Hearing this voice, Jinxia frowned, but had to put a smile on her face before turning around, respectfully saying, “Liu Daren.”
It had been several days since they came to Yangzhou, but there was no progress with the case at all. Although Liu Xiangzuo was calm by nature, every day that passed made him restless and irritated. Yang ChengWan had already been taken by Lu Yi for treatment, and he couldn’t interfere with that matter, but beside him there were no more experts. In front of his eyes was Jinxia who was walking slowly, looking very relaxed… That made him a little annoyed.
“Let me ask you, why did you come to Yangzhou?” Liu Xiangzuo asked with a light voice.
Jinxia heard the annoyance in his tone, she lowered her head and her gaze, “To find the one hundred thousand taels of silver.”
“It’s been days, have you had any leads?”
“Reporting, Daren, not… not yet.”
Hearing her words made him even more angry, “Let’s not mind the injured Head Yang, but those of you, who are his subordinates, should be more diligent, yet every day you’re just lazing around and not progressing at all. How can you be responsible for the Palace? ‘Eating the emperor’s food, you must share the emperor’s suffering’. Even if you have never read a book, you must know this rule!”
“Daren’s words are indeed correct, Beizhe deserves to die.”
He was angry, Jinxia would not be stupid to confront him, instead she just followed his words.
“Last time you said Zhou Xian had a lover, so why didn’t you ask her?”
“The lady is a foster child of the brother-in-law of Yangzhou’s prefect. I’ve visited there a few times, but have constantly been turned away.” Jinxia said truthfully.
“Brother-in-law of Yangzhou’s prefect… This…” Liu Xiangzuo was stunned for a moment, “But we must think of another way. Her house should have maids, kitchen servants, a lot of people! You can interrogate them to find something related to her! You can’t meet the lady because she’s in her room, but are you saying you can’t meet these people too?”
“Daren is right.”
“Well, hurry up, then!”
In the sky, thick dark clouds hung low, bringing the sound of thunder. It seemed a heavy rain would have fallen soon.
Jinxia heard the sound of thunder and awkwardly asked, “Right now?”
“Of course! Do you know how much time you’ve wasted? While investigating a case, you must forget about sleeping or eating and work all the time regardless of day and night. Act like a LiuShanmen a little, you lazy creature, you should be sacrificing your life for the country and the emperor, can I count on you?”
Jinxia took a quick glance at Liu Xiangzuo’s big belly, and sighed, “Liu Daren is right, Beizhe will go right away.”
“Liu Daren.”
Holding several scrolls of case files in his hands, Lu Yi came from the corner of the corridor, faced Liu Xiangzuo and greeted him.
Jinxia looked up at him, surprised for a moment, not knowing why this person seemed to have just jumped out of her mind.
“Oh… Lu Jingli,” Toward this one person, Liu Xiangzuo’s attitude could be too condescending or too exalted, “Because of the case, these days had been difficult for you.”
“How can Daren say that? The purpose of my arrival is to assist, so it’s only appropriate.” He turned towards Jinxia, his face looked unhappy, “Constable Yuan, I happened to be looking for you.”
“Does Daren have an order?”
“Regarding Sha Xiuzhu’s kidnapping last night, I still have a few questions I want to ask.” Lu Yi eyebrows furrowed.
Now it was Liu Xiangzuo who was stunned, “Sha Xiuzhu was kidnapped last night?”
Lu Yi nodded his head, “That’s right, Daren. Last night some members of JinYiWei and I took Sha Xiuzhu out. On the way, we were attacked and several officers were also injured.”
“These criminals are quite bold, is Lu Jingli alright?”
“Beizhe is fine, thanks for Daren’s concern, but unable to arrest these criminals. I am uneasy.”
“Of course, these criminals really do not care about the law, and their actions are out of control…” Liu Xiangzuo turned to face Jinxia, “Since you were there at the time of the incident, you should do your best to help arrest the criminals. Lu Jingli already said so, hence you should go.”
“Those… maids, servants, kitchen servants…?” Jinxia asked.
“Just leave it for tomorrow.”
“Beizhe understands.”
Lu Yi also paid respect to Liu Xiangzuo, “Beizhe will resign first.”
“Please go ahead, no need for the formality.” Liu Xiangzuo hurriedly responded.
Jinxia followed Lu Yi from behind, full of suspicions, thinking whether it was possible that the whole scheme had been found out… Did he find something that indicated that night was unusual, and want to settle it with her?
She was feeling uneasy but continued to walk until they reached the courtyard of Lu Yi’s room. After passing through the moon-shaped door, Lu Yi stopped his steps and coldly said, “Where have you been? Who did you fight with?”
“None!”
“Your wound is already open, still saying none?”
Lu Yi squinted his eyes and looked at her left arm.
Up until now she didn’t notice but when Jinxia looked down at her arm, she spotted some bloodstains on the sleeve of her robe. No wonder it felt extremely painful, and she thought it was the effect of the medicine she took! She supposed that maybe it was when she tried to block YangYue and she was pushed aside, hitting the wall and causing the wound to open again.
“Oh, this… I wasn’t careful and bumped into something earlier.” She could only say that.
Lu Yi seemed about to say something, but he restrained himself, took a small bottle from his pocket and gave an order, “You go in first, I will help you treat the wound.”
“No need, I can treat it myself.” Jinxia hurriedly said, reaching out her hand to take the medicine from his hand, “…Really, I can even bandage a back injury.”
“…” He glanced at the medicine in her hand, “Are you willing to use this medicine now?”
“This is Daren’s good intention, Beizhe doesn’t dare to refuse.” Jinxia looked at the medicine, laughed and said, “Besides, Beizhe has also thought carefully ‘lots of lice don’t bite, lots of debts no need to worry.”
Lu Yi was silent for a moment.
The girl entered the room, closed the door and left him outside.
Lu Yi looked at the closed door, shook his head, lifted his shirt and sat on the fence post of the courtyard. A moment later, there was the sound of a bottle being placed on the table, then he heard Jinxia groaning. If one had listened carefully, they would have heard that she was trying really hard to endure the pain while breathing heavily. Lu Yi didn’t usually see her try to act this tough… her personality could make others laugh at and be angry at the same time.
The sound of thunder passed through the roof of the room, the raindrops fell on the rocks in the garden with a sound loud enough to be heard.
Thinking about it, she found it strange: the medicine that Lu Yi gave her had a fragrance, when she applied it on the wound, it immediately felt soothing cold, and very comfortable. Jinxia tidied up her clothes, and as soon she stood up, she realized that she was in Lu Yi’s room. She opened the door in a hurry and saw Lu Yi sitting on a fence post…
“Daren, Beizhe deserves to die, I momentarily forgot and thought this was my room.” She apologized, while stealing glances in order to catch his expression.
Lu Yi looked at her for a moment, and said slowly, “This wound, is it worth it?”
Jinxia felt those words were a little strange. At the moment, she didn’t know how to answer and could only pretend not to understand the question, “Oh?”
Lu Yi stood up, straightened his sleeve, and asked again, “I asked you, your arm is suffering from a strike of a sword, is it worth it?”
“It’s worth it, of course it’s worth it.” Jinxia answered with a smile, “It’s to serve Daren, this is no problem, just a minor injury.”
Hearing that, Lu Yi ignored her, snorted coldly, lifted his foot, and walked inside the room.
Guessing that his mood was not good, Jinxia hesitated for a while outside the door, then shouted, “If there are no more orders from Daren, Beizhe will leave…”
Before she could finish her words, she was cut off by a cold voice coming from inside the room.
“Come inside, I have something to ask.”
There was no other way, Jinxia walked back into the room, seeing Lu Yi sitting beside the elephant table, pouring tea.
“Daren, you don’t need to do this, let me do it,”
Seeing his displeased expression, she instinctively tried to please him. Jinxia reached her hand out, but as soon as her thumb touched the handle of the teapot, Lu Yi pulled it back.
“Calm down a little.” He glanced at her with displeasure, and said in a deep voice, “Sit!”
Jinxia did not dare to fight back, she sat down right away and felt confused: if he found out that there was something wrong with her on the night Sha Xiuzhu was kidnapped, she would have been punished right now, yet he was still telling her to sit down.. It should have been more appropriate to kneel, right? But if he didn’t know it, then what was the cause for his expression to become dark and his words fierce?
Even though she sat down politely, her mind kept on wondering if there were any flaws that night that would have made her guilty. While still observing Lu Yi’s expression, Jinxia became even more anxious.
“You, there really isn’t anything you want to report to me?” Lu Yo sipped a little of his tea and looked at Jinxia.
“Beizhe doesn’t know what Daren wants to hear…”
Jinxia hated this kind of questioning the most. When she was a child, her mother always liked to ask her sternly, ‘do you have nothing to say to your mother today?’. It made her uncomfortable, as if her mother already knew everything, so she had to say everything honestly, then got a fat beating.
Lu Yi raised his eyebrows slightly.
“Right! There is an important matter that I need to report to you.” Jinxia decided to use Zhai Lanye’s problem. She said in a loud voice, “Ms. Zhai is in trouble!”
“What trouble?”
“Beizhe doesn’t know the exact problem, I only know that last night she boarded on a boat to meet a young master from the Capital. After returning from that trip, something was off: she became silent and unconscious all night long, not listening to anyone around her. The maid was so panicked that she went to Doctor Shen, but then she met Da Yang…” She paused for a moment, then said again, “Da Yang knows that Daren is very fond of Ms. Zhai, so he went to take a look on your behalf…”
“Meeting her on my behalf?” Lu Yi said mockingly.
Jinxia laughed happily, then said, “Doctor Shen pinned Ms. Zhai with a needle, then she regained her consciousness, but still didn’t want to speak, just kept on crying. According to Daren, do you think she was harassed by someone?”
Lu Yi seemed to be conflicted in his heart, he only gave a little cold laughter for a moment, but didn’t say anything.
“Daren, could it be that Daren already knows about this?” Jinxia saw his gestures and guessed, continuing to ask, “Who was the person on the boat?”
“Someone I don’t want to meet, but must meet.” Lu tightened his eyebrows, seeming like he wasn’t going to add more to his words. Instead he just looked at Jinxia, “You ran out because of this problem?”
“I don’t know if this has anything to do with the Zhou Xian’s case, I want to investigate to make it clear… So I can report to Daren.” Jinxia added.
“Don’t pay attention to Ms. Zhai.” Lu Yi simply ordered, “That’s not something you can intervene on.”
“…Oh.”
Jinxia was suspicious, but could only say that.
Lu Yi frowned and said, “Go back. If you’re injured, worry about taking care of the injury, I’m also going to see Head Chief Yang.”
“Oh…”
Jinxia agreed, then got up and left, starting to think to herself, ‘This means Lu Yi knows the person on the boat, he also knows about the relationship between Ms. Zhai and that person, then how much does he know about this Zhou Xian case?
“Wait!”
Lu Yi called out for her from behind, handing her a green oil-covered umbrella. Without saying a word, he turned back and walked into his room, then locked the door.
“Thank you, Daren.”
Jinxia said right away, not knowing whether he heard it or not.
Inside the room, Lu Yi’s forehead creased while listening to the sound of raindrops hitting the umbrella that was slowly moving away.
Hearing this voice, Jinxia frowned, but had to put a smile on her face before turning around, respectfully saying, “Liu Daren.”
It had been several days since they came to Yangzhou, but there was no progress with the case at all. Although Liu Xiangzuo was calm by nature, every day that passed made him restless and irritated. Yang ChengWan had already been taken by Lu Yi for treatment, and he couldn’t interfere with that matter, but beside him there were no more experts. In front of his eyes was Jinxia who was walking slowly, looking very relaxed… That made him a little annoyed.
“Let me ask you, why did you come to Yangzhou?” Liu Xiangzuo asked with a light voice.
Jinxia heard the annoyance in his tone, she lowered her head and her gaze, “To find the one hundred thousand taels of silver.”
“It’s been days, have you had any leads?”
“Reporting, Daren, not… not yet.”
Hearing her words made him even more angry, “Let’s not mind the injured Head Yang, but those of you, who are his subordinates, should be more diligent, yet every day you’re just lazing around and not progressing at all. How can you be responsible for the Palace? ‘Eating the emperor’s food, you must share the emperor’s suffering’. Even if you have never read a book, you must know this rule!”
“Daren’s words are indeed correct, Beizhe deserves to die.”
He was angry, Jinxia would not be stupid to confront him, instead she just followed his words.
“Last time you said Zhou Xian had a lover, so why didn’t you ask her?”
“The lady is a foster child of the brother-in-law of Yangzhou’s prefect. I’ve visited there a few times, but have constantly been turned away.” Jinxia said truthfully.
“Brother-in-law of Yangzhou’s prefect… This…” Liu Xiangzuo was stunned for a moment, “But we must think of another way. Her house should have maids, kitchen servants, a lot of people! You can interrogate them to find something related to her! You can’t meet the lady because she’s in her room, but are you saying you can’t meet these people too?”
“Daren is right.”
“Well, hurry up, then!”
In the sky, thick dark clouds hung low, bringing the sound of thunder. It seemed a heavy rain would have fallen soon.
Jinxia heard the sound of thunder and awkwardly asked, “Right now?”
“Of course! Do you know how much time you’ve wasted? While investigating a case, you must forget about sleeping or eating and work all the time regardless of day and night. Act like a LiuShanmen a little, you lazy creature, you should be sacrificing your life for the country and the emperor, can I count on you?”
Jinxia took a quick glance at Liu Xiangzuo’s big belly, and sighed, “Liu Daren is right, Beizhe will go right away.”
“Liu Daren.”
Holding several scrolls of case files in his hands, Lu Yi came from the corner of the corridor, faced Liu Xiangzuo and greeted him.
Jinxia looked up at him, surprised for a moment, not knowing why this person seemed to have just jumped out of her mind.
“Oh… Lu Jingli,” Toward this one person, Liu Xiangzuo’s attitude could be too condescending or too exalted, “Because of the case, these days had been difficult for you.”
“How can Daren say that? The purpose of my arrival is to assist, so it’s only appropriate.” He turned towards Jinxia, his face looked unhappy, “Constable Yuan, I happened to be looking for you.”
“Does Daren have an order?”
“Regarding Sha Xiuzhu’s kidnapping last night, I still have a few questions I want to ask.” Lu Yi eyebrows furrowed.
Now it was Liu Xiangzuo who was stunned, “Sha Xiuzhu was kidnapped last night?”
Lu Yi nodded his head, “That’s right, Daren. Last night some members of JinYiWei and I took Sha Xiuzhu out. On the way, we were attacked and several officers were also injured.”
“These criminals are quite bold, is Lu Jingli alright?”
“Beizhe is fine, thanks for Daren’s concern, but unable to arrest these criminals. I am uneasy.”
“Of course, these criminals really do not care about the law, and their actions are out of control…” Liu Xiangzuo turned to face Jinxia, “Since you were there at the time of the incident, you should do your best to help arrest the criminals. Lu Jingli already said so, hence you should go.”
“Those… maids, servants, kitchen servants…?” Jinxia asked.
“Just leave it for tomorrow.”
“Beizhe understands.”
Lu Yi also paid respect to Liu Xiangzuo, “Beizhe will resign first.”
“Please go ahead, no need for the formality.” Liu Xiangzuo hurriedly responded.
Jinxia followed Lu Yi from behind, full of suspicions, thinking whether it was possible that the whole scheme had been found out… Did he find something that indicated that night was unusual, and want to settle it with her?
She was feeling uneasy but continued to walk until they reached the courtyard of Lu Yi’s room. After passing through the moon-shaped door, Lu Yi stopped his steps and coldly said, “Where have you been? Who did you fight with?”
“None!”
“Your wound is already open, still saying none?”
Lu Yi squinted his eyes and looked at her left arm.
Up until now she didn’t notice but when Jinxia looked down at her arm, she spotted some bloodstains on the sleeve of her robe. No wonder it felt extremely painful, and she thought it was the effect of the medicine she took! She supposed that maybe it was when she tried to block YangYue and she was pushed aside, hitting the wall and causing the wound to open again.
“Oh, this… I wasn’t careful and bumped into something earlier.” She could only say that.
Lu Yi seemed about to say something, but he restrained himself, took a small bottle from his pocket and gave an order, “You go in first, I will help you treat the wound.”
“No need, I can treat it myself.” Jinxia hurriedly said, reaching out her hand to take the medicine from his hand, “…Really, I can even bandage a back injury.”
“…” He glanced at the medicine in her hand, “Are you willing to use this medicine now?”
“This is Daren’s good intention, Beizhe doesn’t dare to refuse.” Jinxia looked at the medicine, laughed and said, “Besides, Beizhe has also thought carefully ‘lots of lice don’t bite, lots of debts no need to worry.”
Lu Yi was silent for a moment.
The girl entered the room, closed the door and left him outside.
Lu Yi looked at the closed door, shook his head, lifted his shirt and sat on the fence post of the courtyard. A moment later, there was the sound of a bottle being placed on the table, then he heard Jinxia groaning. If one had listened carefully, they would have heard that she was trying really hard to endure the pain while breathing heavily. Lu Yi didn’t usually see her try to act this tough… her personality could make others laugh at and be angry at the same time.
The sound of thunder passed through the roof of the room, the raindrops fell on the rocks in the garden with a sound loud enough to be heard.
Thinking about it, she found it strange: the medicine that Lu Yi gave her had a fragrance, when she applied it on the wound, it immediately felt soothing cold, and very comfortable. Jinxia tidied up her clothes, and as soon she stood up, she realized that she was in Lu Yi’s room. She opened the door in a hurry and saw Lu Yi sitting on a fence post…
“Daren, Beizhe deserves to die, I momentarily forgot and thought this was my room.” She apologized, while stealing glances in order to catch his expression.
Lu Yi looked at her for a moment, and said slowly, “This wound, is it worth it?”
Jinxia felt those words were a little strange. At the moment, she didn’t know how to answer and could only pretend not to understand the question, “Oh?”
Lu Yi stood up, straightened his sleeve, and asked again, “I asked you, your arm is suffering from a strike of a sword, is it worth it?”
“It’s worth it, of course it’s worth it.” Jinxia answered with a smile, “It’s to serve Daren, this is no problem, just a minor injury.”
Hearing that, Lu Yi ignored her, snorted coldly, lifted his foot, and walked inside the room.
Guessing that his mood was not good, Jinxia hesitated for a while outside the door, then shouted, “If there are no more orders from Daren, Beizhe will leave…”
Before she could finish her words, she was cut off by a cold voice coming from inside the room.
“Come inside, I have something to ask.”
There was no other way, Jinxia walked back into the room, seeing Lu Yi sitting beside the elephant table, pouring tea.
“Daren, you don’t need to do this, let me do it,”
Seeing his displeased expression, she instinctively tried to please him. Jinxia reached her hand out, but as soon as her thumb touched the handle of the teapot, Lu Yi pulled it back.
“Calm down a little.” He glanced at her with displeasure, and said in a deep voice, “Sit!”
Jinxia did not dare to fight back, she sat down right away and felt confused: if he found out that there was something wrong with her on the night Sha Xiuzhu was kidnapped, she would have been punished right now, yet he was still telling her to sit down.. It should have been more appropriate to kneel, right? But if he didn’t know it, then what was the cause for his expression to become dark and his words fierce?
Even though she sat down politely, her mind kept on wondering if there were any flaws that night that would have made her guilty. While still observing Lu Yi’s expression, Jinxia became even more anxious.
“You, there really isn’t anything you want to report to me?” Lu Yo sipped a little of his tea and looked at Jinxia.
“Beizhe doesn’t know what Daren wants to hear…”
Jinxia hated this kind of questioning the most. When she was a child, her mother always liked to ask her sternly, ‘do you have nothing to say to your mother today?’. It made her uncomfortable, as if her mother already knew everything, so she had to say everything honestly, then got a fat beating.
Lu Yi raised his eyebrows slightly.
“Right! There is an important matter that I need to report to you.” Jinxia decided to use Zhai Lanye’s problem. She said in a loud voice, “Ms. Zhai is in trouble!”
“What trouble?”
“Beizhe doesn’t know the exact problem, I only know that last night she boarded on a boat to meet a young master from the Capital. After returning from that trip, something was off: she became silent and unconscious all night long, not listening to anyone around her. The maid was so panicked that she went to Doctor Shen, but then she met Da Yang…” She paused for a moment, then said again, “Da Yang knows that Daren is very fond of Ms. Zhai, so he went to take a look on your behalf…”
“Meeting her on my behalf?” Lu Yi said mockingly.
Jinxia laughed happily, then said, “Doctor Shen pinned Ms. Zhai with a needle, then she regained her consciousness, but still didn’t want to speak, just kept on crying. According to Daren, do you think she was harassed by someone?”
Lu Yi seemed to be conflicted in his heart, he only gave a little cold laughter for a moment, but didn’t say anything.
“Daren, could it be that Daren already knows about this?” Jinxia saw his gestures and guessed, continuing to ask, “Who was the person on the boat?”
“Someone I don’t want to meet, but must meet.” Lu tightened his eyebrows, seeming like he wasn’t going to add more to his words. Instead he just looked at Jinxia, “You ran out because of this problem?”
“I don’t know if this has anything to do with the Zhou Xian’s case, I want to investigate to make it clear… So I can report to Daren.” Jinxia added.
“Don’t pay attention to Ms. Zhai.” Lu Yi simply ordered, “That’s not something you can intervene on.”
“…Oh.”
Jinxia was suspicious, but could only say that.
Lu Yi frowned and said, “Go back. If you’re injured, worry about taking care of the injury, I’m also going to see Head Chief Yang.”
“Oh…”
Jinxia agreed, then got up and left, starting to think to herself, ‘This means Lu Yi knows the person on the boat, he also knows about the relationship between Ms. Zhai and that person, then how much does he know about this Zhou Xian case?
“Wait!”
Lu Yi called out for her from behind, handing her a green oil-covered umbrella. Without saying a word, he turned back and walked into his room, then locked the door.
“Thank you, Daren.”
Jinxia said right away, not knowing whether he heard it or not.
Inside the room, Lu Yi’s forehead creased while listening to the sound of raindrops hitting the umbrella that was slowly moving away.
