Chapter 4: Time to flex my skills

 

Chapter 4: Time to flex my skills

Just as he walked into the back hall of the prefectural office, he felt three sharp gazes piercing him.

‘The man wearing crimson robes with Chinese goose embroideries. Yep, it’s a fourth rank official… The old man with a silver gong embroidered on his chest, shit, he’s from the Nightwatchers… Shit, this girl is looking real fine… is she married?

After glancing at her chest, Xu Qi'An became much calmer.

He immediately lowered his head, displaying an attitude of humility.

Magistrate Chen sat on his chair without any expression. He spoke with an imposing tone that was used for interrogation.

“Xu Qi'An, you had not told me about anything when you were incarcerated three days ago. Are you aware of the consequences of withholding important information?”

As a veteran official, he would never get to the point even if he was incredibly flustered. Instead, he chose to mentally suppress the opposition.

Since he had made it this far, it meant that his scheme had been halfway completed. Hence Xu Qi'An was considerably calm. “Your excellency, it was only just now that the second son of the Xu Family had met with me. Then I asked him for the case dossier.”

First, he had to be honest.

The original trio on scene knew of Xu Xing’Nian. It was not because that he was famous, but due to the reason that he was the eldest son of Xu Ping'Zhi. The three of them had made thorough investigations after all.

“What is the relation of that to the supposed information you have?” Magistrate Chen asked.

“This humble one had deduced the truth of the matter from reading the dossier.”

“Wait.” Magistrate Chen interrupted him, his body slightly leaned forward. “From the dossier?”

This was not what he had expected.

“I have already solved the case.” Xu Qi'An nodded, indicating that it was true.

Magistrate Chen suppressed his desire to have the kid sent back into prison, his face was serious. “Why don’t you tell me, but I must remind you. If you are making anything up, you will receive two-hundred baton strikes that will turn your flesh inside out.”

“The tax silver being robbed wasn’t done by any monsters. It was humans.”

The one sentence he spoke shocked all three of them.

Magistrate Chen slammed the table and yelled in anger, “Nonsense! Take him away and grant him two-hundred baton strikes, make it so.”

The monsters behind the case was a fact that was already agreed upon, it was a common conclusion made by the three investigators.

If they expected Xu Qi'An to provide valuable information beforehand, they were utterly disappointed by now.

It was nothing but an act of desperation committed by the kid.

The middle-aged man’s eyes lit up slightly and motioned for the constables that rushed in to back off. “Magistrate Chen, please calm down.”

He shifted his gaze onto Xu Qi'An, intensely, with judgement and expectation in his eyes. “Go ahead.”

The magistrate was currently in a bad temper… Xu Qi'An knew that it is now the time for him to prove himself. “According to the testimonies by the gate guards, my second uncle had entered the city at 5:20. By 7:10, the convoy had reached Southwide Street. By then, a supernatural gust of wind rose which spooked the horses and they ran into the river.”

(T/N: The specific times might conflict because I might’ve misrepresented it in the past chapters, but ignore it, it doesn’t mean anything important.)

He tried his hardest to not to dull his tone, in order to show that he was confident and make it more convincing.

Magistrate Chen nodded. “This is the reason why we suspected that monsters had hidden underneath the river, and planned to rob the tax silver.”

“No!” Xu Qi'An rebutted loudly, “The gust of wind was a distraction, the explosion in the river was also trickery. It was meant for all of you to miss a clue, a deadly weak-point.”

Magistrate Chen urgently asked, “What weak-point?”

The middle-aged man postured himself to listen.

The young lady stopped chewing on the candied fruit in her mouth. Her pair of lively eyes stared at Xu Qi'An in interest.

They had pored over the dossier again and again, and had thoroughly understood what was written. But they had never realized any clues from it.

“My second uncle was escorting fifteen-thousand taels of silver, may I ask your excellencies how much did all of them weigh?”

The middle-aged man’s face froze, while the young lady tilted her head and kept it there for a long time.

Magistrate Chen spoke in displeasure, “just spit it out, stop stalling.”

Xu Qi'An originally thought to provide a hint, allowing them to personally figure out the massive flaw in the case. But it seemed to have gone overboard.

‘You ancient people really have low calculation power…’ Xu Qi'An then stated, “It would be nine-thousand three-hundred seventy-five jin (4687.5 kg).”

According to this world’s calculation formula, 1 jin equates to 16 taels. 15,000 taels of silver would be 9,375 jin (4687.5 kg).

The middle-aged man frowned, he somewhat felt that he realized something.

The young lady raised a brow. “What does this mean?”

Her voice was crisp, akin to a silver bell chiming.

‘This means that you are dumb!’ Xu Qi'An said, “how long is the distance from the city gate from Southwide Street?”

The middle-aged man replied, “30 miles.”

“How many populated areas does it go through?”

“… Four.”

“What’s the predicted speed of horse carts?”

“Horse cart…” The middle-aged man suddenly had his eyes agape, and leapt onto his feet.

His eyes were wide as he showed an expression of grand realization.

After three days of pursuing, they could not even catch a single trace of the monsters. This experienced Nightwatcher had already realized that they went down the wrong direction.

But there was no clear answer inside his head, he had once brought up the issue but was shut down. Thus, he had not bothered to pursue the idea.

Magistrate Chen felt numbness on his scalp as he still had not figured out the problem. It was obvious that he did not display much intelligence at the matter.

Then Magistrate Chen glanced at the young lady, his feelings were soothed. (He thought he was the dumbest person in the room, then he remembered the girl.)

The young lady asked, “Then where’s the problem?”

The middle-aged man was excited. “Time. The time does not match.

There was a distance of 30 miles between the city gate and Southwide Street. They would have to pass through four populated areas. With the speed of horse carts, they would never be able to enter the city at 5:20 and reach Southwide Street by 7:10.”

He was initially affected by the preconceived judgement that the monsters are behind the case. But after Xu Qi'An had dissected the story, he immediately figured out a discrepancy.

“But the tax silver had already reached Southwide Street by that time, many civilians had witnessed the event where the horses had rushed into the river. It is impossible for that to be wrong.” The young lady spoke as a matter of fact.

Magistrate Chen nodded in satisfaction and responded, “How about that?”

The middle-aged man was stunned, he then looked at Xu Qi'An subconsciously.

“Because what they escorted weren’t silver.” Xu Qi'An stated boldly.

“Preposterous!” Magistrate Chen rebutted, “Maybe if we assumed that your second uncle and his subordinates were all blind. But the witness testimonies of civilians recorded in the dossier about the horses rushing into the river and the shiny silver taels that rolled into the water…”

He rattled the dossier in hand. “Is that fake too?”

“What you see may not be real… This humble one is willing to answer your excellency's question.” He looked at the table. “Please lend me writing implements.”

Magistrate Chen flicked his hand, hinting his approval.

Xu Qi'An dragged the shackles all the way to the table, prepared the ink and spread the paper. He then started writing in squiggly lines.

“Your excellency, please do as I ask and arrange what was written on the paper.” After writing, he handed over the piece of paper to Magistrate Chen.

Magistrate Chen received the paper and skimmed through, he was confused.

“let me see.” The young lady came forward, stretched out her snowy white hand and took the paper.

Then she was confused.

“…” The middle-aged man, Li Yu’Chun glanced at the paper and turned expressionless. He flattened the raised corner of the paper and handed it to Magistrate Chen.