Chapter 14#

The Court Session (4)#

The moment he saw the case file, Le Wuya sensed something was off.

He had first taken up an official post at the Dali Temple (Supreme Court).

Case files had passed through his hands like flowing water, and he had witnessed so many twists of human sentiment and the coldness of the world that he had long cultivated the ability to spot suspicious points at a single glance.

Those in power all carried a scale in their hearts—a scale to weigh gold, to weigh human ties, to weigh human lives. It had become second nature.

To put it bluntly, the life of Chang Xiaohu, when placed on that scale, would weigh no more than a feather at most.

At first glance, most people would probably see that his case wasn’t simply a drowning, but at most they’d think it came down to the cruelty of the coal mine and the mistreatment of the miners.

But combined with the later rebellion case of Ming Xiangzhao, Le Wuya couldn’t help but think one layer deeper.

Ming Xiangzhao had stepped forward with sheer reckless courage to investigate Chang Xiaohu’s case.

To deal with such a “troublemaker,” common tactics would be to have a bunch of thugs beat him up, or seize his mother as leverage, alternating kindness and intimidation to force him to give up the investigation.

To instantly accuse him of rebellion the moment he acted was a clear and unequivocal intent to take Ming Xiangzhao’s life.

Therefore, what Xiaofu Coal Mine truly cared about couldn’t possibly be just the single life of Chang Xiaohu.

They had a more important secret that they had no choice but to conceal.

Thus, to clear Ming Xiangzhao’s name, it was necessary to thoroughly investigate Chang Xiaohu’s case.

After reviewing the whole case of Chang Xiaohu, Le Wuya had two points of doubt in his mind:

First, the cause of Chang Xiaohu’s death.

Chang Xiaohu had already died from a fractured skull before falling into the water.

However, if someone from Xiaofu Coal Mine had accidentally killed Chang Xiaohu, they could have simply cremated him on site, placed his ashes in a funeral urn, and returned them to Su, claiming he died of illness. Since the summer heat might breed flies and mosquitoes leading to an epidemic in the mine, they had no choice but to dispose of the body locally.

After all, Xiaofu Coal Mine was sealed off from the outside world, making it difficult for news to leak out. With the dead unable to testify, wouldn’t that have been clean and simple?

Throwing the body into the river and letting it drift away was, on the contrary, illogical.

Second, the relationship between Ge Erzi and Xiaofu Coal Mine.

He was a ruffian and scoundrel, a regular on the streets, yet he often had money to gamble. Where did his income come from?

And where had he found the connections to get his nephew Chang Xiaohu into Xiaofu Coal Mine?

It was highly unlikely that Xiaofu Coal Mine would accept a sickly person without reason. If he happened to die of illness in the mine, that would be a troublesome affair.

As for sending him down to work in the mine, that was no different from affixing a death warrant to him.

Moreover, according to Ge Erzi, Chang Xiaohu was going to be an apprentice in the accounting room, a respectable position.

It was important to note that the accounting room was one of the most critical positions; outsiders were never allowed to meddle.

How could a scoundrel like Ge Erzi ever get a hand in such a prime fat job?

Le Wuya had long had his suspicions about these two points, and upon meeting Ge Erzi in person, he became even more certain.

This man dared to steal and rob right in front of the official soldiers, yet he was also glib-tongued, knowledgeable about the law, and skilled at exonerating himself—a man of great boldness and deep darkness.

Le Wuya suspected that this man had been colluding with Xiaofu Coal Mine for years, using the guise of job referrals to engage in human trafficking.

Mining work was extremely hard and laborious, making recruitment difficult. To hire workers, they had to pay high wages.

Official coal mines could obtain free labor through conscripted corvée labor.

For privately-run coal mines, a common method to reduce labor costs was to trick outsiders into the mine, forcibly confiscate their money and identification, detain them, force them to work with clubs, and tempt them with promises of a generous payout if they worked for five or eight years and then returned home.

Lies would sustain them until their bodies were drained and their blood and sweat had run dry.

Chang Xiaohu was one of these many victims.

Although he didn’t know why Ge Erzi had set his sights on his own nephew, since the man was an inveterate gambler, the reason must always revolve around the word “money.”

Chang Xiaohu was indeed pitiable.

His home was in Nanting; he was a child raised by the Nanting River. His longing to return home was probably stronger than that of those who had drifted to foreign lands.

Le Wuya gently closed his eyes.

A scene emerged before his mind.

On a deep summer night, with a torrential downpour, Chang Xiaohu finally managed to escape the control of the various overseers in the coal mine and sprinted barefoot in the rain.

Behind him came the shouts and curses of his pursuers.

He was weak and short of breath, stumbling along, struggling with all his might through the splashing mud.

He couldn’t escape through the main gate, so he thought of the Nanting River.

If he jumped into the river and drifted downstream, perhaps there would be a way to survive.

Chang Xiaohu’s body was too frail. This desperate run had already drained what little strength he had left. Even if he jumped into the river, he would probably be too weak to swim.

But he had no other way out.

When he gathered himself to leap into the water, his pursuers had already caught up.

A wooden club was raised high and came crashing down on the back of his head.

Chang Xiaohu was knocked unconscious instantly and fell forward into the river.

Plop.

The sound of the body hitting the water was swallowed by the heavy rain, like a single drop merging into the river’s flow.

For now, these were all just Le Wuya’s conjectures.

But he didn’t mind blaming everything on Ge Erzi and testing his reaction.

Hearing Le Wuya’s words, Ge Erzi’s face shifted like changing clouds; the muscles twitched uncontrollably. All traces of his earlier silver tongue were gone.

Seeing his pallid expression, Le Wuya calmly shook the confession document: “If there are no objections, take it for him to sign.”

With that, he handed the confession to the clerk.

The clerk, seeing the magistrate’s confident expression and hearing him speak as if it were all true, didn’t dare not cooperate. He hurriedly bowed his head and shuffled forward to receive it.

As he brought the confession before Ge Erzi, the clerk’s heart pounded with anxiety, terrified of exposing the ruse.

However, before he even reached Ge Erzi, the man had already realized that great disaster was imminent.

Ge Erzi was well-versed in the law, and so his fear was ten thousand times greater than that of an ignorant man.

If he signed this confession, even the best outcome would be exile to the farthest border, never to return.

The worst outcome—he could be hanged twice.

Ge Erzi was also clever. By observing the magistrate’s demeanor, he had already noticed that the magistrate was unusually harsh toward him but showed respect and courtesy toward the managing clerk (daguì) of Xiaofu Coal Mine.

Having witnessed this with his own eyes, what more did he need to understand?

The magistrate clearly intended to raise the matter with Xiaofu Coal Mine gently, let it drop lightly, and punish himself with three cups of wine as penance!

He had never expected that after working for Xiaofu Coal Mine for so long, having only sipped a few bowls of soup and not even tasted a morsel of meat, things would end up like this for him!

He immediately changed his expression to one of misery, crawled forward on his knees, and cried out in grievance: “Your Honor, Your Honor! This is all bullshit! It’s slander! How dare I?! I had only good intentions, wanting to find a good future for Xiaohu and give my widowed sister-in-law some support. How is that selling people?!”

Le Wuya cast a faint glance at him. “What status do you have? To get Chang Xiaohu a position as an apprentice in the accounting room of Xiaofu Coal Mine? Which connection did you use? Which channel did you go through? Tell me. The managers of Xiaofu Coal Mine are all here. Which one would you like to call up for confrontation?”

Ge Erzi was speechless. “I…”

Le Wuya seized the moment and pressed forward relentlessly: “You knew full well that Chang Xiaohu was frail, yet you tricked him into doing hard labor in the coal mine, assuming he would never escape. He was your brother’s only son. If he died young, Su would be left alone and destitute, and you could seize their family property. Truly a masterful scheme!”

Ge Erzi’s nostrils flared slightly. Unwilling to admit guilt, he had no choice but to throw a tantrum: “Your Honor, you wrong me! I am suffering the greatest injustice of the ages!!”

“…What injustice do you have?”

An icy cold voice came from the entrance of the yamen.

He Qingsong and the other yamen runners brought in five hunchbacked, shrunken-shouldered miners, returning to report on their mission.

For some reason, Jiang He was already walking at the very front.

He Qingsong and the others not only raised no objections but were all filled with apprehension, looking as if they wanted to speak but held back.

Jiang He took brisk, soldierly steps forward, clasped his hands in a fist-and-palm salute to Le Wuya, and made a slight bow.

Le Wuya gave a faint smile and nodded in acknowledgment. “You’ve worked hard.”

Jiang He looked up at the smiling magistrate on the dais.

From the moment he entered Xiaofu Coal Mine and stated his purpose, a dozen burly men wielding broadswords had poured out, insisting that they were fake officials pretending to be soldiers, come to rob them. When they tried to stop him from taking the people, Jiang He knew exactly what Le Wuya had sent him to do.

This Xiaofu Coal Mine was definitely up to some nefarious deeds!

If there was still a manager in the mine at that moment, they would surely have come out to calm things down and negotiate with him, at least maintaining a facade of peace while they figured out a long-term plan.

But the county magistrate had thought of everything in advance and, striking first, had summoned away everyone in the mine who could speak authoritatively.

At that moment, Xiaofu Coal Mine was like a headless snake, leaving only a few ferocious overseers—the big and small bosses accustomed to using brute force to subdue the miners—who were the most likely to make foolish moves.

After Jiang He cut down a man two heads taller than himself with one sword stroke, the momentum of the swarming burly men finally diminished somewhat.

Nevertheless, to be safe, Jiang He felt around in his bundle, and then pulled out a short blunderbuss.

Going on official business while accompanying a young master of high status, one had to be well-prepared.

As soon as this gadget was loaded, the men’s feet seemed nailed to the ground.

Then Jiang He reached into his waist pouch and took out a token: “Imperial Guard on duty. Stand aside!”

At this, both the henchmen of Xiaofu Coal Mine and the yamen runners like He Qingsong were shocked to the core.

…The magistrate could command the services of someone from the capital?!

This matter in Nanting County had already reached the capital, thousands of li away?!

Seeing this, Jiang He let out a soft sigh.

He hadn’t wanted to do this.

But to avoid violent conflict and prevent the situation from spiraling out of control, he had no choice but to reveal his identity.

At his command, the yamen runners snapped out of their stupor and moved swiftly. They quickly located the five laborers that the magistrate had instructed them to find—those with non-local accents who were still working—handed them over to Jiang He for confirmation, and only then tied them together with a rope and brought them out of Xiaofu Coal Mine.

Trembling with fear, He Qingsong and the other runners were warned by Jiang He not to reveal his identity. Daring not to disobey even slightly, they hurriedly agreed and, along with the five bewildered, huddled miners, walked in formation like quails back to the yamen.

The five miners, who had moved like walking corpses, slowly came back to their senses halfway through the journey.

They… were out?

The more they walked, the more excited they became. One of them couldn’t hold back his emotions and broke into loud wails.

Seeing a man crying so sorrowfully, Jiang He naturally asked the reason.

Once he asked, he could hardly believe it.

The emperor, in his great benevolence, had only lifted the ban on private coal mines to solve the livelihood problems of the poor.

Never had he imagined that this would become a tool for certain local strongmen to oppress the common people and enrich themselves at their expense!

The angrier Jiang He grew, the more indignant he became. When he returned to the courtroom, burning with righteous fury, he happened to hear the interrogation of Ge Erzi, who was wailing on the ground, crying injustice.

Along the way, he had heard about Ge Erzi’s connection with Xiaofu Coal Mine, and he could no longer contain his anger, so he let out that rebuke.

But the magistrate on the dais seemed completely unfazed that Jiang He, a “merchant,” had overstepped his bounds and yelled at someone in the courtroom.

This made Jiang He even more certain that the magistrate already knew his identity.

When exactly had he given himself away?

Le Wuya’s attention was not on him.

The bright lights of the courtroom cast the faces of the five miners into stark clarity.

Their brows, eyes, and mouths were grimy black—like rooks—and their skin was stretched taut and hard over their bones, covered in a mix of black and purple, so that it was hard to tell at a glance whether it was dirt or scars.

Ge Erzi caught sight of one of them and gave a start, quickly using his sleeve to cover his head and face, curling up like a turtle retreating into its shell.

But he was too late to hide.

That miner had seen him too.

The miner’s throat seemed to have been scorched by something. As soon as he saw Ge Erzi, his eyes bulged as if they would bleed, and in a hoarse, strident voice, he cried out in accusation: “Your Honor!! My name is Ma Lian. I’m from Runan. Half a year ago, I came to Nanting to seek out a relative. But my relative had already moved away. I was looking to find a job here, when this bastard tricked me. He said a wealthy local family was hiring short-term laborers to harvest wheat, and he lured me into the mine! I beg Your Honor to seek justice for this common man!”

Seeing that the matter could no longer be concealed, Ge Erzi decided not to play dead any longer. He turned over and sat up like a leaping carp: “Your Honor, I was forced by Xiaofu Coal Mine!”

Le Wuya: “Oh?”

Ge Erzi’s heart thumped like a drum.

He had tricked his nephew Chang Xiaohu into entering the mine because gambling debts were hounding him and he was at his wit’s end. Lately, there were few foreign laborers to lure, and he was desperate. So he set his sights on Chang Xiaohu.

He had thought: his nephew, delicate and pampered, was probably not going to live out his natural life anyway. Living was nothing but suffering, so why not make use of him?

His widowed sister-in-law, though dirt poor, still owned three rooms of tile-roofed house.

With her only flesh and blood dead, she was getting old, one foot in the grave already—wouldn’t she be easy for him to manipulate?

Seeing that his sinister intentions were about to be exposed, Ge Erzi refused to accept his fate: “Xiaofu Coal Mine has connections everywhere; they threatened me! That’s right! They even made me send Xiaohu into the mine to take my precious nephew as a hostage, so that I wouldn’t dare to tell anyone about their dirty deeds! If they hadn’t threatened the lives of my poor widowed sister-in-law and nephew, I would never have done such a conscience-less thing!!”

Le Wuya gave an “Oh” that didn’t seem convinced. “What connections do they have everywhere? Are your legs just for show? Couldn’t you just run away?”

“I can’t get away! I can’t!”

To save his life, Ge Erzi’s tongue and brain were working overtime.

Soon, he thought of a powerful argument.

Today, while in his cell, he had seen that very person!

He hurriedly trotted out the argument: “Ming Xiangzhao was a scholar, and they turned him into a rebel! I’m just a commoner, a nobody. How could I stand up to them?”

Le Wuya, slow and deliberate: “Scholar Ming? You mean… Ming Xiangzhao?”

Ge Erzi nodded frantically. “Yes, yes, yes! It’s him! He was framed!”

Jiang He, who was quietly slipping out of the courtroom, stopped short at this.

He felt the night’s trial was bizarre. It was like pulling on a thread—from grave robbing, to assault and battery, to a past murder case, and now to a rebellion case. It was like an enormous, intricately woven net falling over everything, from which no one could escape or break free.

And the one weaving the net sat high on the hall, smiling faintly.

“…Is that so? Do you have evidence?”

He straightened his back and slapped the jingtangmu (wooden block) heavily on the desk:

“Summon Ming Xiangzhao and the witnesses to the court.”