gnovel Chapter 096: Meeting
Chapter 096: Meeting
Qin Keqing nodded, then put away the note and walked out. After a few steps, she suddenly stopped and turned her head back.
She recalled the words "From the father's perspective, it's not good" in the Qin family's signing room, and also the line in the book that hadn't been completed yet, but she didn't say these two things out loud.
"Your Highness, if Tang Situi asks about the past of Yue Family Army, there's no need to bring it up yourself. Let him tell you himself. He has a debt to repay, and he must repay it himself."
Zhao Bozong sat alone in the study for a long time, then took Xin Qizong's Xihe waist knife from the shelf, drew out the blade, and rubbed the deep notch on the back of the knife with his fingers.
Since his transmigration, he has been playing the role of an observer, from outside the Dali Temple to now as his subordinates have begun to accumulate power.
Most of these people gathered there spontaneously.
Xin Qizong said that the knife was missing a blade, and he said he would fix it for him.
Now the Empress Dowager has given him the broken porcelain shards, Xiao Bieli has gone to Ezhou to find Zhu Fu, Yuwen Xu has strung the copper bell wire across the Han River, and Li Bao's fast boat has been waiting at Guazhou Ferry for half a month.
He's accumulating more and more cards in his hand.
But Qin Hui also had his own collection of evidence, including those related to Tian Ruyi, Dong Xian, the old files from the Ezhou Armory, and Zheng Gangzhong, the living evidence he had retrieved from the Dali Temple prison.
The cards on both sides haven't been revealed yet; the real competition hasn't even begun.
On February 15th, Zhao Bocong had his first private conversation with Tang Situi in the study of the Prince of Puan's residence.
Tang Situi was led into the Prince's mansion by Liu An. He entered through the back door and followed the newly modified secret route by Yuwen Xu.
Turning along the corridor into the woodshed, passing through several temporarily partitioned storage rooms, and finally entering the study through the door at the back of the archives, the entire process did not involve passing through any windows that were open to the outside.
When Tang Situi came in, he had his head down and was carrying a box of pastries in his hand. They were sesame candies made by an inconspicuous pastry shop in the west of the city.
He placed the snacks on the table and then gave Zhao Bozong a very formal bow.
"Your Highness, I, Tang Situi, risk my life to request an audience because of something that has been buried for ten years."
"Inspector Tang, there's no need for such formalities." Zhao Bozong gestured for him to sit down, and instead of having a servant serve tea, he picked up a teapot from the table and poured him a cup himself.
This was Zhao Bozong's way of treating guests: he didn't call servants, but did everything himself, so that the guests would feel from the moment they entered that he was not a member of the royal family who was used to being waited on.
Tang Situi didn't touch the cup of tea; his fingers were trembling, as if some emotion that had been suppressed for too long was surging up.
"In the tenth year of Shaoxing, I was a compiler in the Privy Council. During the Battle of Yancheng that year, I delivered a piece of intelligence on the Jin army's troop movements to Yue Fei. The intelligence included the marching sequence and dates of the Jin army's order for Wanyan Zongbi's camp to make a detour southeast of Yancheng."
This intelligence allowed Yue Fei to seize the initiative in Yancheng and decisively defeat the Jin army. He lowered his head even further. "But when I submitted the intelligence, I used the Privy Council's secret channels. An examiner discovered the traces of the transmission. I was terrified at the time, thinking I would lose my head."
"Someone removed the stub of that confidential document from the archives on my behalf, and took the original document directly. The file number is still there, but the text is blank."
The record of that examiner was also crossed out. At the time, I didn't know who it was, but later I learned that it was Master Zhijia who, through Yue Shaobao's insider in the Privy Council, helped me cover up this flaw.
Qin Keqing, standing to the side, twitched her eyebrows slightly when she heard the name "Zhijia".
When the master first showed her the copper coins at Shunhe Tea Shop last year, he said, "I have buried many threads for you, but you have to find them yourself." She unconsciously raised her hand and touched the missing corner of the copper coin in her sleeve.
Tang Situi continued, head bowed, "In the twelfth month of the eleventh year of Shaoxing, on the day Yue Shaobao died, I was on duty at the Dali Temple."
As a compiler in the Privy Council, I was temporarily seconded to the interrogation site to record statements, but I recorded nothing because Yue Shaobao had no statement.
He didn't utter a single word from beginning to end. In court, Qin Hui asked him to sign his confession. He put down his pen, took off his shirt, and revealed four characters on his back.
Everyone present saw those four words. Qin Hui's expression immediately changed.
Tang Situi took off his official hat, pressed his forehead against the edge of the desk, and his voice began to tremble.
"I have pondered these four words for ten whole years. I dare not say it, but I have written them down exactly as they are on paper and brought them with me."
He took a thinly folded piece of paper from his sleeve and placed it on the table. Zhao Bozong unfolded it; only four words were written on it:
"Serve the country with utmost loyalty."
No one spoke in the study anymore. Qin Keqing put down her charcoal pencil. She remembered that last year, Xiao Jinluo had been running around in the corridors of the Prince's Mansion, telling everyone she met, "Loyalty to the country shines brightly under the heavens." It was the Empress Dowager who said that on behalf of Yue Fei in the Imperial Ancestral Temple.
The four characters that Tang Situi wrote at this moment were spoken by Yue Fei on his back.
"Serve the country with utmost loyalty" was said by the Empress Dowager, while "serve the country with all one's heart" was engraved on Yue Fei's back. The difference of four words separated them by an entire destiny.
Zhao Bozong placed the paper on the table, his voice suddenly becoming very deep, "Chief Inspector Tang, what do you want me to do for you today?"
"I do not seek anything for myself. In the tenth year of Shaoxing, I delivered a report once. Later, Yue Shaobao died, and I did nothing else."
After the eleventh year of Shaoxing, I followed Qin Hui, serving as his editor and writing documents for him, signing the official documents of the Ministry of Personnel on his behalf even if he didn't want to sign them.
"Everything I've done has weighed on the name of Yue Fei. If Your Highness wishes to exonerate Yue Fei, I dare not refuse any task that requires my assistance, but I absolutely do not ask for Your Highness's forgiveness."
Tang Situi stood up, took two steps back, and knelt down on both knees.
"Today I am not kneeling before Your Highness, but before myself in the tenth year of Shaoxing, when I was secretly copying Jin army intelligence in the Privy Council's duty room."
That year I was twenty-seven and unafraid of death; now I am thirty-eight and unafraid of death, but even fear of death must be repaid.
Qin Keqing did not look at the kneeling Tang Situi, but looked at Zhao Bozong. Her gaze contained neither sympathy nor contempt, only the calmness of intelligence analysis.
She had seen too many people who survived under Qin Hui's rule. Some became accomplices, some became walking corpses, and some buried their faces in their pillows and cried in the dead of night.
Tang Situi belongs to the last type. This kind of person is neither good nor bad, just someone who has been in debt for too long and has finally been crushed by the interest.
Zhao Bozong remained silent for a moment, then stood up without helping him up.
"Prosecutor Tang, you said you worked under Qin Hui for ten years, so you should know what cards he still has, which cards he's going to use against me, and which cards he hasn't revealed yet."
You don't need to cover for him. He's more wary of you than he is of me now. When you came out of the Qin residence through the back gate today, someone was already following you.
Tang Situi took out an official document from his sleeve and placed it on the table.
"This is a record of all the secret documents Qin Hui sent to Ezhou, Xiangyang, and Xiuzhou through the Privy Council between December of the twelfth year of Shaoxing and January of the thirteenth year of Shaoxing."
The content of the document is not visible, but the date of issuance and the receiving department are listed.
"I only have the table of contents; I haven't been able to get the main text. But the table of contents itself proves one thing: from the first month of the lunar calendar until now, Qin Hui has sent at least six secret documents to Ezhou, and the recipient of each one was the official stationed at the Imperial City Guard in Ezhou."
Qin Keqing took the official document and read it carefully.
All six secret documents were sent to Ezhou, all through the Privy Council, with each document spaced five to seven days apart. The earliest document was sent on the third day of the first lunar month, which happened to be the same day that Dong Xian was promoted.