青春期撞上更年期第1部

The chief supervisor’s eyes gleamed, and he misunderstood her intentions. “Rest assured, Your Highness. The princess from the Xu State won’t marry His Highness when she comes to the capital. It has nothing to do with His Highness!”

He thought Shao Wanru was jealous, so he hurriedly explained.

“I know that, but others don’t. Some people want to use it to sound out His Highness’s potential,” Shao Wanru explained softly with a smile.

!!

The chief supervisor had had lots of dealings with many people in the Palace and had experienced the previous dynasty, so he obtained a sophisticated understanding of worldly wisdom. Shao Wanru’s words astounded him.

After pondering carefully, he immediately got up, bowed to Shao Wanru, and said with heartfelt admiration, “Your Highness, I thought too little of it.”

He saluted from the bottom of his heart.

He treated Her Highness with respect only because of Prince Chen, but now he viewed Princess Chen in a new, more favorable light and sincerely bowed to her.

People like him, who came out on top of numerous servants in the Palace step by step, were sophisticated and tactful. He instantly discovered the critical point in Shao Wanru’s words that he had ignored.

“You shouldn’t have. Please sit down!” Shao Wanru said with a light smile.

The chief supervisor sat down again. “I’ve carefully thought over the safety of our mansion and arranged people to protect us from any potential dangers. Besides, I dispatched more people to tighten security and told all of them to pay special attention to you. I must make sure nothing bad will happen to you. Frankly, if you want to go out during this period, I will have to persuade you to stay at home.”

He thought Princess Chen was secure here. No one could hurt her inside the mansion. As for outside, the chief supervisor would try his best to stop Princess Chen from going out before Prince Chen returned.

If Princess Chen insisted on hanging out, he had planned to stop her and even make her current situation clear so that she would know what should be done or not. Unexpectedly, the young master was so intelligent that she had figured out the essential part long ago. Moreover, she had even thought through the things that he had overlooked. Though he had experienced myriad hardships and hazards, he couldn’t grasp the overall situation better than Princess Chen.

Deep down, he couldn’t help feeling ashamed and became even more respectful to Shao Wanru.

No wonder Xiao Xuanzi praised Princess Chen many times, saying she was brilliant. At first, the chief supervisor thought Xiao Xuanzi must have been exaggerating, but now it seemed that he actually described Princess Chen in a modest way.

“Thank you very much, Sir. Before His Highness left, he seriously told me something. I’m young and inexperienced, so I should ask for your advice if I encounter any tricky things. I shouldn’t let outsiders seize any opportunity to stir trouble. Sometimes, a terrible misunderstanding might be caused by some small things and destroy our mutual trust,” Shao Wanru said, feeling very satisfied with this chief supervisor.

“Your Highness, is there any trifle in the mansion that bothers you?” the chief supervisor asked with a frown. After thinking for a while, he suddenly understood the hidden meaning of Shao Wanru’s words. He had the growing sense that he had been negligent in not considering the safety within the mansion, when he devoted most of his attention to the outside.

In the past, there was no master in the inner court. As long as he handled well the affairs in the mansion, he protected the whole mansion. As for Prince Chen, he could take good care of himself long ago.

Prince Chen was wise, deep, and precociously bright. The outsiders only saw his master grow up under his protection, but they didn’t know that his master had been protecting him since he became mature at a young age.

The chief supervisor had a lot of enemies in the Palace back then. When he was the former empress’ general steward, these people deeply hid their hatred toward him. But as soon as he became less powerful, many of them secretly trampled on him. If it hadn’t been for Prince Chen’s concern, they would have rushed up in a crowd to hurt him, and he would have been murdered long ago.

At present, he had gained both fame and benefits. Even when the Empress Dowager occasionally rewarded Prince Chen’s Mansion, she would give him some reward in passing.

“There was a dispute in the kitchen. The person who delivered the cooking ingredients was ill, so he asked his nephew to do the job. But the young man was not a good one. The food he sent was of inferior quality, and he even made a scene in the kitchen. He claimed you offered him this job and urged the people in the kitchen to inform you about this.”

Since the chief supervisor was sensible enough, Shao Wanru spoke without reservation.

“The delivery man?” The chief supervisor was stunned and did not think of this for a while.

A servant behind the chief supervisor reminded him, “Please excuse me, but I’ve heard of the servant who delivered the food. He seems to have something to do with you when you were in the Palace!”

Hearing the servant’s words, the chief supervisor finally remembered and nodded repeatedly. “Yes… right. It’s something about me. The delivery man was… the nephew of a trusted eunuch of the former empress. The eunuch died for her, and I was asked to take care of his nephew. After I left the Palace, I asked his nephew to help deliver the food ingredients to the kitchen. He had done this work for more than a decade.”

It had been so long that the chief supervisor could hardly remember it.

The news came as a surprise to Shao Wanru. No wonder their rivals started with a delivery man working in the kitchen. Shao Wanru had an idea in her heart and said, “Sir, do you still remember this person’s character?”

“Yes, he is a good person. Back then, I saw that he was honest, so I sent him to deliver the food to the kitchen. In the very beginning, I would check his work personally. His performance had always been excellent. Since I let the supervisor in the kitchen manage him, no one came to report his mistake. Therefore, I suppose he should have done a good job all these years!”

The chief supervisor said after thinking for a while.

“Then send someone to check it out. Maybe something has happened to him.” Shao Wanru narrowed her watery eyes slightly and reminded him.

The delivery man had been well-behaved, but he suddenly fell sick. There must be something fishy behind this. Obviously, the new delivery man was here to stir up trouble.

“I will go and investigate this matter.” The chief supervisor nodded, knowing an accident might have occurred to him.

“The dishes sent here this morning were not good. I’ve told Qing Yue to drive him out. At this moment, he should have come to report this to you. We seldom met, but I can tell you’re smart. Now I entrust this matter to you. I hope you find out who is behind this matter,” said Shao Wanru.

The chief supervisor was intelligent and treated her with respect, which made it great convenient for her to tackle this dispute urgently. If he were prejudiced against her and wanted to suppress her with his seniority, it would be difficult to solve the problem.

The current situation was the best.

“Your Highness, I got it.” The chief supervisor understood and grasped the meaning of the matter.

“If you need Qing Yue later, you can take her there,” Shao Wanru said meaningfully with a gentle and kind smile, her lustrous eyes growing slightly larger.

Birds of the same kind generally live together. The chief supervisor felt Princess Chen’s genial smile was precisely the same as the smile on his master’s face.

“How could such a smile be considered pure and kind? It means scheming.”

Thinking of his duplicitous master with a pretty face, the chief supervisor felt his heart racing. It suddenly came to him that Princess Chen, the delicate young lady before him, might be as underhand as Prince Chen!

“But it’s good that they’re not that upright. A soft heart can be fatal to noble descendants. It’s great to be scheming!”

The chief supervisor left the inner court, beaming with delight. He was in a good mood along the way, walking back while smiling. He had worried that Princess Chen would be too young to know what was happening, but now it seemed that Prince Chen and Princess Chen couldn’t be more perfectly matched.

When he walked out of Chuihua Gate, the chief supervisor stopped smiling, and his face darkened. Putting on a dignified look, he continued going outside with his servant. Halfway on their way back, a young male servant ran over with sweat all over his face. “Sir, you are here. Someone came to you. Now he is overly anxious and has inquired about your whereabouts several times.”

“Who is it?” The chief supervisor wrinkled his brows and asked.

“I heard that he was responsible for sending food to the kitchen. He wanted you to uphold justice for him, but I don’t know what has happened. His complaint sounds confused!” The servant trotted and reported.

As expected, Princess Chen guessed it right. The supervisor was delighted but did not show it on his face. He strode forward and asked. “What did you tell him where I was?”

“You have taught me how to deal with this, so I certainly didn’t tell him where you went. I just said that you hadn’t gotten up because you went to bed late last night.” The young male servant wiped the sweat on his forehead and said.

When any outsider came to find the chief supervisor, who might be too busy to meet the person, his servants would let the visitor wait and stall for time. As for the specific affairs that the chief supervisor was doing, they wouldn’t reveal any to others.

This time, seeing that it was still early, he deliberately came up with a valid excuse.

“Okay, let’s go and have a look!” The chief supervisor nodded and followed the young male servant out.

After they walked through a few courtyards, they saw a young man in his twenties anxiously walking around in circles. When the chief supervisor stepped out, his eyes immediately lit up. He rushed over, knelt before the chief supervisor, and kowtowed hard three times. “Sir, please uphold justice for me!”

After that, he burst into tears, as if he had been wronged.

Behind him were two baskets full of vegetables and meat. There was even a tied chicken struggling with all its might. It moved so vigorously with incredible strength that it nearly shook the vegetables above it out of the basket.

In addition, a fish lay on the food with its tail wagging. From time to time, it would jump up and twitch its tail, making a loud noise.

“What’s going on?” The chief supervisor stopped and asked, checking the current situation with his hands clasped behind his back.

“I… I didn’t know why they would do that to me. Today, I brought the food to the kitchen, but they said that the chicken was not very active, the fish was dying, and the vegetables were not fresh. But in fact, all of them are in perfect condition. You can send someone to check them if you don’t believe me. Anyone finds anything wrong with these things, and I’m willing to take all punishments.”

The young man wiped away his tears and said, “My uncle has been ill these days, so he asked me to send food for him in a few days, but these people in the kitchen bullied me fiercely. They pointed at me and blamed me for everything. I was so annoyed that I wanted to let you decide which side was right, but they felt reluctant to do that. Then they called a girl named Qing Yue over to punish me. She ordered her helpers to throw me out along with all the baskets. All the ingredients were ruined… And… and there are some badly broken ones that I didn’t dare to show you. I want nothing but justice. Please help me, Sir.”

He sobbed out all of this, his broken voice full of grievance. Then he bowed deeply to the chief supervisor.

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