in case Khinh Vu's true identity was one day discovered.

To confirm it even more firmly, Viet Khoi also sent someone to trace Tuong Ba Khiem's trusted butler, quietly asking the neighbors living around that small mansion. Through this, he learned that this butler had served in the Grand Master's palace for a long time, was entrusted with many confidential matters that even the other servants in the palace were not aware of, and often had to secretly travel to many different places in the capital to convey orders or receive reports from the scouts that Tuong Ba Khiem had scattered throughout the years, not only in the royal court but also in large and small merchant families throughout Khanh Duong city.

Viet Khoi asked people to dig deeper into Nhuoc Lan's past, and finally discovered the heartbreaking truth: the orphan girl that Sam Dinh Ngan picked up on the side of the road in the past, was in fact not a random coincidence as he had believed all these years, but a deliberate arrangement, very delicately orchestrated so that the child would appear at the right time, in the right place, making it impossible for a kind-hearted person like him to take her home. nurture.

"So that means," Khinh Vu said, her voice trembling as he listened to Viet Khoi recount his entire discovery, "for the past fifteen years, Nhuoc Lan has lived by my side not because of true sisterly love, but just a task entrusted to her since childhood? Are all the years we grew up together, sharing joys and sorrows together, just a fake cover?"

"I'm afraid so," Viet Khoi replied, his voice low and filled with sympathy for her pain. "But I think, over time, perhaps the line between the assigned task and a person's true feelings gradually becomes blurred. The jealousy she had for you, perhaps at first was just a part of the necessary cover to integrate, but over the long years, when she had to witness you always being loved and valued more than yourself, it gradually turned into a real emotion, interwoven with the reconnaissance mission, creating a person who is both pitiful and worthy. Blame me like Nhuoc Lan is now."

Khinh Vu was silent for a long time, his hands clasped tightly together on his knees and then let go, unable to find a position that made him feel at peace. Although she knew clearly that Nhuoc Lan had cruelly harmed her, when she understood the truth that she was just a pawn who had been manipulated since childhood, with no right to choose her own fate, she suddenly remembered an afternoon when she was ten years old, when Nhuoc Lan quietly gave the last piece of cake to her without a single complaint - at that time she thought it was sisterly love, but now she doesn't know where to put that memory. That hard-to-name sadness is entwined with anger for the person who pulled the strings behind it all, turning an innocent child into a tool for dark political calculations.

"This further shows," Viet Khoi continued, his voice becoming more serious, "the real root of all the disasters she suffered, lies not with Bach Quan or Nhuoc Lan, but with Tuong Ba Khiem. He is the one who caused the death of her mother twenty years ago, the one who has installed people to follow her for the past fifteen years, and is also the one behind the direction of the plot to poison her this time, even though he did not directly act, but his hand was his own." We were involved from the very first steps.""

Viet Khoi, after hearing Khinh Vu's thoughts, also pondered and considered. "If you really want to give Nhuoc Lan a chance," he said, "we need to act very tactfully, not revealing that we have grasped the connection between her and Tuong Ba Khiem, lest he immediately kill her before she can testify. Perhaps we should wait until the most appropriate time, when all other evidence is complete, before considering approaching her privately to make the final choice."

With this new evidence in hand, Viet Khoi and Khinh Vu understood that it was time to act more cautiously than ever. Tuong Ba Khiem, once he discovers that his spy network is at risk of being exposed, will certainly not sit idly by and wait for death, but will find a way to fiercely counterattack to protect the position of power he has painstakingly built over the past twenty years, even if he has to use the most cruel measures.

That night, after hearing the whole story, Khinh Vu sat alone for a long time in the palace, looking out at the dark courtyard, his heart both sad and determined. She thought of her biological mother who had never met her, her adoptive father who had silently endured the secret for twenty years, and even Nhuoc Lan, another life who had been turned into a tool by Tuong Ba Khiem since childhood. She understood that the battle ahead was not simply about reclaiming justice for herself, but also against a force that had brought so much suffering to countless other innocent lives for twenty years, and she was determined to go to the end, no matter how dangerous the road ahead was.

She also thought about whether, now that she understood Nhuoc Lan's true situation, she should find a way to give her a chance to tell the truth, to save herself before it was too late. Even though she had been brutally betrayed, deep in her heart, Khinh Vu still could not completely let go of the sisterly love that had been attached for fifteen years. There was still a part of her that hoped that, if there was a way to help Nhuoc Lan escape Tuong Ba Khiem's manipulation and voluntarily testify against him, then at least she would have a chance to atone for part of the mistakes she had made, instead of having to suffer the same tragic fate as the mastermind behind everything that had happened. for the past twenty years.