Taichang Ming Dynasty

Chapter 116: Can’t Make Mistakes at This Time

Zhang Shirui and Ding Baiying left the capital early in the morning, their luggage ready. Miss Zhang had always believed that as long as one had money, there was no need to bring too much. So, the two of them rode lightly, packing only the necessities and a change of clothes.

Near the time of Shen, the two arrived in Tianjin again.

"It gets dark early in the north in winter. The sun has already started to set at this hour." The atmosphere on the road was a bit depressing, so as soon as he got off the horse, Ding Baiying started to make small talk, trying to break the silence.

"Yeah." Zhang Shirui wasn't in a good mood or in a good mood. She had been tossing and turning all night, unable to sleep, and now she was completely depressed.

After leaving the Ministry of Rites, Zhang Shirui couldn't stop thinking about her father. She felt something was amiss. The private letter announcing his well-being was written by her brother, which was undeniable, but the official letter her father submitted to the court stated that he was seriously ill. She had a vague idea of ​​what her father was thinking, but deep down, she instinctively resisted the answer.

She hoped that Miss Ding, who was deeply involved in the case and had rich experience in the martial arts world, could come to a different conclusion, but Miss Ding told her in a blessing tone: Don't worry, the Taoist priest is probably just pretending to be sick.

Logically, she should feel relieved that her father was healthy, but Zhang Shirui just couldn't be happy.

Why did the father feign illness? The answer is not difficult to guess. The Kong family corrupted themselves, while the Zhang family remained silent. This is the fundamental reason why these two families, representing Confucianism and Taoism, have survived for thousands of years.

Zhang Shirui understood the principle of "having power but not fighting for it," but she didn't think her father could use this to deceive the emperor. The Zhang family received a salary of the highest rank, a salary of the highest rank.

"I eat the salary from the court and enjoy the privileges granted by the emperor, but I am unwilling to do anything. This is not right." Zhang Shirui muttered to himself as he looked at the purple-red setting sun.

Ding Baiying heard this, but wasn't sure what Zhang Shirui was referring to. She assumed she was revisiting the inn, reminiscing about its connections with the Tianjin Garrison. "If you don't want to stay there, we can try another one a little further away. Or we could try our luck and see if there's a night boat to Nanjing."

"Miss Ding, I'm a little confused." Zhang Shirui withdrew her gaze from the sunset and gave Ding Baiying an ugly smile.

"What's wrong?" Ding Baiying felt that Zhang Shirui was about to burst into tears. She misunderstood again and comforted her, "You don't have to worry too much."

"Miss Ding, where are you going?" Zhang Shirui asked abruptly. "After my escort mission is over."

"Although it's a bit tiring to travel back and forth, I plan to go to Shanhaiguan first, and then try my luck in Liaodong." Ding Baiying said with a smile.

"Go to Liaodong to try your luck? It's not a place where you can make a fortune in peace." Zhang Shirui was puzzled.

"I'm just a homeless escort, and I don't expect a peaceful and comfortable life. Look at my hands." Ding Baiying's inferiority complex had dissipated, and she now wore a relieved smile. "I'm a warrior, and I'm old. Instead of marrying any man, I might as well go to Liaodong and try my luck. Maybe I can find a chance to become the Hua Mulan of our time."

"You want to emulate Qin Liangyu and become a female general?" Zhang Shirui was a little surprised, and said with admiration, "You listened to that scholar's words? That's great."

"General Qin was a chieftain in Sichuan, so the corruption in Liaodong had nothing to do with her. Yet, she left her homeland and traveled thousands of miles with her soldiers. She served the court and saved the people from disaster. Perhaps she will even go down in history." Ding Baiying's eyes were filled with longing. She didn't realize that her words were like a hammer hammering at Zhang Shirui's heart.

"Yes, General Qin could have stayed, but she came anyway," Zhang Shirui said, each word a dreamlike whisper. After a moment, she made up her mind: upon returning to Nanjing, she would persuade her father to take on the responsibilities that belonged to the Zhang family.

------

Lu Wenzhao led the ten-man flag that had been directly under his command before his promotion and rushed to Tianjin without stopping, leaving Yin Cheng alone at Zhang's house to watch over it.

Despite bringing a spare horse, this team of Jinyiwei still arrived more than two hours after Zhang and Ding arrived in Tianjin.

When we arrived in Tianjin, it was completely dark and the city gates were lowered.

"Open the door!" Lu Wenzhao did not dismount, but looked up and shouted to the flag-gatherer guarding the gate.

"Do you understand the rules? You have to go into the city and wait until the morning of April 5th to come back. Find an inn outside to stay first." Lu Wenzhao and his team had been wearing casual clothes for surveillance since morning, so when the chief flag officer on duty could barely see the newcomers in the light of the torch, he immediately regarded them as playboys who did not know the rules.

"Rules? I am the rules! Jinyiwei is on duty, open the door!" Lu Wenzhao held up the waist badge engraved with "Jinyiwei Captain Lu" and said bluntly.

"Jinyiwei?" The general couldn't even read the small characters on the badge, and it had been a while since Jinyiwei had knocked on the city gates at night. "You're kidding, aren't you?" Although the general didn't immediately believe Lu Wenzhao's words, he smoothly changed the address from "you" to "you."

"You're kidding me! If you've delayed my Jinyiwei mission, you'll be whipped." Lu Wenzhao was blunt and added in a commanding tone, "If you don't open the door, tell your guard commander to open it."

"Please wait a moment, sir. I'll be down right away!" The general flag-taker who was talking with Lu Wenzhao greeted the soldiers on the city wall, and hurried downstairs while sending someone to report to the Weizhihuishi Yamen.

"Release the winch and lower the drawbridge." The general ordered the soldier guarding the winch.

The general commander waited for the drawbridge to descend while ordering his soldiers to stand in formation with their weapons. Once the drawbridge was once again across the moat, the general commander emerged alone from the slightly ajar door. "Sir, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, but this is my duty. I hope you'll forgive me."

Lu Wenzhao noticed that after the general flag left the city gate, the slightly opened door closed again. He nodded and praised, "He still looks a bit like an officer." Lu Wenzhao dismounted and handed his badge to the general flag with both hands.

"Captain!" Lu Wenzhao was only two ranks higher than the general, but the general still bowed respectfully at a full ninety degrees. "Open the door!" the general ordered.

The gate opened, and ten men and twenty horses filed into the city.

"Send five people to the dock to ask." Lu Wenzhao didn't waste any words and rode his horse forward quickly in the direction pointed by the general flag.

In a moment, Lu Wenzhao arrived at the headquarters. Meanwhile, Shen Caiyu, the Tianjin garrison commander who had just received the news, hurried out the door. As he walked, adjusting his official uniform, he unexpectedly bumped into Lu Wenzhao and his group.

The local government office served as both an office and a residence, so Lu Wenzhao wasn't surprised to see Shen Caiyu's disheveled attire. But after a few breaths, Lu Wenzhao sensed something was amiss: This guy was visiting prostitutes in the government office!
"I'm Lu Wenzhao, a captain of the East Office of the Beijing Jinyiwei Command Headquarters. Now I need your cooperation in the investigation!" Lu Wenzhao had no respect for the short and fat man in front of him who was wearing the uniform of a third-rank military officer. He didn't even want to ask his name.

"Thank you for coming, Captain Lu. I am Shen Caiyu, the commander of the Tianjin Garrison." Not hearing the words "Important order to arrest someone" made Shen Caiyu breathe a sigh of relief. "Just tell me what you want."

"Which ships left your country today and when, and where did they go?" Lu Wenzhao asked three questions in a row straight to the point.

"I uh. I..." Shen Caiyu didn't know.

"Where are your guards' documents? I'll take people to check." Lu Wenzhao instantly became impatient: Damn it! Another useless person who eats the court salary!

Shen Caiyu swallowed his saliva. "Lord Lu, could you please wait here for a moment? I'll go check it out right away. I won't bother you with the trip."

"I don't care what you do at the government office." Lu Wenzhao looked past Shen Caiyu and into the government office. "I'll give you two quarters of an hour to find out what I just asked." After a moment's thought, he said in a deep voice.

"Master Lu, please wait a moment." Not long after he came out, Shen Caiyu turned back.

"Captain, we can go straight in. This fat man won't dare to stop us." Shen Lian walked over and said, "He'll go much faster." Lu Wenzhao took the water bag from the saddle and took a few swigs. "Even if Shen Caiyu is a loser, he knows more about Tianjin Wei than we do."

"Moreover, coming to the Commander-in-Chief's Office is just to collect secondary important information for the next step." Lu Wenzhao said slowly.

"Second most important?" Shen Lian was puzzled.

"Of course, the most important thing is the news from the docks." Lu Wenzhao rubbed his butt. After being jostled by the horse for so long, he felt like his butt cheeks were about to split into four pieces. "It's quite rare for two women to travel alone without a man. Anyone in charge at the docks who sees them will definitely be impressed."

"Then why are we here? Can't we just go directly to the dock?" Shen Lian asked.

"Whether they've left or not, we need Shen Caiyu's cooperation. We have the authority to order Tianjin Wei to assist in the case, but they still have to do the work," Lu Wenzhao explained. "If Zhang Shirui is still in Tianjin Wei, we need to have Tianjin Wei send troops to help stop her. If Zhang Shirui is on a ship bound for Nanjing or elsewhere, then Shen Caiyu will have to find us a ship that can depart immediately."

Lu Wenzhao's expression was calm, but he was worried in his heart: If he couldn't successfully intercept Zhang Shirui in Tianjin, or if Zhang Shirui really took another route to Nanjing, then my first job after being promoted to a centurion would be completely ruined.

Before the deadline of two quarters of an hour was up, Shen Caiyu came back.

"Lord Lu. This is today's record." Shen Caiyu panted. Beads of sweat, as big as beans, ran down the fat-crushed grooves on his face and dripped onto the blue bricks paving the entrance to the yamen. The passing cold wind immediately absorbed the heat, turning it into a small, splattering piece of turbid ice.

Shen Caiyu handed the booklet to Lu Wenzhao. "Sir Lu, everything you want is inside."

"Very good." Lu Wenzhao took the booklet.

The booklet was uneven, clearly laced with something. Lu Wenzhao flipped to the page guided by the uneven texture. But when he saw the foreign object stuck inside, he froze.

It was a silver note with the words "Two thousand taels" written on it, inscribed on Xuanchang.

Shen Caiyu didn't mention money or filial piety. He just smiled and said, "Master Lu, you have worked hard."

Since Lu Wenzhao took over the position, he had received many bribes and also sent gifts and tributes of considerable amounts to others, but he had never seen a large bill of exchange for two thousand taels of silver.

Lu Wenzhao was deeply moved: Is this how the local garrisons make money?!
But after a moment, Lu Wenzhao came to his senses. He couldn't take the money!

"It's too much. The standard allowance for a centurion on a business trip is fifty taels. Even if each of my brothers takes an additional twenty taels, it's still only two hundred and thirty taels." Lu Wenzhao closed the booklet and walked over to Shen Caiyu, whispering. "You're breaking the rules by giving me two thousand taels. Of course, I can submit the extra money to Luo Taibao and explain the reason."

"This?" The fat accumulated on Shen Caiyu's face shook with confusion. But Shen Caiyu had been in the officialdom for decades after all, so it didn't take long for him to understand what Lu Wenzhao meant. "I'm ignorant. Lord Lu has gone all the way here, and I actually asked Lord Lu to personally read it."

Shen Caiyu grasped the blank page with the banknotes, flipped to the most recent entry, and began reading. "At 5:05 a.m. in the morning, a 200-ton grain ship from Jinan arrived. At 2:02 a.m. in the afternoon, a 500-ton cargo ship departed from Nanjing. At 3:00 a.m. in the afternoon, a tribute ship from the West departed from Beijing."

"That means there are only two ships heading to Nanjing today, and they are both cargo ships?" Lu Wenzhao asked after listening.

"Lord Lu, there are indeed only two ships. They leave Tianjin at 6:15 am and 2:15 pm respectively." Shen Caiyu never asked about the specific content of the mission from beginning to end.

"Yeah." Lu Wenzhao nodded, then waved his hand to send Shen Caiyu away.

After Shen Caiyu left, Lu Wenzhao said to Shen Lian who was standing beside him: "Ask if you have anything to say."

"That's two thousand taels of silver." Shen Lian's eyes were full of unwillingness, but he did not ask any questions.

"Do you want to know why I didn't accept the money?" Lu Wenzhao took a few steps away from the other three captains.

"Yes." Shen Lian had fallen for a thirteen-year-old prostitute. He wanted to buy her out before she turned fourteen and had her first client, but the brothel's asking price was too high. Furthermore, the prostitute was an official prostitute under the name of the Imperial Music Bureau. To take her away, he would have to go through the Ministry of Justice, which would cost a fortune.

"We are brothers who have shared life and death. I'll tell you the truth." Lu Wenzhao said in a voice that only the two of them could hear: "The word 'test' in front of the centurion's name was removed for me by the emperor himself."

“.” Shen Lian widened his eyes.

"The emperor will send me back to Liaodong sooner or later. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! If I can achieve great success in Liaodong, I'll have a place in his heart." Though the lanterns were dim, the enthusiasm on Lu Wenzhao's face was clear. "I can't make a mistake. Accepting the usual rules is fine, but taking Shen Caiyu's 'exception' would be like treating him as one of our own. This idiot, visiting prostitutes in the government office, will eventually get himself killed. We didn't go in, so we can pretend we didn't know."

".Alas!" Shen Lian sighed.

"Are you short of money?" Lu Wenzhao noticed Shen Lian's mood. "How much?"

"I want one thousand taels for everything." Shen Lian hesitated for a moment and said.

"So much!" Lu Wenzhao couldn't believe it. "Did you bet?"

"Of course not!" Shen Lian quickly denied. "I fell in love with a girl."

"A prostitute?" Lu Wenzhao knew very well that a formal marriage would not cost so much money.

"Yes. She will be fourteen next year." Shen Lian hinted in an obscure way.

"How many do you have?" As a grassroots Jinyiwei who has been dealing with all kinds of people for many years, how could Lu Wenzhao not understand what the meaning of "fourteen Qingguaner" is.

"Two hundred and thirty-two taels and eight cents." Shen Lian was counting on his fingers.

"Damn, you're richer than me." Lu Wenzhao had used almost all the gifts and tributes he received to bribe people. "How about this, I'll go with you after we get back to Beijing. You can use 230 taels as a deposit, and we can slowly raise the rest."

"Going to a brothel to pay a deposit, is this really possible?" Shen Lian asked worriedly, "Didn't they say we can't make mistakes?"

"This is a complete blunder. We didn't go to the brothel to rob anyone, and we didn't visit prostitutes in the government office. Besides, this is about redeeming a lowly woman and turning her back on her husband. Maybe it can even be considered a good deed." Hearing the distant sound of horse hooves, Lu Wenzhao couldn't help but become nervous, but he continued to maintain a calm face and said in a neutral tone: "The Grand Secretary is visiting the brothel. I just asked the brothel to do a favor for the Jinyiwei captain."

"Then." Shen Lian's eyes showed obvious joy.

"What a joke." Lu Wenzhao couldn't empathize with Shen Lian's joy. He looked at the captain on horseback and felt like a criminal about to be tried. "News from the dock."

(End of this chapter)