Chapter 10: Biological Child?
Eight cents.
Jin Shu did the math in her mind and realized it wasn't bad; there was potential to make a profit. Her conflicted feelings finally eased considerably, and she knelt on the ground, kowtowing and saying, "Jin Shu is willing to go to the capital with Your Highness and obey your orders!"
Upon hearing this, Li Jin couldn't help but smile. With the help of "Mr. Jin," who was proficient in the language of corpses, there might really be hope for the exoneration of the person who caused the incident six years ago.
That night, Jin Shu looked at Jin Rong, who was sleeping soundly in bed, and gently tucked the blanket in.
She held the half of the jade pendant left by Jin Rong's birth mother in her hand, her feelings complicated.
Under the gentle moonlight, the Liu residence was peaceful and serene. It should have been bedtime long ago, but the study was still brightly lit.
Looking at the letter in his hand, Li Jin asked solemnly, "Lord Liu, do you remember how Jin Rong's child came to be six years ago?"
"Jin Rong?" Liu Cheng'an raised his hand, stroking his chin.
"Have you ever met Jin Shu's parents? Her mother had a ten-month pregnancy?" Li Jin picked up the cup of tea that had gone cold, stirred the tea leaves, and waited for Liu Cheng'an's answer.
According to intelligence, in early 203 AD, Jin Shu's parents encountered a group of bandits while traveling. Both were seriously injured and died shortly after returning home.
This child named Jin Rong only appeared in Jin Shu's home in the winter of 204 AD.
Li Jin held the lid, pausing frequently.
The timing and the route don't match up with Jin Shu's parents, but they coincide with the story of Crown Prince Li Mu, who was falsely accused of treason, had his family property confiscated, and died tragically, and his pregnant wife, Cen Shi, who fled overnight.
During the time Li Jin stayed at Liu Cheng'an's residence, he paid special attention to the boy named Jin Rong.
He always felt that his older brother Li Mu was a part of him in his every move.
But Dingzhou in Jiangnan is a thousand miles away from the capital. How did the pregnant Crown Princess manage to walk a thousand miles to Jiangnan all by herself?
At that time, everyone in the world was in danger when they heard the name of Li Mu's followers, and no one would dare to lend her a helping hand.
Even when Li Jin secretly rushed back to the capital from the frontier, he risked being beheaded and having his property confiscated.
But it was still too late.
The only consolation was that Li Mu had some foresight at the time, knowing that he was doomed this time, and had arranged for the Crown Princess Cen to escape with her unborn child.
In prison, when Li Jin, dressed in black, risked his life to meet him, Li Mu, who had been tortured to the point of near death, only managed to utter the words, "Take good care of the child and his mother," before fainting.
Just as planned, when the purge of Li Mu was sweeping through the capital, the border suddenly became critical. Li Jin had no choice but to rush back as fast as he could, in order to protect himself and leave hope.
This caused them to miss the best time to find the Crown Princess.
After that, Li Mu and Li Jin's mother, Consort Xiao, were sent to the Cold Palace, while Consort Shu's son, Li Jing, ascended to the position of Crown Prince.
Li Jin, who held military power, gradually discovered in his covert investigations over the next few years that there were too many suspicious aspects to the case that led to Li Mu's death sentence...
So he spent some time annihilating or suppressing the small border states, and when all sides were no longer able to fight against the Great Wei, he requested to relinquish his military power and return to the capital to retire.
At that time, Prince Jing, who was twenty-two years old and known as the God of War, wanted to return to the capital to retire, which caused a great stir among the court officials.
If he hadn't voluntarily relinquished his military power, most people would have assumed he had returned to pressure the Crown Prince.
Emperor Li Yi outwardly reprimanded him for his lack of ambition and his unprecedented behavior of preparing to idly stay in the palace in his twenties. However, he then readily granted him the position of head of the Six Doors in the capital and the position of Grand Prefect of Jingzhao Prefecture.
Li Jin roughly understood what Li Yi was expecting.
Without Li Mu, the power behind Consort Xiao would be difficult for the royal family to use. He needed someone to counterbalance the increasingly powerful Crown Prince's clan.
Li Jin, who shares the same mother as Li Mu, is the best candidate.
When Li Jin was in charge of the Six Doors, he outwardly appeared to be enjoying himself and not caring about anything, but inwardly he had built his own "shadow" and was strategizing behind the scenes.
For so many years he has been "traveling" in the Jiangnan area because he secretly found a little clue about the Crown Princess Cen and knew that she had come to the Jiangnan area back then.
If that posthumous child had been born and grown up successfully, he would be about the same age as Jin Rong now.
Could this child be the posthumous child from back then?
"Your Highness is overthinking it." Liu Cheng'an recalled for a long time. Perhaps it was because of his age, or perhaps it was because Jin Shu had been nagging him so frequently and so intensely over the years that Liu Cheng'an had come to believe what was false. He spoke with absolute certainty, saying, "She is indeed my biological younger brother. Her father is a well-known scholar in Dingzhou, and he has a very good relationship with me. I had heard before that his wife was about to give birth. There's no mistake."
Upon hearing this, Li Jin, holding the letter in her hand, froze in place.
Biological child?
Seeing that he had been pondering for a long time, Liu Chengan stood up, cupped his hands, and spoke in an exceptionally formal manner: "Your Highness, Mr. Jin is the son of my dear friend. Over the years, she has helped the local people in Dingzhou solve many cases and is a meritorious person."
He paused, then forced himself to continue, "However, Mr. Jin is a bit unusual. He dislikes crowds and is particularly averse to sharing a room with others. He also insists on bathing alone. I hope Your Highness will be accommodating to him once you arrive in the capital."
Li Jin listened to his words, looked at the flickering candlelight, and after a while, chuckled.
“Since ancient times, wise and talented people have all had some bad habits. I am well aware of this, so please rest assured, my lord.”
A woman would certainly not like living with a man, nor would she bathe with someone else.
More than anything else, Li Jin wanted to know when Mr. Jin would finally be unable to hide his true gender, and would tearfully confess to her, begging for forgiveness.
"Thank you very much, Lord Liu, for these past few days," he said with a smile. "I will set off tomorrow."
"Huh?" Liu Cheng'an was taken aback. "So urgent? Where are you headed?"
“Lin Yang,” he said.
In the early spring of the 210th year of the Great Wei Dynasty, Prince Jing, Li Jin, who was supposedly going to Dingzhou to admire the flowers, wandered around Peach Blossom Valley and discovered a case of "murder of a courtesan".
When he arrived in Dingzhou, he traveled leisurely in a horse-drawn carriage with a guard, stopping and starting as he went.
When they left, it was still a horse-drawn carriage, but there was a coachman in front of the carriage and a six-year-old child inside.
Thus, Dingzhou lost "Mr. Jin," but the Six Doors gained a divine constable named "Jin Shu," who spoke for the deceased.
"Your Highness Prince Jing, why hasn't Lin Yang arrived yet?"
Inside the car, Jin Rong's childish voice rang out again, and Jin Shu, sitting in the front of the car, subconsciously tensed up.
These past two days have been tiring, and Jin Rong, being just a child, found sitting for long periods of time particularly boring.
To everyone's surprise, Li Jin told him many stories about national and familial history in the car.
But after a while, Jin Rong got tired of the stories and couldn't keep going any longer.
Li Jin raised his hand, lifted the curtain, glanced outside the carriage, and said with a smile, "We'll see Lin Yangcheng in less than fifteen minutes."
Jin Shu, who had been a coachman for two days and whose backside was sore from the bumpy ride, immediately perked up upon hearing this. She looked at Zhou Zheng, who was sitting next to her with a serious expression and hadn't said a word for two days, with a beaming smile: "Lord Zhou, what are we going to Lin Yang for?"
Zhou Zheng stared straight ahead at the road, and after a long while, he blurted out two words: "Solve the case."
Inside the carriage, Li Jin lifted the curtain behind Jin Shu and said jokingly, "Mr. Jin, you may not know this, but every year, the Six Doors receive quite a few letters from the local areas, accusing Liu Cheng'an, the prefect of Dingzhou."
Jin Shu was taken aback: "Why? Lord Liu is a good official! He's kind-hearted and diligent in his duties."
“Yes, but it’s limited to the state’s territory.” Li Jinshua waved his fan and said with a smile, “There was a case in Linyang. The magistrate of Linyang County has been trying to borrow people for more than ten days. He’s as anxious as an ant on a hot pan. In the end, Liu Chengan only replied with two words.”
"No, I won't lend it to you." He finished speaking and then burst into laughter.
Outside the car, Jin Shu listened to him teasing her, chuckled dryly twice, raised her hand to support her chin, and stopped asking questions.
But Li Jin leaned closer to the window, lowered her voice, and asked mysteriously:
"Mr. Jin, do you think it's more likely to succeed in strangling someone who is congenitally blind, or someone who is lame with a leg injury?"
Blind? Lame?
Jin Shu paused for a moment, then turned around and looked at his smile in surprise.
"A blind person can kill someone?!"
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
