"My lord, I am wronged, I, I really didn't kill him!"
"My lord, even if you gave me the courage of a thousand lifetimes, I wouldn't dare to kill the Prefect!"
"Wuwuwu, I have an eighty-year-old mother at home and an eight-year-old child who is hungry and crying, my lord! My lord, spare my life!"
Unable to withstand the pressure, the three kowtowed and begged for mercy.
"My lord, this is the intelligence on these three people. It is basically consistent with what they said."
At this moment, a yamen runner hurried in from outside the prison cell, handing over the documents in his hand.
Leng Luo flipped through them for a while.
Indeed.
None of them had come into contact with any suspicious individuals. Their families were all clean, and their ancestors had worked odd jobs in Qingzhou for generations. From this perspective, the three indeed had no motive to kill.
Leng Luo closed her eyes and fell into thought. Just then, one of them grew impatient. She gritted her teeth, straightened her back, and said loudly to Leng Luo:
"Lord Leng, if we are to speak of suspects, it is not just the three of us! If you ask me, anyone who saw the Prefect that day is a suspect!"
Leng Luo's eyes snapped open:
"Oh? What do you mean?"
...
Nian Family.
Since the Tongshi examination had just concluded, and the academy was also on break, the academy decided to give the participating Tong Sheng a few extra days off.
However, during these two days at home, Nian Jiaojiao found the household to be unusually quiet.
Xingyun spent all day practicing painting in her room, and Nan Qing also began to stay in her room and not come out.
Nian Jiaojiao had previously guessed that Nan Qing could read, but Nan Qing insisted on staying in her room under the guise of "practicing calligraphy," which truly puzzled Nian Jiaojiao.
"Wife Lord."
Nian Jiaojiao looked up at Yu Chuan, took the tea he handed over, and said:
"Sit with me."
Yu Chuan immediately sat down beside Nian Jiaojiao.
Nian Jiaojiao looked at the gentle man in front of her and asked:
"Chuan'er, is there anything you enjoy doing?"
Yu Chuan seemed a little confused:
"Wife Lord, why do you ask?"
He liked it when his wife Lord was happy.
He wanted to do things that made his wife Lord happy.
Nian Jiaojiao said:
"Currently, Xingyun enjoys painting, Nan Qing enjoys practicing calligraphy (falsely), and Xuan Yi practices martial arts in the backyard when he has nothing else to do. What about you? Is there anything you want to do?"
Yu Chuan lowered his head and looked at his fingers, saying softly:
"Wife Lord, I'm sorry, but I am good at nothing..."
Nian Jiaojiao immediately knew the other party had misunderstood her words. She took his slender, bony fingers and said seriously:
"Who says you're good at nothing? You're quite long at night..."
Yu Chuan froze, unable to comprehend the meaning of Nian Jiaojiao's words for a moment.
At night?
He thought carefully about what he had done at night, and then, as if he had realized something, his face immediately turned red, and he stammered:
"Wife, Wife Lord, you, you mustn't make such jokes anymore?"
How could his wife Lord speak of bedroom matters so casually.
Fortunately, no one was around...
Nian Jiaojiao admired his shy appearance for a moment, feeling a tickle in her heart.
However, she also knew Yu Chuan's personality, so she decided to stop teasing him. She cleared her throat and said:
"Chuan'er, you misunderstood me. Never mind if you can't paint or write. Even if you couldn't eat, I would feed you every day. Moreover, you are not entirely without merit. The house is run in an orderly fashion, all thanks to you."
Upon hearing Nian Jiaojiao's affirmation, Yu Chuan's expression brightened considerably, but he still said with a lack of confidence:
"Thank you, Wife Lord, for comforting me."
Nian Jiaojiao turned him around so they were facing each other, and continued:
"Truly. However, I just don't want you to live solely for me. Finding something you enjoy is very important.
When I enter cultivation, currently, my cultivation is still shallow, and closing my eyes means at least one night. What about in the future? Perhaps a few days? A month? Or even longer, and you won't see me. If you have something you enjoy doing, then even if you don't see me, you'll have something to make yourself happy, won't you?"