AWB Chapter 298 At worst, I'll just be disfigured!
Chapter 298 At worst, I'll just be disfigured!
Lu Yangyang almost slapped him on the head, asking incredulously,
"Did a donkey kick your brain?"
"No, don't you think my idea is excellent? Anyway, it doesn't matter whether you marry your cousin or not. If you marry him, he might have to worry about your safety. In the palace, there are people watching you 24 hours a day. You definitely can't stand it. As for me, I don't want to marry the Sixth Princess, but I don't dare to openly refuse the marriage. Wouldn't that be courting death? But it's different if we elope," Yan Yue analyzed for Lu Yangyang, feeling more and more that his idea was brilliant. "Look, His Majesty bestowed the marriage between you and your cousin using your aunt's last decree, right? Your cousin can't disobey, but I'm my aunt's nephew. If I steal his marriage, it won't sound good, but at most it will be embarrassing for your cousin. No one will say he's unfilial. Even if he's angry with me, he won't hold a grudge against me, right?"
"How about it? Thinking about it this way, don't you think my idea is absolutely brilliant? It kills two birds with one stone, a perfect solution!" Yan Yue said proudly.
Lu Yangyang looked at his smug expression and was speechless.
She pointed to the chair: "Sit down first."
Yan Yue walked over to the chair and sat down, looking at her with a puzzled expression. "Is there something wrong with my idea?"
“No problem. If we don’t consider the deeper factors, your idea is absolutely brilliant. I can’t wait to pack my things and elope with you right now!” Lu Yangyang said.
Yan Yue raised an eyebrow: "That's it! I knew this idea would work!"
Lu Yangyang tapped the table: "But have you ever thought about the deeper meaning behind His Majesty's two decrees? You left the palace, racking your brains to avoid marrying the Sixth Princess, trying to escape the capital under the pretext of your lingering illness. Do you think His Majesty didn't know your intentions? He didn't issue a decree to bestow a marriage upon you from the beginning, giving you room to maneuver. But at the same time, he issued another decree to bestow another marriage, seemingly unrelated, but both are related to Your Highness. It's a choice between two options. His Majesty can let you leave the capital, and it's not mandatory for you to marry the Sixth Princess, but he has to accept His Majesty's arrangement, marry me, and cut off his path of marriage alliances."
"Either he refuses the marriage and His Majesty's arrangement, in which case he will be besieged for being unfilial, and there's no telling what might happen next. Or, as you said, we elope, which won't be blamed on His Highness, but believe it or not, the moment we leave the capital, a net of heaven and earth awaits us, regardless of life or death. Are you confident that we can escape alive?"
Yan Yue swallowed hard and froze.
He stared at Lu Yangyang as if he'd seen a ghost, his lips trembling for a moment before he managed to stammer out, "I... I feel like you... the way you're acting right now is a bit like my cousin?"
"So, according to what you're saying, my cousin was trying to trick me into leaving quickly because he knew His Majesty had a backup plan, and if he accepted it, His Majesty would let me go this time. Is that what you mean?" Yan Yue asked.
Lu Yangyang nodded: "That should be the case, but Your Highness probably didn't expect that His Majesty's backup plan would be used here."
Political maneuvering is like playing chess. Lu Yangyang didn't understand chess before, but at this moment she suddenly grasped a bit of its meaning.
The matter of bestowing a marriage may seem like a small thing, but when connected to His Majesty's intention to depose the Crown Prince, every step is a contest on a chessboard.
"Then, then I..." Yan Yue said with difficulty, looking at Lu Yangyang.
Lu Yangyang understood what he wanted to say: "Even if you marry the Sixth Princess, you can't help His Highness. It will only make things worse. The best course of action now is to leave the capital as soon as possible, just like he said."
Yan Yue lowered his head dejectedly, wanting to say something but ultimately remaining silent. Yang Yang was right; the biggest help he could offer now was to avoid causing trouble. If he married the Sixth Princess and complicated matters further, it might bring even more trouble to his cousin.
"I'll have someone bring Xiao Liuzi over. Wait a moment." Lu Yangyang had sorted out her thoughts and stopped worrying about the arranged marriage. The most important thing now was to resolve Yan Yue's matter and get him to leave as soon as possible.
Ever since Lüyao started helping her make money doing business outside, Lu Yangyang had Lüyao spend money to support Xiao Liuzi and his gang. Those beggars seemed to have nothing to do every day and were always being chased away, but sometimes the information they could get was much faster than if they went out to investigate.
While the servant went to deliver the message, Lu Yangyang did not give Yan Yue acupuncture, but instead gave him a packet of medicine.
Without thinking, Yan Yue poured it into his mouth, then took a sip of water and swallowed it, asking, "What kind of medicine is this?"
Lu Yangyang looked at him mockingly: "Poison."
Yan Yue's eyes widened, and he stood up abruptly, clutching his throat with one hand and nervously pointing to his mouth.
"Hahahaha," Lu Yangyang burst into laughter.
Realizing he'd been tricked, Yan Yue snorted in dissatisfaction: "You still have the nerve to laugh? What on earth did you feed me?!"
"You've already eaten it, don't you think it's too late to ask me what I gave you?" Lu Yangyang said with amusement.
Yan Yue glared at him angrily.
“It is indeed a poison, but it won’t kill you. It will only cause your body to break out in sores. Go see the imperial physician tomorrow and say that these sores have been there for several months, and they are multiplying and now cover your entire body. What if they spread to your face? Tell him that the local doctor told you it’s eczema, which grows in damp places, and that nine out of ten people in the military camp have it, but you didn’t take it seriously. However, it just won’t go away, so you want to take advantage of your trip back to the capital to see the imperial physician. Tell him that you came to see me, but I’ve never seen this symptom before and I can’t cure it,” Lu Yangyang explained to him.
Yan Yue nodded hurriedly: "Then when should I take the antidote?"
"I've prepared the antidote for you. After you leave the capital, take it for half a month and you'll be fine. The imperial physician can only diagnose it as damp-heat sores, a type of sores caused by the local climate and mosquitoes. It can't be eliminated. I'll prescribe some medicine to clear heat, which can relieve the itching, but it can't cure it completely."
Yan Yue asked in a trembling voice, "It...it still itches?"
Then, gritting his teeth, he said resolutely, "Fine, let it itch! As long as I don't have to marry the Sixth Princess, it's worth it!"
Lu Yangyang patted his shoulder: "You've worked hard!"
At this moment, the servants brought Xiao Liuzi over.
Lu Yangyang let Xiao Liuzi in and closed the door.
Xiao Liuzi hurriedly asked, "Master, what are your orders?"
Lu Yangyang looked at Yan Yue and said to Xiao Liuzi, "When you get back later, spread the word in the teahouses and other places that Young Master Yan returned from the southwest covered in boils and was seeking medical help everywhere. Say that he's making a fuss and is ignorant. The southwest is full of poisonous miasma. What are boils? At worst, he'll be disfigured. What does a grown man care about disfigurement? The most dangerous thing there is poisonous insects that crawl everywhere and suck people's blood. The wild people in the mountains eat raw meat. There are living corpses everywhere, and witchcraft is rampant. Once you go there, you never come back!"