It seemed I would have to find an excuse to tell him that I had absolutely no more military knowledge to share.
When my mother, my wife, and I finally left the camp, the soldiers all came out to see us off. Beyond thanking us for the pleasure we had provided the previous night, they were also grateful for the guidance we had offered regarding their martial arts.
After leaving the military camp, we made our way to the Duke of Wu's estate; by the time we arrived, it was already afternoon.
Upon entering the main hall, we found Mother, Yang Ye, and a middle-aged man—who clearly possessed considerable cultivation—engaged in discussion.
Seeing us enter, Yang Ye immediately introduced the middle-aged man to us.
Just as we had anticipated, he was Wu Zhenying, one of the three current Grand Chancellors.
We then began to discuss our plan. First, one of us four beauties would need to find a way to seduce the Emperor and stir romantic feelings within him.
Next, Wu Zhenying would step in to encourage the Emperor to take a new consort; the woman who had won the Emperor's favor would then—with a show of feigned reluctance—agree to become his new consort.
Among the four of us, neither Mother nor my wife was suitable; after all, both of them had reputations far too notorious to allow for such a position.
Since I also needed to find a way to obtain the antidote from Pang Xing, the only remaining candidate to become the consort was Mother.
Once Mother entered the palace, she would have to accomplish two things.
First, she had to vie with Consort Pang for influence over the Emperor; second, she had to discover the location of the Demon Realm Stone from him.
Neither task would be easy. Mother had only recently transformed into a woman, and she knew even less than I did about the ways to please a man.
Finding out the location of the Demon Realm Stone would be even harder. Consort Pang had failed to do so for a long time, so the chances of Mother succeeding quickly were slim; she might not even get the answer after bearing the Emperor two or three children.
After the discussion concluded, Wu Zhenying took his leave. With the Emperor's return imminent, he had to have everything set up before the monarch arrived.
At the same time, Dad needed to set off quickly, aiming to meet the Emperor first and leave a deep, captivating impression on him.
After Wu Zhenying left, Dad went to the Emperor and Empress Dowager's summer retreat to look for an opportunity.
Mom, my wife, and I immediately began devising a plan to infiltrate the imperial palace and find Pang Xing.
If we found him, the ideal course of action would be to quietly eliminate him and retrieve the antidote from his body.
Beyond that, we needed to assess exactly how many operatives the Demonic Sect had deployed within the palace.
Yang Ye and his team were well aware of the standard security arrangements, but it was difficult for them to track the experts who possessed exceptional stealth capabilities.
This was especially true for Pang Tianlong—a master at the peak of the Xiantian realm—whose current location and schemes remained unknown.
When night fell, my wife, Mom, and I stealthily made our way toward the imperial palace.
After Mom carefully sensed the surroundings and confirmed that Pang Tianlong was not inside, we split into three groups and scaled the palace walls to enter.
However, as I vaulted over the northern wall and landed inside, I was startled to discover that my ability to sense the world around me—a hallmark of the Xiantian peak realm—had vanished.
I quietly circulated my internal energy and found that while my cultivation base remained intact, I had lost the ability to commune with the natural world.
I was now effectively a master whose internal constitution was at the Xiantian peak, yet I could only wield power equivalent to the Xiantian late stage.
After a moment's thought, I leaped back over the wall and found that my sensory connection to the world had returned.
I immediately realized that within the imperial palace, even a supreme expert at the Xiantian peak could only unleash power at the Xiantian late-stage level—though the reason for this remained a mystery. I sprinted through the woods north of the imperial palace, using the sensory techniques my master had taught me to detect any potential ambushes while making my way toward the nearest palace building.
Without the ability to commune with heaven and earth—a power possessed only at the peak of the Xiantian realm—my sensory range was drastically reduced; I could only gain a rough impression of the areas I passed through.
I was startled when I arrived at the nearest palace building.
For inscribed above the entrance were two large characters: "Cold Palace."
Wasn't this the very place where my second brother's mother—the former Empress Yang Bing—was imprisoned?
According to my second brother, she was living a wretched existence here; perhaps I should go and check on her?
Just as this thought crossed my mind, the gates of the Cold Palace creaked open.
Prince Jing—whom I had met only a short while ago—stepped out, accompanied by two other men.
My brows furrowed tightly at the sight of them, for one of the men was Xiong Wannian, whom I had encountered before; he and Lang Ruohai had once ambushed me.
To think that a high-ranking figure from the Demon Palace like him was inside the imperial palace—it seemed the Demon Palace's infiltration of the palace ran far deeper than I had imagined.
"Your Highness Prince Jing, that bitch Yang Bing is truly worthy of having been the Empress; fucking her is an absolute delight! Back at the Demon Palace, the only ones who could compare to her are the Young Miss and the Palace Master's wife—even my own wife's pussy doesn't measure up!"
Xiong Wannian spoke with an expression of utter satisfaction.
"Hehe! Elder Xiong, if that weren't the case, how could she have become Empress? If her pussy didn't feel good, would the Emperor have bothered fucking her?"
Prince Jing replied with a lewd, grinning smirk. "That's true enough. But look—a pussy this fine and high-class is ours to play with whenever we please now! Once we complete the Demon Lord's mission, *then* we'll truly be able to do whatever the hell we want! Hahahaha..."
Xiong Wannian laughed loudly, his mind filled with visions of future bliss.
"Careful with your words, Elder Xiong! We haven't succeeded yet. Watch out for eavesdroppers—there are simply too many of the Emperor's spies in this palace!"