Chapter 33: Chapter 33: Missing Child
Ye Lingyue had just stretched her body in front of the carriage when she heard the commotion. Her eyes sharply turned to Pei Cuiyun.
She lowered her head. There was a hint of annoyance, irritability, and anger in her eyes. Are all the members from the third branch pigs? How can they let Ye Shaoqin get stolen right under their noses like that?
Last night, it was also the imperial guards under Yan Luo who took charge of the night patrol. They were sure incompetent, yet dared to be so arrogant.
"Commander, Captains, please help this poor mother..." Pei Cuiyun continued to sob in heartbreak.
Ye Yaoting stood by her side with the pleading in his eyes as he grabbed her wife’s body to support her. "Imperial guards, please help us..."
Under his grasp, Pei Cuiyun stiffened slightly before she continued to sob again. Meanwhile, their eldest daughter pursed her lips, lowering her head as she wiped her face.
At this moment, Ye Lanxi suddenly came over to them with the intention to scold. "Are you a bunch of pigs? How can you sleep so deeply that you didn’t even feel it when someone stole such a big child?!"
His words echoed the thoughts in a lot of people’s hearts.
Ye Zhiqiu frowned, and he took large strides to the third branch’s carriage. He lifted the curtain and took the sobbing Ye Shaoyin from there.
The little girl was also aware that her brother had gone; he was taken away. Still, she held some desperate hope. "... wuwuwu, Cousin... where is my brother?"
Some people had a look of disapproval on their faces. One child was already gone, and they even left the other alone in the carriage.
Commander Leng Hai’s face darkened upon receiving the report from the couple. He pinched his nose.
Actually, he could just continue the journey and ignored them. Even the imperial family wouldn’t pursue the matter. They were probably too lazy to sweat over such a small detail.
As long as most of the Ye family members were escorted alive to the destination, his mission was considered complete.
The imperial family wouldn’t bother to investigate who lived or died except for the main members like Ye Chengde or his brothers. After all, they had held official titles before, and their deaths needed to be recorded.
Eventually, he gritted his teeth and ordered. "Investigate!"
It would delay the journey a little bit.
He turned to the irresponsible couple, one was sobbing and the other seemed anxious to death. He told them. "I will only delay our journey for one day. If we still can’t find the child tomorrow, we will continue."
It was the best concession he could make.
On another note, it was partly the imperial guards under him who were negligent. He told several imperial guards to help with the search while others continued to stay in the camping site.
The exiled Ye family members weren’t allowed to roam anywhere.
Ye Lingyue knitted her brows, obviously couldn’t help with the search. She turned to her twin brother with a questioning look on her face. "You didn’t do something, right?"
He frowned. "How can Yue’er accuse me like that?"
She glanced at the pair from the third branch. While her eldest brother was taking care and consoling Ye Shaoyin, they were answering some questions from Commander Leng Hai.
Ye Lingrui didn’t do anything at all like putting sleeping powder in their food. If she thought about it, indeed, her accusation didn’t make sense.
She coughed. "I will give my chicken leg to you later."
It was her means of apologizing.
Her storage space could still be stuffed with two chickens or three. She had gotten rid of one rice sack, inviting the whole family to eat it after everyone else had gone to sleep.
If she wanted to eat the games, she just needed to take them out and made several ’lucky encounters’. Alas, these living things wouldn’t stay alive for more than a week in her space.
Besides that, it also wasn’t easy to catch animals alive.
Ye Lingrui smiled and didn’t refuse. Soon, his face became full of frowns again.
Then, they listened to Commander Leng Hai interrogating the couple from the third branch for details.
"When did you notice that your son disappeared?" He asked sternly, trying to gather clues.
Ye Yaoting immediately answered with some stammer. "Just this morning... we woke up and he was gone. We thought that maybe he went out to relieve himself, but he never returned."
"We searched everywhere and still didn’t find him, so we suspected that he had been kidnapped," he added.
"You didn’t feel anyone entering the carriage?" Commander Leng Hai asked.
He shook his head, and when they turned to Pei Cuiyun, she also shook her head, hiccuping.
She bit her lip and opened her mouth. "Qin’er might really want to relieve himself, and they kidnapped him while he was out of the carriage."
Some imperial guards had started the search, and they also interrogated some servants, trying to find suspicious individuals.
Commander Leng Hai couldn’t find any useful information from the third branch, so he just directly dispatched his people to search for the little boy.
"Commander, may I join the search? You can do anything to me. Either tie my hands or tie me to one of your guards if you still don’t trust me," Ye Yaoting requested.
Ye Lingyue raised her brows, finding it interesting. Ye Yaoting suddenly cared so much about his son that he was willing to be humiliated like that.
As expected, Ye Yaoting’s request was rejected. They still want to keep guard against him. Perhaps he was using the disappearance of his son to escape.
In the afternoon, they still hadn’t found Ye Shaoqin. A lot of people started getting restless.
Ye Lingrui tried to find any information from Ye Shaoyin, but the little girl was also totally clueless.
When the sky became darker, they suddenly heard the sounds of horses approaching. Commander Leng Hai seemed to know who the person was.
"The ninth prince?" Ye Lingyue repeated dazedly.
