Chapter 11 11. Invisible and silent
Daming Palace, even at night, bright lights still illuminate every corner.The lights illuminate the pavilions and halls from bottom to top, making them appear more magnificent, magnificent, and magnificent.
The two carriages stopped at the east corner gate of the Daming Palace. They got out of the carriages, and led by the eunuchs holding palace lanterns, they went all the way in and went straight to the Yongchun Palace at the corner of the palace city.
However, the walls of Yongchun Palace were thick and the door was not opened here. They could only walk westward along the tall palace wall, walk all the way to the south wall, and continue walking northward around the corner.A side door was opened there for people to enter and exit.
Yongchun Hall was originally intended to be a warehouse in the palace, so the high walls are tight, and only one west side door is opened, and the main door is opened to the north.Unexpectedly, because it was too tight and dark, the paintings, calligraphy and silks inside were prone to mildew, so they had to be discarded, and two low rockeries were placed in the courtyard to dilute the rigidity of the warehouse and prepare for people to live in.
"Who knows that the most secure place in the palace can't guard against that rumor. Alas, it's God's will to trick people." Cui Chunzhan led the three of them to go inward as he spoke, but he heard a commotion inside. Several people are arguing.
Entering the door is the outer hall, they stood on the outer hall, and saw that the people who were arguing were several members of the Langya Wang family.Huang Zixia saw Wang Yun at a glance, followed by his father, Shangshu Wang Lin.
I only heard Wang Yun say: "If the king is a daughter of our royal family, then she was originally destined for Princess Kui. The girl who has not left the court is so delicate and precious. How can I let Wuzuo open her body to examine her body? This is absolutely impossible!"
Wang Shangshu said distressedly: "You also know that your father and I are the Minister of the Ministry of Punishment. Based on reason and law, people who die violently should carefully inspect the remains. What's more, this matter is so involved and has such a huge impact. If we don't inspect it, Not to mention that it is difficult to explain to the imperial court, but what should we say to the Kui Palace?"
"Could it be that the queen-to-be is being autopsied and her guts searched, so Prince Kui will be proud? Even if anyone can say yes to this matter, I think the queen must not allow it! If you don't believe me, I will go to the queen now."
Wang Yun didn't give her father any face at all, and was about to walk away, but when she turned her head, she saw Li Shubai and Huang Zixia standing on the veranda of the outer hall, and she couldn't help being startled.
A rare smile appeared on Li Shubai's face, he walked towards them and said, "Wang Yunye knows me, so I don't want to let you touch Wang Ruo's body, so I have brought a best candidate."
Wang Yun and others hurriedly saw him. He signaled Zhou Ziqin to examine the corpse, and said, "I think everyone knows this man. The son of Zhou Xiang and Minister Zhou is quite accomplished in autopsy, so I asked him to follow me." Come here, you don't need tools, just take a look at the cause of Wang Ruo's death."
"My lord is still thoughtful." Wang Lin heaved a sigh of relief and immediately agreed.
Zhou Ziqin pleaded guilty to all members of the Wang clan, and then took Huang Zixia into the East Pavilion of Yongchun Hall.
Thousands of lights were lit in the East Pavilion, illuminating the interior of the pavilion brightly. Everything was exactly the same as the day of the accident. Although they searched carefully, the people who searched always remembered that this was the palace, and tried their best to restore it to its original state afterwards. But in this exactly the same environment, under the bright light, lay a girl who had changed beyond recognition.She was wearing a yellow shirt, her hair was tied loosely in a long bun, and her feet were wearing plain silk shoes, exactly the same as the day she disappeared. However, the skin on her whole body was festered and black, pus and blood flowed horizontally, and the original face of that face could not be seen for a long time. No one could see from such a corpse how beautiful her youth was. Huang Zixia stared at her silently, and for a moment the day when she disappeared flashed through her mind, a hairpin with dewy leaves and veins on her temples, and her pearly and jade face complemented each other. However, she was in a trance for a moment, then she pursed her lips and walked to the bed where the corpse was lying. Zhou Ziqin pulled a chair and sat in front of the bed, took out a pair of tanned extremely thin and soft leather gloves and put them on his hands, then bent down, first held her face and looked closely. Rao Huang Zixia, who is used to seeing corpses, would not be able to see such a face with pus and blood flowing, swollen and blurred.She turned her head and asked, "Didn't you bring your tools? When did you bring these gloves?" "When I went out in the morning. I heard that there was a murder near the Xingqing Palace. It seemed that someone was poisoned to death, so I quickly took it with me. I didn't expect it to be useless at the time, but now it is useful." Zhou Ziqin explained with a serious face, Leaning down to look at the seven orifices of the corpse, he opened his mouth to check the tongue and teeth inside, "When testing a poisoned corpse, especially this kind of poison, if you scratch a little skin during the inspection and the poisonous blood seeps in, you will be immediately inspected." It's too bad, so you have to wear gloves." Huang Zixia didn't want to hear what he said, so she just asked: "Since the deceased was wearing Wang Ruo's clothes, is his age and figure suitable?" "The deceased was a young woman. She was slender and tall, about five feet seven inches. This kind of height is relatively rare among women, and it basically fits. I don't know if there are any moles, moles, birthmarks, etc. on Wang Ruo's body. ?” "Let me think about it..." She tried to recall her previous contact with Wang Ruo, "There are no moles and birthmarks, but there seems to be a little freckle on the right wrist, can you see it?" Zhou Ziqin rolled up her right sleeve, looked at it, and said dejectedly: "I suspect that the poison spread from the right hand to the whole body. You see, the degree of poisoning is the deepest here, and the skin is so dark that you can't see it at all, let alone freckles." , even the mole may not be visible." "Yeah." Huang Zixia looked at the swollen black and purple hands, a little sadly thinking of the pair of slender and beautiful jade hands protruding from her sleeves in the carriage when she met Wang Ruo for the first time. The palms of her hands that she couldn't bear to look at made her chest twitch slightly, "This hand...how could it be so swollen? Her previous hands were so slender and soft that everyone would envy them." "Is it slender?" Zhou Ziqin took the giant palm of the corpse, touched it from the palm to all the fingers, and said, "Impossible, the bones in her palm are relatively large among the female corpses I have examined. Yes, even before, it couldn’t be considered slender, right?” Huang Zixia let out a "huh" in surprise, looked at the swollen dark purple hands, then bumped Zhou Ziqin's shoulder with his elbow, and said, "Give me the gloves." Zhou Ziqin looked at her suspiciously and asked, "Why?" She didn't speak, but raised her chin and narrowed her eyes, Zhou Ziqin immediately obediently took off the gloves and gave them to her. Although it was a pair of soft leather tight-fitting gloves, men's gloves were relatively large after all, and Huang Zixia felt a little loose when wearing them.She didn't care about this anymore, pinched the hand of the female corpse through the glove, and compared it with the female corpse's hand through the glove - the swelling can only expand horizontally, but after all, the fingers will not grow too much, and the other party However, her fingers were longer than her pair of big hands that Chen Nianniang called suitable for playing the piano. Zhou Ziqin said beside him: "Look, although you are a man, I guess you must have been cleansed when you were very young, so your hands are smaller than hers." "What does clean body have to do with the size of your palm?" Huang Zixia thought to herself, pinching her own bones through the glove, and then pinching the opponent's bones. Although it was difficult to touch the bones because of the swollen flesh, she tried to pinch it inch by inch, and finally touched something hard, which confirmed what Zhou Ziqin said—the bones in these hands were definitely not slender. Zhou Ziqin said nervously beside him: "Chonggu, don't use too much force, the skin is already festered, and it won't be good if you crush it..." Huang Zixia quickly relaxed her fingers, and turned to see if the female corpse's palm was crushed by herself.Fortunately, it was only broken a little on the edge of the lower palm, and there happened to be a thin layer of white floating skin there, although it was pinched by her, it did not bleed. "This, it should be a thin layer of cocoon, so it doesn't matter if it breaks. Besides, the skin of her whole body is already festered, and no one cares about a little bit of cocoon skin," Zhou Ziqin said, carefully examining where her cocoon was. Seeing that it was on the edge of the palm under the little finger, I couldn't help but slightly frowned, "It's so strange, it's the first time I've seen cocoons grow here after so many years." "Well, logically speaking, the place where a person's palm is exerting force is at the mouth of the tiger, and the edge of the outer palm should be the place where calluses are least likely to grow." Huang Zixia observed carefully, and saw the fingertips of the middle three fingers of the left hand and the thumb of the right hand. He also has a slightly hard skin. He pondered for a long time, making gestures such as writing, embroidering, starching, and pounding clothes, but failed to draw any conclusions. Zhou Ziqin put away the gloves she took off, and said: "Other than that, there is nothing worth paying attention to. This woman should be from a good family background, her hair and teeth are very shiny, and there seems to be no trace of heavy labor on her body. Now Wearing Wang Ruo's clothes and appearing in the Yongchun Palace, it is difficult to distinguish the face, if we say it is not Wang Ruo, it seems that we can't come up with strong evidence..." Huang Zixia said cleanly: "In order not to startle the snake, you should first record it in the autopsy book, but don't tell the truth directly, just tell the cause of death."
The two opened the door and went to the outer hall to see everyone waiting. Zhou Ziqin bowed to everyone, then held the post-mortem file in his hand, and only briefly said: "The inspection is complete: the deceased is a certain woman, five feet seven inches in length, with a blurred face, black and swollen skin all over her body, and pus and blood all over her body. The deceased The teeth are complete, the hair is shiny, and the hair reaches knee length, and there is no trauma to the whole body, so he should have died of poisoning." Wang Lin lamented again and again, and said: "Hateful, too hateful! I never thought that my niece would die in the palace!" Behind him, Wang Ruo and the two brothers who came from Langye to prepare for the big wedding also showed miserable faces.The older one asked, "I don't know the cause of my sister's death?" "Death from poisoned arrow wood is undoubtedly." Zhou Ziqin replied. "Poison arrow wood..." No one had heard of this name before, only Wang Yun asked: "But the poison that the Nanman called 'seeing blood to seal the throat'?" "Yeah, it's rare in the capital city. But last night, a few people died from this poison." Zhou Ziqin looked at Huang Zixia, and seeing that she didn't seem to explain to them, he closed his mouth and stopped talking. Not long after, Queen Wang also came in person.She glanced at the female corpse on the bed through the window, and turned around immediately. Fortunately, Chang Ling behind her hurriedly supported her so that she didn't fall to the ground. Queen Wang staggered and left without saying a word. Changqing led a group of people from the inner court to clean up the body overnight, and the group of people were silent.The Wang family's carriage loaded the coffin and left. Li Shubai stood at the gate of the palace and watched them go. Zhou Ziqin rushed to Cui Chunzhan's carriage, Huang Zixia pulled the horse that had been dismounted and prepared to climb up, Li Shubai, who was sitting in the carriage, looked over from the window, she had no choice but to withdraw her feet from the stirrups, got into the carriage, and sat there as usual On a low stool. The chariots and horses headed all the way to Yongjiafang Kuiwang's Mansion in the dark night. Li Shubai didn't look at her all the way, but only touched the glass bottle for fish keeping with his fingers, causing the little red fish inside to keep chasing after his fingers with its tulle-like tail. "I've heard the autopsy results, what else have you said?" Sitting on a low stool, Huang Zixia looked at the little fish with her chin resting on her chin, and said, "It is true that she died of poisonous arrow wood, and the time of death was yesterday. But unlike those beggars, her throat is not as swollen as it looks, so The poison that caused her death was not in the food, but the trauma—if Zhou Ziqin can dissect the corpse, this point should be clearer.” "If it is a trauma, where is the injury?" "This is another strange place. Although her whole body is festered and swollen, there is no trace of sharp weapon damage on her body. Judging from the traces of skin discoloration, it is most likely that the poison spread from the right hand, and then spread throughout the whole body." "The right hand," Li Shubai was thinking, "is it possible for the poisonous arrow wood to penetrate into the skin and kill people?" "No, so how the deceased was poisoned is still a mystery." Li Shubai's eyes turned from Xiaoyu's body to her face, and suddenly asked: "Before, when your parents passed away and you escaped from Sichuan in men's clothing, along the way... no one suspected that you were a woman?" Huang Zixia, who rested his chin and looked at the little fish, was puzzled. He didn't know why he suddenly brought up this matter: "No, since I was young, I have been dressed as a man and followed my father to investigate cases. , but there is no danger." He didn't respond to her puzzled expression, just staring at her appearance.The girl in the crimson eunuch's attire knelt down on the low stool and looked at herself with her right hand. Those eyes, under the flickering light in the carriage at this time, were as clear as the dew in the heart of hibiscus in the morning.During the turbulence, her eyelashes fluttered occasionally, and the dew-like eyes seemed to flow with brilliance in an instant with the slight swaying of the flowers in the wind. The corners of his lips, which had been tightly pressed all the time, raised slightly at this moment. Huang Zixia touched her face inexplicably, and was still hesitating, but he had already turned his head away, without correcting her overly girlish posture, and only asked, "Apart from that, what traces are there on the corpse? For example— —Is that corpse Wang Ruo’s?” Huang Zixia was slightly surprised: "My lord has never seen the body, so you think so?" "I believe there is a reason for everything. The one who deliberately used poisonous arrow wood to make the corpse so unsightly and unrecognizable must be trying to cover up something." "My lord guessed right. The corpse is not Wang Ruo, because although the flesh is hard to identify, the bones cannot be forged. The bones in the palm of that corpse are much larger than Wang Ruo's." Huang Zixia said, raising his right hand and turning it over. Palm looked in front of him, "There is one more thing that I can't figure out, and that is the distribution of calluses on the female corpse's hand—the fingertips of the middle three fingers of the left hand, the thumb of the right hand, and the edge of the palm of the right hand, here—" She gesticulated with her hand and pointed it to Li Shubai, "There is a thin layer of callus on the edge of the palm under the little finger. Although it may not be visible at ordinary times, the skin on this side is slightly harder than other places. Skin." "The movements here are often used, and it's really rare." Li Shubai spread out his slender white hands, then closed them with fists, made a gesture, thoughtful. Huang Zixia asked: "Does the lord have any clues?" "Just now I felt like there was a movement that flashed by in front of me, but I couldn't remember it in a hurry," he said with a frown, and he simply let go of his hand, saying, "The biggest point of this case should lie in the 'invisible 'Two words." Huang Zixia nodded, and said: "The sudden appearance and disappearance of the man in Xianyou Temple, Wang Ruo's disappearance before our eyes under the heavy guard, and even the non-existing wound on the female corpse's hand are all invisible and invisible. Solve the riddle." "Actually, sometimes, it's like juggling. It's just because it's a simple trick from an angle that ordinary people don't expect, but the bystanders can't know the truth because they can't turn their minds. Another possibility... As Li Shubai said, he picked up the glass bottle on the small table with his own hand, and lifted it to the side of the car light. At the moment of approaching the blazing light, the clear and clear glass bottle and clear water disappeared instantly, and Huang Zixia saw a little red fish floating quietly on Li Shubai's palm in a daze, like a phantom under the light. "Another possibility is that it is clearly in front of us, but because of the angle and feeling, we lose our judgment and think it doesn't exist." Huang Zixia stared at the little red fish, breathed a sigh of relief, and murmured: "In all the cases I have seen so far, there is no one with more clues, more messy clues, and more impossible to start than this." "More than that. If you continue to investigate, you will find that there is an even more terrifying undercurrent behind this case." Li Shubai put the glass bottle in his hand back on the table, and a faint smile appeared on the corner of his lips, "This The case will relate to the ups and downs of the empress' power in the harem and court, the ups and downs of the Langya royal family, the survival of King Yi's lineage, the remnants of the traitor Pang Xun, and even..." Having said that, he didn't say anything, just looked at the little red fish. The expression on that face was obviously calm and calm, but it made Huang Zixia vaguely feel a stagnation in her chest, and there was an invisible coercion that made her It was almost difficult to breathe. She looked at his indifferent side, thinking in her heart, even, what is it?Is there anything higher than the aristocratic families, relatives of the emperor, and remnants of rebels he listed?What is such an unattainable existence? She looked at the little red fish in front of her that seemed to be able to be crushed to death with two fingers, and remembered what Li Shubai said when she talked about the little red fish when they met for the first time—— Huang Zixia stared at this ignorant little red fish.What is the origin of this little red fish that Li Shubai has been carrying around all the time, and what kind of secret is it related to? The light on the car fluctuated slightly with the ups and downs of the car body, shining on Li Shubai's face. His extremely clear and clean side profile was not weakened by the light like that glazed cup.Behind the light, his usually elegant and elegant face appeared extremely bright and eye-catching. She looked at Li Shubai quietly, in the slightly bumpy car, she suddenly felt a sense of God's will.
The second day was fine weather. King Kui's Mansion, Yubing Pavilion. In front of Li Shubai and Huang Zixia was a piece of paper seven feet long and one foot eight wide, filled with densely packed small characters. "This should be almost all the clues in this case." Huang Zixia said. Li Shubai stood in front of the case and read each item. Li Shubai looked it over, pointed his finger next to the word "Jin Nu", and said, "Jin Nu is gone." "What? Missing?" Huang Zixia looked at him in surprise. "Yesterday after you talked about Jinnu, I took the time to ask someone to investigate, and it turned out that she didn't return to the Jiaofang yesterday, and she still hasn't come back until this morning." "The sudden disappearance at this moment is related to this case?" She asked immediately. "I don't know. After all, in recent years, the women in Jiaofang have been seldom controlled, and there are often many who don't come home at night. It's just that even the people I sent can't find out her whereabouts, so it seems a bit secretive," he said, turning The paper was put into the Boshan furnace and burned, then he turned around and sat down on the chair, and said, "Leave Jinnu alone, and deal with those who have motives and suspicions." Huang Zixia hesitated, and said: "If you look at it from the outside, first, she should be Princess Qile. She has motives, and everyone in Beijing knows that she admires you; In the palace." Li Shubai sneered: "What else?" "Secondly, Prince E. I don't know if he was the one who went to Xishi to learn magic tricks. Although the motive for taking in Chen Nianniang is plausible, it seems a bit too coincidental." "other?" "Third, the remnants of the rebellious party Pang Xun took this opportunity to take revenge on the prince." "and also?" Huang Zixia hesitated for a long time before saying: "People in the court who disagree with the prince's political views or who intend to suppress the prince's family." "Speaking of which, there are a lot of candidates." Li Shubai had that half-smile expression on his face again, and asked casually, "Is there anything else?" "There are still a few less likely guesses, such as Wang Ruo being on Langya's side, or Feng Yiniang's enemy on Yangzhou's side." "But there are more signs that this case is coming for me, isn't it?" "Yes," Huang Zixia nodded, "So it is very unlikely that their former enemies will be hunted down to the capital, let alone have a way to act in the palace." "About the truth of the case, there is another possibility that you didn't mention." Li Shubai leaned back in the chair, looking at her with slightly raised lips. Huang Zixia went through the case again in his mind in amazement, and said, "I don't know...what did I miss?" "It's what everyone in Beijing agrees that ghosts and gods are at work." Li Shubai folded his arms and leaned on the chair, the cold smile on his face became more obvious, "Isn't it? Pang Xun, who was shot by me, must realize that picture." The talisman cursed me, that’s why I first left an arrow warning in Xianyou Temple, and then took away my quasi-wangfei in the midst of heavy troops, and finally sent the body of the tragically dead princess back to the original place.” "That's right, as long as you explain it like this, then the motive, method, and process are all complete." Huang Zixia said. "If you really can't find it, then let the Criminal Ministry and Dali Temple close the case like this." Huang Zixia shook his head slowly, and said: "I will definitely find out the truth. This murderer not only killed Wang Ruo, but also implicated Feng Yiniang and several innocent beggars. Even for Chen Nianniang, even for beggars who no one cares about, I must also bring the murderer to justice. Besides—” Li Shubai looked at her, and saw that she had a determined expression, and there was no hesitation in her eyes. She looked at him with burning eyes, and her voice was hoarse and determined with exhaustion. "If I can't help you solve this case, how can I go back to Shuzhong to clear the vengeance of my parents and family?" Li Shubai naturally remembered her promise to him, so he didn't speak.He stared at the girl in front of him, while her eyes were cast on the sky beyond the window. As if remembering something, she suddenly turned her head to look at him again, and asked, "By the way, how is your talisman now?" "Guess?" He stood up and went to the cabinet behind to take out a small square box. The square box has no open lock, only ninety-nine and eighty-one grids on the lid, and eighty blocks are arranged, with scattered characters written on them. Huang Zixia knew that this was the Jiugong Lock, and the box could only be opened if the eighty characters were in the correct place, otherwise, the box could only be opened by destroying the box. She turned her head away, naturally not looking at how the words on Li Shubai's box were arranged.The box was opened, and Li Shubai reached into it, and took out another small oval ball.The ball is semicircular and placed firmly on the table.There are thin cracks in the upper hemisphere, just like an egg cut out into the shape of a lotus flower. The lower base is round, with a total of three circles, each with tiny protrusions. "There are twenty-four small bumps on each of the three circles of keys, all of which can be rotated left and right. The ball can only be opened after they are all aligned in the correct position. Otherwise, the contents inside will be opened before the ball is opened. In an instant, it was twisted into pieces." Li Shubai said while adjusting the dark spots. It seems that Li Shubai really hid the talisman very well. After the next three rotations to the correct position, Li Shubai put the ball on the table, raised his hand and pressed the dome, the ball like a lotus was pulled by the machine, and suddenly burst into pieces , like a lotus flower carved from wood, blooming instantly in front of them. In the middle of the lotus flowers, there is the spell lying quietly. The paper of the talisman is thick and yellowish, two inches wide and eight inches long. On the strange shading, the six characters "Widowed, Disabled, Lonely, Disabled, Disabled" are still as clear as before. On the character "孤", the bloody circle is still dripping red.But on the word "widower", the original bright red circle has faded away, leaving only a little red trace, just like the original "remnant", the blood color that has been circled has faded away. Huang Zixia looked up at Li Shubai in astonishment. He flicked his hands lightly, and the blooming sphere was the same as it was at the beginning, and the petals closed and returned to a half ellipse. "Obviously, with Wang Ruo's death, this marriage has disappeared—I seem to have escaped another cursed disaster." Li Shubai didn't seem to care, he put the ball back into the square box, disrupted the Jiugong lock on it, and put it in the cabinet as before, with the same calm expression as before. Huang Zixia asked silently: "Has this talisman of yours been properly kept here?" "I don't know if it's appropriate, at least I never show it to others," he slowly raised his eyes to look at her, and said, "Perhaps it can be said that after leaving Xuzhou, you were the only one who saw it besides me." In Huang Zixia's heart, a trace of strange blood surged unknowingly. She looked up and saw his gaze, which was secluded and deep.He seemed to be looking at her, but he didn't seem to be looking at her.He is looking at some distant and illusory things, or maybe, he is just looking at something that is close but out of reach. Huang Zixia involuntarily turned her face to the side, avoiding his eyes, and looked out of the window as if evading. In the Yubing Pavilion, only the sound of two people's breathing echoed softly, and the chirping of birds outside the window was mixed with the chirping of cicadas, which made people suddenly realize that late spring is over and early summer is coming.
In front of Zhou Mansion in Chongrenfang, Huang Zixia went to knock on the door.The porter opened the door and came out. "Uncle, please tell me about your young master. Just say my surname is Yang." The uncle who opened the door hurried back, and several other people invited Huang Zixia to sit down and poured tea.Huang Zixia just sat and listened to their chat while drinking tea. "Is everything packed?" "Okay, it's only one month away from the date of leaving Beijing set by the master, everything needs to be packed." "But the young master doesn't seem too excited recently." "Yes, some time ago, the young master was appointed by the emperor to arrest the head in Chengdu. Wasn't he overjoyed all the time? Why didn't he even leave the door all of a sudden, and stayed in the room all day long?" Several people were talking, and the young master Zhou Ziqin who had been silent for a long time jumped out: "Chong Gu, you are here!" "Young Master!" The gatekeepers hurriedly stood up and greeted each other. "Go ahead," Zhou Ziqin waved his hands casually, only grabbing Huang Zixia and asked, "Is there any new progress in the case? Isn't it?" Huang Zixia shook her head and said, "I just want to discuss with you." "Come in," he pulled her sleeves and hurried inside, "I heard that because the weather is getting hotter, the corpse is too unbearable, even if it is placed in the ice cellar, it has begun to rot , so the empress personally ordered the royal family to send the funeral to Langya immediately on the first seven days." "Well," Huang Zixia and him sat down in the house, and then whispered, "So we'd better find out the truth within the first seven days, otherwise the investigation will be even more troublesome once the body is transported away." "So, those beggars who were killed by me still have no clue..." Zhou Ziqin said dejectedly, "However, how can such a complicated case be found out within four or five days? Even if I am the most enamored The arrival of the admired Huang Zixia may not be able to settle the case..." The corners of Huang Zixia's lips twitched almost invisibly, and he coughed dryly and said, "However, King Kui said that if it is really impossible to find out the truth in a hurry, then we can only disclose in advance that this corpse is not Wang Ruo. As long as If there is no coffin, there will be no conclusion, and we can still buy time to investigate." "Investigate... how to investigate, where to start, where is the clue at the beginning, I have no clue..." Zhou Ziqin grabbed his hair and lay down on the table in distress, "Ah... what if Huang Zixia is here at this time? That's good, she will definitely be able to quickly find the most valuable point to check..." Huang Zixia felt that the corners of her mouth must be twitching again.She managed to control her emotions, and patted the corner of the table: "Okay, King Kui and I have already discussed the case and proposed a direction that we urgently need to find." "What direction?" Zhou Ziqin raised his head. "Jing Xu has already gone to Xuzhou to investigate the disappearance of Pang Xun's arrowhead. If we can understand why the arrowhead that King Kui shot and killed Pang Xun appeared in Xianyou Temple, it may also become an important clue in this case. "She said, took out a silver ingot, and put it on the table in front of her, "And this is the clue that I want to pursue." "Silver ingot? Or half a piece?" Zhou Ziqin took the silver ingot, turned it over, looked at the words on it, and asked, "Are you short of money? I'll lend you!" Huang Zixia was speechless, pointing to the words on the back of the silver ingot: "Look at this." "Deputy envoy Liang Weidong... Zhang Junyi, envoy of the internal treasury, casting silver two." He read, puzzled, "Is there any problem?" "However, the names of these two people are not found in all the silver ingots that have been minted in the inner library over the years." "Privately cast? Or is it fake?" "Privately minted, of course the owner's name will be cast on it. Why pretend to be the inner treasury? It's not fake, but absolutely real silver." Huang Zixia held the ingot of silver, looked at him seriously, and said, "The most important thing Yes, this half silver ingot was found by Prince Kui and I in the East Pavilion when Wang Ruo disappeared. At that time, it was covered by an upside-down teacup and placed on the table. Prince Kui found it while drinking tea. .” Zhou Ziqin said happily: "Prince Kui is indeed one of my generation, and he can drink tea leisurely next to that kind of pus-blooded corpse. It's really a big scene." "The female corpse hadn't appeared at that time, and Wang Ruo had only disappeared for a moment." Huang Zixia couldn't help reminding him. Zhou Ziqin didn't care about these details at all. Holding the silver ingot in his hand, he asked, "So, according to your idea, where should we go next?" "Of course, go to the Ministry of Officials to check the names of officials over the years to see if these two people can be found in the records."
The head of the Ministry of Officials on duty today pinched the note that Huang Zixia handed over, looked at the two names "Liang Weidong and Zhang Junyi" on it, and his face was so bitter that he was about to drip Coptis juice: "You two, I suggest you don't wait, If you can find it in ten and a half months, you are lucky." "Ten days and a half?" Zhou Ziqin was dumbfounded, "It takes so long?" The chief raised his hand and pointed to the two-floor seven-room room in front of him: "Here, there are the archives of the official rosters over the years. From the founding of the dynasty to the present, although some materials have been lost, there are still so many archives-this is just The first row of file rooms couldn’t fit, so three rows of identical files were expanded in the back.” "..." The two stood there, feeling that this matter was really not an option. "What should we do? Is there any way to quickly select the person we want to find from so much information?" Zhou Ziqin asked. Huang Zixia thought for a while, then suddenly walked towards the chief, and said, "Please help me find the official files of Xuzhou for the past ten years." "Xuzhou? I don't think there are too many officials' materials in this kind of place." The chief said, and called a small official, who led them to the fourth room in the second row, opened the door and said, "This is the history Information about officials who came to Xuzhou." Zhou Ziqin stared dumbfounded at the rows of bookshelves, and the distance between the bookshelves was so crowded that no one could walk in. He murmured, "I still feel...the project is huge..." "Thank you, I'll look for it first." Huang Zixia left a sentence and walked into the room. Zhou Ziqin saw her go straight to Xiantong's nine-year official files, took off the large stack of documents from the early years of Dazhong, and quickly opened them to Pang Xun's puppet officials and the court's disposal. The house was a bit dark, and the dust was flying gently in the sunlight that slanted in from the window.Zhou Ziqin turned his head to look at her. Her face, which was originally smeared with yellow powder, was faded by the sun, and looked flawless in the dust. Her long and thick eyelashes covered her eyes like spring dew like butterfly wings. He was stunned for a moment, thinking, Yang Chonggu should have been "castrated" when he was very young, otherwise, how could he be so delicate, with a kind of softness emanating from the inside of the bones.Over the years, he has seen many eunuchs who are as delicate and beautiful as women, but judging from his research on various human bones, he always felt that Yang Chonggu had a completely different feeling—he looked at the eunuch With rounded jaws, slender neck, and slender shoulders, if one day Yang Chonggu only had a skeleton left, he would definitely regard his skeleton as a woman. No wonder there are rumors in the capital that Yang Chonggu is the new favorite of King Kui, who rides in the same car when he goes out, and lives in the same room when he enters... Immediately afterwards, he hastened to forcibly stop himself from having any associations with this little eunuch and King Kui, and hastily picked up the stack of documents from the middle and middle years and flipped through the records on it. There was silence in the room for a while, except for the rustling sound of flipping through books.In the silence, Zhou Ziqin couldn't help but turned to look at Huang Zixia again.I saw her finger sliding all the way to the right, scanning a person's name and regulations at a glance, and then her fingertips finally stopped at one place, and looked back and forth again, let out a sigh of relief, and handed him the booklet in her hand in front of him and said, "Look." Zhou Ziqin looked at it, and saw that it said—— Huang Zixia looked up at him and said, "It seems that the silver ingot was cast privately by Pang Xun when he was trying to establish himself as king." As soon as Zhou Ziqin patted the booklet, disregarding the dust that was flying and filling the air, he shouted in surprise and joy: "It turns out that this matter is caused by the remnants of Pang Xun!" "However, even if it's the remnant of Pang Xun, it's not good to take something, why keep silver ingots?" "Could it be that you want to leave money to buy your life?" Zhou Ziqin stroked his chin thoughtfully, "But how could it be possible that a princess is only worth ten taels of silver?" Huang Zixia ignored him, went to borrow a pen and paper to transcribe the passage, and said, "No matter what, it's still a clue, let's report back to the prince first."
Zhou Ziqin walked out of the bureaucracy with her, it was almost noon, Zhou Ziqin touched his belly and said, "Oh, I'm so hungry, Chonggu, let me treat you to dinner!" Huang Zixia hesitated slightly, and said: "I have to go to the prince's side to answer as soon as possible..." "My lord holds several positions and is so busy every day. It's not the time to leave the office yet. How can I wait for you in the mansion?" Zhou Ziqin said, holding her hand involuntarily, and walked to the West Market, "Come on, come on ，我知道一家特好吃的店，那里的老板做的驴肉太好吃了！你知道为什么吗？因为他切肉时是按照肉的纹理，一丝不苟横切出来的，煮出来就特别入味！说起这个肉啊，我觉得杀禽畜和杀人的时候一样，下刀也是很有讲究的，如果横砍断肌肉纹理的话，伤口绽开来就会像一朵贴梗海棠，而如果顺着纹理竖劈的话，伤口就行云流水，血流起来也就分外流畅，不会喷溅得到处都是……” “血喷溅不喷溅，主要还是看是否砍到了经脉吧。”黄梓瑕打断他的话，补上一句，“要是你再提血肉骨头之类的一个字，我就不吃了。” “那提内脏之类的呢？” 黄梓瑕立即转身要走，周子秦赶紧将她的肩膀扳回来，说：“好啦好啦，我发誓，绝对不提！”
Thousands of lights were lit in the East Pavilion, illuminating the interior of the pavilion brightly. Everything was exactly the same as the day of the accident. Although they searched carefully, the people who searched always remembered that this was the palace, and tried their best to restore it to its original state afterwards. But in this exactly the same environment, under the bright light, lay a girl who had changed beyond recognition.She was wearing a yellow shirt, her hair was tied loosely in a long bun, and her feet were wearing plain silk shoes, exactly the same as the day she disappeared. However, the skin on her whole body was festered and black, pus and blood flowed horizontally, and the original face of that face could not be seen for a long time. No one could see from such a corpse how beautiful her youth was. Huang Zixia stared at her silently, and for a moment the day when she disappeared flashed through her mind, a hairpin with dewy leaves and veins on her temples, and her pearly and jade face complemented each other. However, she was in a trance for a moment, then she pursed her lips and walked to the bed where the corpse was lying. Zhou Ziqin pulled a chair and sat in front of the bed, took out a pair of tanned extremely thin and soft leather gloves and put them on his hands, then bent down, first held her face and looked closely. Rao Huang Zixia, who is used to seeing corpses, would not be able to see such a face with pus and blood flowing, swollen and blurred.She turned her head and asked, "Didn't you bring your tools? When did you bring these gloves?" "When I went out in the morning. I heard that there was a murder near the Xingqing Palace. It seemed that someone was poisoned to death, so I quickly took it with me. I didn't expect it to be useless at the time, but now it is useful." Zhou Ziqin explained with a serious face, Leaning down to look at the seven orifices of the corpse, he opened his mouth to check the tongue and teeth inside, "When testing a poisoned corpse, especially this kind of poison, if you scratch a little skin during the inspection and the poisonous blood seeps in, you will be immediately inspected." It's too bad, so you have to wear gloves." Huang Zixia didn't want to hear what he said, so she just asked: "Since the deceased was wearing Wang Ruo's clothes, is his age and figure suitable?" "The deceased was a young woman. She was slender and tall, about five feet seven inches. This kind of height is relatively rare among women, and it basically fits. I don't know if there are any moles, moles, birthmarks, etc. on Wang Ruo's body. ?” "Let me think about it..." She tried to recall her previous contact with Wang Ruo, "There are no moles and birthmarks, but there seems to be a little freckle on the right wrist, can you see it?" Zhou Ziqin rolled up her right sleeve, looked at it, and said dejectedly: "I suspect that the poison spread from the right hand to the whole body. You see, the degree of poisoning is the deepest here, and the skin is so dark that you can't see it at all, let alone freckles." , even the mole may not be visible." "Yeah." Huang Zixia looked at the swollen black and purple hands, a little sadly thinking of the pair of slender and beautiful jade hands protruding from her sleeves in the carriage when she met Wang Ruo for the first time. The palms of her hands that she couldn't bear to look at made her chest twitch slightly, "This hand...how could it be so swollen? Her previous hands were so slender and soft that everyone would envy them." "Is it slender?" Zhou Ziqin took the giant palm of the corpse, touched it from the palm to all the fingers, and said, "Impossible, the bones in her palm are relatively large among the female corpses I have examined. Yes, even before, it couldn’t be considered slender, right?” Huang Zixia let out a "huh" in surprise, looked at the swollen dark purple hands, then bumped Zhou Ziqin's shoulder with his elbow, and said, "Give me the gloves." Zhou Ziqin looked at her suspiciously and asked, "Why?" She didn't speak, but raised her chin and narrowed her eyes, Zhou Ziqin immediately obediently took off the gloves and gave them to her. Although it was a pair of soft leather tight-fitting gloves, men's gloves were relatively large after all, and Huang Zixia felt a little loose when wearing them.She didn't care about this anymore, pinched the hand of the female corpse through the glove, and compared it with the female corpse's hand through the glove - the swelling can only expand horizontally, but after all, the fingers will not grow too much, and the other party However, her fingers were longer than her pair of big hands that Chen Nianniang called suitable for playing the piano. Zhou Ziqin said beside him: "Look, although you are a man, I guess you must have been cleansed when you were very young, so your hands are smaller than hers." "What does clean body have to do with the size of your palm?" Huang Zixia thought to herself, pinching her own bones through the glove, and then pinching the opponent's bones. Although it was difficult to touch the bones because of the swollen flesh, she tried to pinch it inch by inch, and finally touched something hard, which confirmed what Zhou Ziqin said—the bones in these hands were definitely not slender. Zhou Ziqin said nervously beside him: "Chonggu, don't use too much force, the skin is already festered, and it won't be good if you crush it..." Huang Zixia quickly relaxed her fingers, and turned to see if the female corpse's palm was crushed by herself.Fortunately, it was only broken a little on the edge of the lower palm, and there happened to be a thin layer of white floating skin there, although it was pinched by her, it did not bleed. "This, it should be a thin layer of cocoon, so it doesn't matter if it breaks. Besides, the skin of her whole body is already festered, and no one cares about a little bit of cocoon skin," Zhou Ziqin said, carefully examining where her cocoon was. Seeing that it was on the edge of the palm under the little finger, I couldn't help but slightly frowned, "It's so strange, it's the first time I've seen cocoons grow here after so many years." "Well, logically speaking, the place where a person's palm is exerting force is at the mouth of the tiger, and the edge of the outer palm should be the place where calluses are least likely to grow." Huang Zixia observed carefully, and saw the fingertips of the middle three fingers of the left hand and the thumb of the right hand. He also has a slightly hard skin. He pondered for a long time, making gestures such as writing, embroidering, starching, and pounding clothes, but failed to draw any conclusions. Zhou Ziqin put away the gloves she took off, and said: "Other than that, there is nothing worth paying attention to. This woman should be from a good family background, her hair and teeth are very shiny, and there seems to be no trace of heavy labor on her body. Now Wearing Wang Ruo's clothes and appearing in the Yongchun Palace, it is difficult to distinguish the face, if we say it is not Wang Ruo, it seems that we can't come up with strong evidence..." Huang Zixia said cleanly: "In order not to startle the snake, you should first record it in the autopsy book, but don't tell the truth directly, just tell the cause of death."
The two opened the door and went to the outer hall to see everyone waiting. Zhou Ziqin bowed to everyone, then held the post-mortem file in his hand, and only briefly said: "The inspection is complete: the deceased is a certain woman, five feet seven inches in length, with a blurred face, black and swollen skin all over her body, and pus and blood all over her body. The deceased The teeth are complete, the hair is shiny, and the hair reaches knee length, and there is no trauma to the whole body, so he should have died of poisoning." Wang Lin lamented again and again, and said: "Hateful, too hateful! I never thought that my niece would die in the palace!" Behind him, Wang Ruo and the two brothers who came from Langye to prepare for the big wedding also showed miserable faces.The older one asked, "I don't know the cause of my sister's death?" "Death from poisoned arrow wood is undoubtedly." Zhou Ziqin replied. "Poison arrow wood..." No one had heard of this name before, only Wang Yun asked: "But the poison that the Nanman called 'seeing blood to seal the throat'?" "Yeah, it's rare in the capital city. But last night, a few people died from this poison." Zhou Ziqin looked at Huang Zixia, and seeing that she didn't seem to explain to them, he closed his mouth and stopped talking. Not long after, Queen Wang also came in person.She glanced at the female corpse on the bed through the window, and turned around immediately. Fortunately, Chang Ling behind her hurriedly supported her so that she didn't fall to the ground. Queen Wang staggered and left without saying a word. Changqing led a group of people from the inner court to clean up the body overnight, and the group of people were silent.The Wang family's carriage loaded the coffin and left. Li Shubai stood at the gate of the palace and watched them go. Zhou Ziqin rushed to Cui Chunzhan's carriage, Huang Zixia pulled the horse that had been dismounted and prepared to climb up, Li Shubai, who was sitting in the carriage, looked over from the window, she had no choice but to withdraw her feet from the stirrups, got into the carriage, and sat there as usual On a low stool. The chariots and horses headed all the way to Yongjiafang Kuiwang's Mansion in the dark night. Li Shubai didn't look at her all the way, but only touched the glass bottle for fish keeping with his fingers, causing the little red fish inside to keep chasing after his fingers with its tulle-like tail. "I've heard the autopsy results, what else have you said?" Sitting on a low stool, Huang Zixia looked at the little fish with her chin resting on her chin, and said, "It is true that she died of poisonous arrow wood, and the time of death was yesterday. But unlike those beggars, her throat is not as swollen as it looks, so The poison that caused her death was not in the food, but the trauma—if Zhou Ziqin can dissect the corpse, this point should be clearer.” "If it is a trauma, where is the injury?" "This is another strange place. Although her whole body is festered and swollen, there is no trace of sharp weapon damage on her body. Judging from the traces of skin discoloration, it is most likely that the poison spread from the right hand, and then spread throughout the whole body." "The right hand," Li Shubai was thinking, "is it possible for the poisonous arrow wood to penetrate into the skin and kill people?" "No, so how the deceased was poisoned is still a mystery." Li Shubai's eyes turned from Xiaoyu's body to her face, and suddenly asked: "Before, when your parents passed away and you escaped from Sichuan in men's clothing, along the way... no one suspected that you were a woman?" Huang Zixia, who rested his chin and looked at the little fish, was puzzled. He didn't know why he suddenly brought up this matter: "No, since I was young, I have been dressed as a man and followed my father to investigate cases. , but there is no danger." He didn't respond to her puzzled expression, just staring at her appearance.The girl in the crimson eunuch's attire knelt down on the low stool and looked at herself with her right hand. Those eyes, under the flickering light in the carriage at this time, were as clear as the dew in the heart of hibiscus in the morning.During the turbulence, her eyelashes fluttered occasionally, and the dew-like eyes seemed to flow with brilliance in an instant with the slight swaying of the flowers in the wind. The corners of his lips, which had been tightly pressed all the time, raised slightly at this moment. Huang Zixia touched her face inexplicably, and was still hesitating, but he had already turned his head away, without correcting her overly girlish posture, and only asked, "Apart from that, what traces are there on the corpse? For example— —Is that corpse Wang Ruo’s?” Huang Zixia was slightly surprised: "My lord has never seen the body, so you think so?" "I believe there is a reason for everything. The one who deliberately used poisonous arrow wood to make the corpse so unsightly and unrecognizable must be trying to cover up something." "My lord guessed right. The corpse is not Wang Ruo, because although the flesh is hard to identify, the bones cannot be forged. The bones in the palm of that corpse are much larger than Wang Ruo's." Huang Zixia said, raising his right hand and turning it over. Palm looked in front of him, "There is one more thing that I can't figure out, and that is the distribution of calluses on the female corpse's hand—the fingertips of the middle three fingers of the left hand, the thumb of the right hand, and the edge of the palm of the right hand, here—" She gesticulated with her hand and pointed it to Li Shubai, "There is a thin layer of callus on the edge of the palm under the little finger. Although it may not be visible at ordinary times, the skin on this side is slightly harder than other places. Skin." "The movements here are often used, and it's really rare." Li Shubai spread out his slender white hands, then closed them with fists, made a gesture, thoughtful. Huang Zixia asked: "Does the lord have any clues?" "Just now I felt like there was a movement that flashed by in front of me, but I couldn't remember it in a hurry," he said with a frown, and he simply let go of his hand, saying, "The biggest point of this case should lie in the 'invisible 'Two words." Huang Zixia nodded, and said: "The sudden appearance and disappearance of the man in Xianyou Temple, Wang Ruo's disappearance before our eyes under the heavy guard, and even the non-existing wound on the female corpse's hand are all invisible and invisible. Solve the riddle." "Actually, sometimes, it's like juggling. It's just because it's a simple trick from an angle that ordinary people don't expect, but the bystanders can't know the truth because they can't turn their minds. Another possibility... As Li Shubai said, he picked up the glass bottle on the small table with his own hand, and lifted it to the side of the car light. At the moment of approaching the blazing light, the clear and clear glass bottle and clear water disappeared instantly, and Huang Zixia saw a little red fish floating quietly on Li Shubai's palm in a daze, like a phantom under the light. "Another possibility is that it is clearly in front of us, but because of the angle and feeling, we lose our judgment and think it doesn't exist." Huang Zixia stared at the little red fish, breathed a sigh of relief, and murmured: "In all the cases I have seen so far, there is no one with more clues, more messy clues, and more impossible to start than this." "More than that. If you continue to investigate, you will find that there is an even more terrifying undercurrent behind this case." Li Shubai put the glass bottle in his hand back on the table, and a faint smile appeared on the corner of his lips, "This The case will relate to the ups and downs of the empress' power in the harem and court, the ups and downs of the Langya royal family, the survival of King Yi's lineage, the remnants of the traitor Pang Xun, and even..." Having said that, he didn't say anything, just looked at the little red fish. The expression on that face was obviously calm and calm, but it made Huang Zixia vaguely feel a stagnation in her chest, and there was an invisible coercion that made her It was almost difficult to breathe. She looked at his indifferent side, thinking in her heart, even, what is it?Is there anything higher than the aristocratic families, relatives of the emperor, and remnants of rebels he listed?What is such an unattainable existence? She looked at the little red fish in front of her that seemed to be able to be crushed to death with two fingers, and remembered what Li Shubai said when she talked about the little red fish when they met for the first time—— Huang Zixia stared at this ignorant little red fish.What is the origin of this little red fish that Li Shubai has been carrying around all the time, and what kind of secret is it related to? The light on the car fluctuated slightly with the ups and downs of the car body, shining on Li Shubai's face. His extremely clear and clean side profile was not weakened by the light like that glazed cup.Behind the light, his usually elegant and elegant face appeared extremely bright and eye-catching. She looked at Li Shubai quietly, in the slightly bumpy car, she suddenly felt a sense of God's will.
The second day was fine weather. King Kui's Mansion, Yubing Pavilion. In front of Li Shubai and Huang Zixia was a piece of paper seven feet long and one foot eight wide, filled with densely packed small characters. "This should be almost all the clues in this case." Huang Zixia said. Li Shubai stood in front of the case and read each item. Li Shubai looked it over, pointed his finger next to the word "Jin Nu", and said, "Jin Nu is gone." "What? Missing?" Huang Zixia looked at him in surprise. "Yesterday after you talked about Jinnu, I took the time to ask someone to investigate, and it turned out that she didn't return to the Jiaofang yesterday, and she still hasn't come back until this morning." "The sudden disappearance at this moment is related to this case?" She asked immediately. "I don't know. After all, in recent years, the women in Jiaofang have been seldom controlled, and there are often many who don't come home at night. It's just that even the people I sent can't find out her whereabouts, so it seems a bit secretive," he said, turning The paper was put into the Boshan furnace and burned, then he turned around and sat down on the chair, and said, "Leave Jinnu alone, and deal with those who have motives and suspicions." Huang Zixia hesitated, and said: "If you look at it from the outside, first, she should be Princess Qile. She has motives, and everyone in Beijing knows that she admires you; In the palace." Li Shubai sneered: "What else?" "Secondly, Prince E. I don't know if he was the one who went to Xishi to learn magic tricks. Although the motive for taking in Chen Nianniang is plausible, it seems a bit too coincidental." "other?" "Third, the remnants of the rebellious party Pang Xun took this opportunity to take revenge on the prince." "and also?" Huang Zixia hesitated for a long time before saying: "People in the court who disagree with the prince's political views or who intend to suppress the prince's family." "Speaking of which, there are a lot of candidates." Li Shubai had that half-smile expression on his face again, and asked casually, "Is there anything else?" "There are still a few less likely guesses, such as Wang Ruo being on Langya's side, or Feng Yiniang's enemy on Yangzhou's side." "But there are more signs that this case is coming for me, isn't it?" "Yes," Huang Zixia nodded, "So it is very unlikely that their former enemies will be hunted down to the capital, let alone have a way to act in the palace." "About the truth of the case, there is another possibility that you didn't mention." Li Shubai leaned back in the chair, looking at her with slightly raised lips. Huang Zixia went through the case again in his mind in amazement, and said, "I don't know...what did I miss?" "It's what everyone in Beijing agrees that ghosts and gods are at work." Li Shubai folded his arms and leaned on the chair, the cold smile on his face became more obvious, "Isn't it? Pang Xun, who was shot by me, must realize that picture." The talisman cursed me, that’s why I first left an arrow warning in Xianyou Temple, and then took away my quasi-wangfei in the midst of heavy troops, and finally sent the body of the tragically dead princess back to the original place.” "That's right, as long as you explain it like this, then the motive, method, and process are all complete." Huang Zixia said. "If you really can't find it, then let the Criminal Ministry and Dali Temple close the case like this." Huang Zixia shook his head slowly, and said: "I will definitely find out the truth. This murderer not only killed Wang Ruo, but also implicated Feng Yiniang and several innocent beggars. Even for Chen Nianniang, even for beggars who no one cares about, I must also bring the murderer to justice. Besides—” Li Shubai looked at her, and saw that she had a determined expression, and there was no hesitation in her eyes. She looked at him with burning eyes, and her voice was hoarse and determined with exhaustion. "If I can't help you solve this case, how can I go back to Shuzhong to clear the vengeance of my parents and family?" Li Shubai naturally remembered her promise to him, so he didn't speak.He stared at the girl in front of him, while her eyes were cast on the sky beyond the window. As if remembering something, she suddenly turned her head to look at him again, and asked, "By the way, how is your talisman now?" "Guess?" He stood up and went to the cabinet behind to take out a small square box. The square box has no open lock, only ninety-nine and eighty-one grids on the lid, and eighty blocks are arranged, with scattered characters written on them. Huang Zixia knew that this was the Jiugong Lock, and the box could only be opened if the eighty characters were in the correct place, otherwise, the box could only be opened by destroying the box. She turned her head away, naturally not looking at how the words on Li Shubai's box were arranged.The box was opened, and Li Shubai reached into it, and took out another small oval ball.The ball is semicircular and placed firmly on the table.There are thin cracks in the upper hemisphere, just like an egg cut out into the shape of a lotus flower. The lower base is round, with a total of three circles, each with tiny protrusions. "There are twenty-four small bumps on each of the three circles of keys, all of which can be rotated left and right. The ball can only be opened after they are all aligned in the correct position. Otherwise, the contents inside will be opened before the ball is opened. In an instant, it was twisted into pieces." Li Shubai said while adjusting the dark spots. It seems that Li Shubai really hid the talisman very well. After the next three rotations to the correct position, Li Shubai put the ball on the table, raised his hand and pressed the dome, the ball like a lotus was pulled by the machine, and suddenly burst into pieces , like a lotus flower carved from wood, blooming instantly in front of them. In the middle of the lotus flowers, there is the spell lying quietly. The paper of the talisman is thick and yellowish, two inches wide and eight inches long. On the strange shading, the six characters "Widowed, Disabled, Lonely, Disabled, Disabled" are still as clear as before. On the character "孤", the bloody circle is still dripping red.But on the word "widower", the original bright red circle has faded away, leaving only a little red trace, just like the original "remnant", the blood color that has been circled has faded away. Huang Zixia looked up at Li Shubai in astonishment. He flicked his hands lightly, and the blooming sphere was the same as it was at the beginning, and the petals closed and returned to a half ellipse. "Obviously, with Wang Ruo's death, this marriage has disappeared—I seem to have escaped another cursed disaster." Li Shubai didn't seem to care, he put the ball back into the square box, disrupted the Jiugong lock on it, and put it in the cabinet as before, with the same calm expression as before. Huang Zixia asked silently: "Has this talisman of yours been properly kept here?" "I don't know if it's appropriate, at least I never show it to others," he slowly raised his eyes to look at her, and said, "Perhaps it can be said that after leaving Xuzhou, you were the only one who saw it besides me." In Huang Zixia's heart, a trace of strange blood surged unknowingly. She looked up and saw his gaze, which was secluded and deep.He seemed to be looking at her, but he didn't seem to be looking at her.He is looking at some distant and illusory things, or maybe, he is just looking at something that is close but out of reach. Huang Zixia involuntarily turned her face to the side, avoiding his eyes, and looked out of the window as if evading. In the Yubing Pavilion, only the sound of two people's breathing echoed softly, and the chirping of birds outside the window was mixed with the chirping of cicadas, which made people suddenly realize that late spring is over and early summer is coming.
In front of Zhou Mansion in Chongrenfang, Huang Zixia went to knock on the door.The porter opened the door and came out. "Uncle, please tell me about your young master. Just say my surname is Yang." The uncle who opened the door hurried back, and several other people invited Huang Zixia to sit down and poured tea.Huang Zixia just sat and listened to their chat while drinking tea. "Is everything packed?" "Okay, it's only one month away from the date of leaving Beijing set by the master, everything needs to be packed." "But the young master doesn't seem too excited recently." "Yes, some time ago, the young master was appointed by the emperor to arrest the head in Chengdu. Wasn't he overjoyed all the time? Why didn't he even leave the door all of a sudden, and stayed in the room all day long?" Several people were talking, and the young master Zhou Ziqin who had been silent for a long time jumped out: "Chong Gu, you are here!" "Young Master!" The gatekeepers hurriedly stood up and greeted each other. "Go ahead," Zhou Ziqin waved his hands casually, only grabbing Huang Zixia and asked, "Is there any new progress in the case? Isn't it?" Huang Zixia shook her head and said, "I just want to discuss with you." "Come in," he pulled her sleeves and hurried inside, "I heard that because the weather is getting hotter, the corpse is too unbearable, even if it is placed in the ice cellar, it has begun to rot , so the empress personally ordered the royal family to send the funeral to Langya immediately on the first seven days." "Well," Huang Zixia and him sat down in the house, and then whispered, "So we'd better find out the truth within the first seven days, otherwise the investigation will be even more troublesome once the body is transported away." "So, those beggars who were killed by me still have no clue..." Zhou Ziqin said dejectedly, "However, how can such a complicated case be found out within four or five days? Even if I am the most enamored The arrival of the admired Huang Zixia may not be able to settle the case..." The corners of Huang Zixia's lips twitched almost invisibly, and he coughed dryly and said, "However, King Kui said that if it is really impossible to find out the truth in a hurry, then we can only disclose in advance that this corpse is not Wang Ruo. As long as If there is no coffin, there will be no conclusion, and we can still buy time to investigate." "Investigate... how to investigate, where to start, where is the clue at the beginning, I have no clue..." Zhou Ziqin grabbed his hair and lay down on the table in distress, "Ah... what if Huang Zixia is here at this time? That's good, she will definitely be able to quickly find the most valuable point to check..." Huang Zixia felt that the corners of her mouth must be twitching again.She managed to control her emotions, and patted the corner of the table: "Okay, King Kui and I have already discussed the case and proposed a direction that we urgently need to find." "What direction?" Zhou Ziqin raised his head. "Jing Xu has already gone to Xuzhou to investigate the disappearance of Pang Xun's arrowhead. If we can understand why the arrowhead that King Kui shot and killed Pang Xun appeared in Xianyou Temple, it may also become an important clue in this case. "She said, took out a silver ingot, and put it on the table in front of her, "And this is the clue that I want to pursue." "Silver ingot? Or half a piece?" Zhou Ziqin took the silver ingot, turned it over, looked at the words on it, and asked, "Are you short of money? I'll lend you!" Huang Zixia was speechless, pointing to the words on the back of the silver ingot: "Look at this." "Deputy envoy Liang Weidong... Zhang Junyi, envoy of the internal treasury, casting silver two." He read, puzzled, "Is there any problem?" "However, the names of these two people are not found in all the silver ingots that have been minted in the inner library over the years." "Privately cast? Or is it fake?" "Privately minted, of course the owner's name will be cast on it. Why pretend to be the inner treasury? It's not fake, but absolutely real silver." Huang Zixia held the ingot of silver, looked at him seriously, and said, "The most important thing Yes, this half silver ingot was found by Prince Kui and I in the East Pavilion when Wang Ruo disappeared. At that time, it was covered by an upside-down teacup and placed on the table. Prince Kui found it while drinking tea. .” Zhou Ziqin said happily: "Prince Kui is indeed one of my generation, and he can drink tea leisurely next to that kind of pus-blooded corpse. It's really a big scene." "The female corpse hadn't appeared at that time, and Wang Ruo had only disappeared for a moment." Huang Zixia couldn't help reminding him. Zhou Ziqin didn't care about these details at all. Holding the silver ingot in his hand, he asked, "So, according to your idea, where should we go next?" "Of course, go to the Ministry of Officials to check the names of officials over the years to see if these two people can be found in the records."
The head of the Ministry of Officials on duty today pinched the note that Huang Zixia handed over, looked at the two names "Liang Weidong and Zhang Junyi" on it, and his face was so bitter that he was about to drip Coptis juice: "You two, I suggest you don't wait, If you can find it in ten and a half months, you are lucky." "Ten days and a half?" Zhou Ziqin was dumbfounded, "It takes so long?" The chief raised his hand and pointed to the two-floor seven-room room in front of him: "Here, there are the archives of the official rosters over the years. From the founding of the dynasty to the present, although some materials have been lost, there are still so many archives-this is just The first row of file rooms couldn’t fit, so three rows of identical files were expanded in the back.” "..." The two stood there, feeling that this matter was really not an option. "What should we do? Is there any way to quickly select the person we want to find from so much information?" Zhou Ziqin asked. Huang Zixia thought for a while, then suddenly walked towards the chief, and said, "Please help me find the official files of Xuzhou for the past ten years." "Xuzhou? I don't think there are too many officials' materials in this kind of place." The chief said, and called a small official, who led them to the fourth room in the second row, opened the door and said, "This is the history Information about officials who came to Xuzhou." Zhou Ziqin stared dumbfounded at the rows of bookshelves, and the distance between the bookshelves was so crowded that no one could walk in. He murmured, "I still feel...the project is huge..." "Thank you, I'll look for it first." Huang Zixia left a sentence and walked into the room. Zhou Ziqin saw her go straight to Xiantong's nine-year official files, took off the large stack of documents from the early years of Dazhong, and quickly opened them to Pang Xun's puppet officials and the court's disposal. The house was a bit dark, and the dust was flying gently in the sunlight that slanted in from the window.Zhou Ziqin turned his head to look at her. Her face, which was originally smeared with yellow powder, was faded by the sun, and looked flawless in the dust. Her long and thick eyelashes covered her eyes like spring dew like butterfly wings. He was stunned for a moment, thinking, Yang Chonggu should have been "castrated" when he was very young, otherwise, how could he be so delicate, with a kind of softness emanating from the inside of the bones.Over the years, he has seen many eunuchs who are as delicate and beautiful as women, but judging from his research on various human bones, he always felt that Yang Chonggu had a completely different feeling—he looked at the eunuch With rounded jaws, slender neck, and slender shoulders, if one day Yang Chonggu only had a skeleton left, he would definitely regard his skeleton as a woman. No wonder there are rumors in the capital that Yang Chonggu is the new favorite of King Kui, who rides in the same car when he goes out, and lives in the same room when he enters... Immediately afterwards, he hastened to forcibly stop himself from having any associations with this little eunuch and King Kui, and hastily picked up the stack of documents from the middle and middle years and flipped through the records on it. There was silence in the room for a while, except for the rustling sound of flipping through books.In the silence, Zhou Ziqin couldn't help but turned to look at Huang Zixia again.I saw her finger sliding all the way to the right, scanning a person's name and regulations at a glance, and then her fingertips finally stopped at one place, and looked back and forth again, let out a sigh of relief, and handed him the booklet in her hand in front of him and said, "Look." Zhou Ziqin looked at it, and saw that it said—— Huang Zixia looked up at him and said, "It seems that the silver ingot was cast privately by Pang Xun when he was trying to establish himself as king." As soon as Zhou Ziqin patted the booklet, disregarding the dust that was flying and filling the air, he shouted in surprise and joy: "It turns out that this matter is caused by the remnants of Pang Xun!" "However, even if it's the remnant of Pang Xun, it's not good to take something, why keep silver ingots?" "Could it be that you want to leave money to buy your life?" Zhou Ziqin stroked his chin thoughtfully, "But how could it be possible that a princess is only worth ten taels of silver?" Huang Zixia ignored him, went to borrow a pen and paper to transcribe the passage, and said, "No matter what, it's still a clue, let's report back to the prince first."
Zhou Ziqin walked out of the bureaucracy with her, it was almost noon, Zhou Ziqin touched his belly and said, "Oh, I'm so hungry, Chonggu, let me treat you to dinner!" Huang Zixia hesitated slightly, and said: "I have to go to the prince's side to answer as soon as possible..." "My lord holds several positions and is so busy every day. It's not the time to leave the office yet. How can I wait for you in the mansion?" Zhou Ziqin said, holding her hand involuntarily, and walked to the West Market, "Come on, come on ，我知道一家特好吃的店，那里的老板做的驴肉太好吃了！你知道为什么吗？因为他切肉时是按照肉的纹理，一丝不苟横切出来的，煮出来就特别入味！说起这个肉啊，我觉得杀禽畜和杀人的时候一样，下刀也是很有讲究的，如果横砍断肌肉纹理的话，伤口绽开来就会像一朵贴梗海棠，而如果顺着纹理竖劈的话，伤口就行云流水，血流起来也就分外流畅，不会喷溅得到处都是……” “血喷溅不喷溅，主要还是看是否砍到了经脉吧。”黄梓瑕打断他的话，补上一句，“要是你再提血肉骨头之类的一个字，我就不吃了。” “那提内脏之类的呢？” 黄梓瑕立即转身要走，周子秦赶紧将她的肩膀扳回来，说：“好啦好啦，我发誓，绝对不提！”