Chapter 44: The Treasure in the Ancestral Hall

“Old General Song, I presume you already know that I am not the real Tang Zhao. I wonder if you and your grandson have already reunited in the next world,” Tang Zhao thought of that poor girl who had died of illness in her bridal sedan, and said softly, “I believe so, much like my arrival—so absurd, bizarre, and blessed by heaven’s luck.”

“Whether it be a fleeting dream or a journey through past and present lives, from the moment I woke up as 'Tang Zhao,' I have considered myself the true Tang Zhao.”

“I am the daughter the Madam Song fought to death to protect, the granddaughter you loved most dearly, and the last remaining bloodline of the Song clan in this world.”

“I, Tang Zhao, lack talent and dare not claim I can restore the Song clan's name of loyalty, yet I also dare not tarnish the Song reputation or bring shame upon the clan.”

“I beg you, Old General Song, and I beg the Song ancestors to protect me—protect me so that I may soon avenge 'myself,' seek justice for 'my late mother,' and make everyone who participated in the plot against us mother and daughter pay the price!”

Tang Zhao kowtowed with deep devotion.

Gu Ci accompanied her through all nine prostrations.

Tang Zhao glanced around with a heavy sense of furtiveness. “Husband, is there anyone else nearby?”

“There is no one but us within a hundred meters,” Gu Ci said, frowning. “How can you act like a petty thief in front of the ancestors?”

Tang Zhao ignored him. She stood up, took off her outer robe, and reached for her belt.

Gu Ci stood up and retreated several steps as if avoiding a venomous snake. He turned his head away and hissed in a low, angry voice, “Tang Zhao! How dare you be so disrespectful?!”

“What did I do?” Tang Zhao asked innocently.

“This is the sacred ancestral hall, and the ancestors are watching, yet you are undressing,” Gu Ci felt deeply ashamed, but he did not wish to use harsher words. “Hurry and put your robe back on!”

Tang Zhao tossed her belt, which was adorned with numerous pouches and jade pendants, onto the prayer mat, and replaced it with a plain, unadorned belt from her sleeve. She teased, “I wonder if my husband has ever heard the saying: 'The wise see wisdom, and the lewd see lewdness.'”

*Turning the tables on me!* Gu Ci closed his eyes.

The man’s serious demeanor was incredibly endearing. Tang Zhao wanted to continue teasing him, but in front of the Song ancestral tablets, she had to restrain herself.

Tang Zhao turned around, braced her arms against the incense altar, and used the momentum to leap onto the spirit platform. Avoiding the tablets, she walked a few steps toward the portrait of the Song ancestral couple hanging high on the wall and examined it closely.

Hearing the sound, Gu Ci turned his head. Seeing her standing on the spirit platform, he was horrified. He strode forward to close the doors and windows, then whispered angrily, “What kind of decorum is this? Get down this instant.”

Tang Zhao reached up to move the portrait aside. Following the position of the red cinnabar mark between the brows of the first generation Protector General, she searched the wall panel and indeed found a fine crack.

*Click!* A light sound echoed from within the wall. Tang Zhao pressed her ear against the surface, listening to the continuous mechanical sounds of the mechanism turning.

Suddenly, Tang Zhao felt the ground beneath her feet shake. Losing her balance, she took a step back but stepped into empty air, her entire body falling backward.

Tang Zhao closed her eyes, feeling utterly despondent. Tonight, the Song ancestors would likely line up in her dreams just to scold her.

Falling from such a high platform, breaking an arm or a leg would be the least of it. With no other choice, Gu Ci leaped onto the spirit platform.

Tang Zhao felt a sudden tightness around her waist. Her body spun mid-air, and her feet landed firmly on solid ground.

The ancestral tablets on the platform remained undisturbed.

Tang Zhao breathed a massive sigh of relief and looked up to offer her thanks, but the man pushed her away without mercy.

Tang Zhao: *Don't act like I was taking advantage of you!*

“What exactly are you trying to do?” At this point, how could Gu Ci not realize that Tang Zhao had a specific purpose for this visit?

*Click!* The entire spirit platform holding the tablets shifted to the left, revealing a small hidden door behind it.

The two exchanged a glance, walked to the small door, and crouched down. Gu Ci asked, “How do we open it?”

Tang Zhao spread her left hand. Under the light of the ritual candles, her gold and jade hairpin shimmered. The body of the pin was intricately carved, set with a night pearl the size of a dragon's eye, and its sharpened tip was stained with fresh blood from her fingertip.

Gu Ci lowered his gaze. No wonder she had dressed so elaborately today.

“This hairpin was placed on my mother's head by my grandmother on her wedding day,” Tang Zhao said. “Later, my mother gave it to me, and I have always carried it with me.”

The night pearl on this hairpin was peerless in the world. The An clan had coveted it for a long time, but in the end, because too many people had seen the pearl, seizing it by force would have been impossible to justify. Thus, they had allowed Tang Zhao to take it away.

They had been quite vexed by it for a long time.

Gu Ci raised an eyebrow. Old General Song's move was truly unexpected; who would have thought the key to the secret treasury would be a woman's hairpin, given as part of a dowry to a daughter who had long since married?

As Gu Ci thought, he helped her search for the keyhole, finally discovering it beneath a floor tile three steps away.

*The person who built this secret chamber was so calculating,* Tang Zhao mused. She inserted the hairpin into the keyhole, turned it three times to the left, five times to the right, then reversed the direction once more. She gave the entire pin a forceful push, and with a *click*, the small door swung open.

A wooden box sat quietly there.

Tang Zhao carried the box out. It was not locked. Upon opening it, she found only three books and a parchment scroll inside.

【Ding! "Save the Cannon Fodder Male Supporting Character" System. Ultimate Mission: Raise the entire army. First Sub-mission: Obtain the military treatise and the desert map—Completed! Reward: Agricultural tool blueprints and related agricultural books have been stored in the space. 100 Life Points have been credited. Total current Life Points: 186.】

*As expected of the system's target, the Life Points are so generous.*

Tang Zhao felt a pang of envy. She feigned disinterest as she flipped through them, saying, “So it's just military books and maps. Boring,” as she tossed the books and the parchment into Gu Ci's arms.

Gu Ci caught them, his eyes shining.

*The Collection of Divine Soldiers* was a treatise on military strategy personally written by the War God of the previous dynasty. It recorded typical battles from several centuries and included detailed annotations and commentaries; it had been revered as a national treasure by the previous dynasty.

Later, after the War God was framed, the previous emperor, being muddled and incompetent, burned the book, leaving no copies in anyone's possession.

Unexpectedly, the Protector General's Manor had retained extra copies. It seemed the rumors were wrong; the first generation Protector General and the War God of the previous dynasty were not mortal enemies, but rather shared a mutual respect.

“You... are you really giving this book to me?” Gu Ci asked.

“Of course not,” Tang Zhao said righteously. “It is mine.”

The light in Gu Ci's eyes dimmed.

“You can give me the original after you finish copying it,” Tang Zhao fantasized. “Perhaps after I finish reading it, I can become a female general too.”

Since he was receiving a favor, Gu Ci had no standing to pour cold water on her, yet he could not bring himself to agree insincerely. He could only help her restore the ancestral hall to its original state.

Tang Zhao changed her belt, put on her outer robe, and pinned the night pearl back into her hair. “Is there anything else amiss?”

Gu Ci replied good-naturedly, “No.”

Satisfied, Tang Zhao waited until Gu Ci had hidden the military books and the parchment on his person before the two of them kowtowed once more and exited the ancestral hall.