Daming: I can’t kill such a greedy prince-in-law?

"Oh?" Ouyang Lun poured himself a glass of wine slowly. "Then why did I hear that the people under the rule of the King of Xiang were complaining all the time? Whose pocket did the tax collected by force go into? Where did the privately made weapons go?" He suddenly put the wine glass down heavily. "General Zhou, you should know these things, right?"

The temperature in the hall dropped sharply.

Zhou Ji's forehead was covered with cold sweat, and he forced a cold smile: "Stop slandering me, my dear son-in-law!"

"Slander?" Ouyang Lun suddenly pulled out an account book from his pocket and slammed it on the table. "This is the account book found in the home of your confidant. It clearly records the amount of money you withheld from the army and the amount of military equipment you resold." He narrowed his eyes, "Do you want me to read it to the King of Xiang?"

The flickering candlelight in the hall made Zhou Ji's face look even gloomier.

Ouyang Lun slowly filled a glass of wine for himself, and suddenly chuckled: "General Zhou, how about we play a game?"

Zhou Ji tightened his grip on the sword: "What tricks is the Prince Consort trying to play?"

"It's very simple." Ouyang Lun tapped the table with his fingertips. "I ask, you answer. If you answer wrong," he raised his eyes, a cold light flashed in his eyes, "I will cut off one of your fingers."

Zhu Bo was shocked when he heard this: "Brother-in-law! This..."

Ouyang Lun raised his hand to interrupt him, his eyes fixed on Zhou Ji: "First question - where did you hide the military pay you withheld in the name of the King of Xiang in the past six months?"

Zhou Ji sneered: "Don't lie, Prince Consort!"

"Wrong answer." Ouyang Lun sighed and suddenly threw out a ledger from his sleeve, "South of Yueyang City, Zhou's Money House cellar. A total of 230,000 taels of silver, am I right?"

Zhou Ji's face suddenly changed: "You"

"The second question." Ouyang Lun continued, his tone becoming increasingly cold, "Which waterway did you take to secretly transport the weapons to the Japanese pirates?"

Zhou Ji's forehead was covered with cold sweat, and he said with all his might: "I don't understand what you are saying!"

"Wrong answer again." Ouyang Lun shook his head and took out a stack of letters from his arms. "Boss Liu of Dongting Water Fort has confessed. On the 15th of every month, your fleet will disguise itself as a merchant ship and sail out to sea via the Han River." He threw the letter at Zhou Ji's feet. "Do you need me to read it to you?"

Zhu Bo stood up suddenly: "Zhou Ji! Are these all true?!"

Zhou Ji's face twisted, and he suddenly laughed grimly: "So what?!" He suddenly overturned the wine table, "Ouyang Lun! Do you think you can convict me based on this?!"

"Of course not only that." Ouyang Lun took a sip of wine calmly, "One last question -" His eyes suddenly sharpened, "Who instructed you to instigate the King of Xiang to rebel?"

The hall was dead silent.

Zhu Bai stood up suddenly: "Zhou Ji! Is this true?"

Zhou Ji's face turned pale, and he suddenly laughed grimly: "So what?" He smashed the wine glass violently.

"Wow!"

Dozens of soldiers broke into the room in an instant, and the flashes of their swords made the whole room feel cold!
"Ouyang Lun!" Zhou Ji drew his sword and pointed it at me. "Do you think you can scare me with a golden order that says 'I am here in person'?" He laughed wildly. "None of you will get out alive tonight!"

Zhu Bo was shocked: "Zhou Ji! Are you crazy?!"

"You are the one who is crazy!" Zhou Ji shouted, "If you are indecisive, you will never accomplish anything great!" He waved his hand and said, "Take down the King of Xiang!"

Two soldiers immediately held down Zhu Bo.

Ouyang Lun was still lazily leaning on the table, and even had the leisure to pick up a piece of fish: "Tsk tsk, are we going to fall out already?" He shook his head and sighed, "General Zhou, do you know why I can walk into the city so openly?"

Zhou Ji sneered: "You are still playing tricks when you are about to die!"

"Because," Ouyang Lun suddenly snapped his fingers, "the time has come."

"boom--!"

Suddenly, a deafening explosion was heard in the distance!

Zhou Ji's face changed drastically: "What's going on?!"

A soldier covered in blood stumbled in and said, "General! It's bad! There's a mutiny in the barracks!"

"What?!"

Ouyang Lun stood up slowly and brushed his sleeves: "I forgot to tell you that in my salary," he showed a devilish smile, "there is a note exposing your crimes."

Zhou Ji's face was ashen, and he suddenly swung his sword at Ouyang Lun: "I will kill you!"

"boom!"

A crossbow arrow accurately pierced Zhou Ji's wrist!
At the gate, Ouyang Lun's personal guard captain put away his crossbow and bowed, saying, "Your Highness, our people have taken control of the four gates, all of Xiang Wang's rebels have surrendered, and the people are helping us!"

Ouyang Lun nodded, turned around and looked at Zhu Bo who was dumbfounded: "Twelfth brother, can you tell your brother-in-law now who instigated you to rebel?"

Zhou Ji suddenly laughed wildly: "Hahaha Ouyang Lun, you will never know!" Before he finished speaking, he drew his sword and stabbed Zhu Bai!
"Qiang!"

A flying knife hit the sword accurately. Before Zhou Ji could react, Ouyang Lun flashed behind him like a ghost and chopped his neck heavily with a knife!
With a "thump", Zhou Ji collapsed to the ground.

Ouyang Lun brushed his sleeves, turned to the stunned Zhu Bo and said with a smile: "Twelfth brother, do you understand now? Your Lordship, the Chief Secretary, is the real bad guy!"

He leaned over and took out a token from Zhou Ji's arms, on which were engraved three large characters: "Emperor's Order".

Zhu Bo looked ashen, staggering and falling into a chair: "It turns out... It turns out that I have been kept in the dark all along."

Ouyang Lun patted his shoulder and said in a rare serious tone: "Every failure makes you wiser. Now, it's time to tell your brother-in-law how you were fooled by this old fox, right?"

The candlelight popped and a flower of light burst out. Zhu Bai's cold sweat dripped down his chin onto his clothes. Ouyang Lun picked up the Japanese pirate token and suddenly said something in Japanese. Zhou Ji's fingers twitched as if conditioned reflex.

"Sure enough." Ouyang Lun threw the token to his personal soldier, "I saw this kind of secret code when we were fighting against the Japanese pirates at sea several years ago." He squatted down and pulled open Zhou Ji's collar, revealing the cherry blossom-shaped tattoo on his collarbone, "It's the mark of the Japanese pirates' killer soldiers. It seems that General Zhou... No, Lord Yamamoto has been lurking in my Ming Dynasty for some years." Zhu Bo grabbed Ouyang Lun's sleeve fiercely: "Brother-in-law is saying..."

"Twelfth brother." Ouyang Lun sighed, took out a roll of sea chart from his arms and spread it out, "Do you know why the Japanese threat has increased sharply along the coast of Fujian recently?" He pointed his finger at several ports, "Because merchant ships flying the flag of the King of Xiang have appeared in these places."

"Impossible!" Zhu Bo cried out, "I have never..."

"Of course you don't know." Ouyang Lun suddenly used a knife to pry open the sole of Zhou Ji's boots, and several secret letters fell out of the interlayer. "Look at this - he wrote a letter to the leader of the Japanese pirates in your name, promising that as long as they create chaos in the south, when you 'raise an army to quell the rebellion', he will cede Taizhou and other five prefectures to them as bases."

"Although the Japanese islands are already under the rule of our Ming Dynasty, the Japanese are still determined to do evil. We have not taken care of them in recent years. Instead, we have allowed them to develop again and even colluded with officials of the imperial court!"

"It seems like we need to find a time to clean up the garbage!"

Zhu Bo held the secret letter in his shaking hands and suddenly rushed towards Zhou Ji: "You beast! I treat you like my confidant, but you..."

Ouyang Lun stopped him and said, "Don't be impatient, the fun has just begun." He suddenly pulled Zhou Ji's hair aside, revealing an old scar behind his ear, "Do you remember when you fell off a horse five years ago? It wasn't him who saved you at that time. The person who really saved you had already been drowned in the river."

As Ouyang Lun high-fived, two of his personal soldiers brought in a soaking wet Japanese pirate prisoner.

As soon as the man saw Zhou Ji, he started to curse: "Baga! You bastard! Where is the gunpowder formula you agreed on?"

Amid the uproar in the room, Ouyang Lun chuckled, "General Zhou is very calculating. On the one hand, he encouraged the King of Xiang to rebel, and on the other hand, he promised the Japanese pirates to steal the secret recipe of our Ming Dynasty firearms." He suddenly kicked Zhou Ji awake, "The Fire Dragon Sutra in the secret compartment of your study is copied very neatly, right?"

Zhu Bo suddenly remembered something and his face turned pale: "Last month. Last month, Zhou Ji always found excuses to go to the library."

"Report!" At this time, the personal guards rushed in, "Twenty boxes of Japanese swords were found in Zhou Ji's villa, and your dragon robe, Your Highness Prince Xiang!"

When a robe embroidered with a four-clawed golden dragon was thrown on the ground, Zhu Bai finally collapsed - that was clearly the dress that Zhou Ji said was "specially made for His Highness" the day before.

"Twelfth brother." Ouyang Lun picked up the dragon robe and shook it. "Do you know why it is so small?" He pointed to the dark pattern on the cuffs. "The shortest daimyo of the Japanese pirates is five feet one inch tall, just right..."

"Enough!" Zhu Bai suddenly drew out his sword and was about to stab Zhou Ji, but Ouyang Lun rushed in with his bare hands and snatched the weapon away.

"It's easy to kill him." Ouyang Lun put the sword back into the scabbard, "but only by keeping him alive can we dig out all the hidden Japanese pirates." As he said this, he suddenly shouted in Japanese, and the unconscious Zhou Ji instinctively responded with Japanese pirate etiquette.

The personal guards presented the list at the right time: "According to the Prince Consort's plan, we deliberately let a Japanese pirate spy escape, and indeed we tracked them down to their hideout in Changsha."

Ouyang Lun flipped through the list and suddenly sneered: "General Zhou didn't even let go of the brothel? The courtesan in Zuiyue Tower is also yours?" He turned to explain to Zhu Bo, "Remember the girl from Yangzhou you favored? She hid this under her pillow--"

A poisoned hairpin was thrown on the ground. Zhu Bo staggered back two steps and suddenly bent down to vomit.

"Report! The navy has intercepted three Japanese pirate warships!" Another messenger rushed in, "We found Zhou Ji's handwritten letter on the ship, agreeing to attack Changsha in three days!"

Ouyang Lun patted Zhu Bo on the back and said, "Now you understand why I traveled all the way? It was to make Zhou Ji anxious and force him to contact the Japanese pirates in advance." He pointed to the direction of the fire outside the window and said, "Look, the navy is cleaning up his accomplices."

When the guard took out the Changsha defense map from the secret compartment of Zhou Ji's shoe heel, Zhu Bo finally burst into tears: "Brother-in-law, I..."

"Get up." Ouyang Lun pulled him up, "I'll take you somewhere."

In the slums in the west of the city, Ouyang Lun lifted the straw curtain of a thatched hut. Under the dim oil lamp, a dozen skinny children were sharing military rations.

"These children are the families of the men captured by Zhou Ji in the name of 'conscription.'" Ouyang Lun's voice was unusually low. "Their father is now wearing the armor of the Xiangwang Army and fighting for the Japanese pirates at sea."

A little girl with missing front teeth suddenly knelt down and asked: "Sir, when will my father come back?"

Zhu Bo couldn't bear it any longer, turned around and punched the wall, blood flowing through his fingers.

On the way back home, Ouyang Lun suddenly asked, "Do you know why Zhou Ji chose you?" Without waiting for an answer, he asked and answered himself, "Because you are simple, and because you look like His Majesty when he was young."

Seeing Zhu Bo's doubts, Ouyang Lun sneered: "The Japanese pirates want to disrupt Jiangnan in the name of 'clearing the emperor' and then find a puppet emperor. And you" he patted Zhu Bo's shoulder, "are the cover they chose."

During the interrogation that night, Zhou Ji finally broke down and confessed. It turned out that 20 years ago, a Japanese pirate spy replaced the real Zhou Ji, and after entering the officialdom through the imperial examination, he deliberately provoked the relationship between the princes. This time, he instigated the rebellion of the Prince of Xiang, not only to tie down the court's military strength, but also to steal the latest artillery technology.

"Excellent, really excellent." Ouyang Lun threw the confession to the clerk, "He even confessed to the assassination of the retired emperor. It seems that the Japanese pirates' plan is more in-depth than I thought."

Three days later, when Ouyang Lun escorted Zhou Ji back to Beijing, the people of Changsha knelt spontaneously in the streets. Zhu Bai handed over a letter of apology with red eyes, but it was torn to pieces by Ouyang Lun.

"Silly boy." He ruffled Zhu Bo's hair crown, "Just remember this lesson. I have already written the memorial, saying that you killed your relatives for the sake of justice and caught the leader of the Japanese pirates." He leaned close to his ear and whispered, "The emperor promised to let you make up for your crime and go to Fujian to train the navy."

"If you are angry, just vent it on the pirates, so I don't have to do it myself."

When the carriage drove out of the city gate, Ouyang Lun suddenly leaned out and shouted, "Twelfth brother! Remember to prepare wine next time you come!" He paused and scolded with a smile, "Also! Don't let others use you as a gun again!"

Zhu Bai looked at the smoke and dust going away, and finally showed his first sincere smile in a month. In the carriage, Ouyang Lun was playing with the last piece of evidence he had found on Zhou Ji - a jade pendant engraved with the emblem of a Japanese pirate family. The sunlight came through the window, making the sneer on his lips particularly sharp.

The copper tortoise incense burner outside the Jinluan Palace emitted curls of green smoke. Zhu Yuanzhang's hand holding the secret letter from the Japanese pirates was throbbing with veins, and the edge of the letter was wrinkled. Ouyang Lun knelt on one knee, and the tassel of the imperial sword hung on the gold brick like a solidified bloodstain.

"The Japanese pirates have infiltrated the Prince of Xiang's mansion." Zhu Yuanzhang's voice was like a knife tempered with ice. "Zhou Ji has been lurking for twenty years. Did you notice it?"

Zhu Yuanzhang narrowed his hawk-like eyes and tapped the armrests of the dragon throne with his fingers, making a dull sound. Ouyang Lun stood in the hall with his usual playful expression on his face, as if he was not the one who had just uncovered a shocking conspiracy.

"Ouyang Lun." Zhu Yuanzhang spoke slowly, his voice low and majestic, "Did you really just get lucky with Zhou Ji's incident?"

"What good luck!" Ouyang Lun waved his hands repeatedly, looking innocent: "Your Majesty, you think too highly of me! How could I have any foresight? I just happened to run into it, and I happened to be more careful." He paused, then added with a smile, "Anyway, this is the current situation. Your Majesty asked me to do it, and I have done it. How to deal with it is up to Your Majesty and Your Majesty to decide, and I dare not say anything nonsense!"

Zhu Yuanzhang stared at him for a long while, and suddenly snorted coldly: "Slippery tongue!"

Ouyang Lun immediately shrank his neck and pretended to be aggrieved.

Zhu Yuanzhang was too lazy to talk nonsense with him. He turned to look at the Jinyiwei commander Ji Gang and said coldly: "Ji Gang, interrogate him severely! Make sure Zhou Ji confesses all his accomplices!" (End of this chapter)