boyutpedia Chapter 13: Drunken Life
Chapter 13: Drunken Life
The yamen runners took great pains to clean the dirt off the bones.
The corpse was completely black, obviously dying of poisoning.
wrong.
Just as Lin Lezhi was about to turn around to get the torch, Xiao Xu had already brought it over. With Xiao Xu's help, Lin Lezhi had enough time to carefully examine the corpse.
"Thank you."
Relying on the light of the torch, Lin Lezhi squatted down and took a closer look. There were traces of scratches from sharp weapons everywhere on the corpse, including on the neck, ribs, leg bones, and arms, almost all over the body.
Lin Lezhi looked at the injured part of the bone and could see some traces of blood, which were injuries caused during his lifetime.
Since the poison had been administered, why did he chop the person into pieces like this?
After Lin Lezhi and Xiao Xu exchanged a glance, he stood up, took out the small piece of wood in his arms, looked at the kneeling village chief Ji and said, "You said you knew nothing about what happened back then, then please explain to me why the missing corner of the furniture in the post station appeared in the He family. Is this also a coincidence?"
"This……"
Village Chief Ji said in a panic, "That year... after Yuqing died, Yuqing's parents were grief-stricken. When we rushed to the He family, Yuqing's parents had already died at home. We felt that Yuqing's parents were too sad, so they took their own lives. We couldn't bear to see Yuqing's parents die at home like that, so we moved their remains here."
"Every word I said is true. Please examine it carefully, Mr. Jiang."
As he was about to kowtow, Lin Lezhi reached out and grabbed Ji's shoulder. "You always say that everything you say is true. If, as you said, He Yuqing's parents committed suicide, why don't you erect a monument for them?"
The two bodies were buried directly in the ground, without even a straw mat to wrap them, and there was no tombstone. It was just a desolate grave.
"People who died suddenly are unlucky. If...if their names were left behind, their spirits would surely come looking for them and bring unrest to the village."
"Okay, then explain to me again, why would someone who decides to commit suicide take poison first and then hack themselves to death with a knife? How did they do such a cruel thing to themselves?"
"Because... because..."
"You still want to hide it after all this!"
Lin Lezhi dragged Village Chief Ji to the front of Yuqing's parents, then took out the incense in his arms again, handed it to the Village Chief and threatened: "You are the one who lit this incense in our room. It's obvious that you want to kill us in the same way. You still dare to say you don't know. Village Chief Ji, you are so brave that you dare to lie in front of Yuqing's parents' corpses. Aren't you afraid that they will come to look for you at night!"
Village Chief Ji looked at the corpse in front of him and swallowed unconsciously, looking as if his soul had been sucked out.
Village Chief Ji quickly shook his head and denied, "This incense is not mine. I'll tell you everything. Mr. Jiang, please let me go first."
Lin Lezhi let go of Village Chief Ji, who rolled and crawled away from the corpses of Yuqing's parents. His face turned pale with fear, and he held his head and murmured, "I'll tell you... I'll tell you everything. This incense was given to me by the rich man. It's called Fu Sheng Zui."
"Drunk in the life?"
Village Chief Ji nodded his head like a rattle and continued, "Yuqing was very reluctant at first, but she agreed to the marriage after she came back from an outing one day.
"On the day of my wedding, the rich master was afraid that Yuqing would regret it before she got married, so he gave me this incense, and said something like "Spring breeze blowing on willow leaves, a dream of incense". The rich master said that after lighting this incense, at the very least, it will make people sleepy, and if it lasts longer, it will make people hallucinate, with the body swaying like a willow leaf as if drunk, and at the worst, it will make people comatose. He said that if we fail to accomplish this, the whole village will be buried with us, and we dare not disobey."
"In order to ensure that the wedding could go on smoothly, we lit a few more incense sticks in the room, but Yuqing still ran out. Before we could stop her, she jumped into the river."
"Why didn't you go down and save her, instead of just watching her drown?"
"Master Jiang, Yuqing is a child I have watched grow up. It's not that we don't want to save her, but the river is turbulent and connected to the Yulong Waterfall. No one in our village dares to go near there. We can only watch Yuqing being washed away by the turbulent water."
"Afterwards, when the rich man saw that his plan had failed, he sent his servants to hack Yuqing's parents to death. He also gave us a large sum of money as hush money and threatened us not to tell anyone about it. Then he disappeared without a trace. We had no choice but to bury Yuqing's parents here."
"Then why do you want to exchange furniture in your home?"
"The next day was the day when the government officials came to the village to collect taxes. It was almost dawn when we finished burying the body. There were bloodstains and knife marks on the wooden furniture in the house. Seeing that the government officials were coming soon, we could only exchange the furniture in the house with the uninhabited post house. We also fabricated the facts of that night to the government officials, saying that Yuqing refused to marry and drowned, and Yuqing's parents moved out of Yulong Village overnight."
"Didn't the government officials go to look for He Yuqing's body?"
At this point, Village Chief Ji's face showed a look of fear, as if he had seen something horrible.
Village Chief Ji's eyes widened, and he said nervously, "What's strange is that the officials searched the bottom of the pond for a whole day but couldn't find Yuqing's body. Then people from our village also went there and searched for two whole days but still couldn't find it. Then, at this time, even more terrifying news came."
"What's the matter?"
"The rich man who forced Yuqing to marry, everyone in his house died overnight. Everyone's body was hacked to pieces by knives, just like the way Yuqing's parents died."
Lin Lezhi's eyes darkened, "So you think that He Yuqing's parents came back to seek revenge, so you held this grand river god sacrifice. Every other year, you return your daughter to them and use it to sacrifice to them."
Village Chief Ji kowtowed and said, "Mr. Jiang is right. That's right. We feel guilty and think that the He family's affairs are closely related to our entire village. That's why we... did such a cruel thing. We just took the money and didn't harm the He family. Please investigate!"
Lin Lezhi's face was filled with anger, and he suppressed his anger and said, "Since you knew it was money you used to deceive people, why did you send so many innocent girls to die?"
"I...we are really scared!" Village Chief Ji turned to look at Li Weisheng, and tears actually flowed from his previously angry eyes.
Village Chief Ji knelt down and grabbed Li Weisheng's legs and said, "Weisheng, no, County Magistrate Li, we are innocent people who did it unintentionally. Can you please not blame us?"
Seeing that Li Weisheng clenched his fists and did not react, Village Chief Ji shouted hysterically at Li Weisheng: "Since Yuqing saved your life, it was also our village that saved you. You can't be ungrateful!"