A muffled sobbing came from within the room, and a gloomy cloud seemed to hang over the entire Gao household.
“My Lord, Madam and the others are all safe. They passed by the residence of the retired Minister Song and were invited to stay,” an advisor whispered.
Gao Lingjun sat with his hands on his knees, tears streaming down his face.
“Why did Shi’si follow them?” he asked. “Wasn’t he supposed to stay where he was?”
As he spoke, he suddenly raised a hand and overturned the table before him.
The advisors in the room couldn’t help but take a step back.
“What about the others? The men who were with him? How did they watch over Shi’si? Were they just there to watch him die?”
“Young Master did not go. Everyone acted according to your orders, my lord,” another advisor hurriedly explained. “They only visited old friends and detoured to wait on the other side. They did not personally take part in the ambush.”
“I knew it. My son may be reckless, but he still follows orders when it comes to important matters,” Gao Lingjun wept.
Shi’si, his Shi’si.
“My Lord, Young Master was ambushed and killed,” the advisor said.
“When I arrived on the scene, over twenty people were already dead,” the messenger knelt on the ground, trembling as he spoke. “Judging by the scene, they were pursued and killed by a large group. The over twenty men suffered different fatal injuries, and the young master was killed by a dart piercing his throat. I don’t know how many opponents there were. I didn’t dare stay and rushed back immediately to report.”
A pierced throat…
What in the world could be more agonizing than hearing the gruesome details of your own son’s death?
Gao Lingjun began to weep again.
“We are investigating who did this…” an advisor murmured quietly.
“There’s no need to investigate,” Gao Lingjun cried out. “What’s left to investigate? Isn’t it obvious?”
Who you want to kill, that person will also want to kill you.
This was an opportunity – your opportunity, and inevitably, someone else’s opportunity as well.
Gao Lingjun suddenly raised his head.
“Oh no!” he exclaimed, his grief-stricken face instantly transforming with alarm.
…
The magistrate of Qingyuan suddenly let out a sneeze.
The gradually brightening dawn light began to disperse the chill of the night.
However, as he looked at the scene before him, the magistrate felt a bone-deep chill and trembled all over.
The bodies had already been arranged and carried to the roadside, and one by one, people were covering them with white cloths or mats.
Normally, the authorities would rarely do this. But deep down, he knew the true origins of the figures he was about to face this time. So he had called for these coverings, thinking that it would at least offer some semblance of dignity and show a bit of respect.
Before the magistrate now lay a corpse that had not yet been covered with a mat. The body’s clothes were disheveled and covered in blood. The large head bore a contorted, fierce expression, vividly revealing the agony of its final moments.
“Gao… Gao…” the magistrate’s teeth chattered as he uttered a blurred word.
“My lord?” an attendant beside him asked in confusion.
Why had the magistrate’s expression suddenly changed so dramatically?
Was he frightened by the sight of so many corpses?
Probably. Ever since arriving here, the magistrate had been avoiding eye contact, as if wanting to look but not daring to. Finally gathering the courage to glance over, he must have been shocked after all.
If this corpse were still alive, many people would have fallen over themselves to kneel and kiss the soles of his feet – not show the contempt and disgust now evident in their expressions.
These people simply didn’t recognize whose body this was.
How could the lowly clerks and runners possibly recognize someone so far above them? Just catching a glimpse would be considered a great blessing.
For someone so exalted – how many bribes and gifts had he himself sent before securing a single audience? And that one meeting had landed him this lucrative vacancy.
And now… such a person had become a corpse?
No, that’s not right, that’s not how it was supposed to be?
“…How ruthless these bandits are… absolutely outrageous…” The magistrate runners on the side, having received their instructions, stood with hands on their hips and shouted with feigned righteous anger.
No! That’s wrong!
The magistrate of Qingyuan suddenly cried out.
Urgent hoofbeats sounded in the distance. Everyone looked up to see a group of over ten men galloping toward them.
“Who are you?” shouted a magistrate runner stationed at the outer perimeter, responsible for maintaining order, raising his waist sword while attempting to block their path.
The arrivals did not slow down; one of them swung his whip and sent the magistrate runner tumbling aside.
“Magistrate of Qingyuan!” The leader of the group, his face livid with anger, pointed a trembling finger at the quaking magistrate. “What are you doing here? Who told you to come?”
Who told me to come?
Wasn’t it you who told me to come?
The magistrate stared at the man on horseback, utterly bewildered.
In the distance, the sound of gongs and drums echoed continuously.
“…Government forces are in pursuit of murderous bandits. All bystanders, make way…”
The clanging of the gongs and drums gradually faded into the distance, seemingly beating the entire sky into brightness.
The expressions on the faces of the men on horseback grew even uglier.
“Damn you, Magistrate of Qingyuan!” One of them swung his whip viciously down. “What were you told originally? You don’t move unless we call for you! What the hell are you doing now? Our young master was killed by enemies in an ambush, not by bandits!”
The magistrate was struck by the whip and fell to the ground. The people around him were stunned, frozen in place; none dared step forward.
“My lord,” the magistrate scrambled to his feet, shouting at the men on horseback while pointing frantically behind him. “It was truly your people who came to summon me last night… The man is right…”
He turned to look. Beside him were only yamen runners and his own servants and attendants – there wasn’t a single unfamiliar face.
The messenger who had come with the Gao family token to report the news had vanished at some point, as if he had never existed.
Oh no!
We’ve been tricked!
This ambush didn’t just claim the life of Young Master Gao – it claimed me as well.
The magistrate thudded to his knees.
“Oh no!” he cried out in a trembling voice, pointing frantically in a direction. “Quick, go after them–”
After the man who went to report to the capital!
Hurry, go after him! Bring him back!
…
A horse galloped fiercely, splattering mud across the wide road.
Whoosh! A long arrow shot straight into the neck of the rider. Without even a grunt, the man tumbled from his horse. Startled, the horse neighed and turned to run back the way it came.
From behind a large tree at the roadside, three figures emerged and hurried over. One of them stripped the clothes from the fallen magistrate runner, put them on, then retrieved a letter from the runner’s chest. Opening it, he confirmed in the faint pre-dawn light the bright red official seal of the Qingyuan County government, then safely tucked it away. Mounting the horse, he sped off.
The remaining two hauled the yamen runner’s body to the roadside, threw it into a pit that had been dug earlier, hastily covered it over, and rode away.
The eastern sky grew pale, and with a few creaks and groans, the heavy city gates of the capital slowly swung open.
A crowd of commoners had already gathered before the gates. As the doors parted, they surged forward.
“Stop shoving,” a city guard scolded irritably, selecting a few who looked unpleasant to his eyes for searches.
Zhou Fu led his team of armored soldiers straight in without delay.
Right by the city gate was a tea-soup stall. A night-shift operation, it was already starting to pack up in the early morning. Zhou Fu dismounted and sat down there.
“Honorable Officer…”
“Young Master Zhou?”
Both the tea-soup vendor and the armored soldiers voiced their confusion.
“I’ll just have a bowl of tea soup, nothing else,” Zhou Fu said. This was directed at the vendor.
He then turned to the armored soldiers.
“Do as you please. After eating, no delays, no going home. Return to the barracks immediately.”
The soldiers responded with chuckles of “Yes, sir!” and scattered to find stalls that appealed to them.
A customer arriving couldn’t very well be turned away, especially when it was a city patrol officer. Annoying them could easily lead to them finding an excuse to overturn your stall.
So, the tea-soup vendor called out an acknowledgment, brewed a bowl of tea soup, and even offered a complimentary plate of pickled fish.
“This is called the ‘clamped fish,'” the vendor said with a grin. “It’s made using a secret recipe from Minister Chen’s household for their ‘clamped sparrows.'”
Minister Chen’s sparrows.
Zhou Fu couldn’t help but look over and smile.
Passing Immortal, eat-as-you-please, clamped sparrows, clamped fish… She really had brought quite a few new dishes to the capital.
He slowly picked up a piece and ate it, all the while watching the city gate with a nonchalant air.
A herd of cattle and sheep were entering the city, making the gate area noisy.
“Urgent report! Urgent report!”
Someone shouted as he galloped forward on horseback.
Hearing the words “urgent report” and seeing the magistrate runner’s uniform on the approaching rider, the city guards quickly cleared a path.
“Urgent report from Qingyuan County!”
The magistrate runner passed through the gate, threaded his way through the chaotic herd of cattle and sheep, and shouted loudly, drawing the attention of everyone on the street.
“Bandits have raided and killed!”
Zhou Fu also sprang to his feet, watching the magistrate runner speed past on the street.
The people on the street were already buzzing with discussion.
“Bandits,” the tea-soup stall owner also stepped over, tsk-tsking as he looked down the street. “I heard rumors about bandits causing trouble. Something bad was bound to happen.”
As soon as his words fell, Zhou Fu pulled his horse over, mounted, and galloped toward the city center.
“Hey, you haven’t paid!” the vendor hurriedly called out, but Zhou Fu was already disappearing into the distance without looking back. Sighing, the vendor shook his head, resigning himself to the loss.
On the quiet morning streets, shouts scattered along the road.
“Urgent report! Urgent report! Urgent report from Qingyuan County! Bandits have raided and killed!”
The men who had just stepped out of Rouge Alley were instantly jolted awake, their already weary bodies almost collapsing to the ground.
Bandits!
Food vendors carrying their loads on shoulder poles hurriedly dodged aside. Hearing the cries, they dropped their loads to the ground.
So, the bandits are real!
As the horse raced onward, the tranquil dawn of the entire capital was stirred into a boiling frenzy.
“What’s going on?”
An official, returning from his night duty, lifted the carriage curtain, frowned, and looked outside.
“Making such a racket right in front of the government office so early in the morning.”
“My lord, it’s said to be an urgent report from Qingyuan County,” an attendant by the carriage hurried over and said. “Qingyuan County is reporting bandit raids and killings.”
Bandits?
Mountain bandits and horse thieves aren’t uncommon.
“What’s Qingyuan County making such a fuss about?” the official frowned. “Have they lost their minds over a few bandits?”
“My lord, perhaps they fear taking responsibility,” the attendant smiled. “Maybe the bandits killed some important person. They likely reported it to avoid punishment, since the incident occurred within Qingyuan County’s borders.”
That’s how these low-level officials are – either hiding problems or shifting blame.
The official shook his head, then suddenly paused.
Qingyuan County… an important person…
Based on the timing, a significant figure passing through Qingyuan County around now…
“Oh no!” His expression instantly changed, and the words escaped his lips.
…
The man shouting the urgent report outside the gate had already flashed past in the blink of an eye. The three advisors remained standing there, dumbfounded, feeling a chill permeating their entire bodies.
What a perfect plan, what a flawless procedure – a single touch setting everything in motion, each link tightly interlocked.
In truth, they had imagined this scene before.
They just hadn’t expected that when it actually unfolded before their eyes, what awaited them wouldn’t be cheers and celebration.
Everything had gone according to plan – except it was someone else’s plan.
“Excellent! Excellent!”
Suddenly, Gao Lingjun’s roar came from behind them.
The people at the gate finally snapped back to reality and hurriedly turned to look. They saw that Gao Lingjun had, at some point, also come to the entrance. His face was now flushed and then pale, his eyes bulging wide.
Excellent, excellent! How very fitting, Prince of Jin’an!
What in the world could be more agonizing than hearing the gruesome details of your own son’s death?
It is to have personally arranged the burial and cover-up of the truth of your son’s death!
Suddenly, Gao Lingbo remembered the last time – stealing someone else’s possession only to be poisoned by it, unable to make a sound, like a mute forced to swallow bitter herbs, unable to voice the pain.
And now, this time, attempting to kill someone only to be killed in return – it was like having a tooth knocked out and having to swallow both the tooth and the blood.
Excellent, excellent! How very fitting, Duke Jin’an!
No, no. Duke Jin’an absolutely couldn’t have done this alone. This way of acting, this style – it could only be that girl!
Lady Cheng!
Gao Lingjun felt a sudden heat in his chest. He opened his mouth and wretched, spewing a mouthful of blood.
The courtyard instantly erupted into screams and chaos.
Staring at the pool of blood on the ground, amidst the confusion, one advisor stood somewhat dazed.
Spitting blood again.
And it hasn’t been long since the last time.
Then… will there be a third time?
The advisor couldn’t help but shudder.
How did things ever come to this?
*grinning for ear to ear*