Chapter 111 Justice is the duty of those in positions of authority.
As he was escorted by the bailiffs to the main hall, Xu Mingxing was completely bewildered. Ever since he was arrested, he had been unable to believe what had happened. It was just a trivial matter at home; why did it have to be taken to court?
The two walked through many long corridors. On their way there, they had already heard the discussions among the onlookers. They heard that not only high-ranking officials were being presided over today's trial, but even the Crown Princess was there. The highest-ranking official Xu Mingxing knew was his younger brother. After hearing this news, his legs went weak halfway there.
Seeing Xu Mingxing's state, Wang Zhou couldn't help but frown. Unlike Xu Mingxing, who was completely terrified, Wang Zhou had already analyzed the pros and cons of the current situation on his way here:
The Crown Princess agreed to appear today because Xu Mingxing's niece is Xu Mingchang's daughter, and Xu Mingchang is one of the soldiers sent to the northern frontier. The Crown Princess was merely putting on an act for everyone, after all, she had previously said she would protect the families of soldiers in the capital, and she herself hadn't originally taken a liking to Xu Wanzhen...
Ultimately, this is all an internal matter within the Xu family. Xu Mingxing himself owed money and refused to pay it back, so he offered his daughter to him as a concubine to pay off the debt. He merely agreed to Xu Mingxing's substitution of his daughter for his niece. Who married into the family was a decision made by their own family. The one who started the whole incident was Xu Mingxing.
Wang Zhou walked beside Xu Mingxing and threatened in a low voice, "When you get to the hall, you'd better know what you should and shouldn't say."
Xu Mingxing was startled and couldn't immediately understand the meaning behind those words, so he just kept nodding.
Seeing that he was at least sensible, Wang Zhou breathed a slight sigh of relief. If the blame lay entirely with Xu Mingxing, then he would at most be implicated and fined or given a few lashes. His sister was from the Qian family, the prefectural magistrate, so whether or not the fine or the punishment was carried out was entirely up to his brother-in-law.
Wang Zhou grew up in the capital and believed he had seen through the tricks of these powerful families and high-ranking officials. As long as things looked good on the surface, that was enough. In the end, he could preserve the Crown Princess's good reputation for upholding justice for the people and also extricate himself from the situation.
Hang in there... Once this charade is over, it'll all be over, as long as the Qian family isn't implicated...
Wang Zhou lowered his eyelids and knelt down to pay his respects along with Xu Mingxing.
"Do you two plead guilty to what the aggrieved party said in court just now?"
Zheng Jin glanced at Xu Mingxing, then turned to look at Wang Zhou. Seeing that neither of them spoke, he pointed to the one who was relatively calm: "Wang Zhou, I ask you, is what the aggrieved party said true?"
"Replying to your question, sir, to the best of my knowledge, what Miss Xu said is likely true. However, my relationship with Xu Mingxing is merely that of creditor and debtor; I was unaware of the disputes within his family. A month ago..."
“Alright,” Qiao Shida interrupted him, “you can speak when I tell you to.”
Then he looked at Xu Mingxing: "Do you plead guilty?"
"Confess...confess...I, I don't confess!" Xu Mingxing seemed to wake from a dream, hurriedly waving his hands, the chains on his hands rattling: "It was all, it was all Young Master Wang who instructed me to do this!"
"You—" Wang Zhou was so angry he almost fell over backwards. He was about to speak when he subconsciously glanced at Qiao Shida and calmed down: "This humble subject does not agree with what Xu Mingxing said. I hope Your Excellency will give this humble subject a chance to plead his case."
Qiao Shida glanced at Zheng Jin, and seeing him nod, he said, "Yes—"
“A month ago, Xiaomin gambled with Xu Mingxing at a gambling den. Because Xu Mingxing had a bad run of luck, he lost seventy taels of silver to Xiaomin. Since he only had twenty taels at the time, Xiaomin did not want to continue gambling with him, so he wrote an IOU on the spot and prepared to end the game that day.”
“But Xu Mingxing said he wanted to turn the tables again. I refused once because he had nothing left, but he said he could use his daughter’s marriage as a bargaining chip. If he won, the debt would be forgiven. If he lost, he would not only acknowledge the debt of fifty taels of silver, but also promise to send his daughter to my mansion as a concubine.”
"For Yu Xiaomin, this was definitely a sure-fire way to make money, so he agreed. However, Xu Mingxing had really bad luck gambling that day, so he also lost his daughter's wedding. Since the IOU was not finished at the time, this clause was also written in. Then the two of us signed and sealed it together. Everyone present at the time can testify to this. Even the IOU was made in duplicate. You are free to search it."
His words made Qiao Shida grip his pen tighter. This Wang Zhou was indeed meticulous in his work. As expected of someone from a family that had run restaurants for generations, he hadn't made a single mistake in the matter of the IOU. Not only did he know that there needed to be witnesses, but he had even prepared two copies in black and white. This was quite a challenge.
"...Later, Xu Mingxing said that his second daughter, Xu Hongxiu, had already been betrothed to someone by his wife. Therefore, he planned to marry his niece, Xu Wanzhen, to the family. He even vowed that he could make the decision on Xu Wanzhen's marriage."
As he spoke, Wang Zhou spread his hands: "Sir, this is ultimately a matter of the Xu family. I don't know the specifics of their situation. Whoever marries into the family is just a concubine to me. Therefore, what Miss Xu just said, I only know about the marriage agreement and not about Xu Mingxing's actions afterwards."
He spoke clearly and logically, and everyone understood what he meant. It seemed that the matter was indeed Xu's own business. If Xu Mingxing hadn't been a gambler and in debt, none of this would have happened.
After he finished speaking, Zheng Jin glanced at Qiao Shida again. Qiao Shida had already reached a tacit understanding with Zheng Jin in just a short while. He asked Xu Mingxing, "Is the truth as Wang Zhou said?"
"No, no, no, that's not it!" Xu Mingxing's face turned red with anxiety. He waved his hands frantically to deny it: "Young Master Wang, he, he said that he forced me to marry Wanzhen off within this month. He also said that if I don't marry Wanzhen off, he will cut off one of my hands!"
Wang Zhou didn't even frown when he heard his vehement defense; he simply knelt there and waited for him to finish explaining.
“I did lose my daughter’s marriage, but because my wife was unwilling to let Hongxiu marry into the family, I arranged for Wanzhen to marry her. But... I wasn’t being unfair. Today, Young Master Wang even said—”
As soon as he started speaking, Xu Mingxing felt a burning gaze directed at him. He instinctively turned his head and saw Wang Zhou staring intently at him, which made him feel a chill run down his spine.
"Xu Mingxing, stop beating around the bush. The issue we're discussing now is your forcing Xu Wanzhen into marriage. You say I threatened you? What evidence do you have?"
"I...I..."
Xu Mingxing panicked. What evidence did he have? Wang Zhou wouldn't publicly coerce him in a busy street like this. He broke out in a cold sweat: "My lords, you don't know, but Xu Wanzhen is also my daughter. She is not Zhao's child, but mine and Sun's—"
Upon hearing this, Xu Wanzhen, who had been standing quietly to the side, suddenly burst out with a sharp shout: "Shut up! Shut up! My mother is Zhao Qing'e! My mother's surname is Zhao, not Sun!"
The angry shout came so suddenly that everyone present looked at her involuntarily. At this moment, Xu Wanzhen looked like a little tiger with its fur standing on end, her bloodshot eyes filled with murderous intent as she stared intently at Xu Mingxing.
Xu Mingxing froze for a moment, then spat at Xu Wanzhen fiercely: "You, you ill-mannered brat! Your mother is a bastard, and you're a little bastard too!"
"How dare you talk about my mother like that? I'll fight you to the death!"
Before Xu Zhao could react, Xu Wanzhen darted out, but Zhu Yu, who had been watching closely, pulled her back just as she took a step.
Zhu Yu was a eunuch. Apart from Xu Zhaoshi and Shen Yujiao, he was the only one present who could stop people from ruining the young lady's reputation.
From an angle where no one could see, Zhu Yu lowered his voice and quickly said, "Have you forgotten what His Highness said? Do you still want to bring him to justice?"
Everyone saw that he was agile and quick, yet he did not offend Xu Wanzhen in the slightest. In just a moment, he had been ready to fight to the death, but in the blink of an eye, Xu Wanzhen calmed down.
Seeing that Zhu Yu had returned Xu Wanzhen to Xu Zhao's side, Qiao Shida then pretended to tap the table and said, "Silence!"
Xu Mingxing breathed a sigh of relief when he saw her being stopped. The girl's appearance just now had indeed intimidated him. He calmed down and then said, "In short, I have the right to decide her marriage."
The situation is now clear: Xu Mingxing is completely ignorant of the law, and his crimes are sufficient to convict him. Zheng Jin turned to look at the Crown Princess, wanting to ask her if the case could be closed.
At this moment, Shen Yujiao was thinking: This Wang Zhou is quite clever. Xu Mingxing was not stupid enough to try to implicate the Qian family. But the Qian family was clearly involved in this matter. Could it be that they really escaped this calamity?
The issue of collusion between officials and businessmen can be serious or minor. After all, if the water is too clear, there will be no fish. Cleaning up the officialdom is not a matter of a day or two, or a matter of one or two cases, but...
Shen Yujiao looked down at the hall. In preparation for her arrival, the floor tiles of the main hall of the Jingzhao Prefecture had been specially cleaned. At this moment, the black and shiny floor tiles reflected the plaque above her head: "A Bright Mirror Hangs High".
Under this vast summer sky, in this imperial court, and behind the plaque that hangs high like a bright mirror, representing the integrity of the Great Xia's criminal justice system, all will be the empire that Jiang Chen will inherit in the future. The mother and daughter standing below are the women she will protect when she sits on the throne of Empress.
Although her time in Daxia was not long, it had already been over a thousand days and nights. So long that whenever she recalled her life in the modern world, it felt like a lifetime ago. It was truly like Zhuangzi's dream of a butterfly. Sometimes she couldn't even tell whether this dream of wealth and glory referred to the present or the past.
But one thing she was very clear about was that Shen Yujiao was now the Crown Princess of the Great Xia Dynasty.
Her fingertips, which had been tapping the table, paused. Shen Yujiao raised her eyes again, a sharp glint in them: "Since that's the case, the truth is roughly clear. Then... all those involved must be brought to justice. It seems that the main culprit is Xu Mingxing, and those involved include Xu Jinshi and Wang Zhou... It seems there's someone else who's been overlooked?"
Upon hearing this, everyone in the room held their breath.
"Xu Mingxing, why was Old Madam Xu so angry that she couldn't get out of bed? And where did the injuries on Xu Zhaoshi and Xu Wanzhen come from? A neighbor testified that you brought a group of people to Xu Zhaoshi's house and smashed all the furniture. Who are these people?"
The barrage of questions struck Xu Mingxing's heart like a hammer blow, the last one making him gasp for breath. He instinctively wanted to look at Wang Zhou's expression.
"Don't move! Answer me!"
"Yes...yes...they are my gambling buddies."
"Alright, how many of them are there in total? What are their names? Where do they live? You will tell them one by one right here in the courtroom. The witnesses are right below. If your answer doesn't match any of the eyewitnesses' accounts, you will be charged with deceiving your superiors."
Time was slipping away, and the hourglass beside him had turned over countless times. Xu Mingxing could clearly hear his heartbeat gradually quickening. Even though it was already summer, the sweat on his back was gradually soaking through his inner clothes. A slight breeze swept through the main hall, and he felt a chill that went straight to his heart.
Seeing his face gradually turn pale, Shen Yujiao's lips curled into a playful smile: "Xu..."
"It's Young Master Wang! These are the people Young Master Wang brought; they're all servants of the Qian family!"
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