Before I knew it, it was dawn.
Qin Mubai glanced outside the door, rubbed his stinging eyes, and said: "At this moment, it is the time for the soldiers to gather for morning exercises. It is inconvenient for us to go back to the military camp. Why not take a rest here and come back later?" Let’s go back and see King Wu together and explain what happened.”
"Okay..." Chen Yan nodded, squatted down silently, leaned against the pillar and hugged her knees, staring at an empty space in a daze.
Qin Mubai walked outside the house and stretched his muscles, feeling a little hungry. Those Baiqi subordinates had already dispersed, so he had to go to the woods to pick some wild fruits. He was lucky enough to catch a hare. So we went back to the cabin, lit a fire, killed the hare and started roasting it.
Chen Yan watched silently until Qin Mubai roasted the hare until it was half-cooked before speaking: "You, a pampered member of the official clan, can actually do this?"
"Did someone stipulate that only you people who travel in the world are allowed to do this?" Qin Mubai smiled and threw her two wild fruits and said, "Eat the belly first, and the hare will be roasted quickly. In fact, we Baiqi's appearance is the result of a hundred times of torture. When we were training, it was simply an inhuman situation like this, and it was just a trick. "
"You are really a special official." Chen Yan said, "No official would torture himself or make himself suffer, right?"
"Isn't that Zhu Chengwen?" Qin Mubai smiled lightly, "What we suffered was just physical pain, and he suffered more heartache than us."
Chen Yan pursed her lips slightly, rested her chin on her knees, and said leisurely, "I have something to ask you."
"Ask." Qin Mubai said casually while roasting the hare.
"Do you have a woman you love deeply?" Chen Yan asked.
Qin Mubai was slightly startled and thought for a long time... The woman who had accompanied him or had anything to do with him in the past life and this life was really bad, but how could he talk about the word "deep love"? Most of the time, I feel more like I am in a game world.
"No."
"I can see it." Chen Yan chuckled, her face softened as never before, and she said, "You are a cynical man at first glance, and there must be a lot of women surrounding you. The more men like you, the more , on the contrary, more women like it.”
"You seem to understand very well." Qin Mubai smiled to himself.
"Actually, people are quite mean. When someone truly loves you, you may not feel it and you may not cherish it. Only when you lose it do you realize how precious it is," Chen Yan said.
"Maybe..." Qin Mubai didn't want to continue talking in depth. Women are all emotional creatures, and you can stay up for three days and three nights if you talk to them about emotional topics. Obviously Qin Mubai doesn't have such energy now.
"Actually, I still lied to you." Chen Yan said suddenly.
"Really?" Qin Mubai said slightly surprised.
"Yes." Chen Yan nodded, "Actually, Zhu Chengwen and I have never been a couple, and we have never made a private lifelong commitment or made a marriage contract. We grew up together since childhood, and he has always been like me in my mind. Same as my elder brother. He was twenty-two years old when he got married, and I was sixteen. It was then that I suddenly felt that I had lost something forever, and I realized that I was also deeply in love with him. It was really crazy for me at that time. I wanted to marry him as my concubine, but Zhu Chengwen was a true gentleman and refused. Moreover, even after his wife passed away, he never gave me any hope or opportunity, let alone a promise. I vowed never to marry again. We have always been close friends. After the age of sixteen, we never mentioned our feelings again, but I knew that he would be willing to die for me, just like I was willing to sacrifice everything for him. Same. We talk about everything, like siblings, husband and wife, so I know everything about him, and he always has absolute trust in me."
Qin Mubai's heart moved slightly: "Did he really give you an account book before he died?"
"Yes." Chen Yan said, "I didn't send it to you, but gave it in person. I exchanged letters with him in my hometown. Seeing that his current situation was bad, I went all the way to Jishan County to see him. Unexpectedly, he became furious and wanted to drive me away immediately. He said I shouldn't have come at all. I traveled thousands of miles to spend less than one stick of incense with him. I was so devastated that he gave me one before leaving. He asked me to pass the baggage to his children in his hometown. I picked it up and left without even looking at it. It wasn't until I lost my temper and opened the baggage halfway that I realized... that he had made up his mind. Damn it! I regret being so stupid and not seeing through his intentions! Maybe if I calmed down a little, it wouldn't have ended like this!"
"Hey, the mistakes are often just a few millimeters, but they are thousands of miles away." Qin Mubai shook his head and sighed, and asked, "Where is the ledger now?"
"It's near Zhu Chengwen's tomb, on a big willow tree in the grove. Don't worry, no one can find what I've hidden." Chen Yan said.
"Okay! After a short rest, let's take a trip to get the account book back, and then go back to see King Wu!"
"OK."
Half an hour later, Qin Mubai walked out of the woods and called the Baiqi pawns who were guarding there. He asked them to get two horses, one each for Chen Yan, and galloped towards Zhu Chengwen's grave.
The horse galloped as the leaves fell in the autumn wind. Naturally, Chen Yan's horse was not as good as Qin Mubai's Fire Cloud Horse and fell behind. She always looked at the man with fluttering clothes not far in front of her, and kept thinking in her heart: This man is really unique, he always gives people a mysterious feeling. He can easily see through other people's thoughts and guess their actions, but it is difficult for people to understand what he is thinking. Moreover, as an official, he is different from ordinary officials. He has no official tone and no airs and prestige. Although he can be a bit evil and domineering at times, he still retains a sense of justice, which makes people feel that there is a sense of righteousness in him.
"Do I completely believe him?" Chen Yan kept asking herself, but there was no answer.
We arrived at Zhu Chengwen’s grave. The two of them paid homage first, and then Chen Yan jumped up to a big willow tree as lightly as a civet cat, uncovered a piece of bark, took out a bamboo tube from the hollow tree pole, and jumped down from the tree.
"That's it." Chen Yan said.
Qin Mubai quickly opened the bamboo tube and saw an account book wrapped in oil paper inside. After a quick glance at it, it turned out that it was full of records of the incoming and outgoing of large sums of money and grain, which were recorded in quite detail. Under each record, Zhu Chengwen also made annotations, explaining how the money was recorded in the yamen's public accounts and where it was actually used.
There are three pages specifically recording the direction of six money. It was all a large amount of civil engineering equipment and a large number of labor force hired by the yamen in the name of building lake embankments. In fact, these civil engineering equipment and labor force were completely non-existent. These six sums of money were sent to Jiangxia King Li Daozong in a roundabout way using their own ingenious means!
Obviously this is Zhang Tianci's handiwork. He did not bribe Li Daozong directly with money, but gave Li Daozong large gifts in the name of the yamen during some birthday gifts and holiday visits.
Such things are rare in the officialdom of the Tang Dynasty, where the overall atmosphere is very clean. Emperor Li Shimin once "advocated" officials, big and small, not to encourage such arrogance and extravagance. However, there is indeed no law explicitly prohibiting officials. Accept the gift.
So Zhang Tianci and others took advantage of the loopholes in the law and achieved the goal of bribing Li Daozong.
If Li Daozong knew where the money came from, he would not accept it even if he lived or died. However, as the "highest official" of the Jin Dynasty, the "filial piety" of his subordinate yamen was not too out of line. Although some rumors were unpleasant, it did not violate the law, so he accepted it generously. . Youdao takes advantage of people with short hands and preys on people with short mouths. It is unknown whether Li Daozong provided any convenience to Zhang Tianci later.
"A very clever bribery method." Qin Mubai said, "The law cannot be studied in detail, but Li Daozong did accept money that he should not have received."
"That's right." Chen Yan said, "Because of this, Zhu Chengwen is in great pain. When the money for embankment construction was originally allocated, it was somewhat insufficient, and part of it was taken away from time to time and sent to honor Jiangxia. Wang... The always perfect King of Jiangxia suddenly collapsed. But at the same time, he also suspected that Zhang Tianci, Cheng Songnian and others were deceiving him, and he was still unwilling to believe that King Jiangxia was such a person. Unfortunately, he could not. I met King Jiang Xia in person to clarify the matter, but I had to compromise due to the threats and intimidation from Cheng Songnian and others. "
"You can imagine the scene at that time." Qin Mubai said, "In the officialdom, especially local officials, if you offend your immediate boss, your life will be miserable. In a huge group like Zhang Tianci and Cheng Songnian In front of him, Zhu Chengwen was weak and unable to fight against him. I guess Zhu Chengwen also adopted a delaying strategy at that time, pretending to be conciliatory and compromising with him, but secretly still planning how to solve the matter. If not, he would not be killed. Silenced."
"I don't know that." Chen Yan shook her head with a sad face, "He was very violent and wanted to drive me away, and he had some intentions of not wanting me to be involved in danger. It's just that I didn't wake up at the time..."
"That should be it." Qin Mubai sighed, "Unfortunately, all Zhu Chengwen's efforts failed in the end. A sudden flood disrupted his plan and destroyed his life."
"This is all God's will..." Chen Yan's eyes were red, her brows were furrowed and she stroked Zhu Chengwen's tombstone, stunned.
"Let's go back to Juntun to see King Wu! The three of us will discuss it and we must resolve this matter perfectly!" Qin Mubai said, "This should be considered as a way to comfort Zhu Chengwen's spirit in heaven!"
"Okay, let's go!"