Atropa Belladonna

~~~一~~~

When the meal was finished, the married couple dismissed themselves to return to their usual busnisses and left the younger pair, trusting their daughter to properly provide company for the man in white.

"Your Highness, is there any other reason that you've come to visit us today?" she asked after leading him out to the garden where they grew various plants, both for work and for the visual appeal, "You seemed less focused than you usually do."

"I'm going to meet an envoy from the kingdom of Tashya to bring them back to the capital," the male replied, causing the younger female's eyes to widen as she paused to stare at him.

"Isn't Tashya trying to start a war with us right now? Where are you supposed to meet them?" she questioned with her brows knitted together, "And if you're meeting someone this important, why are you by yourself?"

"We are to meet in Dulaman in two days," Zhang spoke, causing the woman to internally scream as she raised a hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose.

"I hope you know that I'm going to be following you now, because this whole arrangement is really suspicious," she sighed with a strained smile, "It's bad enough that you're going to meet a stranger from a possibly hostile country, by yourself, but you're meeting in Dulaman of all places."

"I know. We leave tomorrow," the male responded flatly with no change in expression before he continued walking along the familiar covered pathway.

"I... He knew I would come along if he said that," the ravenette realized, before clicking her tongue and letting out a sigh before she moved to follow him, "and I can't even be mad about it, because I waltzed right into it."

Shaking her head, the female made sure the guest made it to the room that was always prepared for his visits before going back to her personal plot of plants in the garden to harvest materials to create more poisons since her stock was running low.

Anyone else would have been extremely focused on the task when working with ingredients like Deadly Nightshade, cyanide, Wisteria, Oleander, and Fox Glove, but since the woman had been creating and refining poisons since her childhood she just treated it as if she were cooking a meal.

Her relaxed demeanor around the potentially life threatening substances also came from the fact she had built full immunity to various poisons as a part her training.

Everyone in the clan was trained to build resistance to the substances since the probability that they would come across them in their line of work was extremely high, but the nineteen-year-old was currently the only one who would be completely unaffected.

Once she was finished, the ravenette funneled the finished poisons in both liquid and powdered form into small vials before packing them in the pouch she had attached to her waistband, right next to the holster for her sword's hilt.

The embroidered pouch could fit a surprising amount of items in it despite its small size and normally held the woman's money, poisons, needles, a western-styled pen with a built in ink reservoir that was much more convenient for writing messages when out on a job, and various other items.

When the next day arrived, the Crown Prince and Bai Diān Qié appeared in front of her clan elders to bid their farewells for the diplomatic trip.

She wore her usual black and purple robes with deep purple flowers embroidered into the skirt and golden ferns on the piece around her waist with her sword and pouch hanging within reach of her right hand.

Sitting over her chest was the Imperial Crest, hanging from a darker chain that was originally used to construct the chain scythes and swords her clan used.