Daming: Internship also counts as work experience

Chapter 14: Someone from the County Court Arrives

Jia Chuan sighed softly and said, "If it were winter, that survivor would have been able to wait until we returned, but it happened to be summer, and the temperature has been high these past two days..."

"No, why are you saying this? I'm asking you, aren't they here to silence us?" Dong Shuben was a little anxious. He sat up straight and looked at Jia Chuan and asked.

"Their soles are very thick, and the patterns on the soles are the same. They must belong to someone. The prince once hid here to avoid being hunted down, and only found safety in Bazhou. Everyone knows that it was the King of Han who did it. If something like this happened here again, the first person that would come to mind would be the King of Han. However, the King of Han has people nearby, and they have been hunting us down for the past two days. Where did he find the time to come here and kill so many people? And their only motive was to silence them, so why would they spare a single person..."

"What if it was an accident? I thought he was killed..."

"I checked the bodies. Even if they were stabbed or shot in the back, they would turn them over to make sure they were truly dead. They treat our people like this, let alone those who are still alive!"

"But, why did they kill all of us? Oh, so their purpose wasn't to silence us. That's right, if they wanted to silence us, they wouldn't have killed all of us. That's not right. They might have killed us all just to silence us. Wait a minute, I'm a little confused."

Dong Shuben grabbed his head with an expression of extreme pain.

Jia Chuan patted him gently and said, "No one knows each other, there's no need to kill them all."

Dong Shuben was stunned for a moment, then breathed a sigh of relief and muttered, "Yeah, even if we saw their true appearance, I'm afraid it would be difficult to find their real bodies. If they were wearing face masks, there would be no need to kill them all."

Jia Chuan really wanted to smoke a cigarette at this moment. After three years, he thought he had quit smoking, but that night, he didn't know how many times he subconsciously touched his pocket. He wanted to smoke a cigarette so badly.

Jia Chuan picked up a branch from the ground, checked it for blood, broke it into short pieces, and held them in his mouth. He said, "The murderer's purpose may be to make this matter bigger, so big that the Crown Prince will have to deal with it first in his busy schedule after returning to the capital, and he will deal with it with a clear goal."

"King of Han? They want to...frame the King of Han?" Shunzi asked.

Jia Chuan took a deep breath and said, "There aren't many criminals, probably around ten."

"How do you know? You, you..." Dong Shuben didn't know what to say.

Jia Chuan turned his head and looked at Dong Shuben and asked, "Did you forget what I asked you to write down just now?"

"You should be lucky that I still remember how to write!"

Jia Chuan nodded and said, "Indeed, we've checked the shoe prints on the ground, including the marks left when they left. The shoes are the same style, only the size and walking style are different. They must have acted during the heavy rain, when the mud was soft and easier to identify."

Jia Chuan rubbed his swollen temples, and the scene of that night appeared in his mind.

It was pouring rain, and the patrol officers had retired early. Since Dong Shuben was away, there was naturally no one to patrol in the rain, and the men on duty were too lazy to find shelter. A group of men in black took advantage of the night to sneak up near the house, deliberately making a noise. If anyone came out to investigate, they would kill one, and if two came out, they would kill a pair. The screams were even more terrifying in the rainy night. The clerks and archers on the large bunk beds all stood up. They had no time to put on their armor, and some even rushed out barefoot and shirtless...

Living in comfort for too long has made them forget what danger looks like. If they knew that the executioner was waiting at the door, they might not even get off the bunk bed, trembling in fear as they waited for death.

Jia Chuan bit the branch in his mouth hard.

Because too many people came out, the men in black outside couldn't kill them all. Those who rushed out and were not stabbed in panic could only think of running. At that time, someone might have shouted loudly, "Run! Run!" The people who didn't come out of the house also thought of running, running in all directions.

The people who came also had archers. Some of them were responsible for stabbing, and some were responsible for shooting arrows. They only needed to guard the doors of the two rows of houses and not let anyone go.

Therefore, when Jia Chuan examined the bodies, he found that only a few of them appeared to have resisted the attack. Unfortunately, they couldn't be autopsied. There was not much blood around the bodies, perhaps washed away by the heavy rain. He wished that someone among the more than 40 people would shout, "Fight them!"

But three people still ran out. Little Luobo was short and ran fast, so he was the last one to be shot.

There were more than forty people, but they were unwilling to send more. After all the people from the Inspection Office were killed, they pushed open the door of the woodshed where the few survivors were kept.

Jia Chuan lowered his head. If Dong Shuben was responsible, then wasn't he also responsible? He'd been the leader in slacking off, being cunning and sly, and even telling them stories about Jin Ping Mei...

No one would ever ask him who was more charming between Pan Jinlian and Li Ping'er.

Jia Chuan's nose felt sore and he finally shed tears.

"No matter who it is, this revenge must be avenged!" Shunzi clenched his fists and said with a sob.

"Report? Who should I report to?" Dong Shuben wiped his face. "That's the royal family. No matter who did it, they're someone we can't afford to offend! A patrol inspection office only has a few dozen people. Who would care about them? The Emperor Taizu said to kill at least a thousand people..."

Jia Chuan immediately pressed Dong Shuben's shoulder and whispered, "We didn't hear that. Don't mention it again!"

Dong Shuben was very excited just now, but in an instant his shoulders slumped, and he covered his face and started crying sadly.

Shunzi endured it again and again, pulled Jia Chuan and said: "You have a lot of ideas, think about how to avenge them!"

"This revenge can definitely be avenged, but..."

"Just what?" Shunzi asked nervously.

"I just don't know if the report will be wrong. Since the person who came here is deliberately framing the King of Han, he must be confident that the Crown Prince will deal with the King of Han after returning to the capital and ascending the throne. Our Inspection Office... is just one more piece of evidence to silence all the officials."

"Ascend the throne?" Dong Shuben missed the point again.

Jia Chuan was shocked by his own words. Zhu Zhanji ordered him to verify that the person who was being chased along the way was the King of Han. Although this was a well-known fact, Zhu Zhanji still needed some evidence to prove that he had to deal with his second uncle, especially after he ascended the throne. He needed some evidence that would make anyone who knew about it grit their teeth and feel resentful, otherwise how could he write it in history books?
Jia Chuan took a deep breath. He saw clearly the thought that flashed through his mind. He had previously firmly believed that it was the King of Han who did it, so he didn't think too much about it. Now, after investigation, he basically denied that it was the King of Han who did it. Then who could it be?

Uniformly dressed, equipped with bows and arrows, a small group, yet meticulously executed, they accomplished their mission flawlessly. Who could have accomplished that without training? And the person who seemed to benefit most from this undertaking seemed to be Zhu Zhanji… No, Zhu Zhanji couldn't mobilize troops until he reached Bazhou. On that rainy night, they, too, faced life and death. If Zhu Zhanji had a few men like these by his side, why would he have needed the Inspection Office to stage a spectacle, using these three idiots to protect him? And the audience for this performance was so few. Aside from the final, significant incident, the rest didn't really need to be staged. Just have some cameos to go along with it. Who did these low-class people from this remote area know?

Outside Bazhou City...this is not an act.

Jia Chuan breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn't Zhu Zhanji. Someone was trying to use Zhu Zhanji to get rid of the King of Han? That wasn't possible! Zhu Zhanji would definitely get rid of his uncle without anyone's help, unless...

"What are you thinking about?" Dong Shuben pushed Jia Chuan and said, "Didn't you hear me asking you a question?"

"What are you asking?" Jia Chuan really didn't hear it.

"You just said that the prince will ascend the throne when he returns to the capital? That means..." "Who becomes the emperor has nothing to do with you. Just listen to the news. Fortunately, we were given ten soldiers this time. Otherwise, the three of us would have no words to explain. By the time we get the news from the capital, I'm afraid we would have been too weak to fight."

Shunzi shuddered all over, as if he was thinking of the scene of being tortured and forced to confess his guilt.

Dong Shuben sighed and said, "If they can charge us with collaborating with bandits, they can get away with it, and we just have to die."

Shunzi asked hurriedly, "When will someone come? If they're not buried soon, maggots will be everywhere. The three of us can't dig all the graves even if we die. I don't want them to be buried in a mass grave. I want each of them to have a home, so that if their families want to move their graves one day, they'll know where to start..."

Shunzi couldn't continue.

Dong Shuben sighed and said, "I don't think anyone from the barracks will come. They'd be too busy hiding from this kind of thing. We're under the jurisdiction of Dongzhao County, so people from the county government will definitely come. The magistrate, the county magistrate, the chief clerk, the three shifts of yamen runners, and the miscellaneous servants. Alas, there won't be many who can work. It'll be good if they can still stand after they arrive. Let's start digging, digging one by one, and I'll think of a better spot."

……

By noon, Jia Chuan and the other two had already collapsed on the side of a slope due to exhaustion, and only then did they hear movement in the forest.

The three of them lay on the slope and looked up in the direction of the sound. Their screams echoed in the mountains and forests.

Jia Chuan shook his head. They had not yet reached the Shura Field. He turned over and lay down, looked at the dazzling sunlight, closed his eyes, and thought to himself: According to the time, they should have arrived before dawn. They came at this time, so they must have discussed it with their staff. Zhu Zhanji knew this very well, so Zhu Zhanji relied on time to calculate whether Wu Qiyong was trustworthy in the pavilion that day.

The footsteps and shouts were getting closer.

Dong Shuben took a deep breath, and stood up with all his strength, saying, "I am still an inspector after all, so I have to greet him."

Shunzi also struggled to get up, then fell back down and cried, "But I, I still can't bear to see them lying there..."

Dong Shuben staggered forward two steps and fell to his knees: "I can't do that either!"

Jia Chuan sighed and tried to stand up with his legs, which pulled the wound on the inside of his thigh and made him grimace in pain.

The three people here were trying to find a way to stand up, while the people over there had already walked to the house one after another. The three of them were on a hillside not far away, watching the people falling to the ground one by one, vomiting on the ground, and some even staggering. Someone hurriedly stepped forward to pinch and press the Ren Zhong point.

Jia Chuan knew that what really scared them was not the fact that so many people had died, but the current condition of the bodies.

There was a ditch between the hillside where the three people were and those people. If they wanted to walk over quickly, they had to turn and pass by the houses, but there was no need to go down the ditch or climb over it. Dong Shuben and Shunzi were able to overcome their psychological barriers last night and accompany Jia Chuan to examine the body because it was dark. They just had to not look closely, but now the sun was shining brightly, how could they ignore it?
So, the three of them could only climb down the ditch with great difficulty. When they finally emerged, Jia Chuan politely greeted a group of people. The person who had just woken up after being pinched on the Ren Zhong point fainted again.

The one who fainted was none other than County Magistrate Cui Youzhi, who recognized Dong Shuben. When he woke up again, his graying beard had wilted. He took Dong Shuben's hand and asked in a trembling voice, "Who is it, who is so bold?"

Dong Shuben thought to himself: "That's a good question! There's no need to check it."

Jia Chuan knew in his heart that what County Magistrate Cui wanted to hear was: it was done by bandits.

When the soldier reported the news, he must have explained in detail where Dong Shuben and the other two had gone, when they would return, and how they found the bodies. Otherwise, with Cui Youzhi's temper, he would have only shouted "Catch these three!"

"I was protecting the prince when the incident happened. I don't know who did it." Dong Shuben said sadly.

"This... there are no survivors left?"

"Everyone is dead!"

"What should I do? Where is Chief Liu and Captain Gao? Has Coroner Zheng arrived?" After calling out several names, County Magistrate Cui ran out of breath and fainted again.

Jia Chuan was a little worried whether the county magistrate could survive this. If he was frightened to death, would it be considered a death in the line of duty?

Just as Jia Chuan was thinking, a tall and burly man suddenly appeared beside him. Jia Chuan was startled. When he climbed up, he looked around. Those who could stand were hiding behind, including the soldiers who followed him. Most of the people in front were bending over to vomit, sitting on the ground with their hands covering their faces. Then there were those who surrounded the county magistrate and did not dare to look around. He had never seen such a person.

The man clasped his hands together and said confidently, "Don't worry, Your Excellency. I will lead my men to conduct a thorough investigation and will definitely apprehend the murderer!"

Jia Chuan reminded quietly: "It would be better if you wait until he wakes up, right?"

The man turned his head to look at Jia Chuan, and his peripheral vision also caught sight of the others. He just opened his mouth to say the two words "you are" and then turned around, bent down and vomited.

Jia Chuan shook his head. Cui Youzhi was choked awake again. A middle-aged man beside him hurriedly advised, "The county magistrate should return to the yamen first. Captain Gao and the other yamen officers and coroners can stay here."

Cui Youzhi still held Dong Shuben's hand. He asked in a trembling voice, "Did you see the Crown Prince when you were protecting him?"

Dong Shu almost said, "Isn't this nonsense?"
"Of course I did."

"The prince was in danger here?"

"That's right. Fortunately..."

"Does the prince have any instructions before we leave?"

Dong Shuben quickly turned around and pointed at Jia Chuan, saying, "It was thanks to Jia Chuan that he saved the prince from danger. He was by his side all the way. Before leaving, the prince did have some instructions, and he told them to him privately..."

"Oh? Come here, tell me quickly what the prince said to you? Did he blame Huang Luling... for dereliction of duty?" Cui Youzhi let go of Dong Shuben and reached out to Jia Chuan.

　Please read on! Today's follow-up reading is incomparably important. Whether there will be recommendations next week will all depend on today's follow-up reading. But, I find that posting this sentence today is a bit... well, those who can see this far don't need me to say anything (covering my face), it all depends on God's will.

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(End of this chapter)