The First Criminal Judge of the Zhenguan Era

Chapter 216 Guan Feng's Unexpected Turn of Events! Brother Qin, even Detective Liu Shuyi can't compare to you!
"What!?"

Upon hearing Liu Shuyi's words, Guan Feng frowned and said, "The facts are already before us. How can County Commandant Qin still believe that Cao Rui is truly the County Commandant of Wuyi County?"

He didn't understand: "Was I not clear enough?"

Lu Yangyuan and the others also looked puzzled. Although Guan Feng's identity was questionable and they were extremely wary of him, Guan Feng's deduction just now was exactly the same as their own situation, and they couldn't find any problem with it no matter how they thought about it.

Liu Shuyi was naturally aware of everyone's confusion. He said to Guan Feng, "What County Magistrate Guan said was very clear and logical. From this point of view, Cao Rui and the others do have something to hide and their identities are questionable."

"However, when we investigate a case, we cannot rely solely on inference and logic; we must also consider the actual circumstances and evidence."

Guan Feng frowned: "What are the actual facts and evidence that County Magistrate Qin is referring to?"

Liu Shuyi said, "County Commandant Guan just said that this place is not under the jurisdiction of Wuyi County, so Cao Rui can avoid being exposed by pretending to be the county commandant of Wuyi County..."

"Is there a problem?" the man behind Guan Feng asked.

"Have!"

Liu Shuyi said decisively, "Although this place is not under the jurisdiction of Wuyi County, Wuyi County is a county under the jurisdiction of Jizhou and is not far from here... Ordinary people may not know what the county magistrate of Wuyi County looks like, but the people of the county government of Zaoqiang County, which is under the jurisdiction of this place, must know who the county magistrate of Wuyi County is."

"Before Cao Rui and his group arrived at the inn, and after they arrived, they could not have predicted whether any officials from the Zaoqiang County government would be staying there that night... And when they came to the inn, they were dressed in official robes, making a big show of it without any attempt to conceal themselves. Once the officials from the Zaoqiang County government arrived at the inn, they would definitely notice them, and if they were imposters, they would be exposed immediately!"

“That’s true…” Lu Yangyuan suddenly realized. Guan Feng’s statement was indeed correct, but it was still somewhat different from their actual situation.

They were afraid of being exposed, so they kept their identities tightly under wraps and would never reveal them unless an unexpected incident occurred.

But Cao Rui and his group were completely different. If they were really guilty, why would they be so high-profile?
"besides……"

Liu Shuyi continued, "If Cao Rui and his group were truly in disguise, why would they specifically choose to assume the identities of government officials within Ji Province?"

"If they had chosen an official identity outside of Jizhou, even if they encountered people from the Zaoqiang County government, perhaps no one would have known, and they might not have been exposed..."

"But they chose the identity of a county magistrate from Wuyi County, which is not far from here, and came in a grand manner, fearing no one... How can this be seen as..."

Liu Shuyi stared intently at Guan Feng: "Neither of them seems to have anything to hide!"

Guan Feng's expression flickered, and a thoughtful look flashed across his face. After a moment, he nodded: "Now that County Magistrate Qin has said that... upon careful consideration, my deduction just now does indeed have some problems."

"However, County Commandant Qin just said that we need to consider the actual situation and evidence. We have the actual situation, but what about the evidence?"

Liu Shuyi smiled and said, "This is the evidence."

As he spoke, he held up the document that Guan Feng had just handed to him.

"Guo Suo?" Guan Feng asked, puzzled. "Doesn't this Guo Suo prove that Cao Rui forged his name?"

Liu Shuyi said, "I don't know if there's a problem with Cao Rui's name. I only know that there are no other problems."

"County Commandant Guan, please take a look..."

Liu Shuyi stretched the passageway out in front of Guan Feng and said, "There are two places in this passageway where there are some problems."

"The first thing is the handwriting of the name."

"Handwriting?" Upon hearing this, Lu Yangyuan and the others subconsciously craned their necks to look at the two characters "Fu Ming" on the document.

"The characters 'Fu Ming' seem to be written differently from the other characters." Lu Yangyuan's education level was only at the level of being able to read, so he wasn't too sure whether the handwriting was really different.

Changsun Chong, a man of great learning, immediately gave his conclusion: "They are indeed different. The '撇' (piě, left-falling stroke) in these two characters has a habitual upward curve to the left, but other characters do not."

Guan Feng looked at Changsun Chong with some surprise: "You noticed the subtle difference in the handwriting at a glance. May I ask who this colleague is?"

Liu Shuyi laughed and said, "He is not a colleague... My identity as a candidate is fake, while their identities as candidates are real. It was precisely because they were candidates that I decided to pretend to be a candidate for the imperial examination and blend in with them."

"So that's how it is." Guan Feng suddenly realized.

Liu Shuyi nodded and did not continue the topic. He said, "The second problem is also in the name section, but it's not a problem with the text, but a problem with the paper."

"Paper?" Guan Feng was taken aback.

The others also looked at Guo Suo with some confusion.

Liu Shuyi said, "This problem is not obvious and needs to be carefully examined. You can all take a closer look."

With that, he handed the place over to Changsun Chong and the others.

Changsun Chong took the document, initially puzzled, but suddenly, he seemed to realize something, his eyes narrowed, and he said, "So that's how it is..."

He stretched out a finger and touched the paper under the name, a smirk playing on his lips: "The texture is uneven, if I'm not mistaken..."

"This paper... has been cut open!"

"What? It was cut open? What does that mean?" Lu Yangyuan and Cheng Chumo, both martial artists, were completely confused.

Without wasting words, Changsun Chong suddenly pried open the piece of paper below the name section with his fingertips, revealing the two characters 'Fu Ming' perfectly intact on the paper.

At the same time, a dent, as if something had dug it open, came into everyone's view from underneath the piece of paper.

And in that depression, there were still bits of crushed rice paste left on it.

"This..." Lu Yangyuan's eyes widened in disbelief. "How could this be?"

Although he didn't like reading, he knew that a normal piece of paper shouldn't be like this when it's torn open.

Liu Shuyi's voice rang out calmly: "The paper used in the passage is specially made and is thicker than ordinary paper. Therefore, as long as you carefully cut the thin top layer of paper with a knife, it will not be damaged."

"After that, simply take a grain of cooked rice, mash it into a paste, carefully spread it on the rice, and then place a piece of paper of the same size back in its place to restore it."

"Unless you look closely or touch it with your hands, it's hard to tell that the paper here has been tampered with."

"Moreover, this is a place to write names, and people will focus their attention on the names and won't think about whether there's a problem with the paper underneath."

"In this case..."

Liu Shuyi smiled and looked at Guan Feng, saying, "A fake document, with its original name removed and carefully forged, is now presented before us."

As Guan Feng listened to Liu Shuyi's clear and logical analysis, his eyelids twitched uncontrollably.

He looked at the document he had immediately recognized as problematic, and at the small dent in the name field, and felt his face burning.

"I'm so ashamed..."

Guan Feng shook his head with a self-deprecating laugh: "As County Magistrate Qin said, my attention was completely focused on the two characters 'Fu Ming'. I only thought that Cao Rui had forged the name to deceive us. I never thought that the name was actually pasted on later."

"If it weren't for County Lieutenant Qin's keen eyesight, who saw through the murderer's trick at a glance, I would have been deceived badly, and the investigation might have gone astray."

Guan Feng's men behind him also looked at Liu Shuyi with surprise, seemingly not expecting that a county magistrate they had just met would have such keen insight.

Liu Shuyi smiled and shook his head, saying, "I was just lucky."

"I have a habit of unconsciously rubbing the things in my hands when I'm thinking about something... So just now, I was unconsciously rubbing the paper and happened to touch the name, which is when I realized the problem with the paper."

Guan Feng sighed, "Luck is sometimes a part of ability, and when we investigate cases, isn't it often a gamble on whether the thief has left any loopholes? Isn't that a gamble on luck?"

Liu Shuyi smiled, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

He continued, "Now we can confirm that the original name on this document was removed, and the new name is different from the other characters on the document... So it is obvious that the name 'Fu Ming' was deliberately written here by someone else in order to make us think that Cao Rui is deceiving us, and thus make us doubt Cao Rui's status as a county magistrate."

With Liu Shuyi's previous analysis, no one questioned his words anymore.

Even Guan Feng and the other man nodded repeatedly.

"This murderer is truly cunning; I never expected them to put so much effort into the most obvious thing—the name," said one of Guan Feng's men coldly.

Guan Feng looked at the paper packets in the bundle and said, "So, these sleeping pills and poisons were also a means for the murderer to deceive us."

Is it a date rape drug or poison?
Liu Shuyi recalled the scene when Cao Rui and the others met him; they were clearly hiding a secret... This drug and poison might really be theirs.

However, there was no point in saying these things at the moment, and he was too lazy to waste words.

"Why would the murderer go to such lengths to make us believe that Cao Rui and the others weren't government officials? Was there some special purpose behind it?"

Although Lu Yangyuan understood the murderer's methods, he was even more puzzled by them.

Whether the deceased was an official or not, it probably made no difference to them, right?

He couldn't understand the killer's purpose in doing this.

“That’s a good question,” Liu Shuyi said. “The murderer was able to kill in such a bizarre way, so he must be a meticulous and scheming person. Therefore, nothing he does is without reason.”

"Since he tried every means to cover up Cao Rui's identity as a county magistrate, it means that when we know Cao Rui's true identity, we will learn or confirm something... which may affect some of the murderer's plans, or narrow down or even guess the murderer's identity."

Lu Yangyuan hurriedly asked, "Which situation is it right now?"

Liu Shuyi shook his head: "There are too few clues; we can't be sure yet..."

As he spoke, he looked at Guan Feng and asked, "What does County Commandant Guan think?"

Guan Feng smiled wryly and said, "I was almost completely fooled by the murderer, how could I possibly know the murderer's intentions?"

Liu Shuyi nodded slightly, then turned to look back at the blood-soaked room before him.

Because Cao Rui was the only county magistrate whose identity was made public, the inn gave him the best room in the inn.

The room is quite spacious, and a screen simply divides it into a sleeping area and a reception area.

However, the screen painted with landscapes had fallen to the side, stained with scarlet blood.

The tables and chairs that Cao Rui and the others had used to question him were all overturned on the ground.

Bloodstained red ropes, broken after the explosion, remained on the beams and walls, while the ground was littered with flesh, blood, and severed limbs... Even Liu Shuyi, who had lived two lives and experienced numerous cases, had never seen such a horrific and bloody scene before.

"The black powder of the Tang Dynasty was not as powerful as the gunpowder of later generations, yet it was able to blow Cao Rui up like this... It seems that gunpowder was directly attached to Cao Rui."

As Liu Shuyi observed the scene, he pondered, "How did the murderer light the fuse?"

The situation inside the room was clear from the doorway, and I was certain that no one else was hiding inside at the time.

If the murderer wasn't hiding inside the house, how could they have avoided everyone's sight and accurately lit the fuse?
"This is?"

Suddenly, Liu Shuyi noticed something and raised an eyebrow.

He took two steps forward and then squatted down.

Seeing Liu Shuyi's strange behavior, Lu Yangyuan, who knew Liu Shuyi well, immediately had a thought. He hurried over and asked, "County Commandant Qin, have you discovered something?"

Upon hearing this, everyone immediately looked at Liu Shuyi.

Seeing this, Guan Feng and his subordinates also came to Liu Shuyi's side.

Guan Feng asked, "Have you found anything?"

"County Commandant Guan, please take a look..."

Liu Shuyi picked something up from the ground and held it up to Guan Feng.

"fragrant?"

In Liu Shuyi's hand was half a blood-stained incense stick.

"Why is there incense here?" Guan Feng said. "Could it be that the murderer lit incense to pay tribute to Cao Rui after killing him?"

Liu Shuyi shook his head: "The murderer killed someone in such a cruel way that we couldn't even collect Cao Rui's body, let alone offer him a sacrifice."

"What is that?" Lu Yangyuan asked.

Liu Shuyi looked at the blackened, obviously burnt incense stick in his hand and said, "If I'm not mistaken, this is the reason why Cao Rui died in front of us."

"You mean..." Changsun Chong's expression flickered slightly, "The murderer used this incense stick to ignite the gunpowder?"

Guan Feng looked at Liu Shuyi with some surprise: "County Commandant Qin also determined that Cao Rui's death was caused by gunpowder accidentally produced by an alchemist?"

At this time, gunpowder was still in its infancy in the Tang Dynasty. Some people knew of its existence, but most people were still completely unaware of it, only regarding it as one of the reasons that caused alchemists to suffer misfortune.

Unexpectedly, Guan Feng not only knew about the existence of gunpowder, but also clearly understood it very well. He guessed the murderer's method as soon as he saw Cao Rui's manner of death.

Liu Shuyi said, "I once encountered a case where an alchemist accidentally blew himself up and became crippled, so I have some experience with gunpowder."

"What a coincidence!"

Guan Feng said, "I only learned about gunpowder because I encountered a case involving an alchemist. However, the alchemist I encountered was even more unlucky; he was not only crippled but also died."

Liu Shuyi's eyes flickered slightly as he listened to Guan Feng's "Me too," wondering if Guan Feng had actually encountered a similar case or was simply imitating his own reason to find a plausible excuse.

He nodded and said, "That's really bad luck. After all, unless the proportions are specially adjusted, it's not easy to make something powerful enough to kill someone."

As he spoke, he looked again at the half-burnt incense stick in his hand and said, "Gunpowder needs a fuse to ignite it, but I checked the doorway when the incident happened. There was no one else inside the room, and there were many people watching outside. The murderer couldn't have ignited it remotely... So, he must have used something to ensure that the gunpowder could be ignited in time."

Guan Feng said thoughtfully, "You mean to say that what he borrowed was this incense stick?"

Liu Shuyi did not answer directly, but instead looked up at the roof beam and said, "Lu Da, use the stool to see if there are any unusual marks on the roof beam."

Lu Yangyuan was the eldest of the brothers who were killed by Bai Jinghong, so Liu Shuyi gave him the alias Lu Da, which was simple and easy to pronounce, and Lu Yangyuan was able to remember his new name.

"Yes!"

Without any hesitation, he quickly moved a stool over and stepped onto it.

Because Lu Yangyuan was tall and strong, he could see the beam by standing on a stool and tiptoeing.

He carefully examined the beam with the help of a lantern and then exclaimed in surprise, "There really are marks on this beam."

"What marks?" Cheng Chumo asked hurriedly.

Lu Yangyuan said, "The beam is covered in dust, but there are thin, elongated marks on the dust, as if something thin had scraped across it or been placed on it before..."

"Moreover, the area around these thin, elongated marks is somewhat blackened."

Thin, elongated marks?
Turning black?

As Cheng Chumo was pondering this, Changsun Chong's eyes flashed, and he said directly, "The thin, elongated marks were caused by the fuse. The fuse was hidden on it, which is why it left such marks on the dust. At the same time, the burning fuse would blacken the surrounding things..."

Guan Feng stroked his chin: "It really is!"

He couldn't help but look at Liu Shuyi: "County Commandant Qin, you're amazing! Your ability to investigate cases is probably even better than that legendary detective Liu Shuyi in Chang'an."

Upon suddenly hearing Liu Shuyi's name from Guan Feng's mouth, Cheng Chumo and the others instinctively tensed up, thinking that Guan Feng was beginning to doubt Liu Shuyi's identity.

But Liu Shuyi remained calm, shaking his head and laughing, "County Lieutenant Guan, don't flatter me. I know my situation. I can guess that there was a fuse hidden in the beam. There are very few places in this room that we can't see... Even someone without investigation experience could probably find it by searching little by little."

"As for the legendary Liu Shuyi, it is said that all the cases he investigates are major unsolved cases, and many of his ideas are beyond our comprehension. I can't compare to him."

When Liu Shuyi boasted like this, Changsun Chong almost burst out laughing.

I wonder if Doctor Liu felt embarrassed praising himself in front of everyone.

Upon hearing this, Guan Feng said, "How many words of a rumor can be believed? Perhaps Liu Shuyi is not as good as you when he comes here! Anyway, I think you are really amazing. I thought that as a county magistrate, my ability to investigate cases was not bad, but compared with you, I realized that there are always people more capable than me."

Liu Shuyi can boast, but you're no less so... Cheng Chumo thought to himself.

Liu Shuyi laughed and said, "Let's not talk about that anymore, let's continue with the case."

As he spoke, he looked up at Lu Yangyuan and continued, "Besides these, look carefully again and see if there is any incense ash or anything like that."

"Incense ash?"

Lu Yangyuan shone the lantern over it inch by inch, and suddenly...

"Have!"

Lu Yangyuan's eyes lit up: "There really is incense ash, but there's very little, just a few bits. If County Magistrate Qin hadn't reminded me, I might have missed it."

"really!"

Liu Shuyi looked at Guan Feng and the others: "It seems that my deduction was correct. The murderer must have lit the incense in advance and placed it on the fuse. Since the incense will burn and shorten automatically, as long as the incense burns to the fuse, it can directly ignite the fuse."

"Because the murderer was afraid that we would rescue Cao Rui after discovering his condition... he wouldn't give the fuse much time to burn, so the incense on the beam must have burned for a very short time, quickly igniting the fuse."

"That's why there wasn't much incense ash on the beam. The shock and impact from the explosion also caused some incense ash to fall off... which is why almost all the incense ash on the beam fell off."

"But human resources are ultimately limited; no matter how deep his plans are, they cannot withstand the changes in reality."

Liu Shuyi smiled and said to Guan Feng, "It seems I'm really lucky today. Even with so little incense ash, I still managed to keep some, which confirms my deduction."

(End of this chapter)