Chapter 130 Execution
Qin Xiu felt a little warm in his heart and looked at her deeply: "Don't worry."
He said no more, stood up and said goodbye, and his tall figure quickly disappeared into the night outside the Ning Pavilion.
After seeing Qin Xiu off, Jiang Qingning walked to the desk and dipped his pen in ink.
"Perilla!"
"Miss." Zi Su came in and saw the tears on Jiang Qingning's face. "Miss, why are you crying?"
"I'm fine. Send this credit to Lingnan as quickly as possible!"
Jiang Qingning sealed the secret letter into a specially made wax ball and solemnly handed it to Zi Su.
"Yes!" Zi Su took the wax ball with both hands, his eyes extremely determined.
"Also," Jiang Qingning's voice was as cold as ice, "divide your men into two elite teams and keep a close watch on the Anping Marquis's residence for twelve hours!"
"Xun Chen, Jiang Ruyi, and the old lady of Anping County, who they met every day, what they said, where they went, and what they did. Even if they got up at night, I want to know everything!"
Her eyes flashed with bloodthirstiness. "I want Xun Chen to walk step by step into the hell I have prepared for him in endless fear."
"As you command!" Zi Su took the order and quickly disappeared outside the door.
Jiang Qingning was the only one left in the study.
She walked to the window, opened it, and the cool breeze blew the hair on her temples.
"Xun Chen, the debt you owe to the Jiang family will have to be repaid with interest sooner or later."
Qin Xiu acted quickly.
The doors of the three judicial departments, the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme Court, and the Censorate, were knocked open late at night by personal soldiers holding the token of Duke Qin.
Qin Xiu personally took charge and handed over all the overwhelming evidence concerning Duke Fengguo Lin Chong and his cronies that he had secretly investigated over the past eight years and had already sorted out.
These include not only the serious crimes that have just been discovered, such as illegal and poisonous salt, tax evasion, and occupation of people's land, but also several bloody and unjust cases that have been buried for many years.
Seven years ago, the Minister of Revenue wrote a letter to impeach the Duke of Fengguo for seizing fertile farmland in the south of the Yangtze River. As a result, his entire family of seventeen encountered bandits on their way back home and none of them escaped. The arrows left at the scene were of the type specially supplied by the Military Equipment Bureau and only used by the Lin family's personal guards.
Five years ago, a grain officer at the border who knew the inside story of the Lin family and the Northern Di smuggling arms fell into the moat while drunk on his way back to Beijing to report on his work and drowned. His wife and daughter subsequently committed suicide.
Three years ago, Lin Chong took a fancy to a hot spring villa inherited from the ancestors of a wealthy businessman in the suburbs of Beijing. When he failed to buy it by force, he ordered his minions to frame the wealthy businessman's son for raping and killing a woman. He was tortured into confessing. In the end, the wealthy businessman was ruined and the villa fell into the hands of the Lin family.
Each and every one of them is so shocking that it is difficult to describe them in words.
Each case has detailed human and material evidence, which corroborate each other and are as solid as a mountain of evidence.
Qin Xiu didn't give anyone time to react or act.
On the morning of the next day after the evidence was handed over, before daybreak, a large group of fully armed imperial guards, runners from the Ministry of Justice, and officials from the Dali Temple arrived.
Under Qin Xiu's personal command, the huge Fengguo Mansion was surrounded like a dragnet, and not even a fly could fly out.
There was despair in the Duke of Feng's mansion.
The white banners in the mourning hall had not been removed yet, and Lin Heng's coffin was still there.
The servants in the mansion were already frightened out of their wits, their faces pale ashes, and many of them collapsed on the ground.
The retainers who used to rely on the Lin family now wished they could dig a hole in the ground and crawl into it, for fear of being implicated.
Lin Chongku sat in front of his son's coffin.
Overnight, his originally gray hair turned snow-white, and his cloudy eyes lost all their luster, leaving only a lifeless grayness.
Last night's rebuke from his grandson and the tragic death of his son have completely crushed this man who once held great power.
The housekeeper came tumbling in, his voice trembling, "My Lord, this is bad! There are soldiers everywhere outside, surrounding the mansion. Duke Qin himself has brought in people from the Three Judicial Departments, claiming they're under imperial order to conduct a search and confiscate the property..."
Lin Chong's body trembled violently, and the last ray of light in his eyes went out.
He raised his head with difficulty, looked at his son's cold coffin, and then looked at the dim light of dawn outside the mourning hall.
He laughed out loud, his voice filled with endless sadness: "What a Qin Xiu, what a great emperor! He's the one who kills the donkey after it's done its work, and the bow is put away after the bird is dead. It's karma! It's all karma!"
He understood.
Lin Heng's death was not an accident at all.
It was a trap set by the emperor, a trap to completely eradicate his Lin family.
His Lin family, like the Jiang family back then, were just chess pieces used by the emperor to balance the political situation and discarded after use.
"Duke, what should we do?" The butler cried and prostrated himself on the ground.
"what to do?"
Lin Chong muttered to himself, "When the tree falls, the monkeys scatter; when the wall collapses, everyone pushes it down... What else can I do?"
He started coughing violently, his coughing sound was so severe that it seemed as if he was going to cough out all his internal organs.
After a long while, he finally stopped coughing and said to the housekeeper, panting, "Go to the secret compartment in my study and bring me the pot of drunkenness and dreaming of death."
The butler shuddered and looked up in horror: "Duke! You?"
"go!"
Lin Chong shouted, "Rather than being thrown into the Sky Prison, suffering humiliation, and being judged by those ants who once crawled at my feet, it would be better for me to end my life on my own and give this old man dignity!"
The housekeeper looked at the unquestionable determination to die in Lin Chong's eyes, and knew that everything was irreversible. He kowtowed in tears and staggered out.
Soon, he came back with an exquisite jade pot filled with amber liquid that exuded a strange sweet fragrance.
Lin Chong took the jade pot with trembling hands, and his cloudy eyes fell on Lin Heng's coffin again, with a complex and unspeakable emotion flashing in his eyes.
"waste……"
He cursed in a low voice, not knowing whether he was cursing his dead son or himself.
Then he pulled out the cork from the pot, and without any hesitation, he raised his head and drank the poisoned wine in the pot.
"Bang!"
The jade pot fell to the ground and shattered into pieces.
Lin Chong's body twitched violently several times, and his face quickly turned from gray to purple.
He stared intently at the direction of the palace, and finally fell stiffly beside his son Lin Heng's coffin.
When Qin Xiu, accompanied by officials from the three judicial departments, broke through the vermilion gate of the Duke of Fengguo's Mansion under the protection of his personal guards.
When I entered the mourning hall unimpeded, I saw this scene:
Lin Chong, the once powerful and arrogant Duke of Feng, was found dead in plain clothes, lying beside the coffin of his only son Lin Heng, with blood oozing from all his orifices.
Qin Xiu's footsteps paused slightly at the door of the mourning hall, and his cold gaze swept over Lin Chong's body. There was no ripple in his eyes, only a sense of indifference as if the dust had settled.
The officials behind him gasped in shock and were terrified.
"Duke Fengguo committed suicide out of fear of punishment?" The Minister of Justice's voice trembled with disbelief.
Qin Xiu did not answer, but simply waved his hand calmly. His voice was calm, yet it carried an unquestionable majesty:
"Duke Fengguo Lin Chong, knowing his crimes were grave, committed poison out of fear of punishment and has now surrendered to the law. All properties, documents, and personnel of the Duke Fengguo Mansion will be immediately confiscated. They will all be imprisoned pending trial. All property within the mansion will be registered and deposited into the national treasury!"
"Yes!" The imperial guards and officers answered loudly.
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