Chapter 11 Chapter 11 Xie Tingyu, stop pretending.
Ji Lian wanted to follow Xie Tingyu to the adjacent palace to investigate, but Xie Tingyu advised against it, saying, "It's getting late and the dew is heavy. Your Highness should return to the Posuo Pavilion to rest." He disagreed and even felt that the three-day deadline to capture the culprit was too tight.
Ji Lian frowned, "Xie Tingyu, do you know that you are in a difficult situation now?"
Xie Tingyu nodded.
Ji Lian continued, "Even if you have the support of Grand Tutor Xie, if you don't catch any clues after three days, you won't have any chance to show your face in front of the emperor."
Xie Tingyu nodded like a chick pecking at rice, "I understand, I understand, don't worry." "What do you mean I'm anxious? I'm not anxious for you."
Ji Lian gritted his teeth and saw Xie Tingyu's calm expression, as if he had listened but remained unmoved. Inexplicably, a burning fire was rising and falling in his chest. He could only wonder why this person could always stir up his emotions with just a few words.
Xie Tingyu explained, "It's late at night and the dew is cold. Your Highness must have been hastily awakened from his sleep. Your Highness should go back and rest. We can investigate together at dawn."
Hearing "Let's investigate together", Ji Lian's expression eased a little. When she came to her senses and thought about why she was so upset because of these words, she immediately looked in the direction of Xie Tingyu, but she could only see a plain robe dissolving into the thick night.
When Xie Tingyu returned to Changhaoyuan in a carriage, the courtyard was brightly lit and a group of servants were standing at the steps, including Wei Fenghua.
"I wonder what's the matter that requires us to urgently summon the young master to the palace?" Wei Fenghua stepped forward and asked.
"Well...it's hard to explain in a few words, but it's definitely an urgent matter."
Wei Fenghua looked concerned. "Does the master need to write a letter to inform Lord Situ? The master has been in the court for many years and has many students. He can help the young master deal with things."
Thinking about the round trip of more than three days for writing, delivering and replying letters, Xie Tingyu waved his hand and said, "Mother is still dealing with the refugee issue. I won't burden her."
Xie Tingyu changed into his clogs and was about to enter the inner room when he turned back to Wei Fenghua and said, "There's no need to mention this matter to father. I can handle it."
"yes."
After dawn, Xie Tingyu changed into his purple Taoist robe, put on a lotus crown, and took a carriage back to the palace.
Xie Tingyu did not go to find Ji Lian first, but turned and walked towards the Ye Ting where the palace people lived.
After passing through layers of low corridors, with the guidance of others, Xie Tingyu finally found Shi Chun, the palace maid who claimed that she had "seen a red-clothed ghost carrying a human head with her own eyes."
Unfortunately, God was not on his side and the man went crazy after one night.
He said he was scared silly.
Xie Tingyu picked up a round stool and sat in front of Shi Chun.
Shi Chun's face was dull, his eyes staring blankly into space, and he was lying slanted against the wall. The dirty clothes he had worn yesterday had been taken off, and now he was simply wearing a clean undergarment.
If you get closer, you can still hear Shi Chun mumbling, "There's a ghost... There's a ghost... There's a ghost..."
At first glance, he really looked terrified.
Xie Tingyu raised his chin and looked thoughtfully for a while, and noticed that the edges of Shi Chun's fingers resting on the couch were a little red.
Several palace servants who had worked with Shi Chun were watching from the side, and one of them boldly suggested sprinkling some chicken blood or black dog blood on Shi Chun's body to drive away evil spirits.
Xie Tingyu shook his head and said, "She's so frightened now that even bathing in chicken blood wouldn't help. I've seen this happen before. Can you get me some embroidery needles with silver thread?"
Everyone looked confused, but still obediently asked the palace servant for a fine needle.
So, in front of everyone, Xie Tingyu picked up a silver needle with his two fingers, first heated it over a candle, and then watched as Xie Tingyu slowly moved the needle close to Shi Chun's eyelids.
Everyone's heart was in their throat and they were whispering to each other.
"This, this is so scary, it's useless to poke someone's eyes out with a needle!"
"Master Xie has her own reasons for doing things. Don't worry about it. Stay out of the Master's business."
The silver needle was only half an inch away from piercing his pupil, but Shi Chun didn't blink, and even his eyelashes didn't tremble at all.
Xie Tingyu put down the silver needle and shook his head, saying, "If her soul was still in the body, she would be frightened by the sight of this needle. But seeing that she is motionless, she must be stupid. You guys should take good care of her for the rest of her life."
Everyone looked at each other in confusion, "Then how do you catch ghosts, sir?"
Xie Tingyu spread his hands. "How do I catch it? I was counting on this one survivor. If she could tell me how long the ghost is, how long its fangs are, and what its face looks like, I might be able to cast a spell and go down to the underworld to negotiate with His Majesty the King of Hell to have it removed from the Book of the Dead."
She sighed slightly, "Now it's difficult. If this ghost dares to haunt me again in the next few nights, I'm afraid I'll have to pack up and go back to Shangqing Temple."
Xie Tingyu walked out amidst everyone's expressions of "Poor Lord Xie", passed through the palace corridors, and met the emperor and his ministers in the small garden.
Ji Lian and Xie Tingyu walked together on the palace road to the laundry bureau.
"Your Highness, have you heard of this? It's said that a laundryman passing by Chunhe Hall found a piece of paper that showed writing when it came into contact with water. Last time at Penglai Palace, His Majesty praised your majesty for his calligraphy. I'm sure you're more familiar with paper than I am."
There are dozens of huge wooden basins in the laundry area. The people who wash clothes here are all slaves whose ancestors committed crimes and were confiscated into the palace.
When the slaves saw Di Qing and Xie Tingyu, they stopped what they were doing and knelt down to pay their respects.
The clothes-washing attendant trotted up to the two men, bowed, and said respectfully, "I wonder what brings His Highness the Emperor and Master Xie here?"
Xie Tingyu told the laundryman what he had heard that night, and the laundryman immediately pulled out a thin young boy from among the kneeling slaves.
After Ji Lian and Xie Tingyu exchanged glances, they took the little laundry slave to a remote place for questioning.
"Don't be afraid, I just want to ask you something."
Ji Lian lowered her head and looked at the frightened laundry slave, then softened her voice and asked, "Why did you pass by Chunhe Hall that night with a wooden basin in your arms?"
The laundry slave's voice was as soft as a mosquito's. "I just wanted to take a shortcut back to the laundry that night."
"Then what?"
"A piece of paper floated down from the wall and landed right in a wooden tub. There were unwashed clothes and foamy water in the tub." As if thinking of something terrible, the laundry slave hunched his shoulders. "After the paper got soaked, a few large words appeared. I don't know the words, but the words were red. It was scary... very scary."
The voice gradually became smaller and smaller, and the last few words turned into a trembling breath.
"Where's the paper?"
The laundry slave buried his face in his collar. "When I got the paper, I was very scared, so I gave it to the laundryman. He said it was unclean and burned it."
Ji Lian didn't want to let this clue drop, so she asked in a gentle and persuasive way: "Do you remember what characteristics of that piece of paper were? For example, what color was it?"
"I remember it was a khaki color, a bit dirty, and there seemed to be some thin black things mixed in the paper."
After some detailed questioning, Ji Lian let the slave leave.
He raised his head and looked around, and found that Xie Tingyu was no longer there.
At this moment, Xie Tingyu is in the dyeing office connected to the laundry.
This place is open, with huge drying racks everywhere, each hung with colorful brocade cloth. On the other side are several huge dye vats, which are filled with surging dye liquid, including crimson, indigo, etc.
The dyeing office is the place specifically responsible for dyeing cloth in the palace. More than ten dyers are stirring the dye liquid with long poles.
Xie Tingyu paused to observe for a moment, then approached a dyer and praised, "The crimson in this vat is as brilliant as the morning glow, like the color of a peony in full bloom in summer."
The dyer was very pleased with the compliment and said, "Your Excellency, since you are not in this business, you must know that this is actually dyed with madder. The nobles in the palace like to wear such bright robes."
Xie Tingyu nodded, "If it gets on my hands, will it be easy to wash off?"
The dyer said, "It's easy to wash. Just rub it twice with soapy water and it will come off. However..." The dyer paused and added, "If you mix madder and cinnabar, the color will be even better, a brighter red. However, cinnabar is poisonous and it will be difficult to wash off once it gets on you."
"That madder is planted in the palace. Where is it?"
The dyer took Xie Tingyu to a madder garden.
Here, bamboo racks are arranged in rows, with red-stemmed madder climbing on them. There are no walls blocking the way, so it seems that apart from the people in the dyeing office, it is easy for others to pick them.
Xie Tingyu circled the madder garden several times and suddenly stopped on the west side of the bamboo frame. He found several broken stems scattered on the ground and a series of straw sandal prints in the soil, which were different from those worn by the dyer.
"Can I pick some stems and leaves to take away?"
The dyer quickly cut off a few pieces of madder vine and handed them to Xie Tingyu with both hands.
Xie Tingyu took out a silk handkerchief from his sleeve, wrapped it around the body, and put it in his arms.
Seeing Xie Tingyu coming back, Ji Lian asked with a tone of deliberately suppressed anxiety, "Where have you been?"
"I took a stroll next door and found it quite fruitful." Xie Tingyu asked with a smile, "How is the situation here, Your Highness?"
"Although I haven't seen the paper, my deduction is correct. Come back to Posuo Pavilion with me and I'll demonstrate it to you."
The two returned to Posa Pavilion together.
Xie Tingyu raised his head to admire the words hanging on the wall, his eyes carefully running over the ink marks.
The vertical strokes are like green bamboos, flowing straight down, the horizontal strokes are like distant mountains, and the long strokes are like a solitary crane stretching its neck. Each piece of calligraphy is written by Ji Lian himself, and the calligraphy is like the person himself, making it very ornamental.
"I've been copying Mr. Zhong's 'Declaration' since I was young. Although it's difficult to capture its spirit after a generation, I've been able to glimpse some of its essence. As a curious child, I experimented with brush and ink on all kinds of paper, even silk, including jute paper, rattan paper, and fish paper."
"That little servant said the paper was a khaki color and had impurities mixed in it, so it was definitely jute paper. This kind of paper is only used by palace maids in the palace."
Jiangzhu came over with a tray containing a few sheets of jute paper, a small dish of turmeric powder, a small dish of cinnabar paste, and a piece of alum that looked like rock sugar.
He first dissolved alum in clean water, then took a pinch of turmeric powder, sprinkled it into the alum water and stirred it until the powder was completely dissolved.
There is a rosewood carved mountain-shaped pen holder on the large desk.
After Jiangzhu had ground the cinnabar, Ji Lian took out a green bamboo brush, rolled up her wide sleeves with one hand, revealing her slender wrist, dotted the cinnabar with the brush, lightly touched the brush tube with her ring finger, leaned down, and her black hair like satin fell down.
Ji Lian began to write on the paper seriously.
Xie Tingyu's gaze gradually descended, from his wrist to his well-proportioned, slender fingers, revealing the cyan veins beneath his fair skin. His fingernails were round, clean, their edges trimmed like crescents, and shimmering with a healthy, pale pink sheen.
The hand is as beautiful as its owner.
Well, if I could hold hands with him again...
"what's on your mind?"
Xie Tingyu's thoughts were interrupted, but he quickly came back to his senses and pretended to be puzzled. "Why does Your Highness need to add so many things before writing with cinnabar?"
Ji Lian put down her pen, picked up some bath beans, and washed her hands in the copper basin. "You'll know when the words on the paper are dry."
I saw that the words originally written in cinnabar on the paper gradually faded and disappeared.
Seeing this, Ji Lian scooped up water from the copper basin with one hand and sprinkled it on the paper, and the crimson words suddenly revealed their original shape again.
The book Huainan Wanbi Shu once recorded: "Cinnabar is used to write, and when it is put into alum water, it disappears, and it becomes visible when it rains heavily."
"Your Highness is truly knowledgeable and insightful. How amazing!"
Ji Lian saw Xie Tingyu speaking these words with a calm expression and a deliberately rising tone at the end, which was so artificial that it was outrageous.
He curled his lips slightly, "Xie Tingyu, stop pretending." Thinking of her sudden departure, he asked, "You haven't told me where you went just now?"
Xie Tingyu didn't answer, but handed the handkerchief to Ji Lian, who opened it and looked confused, "What is this?"
"This is madder, used by dyers for dyeing. The crimson color created by using its decoction lasts a long time."
Ji Lian immediately understood what he meant, and the two of them immediately went to Chunhe Hall. Upon investigation, they found that the so-called "bloodstains" on the ground had not turned the dark brown-red color they should have after a night, but instead had become as bright as new vermilion.
"When I arrived, I was thinking that with so many servants in the palace, even if one died, it wouldn't cause any major disturbance. But the strange thing is, where is the body? Where did the head go? A day has passed, and no one has told me. It's as if they disappeared."
Ji Lian glanced at Xie Tingyu and continued, "Perhaps, there may not be any headless corpse. It's just someone is deliberately making things mysterious. Whether there is a headless corpse or not is not important. What is important is whether there are such rumors in the palace and what the emperor thinks."
Xie Tingyu nodded, "Now all that's left is to find out who's behind this."
She tapped her chin with her fingertips. "She's just a small servant hiding in the palace. To have done all these things, she must have had an accomplice. I just don't know if I can pry the information out of her."
The author has something to say:
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Xie Tingyu: I understand, I understand. Please don’t worry about me. [Hug]
Ji Lian: I'm not worried about you... Why do you always misinterpret my words? [Angry] [Angry]
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