Chapter 94: Non-existent Evidence
The last day of the twelfth lunar month.
The clouds were dim, and the sky was overcast.
The wind was damp and cold.
The accumulated snow on the road had been trampled by horse carriages and feet, becoming soiled.
At half past the hour of the monkey, Miss Hong brewed some porridge in a small house in the South Market. She served a bowl to her younger brother, saying, “We have to go out later, drink something warm to ward off the cold.”
While her brother was drinking the porridge, Miss Hong turned and tidied up the things in the small house.
She quietly took a dagger from the bedding and tucked it into her chest, just in case. If something were to happen, at least she could use this dagger to buy her brother a little time to escape.
She chuckled self-deprecatingly. After so many years in the Hundred Flowers Pavilion, her body was already defiled. Death held little value for her, but her brother, he couldn’t be harmed. Their father and mother had passed away years ago. She had brought her brother up, struggling to make a living everywhere. She had long been accustomed to being a wall shielding her brother. Whether it was wind and frost, rain and snow, open attacks, or hidden arrows, she bore it all for him.
At this point, the gambling debts had to be repaid, and Zou Cheng could not be underestimated. She could only hold onto the most stable hope while preparing for the worst.
The dagger against her chest felt cold. She stood up, stroked her brother’s head, and said, “After today, once the accounts are settled, you won’t have to hide anymore. You can live a peaceful life from now on.” Her brother mumbled an assent.
After finishing the porridge, Miss Hong took her brother and left, heading towards the Cai Le Workshop.
On the way, the wind blew her brother’s hat askew. Miss Hong carefully adjusted it for him.
The Cai Le Workshop was on the outskirts of the city, about twenty li from the South Market. Miss Hong walked steadily and slowly.
The sky gradually turned blue, then gray. It seemed as if behind the gloomy clouds, many eyes were scrutinizing the siblings.
In winter, it got dark early.
By the time they arrived, night had already fallen.
Inside the gambling house, it was boisterous. Gamblers, red-eyed with their bets, surrounded the tables, shaking dice and shouting. Beside them were several soft chairs. Those who were tired from gambling lay on them, while the gambling house’s young attendants prepared opium for them to smoke and pass the time. The air was thick with smoke and fumes.
The servant boy who had delivered the message to Miss Hong last night came out, smiling, “Steward Zou arrived a quarter of an hour ago and is waiting for you two in the Liu Yun Chamber. Please.”
The Liu Yun Chamber was in the farthest corner on the second floor.
Stepping through the clamor and the strange scent of opium, they navigated through twists and turns to reach it.
The door opened, and Zou Cheng sat inside, the window tightly shut.
As soon as Miss Hong entered, she smelled a pleasant fragrance in the room, like peach blossoms in the rain, faint and slightly sweet. This scent, unknowingly, made her tense thoughts relax slightly.
“Sit, please sit,” Zou Cheng said warmly.
Miss Hong bowed and said, “Thank you, Steward Zou. Steward Zou truly has a benevolent heart.”
Zou Cheng clapped his hands, and the servant boy brought out a small box. Inside the box was a thick stack of silver notes and an IOU.
Miss Hong looked at the silver notes and the IOU, and her trust in Zou Cheng’s sincerity increased.
She said ingratiatingly, “Steward Zou, please rest assured, I haven’t told anyone about that matter. My lips are tighter than a dead man’s.”
“Oh?” Zou Cheng glanced at her, neither confirming nor denying.
Miss Hong thought for a moment, then took out a jade pendant from her sleeve and quickly handed it to Zou Cheng, “You gave this to me before. I’m returning it to you.”
This was the greatest sincerity she could express.
This jade pendant was her trump card. No matter how difficult things got, she hadn’t dared to sell it.
At this point, she had handed over her trump card, only seeking peace.
Zou Cheng smiled and accepted the jade pendant. He placed the silver notes on the table and instructed the servant boy, “Go, call the owner of the gambling house, Boss Liu, here. Let’s settle the accounts face to face.”
“Yes,” the servant boy replied and left.
Miss Hong’s heart settled. She leaned on Zou Cheng’s shoulder and said, “Steward Zou is so magnanimous, not holding grudges. I am deeply grateful. This time, you have resolved our difficulties. Our siblings will serve you like oxen and horses for the rest of our lives…”
Zou Cheng laughed, “I don’t farm or fight, what need do I have for oxen and horses?”
At this moment, the servant boy came to report, “Boss Liu has gone to Jiangdu on business. He should be back in about half an hour.”
Miss Hong quickly said, “Half an hour isn’t long, we can wait, we can wait.”
Someone outside called out, “Steward Zou, Lord Maternal Uncle needs you for something.”
Zou Cheng looked troubled, “Then I… I’ll have to go first. The silver notes will be left here, and the IOU will be left here. When Boss Liu returns, you can handle it directly.”
Miss Hong nodded, “Alright.”
“It’s cold, turn up the stove, don’t let them freeze,” Zou Cheng said considerately.
“Thank you for your thoughtfulness, Steward Zou,” the siblings said in unison.
The servant boy adjusted the stove and added more charcoal.
The fragrance in the room intensified.
Zou Cheng lowered his head, a barely perceptible smile appearing at the corner of his lips.
Among the charcoal the servant boy had added was a dose of “Soul-Shattering Fragrance,” made from the sap of ninety-nine poisons from the border of Caiyun and Myanmar. In half an hour, they would die in their sleep, unknowingly.
This incense burned completely, leaving no ash, clean and pure.
A person dies in a gambling house. His hands are clean.
Lips tighter than a dead man’s? Impossible. The dead are the safest.
If he couldn’t even outsmart a woman of the night, then Zou Cheng would have wasted all those years working under Minister Zhang.
Just as he was about to leave, a group of people rushed in swiftly.
The opened door slammed shut again.
It was Qin Mingxu.
He had brought over a dozen men, each armed.
Zou Cheng, to avoid suspicion, had only brought one confidant. His heart began to pound, and he secretly calculated how to deal with the situation.
He looked at Miss Hong and said, “The land of willows and mist in Jiangnan, only produces women like you.”
Miss Hong’s face turned pale, “No, no, it wasn’t me, it really wasn’t me. I didn’t expect him to come. I didn’t tell anyone…”
Qin Mingxu said coldly, “I heard everything you just said. I don’t want to harm you, I just want to live a peaceful life and no longer be threatened. I killed the Troupe Leader, and you killed my father. We are even. You can take the jade pendant, and you must leave your evidence behind. From now on, we will mind our own business.”
Zou Cheng smiled, “I don’t have any evidence. Really.”
“You’re lying,” Qin Mingxu extended the sword in his hand, “Then, leave the jade pendant.”
Zou Cheng’s body flickered, and his left leg unexpectedly attacked Qin Mingxu.
Others might not know, but he himself did.
There was Soul-Shattering Fragrance in this room; he couldn’t stay long. He just wanted to leave quickly. However, he truly couldn’t produce the evidence. He just wanted to escape in the chaos.
Qin Mingxu dodged while retaliating. The house guards behind him quickly came to help.
The two groups began to fight.
The box on the table fell to the ground, and the silver notes scattered.
Seeing this, Miss Hong’s brother, fearing that the silver notes would be lost and his gambling debts would remain unsettled, quickly crouched down to pick them up.
Zou Cheng’s servant boy, thinking that Miss Hong and her brother had tricked them and already resentful, saw these shameless people still coveting their money. Anger flared up in his heart, and he swung his saber at Miss Hong’s brother.
Miss Hong’s brother had just picked up the money and was smiling at the corner of his mouth. Unexpectedly, he was struck by a saber. Before he could even cry out, he fell straight down.
Seeing this, Miss Hong cried out in grief and rushed over, “Brother!”
The young man’s blood gushed out like a breached river, flowing all over the ground. He gasped, struggling to stuff the tightly clenched silver notes into Miss Hong’s hands, “Sister, the money, we have money, quickly, quickly put it away. I… I’m dead… the gambling debt doesn’t need to be repaid. You take the money and start a new life…”
Miss Hong’s lips trembled, her words incoherent, “No, no, you can’t die, you can’t die…”
She didn’t shed tears. She only felt as if she had fallen into a deep ice cave, her whole body numb with cold.
“Sister, I’m sorry, I’ve burdened you in this life. In the next life, I’ll be your brother and love you as you loved me…” The young man’s breath grew weaker. Suddenly, his eyes widened, his pupils dilated, and he desperately managed to utter, “Sister, start a new life, start a new life!”
His head tilted, and he was lifeless.
Miss Hong’s hands trembled as she reached out to check his breathing. A cry of despair escaped her chest.
She hugged her brother, curling into a ball, shrinking smaller and smaller, back to over a decade ago, back to when her brother was a snot-nosed child, and she carried him around the village. An elder sister is like a mother. After their mother died, she had clearly always considered herself her brother’s mother.
Beside them, Zou Cheng, despite his martial arts skills, was outnumbered. Over a dozen people pressed in on him, and he retreated step by step.
He wanted to retreat to the window, open it, and jump down.
A wise man doesn’t fight for a moment’s bravery.
He couldn’t get entangled with this group any longer.
Suddenly, a pair of hands like a vengeful ghost grabbed his leg. He stumbled and fell to the ground.
Miss Hong’s eyes blazed with a chilling cold, like a soulless demon.
Qin Mingxu and his men had closed in, “Zou Cheng, I don’t want to make things difficult for you, and I don’t want to spill more blood. Hand over the evidence, and we can both be fine today.”
Zou Cheng looked at him, trying his best to remain calm, “Listen to me—”
Before he could finish speaking, the sound of a blade piercing flesh was heard. A dagger went through his body.
Behind him, Miss Hong’s eyes were clouded, her demeanor frantic.
“Dead, dead, it’s so good, dead… I killed him, killed him…” She clapped her hands.
Zou Cheng had not expected that a woman of pleasure would deliver the fatal blow from behind.
His body felt as if it were being dragged into an abyss.
What appeared before his eyes was a wrinkled, stern, father-like face.
Zhang Taiyue. Minister Zhang.
Although he had been punished and expelled from the manor by Minister Zhang for the Troupe Leader’s death, he had never blamed his former master. He only wished Minister Zhang well, that he would remain healthy and do more for the people. Having served under Minister Zhang for many years, no one knew better than he the Minister’s toils.
However, not long after leaving the Zhang Manor, he heard the shocking news. Minister Zhang had died at the hands of the Eastern Depot. The once glorious Zhang Manor, with its hundreds of people, had suffered death and flight. Minister Zhang had narrowly escaped being whipped by Your Majesty even after death, and his name had been slandered, accusing him of corruption…
Consort Zheng had promised him that one day, when she gave birth to a Prince, and the Prince grew up to be the new Emperor, the first thing he would do would be to vindicate Minister Zhang.
This temptation was too great.
He joined the Lord Maternal Uncle’s household and worked for the Zheng family.
Now, before his mission was accomplished, he had died. Minister Zhang, I will tell you even in the netherworld, a person’s will does not change, and a dog does not change its master. I, Zou Cheng, no matter where I am, will forever be loyal to you.
He smiled and looked at Qin Mingxu, “There really is no evidence. I destroyed it. Otherwise, how could Feng Gao not find it? Feng Gao of the Eastern Depot, known as Black Impermanence, if I wanted to deceive him, I had to take a risky gamble. What doesn’t exist is the safest. I was bluffing you.”
Qin Mingxu stared at him intently, trying to decipher his words.
Zou Cheng said, “After I die, you will be safe. You can forget about this matter and live a stable life with Zhu Sangyu. The only people who know are yourself and Feng Gao. Look outside, all the filth on the streets is covered by a heavy snowfall. It’s so good, so good…”
The moon shone on the accumulated snow, and the north wind wailed mournfully.
The moonlight and the snow light reflected each other, cold and piercing.
Outside, Yangzhou City lay silent and still, a fleeting dream.
