Ask the Nine Ministers

Chapter 142 Gold Level Showdown
The Xuanzheng Hall was solemn and dignified.

Emperor Chongzhao sat upright on the dragon throne, his face gloomy and dark.

Under the red steps, the Imperial Censor Zhou Zhongping held a tablet in his hand, his posture straight and his voice as loud as a bell.

"Your Majesty, I report that the Minister of Works Xiao Zhengyuan should be executed for three crimes! First, he withheld 100,000 taels of silver from the Luo River embankment, causing the embankment to collapse for a thousand miles and seven thousand households to starve to death; second, he privately kept soldiers to intercept and kill the royal carriage, causing serious injuries to the crown prince; third..."

"That's complete nonsense!"

Before he could finish his words, he was interrupted by Prime Minister Xiao Song in a stern voice.

Xiao Song was seen with his hair and beard standing upright, walking out of the line quickly.

"Your Majesty, what Censor Zhou said is all nonsense. Someone in the court must have colluded with him and conspired to frame him! They fabricated so many charges just to eliminate dissidents!"

"Frame-up?" Censor Zhou snorted coldly, holding high in both hands the confession of the assassins in the Xishan Palace, his voice as sonorous as a knife.

"The Xiao family used the people's money to raise assassins and commit crimes. The evidence is overwhelming! Who could frame them?"

Censor Zhou was upright and impartial. He threw the stack of confessions in front of Xiao Song.

"Prime Minister Xiao, why don't you take a closer look at this secret letter with the Xiao family emblem printed on it? Did it come from your nephew Xiao Zhengyuan?"

Xiao Song's face turned pale and he bent down and slowly picked it up.

Seeing this, Zhou Zhongping looked firmly at Emperor Chongzhao on the dragon throne and said loudly, "Your Majesty! With such detailed evidence before us, the Xiao family cannot escape the blame."

Emperor Chongzhao had a blank expression on his face as he rubbed the jade ring on his hand.

On his three-meter-long vermilion lacquered imperial desk, the jute file of the Luo River flooding case was old and mottled.

The big words "Seven Thousand Starving Households" looked as if they were carved with a knife.

Even the former top scholar and imperial consort Lu Youan came forward to testify.

On the signature, there was Lu Youan's handwriting and bright red fingerprints.

Emperor Chongzhao slowly swept his eyes across the hall, looking at the silent majority.

"My dear ministers, do you have anything else to say?"

"Your Majesty—"

With a low shout, Chen Lian, the Junior Secretary of the Dali Temple, stepped out.

"The difference between the records kept by the Ministry of Works and the records cancelled by the Hedao Yamen is 327,000 taels."

Chen Lian is an honest and decent man. To put it bluntly, he is cowardly and afraid of things.

Now old and with grey hair, he only hoped to retire peacefully and go home to enjoy a peaceful life with his grandchildren. He has always acted cautiously, went with the flow, and seldom took the initiative to stand out.

He was inevitably nervous as he suddenly stood up to impeach Xiao. Even the tablet trembled with his voice.

"Only 30% of the six dams supervised by Minister Xiao are made of actual bricks, and the rest are made of straw mixed with river sand—"

He tightly grasped the document in his hand and lowered his head to hand it forward.

"Your Majesty, this is the confession of Zhao Fu, the general manager of the river engineering department."

Xiao Song's fingers suddenly tightened, and he glanced at the silent Dali Temple Minister Xie Yanzhan - Chen Lian's boss, and sneered.

"Is it possible that Chen Shaoqing's eyesight is blurry due to old age? The funds needed for river management have all been verified by three provinces and six ministries. How can we criticize them casually..."

Chen Lian gritted his teeth secretly.

He knew clearly in his heart that it was not that he could not criticize, but that no one dared to criticize in the past.

"I have another thing to report--"

Chen Lian handed over the yellowed account book with trembling hands.

He didn't dare to look Xiao Song in the eye. On the account book he held high was a certificate stamped with the seal of the Ministry of Works.

"On the seventeenth day of the winter month in the tenth year of Chongzhao, the Ministry of Works appropriated three thousand cubic meters of fir wood, as recorded in the wood account book of that day..."

He paused for a moment, looking at Xiao Song's cold face, with a trace of cold sweat on his back.

"Xiao Zhengyu, the eldest son of Xiao Jing, the Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, has received an additional 2,800 cubic meters of golden nanmu from the Ministry of Works..."

Xiao Song said sternly: "How can such an old bad debt be used as evidence?!"

As soon as these words were spoken, there were gasps of shock in the hall.

Chen Lian seemed to have suddenly made up his mind, and he knelt forward with determination.

"Your Majesty, there is one more matter that I, an old minister, would like to report at the risk of my life... Xiao Zhengyuan, the Minister of Works, embezzled the funds for river works and cast a statue of Guanyin to present to the Buddhist temple. The bottom of the statue is engraved with..."

"What is engraved on it?" Emperor Chongzhao asked coldly.

"Live a thousand years, Princess Pingle."

Chen Lian kowtowed heavily, and his forehead hit the gold brick, making a dull sound.

"The Buddha statue is enshrined in Puning Temple. You can find out by checking."

Upon hearing this, Imperial Censor Zhou Zhongping bowed and said, "I beg Your Majesty to conduct a thorough investigation!"

His righteous words shook the court.

Coupled with the fact that the Junior Secretary of the Dali Temple was unable to kowtow, this scene made all the civil and military officials in the court look shocked.

Is this going to lead to the complete downfall of the Xiao family?
The atmosphere in the court became increasingly tense.

"They are really making up accusations..." Xiao Song suddenly laughed up to the sky, "The Censorate and the Dali Temple are in cahoots with each other, fabricating charges and making a fuss. What is their intention?"

After saying that, he turned around abruptly and looked directly at Xie Yanzhan, "Sir Xie, as the Minister of the Dali Temple, you just let this absurd and chaotic situation go without saying a word?"

Xie Yanzhan frowned, looked embarrassed, and bowed respectfully.

"Your Majesty, the Dali Temple has many complicated matters. I was negligent and did not have time to investigate carefully. I really don't know."

What an ignorant person who has cleared himself of all charges.

Xiao Song sneered, turned to face the hall, lifted his robe and knelt on the ground, crying.

"Your Majesty, I have worked diligently for decades and devoted my life to Daliang... I am loyal and devoted, and the sun and the moon can bear witness to this."

Emperor Chongzhao grasped the gilded armrest and tapped it twice gently. The dull sound instantly suppressed the whispers in the hall.

"The facts are all there, Xiao Aiqing, how can I tolerate you?"

"Your Majesty, I have no second thoughts about you and Daliang..."

"What a sincere person!" Li Zhao suddenly sneered and slowly stepped out of the line.

He just flicked his wide sleeves, took a few steps forward and presented the seal.

"Father, this was found on the private soldiers of the Xiao family who hijacked the royal carriage. After repeated identification by the Ministry of Rites and the Honglu Temple, it was found to be the seal specially made by Xizi to train assassins. This shows that the Xiao family had secretly colluded with Xizi and had evil intentions..."

"What a perfect scheme!" Xiao Song staggered two steps and pointed at the people who accused him.

"You are deliberately plotting to put this old man and the Xiao family to death!"

Before he finished speaking, a cry was heard outside the hall.

"Father, I have something to report."

The hall froze for a moment.

Everyone held their breath and dared not speak.

Emperor Chongzhao's face darkened. "Princess Pingle is still under house arrest. She is not allowed to leave the palace without an imperial decree. How can she enter the palace without permission? Come, escort the princess back to the palace."

Seeing this, Xie Yanzhan quickly stepped forward and begged for mercy.

"Your Majesty! The princess came here rashly despite the ban. There must be something else going on. Your Majesty, why don't you let the princess come to the palace and finish what she has to say?"

Emperor Chongzhao hesitated for a moment, then nodded slightly, "Princess Xuan, please come to the palace!"

"Announce - Princess Pingle to the palace!" a loud announcement was made outside the palace.

Princess Pingle held a camphorwood box in her hand, broke through the guards outside the door, and strode into the palace with her soft and gorgeous long skirt sweeping across the mirror-like gold bricks.

The ministers have not seen the imprisoned princess for a long time.

It was said that the princess was suffering from a serious illness. Under the dim palace lanterns, the princess's wide sleeves fluttered in the wind, and she looked much thinner than before. Her originally round and plump face had become thin and pointed, and her waist was so narrow that it seemed like it would break if it was bent slightly...

"My son is guilty of death!"

Pingle kowtowed deeply to the ground, his forehead pressed against the gold brick, his voice choked with sobs.

"But I am here to make amends for my mistakes!"

She dropped her sleeves to the ground and spoke in a tearful and plaintive voice.

"Father, I accidentally discovered that the God Arm Crossbow Diagram that was lost by the Ministry of War appeared in the hands of the Xizi merchant..."

The whole hall was startled, and suddenly there was a sound of whispers.

All the ministers looked at each other in surprise.

Pingle held the drawing high in both hands and presented it.

"Please take a closer look at the crossbow and bed machine on the blueprint. Are they the same as those in the archives of the Ministry of War?"

The drawing had a dark yellow tint.

Emperor Chongzhao looked closely and found the Big Dipper emblem printed in the corner particularly eye-catching.

His breathing stagnated: "This is..."

"Father, I got this from some Xizi peddlers through Yalang. They told me that this picture came from the Ghost Market in Jiuling Marsh..."

Pingle moved his knees forward two steps, looking at Li Zhao in the hall with a weird smile.

"I heard that the Crown Prince was attacked on the way to the Xishan Palace. Was he traveling with Madam Ping'an? After clearing out the assassins, they found the Xizi seal on the assassins, and obtained the assassins' confession accusing the Xiao family?"

Doesn’t this mean that Li Zhao and Xue Sui colluded to frame the Xiao family?
The ministers knew what was going on and exchanged glances with each other.

Suddenly, Pingle changed the subject.

"As we all know, Miss Xue Liu came from the Old Mausoleum Swamp. Who knows if she is Xizi's spy, secretly colluding with Xizi? How can we count the confession submitted by the prince?"

Li Zhao sneered: "Royal sister, who can't slander others with a red mouth and white teeth?"

He pointed at the evidence on the imperial case and said, "Do you think the emperor and the court officials should believe you or the ironclad evidence?"

Pingle raised his chin and stared at him arrogantly. Suddenly, he pulled a roll of yellowed paper out of the box and threw it on the gold bricks in the hall.

"Please look, everyone. This is the archive of the Ministry of War from two years ago. A Xizi woman disguised herself as a Hu Ji and seduced Minister Cao of the Ministry of War. She stole the confidential blueprints and then fled..."

After she finished speaking, she slowly stood up and pressed on, "I'm afraid that no one has missed it. The Miss Xue Liu who has been wandering outside for ten years is not the real Miss Xue Liu, but the witch Xizi, who is a substitute for a dead person—"

Xie Yanzhan immediately asked, "What do you mean, Princess?"

Pingle glanced at Li Zhao with a sneer, bent down again, took out a portrait from the box, and unfolded it in public.

"This is the portrait of the female spy Xizi who seduced the former Minister of War Cao Jin, stole the blueprints of the crossbow and bed machine of the Divine Arm Camp, and fled to the Old Mausoleum Swamp!"

Once the words were spoken, it was like a huge rock falling into a lake, causing a thousand waves.

All the civil and military officials in the court were shocked.

The tablet in Xue Qingzhi's hand fell to the ground with a clang.

He just watched this thrilling court criticism coldly and remained silent.

Unexpectedly, the spearhead was suddenly pointed at the Xue family...

"Princess, you can't say this carelessly, can you?"

Ping Le pointed at the portrait and looked at him aggressively: "Minister Xue, do you dare to say that the woman in the painting is not the daughter you haven't seen for ten years and brought back from the old mausoleum swamp?"

The woman in the yellowed portrait has delicate features and is about 70% similar to Xue Sui.

Xue Qingzhi looked at him, hesitated for a moment, and spoke with difficulty.

"This, this...really looks like my daughter."

Pingle pointed at the yellowed portrait again.

"Then Minister Xue, are you sure that the daughter you found now is the same one who was lost before? Ten years have passed, and the girl's appearance has changed a lot. I'm afraid Minister Xue has long forgotten what she looked like before, right?"

Xue Qingzhi was speechless.

I have to say Pingle’s move is very vicious.

When Xue Liu left the mansion, he was too young.

His memory had long been blurred, and he really didn't dare to pat his chest and guarantee that the current Xue Liu must be the Xue Liu ten years ago...

In the strange silence, Xie Yanzhan suddenly seemed to remember something and said in a trembling voice: "Your Majesty, in the tenth year of Chongzhao, there was indeed a record of a Xizi woman who escaped with confidential drawings. The incident happened suddenly that year, and Minister Cao suffered greatly. Not long after the incident, she passed away..."

Ping Le said confidently: "Father, I think the Sixth Miss of the Xue Family is actually a female spy disguised as Xizi!"

Li Zhao smiled coldly, his face full of disdain.

"What can a blurry portrait prove? Maybe this portrait was forged by the royal sister? After all, you can command the Xiz assassins to assassinate the royal family, so how difficult is it to have the Xiz assassins forge a portrait?"

"I have witnesses."

The princess suddenly spoke loudly, respectfully requesting the emperor on the throne.

"Father, I asked Yalang to find the two peddlers from Xizi in the West Market. They can provide evidence."

Emperor Chongzhao looked stern: "Announce!"