Chapter 1 The Military Officer Who Committed Suicide Out of Fear of Punishment

March of the eighth year of the Great Zhou Dynasty
In the city of Ruishan County in the Palace Capital Kingdom, although it is the beginning of spring, the willow trees in the city have grown green leaves, and the whole city is full of vitality.

However, the traces of war left on the buildings and the patrolling Great Zhou Imperial Guards with swords and guns on the streets still made the air of this small palace city with a population of only 100,000 people tense.
The bedroom of the Liu Mansion, the most luxurious house in Ruishan County, was filled with the bitter smell of traditional Chinese medicine.

A tall girl wearing a traditional palace gown and a white veil was concentrating on taking the pulse of a young man who was lying on the bed with a face as pale as paper.

"Congratulations, General Ye. The toxins in your body have been almost eliminated. All you need to do now is take some medicine and rest!"

After howling for nearly a minute, the girl withdrew her jade hand, looked at the young man in front of her and spoke softly. Her voice was gentle and soft, like a spring breeze, which made people feel relaxed and happy.

"Thank you Miss Pei!"

Hearing the result given by Pei Zhixiu, the weak Ye Mingsheng couldn't help but smile and said very solemnly;
After saying this, Ye Mingsheng waved his hand, and Ye Tie, the captain of the personal guards standing behind Pei Zhixiu, immediately understood what he meant. He took out ten taels of silver from his arms and handed it to Pei Zhixiu.

"Thanks to Miss Pei for treating our general these days, this little bit of silver is not a token of respect, I hope Miss Pei will accept it!"

Seeing the silver handed over by Ye Tie, Pei Zhixiu frowned slightly and declined politely:
"General Ye led the Great Zhou imperial army to protect our Ruishan County from the invasion of the Luobei people. I and the people of Ruishan County are deeply grateful for your kindness."

"I have no way to repay you on weekdays, but I am very happy to have the opportunity to express my gratitude these days. Lord Ye, please don't mention the yellow and white things."

Seeing that Pei Zhixiu was determined not to accept the medical fee, Ye Mingsheng shook his head helplessly and said, "Miss Pei, please keep my poisoning a secret for me!"

"General Ye, rest assured. It is our responsibility as doctors to keep patients' secrets!" Pei Zhixiu nodded. Then she seemed to have thought of something and hesitated to speak. However, she still opened her cherry lips and whispered;
"This Broken Heart Powder is not an ordinary poison. It is specially extracted by humans. The chance of accidental ingestion is very small..."

Upon hearing this, Ye Mingsheng sighed in his heart, then he nodded slightly.

Seeing that the general of the Great Zhou court understood his hidden meaning, Pei Zhixiu stopped talking and continued:
"I will prepare the decoction at Changshan Medical Clinic these days. General Ye, you can just send someone to get it every day."

"Then I'll trouble you Miss Pei!"

"No trouble, General Ye, you should take good care of yourself. I'm going back to the clinic!" Pei Zhixiu said goodbye:

"Ye Tie, help me see Miss Pei off!" Ye Mingsheng said to his personal guard captain:
"Okay, Miss Pei, please come this way..."

As Pei Zhixiu and Ye Tie left, Ye Mingsheng was the only one left in the room, lying on the bed. A bitter smile slowly rose on his angular face.

Of course he knew that this Broken Heart Powder could not have been taken by mistake, because he was the one who took it himself. To be more precise, it was taken by the original owner who committed suicide out of fear of punishment!
Ye Mingsheng is 23 years old. He was born into a military landlord family in Fengshan County, Liaoyang, Da Zhou. His father died of a recurrence of a knife wound when he was ten years old, leaving his mother, Cui, alone in the family.

He joined the army at the age of 14 and was selected to join the Zhaowu Camp of the Imperial Guards, becoming a close soldier of Shangguan Hongyuan, the chief minister of the Great Zhou Dynasty. Because of his meritorious service in suppressing the rebellion of the Dangxiang people in Yongliang, he was promoted to the rank of the seventh-rank commander of the Xuanwu Imperial Guards, commanding a camp of more than a thousand people.

In the seventh year of Anhe, which was one year ago, a rebellion broke out in Gongdu, a vassal state of the Great Zhou Dynasty. The imperial army of the Great Zhou Dynasty went on an expedition to the east and Ye Mingsheng followed the army. After several fierce battles, he was ordered to garrison in Ruishan County to protect the army's rear food supply route.

The Liu Mansion where he lives now was originally the residence of a wealthy businessman in the city. It was vacated and lent to him under the coordination of the Ruishan County Magistrate.

A day ago, he embezzled the seized money in the Wanfengfu battle, and took credit for killing bandits in the suppression of bandits in Xiaoli Town, Ruishan County.

The original owner was secretly interviewed by Jia Liang, a centurion sent by the Supervisory Office. Under Jia Liang's intimidation, the original owner returned to the mansion, and committed suicide by taking poison in panic.

“I’m so unlucky that I encountered such a bad thing as soon as I arrived…” Ye Mingsheng touched his nose, smiled bitterly and said in a low self-deprecating voice;
Although Pei Zhixiu had resolved the danger of the Broken Heart Powder, his life was still in danger. The two crimes committed by the original principal offender were serious crimes in the strict military discipline of the Great Zhou Imperial Guards. The lightest punishment was beheading, and the worst was exile.

If a person's head falls off, it would be fine if he died cleanly and without suffering.

I’m afraid of being exiled to the frontier, where life would be worse than death!
Wearing heavy shackles and fetters, marching step by step to a place thousands of miles away under the scorching sun, even if they reach the border, the final outcome is nothing more than forced labor to death under inhumane conditions and inhumane abuse by supervisors. Just thinking about it is enough to make people shudder...

This is also why, after being secretly interviewed by the Supervisory Department, the original owner chose to commit suicide in the hope that his own life could be used to protect his family from being implicated.

Ye Mingsheng, who had just traveled through time a day ago, felt very disappointed when he realized his current situation.

In his previous life, he was a hard-working online writer. He revised the manuscript seven or eight times and finally got a guaranteed salary of 1,500 yuan. He was planning to write for two years to save up for a down payment on a house.

I didn't expect to wake up in such a desperate situation. When I thought of this, Ye Mingsheng suddenly felt like crying. The 100,000 RMB on the card was accumulated by him even after breaking two keyboards...
Although it was the first time for Ye Mingsheng to travel through time, he was not unfamiliar with it.

After all, under the rejection of the big editor, he didn't know how many times he had revised the manuscript, how many beginnings he had written were ruined, and how many brain cells had died. Although he had never eaten pork, he had seen pigs run.

In his previous life, Ye Mingsheng could not write as well as the masters in formula writing, nor could he come up with any brilliant ideas. Even his writing speed was poor, and he could barely write 2,000 words in an hour.

However, as someone who has loved reading mystery novels since junior high school, he considers himself to be somewhat confident in his reasoning.

Driven by fear, Ye Mingsheng could only lie on the bed like a living dead during the day he traveled through time, although he was tortured by the heart-breaking powder.

But his brain was constantly thinking based on the original owner's memories, like an ant on a hot pan, trying to find a way to survive.

Ye Mingsheng's intuition told him that the original owner's death was not as simple as it seemed!
(End of this chapter)