Wen Xu had thought that his life was surely about to end then and there. He had already been frightened into a quivering heap, but when the blade was still an inch from his throat, it suddenly slipped from its wielder’s hand and clattered to the ground.
He abruptly came to his senses. The delirious joy of surviving a catastrophe surged through his entire body. With his mouth stretching wide, he began laughing uncontrollably, like a loach thrashing wildly from head to tail. “Ha… hahahaha! You didn’t know?!”
Spittle flew as he laughed, his handsome features twisting with smug triumph. “When His Majesty made his inspection tour of the southern regions in disguise, he happened to pass through Liangping County. It was our Wen family who received him! When he learned that Mother was the mother of an imperial official, he was so pleased that he specially bestowed an Imperial Appointment upon her. He even asked whether Mother had any brothers, so he could appoint them to office as well!”
Wen Zhuo’s gaze trembled.
Wen Xu caught that flicker of change clearly. In an instant, he was like a rabid dog that had spotted a meat bun. Having lost all restraint, he began shouting even more wildly. “It was all because of you that Mother received the Imperial Appointment and can save my life today! In the end, I have you to thank for this! You can’t kill me now! You can’t kill me!”
Having gained the upper hand, Wen Xu turned toward the surrounding neighbors and bellowed at the top of his lungs, “Listen up, every one of you! My mother is an Imperially Appointed Lady personally honored by His Majesty! Who dares lay a finger on me? Who dares!”
“Stop it! Wen Xu, stop talking!” Lin Yingniang sobbed through tear-filled eyes as she struggled to rise and lunged forward to cover his mouth.
But Wen Xu reacted like a startled, savage beast, roaring hysterically, “Why shouldn’t I say it?! Mother! Didn’t you see the look on his face just now? He was going to kill me! He really was going to kill me!”
Lin Yingniang’s heart turned cold. She knew Wen Xu had been terrified out of his mind, which was why he had become so crazed and uncontrollable.
Unable to restrain the maddened Wen Xu, she could only turn around and gaze at Wen Zhuo with mournful eyes. In anguish, she said, “Zhuo’er, don’t listen to his nonsense. Mother simply couldn’t bear to see him die. I didn’t… I never intended to use that Imperial Appointment to force you…”
She raised her head and looked into Wen Zhuo’s eyes. Something within them seemed to go out all at once.
An Imperial Appointment alone was nowhere near enough to make a senior first-rank official of the imperial court reveal such a deathly expression. What had disappointed him had never been the appointment itself, but her other identity.
He clearly held power enough to decide a person’s life or death with the flick of a finger. Yet in her dazed state, she seemed to see once more that solitary figure leaving in the night—lonely and calm, accepting his fate and walking away from hers.
She remembered chasing him out the door that night and calling his name from behind.
He had not turned around.
And just like that, ten full years had passed.
The bond between mother and son was a rope held at both ends, with Lin Yingniang gripping one end and Wen Zhuo the other.
For ten years, that rope had remained buried in their memories. Neither of them had dared to think of it, touch it, or mention it. Until today, when she had finally summoned the courage to brush away the dust and tug at it cautiously—only to discover that at the very end, all she had grasped was a thread that had long since been severed.
Once either person let go first, the rope was broken. It could never be joined again.
“Zhuo’er, Zhuo’er! Didn’t you say you were short of silver to provide disaster relief?” Through the cold fabric of his official robes, Lin Yingniang tremblingly seized Wen Zhuo’s hand. “Mother will take you to retrieve it right now. You can use it… use it to provide relief for the people, all right?”
She was desperate to make it up to Wen Zhuo. It seemed to be the only thing she could still do.
Yet Wen Zhuo slowly and firmly withdrew his sleeve from her grasp.
Even now, no matter how much suffering gnawed at his heart or how much hatred scorched his bones, he had always kept it suppressed and held himself in check. Countless times, he had teetered on the brink of losing control, wishing he could grind the people before him into dust, but his identity and responsibilities bound him layer upon layer, leaving no room for the slightest mistake.
Shen Zheng’s gaze grew increasingly dark. At last, he raised his palm and said in a deep voice, “Jiang Mannü, bring me the blade!”
Jiang Mannü froze for a moment, but immediately understood what Shen Zheng intended to do. Though she was blunt and straightforward by nature, she also held the laws of Great Qian in deep awe.
Now that Lin Yingniang had revealed her identity as an Imperially Appointed Lady, the case had to be reported to the Dali Temple for review according to the law. Even if the final result of the review was still death, they should not execute him first and seek authorization afterward.
But when she saw Wen Zhuo’s trembling back, her eyes reddened. Gritting her teeth, she said, “Your Highness, I’ll go!”
Shen Zheng said no more. He drew the cold blade from her pack, held it in his hand, and strode forward.
After this sudden turn of events, even the bailiffs who had been so self-righteous moments ago could not help growing uneasy, and their grips loosened somewhat.
At once, Wen Yingjing, Wen Ze, and the other members of the clan raised their heads, as if they had caught sight of hope rising from the ashes.
Of them all, Wen Xu was the most exuberant. He thrust out his chin and imperiously ordered the bailiff beside him, “Hurry up and unlock these shackles! Did you hear me? If you dare drag your feet, I’ll report you to the emperor and make sure every last one of you suffers for it!”
The bailiffs glanced toward Wen Zhuo for guidance, but his expression was indifferent, offering not the slightest signal. For a moment, none of them knew what to do.
Lin Yingniang was frantic with anxiety. Every word Wen Xu spoke was only adding fuel to the fire!
She was terrified that Wen Zhuo would be driven into losing control, killing Wen Xu and jeopardizing his own official position in the process.
“Zhuo’er, I know he’s a good-for-nothing, a beast! Even if you beat him so badly that he couldn’t get out of bed for half a year, I wouldn’t say a word to stop you, but…”
But Wen Zhuo wanted Wen Xu dead. No mother could stand by and watch her own flesh and blood die.
Before she could finish, Shen Zheng had already closed in. His dark eyes roiled with murderous intent. Without a word, he turned the blade and swung it toward Wen Xu’s throat!
“Mother doesn’t want to hurt you. Can’t you understand? Can’t you…”
“Can’t you…”
Lin Yingniang’s voice abruptly died in midair.
Even Wen Zhuo stood frozen in place.
A two-inch gash had suddenly opened across Wen Xu’s throat. Blood gushed out like a hot spring, bubbling as it poured forth and staining the wooden stocks red in an instant.
At first, his brain was feverishly engorged, and his face turned purplish red as his eyes bulged as if they might burst from their sockets. Then his entire body began convulsing uncontrollably. After only a few spasms, he collapsed to the ground with a thud. The mouth that had been shouting moments before could no longer make the slightest sound.
When the bailiffs saw who held the blade, they hurriedly dropped to one knee and bowed in unison. “Greetings, Your Highness!”
Shen Zheng flung the blade aside. A string of blood droplets splattered across the ground. Without sparing Wen Xu’s corpse a glance, he turned to face the utterly stunned Lin Yingniang.
“You are an Imperially Appointed Lady personally honored by Father the Emperor. You bear glory and distinction, yet your heart is concerned only with whether your son lives or dies! Do you know that Wen Xu beat an old man to death in the street—a father searching for his daughter—and then falsely invoked Director Wen’s name to intimidate the people, leaving the onlookers too terrified to speak up for justice? Why is your son’s life precious, while the lives of displaced commoners may be wrongfully thrown away?”
Lin Yingniang trembled all over and lowered her head timidly. She could not utter a word. Her gentle eyes quivered with pain.
Shen Zheng’s voice was cold and solemn. “Do you think he is merely a good-for-nothing, a beast, and nothing more? He relied on the Wen family’s influence to run rampant throughout the local area, yet he had never suffered the slightest punishment. As a result, the law here ceased to function, and the people completely lost their faith in the court, in fairness, and in justice. That was why Director Wen faced such difficulty providing disaster relief. He had to swear oaths again and again before he could calm the desperate refugees and send them back home to await aid!”
“As an imperially appointed lady, instead of showing concern for the hardships he faces in providing relief and the suffering of the people, you would put your own private interests first and protect this criminal, causing him to lose the trust of all the people of Mianzhou. If rumors spread that he is sheltering his own brother and showing favoritism, throwing the people everywhere into a state of panic and causing unrest amid the disaster, can you bear that responsibility?”
“Do you know what punishment awaits Director Wen when he returns to court if he fails to handle the affairs of Mianzhou properly, despite Father Emperor having entrusted them entirely to him?”
“The scum you are shielding has committed every evil under the sun and deserves nothing less than death! Even if the Censorate and the Court of Judicial Review reexamined the case ten thousand times, he would still have no chance of survival! If he does not die, how can the people’s grievances be appeased? How can justice be upheld? How can the souls of the unjustly slain be comforted?”
The surroundings fell utterly silent, so quiet that even a pin dropping could be heard. A moment later, the crowd suddenly erupted into a roaring uproar. The common people could no longer restrain themselves and began cheering loudly—
“His Highness is absolutely right!”
“Wen Xu got what he deserved! He was arrogant and tyrannical—he should be killed!”
“He used Director Wen’s reputation to commit evil, and now he wants to rely on an imperial edict to stay alive? What gives him the right? It’s not fair!”
“Well killed! Thank you, Your Highness, for standing up for the people!”
Wen Yingjing and Wen Ze turned ashen and collapsed limply to the ground. At last, they understood what it meant for everyone to push a fallen wall, and finally saw clearly how determined Wen Zhuo was to bring about the destruction of the Wen family.
The so-called bonds of kinship and the scruples in his heart had merely been wishful thinking on their part. Before natural disaster and the will of the people, all of those things were as insignificant as dust.
This time, the Wen family was truly finished.
Lin Yingniang had been refuted so thoroughly by Shen Zheng that she was utterly humiliated. Covering her face, she sobbed bitterly, not even possessing the courage to raise her head and look at Wen Zhuo.
She had never seen much of the world. Usually, she hardly ever left the inner compound, and she had never imagined that her momentary desire to protect her child would create so many difficulties for Wen Zhuo.
She had only wanted to make amends. She had wanted to protect her child and do something for Wen Zhuo that she had been unable to do all those years ago.
But she offered no further explanation. She knew that Wen Zhuo probably would not want to hear it anyway.
Looking at her shattered state, Shen Zheng softened his tone slightly. “Under the law, you may go to the Office of Transmission and submit a complaint, accusing me of disregarding procedure and executing first without waiting for a review. Whatever consequences this matter may bring, I will bear them alone.”
As soon as he finished speaking, he reached back and clasped Wen Zhuo’s wrist, pulling him behind himself.
He had seen from the beginning that Wen Zhuo hated the Wen family to the bone, yet toward his birth mother, he still harbored a sliver of expectation that even he himself was unwilling to acknowledge.
That was why Shen Zheng wanted Lin Yingniang to direct all her resentment, hatred, and pain at him.
Wen Xu deserved to die, but Wen Zhuo could remain uninvolved.
“Your Highness…”
Wen Zhuo murmured softly. His dim eyes seemed finally to have found a glimmer of light in the darkness. Sheltered behind that strong, powerful arm, he felt the fierce, genuine warmth radiating from Shen Zheng’s hand around his wrist. It dispelled the deep-seated affliction that had haunted his heart for years.
He had fantasized countless times about a divine warrior descending from the heavens to save him from the despair brought upon him by the Wen family.
But year after year, no such person ever came.
He had grown accustomed to hope ending in disappointment, accustomed to having nothing to look forward to, pretending that he was unharmed.
Just then, brilliant sunlight broke through the thin clouds and illuminated the two of them. Wen Zhuo saw the sobbing, helpless child buried deep within his heart finally laid to rest beneath a wash of golden warmth.
Shen Zheng gently stroked his wrist in response, then continued issuing orders. “The investigation has revealed that Wen Yingjing and Wen Ze refined Bone-Piercing Incense using purchased children as medicinal ingredients. Their methods were cruel beyond measure, and their crimes are monstrous! Arrest them both at once and take them back to the Mianzhou prefectural office for severe interrogation. All of the Wen family’s property—including gold and silver, land deeds, and grain stored in their warehouses—is to be confiscated and surrendered to the state. The Wen clan relatives are to be detained at the Liangping County Office and interrogated one by one. Anyone implicated in corruption, murder, or covering up crimes is to be punished according to the law. No one is to be spared! And those vicious servants who acted as the Wen family’s accomplices—do not let a single one escape. Arrest them all and conduct a thorough investigation into their crimes!”
So many children had died in Wangtian Gully, without even their bones left to be found. He had to give the people of Mianzhou an explanation. Now that all the Wen family’s hidden wealth had been unearthed, there was no need to keep these two parasites alive.
“Yes!”
“Understood!”
The constables, their blood stirred, sprang into action at once.
The common people were initially stunned, staring wide-eyed in shock. Then a towering fury surged through their hearts.
“Children used as medicinal ingredients? So that’s how Bone-Piercing Incense was made?”
“So when Wen Yingjing said he would ‘raise the children on everyone’s behalf and keep them from starving to death,’ it was all a pack of lies! He was turning those children into incense!”
“Wen Yingjing! You evil demon! What a poisonous heart!”
“You heartless beasts! May you die a horrible death!”
Angry roars rang out without end. Driven mad by the brutal truth, the people’s eyes turned bloodshot. One after another, they bent down, picked up stones and handfuls of dirt from the ground, and hurled them straight at Wen Yingjing and Wen Ze.
“Beat them to death! Beat these two beasts to death!”
Before long, Wen Yingjing and Wen Ze had been battered until their heads split open, blood mixing with dirt and smearing their entire bodies and faces.
Wen Yingjing ducked his head and tried to avoid the blows. The wound on his forehead burned with pain, and he had long since lost the composure he once possessed. When the constables forcibly hauled him to his feet, they discovered that his legs hung limp and unsteady like noodles. He no longer had the strength to stand.
