Wang Decai didn't care at all about what Chen Qingqing said.
He handled those ledgers extremely discreetly; no one would discover them. This brat must be bluffing him.
He scoffed dismissively, "You need evidence before you speak. Don't bite people like a mad dog, or I'll sue you for defamation."
Qin Shousheng was also surprised. Seeing the chaotic crowd in the hall, his face darkened, and he slammed his gavel down, shouting sternly.
“Miss Chen, without evidence, making baseless accusations is slander. If the defendant holds you accountable, you could end up in jail.”
"Thank you for reminding me, sir. How could I dare to speak recklessly without evidence?"
As she spoke, Chen Qingqing pulled a stack of account books from her cloth bag and glanced at Wang Decai with a cold smile. "You must be familiar with these account books!"
Upon seeing this, Wang Decai's eyes widened in disbelief as he stared at the account book in Chen Qingqing's hand.
What's going on? He clearly destroyed these ledgers. How did they end up in her hands?
He was stunned for a while before he came to his senses and quickly shook his head, "No, it's impossible, this must be fake, you're framing me."
Wu Cuihua looked at him with disdain and disgust. "Wang Decai, stop making excuses. I have checked it carefully. This ledger is indeed real. Every word on it is written by you."
"No, no, no, that's impossible." Wang Decai's heart skipped a beat, and he panicked instantly. He grinned as he looked at Wu Shiren beside him.
"Shopkeeper, this isn't true! I don't know what's going on. You have to believe me!"
Wu Shiren frowned, gave him a cold look, stepped forward, picked up the account book, and examined it carefully.
Each ledger has two pages with the same date. The top page shows normal income and expenses, while the bottom page shows the tampered entries. Basically, Wang Decai was embezzling his money every day.
He felt a surge of anger rising within him, and he raised his leg and kicked Wang Decai hard.
"You heartless, ungrateful bastard! I've always thought I treated you well. Have you forgotten who saved you and gave you food when you collapsed in front of my shop more than ten years ago when you were desperate? Is this how you repay me?"
"Manager, this...this is a frame-up! This ledger must be fake..."
"It's fake! Every single stroke of this pen is your handwriting! Now that things have come to this, what excuses do you have left?" Wu Shiren was furious and kicked him again.
Wang Decai clutched his stomach, his face contorted in pain as he struggled to his feet. His thoughts were instantly transported back more than ten years.
At that time, my father was a businessman, and his family was relatively well-off.
His carefree life and excessive pampering by his parents from a young age fostered his cynical and uneducated personality.
That autumn, my father, who had gone out to do business, returned home. He was still playing cricket fighting with someone, and lost five hundred taels of silver in one go.
However, he wasn't in a hurry. His family was wealthy, and a few hundred taels of silver was nothing to him. Instead, he turned around and crushed the cricket that had lost.
When I got home, I found my father sighing deeply. Upon asking, I learned that…
My father encountered months of continuous rain on this trip, and the tea he bought got wet due to improper storage.
By the time the silver arrived in Shengjing (the capital), it had already gone moldy, and the more than 200,000 taels of silver were all wasted.
Wang Decai was dumbfounded.
Within a few days, both parents fell ill from worry and stress, becoming increasingly thin and bedridden. All the doctors said they were helpless and left shaking their heads.
His parents passed away less than a month later, leaving him all alone.
After burying his parents, he wasn't particularly sad or heartbroken; instead, he felt a sense of freedom.
Although he lost all his money, his vast fortune remained, and he continued to indulge in drinking, gambling, and whoring every day.
As the saying goes, building a business is like picking up soil with a needle, while squandering a fortune is like sand being washed away by waves.
In just one year, Wang Decai pawned all the dazzling items in his house, leaving him with nothing but bare walls. In the end, he lost his house in a cockfight.
He became homeless, and his former friends treated him like a plague, looking at him with disgust.
Unable to stay in his hometown any longer, he began begging and wandering the streets...
That year, near the Spring Festival, he arrived in Qingshui Town, hungry and cold. He huddled in a dilapidated temple and fell seriously ill.
He was begging for food with his broken body when he fainted at the entrance of Qingshui Restaurant, where Wu Shiren saved his life out of kindness.
Having experienced both wealth and poverty, and having witnessed countless instances of coldness and indifference, he became exceptionally adept at navigating social situations. Wu Shiren then hired him as a waiter in the shop.
Because of his eloquence and his ability to read and do accounting, he was promoted to accountant in less than six months.
From then on, they settled down and built their lives in Qingshui Town.
Initially, out of gratitude, he diligently and meticulously managed the accounts.
As the saying goes, it's easier to change mountains and rivers than to change one's nature; a wolf can't stop eating meat, and a dog can't stop eating excrement.
As time went by, his纨绔 (spoiled brat) side began to emerge.
He looked down on his wife at home and developed a fondness for brothels.
But that meager wage wasn't enough for him to squander, so he set his sights on the money in the accounts, and from then on, he couldn't stop...
Wang Decai, his eyes bloodshot, charged at Chen Feng like a madman, grabbing his neck with both hands. "Why did you expose me? I'll kill you, I'll kill you, you little bastard..."
Chen Feng never expected Wang Decai to attack him. Since he had just recovered from his injuries, he was powerless to resist and was held tightly by the neck, unable to break free.
Chen Qingqing quickly inserted the silver needles into the acupoints on Wang Decai's wrist.
Wang Decai felt pain in his hand and had to let go.
Chen Feng's face turned red from holding his breath. Once relieved, he coughed a few times and immediately took deep breaths.
Qin Shousheng was startled by this sudden action. With a 'smack,' he slammed his gavel and stood up.
"You audacious scoundrel, how dare you commit violence in front of me! Guards, tie up this Wang Decai!"
Several constables came up and, without saying a word, tied Wang Decai up tightly.
Taking advantage of the opportunity, Chen Qingqing shouted, "Sir, Wang Decai dared to kill my elder brother in front of you, which is enough to prove that my brother's injury was caused by them. I beg you, sir, to do justice for my elder brother."
Qin Shousheng hadn't expected things to develop this way. He frowned and looked at Chen Qingqing, "Miss Chen, rest assured, I will not let a bad person go unpunished, nor will I wrong any good person."
Then, with a look of doubt on his face, he asked, "I want to know where these account books came from, and what their connection is to this case?"
“These ledgers were discovered by my elder brother by accident. It was because my elder brother discovered that Wang Decai had embezzled money from the accounts that he was afraid my elder brother would tell Wu Shiren, so he took advantage of the time when my elder brother was being held captive to kill him.”
Qin Shousheng nodded, then asked Chen Feng, "Chen Feng, since Wang Decai embezzled the money, he naturally wouldn't let anyone find out. How did you get it? Tell me the truth quickly."
......
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