"Damn it, you scoundrels!"
This fire destroyed twelve residential houses. The first house to explode and catch fire alone caused eight deaths. After the Ministry of War calculated the losses, it submitted a memorial stating that a total of thirteen civilians perished in the inferno, with five severely injured and dozens lightly wounded.
Although the capital had been in turmoil for the past six months, the common people had not been affected. This disaster was the most severe in terms of casualties in recent years.
Ji Hong's eyes turned bloodshot with anger. Yu Chengxuan's tactic of seizing the initiative was executed with consummate skill. The opponent's move, using Hui'an as a wedge to reveal everything directly, was akin to slapping Ji Hong and Ji Jinmo across the face.
He had made his move before they could even draw their swords.
...
Wang Yuyi squatted by the remains of a residential house, reduced to just pillars and beams. The coroner's examination of the bodies had just concluded: several corpses, burned to a crisp, had died from penetrating wounds, meaning they were already dead before being consumed by the flames.
"Chief, come and see this!"
A constable from the Dali Temple discovered the epicenter of the explosion: a guest room in this very residential house.
The guest room had been leveled, leaving a large pit in the ground. The furniture, beams, and tiles within the room had all been reduced to cinders in the explosion, then devoured by the ensuing fire. The area around the pit was now nothing but dust.
What the constable wanted Wang Yuyi to see were the traces left within the pit.
"Gunpowder?"
Wang Yuyi picked up some ash from the ground and brought it to his nose. To cause an explosion of such magnitude, there must have been at least half a jin of gunpowder stored in this house. This was not a workshop under the Ministry of Works that manufactured fireworks and firecrackers. For a residential house, setting aside how they dared to store so much gunpowder, the very origin of this gunpowder was worth investigating.
"Chief, could this be a private firearms workshop?"
The constables of the Dali Temple had extensive information networks. They had heard that the Ministry of Revenue had been investigating a private firearms workshop recently opened in the capital. Could this residential house be another storage location for gunpowder for that workshop?
But here?
Wang Yuyi frowned slightly. This location was adjacent to the post station. The household registrations of the residents here had all been reviewed by officials from the Ministry of Revenue and the Ministry of War. It could be said that anyone living near the post station had resided in the capital for three generations.
Furthermore, the Ministry of War and the Imperial Guards jointly protected the safety of the envoys from Da Li. If there was a private firearms workshop storing gunpowder warehouses around the post station, could they have failed to notice anything?
This matter, no matter how one looked at it, exuded an air of strangeness.
"Where is General Liu?"
Wang Yuyi looked up and asked.
"At his residence!"
"After General Liu went to the palace to confess his guilt, he was punished by His Majesty with fifty strokes of the rod. He is now recuperating in bed."
Putting aside whether the residential house near the post station was a storage for a private firearms workshop, the mere fact that thirteen Da Li envoys had died was enough for His Majesty to have ordered Liu Zizheng's execution. It was only due to His Majesty's benevolence that he was merely beaten with fifty strokes of the rod.
"You continue your investigation. I will go to Liu Manor!"
Wang Yuyi did not bring his subordinates with him but went to Liu Manor alone to pay his respects.
"Is the General's injury serious?"
A servant from Liu Manor accepted the慰问 pastries brought by Wang Yuyi and, after escorting him into the bedroom, bowed and withdrew.
Liu Zizheng dismissed the attending servants and, with some effort, turned to look at Wang Yuyi, apologizing, "Brother Wang, I apologize, but I am unable to rise to greet you."
His injury was to his buttocks, and he could only lie on his stomach. The sight was rather unseemly, but upon hearing that Wang Yuyi had come to visit, he had still instructed the servants to invite him in. He wanted to know if the explosion next door was related to the assassination at the post station.
"It is I who have disturbed you. In your current state, I should not have come, but I have some questions, and I hope the General can enlighten me."
Wang Yuyi clasped his hands in a fist and bowed. He was not familiar with Liu Zizheng and should not have intruded upon him in such a wretched state. However, he needed to know one thing.
"Brother Wang is too polite. I will tell you everything I know without reservation."
"General, can you tell me why, under your protection, thirteen Da Li envoys died?"
"Because of the Xun sound."
"Xun sound?"
"Yes, the Xun sound. It is a sound that paralyzes the nerves and makes one sink into grief."
"In other words, you and the guards were paralyzed by the Xun sound? But how did you regain consciousness later?"
"The explosion!"
"The thunderous roar of the explosion pulled me out of the mire of sorrow. Once my consciousness returned, I saw assassins rushing towards Yu Chengxuan."
Wang Yuyi fell silent. A suspicion formed in his mind, one that he dared not pursue further. Seeing Wang Yuyi's silence, Liu Zizheng realized that the explosion in the residential house might not be related to the assassination, but rather a coincidence. He urgently sought confirmation: "So, the explosion case and the assassination case are two separate incidents that accidentally occurred together?"
Wang Yuyi opened his mouth, and finally gave an affirmative answer: "Yes!"
However, Liu Zizheng, limited by his line of sight, did not see Wang Yuyi's expression at that moment.
...
"Actually, the most important thing is not what Yu Chengxuan did first, but what kind of scapegoat you will become in this matter."
Nan Shiying looked at Ji Hong, feeling that his anger was premature.
"What do you mean?" Ji Hong did not understand.
Scapegoat?
He would still be made a scapegoat?
"Literally!"
Nan Shiying took a sip of tea. Seeing Ji Hong's displeased expression, she did not tease him further: "Liu Zizheng said that before the assassins attacked, they were disoriented by the Xun sound, and it was the explosion in the residential house that pulled them out of it. Therefore, in the eyes of the Dali Temple constables, the explosion case and the assassination case would be treated as two separate incidents."
"But Wang Yuyi of the Dali Temple would absolutely not think that way."
"Although the sound of the explosion woke Liu Zizheng and the others, the problem is, how did gunpowder end up in a residential house next to the post station? Although the Ministry of Revenue has been investigating cases of private firearms workshops, and Wang Yuyi is certainly aware that a batch of illicit firearms was secretly transported into the capital a few days ago, this residential house is too close to the post station, posing too high a risk. Someone secretly running a private firearms workshop would absolutely not store gunpowder here. Therefore, the origin of the gunpowder and the explosion must be called into question."
"Since it's impossible for the residential house to be a storage place for gunpowder for a private firearms workshop, then who put the gunpowder there?"
"Moreover, the coroner has already examined the bodies in the residential house. None of them died from the fire; all had died before the explosion. This means that someone infiltrated the residence, killed the homeowners, and then detonated the explosives."
"Therefore, after hearing Liu Zizheng's account, Wang Yuyi would naturally connect all the events into one continuous line."
"Someone killed the homeowner and ignited the explosives. The sound of the explosion woke Liu Zizheng, and Liu Zizheng discovered the assassins."
"Within this line, there is a very fatal flaw: after Liu Zizheng and the other guards were incapacitated, the assassins did not kill them immediately but chose to assassinate the Da Li envoys instead. Such a disjointed strangeness, if you were Wang Yuyi, what would you think?"
Ji Hong gritted his teeth and said word by word: "I would think that I orchestrated this assassination."