Red Mansion: Fuyao River and Mountain

Chapter 344: Criminal Justice Dali Temple

Earl's Palace.

Jia Cong changed his clothes and went to Yingchun's courtyard.

Passing by the pond in front of the yard, green lotus and red lotus are in full bloom among the clear blue waves. There is an embroidered pavilion with a corridor beside the waterside pavilion, and a round table and embroidered cushion are placed in the pavilion.

Qingwen, Yuanyang and other maids were sitting around the table, laughing like silver bells, with red colored threads and gleaming silver needles in their hands, trying to thread the needle together.

Competing for skills is an inherent custom of the Chinese Valentine's Day and is most loved and respected by young women.

Needle threading competition is a competition among women to thread a needle, tying red colored thread, and threading a seven-hole needle. Whoever threads more and faster means more skill, and the woman who threads the slowest is called "the loser in skill".

Most of the maids present here are from Lady Jia's and Lady Wang's rooms. The maids in these two rooms have many rules and regulations, and usually do not dare to learn from other maids and old women to gamble and drink.

All their extra energy is spent on needlework, so this kind of needlework competition game is also something they often play when they get together with nothing to do, not to mention that today is the day of praying for cleverness.

Among the whole family, Qingwen is famous for her needlework and her skills are the best.

While others had only threaded seven or eight stitches, she had already threaded more than ten stitches on the colored thread in her hand. Although she laughed at others for being too slow, her little hands were flying up and down without slowing down at all.

When everyone saw Jia Cong coming, Jin Chuan couldn't help but smile when she saw Jia Cong's new clothes, and wanted to tease Qingwen.

Unexpectedly, when Qingwen saw Jia Cong coming, she felt a little uncomfortable. She also anticipated her opponent's move and glared at Jin Chuan, making the other swallow the teasing words she wanted to say.

When Jia Cong entered Yingchun's courtyard, he saw Daiyu, Tanchun, Baochai and other sisters there.

Cui Mo and Zi Juan were serving nearby and smiled when they saw him come in.

Tanchun smiled and joked, "I heard that Third Brother washed someone else's hair today, and he washed several people at once."

When Jia Cong heard this, he knew that the scene in his yard just now must have been told by Zijuan and others. Thinking of Jinchuan's joke, he knew that there was a lot to be said about washing hair.

But he didn't care much and said with a smile: "If you want, I can wash it for you."

When Tanchun heard this, her pretty face turned red and she couldn't help but burst out laughing.

Yingchun laughed and said, "Brother Cong, you are talking nonsense. On the day of Qiqiao Festival, a girl's hair cannot be washed casually."

Daiyu on the side frowned at him and pouted her lips slightly.

However, Daiyu came from a noble family and had seen a lot of things happening among the children of wealthy families, so she was accustomed to them. When Daiyu's mother was alive, in order to increase the number of offspring in the Lin family, her father had no shortage of concubines to serve him.

After hearing Jia Cong's absurd behavior, although she felt a little jealous, she didn't take it to heart. Besides, Zhishao and Yinglian in Jia Cong's room had somewhat different identities, and everyone in the Jia family knew it.

But he joked, "I thought Third Brother was smart, but it turns out he's just a fool. He doesn't even know he's been fooled by your precious girls."

Yingchun and Tanchun could tell that Daiyu was a little unconvinced, and they both smiled and tried to hold back their laughter. Although Baochai also smiled, she looked a little lonely.

Even though Daiyu's words were a little bit petty, the intimacy and coquettishness she exuded was something that the other sisters did not have...

……

Shenjing, Dali Temple.

The gloomy prison was filled with a damp and moldy smell, mixed with the pungent smell of blood and the weak breathing of feeble human bodies.

The brazier nearby was burning red, dispelling some of the dampness in the prison.

The iron in the brazier was burned purple-red, emitting a cruel smell of burnt metal.

A man was tied to an elm rack. His clothes were torn to shreds by the whip and his body was covered in blood. He looked extremely miserable and embarrassed.

Dali Temple Chief Yang Hongbin walked into the torture chamber, and the jailer at the side hurriedly came forward to greet him.

"Sir, I have been questioning him for several days, but he is evasive and refuses to tell the truth. I have no choice but to torture him. If he still refuses to confess, I will use severe punishment."

Yang Hongbin had served as a judge in the Dali Temple for many years. He was proficient in investigating and solving cases, as well as criminal inquiries, and was always highly regarded by his superiors in the Dali Temple.

He was promoted to the position of Zuo Shizheng of Dali Temple because he and Jia Cong worked together to solve the major case of Water Conservancy in Jinling. Now he is a capable man relied upon by Wei Guanyao, the Minister of Dali Temple.

When he entered the torture chamber, he was holding a document in his hand and looking at the messy prisoners on the rack.

He said: "Zhou Suqing, when Zou Huaiyi was executed, many people could not escape the blame, but you were able to escape unscathed and hide away. The people from Yingtian Prefecture and Jinyiwei searched all over Jinling, but they could not catch you.

If you weren't protected by the powerful people in Jinling, you would never have such ability!

You thought that everything would be fine if you escaped to a remote place like Liaodong, but unfortunately, the law is long and you still ran into Weiyuanbo's hands after all."

The man on the rack looked up at Yang Hongbin, as if he was unfamiliar with the title of Weiyuanbo.

At first he fled to Liaodong and settled down in Yafu Pass. He also hired the most outstanding female swordsman in town, Ellie, as a bodyguard. He wanted to wait until his fame had passed for a few years before finding a way to finish off the mess left in Nanjing.

He didn't expect to meet that strange young man at Yafu Pass, who knew his background in Jinling very well. He was caught inexplicably.

He was imprisoned in the prison of the Military Affairs Office of Yafu Pass. The other party arranged strict guards. He was unfamiliar with the people and the place in Liaodong, so there was no possibility of escape.

Later, he heard some words from the jailer. Because the Great Zhou and the Jurchens were in a stalemate at that time, no one cared about him for a while.

He was detained in the prison of the Military Affairs Office of Yafu Pass for two whole months. The young man who arrested him never appeared again after locking himself in the cell.

It was not until June that someone came to escort him, and he also heard that the imperial court had defeated the Jurchens outside the Great Wall.

He had been on the road for half a month before he realized that he was not being escorted back to Jinling, but to Shenjing, which made him very nervous and afraid.

He had just been imprisoned in the Dali Temple, and the officials there had spent several days questioning him, but he had only confessed some insignificant things, trying to get away with it.

He dared not reveal any of the fatal things happening in Jinling, because he had left a fatal weakness in Jinling, forcing him to be cautious.

Even when the Dali Temple began to torture him, he gritted his teeth and persevered.

But he didn't know how long he could hold on. The officials from the Dali Temple didn't seem to be in a hurry. They would whip him dozens of times every day and then stop to let himself recover and continue the next day.

He had been out in the world for many years and had some experience. He knew that the flogging he was experiencing was just an appetizer and was far from the truly terrible punishment.

Once you are tortured, confessing or not confessing means the difference between life and death.

But the people from the Dali Temple seemed confident and not in a hurry. It seemed as if they were waiting for something and did not want to kill themselves easily.

Zhou Suqing knew that the official who had just come in was named Yang, and he was the person in charge of her case. She had been in jail for almost ten days, and he had come several times, but he didn't say much each time.

The young man who captured him in Liaodong was actually called Weiyuan Bo in his mouth. It was amazing that such a young man was actually a lord...

……

Yang Hongbin said coldly: "Zhou Suqing, you have traveled a lot and have gained some experience. I have interrogated you for so many days, but you still refuse to tell the truth. You know that you will die for your crime, but you still want to get away with it.

But I was not idle. I took this opportunity to go to Jinling to do something. I found a woman named Chunlian and a boy who just turned one year old in Jinling Liuhe. "Yang Hongbin smiled sinisterly and said, "You are lucky to be surnamed Zhou. The child is strong and the mother has enough milk. It should be easy to raise him..."

When Zhou Suqing heard this, her face changed drastically, and a chill ran down her spine. Her bloodstained body twisted uncontrollably on the rack, as if she was trying to break free.

……

Zhou Suqing knew that if she was caught, she would definitely not have a good ending.

He was closely involved in the rebellion of Japanese wanderers in Longtan Port in Nanjing; he colluded with high-ranking officials in Nanjing to sell stolen goods and loot large quantities of foreign goods.

No matter which one it was, he would die.

Back then, he was just a servant of the Zhen family in Gusu. He lost his lady on the night of the Lantern Festival and fled to Japan to make a living for fear of getting into trouble.

After wandering around for half his life, he finally saved up some property and married a wife, but he had no children for several years.

Later, he fell in love with Chunlian, a singing girl from Xingxiu Tower in Jinling, and redeemed her and took her as his concubine. Very few people knew about this.

Unexpectedly, after several months of being with Chunlian, she became pregnant.

That child was his only flesh and blood, and it was a boy, so he was the only bloodline of his Huo family.

When he fled Jinling, Chunlian was already pregnant and about to give birth, so he was unable to take her with him.

That was his biggest weakness and handle in Jinling.

The person behind him is very powerful. After he escapes, this person will definitely inquire around and will definitely find out this secret.

At that time, he was anxious to escape and had no other choice.

He also expected that as long as his whereabouts were unknown, the people in Jinling would be cautious. Even if they found his women and children, they would think they were rare treasures and would not easily harm them.

He had originally thought that after a few years when things had calmed down completely, he would find a way to take her and her son and escape to the open sea.

It was because of this that, after he was imprisoned in the Dali Temple, although he was repeatedly whipped and tortured, he gritted his teeth and dared not tell the truth.

He didn't expect things to have come to this point. He didn't know how this official from the Dali Temple found out about this. From his tone, Chunlian and the child must have fallen into his hands.

……

Yang Hongbin waved towards the door, and a woman guarding female prisoners entered the torture room with a woman and a child.

The woman was pretty and charming, and she was holding a child in her arms, who was white, plump and very cute.

The woman entered the torture chamber with a look of fear. When she saw Zhou Suqing, who was covered in blood, lying on the rack, she could not recognize her for a moment.

But Zhou Suqing recognized him at a glance and shouted, "Chunlian!"

The woman finally reacted and exclaimed: "Master! How did you become like this..."

Yang Hongbin waved to the prisoner's wife, and the mother and son were pulled out of the cell.

A gloomy voice sounded: "You have seen your woman and children. I brought them all the way from Jinling. You know very well what I want to do.

With them and their son, I am too lazy to torture them anymore...!"

At this time, Zhou Suqing's spirit had completely collapsed. He never thought that an official of the Dali Temple could be so cruel and despicable.

"Please spare my life, sir. If you let them go, I will confess everything. I will never lie..."

After hearing this, Yang Hongbin secretly breathed a sigh of relief. In fact, no one knew how much inside information Zhou Suqing knew about the Jinling Water Supervision Bureau case.

He was also very clear that Zhou Suqing would most likely confess under severe torture, but he had seen too many cases where she confessed under torture or made groundless accusations while under torture.

Zou Huaiyi, a captain of the Jinling Water Conservancy, was executed. If there is someone behind the scenes who is behind this, then this person must be very powerful and important. Jinling is the secondary capital of the Great Zhou Dynasty, so the implications must be very wide.

At first, Jia Cong came up with many brilliant ideas in Jinling, but once Zou Huaiyi was executed, Jia Cong withdrew in time. It was based on such concerns.

Yang Hongbin and Jia Cong had experienced risks together in Jinling, and they both agreed with this.

Now that the Dali Temple Minister has personally named him to be in charge of Zhou Suqing's case, it is tantamount to making him sit on a dangerous pile of gunpowder.

If Zhou Suqing confessed something untrue or incomplete under severe punishment, which triggered turmoil in the officialdom of Nanjing and even the six prefectures and one city in Jiangnan, Yang Hongbin would become the living sacrifice and would have no place to be buried.

Yang Hongbin was well versed in torture and naturally knew that forced confessions were the crudest method of torture.

Severe punishment is feasible, but it is not the safest way to deal with such a serious case.

……

Fortunately, there is always a way out. Just as Zhou Suqing was escorted to Beijing, the head of the China Railway Corporation's Shenjing Department received the information and soon delivered an important message.

An agent of the China Railway Company was deeply involved in a major case involving the Water Supervision Bureau, and therefore learned some of the secrets. It turned out that Zhou Suqing had important family members left in Jinling, who could be used!
Based on the clues provided by the China Railway Corporation, Yang Hongbin dispatched officials from the Dali Temple to secretly go to Nanjing. It didn't take much effort to find the mother and son.

After Zhou Suqing was imprisoned, Yang Hongbin did not use severe torture. He was just delaying time to accumulate psychological pressure on Zhou Suqing, waiting for the mother and son to be found so that he could strike them in one blow!

This is because even the most cunning, treacherous and sinister person will give up all hope and surrender when faced with his only blood descendant.

Only when Zhou Suqing is in this state can his confession be as foolproof as possible.

The risks faced by Yang Hongbin will also be minimized to the greatest extent possible...

……

That night, the candles in the Dali Temple's torture chamber were lit all night. Yang Hongbin called a doctor and treated Zhou Suqing's wounds.

He asked all the jailers to leave the torture room, leaving only himself and a Dali criminal recorder who served as a secretary.

The entire torture room was eerily quiet, with only the occasional sound of a baby crying coming from the next room.

To Zhou Suqing, this was the most heart-wrenching sound in the world...

That night, the criminal recorder wrote more than ten pages of transcripts based on Zhou Suqing's confession. He was sweating profusely after finishing each page...

Yang Hongbin was shocked when he heard Zhou Suqing's confession.

He also repeatedly questioned Zhou Suqing about the content and asked them to proofread it until they were confirmed to be correct.

It was not until the sky in the east turned white that Yang Hongbin handed the revised confession to the criminal recorder to re-transcribe it.

He didn't even wait for the Dali Temple Minister Wei Guanyao to go to the yamen, and went straight to the official's residence.

He had to get the confession confirmed by Wei Guanyao, the Minister of Dali Temple, before he could submit it to the palace for imperial decree as soon as possible!

(End of this chapter)