It was almost lunchtime, and the twenty-eight cooks had all prepared the food and were waiting to be served. They all sat down and chatted idly, while only the lower-ranking servants who did the rough work were still busy.
They loaded buckets of cooking waste onto the truck, filling ten carts in total, and then pushed them out through a small back door. Not far away was a deep pit where they used to dump all their garbage. Now, they had filled in half of that deep pit.
"Get out of the way!"
The servants shouted and dispersed the people scavenging for garbage. Zhao Dajia, disguised as a beggar and covering most of his face with a tattered cloth, mingled among them. He grinned excitedly as he watched the servants dump buckets of waste onto the garbage mountain.
"Look, there's plenty of meat today too!"
A scruffy, middle-aged beggar next to them pointed at the white duck intestines and stomach in the swill bucket, and his eyes lit up with excitement.
"How about we have grilled duck intestines today?"
Upon hearing this, Zhao Dajia immediately became alert. He pushed off the ground with his toes and assumed the stance of an 800-meter sprint. He was determined to get the duck intestines and stomach today in order to make duck offal soup for his wife!
As soon as the servants who were taking out the trash left, the group of people rushed forward. Zhao Dajia took the lead and charged ahead of everyone else, grabbing the pile of garbage and grabbing the white duck intestines and bellies. He laughed excitedly, "Hahaha, they're his!"
However, at that moment, a dark hand slapped him across the face. The skinny beggar and his companion, one holding Zhao Dajia down and the other grabbing the duck intestines and stomach, ran away. Zhao Dajia roared, "I found it first! I found it first!"
His eyes widened in anger, and he threw all pretense of officialdom to the back of his mind. He started fighting with the skinny beggar. As the fight went on, he felt something was wrong. He felt a chill down his spine, as if he were being watched by many people.
It's probably just my imagination...
"Give it back to me! Give it back to me!"
Zhao Dajia couldn't beat the skinny beggar and was pinned down. He reached out his longing finger towards the fleeing beggar, crying and shouting with tears and snot streaming down his face. To be precise, he was shouting for the white duck intestines and stomach in the fleeing beggar's hand.
Hey, how come he saw the emperor when he was so blinded by the beating?
......
emperor?
emperor?
emperor?
emperor! ! !
After three question marks appeared on Zhao Dajia's forehead, beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.
Not only the emperor, but he also saw several colleagues, and even that girl from the Changxing Marquis's family...
At this moment, the emperor and his entourage were all astonished, their mouths agape. A proper sixth-rank official had actually disguised himself as a beggar to scavenge for trash! Scaffolding trash was one thing, but he was so greedy that he got into a fight with a real beggar over duck intestines! And to make matters worse, he was the one who got beaten up and pinned down!
How pitiful!
Zhao Dajia was punched again, his face was turned to one side, and Chuanwen felt a pain in his face when he saw it, and couldn't help but sigh in his heart.
The emperor and several officials silently felt a pang of sympathy: How pitiful...
Although no one spoke, silence spoke louder than words.
Zhao Dajia's face flushed red instantly. He had lost all face in his entire life at this moment. He wanted to cry sob sob T﹏T
"A scholar can be killed but not humiliated!" Zhao Dajia suddenly became fierce, his face contorted with rage, and he bit down on the beggar's hand.
The beggar screamed in pain, and Zhao Dajia was extremely pleased, as if he had finally turned the tables. Who said he couldn't even beat a beggar!
They looked towards the emperor, but instead of admiration, they saw only disdain...
Those claws were so black, how could they bite like that? (Third tone)...
They even beat up beggars! What kind of person is that?! (Thinking in a slightly off-key tone)...
Zhao Dajia sobs, sobs X﹏X, I really want to roar to the heavens, what did I do wrong?! God, why are you punishing me like this!
The ordeal wasn't over yet; the bitten beggar lay on the ground, refusing to get up...
Thus, the dispute over duck intestines ended with Zhao Dajia being extorted for a string of cash, but he didn't have the money, so Chuanhai paid it for him.
Zhao Dajia glared at Chuanhai hatefully: Right, right, it's that girl again!
Chuanwen is such a cute little girl that Zhao Dajia couldn't bear to glare at her. Of course, the main reason was that Chuanwen was right next to the emperor, so he didn't dare to glare at her. He could only glare at Chuanhai. What could Chuanhai do? He could only silently endure it. Sigh.
"My dear minister, you must have made a lot of money selling that ring, so why are you competing with a beggar for trash?"
The emperor took out a jade thumb ring, his tone full of amusement, but also tinged with a hint of disdain.
When Zhao Dajia saw the jade thumb ring, his expression changed repeatedly, and he stammered.
You dare not say? Could it really have been obtained through embezzlement?
Zhang Hui stepped forward and rebuked, "Zhao Dajia, I never thought you were this kind of person! How could you embezzle? How can you face the emperor and the common people?!"
Zhang Hui was heartbroken and wished he could scold Zhao Dajia awake.
But the emperor and Chuanhai looked at Zhang Hui and said, "He's so poor, how can you still accuse him of corruption? Doesn't your conscience hurt?"
Zhang Hui raised his neck and snorted, "What if he's faking it? Whether it hurts or not, we'll see when he confesses honestly!"
Zhao Dajia was shocked, "Embezzlement!"
"Your Majesty is wise!"
A man knelt down with a thud, not caring if people laughed at him, and Zhao Dajia truthfully told them the origin of the jade thumb ring.
He did indeed find it. Every day after dinner, he would disguise himself and come here to rummage through things. That jade thumb ring was one of the things he dug out of the garbage dump one time.
As for his furtive behavior during the transaction, it was mainly because he didn't want anyone to know about his colleague's trash collection through the jade ring. If people found out, he would lose face, even though he probably wouldn't be able to recover his reputation after today.
My dear reader, there's more to this chapter! Please click the next page to continue reading—even more exciting content awaits!
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