In the past, when the Princess Regent returned to the palace, she would always get off at the gate, but today the carriage drove directly in through the corner gate on the other side of the palace. Upon hearing the news, the palace manager rushed over to greet her, fearing that the environment in the backyard would stain the princess' eyes.
By the time the manager rushed over, Luo Junyao had already led people to the gate of Jingyuan.
The steward was shocked when he saw the strange young man following the princess and several people who were tied into rice dumplings. He quickly asked: "Princess, what happened?"
Luo Jun waved his hand and asked, "Is Ayan at home?"
The steward replied: "Back to the princess, the prince has just returned not long ago, and he just asked the princess about her whereabouts."
Luo Junyao nodded and said, "That's enough. I'll go see Ayan and the manager will go do other things."
The manager understood that the princess wanted to take these people to see the prince, so he bowed respectfully and left without asking any more questions.
Entering Jingyuan, Chen Xun, who followed Luo Junyao, entered a place like the palace for the first time. He did not dare to look around for fear of offending something.
Because there is an extra hostess in the garden, this spring is different from the quiet and deserted ones in previous years. At this time, there are already hundreds of flowers blooming, fragrant flowers are dancing, and it is like a fairyland. Although Chen Xun tried his best not to look around, he still couldn't help but be fascinated.
This beautiful scenery attracts the attention.
As soon as I walked into the garden, I saw Xie Cheng running over with a few children from a distance, "Little Auntie Huang!"
Xie Cheng happily clapped over and grabbed Luo Junyao's clothes and shook them, "Little Aunt Huang, you went out so early today, A Cheng didn't even find you."
Luo Junyao smiled and leaned over to touch his little face and said, "What does Ah Cheng want from me?"
Xie Cheng said: "A Cheng is going to the palace today to pay his respects to the imperial grandmother, and he would like to invite the little imperial aunt to go with him."
Luo Junyao sighed and said, "I'm sorry, Ah Cheng, the little emperor's aunt went out to the academy in the morning. How is the emperor's grandmother today?"
Xie Cheng said sadly: "The Imperial Grandmother only said a few words to A Cheng. Aunt Changling said that the Imperial Grandmother needs to rest, and A Cheng should not disturb the Imperial Grandmother."
"Ah Cheng is a good boy. When the emperor's grandmother feels better someday, can we go visit her together?"
"Okay!" Xie Cheng responded happily, "I know that Auntie Xiao Huang is now the head of the mountain and has to go to Anlan Academy often to handle official business." Luo Junyao was a little surprised and raised his eyebrows: "You also know that when you become the head of the mountain, you have to go there often.
Handling official business?"
"Of course, just like the emperor's uncle also has many things to deal with every day." Xie Cheng said.
"Ah Cheng is so smart."
"Little Auntie Huang, who are they?"
"Them..." Before Luo Junyao could speak, Chen Xun, who was standing aside, had already looked stiff. Only then did he come back to his senses and quickly knelt down on the ground, "The common people bow to your majesty!"
Xie Cheng was wearing regular clothes today and looked just like an ordinary child from a wealthy family. Therefore, Chen Xun didn't react when he called Auntie Xiao Huang for the first time. But the two of them talked about each other for a long time.
If Chen Xun didn't react, he would be a fool.
Xie Cheng looked at Chen Xun with some surprise. Luo Junyao smiled and said: "He is a scholar I met outside the city. He encountered a little trouble. We want to find your uncle. Ayan will go play with everyone first."
Okay?"
Xie Cheng nodded and said, "Has he met a bad guy?" The bad guys naturally refer to those who were tied into rice dumplings.
"Yes, we need to ask your uncle for help."
"Okay then." Xie Cheng nodded and said to Chen Xun: "Get on your own, don't worry, the emperor is very powerful and will definitely help you fix these bad guys!"
What he said was innocent yet serious, and Chen Xun couldn't help but feel a little jealous.
In months, this was the first time someone told him with such certainty that someone would help him fix those bad guys.
"Thank you, Your Majesty, the common people." Chen Xun said solemnly.
When the group of people walked to the entrance of the main courtyard, Xie Yan had already come out. When he saw them coming, Xie Yan stood under the eaves of the gate and glanced at the people following Luo Junyao with an indifferent expression.
Luo Junyao ran over quickly and whispered what happened in Xie Yan's ear.
After hearing this, Xie Yan's originally indifferent expression seemed to be instantly covered with a layer of frost. The middle-aged men who were tied up looked at him and their feet became weak, and they could hardly walk.
They never expected that they would back-to-back like this. As soon as they arrived at Shangyong, they bumped into the hands of the Princess Regent.
Before they came, your Excellency had repeatedly warned them not to provoke the Prince Regent's palace or attract the Prince Regent's attention.
It’s over! It’s all over!
"Ask Zhu Siming, Qu Tiange and Wei Changting to come over and see me." Xie Yan led Luo Junyao by the hand and walked inside while giving instructions.
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Zhu Siming and Qu Tiange both arrived at the mansion very quickly, but Wei Changting still had to wait for someone to go to the Ministry of Household Affairs to deliver the message, so naturally he could not arrive immediately.
Qu Tiange had a special background and had just taken over the Secret Code Camp. Zhu Siming was not familiar with him either. Although the two of them walked into the hall together, they obviously looked a little strange.
"I have met the prince and the princess." Zhu Siming glanced at the strangers in the hall with some strange eyes, and finally laid his eyes on Chen Xun.
"Sit down." Xie Yan said.
"Thank you, Your Majesty."
After the two of them sat down, Xie Yan picked up the blood book on the table and handed it to Zhu Siming: "Take a look."
Zhu Siming took it and opened it, and his expression suddenly changed.
After reading it, he handed it to Qu Tiange without saying a word. Qu Tiange was not familiar with anything about Shang Yong, let alone other places. After reading it, he just frowned slightly and his eyes fell on that
On several men who were already shivering into a ball.
Xie Yan took a deep breath and said to Chen Xundao: "Tell me what happened in detail."
Chen Xun said respectfully: "Your Majesty, on August 14th last year, Du Cheng, a student of Yunhai Academy, returned home to Laicheng due to a break at the academy. He was walking at night and happened to see someone on the beach forcing a group of girls onto a boat at night, and then
Unexpectedly, I heard that the leader said that these women were sold to Yingzhou as prostitutes. The leader had gone to Yunhai Academy with Cao Mian, the governor of Qingzhou, and was Cao Mian's confidant. Du Cheng accidentally alerted those people.
Although he escaped successfully, he left behind something belonging to the academy. He was too scared to go home, so he returned to the academy overnight and told the gentleman about it. Unexpectedly, the next day, people from the Governor's Palace came to his door."
This chapter is not finished yet. Please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! At this point, Chen Xun paused and his eyes turned red. He continued: "The gentlemen of the academy refused to make friends. They only said that Ducheng left the academy.
He did not come back after that. Those people...those people actually set fire to the dormitory of the academy in the middle of the night and almost burned it to the ground. A total of more than 20 classmates were burned to death on the spot, and Ducheng was also taken away. Not only that, the remaining students of the academy were
All the teachers and students were also arrested, leaving only two gentlemen and a few classmates who escaped. One gentleman said that he was an old friend of the prefect of Dengzhou, and it was also common for him to take two students to ask the prefect for help.
Whether they went back or not, they were all imprisoned by the Governor's Mansion for gathering a crowd to cause chaos and causing a fire in the academy. In the end, there were only eight of us left in the entire Yunhai Academy. We could only write blood letters and dispersed to leave Qingzhou at the end of October. The students circled around
I traveled many roads and took several months to get to the imperial city. Please seek justice for the teachers and students of Yunhai Academy! Please save so many innocent women in Qingzhou!"
After saying this, Chen Xun leaned over and kowtowed heavily several times.
There was silence in the hall. Zhu Siming looked at Xie Yan and Luo Junyao who were sitting in the main seats, coughed lightly and said: "Your Majesty, it seems that this matter should be returned to..."
Xie Yan raised his eyes and glanced at him lightly, and Zhu Siming immediately closed his mouth.
Of course he knew who Cao Mian was. If no one in Shangyong knew about such a big thing, it would be impossible.
"Qu Tiange, I'll leave these people to you." Xie Yan glanced at the human-shaped rice dumplings on the ground and said.
Qu Tiange nodded silently, stood up, picked up one of them and walked out. After a while, someone came in and carried the rest out too.
Zhu Siming watched Qu Tiange leave with rare emotion, "This Mr. Qu is really a little different."
Qu Tiange is from the Jianghu community, and is indeed quite different from the people he usually interacts with.
Xie Yan said: "Qu Tiange is not important. I want to know what Dai Yunwen is doing?"
Zhu Siming's scalp tightened when he heard this, and he said cautiously: "Your Majesty, this... Mr. Dai is only one person after all. I heard that something happened in Yizhou at the end of the year. He is now in Yizhou, separated by hundreds of thousands of people."
inner……"
Xie Yan said: "So this is my fault?"
Zhu Siming said quickly: "I don't dare to lower my rank!"
The Dai Yunwen whom Xie Yan was talking about was none other than another long-time official of the Regent's Palace.
Unlike Zhu Siming, the left commander who stayed in Shangyong for a long time to handle the affairs of the regent's palace, Shi Dai Yunwen, the right commander, did not care about the affairs of the palace, but visited various places incognito under the orders of the regent all the year round.
Xie Yan has been away from the court for a long time, not to mention the place, even the court has no control over it. Although the Secret Code Camp is good at investigating, it is limited in number and cannot cover everything. All these years of effort have been spent on the border. What's more, some things are really extraordinary.
For spies to understand clearly, someone who understands officialdom and people's livelihood must go and inspect it in person.
That's what Dai Yunwen did. To use the parlance in the play, he was an imperial envoy.
"Get up, sit down and talk." Xie Yan ignored Zhu Siming and lowered his head to Chen Xundao, who was still kneeling on the ground.
Chen Xun thanked him in a low voice, stood up and sat down at the bottom.
Xie Yan looked at Chen Xundao: "Cao Mian has been in Qingzhou for fifteen years, and it seems that no one has ever heard of anyone impeaching him in these years. Mr. Chen is a native of Qingzhou. Before this incident, what did you think of Cao Mian?"
Chen Xun cupped his hands and said he didn't dare, and then slowly said: "If this hadn't happened before my eyes, the students wouldn't have believed that Cao Mian would do such a thing. Cao Mian has been in Qingzhou for many years, even though he can't be said to be a breeze.
He is kind-hearted, but apart from being a little lax in his family discipline over the years, he himself has not done any bad deeds. It is for this reason that the mountain chief initially regarded him as an evil servant who took advantage of his master's influence to cause trouble, and wanted to go to the Governor's Mansion to fight against
He has a clear theory. Who knows..."
Yunhai Academy is a somewhat famous academy in Qingzhou, and the academy's mountain chief is naturally a well-known figure. It's not that he has no friendship with Cao Mian. But even so, it still didn't end well.
"You said that the general manager of the Cao family sold those women to Yingzhou? Is there any evidence?"
Chen Xun shook his head and said: "The students have no evidence, but...it is true that the place where Du Cheng bumped into was blocked by government troops. Moreover, a classmate and I hid nearby and monitored for nearly a month, during which they were still there.
The people who were transported outside were indeed young women, and it was not Du Cheng who was just talking about it. During that time, other teachers and classmates also collected some information, but many good women were lost every year near Qingzhou Fucheng, and further away...such as students'
In my hometown of Guangxian County, the county magistrate said... the number of girls from good families who went missing in Guangxian County in the year before last was more than 70. "Guangxian County is not a big place, with a population of only more than 10,000.
"There are vague rumors circulating among the people in Qingzhou, saying that there is the richest and most beautiful gold-selling cave in the world on Yingzhou Island overseas. It is said that the ground is covered with gold, the treasures are like mountains, and the beauties are like clouds. As long as people of all ages enter it, they will
Linger and forget to leave. No matter what you want there, you will be satisfied until you spend your last penny. Either you will be kicked out of the island penniless, or you will stay on the island as a slave, or you will be reluctant to leave.
Those who can't do anything will be thrown into the sea and fed to the fish."
"Who are you going to throw into the sea to feed the fish?" Wei Changting's voice came from outside the door. A moment later, Crown Prince Wei walked in from the outside wearing a plain gown and holding a folding fan.
Seeing Chen Xunwei Changting sitting on the side, he raised his eyebrows and asked: "My lord and princess, what happened? What are you doing in Xiyuan with the howling ghosts and wolves?"
Luo Junyao made a gesture of wiping his neck towards him. Wei Changting took another look at Xie Yan's expression and knew that something big had happened. His expression stopped joking, "Your Majesty summoned me, I don't know why?"
Zhu Siming quickly came to his side and explained the matter in general.
Wei Changting was obviously surprised, "Cao Mian? He has such courage?"
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Luo Junyao said: "I am the governor of one place. The sky is high and the emperor is far away. Why don't I have the courage?" How else can we say that the local official is the emperor of the country?
Wei Changting shook his head and said: "Princess, you don't know that Cao Mian... was famous for being gentle and cautious around Gaozu in his early years. Not to mention the matter of buying and selling people... he burned the teachers and students of the academy to death, and almost destroyed the entire Yunhai Academy in one pot.
No matter how you look at it, it doesn’t look like he dared to do it, does it?”
"Sir, students should take care of their relatives, friends and classmates even if they die themselves! Don't dare to attack the governor randomly!" Chen Xun became a little anxious when he heard Wei Changting's words and gritted his teeth.
Wei Changting waved his hands and said, "Master, don't be anxious, that's not what I meant."
Xie Yan said: "You have dealt with Cao Mian, what do you think?"
Wei Changting sighed and said: "The last time I dealt with Cao Mian was five years ago. At that time, I was not as accurate as I am now. But... the person who went with me at that time said something to me afterwards, and I did remember it.
Now."
"What?" Luo Junyao asked curiously, and everyone else looked at Wei Changting.
Wei Changting said: "People say that although Cao Mian is in a high position, he has no arrogance. He is not greedy for money, does not like gambling, is not greedy for drinks, is not greedy for food and drink, and does not like sex. He is a courteous and virtuous corporal, generous and tolerant, tolerant, peaceful and even capable.
It is inevitable that even General Luo, Old Taifu Su and even the late emperor would have a few things that made people talk about it for more than 30 years since they first followed Emperor Gaozu. This person is the only one.
, there is not even a single omission. Such a person... is either a saint or a great villain."
Luo Jun said: "This is too extreme."
Wei Changting said with a smile: "It was originally a joke. I only took it as a joke at the time, and now I just take it as a joke. We have met each other a few times, but I really can't say that we understand each other."
Xie Yan frowned and said nothing. Wei Changting raised his eyebrows and said, "What do you think, Your Majesty?"
Xie Yan said: "Qu Tiange is already interrogating. Let's see what we can get out of those people first. If this matter is true, it is impossible for Cao Mian to just send these few people to Shangyong and ask people to pay attention to what happened recently.
People coming from the direction of Qingzhou to Shangyong." After saying this, Xie Yan looked at Chen Xundao: "Master Chen, go down and rest first. I will not just listen to one side of the story, I will investigate this matter clearly."
Chen Xun was a little uneasy, but when he looked at Xie Yan and thought of the regent's reputation, he seemed to have no other choice but to believe in the regent.
"Yes, thank you, Your Majesty." Chen Xun stood up and saluted, then came in and asked his steward to go out.
After Chen Xun went out, Wei Changting asked: "Isn't that what the prince wanted to say just now?"
Xie Yan raised his hand and rubbed his eyebrows, and said: "It stands to reason that even if it is really the Cao family that is trafficking people to Yingzhou, Cao Mian can make this matter not spread to Shangyong at all after nearly half a year, so that the entire Qingzhou
No official dared to go to court to impeach him, and he couldn't do such a cruel thing to Yunhai Academy."
Wei Changting said: "Maybe it's because he has this ability that he feels confident?"
"Yunhai Academy is a famous academy in Qingzhou. If it is accidentally leaked out, all the scholars and even the people in Qingzhou will get into trouble. At that time, it will not be able to be suppressed by a few officials. You also said that Cao Mian has a gentle personality.
Be cautious, given his character, it would be better to introduce a scapegoat than to make things happen like this."
"What does the prince mean?" Zhu Siming couldn't help but ask.
Xie Yan said slowly: "Are there really only people on the ship going to Yingzhou?"
Although it is a bit cruel and unfair, we have to admit that in today's world, there are many parents who sell their children. For people like Cao Mian, this is not necessarily a big deal.
Even though he was bumped into accidentally, he was bumped into on the spot, so why should he not bring it upon himself?
Unless there was something more important than human beings on the ship at that time, Cao Mian would rather kill him by mistake than let him go.
Of course, the premise of all this is that Chen Xun is telling the truth.
