The Beauty and the Swordsman

Just looking at Pei Lingyou sleeping peacefully, Kuang Ye felt completely mesmerized, his heart softening as if it were enveloped in warm, white cotton.

It was only when Shoumo spoke softly that he was awakened:

"Sect Leader, what's wrong with her? Why is she sleeping here in night clothes? I didn't realize she was such a free spirit, a bit of an artist."

Kuang Ye looked at the official road not far away, pondered for a moment, and guessed that they were probably going to rob passing caravans.

There can only be one reason:

Short of money.

And it's highly likely that the Hun Tian Gang is short of money, not a personal matter.

Although Kuang Ye couldn't guess what had led Pei Lingyou to such a desperate measure, or how much money would be needed, he immediately thought of a way to help.

He sighed softly, and said to Shoumo and Chengui with a heavy expression:

"The two young women are trapped by money; it's truly heartbreaking to see. Shoumo, Chengui, what do you say our Tongchen Sect's rules and regulations should be followed in this situation?"

Shoumo was immediately inspired with youthful vigor, straightened his chest, and said as if taking an oath:

"The third rule of the Tongchen Sect is: When encountering danger on the road, one must not stand idly by, but do one's best to help."

"Fellow disciples are like brothers, and we will not be estranged in times of trouble," Chen Gui added from the side.

The two felt that, not to mention Pei Lingyou was now studying at the Tongchen Sect, she was practically a disciple of the Tongchen Sect.

Even if it's just a stranger on the street who sees someone struggling to make ends meet, you should still lend a helping hand.

Kuang Ye said "okay" several times and immediately made arrangements, deciding to secretly help Pei Lingyou.

Of course, it can't be through such despicable means as robbery.

The three of them patrolled and guarded the area outside the bushes where Pei Lingyou and Pingping slept all night, and only left quietly at dawn.

Kuang Ye ordered Shou Mo to spread the word that there were bandits on the official road, so that caravans would not dare to pass through this area again.

On the one hand, Chen Gui was ordered to return to Tongchenmen and retrieve the Kuang family's token from Jun Buzhi's study. At dawn, he was to go to the money exchange and withdraw two hundred taels of silver from Kuang Ye's private account.

This was a sum of money sufficient to purchase a house; most merchant caravans carried only this much cash when traveling, and Kuang Ye thought it should be enough.

Shoumo and Chengui immediately obeyed and carried out the order.

Chen Gui returned to Tongchen Sect overnight, and rushed to the money exchange at the foot of the mountain at dawn. He had just retrieved the two hundred taels of silver notes and hadn't even had time to enjoy them when a great commotion suddenly came from the prefect's residence.

Upon hearing the news, Kuang Ye and his two companions rushed over to investigate. They quietly ran to the outer perimeter of the prefect's residence to observe, and saw Pingping dragging the drunken Pei Lingyou and the dog over the courtyard wall.

Pei Lingyou was still shouting "Heizi, Heizi! I miss you!" which made Shoumo's nose tingle. He said he never expected that she, who was usually so carefree and never mentioned Heizi, was actually such a sentimental person.

Seeing that Pingping and Pei Lingyou had safely gone far away, Kuang Ye and the other two hurriedly picked up the scattered jewelry and ornaments on the ground, leading away from the direction Pei Lingyou had fled, creating the impression that the prefect was embezzling and hoarding the goods.

Kuang Ye ordered Shoumo to knock on doors one by one to wake up the people and call them to come and watch. On the other hand, he ordered Chen Gui to collect evidence overnight and send it to his superiors as fast as possible.

This ultimately led to the swift trial and resolution of the prefect's embezzlement case.

The two thieves disappeared completely during the incident, and no one pursued the matter further.

After considering for a moment, and taking into account the scattered jewels that Pei Lingyou and her group had failed to steal from the Prefect's mansion, Kuang Ye said to Shoumo and Chen Gui:

"Miss Pei has probably encountered a great disaster and needs a lot of money."

Kuang Ye ordered Chen Gui to go to the money shop and withdraw another three hundred taels.

He had already figured out that Pei Lingyou must be short of a large sum of money.

But I really didn't expect it to be such a large sum of money missing.

The three were stunned when they heard that a large number of the city's garrison had been mobilized to pursue and capture the bandits who had stolen the imperial army's funds.

Shoumo's eyes widened in surprise as he asked, "Just how much silver do we need? Enough to cover military expenses?"

Chen Gui ran back and forth twice, panting heavily, feeling that their cleanup efforts couldn't keep up with the speed at which Pei Lingyou caused trouble.

He couldn't even withdraw money as quickly as Pei Lingyou robbed him.

He gritted his teeth and, before Kuang Ye could speak, said on his own:

"Sect Leader, should I go to the bank again and withdraw more money? How much this time?"

Kuang Ye frowned slightly, wondering what terrible thing Pei Lingyou had encountered and how much money she needed.

"Withdraw all the money from my private account."

Chen Gui was taken aback: "All of it? More than 1.3 million taels in total. I'm afraid even the money shops can't draw down that many bills. Also, what should we say if the Kuang family asks?"

Kuang Ye shook his head. "It's a small expense; my family won't question it. If they do ask, just say it was spent on the Tongchen Sect."

Chen Gui nodded. He knew about Kuang Ye's family situation.

More than a million taels of silver is an amount that ordinary people would never see in eight generations, even if they went back three generations.

But for the Kwong family, it was just a drop in the ocean.

If asked, I can simply say "it's to subsidize" the Tongchen Sect and that will be the end of it.

After all, since Kuang Ye became the sect leader, it has become commonplace for him to use his private treasury to subsidize Tongchen Sect.

The Tongchen Sect has land, which is enough to support itself and barely cover the sect's daily expenses and feed all its disciples.

But other additional expenses are not an option.

In recent years, in order to help the people pay back taxes, Kuang Ye has often snatched people from the imperial court, and he has spent a lot of money privately to help them.

The Kuang family only had one eldest son who had ventured into the martial world, so naturally, he had plenty of gold and silver.

The fact that over a million taels of silver was withdrawn in a single transaction was unprecedented.

Chen Gui dared not delay, praying in his heart that Pei Lingyou would not cause any more trouble and that he would have some time to go to the various banks to withdraw silver notes.

Kuang Ye's thoughts were clearly not aligned with Chen Gui's.

He didn't care about the amount of silver notes or gold and silver; he just looked at the riots in the distance with some concern.

Judging from the frantic running and panic of the city's defenders, Pei Lingyou was treating them like dogs.

Given her skills, escaping safely shouldn't be difficult, but cleaning up the mess might be a challenge.

Given Pei Lingyou's nature of causing havoc in the Heavenly Palace, she only cares about her goal and doesn't care about the consequences.

But military pay is not like that of a merchant caravan, which can be robbed at will. If gold and silver are missing, the matter is reported to the authorities, and if the culprit is not caught, the case may be dropped.

Military pay is a matter of paramount importance concerning the survival of the army; with money to support the troops, there will be chaos and disorder.

With such a serious incident, the culprit must be brought to justice and the case closed.

Kuang Ye, along with Shou Mo and Chen Gui, sneaked back to the vicinity of the official road under cover of night.

The officials who had been knocked to the ground by Pei Lingyou had mostly gotten up and were negotiating with several of the city guards who were supposed to be there to receive the military pay.

When Kuang Ye heard the officials say that a total of 700,000 taels of government silver were missing, his brows furrowed slightly.

He carefully examined the route the imperial convoy had taken and immediately deduced from the consistent depth of the tire tracks that the boxes carrying military pay must have been empty from the beginning.

The so-called escorting of military funds was probably just a pretext to fill the gaps in embezzled funds.

Thinking of this, Kuang Ye frowned even more deeply.

With such a large sum of military pay gone, the army will be in discontent and in turmoil. Those officials who embezzled the pay will surely find a scapegoat and claim that the silver was stolen by bandits.

It seems that simply finding the culprit and closing the case is not enough; in the end, they'll probably have to take a life to quell the situation.

As a result, the imperial court will spare no effort to hunt down the robbers, leaving no stone unturned, which will greatly disadvantage Pei Lingyou.

The entire situation, with its pros and cons, was quickly weighed in Kuang Ye's mind.

He ordered Shoumo to return to Tongchen Sect and gather several dozen close disciples, who would then take up the mountain under cover of night, swords in hand. He instructed them not to make a fuss about it, but simply to say that it was a sect-wide night study session.

The mountainous terrain is complex and full of trees, making it an easy place to hide and escape. He estimated that after Pei Lingyou finished leading the soldiers, she would probably take the mountain path back to Tongchen Sect.

He ordered Shoumo to lead men to meet Pei Lingyou in order to prevent her from being searched and surrounded by the city's garrison.

He himself went alone to the garrison camp.

At that time, the deputy general guarding the city had just come down from Wanxiang Mountain, stopped the search, and turned back to camp.

Kuang Ye waited quietly on the road the deputy general would inevitably take back to camp, saying and doing nothing. His extraordinary demeanor alone quickly caught the deputy general's attention.

The deputy general sat atop his warhorse, looking down over the enemy.

These men, who kill without hesitation on the battlefield, exude an aura of authority and killing intent. Ordinary people would quickly lower their heads if they even met their gaze, let alone stand there and stare at them.

But Kuang Ye remained calm, staring straight at him. Only when the adjutant rode past him did he quickly whisper two words:

"Empty box".

The lieutenant was stunned, thinking to himself that this was really weird. How come everyone else knew about the shady dealings in the military pay, but he was being led around by the nose and completely fooled?

That priest was said to be able to know everything in the world with a single divination; knowing that was enough.

How come this fair-skinned scholar also knows about the conspiracy?

After a moment's thought, the lieutenant dismissed his attendants and politely invited Kuang Ye into the main tent.

Kuang Ye informed the adjutant of his guess that the box was empty based on the tire tracks.

The latter pondered for a moment and said:

"What if I pretend I don't know anything and assume that two robbers stole the military pay? Wouldn't it be much easier for me and the officers to find the culprits than to expose this?"

Kuang Ye laughed:

"One jin is sixteen liang. Seven hundred thousand jin of military pay weighs at least forty-three thousand jin. Even eight horse-drawn carts might not be able to carry it all. Are you saying that two bandits weighing a hundred or so jin each, with superhuman strength capable of uprooting mountains, could carry three jin of silver as heavy as Sun Wukong's golden cudgel with their bare hands and still move as fast as they can? I wonder what the Dragon King of the East Sea would think if he heard this."

The deputy was rendered speechless by this shrewd, accurate, and logically sound argument. He moved his lips, and after a long while, he finally uttered a displeased sentence:

Are you being sarcastic?

"How dare I?" Kuang Ye's tone was arrogant, but his expression remained gentle.

"If we could truly find the culprit, the general should have done so already. Why then retreat?"

The lieutenant's face darkened this time.

Kuang Ye was right; those two robbers were incredibly skilled and so fast that the soldiers couldn't catch up with them at all.

One of the robbers was extremely audacious, repeatedly provoking the soldiers during their escape, causing many of them to be busy repairing their belts.

Catching such a highly skilled individual would be extremely difficult.

"If I were a general, I would be home packing my bags and settling my family down right now," Kuang Ye remarked at the opportune moment.

The lieutenant immediately understood Kuang Ye's implication.

He was saying that if the robbers could not be caught for a long time and the case could not be closed, all parties would be concerned for their own interests, and the commander-in-chief would be concerned for his own position. He might put a label of "dereliction of duty" and "ineffective arrest" on his deputy.

Kuang Ye was advising him to take a good look at himself as soon as possible.

The lieutenant understood perfectly well, but pretended not to understand and sneered:

"Judging by your appearance, you must be someone from the underworld! Since you've come as an intermediary, it means the robbers are also from the underworld like you. If I just arrest you and torture you, I can easily find out who the culprit is. Why go through all that trouble and offend my colleagues!"

Kuang Ye was not surprised to hear these words. He just sighed with a hint of helplessness, then lightly lifted the hem of his robe, stretched out his right arm, and made a neat and dashing scouting gesture.

He didn't say another word, but his unwavering yet silent and sharp expression made it clear that if reasoning was useless, then none of them should live.

The lieutenant was quite surprised, never expecting that Kuang Ye, who looked like a gentle and refined scholar, was actually ruthless and decisive.

It is like a river that appears calm on the surface but is actually unfathomably deep.

Years of battlefield experience and intuition told the adjutant that the young man in front of him could deliver on his promises.

Even when bloodshed takes his life, Kuang Ye's expression will remain as calm as it is now.

This is someone you'd better not mess with, the lieutenant thought to himself. His expression softened, he chuckled, and said in a joking tone:

"There must be a woman behind a man who can be so fearless in the face of death, right?"

Seeing that the deputy general didn't want to escalate the conflict, Kuang Ye slowly withdrew his stance, his eyes crinkling with a smile as he said:

"Maybe."