Nine Chapters of Strange Cases

Chapter 285 The whole army attacks
Su Changying, who was standing guard by the coffin, looked towards the doorway.

Fan Lishen, dressed in white, ran in crying. His nose was red and his eyes were swollen like peaches. He rushed straight to the coffin.

"Ah Zhao! Ah Zhao, I returned to Chang'an and dared not come to see you. Had I known this would happen, I would have crawled here even if I had to carry thorns to beg for forgiveness, just to see you one last time. I haven't even had a chance to ask you, do you blame me?"

I'm a coward, I only dared to flee Chang'an in a panic, I didn't even dare to write you a letter. I didn't even dare to eat sweets, I...Ah Zhao...I've missed you all so much these past few years. I...I...I..."

As Fan Lishen spoke, he took out a packet of candied plums from his sleeve pocket. With trembling hands, he took one out and held it towards Zhou Zhao's mouth.

He peeked out and saw Zhou Zhao's deathly pale face, and the dried bloodstains on her chest.

There was no breath under her nose, and her bright eyes would never move again. Fan Lishen suddenly collapsed to the ground in a daze. The plum was about to hit Zhou Zhao's face when Su Changying, who was guarding the coffin, grabbed it at the last moment.

Su Changying stood beside the coffin, his face ashen.

Even though Zhou Zhao had told him beforehand that it was a fake death, the moment he saw Ah Huang carrying Zhou Zhao's "corpse" off the ground, his blood seemed to freeze.

"Fan Lishen, if you disturb Zhaozhao again, don't blame me for being impolite."

As Su Changying spoke, her eyes turned bloodshot.

Fan Lishen leaned against the coffin, a few dried plums rolling off his hand and onto the ground. He pressed his forehead against the coffin, looking utterly lost, and while crying, he picked up the dried plums and stuffed them into his mouth, feeling nauseous as he did so.

As if torturing himself, he stuffed the dried plums into his mouth one by one.

“My mother was murdered, and Yan-ge lost his life because of me. I could only desert. But you have been searching for the real culprit, and you lost your life for it. You did everything you could to find the person who killed your mother. The one who died for this should be me... Ah Zhao, Ah Zhao... I'm sorry.”

If I could go back in time, I would definitely choose not to know you. If Brother Yan didn't know me, if Changying didn't know me... if you didn't know me... none of you would have gotten into trouble. Ah Zhao..."

Zhou Zhao lay quietly in the coffin, believing that no one in the entire city of Chang'an knew better than her and A Huang how to pretend to be dead.

As she listened to Fan Lishen's repeated cries, her feelings were extremely complicated.

Fan Lishen should actually be called Fan Lishen.

From the day she met him, she never saw him in a low mood or listless. He was like an ox that had eaten a bucket of five-stone powder, able to plow five hundred acres of land in one go, plowing it deep.

His mouth never stops chattering; he can talk for an hour straight, even while facing a large rock by the roadside, gesturing wildly.

Ah Huang used to be most afraid of him.

No matter which corner Ah Huang huddled in, as long as Fan Lishen stood beside him, that corner seemed to be stared at by the sunlight, attracting everyone's attention.

In the blink of an eye, four years had passed since she last saw Fan Lishen.

The friends who used to walk arm in arm with each other are now all grown up, and things have changed.

"Li Shen, get up and light some incense for A Zhao! Father knows you two are close, but don't be so willful and disturb her here."

Fan Fuma's voice rang out above Zhou Zhao, and Zhou Zhao could smell the strong scent of incense emanating from him.

She could feel that Prince Consort Fan was looking at her.

However, the gaze was fleeting and immediately looked away. Prince Consort Fan pulled up the distraught Fan Lishen who was sitting on the ground, walked to Zhou Buhai, and cupped his hands in a gesture of respect, "Please accept my condolences, Lord Li. My son was rude and I hope you will forgive him."

With tears in his eyes, Zhou Buhai returned the greeting, saying, "Ah Zhao and Li Shen have always been on good terms. She must be happy to see him come to see her off."

Prince Consort Fan took the incense from the side and pushed Fan Lishen forward to offer incense.

Just then, a large group of people walked in. Zhou Zhao was lying in the coffin when he heard the steward announce his name. It was his colleagues from the Court of Justice who had arrived.

Zhou Zhao's heart skipped a beat.

Thus, all the people she was waiting for tonight had arrived.

“Li Tingwei, Chang Zuoping, Guan Youping, and all the court officials, thank you for coming to see my daughter off.”

"Please accept my condolences, Lord Li. Zhou Zhao was a great talent of our Court of Justice. Now she has lost her life in the line of duty. The Court of Justice will definitely capture that young master Yu and give Zhou Zhao an explanation. It is truly a case of heaven being jealous of talent. Zhou Zhao was a promising junior of mine. She was just promoted to Court Clerk. Given time, she will surely become the Court of Justice."

The voice was exceptionally gentle; it belonged to Li Tingwei.

After exchanging a few more pleasantries, Li Tingwei led the people from Tingwei Temple to accept the incense.

"Commander Li, I have a favor to ask. Zhou Zhao's greatest wish before her death was to become the Commandant of Justice. I would like to request that you, Commander Li, lend her the Commandant's badge so that she may see it and fulfill her last wish. I wonder if you would grant my request, sir..."

Li Tingwei nodded kindly, walked to the coffin, glanced at Zhou Zhao lying inside, and sighed softly.

Then he lowered his head and began to untie his waist tag.

Zhou Zhao lay in the coffin, the Green Fish Dagger already in his hand. Just then, a loud thud was heard as Su Changying's longsword sheath accidentally bumped into the coffin.

This was a signal they had agreed upon beforehand.

Just then, Zhou Zhao suddenly stood up and thrust his Qingyu dagger unceremoniously at Li Tingwei, who was bowing his head to remove his waist token. At the same time, Su Changying's longsword was also drawn and thrust straight at Li Tingwei.

Ah Huang, who had been huddled in the corner, suddenly lunged at Fan Fuma from behind like a cheetah leaping out of the shadows.

Meanwhile, the pair of wiry old twins who had been playing the suona, drums, and singing night songs earlier were now as close as shadows to Li Tingwei.

Everyone in the room was startled by this sudden turn of events.

I don't know who it was, but someone shouted "The zombie has come back to life!"

Many people immediately began to flee. The group from the Court of Judicial Review, their eyes still wet with tears, stood frozen in place, He Tingshi's eyes wide and red from crying. He murmured in disbelief, "This...this..."

Just then, Han Ze led a group of Northern Army soldiers in and rushed in. He shouted, "Li Tingwei and Fan Fuma are traitors. We are ordered to arrest them. Everyone else, please leave the mourning hall first, but you must not leave the Zhou residence. Otherwise, you will be punished for treason and killed without exception."

Almost instantly, more than half of the people in the room were gone.

The soldiers of the Northern Army surrounded the entire mourning hall, and the archers had their bows drawn, ready to shoot everyone in the room into mincemeat at any moment.

Zhou Zhao, along with Su Changying and the two imperial guards, were already locked in battle with Li Tingwei.

Li Tingwei remained composed, "What's going on? I, Li, have always been loyal to His Majesty, how could I be a traitor? Zhou Zhao, you're not dead? I am truly baffled by this situation. Can someone give me an explanation?"