Chapter 67 Death by Poisoning
Ye Qingyu was even more worried when he didn't find Qing Yi in the Dali Temple. He returned to the government office in the capital. Lord Zhang was calming down with the company of a beauty. He had just been almost beheaded by the aggressive young prince of the northwest. Fortunately, he had passed the hot potato away.
"My Lord, my Lord! The Little Prince of the Northwest has returned!" The Zhang residence's gatekeeper tumbled in, his voice filled with terror. Not long ago, he'd been frightened to the point of wetting his pants by the Little Prince of the Northwest, and had just changed into clean clothes. He hadn't expected this evil spirit to return again, a threat that threatened his life.
"What? It's happening again?" Master Zhang was so shocked that he almost jumped up from his chair and quickly pushed the beauty away from him. The force of the push was so strong that the beauty staggered and almost fell to the ground. She said in dissatisfaction, "Master, you hurt me..."
But Master Zhang had no time to pay attention to the beauty's coquettish anger at the moment. He hurriedly put on his clothes and went to greet the young prince of the Northwest. However, as soon as he stood up, Ye Qingyu strode in.
"Young Prince, what's wrong with you?" Lord Zhang asked stutteringly. Looking at the young prince's gloomy face, he couldn't help but feel fear.
"Zhang Dexing, do you know what crime you committed by deceiving me?" Ye Qingyu's eyes were cold. He ignored the disheveled and shivering beauty next to him and shot his cold eyes directly at Lord Zhang.
"Ah, young prince...this...where does this come from? Even if I had a hundred guts, I would not dare to deceive you!" Lord Zhang's forehead was covered with cold sweat.
"No? You said that the arrested person was transferred to the Dali Temple. I just went to ask the Dali Temple Minister Lu Yuan in person, but he said that he had not received the transferred person." Ye Qingyu stared at Lord Zhang, who seemed as timid as a mouse.
"Ah, ah... It's impossible. It was indeed someone sent by the Dali Temple to pick him up. Master, go and get the handover documents!" When Lord Zhang heard this, he turned pale with fright. If the person was lost, it would be a disaster!
Soon the document was brought over. Ye Qingyu took it, opened it, and glanced at it. It was indeed stamped with the seal of Dali Temple Lu Yuan. At this moment, Dali Temple Minister Lu Yuan's advisor also hurried over with his guards.
It turned out that after the young prince left the Northwest, Lord Lu thought more and more about the matter. Although the person the young prince was looking for had not been transferred to the Dali Temple, he did receive the transfer document. To be safe, he sent his legal advisor to check, and just in time, he saw Lord Zhang holding out the transfer document.
Ye Qingyu handed the document to the Dali Temple's legal advisor. The advisor took it and examined it carefully for a long time before cautiously saying, "Young Prince, this seal is fake. The seals of first-rank officials have strict regulations on size, and this seal seems to be a size larger than Lord Lu's."
"Fake? Have you looked carefully?" Ye Qingyu asked solemnly.
"I am certain of it. If you don't believe me, you can compare it carefully with Lord Lu's seal." The lawyer said in a firm tone.
"Fake?" Upon hearing this, Lord Zhang collapsed to the ground, his legs weakening. He had been so careless, handing the person over without even verifying the seal's authenticity. At the time, he was only concerned with getting rid of this hot potato, so he didn't even bother to examine it carefully.
"Master Zhang, you've been an official for many years, and you can't even recognize Master Lu's seal? Besides, didn't your government in the capital send anyone to accompany the prisoner when he was transferred?" the lawyer demanded sternly. He had long disliked this junior official.
"Your subordinate...your subordinate..." Lord Zhang stammered, cold sweat breaking out on his forehead, but he couldn't make any words out for a long time.
Ye Qingyu's face was gloomy at this moment, his lips tightly pursed, and he said nothing. This was clearly a carefully arranged trap. Was it aimed at Qing Yi, or was it aimed at him, the young prince of the Northwest?
From Qing Yi's chance encounter with the little beggar, to his inexplicable arrest and taking him to the government office in the capital, to someone daring to come and take away the prisoner in the name of the Dali Temple, all of this seemed to be controlled by someone behind the scenes, step by step.
"Bring here the two witnesses who claimed to have seen Qing Yi kill someone!" Ye Qingyu ordered coldly.
"Yes, yes!" Lord Zhang was terrified and immediately asked Captain Wang to go to the prison to pick up the person.
"Sir, something terrible has happened!" Captain Wang and his men hurried to the cell, ready to take away the old man and the girl who had accused Qing Yi of murder. However, when they arrived at the cell, they saw the two lying with their backs to the cell door, seemingly sleeping and resting. Captain Wang called out several times, but there was no movement from the two. He opened the cell door to check, and what he saw was a terrifying sight—the two were bleeding from all seven orifices, dead from poisoning!
Captain Wang didn't dare to delay and ran to report to Lord Zhang. He was also regretting it at this time. He just arrested someone while patrolling the streets, how could he cause such a big trouble!
"W...what? Dead?" Lord Zhang was shocked.
"Take me to check it out!" Ye Qingyu's tone was cold, and anyone could hear the anger in it.
Arriving at the prison, Ye Qingyu personally went forward to examine the body. He reached out and touched it, and found that the body was still slightly warm, obviously not long after death.
Ye Qingyu's eyes were sharp as he searched the cell carefully. Suddenly, he found some blackened chicken bones scattered in the grass. It was obvious that the problem was with the food.
"Did you give them roast chicken?" Ye Qingyu turned around and asked.
"No, they are nothing, how could we possibly feed them roast chicken?" Lord Zhang blurted out subconsciously. As soon as he said that, he remembered that the person standing before him was the young prince of the Northwest. His words were rude and offensive, so he quickly corrected himself, "Young prince, the food in the cells is uniform. We only get some coarse grain steamed bread."
"Then why are the remains of the roast chicken here?" Ye Qingyu asked.
"This..." Lord Zhang was suddenly speechless. He really didn't know the reason.
"Where was Qing Yi imprisoned before? Take me there to see."
"..." Lord Zhang looked confused and quickly turned around to look at Captain Wang.
Captain Wang quickly said, "Young Prince, he's imprisoned in the cell next door."
Ye Qingyu slowly walked towards the adjacent cell and scanned the interior. He saw some scattered straw, a wine jug, and half a roast chicken on the floor. A chill ran down his spine, "Could it be that Qingyi also ate the poisoned roast chicken?"
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