Nine Chapters of Strange Cases

Chapter 401 Mud can’t hold up the wall
Zhou Zhao glanced indifferently at the top of the purple-robed man's head, where there was a clear fingerprint of Ah Huang.

Do you have a headache right now?

As she spoke, she took out a small porcelain bottle from her sleeve, held it to her ear and shook it a few times. The pills inside the bottle made a rattling sound as they hit the bottle.

Su Changying, who was standing to the side, understood Zhou Zhao's plan.

Ah Huang is as strong as an ox; if he wanted to, Chu Heng's head would have been crushed by now.

With such obvious fingerprints, how could his head not hurt?

The man in the purple robe felt a surge of pain. He hadn't thought about his head earlier because he was so embarrassed. Now that his thoughts were on it, he felt a splitting headache, as if the top of his head was about to fly off.

His expression changed drastically, and he opened his mouth to speak.

Old Man Chu behind him decisively interrupted him, "My Heng'er was in the city all day yesterday and didn't leave the city at all."

Seeing this, Zhou Zhao chuckled indifferently.

"When Jiang Yan died, she was in a golden birdcage, with thorns all around her. The murderer went in and strangled her, then untied her belt and hung her from the birdcage to make it look like she had hanged herself."

To do all this, the murderer would have had to enter the birdcage and step onto the thorns. To make Jiang Yan bleed profusely and suffer torture, the thorns on the thorns were hard and dense, like needles.

The murderer stepped on the thorns and lifted her body; the combined weight of the two would cause his feet to be pricked.

You invited Zhao Yizhou for drinks, but you remained lying down the whole time. It wasn't that you didn't want to sit up, but rather that your foot was injured.

Seeing that the old man Chu was about to continue speaking, Zhou Zhao interrupted him sharply, "This is just one piece of evidence."

The truly irrefutable evidence is that we found gold powder under the victim's fingernails. When a person is strangled, they instinctively try to pull at the rope around their neck; it was at this moment that the victim forcefully grabbed the killer's hand.

As soon as Zhou Zhao finished speaking, everyone's eyes fell on the back of Chu Heng's hand.

His wrists were locked by Zhou Zhao, and the backs of his hands were directly exposed to everyone.

On the middle finger of Chu Heng's right hand, there was a ring, which was linked to a piece of shimmering purple brocade.

The brocade, like a woman's veil, covered the back of his hand.

I was too far away to see anything but a fleeting glimpse of the golden light.

Now that they were closer, they noticed that Chu Heng had burn marks on the back of his hand, leaving some ugly scars.

Perhaps for this reason, he deliberately wore this brocade as a cover.

As Zhou Zhao spoke, he looked at Zhao Yizhou and said, "Take a scratch and see if there's any gold powder under your fingernails? Take off your boots and see if there are any marks from thorns. Zhao Yizhou, why don't you examine them yourself, so that people from the Court of Justice and the Northern Army won't say that we are being aggressive?"

Upon hearing this, Chu Heng hurriedly tried to pull his hand behind his back.

When Old Man Chu and Madam Chu saw this, they wanted to step forward to stop them, but before they could take a step, they were stopped by Su Changying's long sword.

Zhao Yizhou stood still for a long time before letting out a long breath. He walked up to Chu Heng and gently touched the back of Chu Heng's hand. Then he looked at his own fingers. He hadn't used any force at all; he had just touched them lightly, and gold dust had already settled on his fingers.

He knew this all too well.

Chu Heng was born late in life. Both his father's and mother's families were powerful clans that lived a life of extravagance and dissipation.

When he was in Chang'an, he had repeatedly advised Chu Heng, but was always scolded and dismissed. In the last two years, he went to Dai to serve as an official, far from the emperor's reach, and had no say in Chu Heng's affairs. He never expected that Chu Heng would cause such a terrible disaster.

As a child, he accidentally burned the back of his hand with a candle, leaving an ugly scar. He always covered it with brocade, but he disliked the brocade for its beauty, so he sprinkled gold powder on it. The shimmering, yellowish sheen was his favorite. All his close friends knew this.

As Zhao Yizhou pondered, he froze, staring at the gold powder on his fingertips.

His gaze couldn't help but drift towards Chu Heng's feet.

Seeing that Zhao Yizhou did not move, Su Changying impatiently swung her sword, and Chu Heng's trousers and boots were ripped apart at the same time.

At that moment, everyone noticed the marks left by thorns on Chu Heng's legs.

Chu Heng's face turned pale, and his head began to throb even more. He looked up at Zhou Zhao in a panic and saw a red worm hanging from his hair, wriggling in front of him.

It was a worm that looked like a thin line of blood; though tiny, it was terrifying.

Chu Heng finally couldn't hold back and shouted out. He stood up abruptly, completely oblivious to the pain in his foot or any other problem.

He just kept jumping up and down, slapping the top of his head, crying out, "Give me the antidote! Give me the antidote! The bugs, the bugs are crawling out of my head! If you don't hurry, I'm going to die! Father, Mother, save me!"

Zhou Zhao looked at him and exclaimed twice, "Didn't you not leave the city yesterday? You didn't go to the Huo family's tomb, so how could you have contracted the Gu worms?"

Chu Heng slapped his head frantically, causing two more worms to appear. His voice was trembling with sobs, "I'm going! I'm going! Give me the antidote! I went to the Great Tomb. I had guards with me, intending to have them kill Jiang Yan and fake it as suicide."

But I never expected that you would find him and then kill him.

I was the only one left at that time, and I had no choice but to kill Jiang Yan myself.

"Give me the antidote! Give me the antidote! I don't want to die!"

Looking at Chu Heng's terrified face, Zhou Zhao suddenly understood why, when Grand Commandant Huo arranged for Jiang Yan to come and deceive Fan Yin, he dared not let Fan Yin meet the legendary Young Master Chu. At the time, he thought the Chu family was unaware of the situation, and that Jiang Yan was a spy planted by Grand Commandant Huo within the Chu family.

Looking back now, he overestimated Chu Heng.

This person is clearly a complete idiot who's good for nothing but causing trouble.

Why would the Chu family arrange for Chu Heng to kill Jiang Yan? He's clearly not very capable.

Zhou Zhao had a sudden thought: perhaps Grand Commandant Huo was behind this.

She thought about it and then asked the question.

Chu Heng was terrified and reached out to snatch the porcelain bottle from Zhou Zhao's hand.

Zhou Zhao raised his hand high, and the porcelain bottle slipped back into his sleeve pocket.

Chu Heng shouted, "Give me the antidote! I don't want to die!"

Zhou Zhao looked at Chu Heng, "A life for a life, you killed Jiang Yan..."

Chu Heng shook his head irritably, "She was just a lowly servant girl, so what if I killed her? At worst, I'll just be demoted and fined! Give me the antidote!"

Zhou Zhao was taken aback and looked at Chu Heng with disgust. "How did you know that Jiang Yan was in the Huo family's tomb? And why did you only bring one guard with you?"

As she spoke, she turned to look at Old Man Chu and Madam Chu standing at the door.

(End of this chapter)