Smack!
A sheaf of papers was hurled heavily onto the large huanghuali desk.
The pages scattered with a rustle. The one on top was a copied version of the memorial transcribed by the Office of Transmission.
The ink was still fresh, and at the bottom were the traced impressions of two clan seals.
“How many clan seals does it bear?” Xiao Jingxing asked, reclining against the back of his chair without even lifting his eyes.
Censor Zhou leaned over for a look and blurted out, “The Chen and Fang families…”
“The alliance of the three great Jiangnan clans was established as an ironclad rule over a hundred years ago.” Xiao Jingxing’s finger tapped against the two seal impressions, each knock striking the tabletop with a dull thud. “Chen, Fang, and Yang. They advance and retreat together. Even a three-year-old child in Jiangnan knows that.”
His finger moved aside and pointed to the blank space.
“The Yang clan has the greatest prestige, the choicest land, and the most ancestral graves marked for exhumation. I ask you, where is the Yang family’s seal?”
The study fell silent in an instant.
The Vice Minister of War set down his teacup and broke the stalemate in a lowered voice. “I heard that last night, the residence of Ministry of Personnel Director Zhou Mingyuan sent men south in the middle of the night. They were investigating Yang Bonian’s background. Supposedly… he’s ill.”
“Ill?” Xiao Jingxing let out a mocking laugh, his face full of scorn. “He fell ill at a remarkably convenient time!”
“The memorial charging into battle dares to bear only two seals, while the family leading the charge happens to collapse from illness at this very moment? Gentlemen, you have all spent half your lives navigating officialdom. Who among you has never used the same trick of falling ill when the situation called for it?”
Sweat appeared on the forehead of the Vice Director of the Court of Imperial Studs, and he unconsciously shrank back.
Xiao Jingxing leaned forward and shoved the copied memorial against Censor Zhou’s chest.
“Take another careful look at what this memorial actually says!”
“Eight million taels of embezzled government silver! Eight million! How much is the Ministry of Revenue’s annual income? Did Xu Youde strip the land of Jiangnan bare, or what?”
“Where are the account books? The land deeds? The witness statements? There isn’t a single one!”
His tone suddenly sharpened. “‘It is rumored,’ ‘according to reports,’ ‘some say,’ ‘someone allegedly witnessed it’… The entire thing is nothing but a collection of absurdities! Censor Zhou, how many heads do you have, that you dare use such a worthless piece of paper to impeach a second-rank minister who holds an imperial commissioner’s seal of authority and acts under His Majesty’s direct orders?”
Censor Zhou clutched his three-thousand-word memorial, cold sweat trickling down his temples. He wiped it away repeatedly and stammered, “Your Highness, my memorial… my memorial says the same things…”
“I’m not finished yet.”
“This was transcribed at the order of Chief Grand Secretary Xu Jie. There are three copies.”
“One was sent to the Ministry of Revenue. Xu Youde is the Minister of Revenue, so sending him a warning through his own ministry is perfectly reasonable.”
“One was sent to the Ministry of Justice. The accusation concerns embezzlement and the excavation of graves; the ministry needs to be prepared to investigate and interrogate him. That, too, makes sense.”
He slapped the stack of papers against the desk.
“The third was sent to my residence.”
“I neither oversee the Ministry of Revenue nor control criminal affairs. That old fox Xu Jie has not made a single mistake in twenty years, yet this time he had an extra copy transcribed and sent it straight to my desk by name!”
Xiao Jingxing lifted his head, his gaze sweeping over the four men like a blade. “Use your heads, gentlemen. Why would the Chief Grand Secretary send this copy? Isn’t it obvious? He wants to fan the flames!”
Seeing the four men sit in fearful silence, Xiao Jingxing jerked his chin toward the door.
“Bring it in.”
The chief secretary hurriedly acknowledged the order and brought out a black lacquered box from behind the bookcase. Inside was a thick stack of intelligence reports.
These were the trump cards they had spent the past two days and two nights sorting through.
The chief secretary trimmed the lampwick, picked up the top report, and cleared his throat before reading:
“Fifth Master Zhao of the timber guild had a stockpile of premium timber stored for three years. A group of merchants with northern accents bought it all at a high price. Among the timber were forty camphor trees, the thickest requiring more than ten men to encircle. Such massive timber is prohibited by regulation.”
“There were also more than seventy sections of coffin timber. Everything was purchased together, loaded onto a ship, and sent toward the southern part of the city that same day.”
The chief secretary paused halfway through to catch his breath.
After hearing this, the Vice Director of the Court of Imperial Studs could no longer keep his legs still.
He shot up from his stool, pulling both hands from his sleeves. His voice trembled. “Your Highness, that matter of mine… it’s this!”
Xiao Jingxing stared at him. “Speak.”
“I have a student named Sun who serves as a minor registrar at the Imperial Astronomical Bureau.” The Vice Director licked his cracked lips. “Half a month ago, he ran to my residence in the middle of the night, his face white with terror. He said that after the second watch of the night, the Directorate of Ceremonial Affairs delivered a secret letter to the Observatory. He was the one who personally brought it to the chief astronomer’s desk.”
“The next morning, the chief astronomer sealed away all the astronomical records from that night. He wrote a different divination instead. My student secretly glanced at it…”
“It contained the words ‘transport south.’”
The study became so quiet that a pin could have been heard dropping.
The Vice Minister of War’s goatee trembled as he took up the thread. “There is an unusual matter on my side as well.”
“Over the past two months, the Ministry of Revenue has allocated a special sum of ready cash to Jiangnan. It did not pass through the national treasury. Instead, it used drafts from the Jiangnan Grand Exchange Bank, redeemed in Jinling after being issued in the capital. The amounts were astonishing, one transaction after another. My men happened to discover it while the Ministry of War was arguing with the Ministry of Revenue over provisions for the frontier garrisons.”
He paused and swallowed. “The accounts say only ‘construction.’ They do not mention what is being built.”
The commander of the Five Cities Military Command, who had been standing by the door, now strode forward and clasped his fists. “I have something as well!”
“The eldest son of the Chengyi Earl’s residence, Xu Wuyou, moored a small covered boat on the Tonghui River the night before last and spent half the night fishing. At the time, my men assumed he was merely a bored young nobleman.”
“But this morning, the city gates reported that his boat was gone. It had followed the current southward.”
After listening to them all, Xiao Jingxing said nothing. He drew several intelligence reports from the box and arranged them one by one across the desk.
For the matter involving the Imperial Astronomical Bureau, he took a blank sheet and wrote the words “astronomical signs,” placing it on top. For the ready cash mentioned by the Vice Minister of War, he wrote “ready cash” and set it beside the first. For Xu Wuyou, he wrote a single character—“Xu”—and placed it at the far end.
Massive timber. Government drafts. Ready cash. Astronomical signs. The Xu family’s eldest son heading south.
The sheets of paper spread across half the desk like death warrants.
At last, Xiao Jingxing pulled out the copied map of the southern part of the city and slammed it down in the very center of the papers.
A large tract of land had been circled in vermilion ink on the map.
It was square and orderly, bordered on the east by a tributary of the Grand Canal and backed on the west by a stretch of sloping ground.
“Massive timber. Government drafts. Ready cash. Astronomical signs.”
Xiao Jingxing’s finger moved from one item to the next, pressing down with tremendous force before coming to rest firmly on the vermilion circle.
“Even the Xu family’s eldest son is heading south to lend his father a hand.”
“More than ten thousand mu, all in one continuous tract. Square, high and dry, safe from flooding, and right beside the canal system.”
He slowly raised his head, his gaze fixed on the four men before him like an eagle’s.
The Vice Minister of War lowered his eyes, the veins standing out on the back of his hand. The color had drained completely from the face of the Vice Director of the Court of Imperial Studs, and his legs were trembling uncontrollably.
“You gentlemen have spent half your lives in the imperial court.” Xiao Jingxing spoke one word at a time, his voice cold as tempered steel. “Before coming here tonight, I imagine you had already arrived at those two words in your hearts.”
“It’s just that none of you dared to say them first?”
Xiao Jingxing gave a cold laugh.
“Then I’ll say them.”
“Imperial Father, we must move the capital.”
