Chapter 119 [VIP]
"No……"
Ji Huacheng opened his mouth in horror.
Gu Zhizhuo gave him a single glance, and he was immediately terrified, breaking out in a cold sweat.
Miss Gu is too ruthless.
Since the Duke of Zhenguo's mansion dared not take the lead, they pushed the Ji family to the forefront.
The clan leader must not agree to this. The emperor's favor towards Ji Ruo is a good thing for the Ji family; why should they play the villain?
Once the petition drum is sounded, it would be tantamount to slapping the emperor in the face. What benefit would the Ji family gain? They would only face the annihilation of the entire family.
When the emperor is enraged, millions will die.
What does reputation matter? Preserving your life is the most important thing.
"Meow!"
As the mountain breeze blew, Gu Zhizhuo's clothes fluttered in the wind.
Chief Ji stiffly raised his head. The smoke from the chimneys below the mountain felt like sharp needles piercing his pupils. He closed his eyes in pain, and all he could hear were whispers of "unfilial descendants."
"I'll go."
Chief Ji spoke those two words with unusual firmness.
"Has the clan chief gone mad?!" Ji Huacheng cried out, lunging forward with both arms to grab his legs tightly.
No. Don't!
Offending the emperor could mean the annihilation of your entire family and clan!
Clan Chief Ji kicked him angrily, but it was unclear where he was injured. Ji Huacheng screamed in pain and rolled around on the ground.
"Mmm?"
Shen Mao's golden eyes lit up.
"You're not allowed to roll away. If you get your fur dirty, your owner will throw you out the door."
"Mimi~"
It twitched its ears, tilted its little face to watch Ji Huacheng roll around, and stretched out its little paws, eager to try.
"How did Hua Zhen die?"
As soon as the clan chief spoke, Ji Huacheng suddenly stopped rolling. He said in a trembling voice, "My eldest cousin died after accidentally falling into the water and developing a high fever."
He propped himself up on his elbows, his voice slightly hurried: "On our way back to Jiangnan, my eldest cousin was depressed and spent his days drowning his sorrows in alcohol. He fell off the boat while drunk."
"Oh."
A cold smile crept across Chief Ji's lips.
If Ji Huacheng had told the whole truth after returning to the clan, he wouldn't be in this dilemma now.
Chief Ji looked back on the past six years and understood everything.
Ji Huacheng deliberately concealed the truth, and he even used this as leverage to blackmail Ji Ruo, amassing a huge fortune. He may even have been behind Hua Zhen's death.
Therefore, after returning to Jiangnan, he kept quiet about it.
Chief Ji gritted his teeth in hatred. He slowly stood up, leaning on the tree trunk, his entire weight resting on the tree.
His eyes met Gu Zhizhuo's in mid-air.
This Miss Gu still wore her hair in double buns, so she probably hadn't reached marriageable age yet, but from the moment they met until now, she had them completely under her thumb.
Moreover, even though Chief Ji knew she was using him, he had no choice but to be used by her.
This is indeed the only way out for the Ji family.
“Miss Gu, if you were a man, becoming a marquis or prime minister would be within your reach.” Clan Chief Ji smiled bitterly.
“Even if I say no, the Emperor’s absurdity cannot be hidden for long. In this way, the Ji family will lose all face, their century-old reputation will be ruined, and they will never be able to hold their heads up in the literary circles again.”
“If that happens, the Ji family will have no chance of turning things around.”
The Ji clan chief's face was almost filled with despair.
Gu Zhizhuo pushed him out; he had no other choice.
Whether he does it or not, the final result is actually the same.
If they really want to confiscate your property and exterminate your entire clan, there's no escaping it.
The only difference is that he himself filed the appeal, which shows that the Ji family are upright and honest officials who are not afraid of imperial power. Even if they die, the Ji family will still maintain their integrity and will be even more respected among students.
Miss Gu seemed to have given him a choice, but in reality, he had no choice at all.
Chief Ji wiped the bloodstains from the corner of his mouth, bowed deeply, and said, "Please, young lady, escort me back to the capital."
Gu Zhizhuo was not surprised by his decision. After two dynasties, he was able to keep his family from falling. If he didn't have a strong sense of determination, he wouldn't have been able to continue as the clan leader.
"please."
Chief Ji glanced back at the direction of the manor one last time, his heart burning with shame and humiliation.
Ji Huacheng lay on the ground in despair, trembling. His mind was filled with the words "confiscation of property and exile." His eyes were empty as he murmured, "Our Ji family is finished, finished."
Gu Zhizhu walked past him, saying impatiently, "Shut up."
Ji Huacheng covered his mouth with both hands and curled up.
Two guards went over and dragged Ji Huacheng up. He seemed to have lost all his strength, and his limbs were limp.
The mountain is not high.
When chasing after him, Gu Zhizhu deliberately led Ji Huacheng to that cliff, which took longer than usual.
Before an incense stick had burned, they returned to Wangshan Pavilion.
The Ji family members all leaned over the railing, peering down expectantly. When they saw Gu Zhizhuo and the Ji clan leader coming up one after the other, the Second Master Ji hurriedly asked, "Uncle, where is Cheng'er?"
As soon as he finished speaking, he saw Ji Huacheng, covered in blood, being dragged up, his toes barely touching the ground, unconscious and his fate unknown.
This scene brought tears to the eyes of Master Ji, who was on the verge of collapse. He shouted his son's name and rushed out. Seeing that Gu Zhizhuo did not give any signal, the guards did not stop him either.
"Miss Gu, you've maliciously injured someone; do you even respect the law?"
He held his son in his arms, his clothes stained red with his son's blood, and his hands were wet and covered in blood.
The shocking bright red color made his heart almost stop: "Cheng'er! Wake up, Cheng'er."
"Ji Huacheng," Gu Zhizhuo said calmly, leaning against a pillar in the pavilion, "Your father said I hurt you maliciously. What do you think?"
The tabby cat, emboldened by her presence, meowed: "Meow!"
"No, no, it's not true!"
Ji Huacheng, who had been half-dead just moments before, jolted awake and weakly said, "Father, I hurt myself. It has nothing to do with Miss Gu. I accidentally fell and scraped myself." To convince him, he struggled to get up and jumped a couple of times, blood gushing from his unhealed wound. "It's all superficial."
He smiled ingratiatingly at Gu Zhizhuo; in just one short hour, his fear of her had been etched deep into his soul.
"Cheng'er?"
Master Ji found it hard to believe.
He was about to say something more when he was interrupted by Chief Ji's "Enough!"
He looked up and saw the Ji clan chief staring at them menacingly, as if he wanted to tear them apart alive. What on earth had happened? He wanted to ask his son, but Ji Huacheng rolled his eyes and looked away again.
"Miss Gu," Chief Ji said politely, "could I take Ji Xinyuan with me?"
Ji Xinyuan was Ji's biological father.
When the clan chief called out his name, he quickly looked away and replied, "Uncle, where are we going?"
Will the Duke of Zhenguo's mansion let them go?
Gu Zhizhuo nodded: "Prepare a carriage for them."
Zheng Qi obeyed the order. As for the others, Gu Zhizhuo did not give any instructions. Zheng Qi then had someone lead them to "rest" and separated the west courtyard for them to use.
Once the carriage was ready, Chief Ji took Ji Xinyuan with him and they left.
After leaving the manor in the carriage, Chief Ji, in a low, hoarse voice, told Ji Xinyuan everything that had happened.
Ji Xinyuan's eyes widened, a chill rising from his tailbone and spreading throughout his body. Just like when he first heard about it.
Ji Xinyuan was sweating profusely, his temples were soaked.
"Could it be that they're deliberately lying to us?" he asked, without any hope.
Clan Chief Ji: "..."
Silence often carries a lot of meaning.
Ji Xinyuan's last shred of hope vanished, and he regretted it: "I shouldn't have listened to her, I shouldn't have let her take Yuan Chu's place."
He cried heartbrokenly, "That old Taoist priest was right back then, twins are an omen of misfortune. I was clinging to wishful thinking, I've ruined the Ji family!"
It wasn't that Jiangnan people were superstitious about twins. Rather, before Ji Yuanchu and her sister were born, a wandering Taoist priest said that the eldest son would give birth to twin daughters, and the younger sister would be a calamity that would bring ruin to their family.
That's right. Everything you said is right.
"Xinyuan," the Ji clan chief said in a deep voice, "You are the patriarch, and you should have been the next patriarch. Over the past few decades, everyone in the Ji family has seen how well you have performed; you are a qualified patriarch. You must make amends for the mistakes you have made..."
Chief Ji's voice was drowned out by the clattering of wheels.
The carriage traveled slowly along the official road and finally entered the city gate at dusk.
The Ji clan chief had never been to the capital of the Great Qi Dynasty before. He had originally decided that he would only set foot in the capital after a member of the Ji family passed the imperial examination and entered officialdom.
"Go directly to the Meridian Gate."
Chief Ji spoke from inside the carriage.
The Dengwen Drum stands on the Meridian Gate city wall. After the carriage stopped at the Meridian Gate Square, the two got off the carriage one after the other and climbed up the city wall.
Emperor Taizu erected the Dengwen Drum, which allowed those with grievances to strike and have their grievances heard by the emperor.
Chief Ji walked toward the large vermilion drum that stood there, and picked up the drumsticks with trembling hands.
Once you strike, there's no turning back.
"Knock it, Uncle." Ji Xinyuan's face was ashen, but he did not hesitate for a moment.
While in the carriage, they discussed the worst-case scenario: the emperor would be furious and his entire family would be wiped out. But that possibility was extremely small. The emperor was not cruel; he was rather indecisive. If he still had any sense of shame, and if even one of the officials was reasonable, it wouldn't come to the point of confiscating their property.
"For the sake of the Ji family!"
Before the eyes of the clan chief Ji, the merit archways and imperial steles in front of the ancestral hall appeared, all representing the glory of the Ji family.
We must not lose our integrity.
He tightened his grip on the drumsticks and struck them down hard.
Thump!
The Dengwen Drum was much larger and more somber than the Crying Drum that stood in front of the Jingzhao Prefecture.
One strike of the hammer is enough to be heard throughout half of the capital.
The fact that the two of them were standing here had already attracted the attention of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. No one was allowed to stop them from striking the Dengwen Drum, but the person who struck the drum would be punished with thirty strokes of the cane afterward, so no one would strike it for fun.
Thump!
Thump!
The sound of drums echoed through the sky.
The Dengwen Drum had not been sounded for five or six years, and many people who heard the noise came to the Meridian Gate Square.
After Chief Ji struck the drum a full eighteen times, Jiang Tongzhi, the Imperial Guard on duty, stepped forward and asked routinely, "Who is striking the drum?"
The clan chief, Ji, lowered his hand that had been holding the drumstick, and answered the question: "Ji Yan, clan chief of the Ji clan of Jiangnan and headmaster of Tongshan Academy."
As soon as he said this, some students recognized him.
"It's the Ji family from Jiangnan," the student exclaimed excitedly.
There's no mistake, he also said that he was the headmaster of Tongshan Academy.
Classmate: "The Ji family?"
The student excitedly told his classmates, "The book we've been reading recently, 'The Collected Annotations on the Four Books,' was written by the great scholar Ji Shuo of the Ji family."
"So Ji Yong, who wrote the 'Strategies of the World,' was also a member of the Ji family?" his classmate asked admiringly. "In the previous provincial examination, there was a question that had a similar approach to the ninth strategy in the 'Strategies of the World.'"
"It's the Ji family who have filed a petition! Come quickly!"
Students called out to their friends at the foot of the city gate.
On the city tower, Magistrate Jiang continued to ask, "Why are you beating the drums?"
"I sue!" Chief Ji gritted his teeth, steeled his resolve, and declared in a passionate voice, "I sue the king for taking his subject's wife."
Jiang Tongzhi was dumbfounded.
He even forgot to stop him from continuing.
As the number of people in the Meridian Gate Square gradually increased, Chief Ji deliberately spoke in more colloquial terms: "It is hereby reported that the current Emperor has committed adultery with a married woman."
"It is hereby reported that Ji Ruo, the daughter of the Ji family and concubine of the late Duke Teng, has lost her chastity and committed adultery with the current emperor, giving birth to an illegitimate child."
An uproar ensued.
The Meridian Gate Square was in complete chaos.
"How dare you!"
Jiang Tongzhi finally found his voice and said sternly, "You have framed the current emperor. What is your crime?"
His heart pounded with fear. This man was spouting nonsense and inciting public sentiment; if investigated, none of them would escape justice.
Chief Ji's chaotic eyes gleamed with a sharp light. He had taught at Tongshan Academy before, and in the huge classroom, making sure everyone could hear his voice clearly was not a matter of shouting.
That's still true today.
His voice was extremely penetrating, and he said loudly, "The Great Ancestor Emperor once said that if any citizen of the Great Qi Dynasty has a grievance that cannot be redressed, he may beat the Dengwen Drum, and no one shall stop him."
He held the drumsticks.
"Today, I will accuse the Emperor of being shameless, disregarding the people's livelihood, indulging in debauchery and extravagance."
He dared to say these things, but Magistrate Jiang dared not listen to a single word.
The Meridian Gate Square was in chaos. I don't know where all these people came from, but they all gathered around it.
"Step back!" Jiang Tongzhi just wanted to stop it all as soon as possible.
However, you cannot kill people.
With so many eyes watching, killing the person who beat the petition drum would be a grave taboo.
We have no choice but to resort to coercion.
"Men, seize him!"
"Those who speak nonsense and spread heresies to mislead the public shall be killed without mercy."
The Imperial Guards on duty immediately surrounded them, their embroidered spring knives drawn, their cold blades pointed at them, the threat of death drawing ever closer.
For those who uphold integrity, dying for their principles is an honor.
For the sake of the Ji family. Ji Xinyuan's lips moved slightly, and he murmured to himself almost imperceptibly.
He raised his voice and shouted, "The drum of petition reaches the ears of Heaven!"
“We have sounded the drum of petition; how can you not investigate and question us?”
"I refuse to accept this!"
After saying that, he spread his arms and resolutely lunged at the blade of the Embroidered Spring Blade.
The Imperial Guard didn't have time to retract his hand; the sharp blade pierced through his abdomen.
Ji Xinyuan gripped the embroidered spring knife that had been plunged into his abdomen, pulled it out forcefully, and the spurting blood drifted with the wind to the foot of the city tower.
rain?
Someone wiped the wetness from their face and shouted, "It's blood! Blood! The Imperial Guards are killing people!"
"I want to sue! The late Duke Zhenguo was a man of unwavering integrity, yet the Emperor disregarded all human ethics and took his wife away..."
His body slowly collapsed.
He stared at the sky. The worst thing he had ever done in his life was to let Ji Ruo marry in his place.
The Yuan Dynasty is over.
At the time, he was almost certain that Ji Ruo had pushed Yuan Chu off the cliff. He wanted her to pay with her life, but Ji Ruo said that if no one married into the Duke of Zhenguo's mansion, the late emperor would surely think that the Ji family was unwilling to submit. The opportunity that the Ji family had waited for for three generations would also be ruined because of his decision.
She was like a demon, bewitching him and arousing his greed.
The Yuan Dynasty is over.
Hua Zhen is dead.
She had ruined the eldest branch of the family, and she even wanted to destroy the Ji family.
He absolutely will not allow it!
"Xinyuan."
Chief Ji bent down and hugged him. He was old and thin, and he was crying uncontrollably, but there was not a single tear on his lowered face.
On the carriage to the Meridian Gate, Chief Ji had also considered that after beating the Dengwen Drum, the Imperial Guards would most likely not dare to report it. They would be stopped, driven away, or even secretly killed after being driven away to prevent future troubles.
However, if his death could incite public outrage, the Embroidered Uniform Guard would have no choice but to retaliate.
Ji Xinyuan failed in his duty to raise his daughter and should atone with his death.
"Xinyuan".
When Chief Ji raised his head, tears streamed down his face.
"I'm going to sue!"
"I hereby inform His Majesty of the crime of adultery."
"If the Embroidered Uniform Guard wants to silence me, they might as well kill me too."
The Imperial Guards killed the man who beat the drum to appeal for justice without cause! They killed the entire Ji family. The students below the Meridian Gate erupted in protest: "We demand justice!"
It's unclear who uttered those three words first, but a chorus of voices converged, creating a huge uproar.
"We demand justice!"
"Did Your Majesty really commit adultery with my wife?"
"It's definitely true, the Embroidered Uniform Guard is killing people to cover it up!"
"And there are illegitimate children?"
Why hasn't the Emperor come out yet?
It's out of control now. Magistrate Jiang's face turned ashen: "Go report this to the Cabinet and His Highness Prince Chen. Go immediately."
A note from the author:
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