The summer heat breached the palace walls early, climbing all the way up the white marble steps and crashing straight into the Golden Throne Room.
Many officials' backs were already drenched in sweat, their official robes clinging to their bodies, making them utterly miserable.
The Emperor sat high upon the dragon throne, his face obscured by the shadows behind his imperial crown's beaded fringes. The officials standing below had to be extremely careful even when wiping their sweat, terrified that the slightest noise might bring about a fatal disaster.
The silence in the imperial court was eerie. Everyone was waiting, waiting for the blade suspended in mid-air to finally drop.
Nearly seventy years old, the Left Censor-in-Chief Zhang Yanling was the first to break this deathly stillness. Holding his ceremonial tablet, he strode out of the ranks, shattering the suffocating peace.
"This subject has a memorial to present!"
Zhang Yanling held the memorial high with both hands, his voice echoing back and forth across the vast hall.
"This subject impeaches Xu Youde, the Left Vice Minister of Revenue, for unauthorized rummaging through old archives, causing chaos in the capital's waterways and cutting off military rations to the northern border!"
As soon as these words rang out, the hall erupted into an uproar, the tranquility completely torn to shreds.
Immediately following, seven or eight censors and supervising secretaries stepped out of their ranks one after another, the rustling of their robes merging into a single sound as they knelt in unison on both sides of the imperial path.
"We second this motion!"
A young supervising secretary eagerly took up the thread, his face flushed with agitation. He pointed his finger directly at the ranks of civil officials, his spit nearly flying onto the neck of the official in front of him.
"Vice Minister Xu, in order to investigate those fabricated bad debts, has thrown the water transport guilds and boatmen into a state of panic. Now, the Tongjin Lock is blocked by three broken boats, and seventeen large grain-transport ships remain docked, not even daring to untie their mooring ropes!"
"As a result, the price of rice in the capital will soon double. The common people are panicked and restless, and every street and alley is filled with bitter curses against the imperial court for ignoring their livelihoods!"
Another censor kowtowed heavily.
"Tens of thousands of soldiers in the northern border are fighting desperately against the Helian people, yet Vice Minister Xu has cut off their rations from the rear. This is treating the Great Qian's empire as child's play, exchanging the lives of our soldiers for his own political achievements!"
"Once the waterways are cut off, the taxes from Jiangnan cannot be delivered to the capital either. The danger of an empty national treasury is imminent!"
"This subject beseeches Your Majesty to severely punish Xu Youde, immediately halt the audit, and execute this disaster-bringing traitor to appease the people on the waters and give an explanation to the common folk!"
These speaking officials usually earned their reputations by scolding others. Now that they had seized such a massive vulnerability, every word and sentence was aimed to kill, as if they wanted to swallow Xu Youde alive on the spot.
The Right Vice Minister of Revenue, Cui Jin, closely followed suit, stepping out of the ranks and kneeling behind Zhang Yanling, his words full of righteous indignation.
"Your Majesty, as the Right Vice Minister of Revenue, this subject has witnessed with his own eyes Vice Minister Xu acting recklessly in the yamen these past few days."
"Using the audit as an excuse, he not only turned the old archives room upside down but also moved all the bad debts from twenty years ago back to his own manor. This is simply treating the court's laws as nothing!"
"Now, the boatmen at the Tongjin docks have all been scared out of their wits by him, terrified that they might be implicated in the old cases of the past and have their families exterminated. That is why they have submitted notices to suspend their voyages."
Cui Jin slammed his head heavily onto the ground, his tone growing increasingly impassioned.
"Whoever tied the bell must untie it. This subject implores Your Majesty to issue a decree confiscating the audit warrants in Xu Youde's hands! Throw him into prison to await punishment. Only by doing so can we quell the grievances of the water-folk and secure the military rations for the northern border!"
These words from Cui Jin directly branded Xu Youde as a power-hungry official who abused his authority, spinning the audit into a personal vendetta.
Holding his ceremonial tablet, Xu Youde stood in the ranks of civil officials, not even batting an eyelid.
As those vicious charges rained down on him, he simply kept his head lowered, listening motionlessly.
The surrounding officials hurriedly shuffled their feet to the side, forcefully clearing a circle of space around him, terrified of being tainted by this colossal bad luck.
Xu Youde paid no mind to the cold shoulder from his peers.
He knew very well in his heart that these censors were nothing but pawns pushed out to issue challenges, doing deeds for money. The truly fatal killing blow was still to come.
The names he had seen in his study last night flashed through his mind: Guanghui Bank, the First Prince, the seventeen boatmen families.
The entanglements behind these names had long tightly bound the lifeblood of the entire Great Qian.
Shang Qitai thought that by grasping the First Prince's vulnerability, he could force the Emperor to hold back for fear of collateral damage and call off this auditing storm.
But Shang Qitai had miscalculated one thing: the imperial family was ruthless.
What the Emperor truly cared about was never the face of any prince, but rather who exactly this empire answered to.
Standing here today, Xu Youde had no intention of defending himself whatsoever.
All he needed to do was expose those shady dealings in front of all the civil and military officials on behalf of the Emperor, and then plug the hole with his own hands.
Standing at the very front of the ranks, Shang Qitai listened to the spitting curses of the censors behind him, his heart already blooming with joy.
The timing was just about right; it was time for him, the Minister of Revenue, to step up and pull in the net.
Shang Qitai slowly stepped out of the ranks, forcing his eye sockets to turn slightly red, playing the image of an old minister who worried for his country and his people to absolute perfection.
He lifted the hem of his official robes and knelt heavily beside Zhang Yanling, his voice laced with a heartbroken, anguished choke.
"Your Majesty!"
"This subject had long advised Vice Minister Xu that the accounts of the Ministry of Revenue affect the whole body with a single hair, and must absolutely not be touched lightly. But Vice Minister Xu, eager for quick success and instant benefits, insisted on rummaging through the old accounts from twenty years ago."
Shang Qitai raised his head, crying out with a face full of grief and indignation, his palms slapping heavily against the blue brick floor.
"Now it has incited a civil rebellion and obstructed water transport. What is blocked outside the Tongjin Lock is the life-saving grain destined for the Central Route Prefecture of the northern border!"
"If the border army lacks grain for even a single day, there is a risk of mutiny. If the border is lost because of this, who will bear this monumental responsibility!"
He turned his head, pointing in Xu Youde's direction, and shouted severely.
"Xu Youde, for your own selfish gain, you have disregarded the empire and the lives of tens of thousands of border troops. Can you sleep soundly at night!"
These words were meant to condemn his very soul. Shang Qitai tied the northern military rations and the paralysis of the water transport together, pinning the blame directly on Xu Youde's head.
Embezzling a little silver in court might still leave one alive, but cutting off military rations to the border was a capital offense punishable by the extermination of one's entire family.
Shang Qitai intended to use the hands of the Emperor and the officials to thoroughly nail the Xu family to the pillar of shame, denying them any chance of turning things around.
The hall echoed with Shang Qitai's heartbroken words. The officials whispered to each other, their murmurs converging into a buzzing wave of sound.
The Grand Secretary, Xu Jie, stood at the very front of the civil officials. His eyelids drooped slightly, his breathing extremely light, turning a deaf ear to the farce behind him without even a twitch of his eyelashes.
Those officials who usually had good relations with the Xu family all became mutes at this moment, burying their heads low, terrified of being called out by the Emperor.
The mess the Earl of Chengyi's estate had made this time was too great; whoever got involved would be out of luck.
Kneeling on the ground, Shang Qitai swept the surrounding activity with his peripheral vision, the heavy stone in his heart finally dropping.
With all the civil and military officials forcing his hand, even if the Emperor desperately wanted to protect Xu Youde, he would have to consider the wagging tongues of the masses and the northern border army that was about to run out of grain.
The Emperor sat on the high dragon throne, looking down at the group of officials performing so strenuously below.
The temperature in the hall seemed to drop to the freezing point due to the Emperor's silence.
The Emperor did not show anger, nor did he issue a decree immediately. He just quietly watched Shang Qitai and Cui Jin weeping bitterly below, and watched those censors spitting as they spoke.
This silent scrutiny was far more terrifying than a thunderous rage.
It was not until everyone had grown tired of shouting their rebukes, leaving only the sound of heavy panting echoing in the great hall, that the Emperor finally tapped his fingers twice against his armrest.
The sound was not loud, yet it reached every person's ears with absolute clarity.
The buzzing murmurs vanished instantly. The hall was plunged back into a deathly silence where one could hear a pin drop.
The Emperor's gaze pierced through the hall, landing coldly upon Xu Youde. His voice betrayed neither joy nor anger.
"Xu Youde, the ministers have impeached you for causing the cutoff of military rations. What is your defense?"
All eyes instantly crashed down upon Xu Youde. Some reveled in his misfortune, while others secretly shook their heads, all waiting to witness the pathetic sight of the old man kowtowing and pleading guilty.
Xu Youde slowly raised his head, reached out to smooth the front of his official robes, and walked to the center of the hall with steady steps.
He bent his knees and knelt heavily on the green brick floor.
Shang Qitai cast a sidelong glance at him, sneering inwardly. He thought to himself that even if this old bag of bones smashed his head open from kowtowing today, he could forget about leaving the Jingyun Gate alive.
Everyone was waiting for Xu Youde to beg for mercy, but instead, he straightened his spine.
Xu Youde did not follow Shang Qitai's rhetoric to explain how difficult the waterways were to manage, nor did he mention the grievances he had suffered while auditing the accounts. He knew all too well that such excuses were utterly useless in the royal court.
Instead, he reached into his wide sleeve and drew out a neatly folded list.
Xu Youde's movements were slow, yet they emanated an aura of absolute resolve.
The list had been transcribed on premium rice paper, and the ink was still somewhat fresh.
He held it high with both hands, his wrists so steady that they did not tremble in the slightest.
Every gaze in the great hall fixated on that thin piece of paper.
The righteous indignation on Shang Qitai's face stiffened slightly, and an inexplicable sense of foreboding welled up in his heart.
This old fool wasn't playing by the rules. He wasn't crying foul, nor was he confessing. What was he doing pulling out a useless piece of paper?
Xu Youde held the list high above his head with both hands.
"I will not defend the chaos of the water transport! I only ask Your Majesty to take a look and see exactly whose family name belongs to the three ships that halted their voyages!"
