The room goes through the late Ming Dynasty, and the back door leads to North America at the beginni

After hearing Gao Jin's words, Ning Wen knew that this man might have been interested in Da Wei for a long time.

However, Gao Jing was able to quickly take control of the Confucius Mansion with 800 elite soldiers, plunder and seize so many gold and silver treasures in a short period of time, and restrain his subordinates from surrendering collectively. He was definitely a talented person.

It is undoubtedly a good thing for Damei that such people join Da'ei.

He said: "We in the Yi army do not just randomly find someone to hold a public trial, but conduct a public trial after conducting an investigation and confirming that the person is indeed an evil gentry and bully.

Although the Kong family has a bad reputation in Qufu, according to the rules, it is still necessary to investigate and collect evidence, and only after confirmation can a targeted public trial be held. "

Nowadays, Damei is more and more aware that the public trial is a sharp weapon, and it is double-edged, so he has tightened his control. To prevent the public trial from being wantonly abused, implicating innocent people, and even affecting Da'ei's officialdom.

Gao Jin nodded in understanding and said, "If that's the case, I can provide some clues about the Kong family's illegal activities of oppressing good people and even taking human lives lightly."

With that said, Gao Jin took out another book and handed it to Ning Wen.

This was something he asked casually while interrogating Kong Xingxie and others about their money and food. He originally wanted to hold on to the evidence of the Kong family's crimes, so as to avoid the Kong family turning around and retaliating against him in the future. Now he simply used it to help the Yi army convict Kong Xingxie and others.

As for whether using torture to obtain confessions was in line with Da'Ei's rules, it was not within the scope of Gao Jin's consideration - after all, when he did this, he was still following the army, not the Wei army.

Ning Wen flipped through the book and glanced through it, then smiled and said: "Okay, if most of the confessions in this are true, then Kong Xingxie, Kong Xingde and others will definitely go to the public trial."

···

After the Yi army took over the Kong Mansion, a group of Kong family leaders who had been captured and tortured by the Shun army were also released, but they were not returned to their homes, but were placed under house arrest in a courtyard.

Among these people, Kong Xingxie, the eldest son of the contemporary Yanshenggong Kong Yinzhi, and the scheduled next Yanshenggong Kong Xingxie, is naturally the most famous.

However, although Yanshenggong had a respected status, he basically did not interfere with the Confucian family's general affairs. He was only responsible for the superficial appearance and was equivalent to the honorary spokesperson of the Confucian family.

Under him are the head of the Kong family (also known as the head of the Kong family), Linmiao administrator (Confucius Lin, manager of the Confucius Temple), Qufu magistrate, county magistrate, chief registrar, classics historian, etc., whether they are positions within the clan or officials in Qufu , all selected "virtuous" people from recent branches of the Confucius family to take charge.

Even the Confucian academic officials are like this.

The academic officials of Confucius are not the academic officials of Qufu - their official positions are generally Doctor of the Five Classics of the Hanlin Academy, Doctor of Taichang Temple, Academic Records of the Imperial Academy, Xuezheng, etc. They all hold temporary positions in the Hanlin Academy and the Imperial Academy, and are actually only responsible for Confucius. Everything about the government academy.

All in all, Qufu is a state within a state controlled by the Kong family, and power is divided between the direct lineage and the descendants of the Kong family.

There were as many as thirty or forty hereditary official and clan positions in Qufu that were inherited by the Confucius family. However, when Gao Jin and other shun troops occupied the Confucius mansion, not all of them were there, so only a dozen or so were arrested and tortured by them. people.

Because these people are all weaklings who are greedy for life and afraid of death. They will confess as soon as they are pinched with sticks, and they will even confess when they see the sticks. Therefore, most of them are fine, and at most they have suffered some skin injuries during the torture.

At this time, these dozen people gathered around Kong Xingxie, discussing the situation that the Kong family was currently facing.

Kong Xingjie raised the issue in Linmiao and said: "Since the Yi army rescued us from the hands of the Shun army, they must know to respect our Kong family. In my opinion, we don't have to worry, we can just wait for the Yi army to let us go back."

The clan leader Kong Yinhuang said: "I'm afraid it's not that simple - if the Wei army really respected our identity as descendants of Kong Sheng, they should have released us back home from the beginning, and arrested the traitor Gao Jin and others.

Now that they have surrendered Gao Jin and others, they have put us and others under house arrest here. It has been a day and they are still indifferent. How can they show any respect at all? "

Kong Xingxie sighed: "Well, after all, these generals of the Shun army and the Yi army who came to Qufu are all warriors. They have no idea about the status of our Kong family in the minds of scholars in the world. I don't know what it means to the new dynasty if I, the Kong family, surrender and serve." major."

Hearing this, the patriarch Kong Yinhuang was a little angry and said: "In the end, it's your father's fault for not rushing to join Li Zicheng - Li Chuang called Yanzhou at that time, which was good, but he didn't achieve much. What does it look like?

As expected, only about a month after entering the capital, he was defeated by Jian Nu and fled westward in embarrassment. Gao Yigong, who was guarding Shandong, probably wanted to escape, so he thought of sending someone to our Kong Mansion to snatch him away. Kong Xingxie's face turned ugly when he heard this, and said, "What's the use of Uncle Qi talking about this now?" If you had the foresight, why didn't you stop my father from surrendering? Now that my father's life and death in the capital are unknown, you are blaming him, which is an afterthought. "

"You!" Kong Yinshan was trembling with anger, "You are so disrespectful to your elders. You are really a child of the Kong family in vain!"

Kong Xingxie sneered, "When it comes to disrespecting the elders, I'm far behind Uncle Qi. Of those clan members who were killed by Uncle Qi using clan rules, there are probably more than one or two who are senior to Uncle Qi, right?"

Kong Xingjie saw this and said quickly: "It's now, don't say who is right and who is wrong, let's think about what to do next."

Kong Xingxie was still relatively optimistic and said: "Even if the generals of the Wei army who came to Qufu don't know the importance of my Kong family, then there are always people in the Da'ei court who know. As long as we wait, we can eventually restore our former noble status."

"How long do we have to wait?" Kong Yinhuang snorted, then rolled his eyes and said: "In my opinion, you might as well write a letter of surrender to Emperor Da'ei, indicating that our Kong family is willing to surrender to Da'ei and respect Da'ei as the emperor. The world is in good shape.

In this case, Emperor Da'ei might be pleased and decree that you should inherit your father's title of Duke of Yansheng. "

When Kong Xingxie heard this, he became angry and said: "Uncle Qi, do you think I am a fool? Since my father surrendered Li Shun, how can I be the one to submit the surrender to Liu Wei? By then, I will have a bad name of 'unfilial' , how can I still inherit the Dukedom of Yansheng?"

Kong Yinhuang snorted, "What? Do you think that the Duke of Yansheng can continue to fall to you?"

Hearing this, the eyes of other Kong family leaders around them became erratic and strange.

The core power of the Kong family is in the hands of Yanshenggong. For example, official and clan positions such as Qufu County Magistrate and Linmiao Governor were nominated by Yanshenggong and then elected by nearby clan members.

Therefore, the main branches of the nearby branch all want to obtain the right to inherit the Duke of Yansheng - this is not possible at ordinary times, but when the dynasty changes, the chance is not small.

For example, after Kong Yinzhi surrendered Li Shun and Liu Wei conquered the world, if he wanted to use the Kong family to win over the world's scholars, he would probably not let Kong Yinzhi's son Kong Xingxie succeed Yanshenggong, but choose another person from the Kong family. Come and succeed.

Kong Xingxie felt that the atmosphere was a little subtle and became nervous for a moment.

Fortunately, not long after, the courtyard door was opened, and a large group of Wei troops came in. The leading general seemed to be of high rank.

Seeing this, Kong Xingxie immediately snorted: "Is that what I said? There is no need to worry at all. Won't the army of Yi come and let us go now?"

The rest of the people no longer had any thoughts of fighting among themselves, and all looked at Wei Jun expectantly - as descendants of Duke Yan who had been at ease for most of their lives, they hoped to return as soon as possible instead of racking their brains and taking risks to compete for the title. In their respective mansions, they took a hot bath, had a good meal, and then hugged a few concubines to do some mischief.

Just when Kong Yinhui, Kong Xingjie and others were thinking this, they saw the general of the Yi army wave his hand, and the soldiers behind them rushed forward like wolves and tigers, and tied their hands behind their backs with hemp ropes.

Kong Xingxie was the first one to be tied up. When he was tied up and pulled away, he realized what he was doing and shouted loudly: "What are you doing? We are all descendants of Kong Sheng, so don't do anything random!"

The general of the Yi army smiled coldly and said: "Don't worry, we are not doing anything random, we are just taking you to a public trial in front of Saint Kong."

public trial?

Most of the people in power of the Kong family were obsessed with dominating the small independent kingdom of Qufu, so they didn't know much about the affairs of the Yi army, and they were still confused when they heard about the "public trial".

However, there were also a few people who had heard about the public trial of Wei Jun. Thinking of the horror of the rumors, they suddenly became unsteady.

These officers and soldiers of the Yi army were not polite and directly dragged Kong Xingxie, Kong Yinshan and others to the small square in front of the Confucius Temple in Qufu County - a public trial platform had been set up there, facing the statue of Confucius in the Confucius Temple. (End of chapter)