As Su Rong predicted, their journey back to the city, despite the heavy snowfall, went smoothly.
After entering the city gate, the carriage of the Rui’an King leading the way stopped to wait for Su Rong’s carriage to catch up. He drew back the curtain and asked, "Lady Su Qi, I believe we should head straight to the palace. What do you think?"
Su Rong nodded, "Alright."
She turned to Ye Guixue, intending to suggest that he return to the Duke Residence. However, Ye Guixue said, "I was involved in this matter as well, I will accompany you to the palace."
Rui’an King, hearing Ye Guixue’s words, immediately responded, "That would be even better. Thank you, Second Young Master Ye."
Ye Guixue shook his head, "There’s no need for thanks."
Thus, the Rui’an King decided to take even the monks in residence, including the abbot, to the Imperial Palace.
Inside the Imperial Palace, the Emperor, who had finished his morning court session, was reviewing petitions in the Imperial Study Room. Without Yu An’s service, he found the attendance of others to be lacking and unsatisfactory. Yet he couldn’t release Yu An either. Moreover, several cases were interrelated, and he did not know what the Rui’an King might uncover. This morning, Fourth Prince Yan Shen had already cleared his name in court and requested a review into the case of Lipin, leading the Emperor to suspect the actual culprits in Lipin’s case were yet to be revealed. He did not believe that all these major cases could possibly be perpetrated by Lipin alone.
Upon hearing that Rui’an King, along with Lady Su Qi and Second Young Master Ye, had entered the Palace accompanied by the abbot from the Great Buddha Temple, the Emperor immediately ordered, "Send them in."
Soon, Rui’an King and the others arrived at the Imperial Study Room.
The warmth from the royal golden charcoals filled the Imperial Study Room. As they stepped through the entrance, a wave of heat and warmth swept over them. Su Rong brushed the snow off her body, and Ye Guixue dusted off his sleeves while also fixing Su Rong’s hairpin, which had been knocked askew by her movements.
The Emperor, who had been watching the pair the entire time, paused at Ye Guixue’s gesture.
Rui’an King paid his respects and said, "Your Majesty, I left the capital last night to re-investigate the Great Buddha Temple..."
Rui’an King detailed the events of their journey out of the capital to the Emperor, including the tale of Su Rong and Ye Guixue’s discovery of the hidden gold by the Yingzui cliff according to Su Rong’s narration, and the subsequent arrest and interrogation of the abbot and several of the Temple’s main monks.
The Emperor was both shocked and angry after hearing this, "The hidden treasure halfway up Yingzui Cliff, two hundred boxes of gold? Was it all the doing of the monks from the Great Buddha Temple?"
Rui’an King nodded then shook his head, "We must investigate further to know who is behind this. The abbot of the Grand Buddha Temple has been denying any knowledge of this."
"How much is two hundred boxes of gold?" The Emperor asked.
"One box contains fifty catties of gold, so two hundred boxes make up ten thousand catties," Rui’an King replied. "If converted to silver taels, it is approximately over one million taels."
Though a sizable amount, a million taels was not something the Emperor would regard highly. He continued to question, "According to your narration, such a large space has been dug for the hidden treasure; it should contain more than just gold?"
Rui’an King glanced at Su Rong, nodded and said, "Lady Su Qi mentioned this to me as well, and I too find it strange."
At this point, Su Rong also spoke up: "Your Majesty, indeed, that’s why Guixue and I found it extremely strange after we discovered the location of the hidden gold, hence the doubt."
The Emperor nodded, "Did you find the location of the hidden gold by first investigating the Great Buddha Temple, and then following the clues from the temple?"
"Yes." Su Rong hid the fact of Yan Shen’s visit to the Eastern Palace to seek Yan Huisheng, and naturally also concealed the information about the location of the hidden gold from Yan Shen’s mouth. All was built upon the suspicion that the cases of Imperial Censor Qin Yuan and the Lipin Consort had similarities as well as the suspicion towards the Great Buddha Temple.
The Emperor suppressed his anger, "This is outrageous. Summon the abbot of the Great Buddha Temple to me."
Someone immediately went to fetch him. In no time, the abbot was brought into the Imperial Study Room.
The abbot, with a pale face, immediately knelt upon seeing the Emperor, "Amitabha, Your Majesty, I’ve been wronged."
The emperor looked at him angrily, "What do you mean by ’wronged’? The Great Buddha Temple, a place of Buddhism, has found monks who harbor evil intentions, concealing filth and accepting bribes. Now it’s even discovered that there’s a hidden gold site behind Eagle Beak Cliff? Confess everything truthfully to me. I will leniently deal with you for the sake of my late mother. If you fail to confess, I will order your execution and shut down the Great Buddha Temple, this ancient temple of a thousand years."
The abbot trembled, "Your Majesty, I am truly innocent. I have no idea how the Eagle Beak Cliff behind the Great Buddha Temple could have a hidden gold site." He defended himself with a pale face, "I haven’t been to the back mountain for years, let alone Eagle Beak Cliff."
"Then how do you explain the monks moving rocks into the cave at the bottom of Eagle Beak Cliff in the middle of the night?" The Emperor asked.
The abbot replied: "It was eleven years ago. My master, Puhui, decided to build a platform for the Buddha before his pilgrimage. I fully supported it. So, we selected rocks from Eagle Beak Cliff and shaped them into flat pieces of stone, which were temporarily stored at the bottom of the cliff. We then recited scriptures in front of the Buddha statue every day. The construction was supposed to begin after three years, but the master never returned from his pilgrimage, hence the delay until now. Recently, disturbances have occurred in the Great Buddha Temple. I got anxious and thought that perhaps the Buddha is angry because the platform that should have been built long ago hasn’t been started yet. So, I hurriedly discussed the matter with my brothers and decided to put it on the agenda. I didn’t expect that this would be misunderstood yesterday by His Highness."
Rui’an King asked: "Whether the king misunderstands or not is not relevant. What is important is the hidden gold site on the Eagle Beak Cliff, what do you have to say for that?"
The abbot shook his head with a pale face, "I really don’t know."
The Emperor slammed the table in anger, "You don’t know? I heard that the mechanism was placed halfway up the cliff, which must have taken a lot of time and effort to accomplish. They must have made a considerable amount of noise during the construction. Didn’t your Great Buddha Temple hear anything? How many years have you been the abbot? You were the abbot when my late mother was still alive, for almost twenty years, right?"
The abbot was speechless.
"Confess everything truthfully now!" The Emperor, thoroughly upset, exclaimed, "I am giving you one more chance. If you still claim ignorance and try to make excuses, I will cut off your head first, followed by the heads of all the monks in the Great Buddha Temple, and then shut down the temple."
The abbot opened his mouth, his face pale, seemingly stunned, but no sound came out.
From the side, Su Rong spoke up: "Master Abbot, you mustn’t be confused. Best to confess everything honestly. The emperor is giving you this opportunity so you may receive leniency. If you continue to exhibit confusion and conceal any information, you will be guilty of deceiving the emperor, and should the Great Buddha Temple be slaughtered, you will be held responsible for ruining this ancient temple of a thousand years."
Upon hearing this, the abbot’s face turned even paler. After a moment, he gritted his teeth and said: "Amitabha, Your Majesty, forgive me. I... When the master suddenly proposed to reconstruct the Buddha’s platform years ago, I was initially against it, because it would cause such a big commotion unnecessarily, why rebuild the platform? Especially given the scale of the project. But the master was very insistent. He is highly respected and I had no choice but to agree. So, the master was in charge of the construction project, and I had no involvement. I was suspicious that year, but then I saw that everything was being done as the master said, so I reassured myself. Half a year later, the master left for his pilgrimage and has not returned for ten years. Now that His Highness has discovered the hidden gold site on Eagle Beak Cliff, I immediately thought of that year, perhaps the master did something on the cliff under the guise of constructing the Buddha’s platform, because for all these years, the back mountain was quiet except for the half a year when the master was digging at the bottom of Eagle Beak Cliff and carving rocks. As Your Majesty said, there wasn’t any big commotion, and for good reason, I had no idea."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
