That single declaration from Hua Yitang produced the stunning effect of every bird in a forest falling silent when one bird calls out.

Every pair of eyes in the room snapped to Wang Jinglu.

Wang Jinglu sat on the floor, blinked once, then let out a snort of laughter. He stood up, brushed off his robes, and said: “Hua the Fourth, are you drunk and raving? How could I possibly have killed someone?!”

Wang Jingfu, the Wang Family patriarch, slammed the table and surged to his feet in fury. “Hua the Fourth, you have gone far enough! You spent the evening brawling and fighting with the Su Family, and now you slander a scion of my Wang Family as a murderer?! Are you determined to drive every noble family in Yidu to ruin?!”

Prefect Chi pressed a hand to his chest and groaned in distress, then gave Chief Historian Xia a covert kick to the shin.

“Wang Family patriarch, please calm yourself.” Chief Historian Xia hitched up his robes and scurried forward, dropping his voice. “Adjutant Hua — in matters of investigation, one must have evidence before making pronouncements—”

Before his words were finished, Fangke flung his cloth bundle outward. It hit the floor beside the saber with a dull thud, spilling open to reveal the bloodied robe and the bloody boots.

The crowd looked — and broke into an uproar again. The color and style of the bloodied robe and boots were identical to what Wang Jinglu was wearing.

Wang Jingfu and Chief Historian Xia went silent. Prefect Chi sat down heavily.

Wang Jinglu’s face changed. He grabbed his own robes and looked them over. “Impossible! How can this robe and these boots possibly look like mine — what is going on?!”

“This bloodied robe was found in the hidden room of the Cherry Chamber on the fourth floor. The blood on it is Minina’s blood.” Hua Yitang’s voice rang out forcefully. “With such iron evidence, there is no denying this!”

“Impossible! I have been right here in this sixth-floor pavilion from the beginning of the banquet — how could I possibly have slipped away to commit murder? I have an alibi!” Wang Jingfu bellowed. “I was not at the scene!”

“Is that so?” Hua Yitang swept his gaze over the crowd. “Let me invite everyone to think back — when Hua was arguing the matter with Su the Tenth, and when Lady Lin was fighting Wu Chun, was Wang Jinglu truly present in this room the entire time?”

People exchanged glances with one another in silence.

Ling Zhiyan raised his voice: “All here must be reminded — this is a murder case, and the method of killing was extremely brutal. All witness testimony will be recorded on file and submitted to the Court of Judicial Review, the Ministry of Justice, and the Censorate for verification and final sentencing. Anyone who dares to give false testimony is an accomplice to murder and will be punished without mercy.”

These words struck like a thunderclap. Several scions who had been tempted to muddy the waters immediately stepped back and thought carefully — and one after another, shook their heads.

During the argument between Hua Yitang and Su Yiyun, everyone had been watching the spectacle, paying no mind to the bystanders. When Lin Sui’an fought Wu Chun, everyone had been busy either stoking the fire or fleeing, and had paid even less attention.

The only clear memory anyone had was of Wang Jinglu being a constant, tiresome presence hovering around Minina during the whirling dance.

Hua Yitang let out a cold laugh. “It seems not a single person is willing to vouch for you.”

Wang Jinglu looked at Wang Jingfu. “Brother!”

Wang Jingfu’s expression went through several shifts. He exhaled a long breath. “I… did not take notice.”

Wang Jinglu’s eyes darkened with a flash of hatred. He turned to look at his circle of associates. “We’re supposed to be brothers who’d take a blade for each other — are you really going to watch me be framed and lose my life over this?!”

Several of them looked away.

“Wang, it’s not that we won’t help you — we really didn’t notice where you were at the time.”

“Judicial Inspector Ling said just now that our words would go into the official record. We can’t just make things up, can we?”

“I still have the examinations to sit next year — I can’t afford to be dragged into this by you, Wang.”

“The way I see it, if Wang truly did do it, a man owns what he does. You might as well admit it — save us all the trouble.”

Wang Jinglu shook all over with fury. “Excellent! Excellent! Excellent! You ungrateful, treacherous lot — Wang Jinglu will not forget a single one of you!” His gaze suddenly shot toward a figure huddled in a corner. “Zhou Gan! Tell them where I was! Tell them!”

A young man who went by the name Zhou Gan — he appeared to be barely past the age of twenty, and was unusually gaunt and pale — flinched under Wang Jinglu’s stare and trembled like a startled chick. “I… I don’t know…”

Wang Jinglu erupted in fury, lunged forward, and sent a punch into Zhou Gan’s face. “Zhou Gan, you piece of filth — do you want me dead?!”

Zhou Gan crashed to the floor and curled tightly into a ball, hands over his face, whimpering: “I don’t know… I don’t know…”

Officers of the law quickly separated the two. Wang Jinglu foamed and spat furiously. “Zhou Gan — if you don’t stand as my witness, you’ll never speak again—”

Before Wang Jinglu could finish, Ling Zhiyan applied a grappling hold that brought him to the ground in an instant. Constable Wu Da made short work of binding Wang Jinglu hand and foot, and stuffed a rag in his mouth.

Wang Jinglu struggled frantically. His eyes were cracked red at the corners. The sound from his throat was something beyond human.

The officers of the law helped Zhou Gan to his feet. Zhou Gan’s whole body twitched, and he didn’t dare raise his head.

Lin Sui’an noted that when Wang Jinglu had called out Zhou Gan’s name, every one of Wang Jinglu’s supposed “brothers” had, without exception, worn an expression of peculiar amusement — three parts slyness, three parts schadenfreude, and four parts knowing, complicit smugness.

“Who is that Zhou Gan?” Lin Sui’an said quietly to Jin Ruo.

Jin Ruo thought for a moment. “I believe he’s an unwanted base-born son of the Zhou Family of the southern city — his mother wasn’t of good standing.”

Lin Sui’an found this increasingly puzzling. “Why would such a person appear at a Su Family banquet?”

Jin Ruo shrugged. “Who knows.”

“He was most likely brought here by Wang Jinglu.” Liu Qingxi had drifted over at some point, keeping her voice low. “A clan elder had originally selected Zhou Gan as a candidate to marry into our family. We had someone follow him for a time, and discovered he had ties with Wang Jinglu — after that, he was removed from the list of candidates.”

Lin Sui’an was taken aback. “Lady Liu, how did you come by that information?”

That was something not even the Pure Gate knew.

Liu Qingxi smiled awkwardly. “The elder had originally intended Zhou Gan as a potential husband for me — which is why we had him investigated. Once the connection to Wang Jinglu came to light, he was removed from the list.”

Jin Ruo rubbed her chin. “This is interesting. Wang Jinglu is the legitimate eldest son of the previous Wang Family patriarch, yet he was passed over and the headship went to his cousin’s legitimate eldest son, Wang Jingfu. You’d think he’d want nothing to do with someone of base-born origins like Zhou Gan — so why have they been keeping company?”

Lin Sui’an chewed this over silently. Something about this felt like an enormous amount of gossip waiting to be unearthed.

Ling Zhiyan began questioning Zhou Gan. But whether he was asked about his relationship with Wang Jinglu or about Wang Jinglu’s alibi, Zhou Gan neither spoke nor answered — he simply kept his head down, shaking it over and over.

“There’s actually something else I feel isn’t quite right,” Liu Qingxi said, lowering her voice.

Lin Sui’an: “Please go ahead, Lady Liu.”

“Wang Jinglu’s hair must have been redone,” Liu Qingxi said. “The original direction of his hair pin was from left to right — now it goes from right to left.”

Lin Sui’an glanced quickly over. Wang Jinglu wore a green jade pin in his topknot. The tip faced left — suggesting his right hand had inserted it from the left side inward.

“That confirms it!” Jin Ruo said. “He must have fixed his hair when he changed his clothes and cleaned off the blood.”

“But—” Liu Qingxi said quickly, “another person’s hair has also been redone.”

Lin Sui’an and Jin Ruo went pale at once. Liu Qingxi’s gaze moved to Wang Jingfu. “Wang Jingfu’s pin has also reversed direction — just like Wang Jinglu’s.”

Jin Ruo’s eyes darted rapidly over the two brothers. “Wang Jingfu stands six feet six — weight approximately one hundred and ninety catties. Wang Jinglu stands six feet six and a half — weight approximately one hundred and ninety-five catties—”

Lin Sui’an: “If they are similar in height and weight—”

Jin Ruo: “Their shoe size and footprint would be similar as well—”

The two looked at each other simultaneously, drew in a sharp breath, and both looked toward Hua Yitang.

The elegantly attired Adjutant was fanning himself, holding his chin up with insufferable pride, conducting a dramatic narrative reconstruction of the case. “Wang Jinglu harbored wicked desires toward Minina for a long time. She spurned his advances repeatedly, and he took it badly — going so far as to declare publicly that if Minina would not belong to him, he would twist her neck and send her to the underworld to dance for demons. These words are all on record, attested to by the dancers of Eternal Day Pavilion. This is Wang Jinglu’s motive for murder!”

“Knowing in advance that Minina would be performing tonight at Sanhua Tower, Wang Jinglu devised a plan. He bribed Proprietor Lu of Sanhua Tower to lace the candles in Minina’s room with an arousal-incense compound. When Minina returned to her room to rest after the performance, he immediately slipped onto the fifth floor of the Swallow Hairpin Chamber and intended to have his way with her by force. But Minina resisted to the death, and his plan failed. Wang Jinglu, furious that he’d been denied, decided to go the whole way — and killed her.”

Ling Zhiyan: “Bring the witness!”

Officers of the law escorted Proprietor Lu in. Proprietor Lu went straight to his knees and wailed: “I admit it! I was the one who put the arousal-incense candles in Minina’s room! But it was all Wang Jinglu who instructed me to do it! I thought he only wanted to be intimate with the dancer — I had no idea he was going to kill anyone!”

Ling Zhiyan looked at Proprietor Lu in cold disdain. “If we had not discovered the anomaly in the candles at the Swallow Hairpin Chamber, would you have planned to conceal this matter entirely?”

Proprietor Lu’s forehead struck the floor in rapid succession. “It was all for self-preservation — I know I was wrong. I beg the officials, in consideration of my elderly mother of eighty and my nursing infant barely weaned, to spare this wretched life of mine!”

Ling Zhiyan frowned deeply and said nothing.

“Wang Jinglu — have you anything to say?” Hua Yitang demanded.

Wang Jinglu lay on the floor, his body writhing frantically like a maggot. Everyone’s eyes on him were like eyes on a maggot in a drain — contempt in its purest form.

Hua Yitang gave a cold laugh. “After the killing, Wang Jinglu slipped out through the hidden-room passageway of the Swallow Hairpin Chamber, changed into the identical clean set of clothes he had pre-stored in the hidden room of the Cherry Chamber on the fourth floor, used the pre-positioned water to wash the blood from his face and hands, and returned to the sixth-floor pavilion as though nothing had happened — even going so far as to instigate the crowd to storm the doors, thinking that would allow him to escape without a trace.”

Wang Jinglu suddenly raised his head and fixed Hua Yitang with a stare that looked as though it might bleed. The sounds from his throat were no longer quite those of a human being.

Hua Yitang executed a deep and formal bow toward Prefect Chi. His voice rang out. “In this case, the witness testimony and physical evidence are complete. The motive is established. The sequence of events is clear and coherent. The facts of Wang Jinglu’s killing are beyond dispute. I defer to Prefect Chi for his judgment on how this should be decided!”

“Master, master, master—” Jin Ruo jabbed her elbow into Lin Sui’an’s arm furiously. “Should we tell Hua the thing about Wang Jingfu’s pin? What if he gets the verdict wrong?!”

Lin Sui’an frowned, and took a step forward — only for Hua Yitang to suddenly turn and meet her eyes. He blinked at her once, and mouthed: “Trust me.”

Lin Sui’an withdrew the foot she had extended.

The pressure now fell on Prefect Chi. Originally slumped on his couch with a hand over his heart, he absolutely could not pretend to faint anymore, and had no choice but to sit up, steel himself, and look first to the left, then to the right — then turned to Chief Historian Xia.

Chief Historian Xia immediately received the signal and began his customary mediation. “Be that as it may — Minina was, after all, a lowly registered entertainer, whereas Wang Jinglu is the legitimate eldest son of the previous Wang Family patriarch — the only surviving legitimate bloodline of the Wang clan. Any punishment must be given the most careful consideration. As they say, the law need not be devoid of human sentiment. I think that for now we simply detain him, and after consulting with the Wang Family elders, determine the punishment then — what do the others think?”

Prefect Chi immediately looked toward Su Feizhang. “What does the Su Family patriarch think?”

Su Feizhang gave a nod. “That will do.”

Lin Sui’an was stunned. What kind of maneuver was this?

This was nothing less than openly trampling the Tang Code into the mud in front of everyone.

Ling Zhiyan’s face went iron-hard. He stepped forward, and Hua Yitang’s fan tapped against his shoulder. Hua Yitang gave a laugh, and said: “According to the honored parties’ logic — the Wang family name is worth a human life?”

“Ahem, ahem, ahem!” Chief Historian Xia gave Hua Yitang emphatic signals with his eyes. “Adjutant Hua, this case involves the reputation of the Yidu noble families — it is advisable to follow the Su Family patriarch’s suggestion and consider carefully before proceeding.”

“Is Chief Historian Xia suggesting—” Hua Yitang’s expression sharpened. “—that the Yidu prefecture office is in fact named Su?”

“Adjutant Hua!” Prefect Chi shot to his feet abruptly. “Please take care with your words!”

“Killing must be paid with killing. This is the Tang Code!” Hua Yitang’s voice cracked like thunder. “Are the Yidu noble families to place themselves above the Tang Code?!”

The hall went deathly silent. Prefect Chi and Chief Historian Xia turned from pale to greenish, sweat pouring from their brows. Su Feizhang glared at Hua Yitang in grinding fury for a long moment. “Adjutant Hua speaks with reason. The Su Family will not interfere in this case!”

Prefect Chi mopped his sweat. “Then according to Adjutant Hua and Judicial Inspector Ling’s view — how should this be judged?”

Hua Yitang’s expression eased somewhat. “Just now, when Hua was arguing the matter with Su the Tenth, the cases we discussed were very similar to this one — and therefore Hua believes this case should be decided by the precedent of those previous cases: the punishment is death by strangulation.”

At these words, the entire room went blank.

What on earth was this Hua the Fourth talking about? When had he been arguing anything with Su Yiyun? All they had done was brawl like two fishwives, filling every sentence with filth — and when had any legal case been brought up?

Lin Sui’an’s eyebrow gave a sharp twitch. She understood Hua Yitang’s intent in an instant.

Hua Yitang turned his burning gaze toward Wang Jingfu. “Wang Family patriarch — do you have any objection to this verdict?”

Wang Jingfu exhaled a long, long breath. He rose and clasped his hands in a bow. “To think my Wang Family, a clan of good and upright men across generations, has produced such a depraved and monstrous wretch. The shame of it — I cannot face our ancestors. Since matters have come to this, I ask Adjutant Hua to proceed according to the law.”

Everyone stared at Wang Jingfu in absolute stupefaction. Wang Jinglu began to convulse in frenzied, inhuman screaming.

Hua Yitang’s eyes flickered. “Lin Sui’an!”

The word “Lin” had barely left his lips before Lin Sui’an had already flown to Wang Jingfu’s back. She slammed him to the floor with one palm and yanked the pin from his hair. Wang Jingfu’s face was pressed into an ugly shape against the floor, and his hair cascaded loose around him.

Ling Zhiyan rushed over, caught a lock of the hair, and held it close — then called out loudly: “He has blood in his hair!”

The crowd: “What?!”

Hua Yitang suddenly broke into laughter — clear and genuine. He fanned himself as he strolled over to Wang Jingfu’s side, crouched down, and tapped the fan handle against Wang Jingfu’s skull. “So the true killer who murdered Minina — was you all along.”

Side story:

Jin Ruo: My brain is frying — what the—