In the throne room, Emperor Wen Hui sat on the dragon throne with a dark expression. Looking at the officials in the hall, he threw the memorial in his hand at the face of the closest official.
The official was hit in the face, but he did not dare to say a word and immediately knelt down.
Ever since Shen Xin, his wife, and Shen Qiu entered the palace, they had not left. No one outside knew what happened, but the officials knew very well that Shen Xin and his wife had clearly been detained by Emperor Wen Hui. Why were they detained? It went without saying that Emperor Wen Hui wanted to show them who the ruler of the dynasty was.
All the officials understood this simple logic. Generally speaking, all they needed to do was pretend nothing happened. However, Emperor Wen Hui’s expression today was a little strange.
“Earl of Pingnan, you tell me!” Emperor Wen Hui called out.
Su Yu, the Earl of Pingnan, shuddered. The other officials all looked at him. Su Yu thought of what Su Mingfeng said to him last night and immediately stopped hesitating. He took out a letter from his sleeve and handed it to the eunuch who then handed it to the emperor.
“Your Majesty, I also think that the mighty general is not to be forgiven. He doesn’t take the royal family seriously and doesn’t respect you. Please punish Shen Xin and kill his entire family!”
Killing his entire family? The officials who weren’t particularly on good terms with Su Yu were all shocked when they heard this. The Earl of Pingnan had always been considered a non-violent and friendly person in the imperial court. Unexpectedly, this time, he was more ruthless than anyone else.
Emperor Wen Hui’s hand trembled as he took the letter and stared at Su Yu with a burning gaze.
Su Yu raised his head and looked determined.
“Your Majesty.” On the other side, the Marquis of Lin’an, Xie Ding, who had been silent all this while, also said, “Shen Xin has a lot of soldiers. He even dares to resist your orders outside. I’m afraid he already has the intention to rebel. I also agree with Lord Su about executing him and his entire family.”
Everyone looked at Xie Ding and Su Yu. They knew that the Su and Xie families had always been on good terms, but the Shen family and these two families were clearly not on the same boat. Now that Shen Xin was in trouble, the Su and Xie families were naturally willing to kick him when he was down.
Emperor Wen Hui’s gaze was uncertain.
Originally, he was extremely satisfied with the evidence sent by Fu Xiuyi. He had always been eyeing the Shen family covetously, but he could not find a chance. With the evidence of Shen Xin disobeying his order, the emperor could easily take back the Shen family’s military power. Unexpectedly, early this morning, when he mentioned this in the court, the court officials all expressed that they agreed to punish Shen Xin severely.
Shen Xin had been fighting in the northwest all year round and did not have a deep relationship with the officials in the imperial court. Emperor Wen Hui had expected that many people would agree to punishing Shen Xin, but he did not expect it to be so many.
Emperor Wen Hui was paranoid. If there were many officials who spoke up for Shen Xin, Emperor Wen Hui would probably suspect that Shen Xin was roping in many people in private. However, with so many people suggesting to punish Shen Xin, Emperor Wen Hui was actually relieved. An official with an ambition to rebel would not make so many enemies for himself.
If the impeachment of Shen Xin by these officials only made Emperor Wen Hui a little hesitant, the “killing his entire family” suggested by the Earl of Pingnan and the Marquis of Lin’an made Emperor Wen Hui suspicious.
The Shen family, the Su family, and the Xie family were all thorns in Emperor Wen Hui’s heart. It was not that these officials were bad, but just the reputation and military strength of these large families would make Emperor Wen Hui feel a constant threat. How could he allow others to be more powerful than him?
