Chapter 23: Displaying Abilities — Prime Minister Su’s Highlight Moment, The Killer Points to…
As soon as Cheng Shun’s name was spoken, Ying Xi instantly remembered—it was that slightly scatterbrained little eunuch who had changed his lantern and played games with him.
It was Cheng Shun who had just proposed preparing the sachets to him.
Ying Xi thought, if Cheng Shun himself was still around, and had accidentally injured his finger, causing it to be severed and mistakenly packed into a sachet by the maids, that could still be explained.
However, Cheng Shun himself did not appear.
Even though Ying Xi sent more guards to search, there was still no trace of Cheng Shun.
A eunuch missing, leaving only a severed finger.
Instantly, more unknown mysteries drove the matter toward greater complexity.
Imagination fuels fear. Within the confines of Yichun Palace, the officials began to conjure up many supernatural speculations, their expressions secretive and deep.
Ying Xi keenly captured these thoughts.
Now that he had investigated this far, he absolutely could not stop.
Otherwise, once it was rumored that the Emperor halted the investigation out of fear, talk of divine punishment or prophetic omens would surely follow.
He didn’t have much of an idea how to investigate.
Although he usually paid attention to the investigative departments, as an Emperor, he had to know a little about everything.
But personally investigating a case as the Emperor… it wasn’t that he couldn’t, but it wasn’t appropriate. For him, being good at using people was far superior to doing everything himself—of course, this was a realization he had only gained in this life.
Ying Xi said, “I have often heard that the Ministry of Justice possesses the talent to perceive the finest details. The Minister of Justice should be present; can you find the owner of this severed finger from the finger itself?”
After Ying Xi finished speaking, normally the Minister of Justice should have stepped forward. But there was no response from below.
Ying Xi suddenly realized that his recent anti-corruption campaign, which struck at corrupt officials across the court, had led to the Minister of Justice being investigated.
And not just the Minister; one of the two Vice Ministers was gone too. Recently, the number of corrupt officials swept up by this storm was not small.
The sole remaining Vice Minister of Justice was not in charge of operations.
Although Vice Minister Sun eventually had to stand out with a lack of confidence, his reserves were insufficient. He couldn’t say anything, and without even approaching the severed finger, he stammered an analysis from his spot:
“This humble subject believes that since the severed finger appeared in the sachet, the maid responsible for filling the sachet was the last person to contact the finger and should have clues.”
After finishing, Vice Minister Sun tried his best to find evidence for his deduction: “Eunuchs… Eunuchs and maids are of the same class and interact closely. There are always rumors and gossip. Perhaps one of them had some unclear relationship with Cheng Shun, leading to a crime of passion—going to extremes and chopping off Cheng Shun’s finger wouldn’t be excessive…”
As Vice Minister Sun spoke, all the maids in the venue knelt down, their voices mournful and pleading: “Please, Your Majesty, investigate clearly! We servants would not dare!”
Chaos in the palace harem was already a grave crime for them.
Let alone daring to harm someone for love?
Furthermore, even if they cut off Cheng Shun’s finger, how would they dare be so bold as to put the severed finger into a sachet bestowed by the Emperor to the court officials, deliberately ruining the Emperor’s mood? Did they not want to live?!
The maids maintained a high degree of unity.
Vice Minister Sun looked embarrassed.
Ying Xi had his own judgment. The finger being packed into the sachet could only happen if the maid grabbed a large handful of flowers at the time and didn’t feel the foreign object at all. It was an unconscious act. Vice Minister Sun was wrong.
Sure enough, many court officials held skeptical views as well.
Su Xueyi couldn’t listen anymore.
He was the head of the Department of State Affairs. If any of the Six Ministries lost face, he lost face too.
How could the arrogance of the “Chang’an Universal Talent” allow him to receive mocking glances from his colleagues?
Su Xueyi interrupted directly, “Full of errors, simply nonsense!”
When Su Xueyi spoke, Vice Minister Sun, not seeing who it was, flushed red and planned to retort.
But seeing it was Su Xueyi, he swallowed the defense on the tip of his tongue. Saying one word would only invite ten or a hundred sharper words in return.
Su Xueyi walked out from his seat, approached, and squatted with proper decorum. He took out a snow-white silk handkerchief from his sleeve.
His handsome brows furrowed slightly. Lowering his head, he used the silk handkerchief to pad his fingers and poked at the severed finger on the ground. Finding a spot with less blood, he picked up the finger to examine it, repeatedly scrutinizing the cross-section.
Sweet Tub: “How can he stand looking at that?”
Ying Xi didn’t answer.
But Su Xueyi clearly had ideas.
Su Xueyi’s eyelashes lowered slightly in thought for a moment. Then, wrapping the finger in the silk, he put it down. He held his right hand in front of his forehead in a blocking posture, nodded slightly, pursed his lips, and took a deep breath.
No one could deny Su Xueyi’s talent.
Even if many disliked his arrogant temper.
Su Xueyi finally stood up.
He looked around. Before reporting to the Emperor, he first questioned the flower-picking eunuchs: “Did anyone among you pick up a flower basket?”
The eunuchs hesitated, looking at each other.
Gazes were exchanged in secret, then one eunuch boldly spoke up: “Reporting to Prime Minister Su, one of us indeed picked up a basket.”
Su Xueyi: “Why?”
His tone was slightly hurried. The eunuch leaned back, unsure of the Right Prime Minister’s meaning, and his voice became fainter: “This slave… while picking flowers on the floating island, saw an ownerless basket under a flowering tree.”
“Eunuch Cheng Shun said we had to be fast with our task, and the more we picked, the more reward money we’d get. So this slave hurriedly picked it up.”
“Which floating island?”
Some of the architecture in Shanglin Park referenced the immortal islands of ancient mythology.
Legend had it that there were three immortal islands in Penglai, named Penglai, Fangzhang, and Yingzhou.
Shanglin Park had all three floating islands. Arranged in a triangle around Yichun Palace, the flowers and trees on the islands were quite lush, and they weren’t far from Yichun Palace.
The eunuch answered, “It was Yingzhou Island.”
Ying Xi frowned slightly, remembering that the strange light he had seen earlier came from the direction of Yingzhou Island.
The eunuch said, “We were assigned different directions. Yingzhou Island has many flowers and trees, and many fallen flowers. This lowly one needed money, so after collecting enough from my side, I thought I’d go check the island.”
Having finished his report, the eunuch burst into tears. “This lowly one didn’t see Eunuch Cheng Shun on the island; this lowly one only saw that basket of flowers.”
“Besides, Eunuch Cheng Shun is currently a favorite before His Majesty; how would this lowly one dare offend him…”
The little eunuch wept incessantly.
But Su Xueyi waved his hand, and other eunuchs took the man away.
Su Xueyi then said to the Emperor, “Your Majesty, regarding the severed finger in the sachet, this subject has a conjecture.”
“Speak.”
Su Xueyi said crisply, “This subject heard that Your Majesty’s bestowal of sachets was a spur-of-the-moment decision unknown to anyone beforehand. Therefore, this subject temporarily rules out a premeditated vendetta.”
“If it wasn’t premeditated, then it was accidental.”
“Cheng Shun stumbled upon a scene he shouldn’t have seen and was silenced.”
At the word “silenced,” Yu Jing, as Cheng Shun’s master, couldn’t help but clutch his chest, frowning for a long while before letting out a long sigh.
However, Su Xueyi’s guess was still questioned. Someone asked, “If he was silenced, why leave a severed finger?”
“Would they deliberately leave a clue for people?”
This highlighted Su Xueyi’s poor popularity.
Colleagues who feared him might not dare speak up.
But if they disliked him and belonged to departments with little interaction, they certainly wouldn’t save face for Su Xueyi.
Su Xueyi sneered, “That wasn’t left intentionally.”
The other party didn’t believe it.
Su Xueyi: “You, come here.”
That person naturally wouldn’t back down to Su Xueyi. He was a military official, swinging his arms as he walked up to Su Xueyi: “What for!”
He was aggressive.
Su Xueyi was unceremonious: “Squat down, turn around.”
The military official thought Su Xueyi was playing him and was about to explode in anger, but he was wary of the Emperor being present.
The military official looked at the Emperor. The Emperor nodded, meaning do as he says.
The official blushed, confused, but had to comply due to the Imperial Decree.
When the military official squatted down broadly, Su Xueyi stood behind him, holding a flower basket.
The official remained squatting.
Su Xueyi approached slowly and carefully.
When he was closest to the official, Su Xueyi suddenly shouted, “Who are you! What are you doing there!”
The squatting official, having his back to Su Xueyi, already looked sneaky. Hearing Su Xueyi’s sudden interrogation, he immediately stood up and turned around, facing Su Xueyi.
The official raised his hand to attack!
Simultaneously, the flower basket in Su Xueyi’s hand fell.
Su Xueyi held his right hand in front of him in a blocking posture, but to avoid accidentally injuring his colleague, he used his other hand to block the official, diffusing the force of the punch.
Both parties took a half-step back!
The flower basket lay between them.
Ying Xi suddenly understood: “His finger was severed while blocking, and it fell into the basket!”
Then, sitting under the flower tree, the basket gathered more falling petals, covering the blood from the finger.
It wasn’t visible at a glance, so it was naturally picked up by the other little eunuch.
“More than that,” Su Xueyi said. Being in sync with the Emperor only fueled Su Xueyi’s interest in the event. “This subject guesses that after the first blow failed, the opponent definitely pursued. The second move caused Cheng Shun’s death. Dead and missing—where would he be thrown?”
“In the water.” Su Xueyi answered his own question without waiting for Ying Xi to guess.
“Your Majesty! This subject requests that people be sent to dredge the waters along Yingzhou Island. Cheng Shun should be in the water.”
“Granted.”
Ying Xi stood up. The guards surrounding him tensed up as well.
The captain of the guard looked at the Emperor. “Your Majesty?”
“Proceed to Yingzhou Island. You all go dredge immediately.”
The captain nodded. “Yes!”
With the protection squad flanking him, the Emperor went to the island; Yingzhou Island was very close.
Before the Emperor arrived at Yingzhou Island, the advance guards had entered the water, having already arranged their tasks.
Then the Emperor landed on the island. Some important court members followed closely behind him. Su Xueyi was the guide; he was at the very front.
Yingzhou Island was dense with flowering trees swaying in the wind, falling flowers like snow.
Layers of petals paved the ground like a carpet, actually having a certain thickness.
The little eunuch who found the basket followed Su Xueyi closely. In the middle of Yingzhou Island, he suddenly stopped and pointed to the ground, whispering, “Reporting to Your Majesty, reporting to Prime Minister Su… this slave… this slave found Eunuch Cheng Shun’s basket near this flower patch.”
As soon as the eunuch spoke, everyone stopped.
Ying Xi’s boot tip crushed the earth; he remained silent.
Then Su Xueyi squatted, scooping up the bottom of the flower petals with five fingers and flipping the layer over.
Su Xueyi examined it carefully and displayed it: “There are blood beads inside.”
This was the scene of Cheng Shun’s murder!
Instantly, many officials who had followed along shuddered. Some boldly squatted down to scoop up petals and examine them carefully, also seeing blood in the bottom layer.
At this time, a guard raised his voice to report: “Found him—we found Eunuch Cheng Shun’s body by the water.”
Just as Su Xueyi predicted, Cheng Shun was killed and thrown into the water.
At this moment, Cheng Shun was covered by a white cloth, lying quietly by the water’s edge.
Yu Jing fell silent. He wanted to rush over but couldn’t leave the Emperor behind; his red lips were pressed tight.
Ying Xi wasn’t slower than him. Arriving in front of Cheng Shun, he ordered the white cloth covering him to be lifted.
The guard lifted it.
Cheng Shun was lifeless, not yet bloated.
A knife wound on the right side slashed obliquely down, severing his windpipe. The cut was so deep it almost decapitated him.
Cheng Shun’s brow was still knotted, as if silently recounting the intense pain before death.
Sweet Tub whimpered, but since Cheng Shun was an acquaintance, it wasn’t too scared: “So pitiful.”
Such a familiar, vivid life.
Yesterday he was changing the lantern, just now he was keeping him company.
He was scatterbrained, kind-hearted, and possessed a rare childlike innocence.
Now he was dead, turned into a cold corpse.
Unlike his past life, because he had put aside many court affairs, his thoughts unconsciously shifted to the people around him.
Ying Xi’s heart was exceptionally heavy.
His fingers curled inside his sleeves, gradually forming a fist in secret. The Emperor’s face darkened.
“Investigate the cause of death,” Ying Xi said.
“What exactly did he see to make someone lay such a vicious hand on him?”
As Ying Xi finished his decree, the guards made another discovery. A guard shouted loudly, “Your Majesty, other things have been fished up from the water!”
Before the guard finished speaking, Ying Xi looked over.
He saw the guards in the water throwing scattered parts onto the shore one by one: silk strings, wooden frames, trigger mechanisms… arrows freshly sharpened to dozens of inches long. Perhaps some had sunk deep into the silt and couldn’t be retrieved, but what was brought up was enough to explain the problem.
The killer was making a crossbow mechanism!
Aiming from Yingzhou Island to snipe from a hidden spot.
A ray of light reflected from the crossbow assembly happened to shine into Ying Xi’s eyes.
If the crossbow’s range was sufficient, standing where the flower basket was picked up, one could see the pergola in front of Yichun Palace perfectly.
It wasn’t the eunuch who died; the eunuch died as a substitute.
Cheng Shun stumbled upon the scene where the killer was about to commit regicide, so the killer murdered him and dumped the body, disrupting the killer’s sniping plan!
The killer’s target was… himself.
Ying Xi felt cold from his hair down to the soles of his feet.
Suddenly someone in the field shouted, “It’s Xie Qianli! Who else could be so proficient in military weapons besides Xie Qianli!?”
“The Duke of Ying plotting regicide and rebellion—a heinous crime!”
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