QYT - 32

Chaotian had heard the sounds of a fight earlier and was about to go check for an intruder, but Derong insisted it was a private matter between the young master and madam and stopped him. He didn’t dare to sleep and rushed over as soon as he heard Jiang Cizhou leave the room.

“Young master, are you going out?”

Jiang Cizhou said “Mm,” entered the study, and changed into his night clothes. “I’m going to the Zhuning Estate to see Fudong.”

“But we were looking for Fuxia? Why do you need to see Miss Fudong?”

Jiang Cizhou adjusted his sleeves and didn’t answer.

Just now, Qingwei was being vague, talking about investigating an old case. In all her time in the capital, the only key person she had met was Xue Changxing. What kind of old case could the clue he left her be related to?

Seeing Jiang Cizhou was not responding, Chaotian said, “Young master, let me go instead.”

Jiang Cizhou glanced at him. “Who are you to Wen Xiaoye? Will Fudong trust you?”

Chaotian looked puzzled.

Jiang Cizhou said, “I’m her husband, for goodness’ sake. I can at least use that identity to bluff a clue out of Fudong.”

He spread a copy of The Analects of Confucius on the desk, smoothed a piece of paper, and said, “I tricked Wen Xiaoye into thinking I’m writing a memorial tonight. You sit here and pretend to be me. Copy a few pages while you’re at it, and wait for me to return.”

Chaotian was a military guard who hated reading and writing more than anything. He was just about to ask if Derong could do it instead, but Jiang Cizhou had already pushed open the door and disappeared into the night.

________________________________________

Qingwei sat silently in her room for a while. She quietly put on her shoes and went to the study. Seeing a tall, straight silhouette on the window writing diligently, she quickly returned to her room.

Since Jiang Cizhou was suspicious of Fudong, he wouldn’t let the matter go. With his identity as the Deputy Commander of the Xuan Ying Division, it would be much easier for him to investigate the case than for her. To prevent the clues from falling into someone else’s hands, she had to break into the Zhuning Estate tonight, no matter what.

With that thought, Qingwei put on her black robe, took her rope, and quickly jumped out of the window.

The guards at the Zhuning Estate were indeed much more relaxed than before. The powerful guards were all gone. Although new sentries had been deployed, they were hired on short notice and were not familiar with the estate, making them easy to avoid.

Qingwei expertly made her way to the small courtyard of the pavilion and hid in a tall tree.

The number of guards in the pavilion courtyard had not decreased; on the contrary, it seemed to have increased. Qingwei observed for a while. There were three teams of six guards each, who would patrol the courtyard once every fifteen minutes and check the inside of each room every half an hour.

After her previous experience of Chaotian breaking into the Fuxia Pavilion, Qingwei didn’t dare to act rashly. She waited until midnight, and when the guards came out of Fudong’s pavilion, she silently slipped to the second floor and knocked on the door.

A moment later, Fudong’s voice came lazily from inside. “Who is it?”

“Patrol,” Qingwei said in a low voice.

After some soft shuffling, Fudong got up and opened the door. “Didn’t you just come? Why are you still—”

Before she could finish, Qingwei’s hand clamped over her mouth. Qingwei stepped into the room, hooked her heel to close the door, and was about to remove her hood to reveal her identity when she felt a powerful gust of wind from the side.

Someone else was hiding in the room!

Qingwei immediately became alert. She released Fudong and retreated, meeting the attack in the darkness.

The attack wasn’t heavy; it was more like a probe. It touched her elbow, making a “clack” sound. The weapon seemed to be... a fan?

A bad thought flashed through Qingwei’s mind, but the person moved in again. He didn’t attack or defend, just moved close to her, used the fan to block her palm strike, and wrapped his arm around her waist.

Her waist was slender yet firm and strong.

Recognizing the waist, Jiang Cizhou immediately took a half-step back. “Wife?”

Although he had thought she might come, he hadn’t expected her to arrive so quickly. Most of the guards at the Zhuning Estate had been removed, but it was still not easy to get in. She didn’t have a fast horse and had just suffered a setback, so she should have been extremely cautious about coming again tonight. Or was her lightness skill that good?

At the same time, Fudong lit a candle. “Miss, Young Master Jiang, stop fighting. Aren’t you... together?”

Qingwei, who was about to deliver another palm strike to Jiang Cizhou’s face, stopped upon hearing Fudong’s words. She angrily withdrew her hand. “Who’s with him!”

Jiang Cizhou smiled faintly. “Wife, weren’t you sleeping? Are you sleepless because the room was a mess?”

Qingwei stared at him. He was wearing a black long gown with tight sleeves. The fan in his hand was also black. He stood there, tall and straight, just like the silhouette on the study window. “Weren’t you writing a memorial? Did you come all the way here to write it?”

She asked Fudong, “You didn’t tell him anything, did you?”

Fudong was stunned for a long time before she realized the two people in front of her didn’t seem to be on the same side. “At Zhezhiju, I saw you two united against a common enemy and seemed quite in love. I thought you must be a very close couple. So when Young Master Jiang asked me about the hairpin... I told him everything.”

When Qingwei heard this, she looked at Jiang Cizhou, then at Fudong, wanting to say something but stopping herself several times. After a while, she just sat down by the table and said in a low voice, “Never mind.”

She wasn’t that angry, just disappointed in herself.

Their goal was the Zhuning Estate. She had been outsmarted and was a step behind. She couldn’t blame anyone for getting the clues before her.

However, Xue Changxing had given her such an important hairpin. She had only investigated halfway, and now someone had beaten her to it. Disappointing Uncle Xue was one thing, but she was afraid that these clues would be used by a scheming person and turned against her.

Jiang Cizhou looked at Qingwei, seeing the deep melancholy in her eyes. He also sat down at the table and asked, “Are you unhappy?”

He picked up the teapot, poured a cup of tea, and pushed it toward her. “How about this? I won’t take advantage of you. I’ve heard the clues from Miss Fudong. Afterward, I’ll tell you about Fuxia.”

Qingwei was surprised. She turned to look at him. “Really?”

“Really,” Jiang Cizhou said calmly. “You suddenly started asking me about the Ningzhou Plague case from five years ago. Wasn’t it the person behind you who told you to investigate it? If I don’t reveal a little more, how will you be able to report back?”

Qingwei was a little skeptical. “You’re willing to talk?”

Jiang Cizhou nodded.

The candlelight was dim, and the tall cabinet obscured their silhouettes on the window. The room was dark. Jiang Cizhou was wearing his mask, so Qingwei couldn’t even see his eyes, but in that moment, she inexplicably trusted him.

She nodded. “Alright.”

Jiang Cizhou smiled and said to Fudong, “Then, Miss Fudong, please tell the story you were in the middle of from the beginning.”

Fudong nodded. “Before I begin, I have a question for the two of you. Since you were both able to find me, I assume you are both here because of the Xijintai that collapsed five years ago. What is your relationship with the Xijintai?”

However, after she asked the question, neither Qingwei nor Jiang Cizhou said a word.

Fudong didn’t expect them to answer immediately. If it wasn’t a wound that had festered in their hearts for so long that it was difficult to express, why would they risk their lives to pursue it for so many years?

She was the same.

“Then I will begin from the start.

“My current identity is fake. The name Fudong was also adopted after I arrived at the Zhuning Estate. I was originally from Chongyang County, Lingchuan. Because my family was poor when I was a child, I was sold to an estate and raised by the nannies there.

“That estate, just like the Zhuning Estate, looked like a private garden but was actually a place for officials and nobles to entertain themselves with courtesans. There were many young girls like me on the estate. Since childhood, we were taught not only music and dance but also how to please men.

“I entered the estate at the age of six and didn’t leave until I was fifteen. The tenth day after a girl turned fifteen was a big day for every girl on the estate. The nannies on the estate called it ‘Hairpin Removal Day,’ and privately, ‘Melon Breaking Day.’ After all, the estate couldn’t afford to raise us for nothing. After this day, we were expected to start receiving guests.

“That year was the twelfth year of Zhaohua. On my Hairpin Removal Day, my patron was not an official or a merchant. He was a scholar with clean sleeves. His name was Xu Shubai.”

Fudong continued, “If you still remember the court’s handling of the Xijintai collapse, you should know that five years ago, a merchant family named Xu in Chongyang County, Lingchuan, died. Twenty-seven people, including servants and stable hands, all perished.”

Qingwei had only vaguely heard about this and remembered that the family had supposedly committed suicide out of guilt.

Jiang Cizhou said, “The most direct cause of the Xijintai collapse was that the wood for the first floor was problematic. The court had allocated funds and ordered the use of the best iron pear wood, as Baiyang Mountain has a lot of rain in the summer, and iron pear wood is the most moisture-proof and waterproof. But He Zhongliang, the official from the Ministry of Works who was in charge of the matter, colluded with the official of the Lingchuan Prefecture, Wei Sheng, and the merchant Xu Tu to seek profit. They swapped the good wood for a batch of inferior iron pear wood that had been soaked and then sun-dried, earning a profit from the price difference.”

Qingwei was stunned when she heard this. “But Master Wen... was the one supervising the construction in the end. Didn’t he notice them swapping the wood?”

Jiang Cizhou glanced at her, lowered his eyes, and gave a lonely smile. “When Master Wen went to supervise the Xijintai, the drawings had already been modified for the second time, and the first floor of the platform had already been built. The quality of wood is judged by its aroma, grain, texture, diameter, and weight. The diameter of this batch of wood was suitable. Once it was embedded in the platform, its weight was impossible to estimate. Wei Sheng claimed it was for aesthetics and, after brushing on a layer of clear lacquer, added another layer of vermilion lacquer, which completely concealed the grain and smell. Not to mention Master Wen, unless you split the wood open, how could anyone have known they used inferior materials?”

“Young Master Jiang is right,” Fudong said. “I was in Lingchuan at the time. It wasn’t until the Xijintai collapsed that the inferior wood was discovered. The He Zhongliang and Wei Sheng that Young Master Jiang just mentioned were quickly executed by the court, and Xu Tu’s family also supposedly committed suicide out of guilt. But these are all later events.

“Back to Xu Tu. This Xu Tu was not a good person. He had done too many evil things. Even heaven couldn’t bear it. He was nearing forty, had seven concubines, and still had no children. He was anxious, and his mind kept turning until he settled on his cousin’s son, who was of the same bloodline.”

Qingwei asked, “The scholar you just mentioned, Xu Shubai?”

Fudong nodded. “The Xu family had already split up in the previous generation. Xu Tu was a cunning merchant. Xu Shubai was different from him. He came from a poor family and was a scholar who had just passed the provincial civil service exam. Xu Tu, seeing that Xu Shubai had a title, hoped he would become his son by adoption. But he also found him pedantic, so he brought him to the estate...”