Chapter 28 The Prefect's Office should consider this a favor to me...
The case of He Renzhi in Huaiyuan is filled with countless pieces of evidence, including both witness testimonies and physical evidence.
All those involved have been brought down, except for the people from the prefect's office.
Currently, there is not a single piece of physical evidence to prove that Prefect Zhao Shuhuai was directly involved in this case.
That secret letter cannot be used as evidence.
He Renzhi only used coded language in his letter to seek protection from Zhao Shuhuai, hoping for his rescue. As father-in-law and son-in-law, it was not unreasonable for He Renzhi to have such a motive.
This is completely insufficient to support the conclusion that Zhao Shuhuai was He Renzhi's accomplice.
In order to capture Zhao Shuhuai, Zijing had already ordered his attendant Lu to send people to secretly monitor He Renzhi before he entered Huaiyuan. At the same time, he also sent people to monitor the actions of the prefect's mansion.
But the spies, who had been sending messages via falcon every day for the past two days to report Zhao Shuhuai's movements, suddenly disappeared without a trace.
Zijing sensed something was wrong, so yesterday he immediately dispatched Xie Cheng with troops to travel lightly to the prefect's residence to investigate the situation.
Zi Jing dismissed the guards and turned to Yu Nie and the others, saying, "I'm really sorry, everyone, but I have important matters to discuss with Guard Xie."
He glanced at the food on the table and said, "Gentlemen, you are kind enough to tell me this when I see Guard Xie later."
Yu Nie replied, "Young master, please go ahead and attend to your business. We didn't come here for anything important, and we already know what we need to know. We should head back now."
"How can this be? You've come all this way. It's already a disservice that I haven't had time to entertain you. If you leave hungry, wouldn't it be a laughing stock?" Zi Jing pleaded, then turned to Lu's attendant and beckoned: "Quickly prepare a carriage to take you Daoist priests to Saibei Tower. All the fresh delicacies must be of the highest quality and made with the finest ingredients. You must be served the most exquisite food. If there is the slightest neglect, you will be held responsible."
Although Lu Jinshi had his own opinions about Yu Nie, he wouldn't complain at all since it was his master who had given him the order. He bowed and said, "Your subordinate obeys."
Yu Nie quickly waved his hand to decline, and Lang Xi also said tactfully, "It is already presumptuous of us to come here, how dare we trouble the captain to prepare a banquet for us."
Zi Jing said, "There's no need for such trouble, Daoist Langxi. Just consider it an honor for me to do my part as a host."
"this……"
Before the two could refuse again, he bowed slightly and said, "Guard Xie is still waiting in the council hall. Please allow me to go ahead."
After saying this, he turned and walked towards the council hall.
"Hey..." Yu Nie tried to reach out and stop him, but he walked very fast and disappeared at the cave entrance in the blink of an eye. She shook her head: "You walk pretty fast."
Lang Xi, sword in hand, looked ahead at the same time as her: "He Renzhi's case involves Prefect Zhao. The matter is urgent, so of course we need to act quickly."
Yu Nie understood. She sat down on the round wooden chair and asked, "So... are we really going to that Saibei Tower?"
Zi Jing's words still echoed in her ears. Lang Xi pondered for a moment and finally said, "Since the Commandant has extended such a warm invitation, it would be impolite of us to refuse." She turned to look at Lu Jinshi, who was waiting to the side, and nodded slightly, "Thank you for leading the way, Jinshi."
Compared to the quirky and clever Yu Nie, Lu Jinshi showed far more than three degrees of courtesy to the beautiful, quiet, and soft-spoken Lang Xi.
"You're too kind, Taoist priest. Please follow me."
After he finished speaking, Lu Jinshi led the way, followed by Yu Nie and the others, and they all went to the Saibei Tower together.
*
Inside the council chamber, Xie Cheng sat upright, his hands clasped tightly on his knees, the tea beside him untouched.
He caught a glimpse of that familiar figure approaching out of the corner of his eye. He looked away from the corpse in front of him, stood up solemnly, and bowed: "My lord."
Zijing stepped across the threshold and caught a glimpse of the dead body on the ground.
His eyes turned cold, and he half-squatted down, yanking off the white cloth covering the corpse.
The cold body was already stiff, with black ligature marks on the neck and a gruesome knife wound on the chest.
Outside, it was hot, the sun was blazing, and the branches swayed. Inside, however, it was chillingly cold and eerily quiet.
Xie Cheng raised his eyes slightly, remained silent for a moment, and then said in a low voice, "The body was found by the river near Zhao Shuhuai's house. The area is open and crowded. When we arrived, some people were calling out to us. My subordinates sent people to check, and unexpectedly... it was the people we sent to monitor the prefect's residence."
Staring at the corpse's face, Zijing covered it with the white sheet again. He slowly stood up and walked around the corpse, once in front and once in back.
Everyone lowered their eyes, and he remained silent, yet a chilling atmosphere filled the room.
"You dumped the body in full view of everyone, and when you arrived, the body just happened to appear..." He stopped and glanced at Xie Cheng standing to the side: "Guard Xie said, is there really such a coincidence in the world?"
The answer to this question was obvious to everyone present.
By the time He Renzhi's secret letter reached the prefect's residence at the latest, Zhao Shuhuai already knew everything that had happened in Huaiyuan. He knew that they would eventually find out about him. Just then, Xie Cheng's secret agent was exposed, so he killed the spy and disposed of the body in public when the Xuan Ce army went to the prefect's residence.
The answer to this behavior is already quite clear.
Xie Cheng said, "There are no coincidences in this world. Zhao Shuhuai's actions are intended to give us a warning. As a member of the royal family, he is used to being arrogant and will naturally not take us seriously. Besides..." Xie Cheng hesitated for the last part, as if he was considering whether he should say it.
Before he could speak, Zijing filled in what he hadn't said: "Besides, although military households have now been separated from the lowly household registration, they are still military households. Where would they get the guts to touch a prince's son like him?"
The Beiye region had a strict hierarchical system, with the household registration system divided from top to bottom into the imperial family, the gentry, commoners, and the lowest social classes.
The imperial family consisted of princes, nobles, and descendants of emperors and emperors; the aristocratic families included powerful clans such as the Wang, Chen, Gao, and Li families; the common people included ordinary people, poor merchants, Taoist priests, Buddhist monks, and so on; and the lowest class was divided into tenant farmers, slaves, military households, official households, artisans, and miscellaneous households.
Three years ago, the renowned scholar Yang Weikuan of the imperial court spoke up for military households, and his adoptive father Yan Yue submitted a memorial to the emperor, requesting that military households be separated from the status of lowly people and changed to commoner status. Now, all families of military household origin are not even allowed to intermarry with ordinary people.
They could only marry into military households, and their children would also be military households, generation after generation destined to live by risking their lives on the battlefield.
But royal relatives like Zhao Shuhuai were born superior to others. Even though they were from military households and were no longer considered lowly, they still looked down on them.
Even if he were investigating the case under the identity of "Huan Xun", Zhao Shuhuai would still do such a thing.
Not everyone knows how to assess the situation and know when to advance and retreat. Some people in high positions have the intelligence of a three-year-old child.
Xie Cheng spoke up: "When we went to see Zhao Shuhuai, he claimed to be ill, old and weak, saying that there was an epidemic in the county and that to avoid being infected, he asked us to question him outside the ceremonial gate. After I questioned He Renzhi in detail, he replied that he knew nothing about it."
The prefect's office's practice of "discussing matters outside the ceremonial gate" clearly made their contempt obvious. As for the so-called epidemic in the prefecture, anyone with discerning eyes could see that it was nothing but a pretext.
Zhao Shuhuai was about to feign deafness and dumbness when Zi Jing's eyes grew even colder: "The prefect's salary is 1,200 shi of grain per year, which is equivalent to about 300,000 coins. The spy wrote in a letter earlier that the prefect's carriage was wrapped with gold thread when he traveled. Where did this huge sum of money come from? Have you questioned him about it?"
"I have questioned them one by one. Zhao Shuhuai claimed that they were all birthday gifts from merchants, and he could not refuse them, so he accepted them." Xie Cheng said, "Although we were stopped outside the main hall, I still forcibly searched the inner courtyard. His residence has beams made of nanmu wood and pillars covered with gold leaf. All the utensils he uses are extremely extravagant. We also found that the pearl crown he was wearing was inlaid with 130 pearls."
“Even if he is the eldest son of a prince, he cannot use such regulations before he has been officially enfeoffed. He is merely a second son whose title has not yet been determined. According to the Law of Beiye, such an overstepping of the rules should be met with immediate arrest and punishment.”
Xie Cheng's eyes were blazing with anger as he spoke: "I immediately questioned Zhao Shuhuai, but that old scoundrel claimed that his servants were ignorant of the rules and had mistakenly set the bead in the wrong place. He even said that his old eyes were failing him and that he hadn't seen clearly, which caused this misunderstanding."
"He couldn't even be bothered to come up with a respectable lie like 'a reward from the Prince of Yan.' This perfunctory approach—isn't he just fooling us?"
Zi Jing was not surprised at all by this man's arrogant behavior. When he first met this prince's son in the Jian'an Imperial City, the man was just as arrogant and foolish in his words and actions.
Without irrefutable evidence, Zhao Shuhuai's attempts to argue always have a chance of survival. He kept his identity hidden and secretly planned ahead to avoid wasting words with such a person, to find irrefutable evidence, to sentence him to death, and to eradicate this cancer from its roots, preventing future troubles.
After Xie Cheng finished speaking, the only sound inside the room was the chirping of gray sparrows on the eaves.
Zi Jing hesitated for a moment before speaking: "What did he say about being interrogated tomorrow?"
"He initially said he was slightly unwell, but when He Renzhi's daughter tearfully pleaded to come and see her family, he had no choice but to agree, saying he would arrive around 9:00 AM."
"It's good that you can come; it saves me a lot of trouble." Zi Jing walked to the door, looked at the large gray sparrow, and ordered the guards, "Bring me a bow and arrows."
Xie Cheng followed up and asked, "When Zhao Shuhuai comes tomorrow, we still don't have any solid evidence. The last letter from the scout said that the prefect's mansion used carriages to transport things out of the mansion at night, all the way to the back of Nanshan outside the city. The people who went to check reported back that some of the wheel tracks left on the path were very deep, which must have been heavy objects."
He offered his guess: "It is very likely that it was money that He Renzhi offered as tribute to the prefect's office."
“Even if it’s not money, it’s definitely something that Zhao Shuhuai will find difficult to handle,” Zijing said. “For a fool like him to sense such danger, the things in the mountains are very useful to us.”
The guard came running with his bow and arrows.
He took it casually, nocked an arrow, aimed at the gray sparrow, and ordered: "Send another five hundred soldiers over. I want Zhao Shuhuai to come, and he won't be able to leave tomorrow."
With a "whoosh," the sharp arrowhead shot straight at the gray sparrow.
Before long, another guard rushed over, shouting: "Report—"
"My lord, an urgent report from the capital."
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