Earlier that day, while the Capital Prefecture was filled with a steady stream of distinguished visitors, Ming Huazhang seemed unable to hear the clamor of the outside world. He sat alone in the silent stillness of his chambers, his fingers meticulous and steady — steady to an almost uncanny degree — carefully gluing a fragment of bone into place.
A precise, measured knocking came from beyond the door. Ming Huazhang did not look up; his hands kept moving without pause. He said lightly, “Enter.”
The door was slowly pushed open. Ming Huazhang set the fragment down and swept a glance over — and that single glance caused his hands to stop.
Su Xingzhi stood in the unhurried drift of daylight, clad in deep azure official robes, and inclined his head toward Ming Huazhang. “Deputy Prefect Ming. It has been some time.”
It had indeed been some time. Ming Huazhang set down the tool in his hand and rose to his feet. “I did not know Censor Su would be coming — forgive me for the lack of proper welcome. May I ask what business brings the Censor here?”
“What else would bring the Censorate? Naturally, it is the matter of the serial murders.”
“Censor Su means the cases of Cheng Siyue, Huang Caiwei, and the others?” Ming Huazhang replied coolly. “That case has been transferred in its entirety to the Jing Zhaoyiin. I believe the Censor has come to the wrong place.”
Su Xingzhi gave a faint smile and looked around the room. “The Chief Censor is currently speaking with the Jing Zhaoyiin to understand the situation. I had some time to spare, so I came to look around. I hope I haven’t interrupted you, Deputy Prefect — what were you just doing?”
Su Xingzhi was already inside. Many things seemed to need no further words. Ming Huazhang made no attempt to conceal what lay behind him; he turned and quite naturally revealed the bones he had been painstakingly reassembling. “I myself have too much time on my hands — I’m afraid I’ve made Censor Su laugh at me.”
Ming Huazhang returned to the desk and continued fitting the bones together, utterly unconcerned that there was now another person in the room. Su Xingzhi walked over slowly, watching his hands at work, and asked, “Whose bones are these?”
“Sacred relics from Purdu Temple — the items stolen by Cen Hu.” Ming Huazhang said calmly. “The abbot of Purdu Temple provided a list, and I have already called on each household named. Those families did indeed follow their ancestors’ wishes and donate remains to Purdu Temple.”
“Since the Deputy Prefect has already verified this, why continue reassembling the bones?”
“I believe the number of bones does not add up.” Ming Huazhang said evenly. “Naturally, this case is no longer under my jurisdiction, and I have no evidence — it is merely an idle guess.”
Su Xingzhi had seen what he was capable of and did not for one moment believe this was merely idle guessing. He observed for a while longer, then asked, “Does the Deputy Prefect truly believe the murderer is Cen Hu?”
“The Jing Zhaoyiin has the complete case files. If the Censor has doubts, you are welcome to examine them there. What purpose does asking me serve?”
“As a Censorate investigator, I have the authority to question any official involved in any case of significant magnitude. Does the Deputy Prefect seem to bear some grudge against me?”
In cases of major significance, the Censorate, the Ministry of Justice, and the Court of Judicial Review would form a joint tribunal of three courts. The Court of Judicial Review drafted the verdict, the Ministry of Justice was responsible for the review, while the Censorate simultaneously submitted its own supervisory report.
This was also the difficult position the Capital Prefecture found itself in. The Capital Prefecture bore responsibility for all the exhausting and thankless work — investigating, conducting interrogations, enforcing the law, making arrests — and not only was credit hard to come by, but there was always a crowd of people waiting to find fault. The Capital Prefecture had the most to fear from a joint tribunal of the three courts, and the Censorate’s investigating division was the most dreaded of the three. These censors might appear to hold modest official ranks, but their authority was enormous. If the Censorate found any problem with any aspect of the proceedings, they could send the entire case back for re-examination, and no matter how much effort the Capital Prefecture had previously invested, the whole thing would have to be done again from the beginning.
This was why among all the officials in the capital, one could afford to offend almost anyone before offending a censor — and enforcement agencies like the Capital Prefecture were even more mindful of this than most. Yet Ming Huazhang showed not a trace of the deference one would expect when facing a supervisory official, remaining as cold and indifferent as ever, as though barely registering the other man’s presence. He said, “I would not dare.”
And yet his demeanor suggested that daring to do otherwise never even crossed his mind as a concern. Su Xingzhi paid no mind to Ming Huazhang’s attitude and asked with a forthright expression, “I listened to the Jing Zhaoyiin describe the details of the case and found myself consistently troubled by certain things. I understand that you were the one leading the early stages of this investigation. There are a few specifics I would like the Deputy Prefect to clarify for me.”
“Please, Censor.”
“Is Cen Hu truly the murderer?”
As soon as Su Xingzhi finished speaking, he fixed his gaze intently on Ming Huazhang. Ming Huazhang, unhurried and composed, fitted another fragment of bone into place, his breathing so steady and calm that Su Xingzhi almost wondered whether he had heard the question at all.
Fortunately, Ming Huazhang had heard it. He set down his tweezers and lifted his gaze — those clear, limpid dark eyes fixed steadily on Su Xingzhi. “If I say no — can the Censor help me delay this case from being officially closed?”
Su Xingzhi raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t it supposed to be me here to review your work? You’re now actively confessing to a wrongful judgment, and in the same breath want to drag me into it with you?”
“My superior has issued his orders, and on my own I am powerless to change the situation.” Ming Huazhang said, “But I have already found evidence. If you can help me stall for time, I expect to be able to apprehend the true murderer very soon.”
Su Xingzhi raised an eyebrow further, but did not take the bait. “You have no evidence right now. With nothing but your word, why would I believe you?”
Ming Huazhang spread his slender, refined fingers wide and gestured to what lay below him. “These bones are reason enough. I have been making inquiries all over these past days, and I can confirm that I have tracked down every household on the list. But the number of bones does not match.”
“There are fewer than expected?”
“No — more.” Ming Huazhang said. “One extra pair of shin bones — one male, one female. Given how little information there is, at present I can only determine that the male was approximately six feet in height, between thirty and forty years of age, had sustained an injury to his right leg, and walked with a slight limp. The female was approximately five and a half feet tall; her age is harder to determine, though she was most likely middle-aged.”
Su Xingzhi found himself growing more and more intrigued by the increasingly extraordinary claims. He folded his arms and asked, “How did you determine all of that? From a single bone?”
“A corpse is often the most precise evidence there is.” Ming Huazhang, unconcerned by Su Xingzhi’s skepticism, said with cool clarity: “Male bones are thicker and coarser than female bones — easy to distinguish. Among them, the male’s bone had a crack, one that was already very old in appearance and clearly not a recent injury, which indicated the man had lived with a leg ailment throughout his life. I estimated the age based on the state of the bone’s development. As for height — I observed the shin bones of those around me and noticed that people with longer lower leg bones tended to be taller overall. I measured the lengths of their shin bones and used that to calculate a rough approximation.”
The first part Su Xingzhi had heard of before; by the latter part he was left only with admiration. Ming Huazhang’s tenacity in getting to the bottom of things was extraordinary — Su Xingzhi had no way of imagining himself arriving at the idea of measuring the shin bones of the people around him in order to estimate the height of a bone flute’s original owner.
Such meticulous powers of observation, such a rigorous and exacting mind — for someone like this to say he only needed a few more days to apprehend the true murderer, Su Xingzhi found himself almost believing it. He asked, “What have you found?”
“I examined the death records for Chang’an spanning nearly a decade, and found a couple who died in what was recorded as an accident that matches the above conditions. The reason I took notice of them is that they were Lu Du’s parents.”
Su Xingzhi was puzzled. “Who is that?”
Su Xingzhi had not been involved in the investigation and was not aware that Lu Du had once been a significant suspect who had since been eliminated. Ming Huazhang explained: “He is the teacher of Cheng Da, Cheng Siyue’s elder brother, and was recommended by the Imperial Sacrificial Wine to enter the Imperial Academy as a doctor of learning four years ago. In his earlier years he had been lodging at Purdu Temple. Four years ago, his parents perished in a fire, with only him surviving. Devastated by this blow, he donated his family’s residence to Qingchan Temple and acquired a different property, only then settling permanently in Chang’an. However, through my private inquiries, I’ve found that his relationship with his parents was not a warm one. Moreover, he once had a younger sister — kept secluded within the inner quarters, rarely seen by others — who one day suddenly died of an acute illness. The body was not permitted to be viewed, and she was buried hastily. From that point on, Lu Du’s own health deteriorated sharply, and he had to move to Purdu Temple outside the city to recuperate.”
Su Xingzhi listened with close attention. He furrowed his brow, sorting through the connections in his mind. After a long moment of thought he said, “He is Cheng Da’s doctor of learning, was recommended by the Imperial Sacrificial Wine, and was living at Purdu Temple four years ago. Looked at this way, he would have had every opportunity to have become acquainted with Cheng Siyue, Huang Caiwei, and the female vagrant.”
“Exactly.” Ming Huazhang said. “And I also discovered by chance that Purdu Temple was donated by the Xingyang Zheng clan — and Lu Du’s mother’s maiden name was Zheng.”
Both Qingchan Temple and Purdu Temple had connections to Lu Du. If someone intended to commit crimes at either location, Lu Du was without a doubt the person most familiar with both environments. Su Xingzhi was effectively persuaded. He adjusted his cuffs and clasped his hands behind his back. “I will do what I can to encourage the Chief Censor to delay the review — but no matter what, an answer must be given to His Majesty before the year’s end. Whether or not you can find the murderer, whether you can appease His Majesty’s wrath and preserve your posts — all of that depends on you.”
Though the case had ultimately been taken over by the Jing Zhaoyiin and the murderer had been identified through the Jing Zhaoyiin’s unilateral insistence, if the case turned out to be wrongly judged, His Majesty and the people of Chang’an would not stop to consider whether Ming Huazhang was an innocent party in all of this. Ming Huazhang was grateful for Su Xingzhi’s support, and with solemnity clasped his hands in a deep bow. “Many thanks.”
Having received Su Xingzhi’s assurance that the Censorate would help delay the finalization of the verdict, Ming Huazhang could now focus his efforts on gathering evidence without distraction. When the offices closed at the end of the afternoon, Ming Huazhang told no one and slipped quietly out of the city, heading for Purdu Temple.
He had already learned Purdu Temple’s schedule in advance and knew that at the hour of xu, all the monks — including the abbot — would be conducting the evening liturgy. It was the best opportunity to covertly explore Purdu Temple.
It was something of an embarrassment to acknowledge: three murders had already occurred, yet not a single crime scene had been found. Ming Huazhang had studied the map of Chang’an from every angle, and in the end, his gaze had kept returning to Purdu Temple.
Lu Du’s parents’ shin bones had clearly been made into bone flutes, yet when the abbot of Purdu Temple had written out the list, he had deliberately omitted the names of the Lu couple.
A pure lie was easy to see through. The most dangerous kind was truth mixed with falsehood, and falsehood mixed with truth. Every person on the list was real, and the bones had already been smashed to pieces — leaving out one or two names would not be noticeable at all.
The abbot simply hadn’t anticipated that anyone would actually piece together every fragment of bone and call on household after household. Yet that was exactly what Ming Huazhang had done, and he had found the gap.
The abbot had produced that many names in a single sitting, and there was no reason to think he would accidentally overlook Lu Du’s parents. The only possibility was deliberate concealment. Wherever something so out of the ordinary exists, something is lurking beneath it — and tonight, Ming Huazhang intended to see what secret Purdu Temple was hiding.
Ming Huazhang was the Deputy Prefect of the Capital Prefecture, and at the same time a member of the Xuan Xiaowei. He slipped into Purdu Temple with effortless ease, not alerting a single monk. At this moment, everyone was in the main hall chanting scriptures; the abbot’s chamber was dark and cold, empty of all life — the perfect opportunity.
Without a sound, Ming Huazhang dropped into the meditation room and went straight toward the hidden chamber. The wall had been restored to its original appearance. A gilded Buddha statue stood before it, adorned with a jeweled crown and flowing sashes — its gender ambiguous, its ornamentation unusually magnificent. Without prior knowledge, no one would guess that a door lay behind it.
Unfortunately for those responsible, this did not include Ming Huazhang. In truth, he had noticed on the day of his first visit: the sacred relic had been stolen, yet the solid gold Buddha statue just on the other side of the wall had been left completely untouched.
Sacred relics were different from material wealth — they only held value in the eyes of believers. To someone who did not believe in Buddhism, they were nothing but a pile of bones. Cen Hu was a bandit willing to risk everything for money, someone who had dared to rob an official silver shipment — and yet he had left the solid gold Buddha statue in the abbot’s chamber untouched and had instead taken the sacred relic?
Ming Huazhang did not believe it. He recalled the position he had observed that day, tapped lightly on the wall, and quickly found the hidden door.
He opened it just a narrow crack and slipped inside like a wisp of snow, then pulled the hidden door shut behind him. The Buddha statue outside remained entirely undisturbed, still and silent as though nothing had happened. Ming Huazhang lit a fire-starter and surveyed the hidden chamber for the second time.
The furnishings had been tidied back into order, but the platform above stood bare and empty, the sacred relic nowhere in sight. Ming Huazhang lifted the silk cloth covering the table and, as he had expected, found dust beneath it.
The firelight passed across Ming Huazhang’s eyes; those pupils flickered between light and shadow, like a deep and fathomless pool. He had noticed it on his first visit as well: the room appeared to have been ransacked, but only items had been overturned — nothing was actually damaged. Would someone stealing valuables take such care with how they handled things?
The silk on the table’s surface was completely clean, yet the tabletop beneath it was dusty — every indication pointed to the same conclusion: this was never where the sacred relic had actually been kept. Whoever had done this wanted to create the scene of a stolen relic; the silk had been laid out temporarily, and the wooden stand had been toppled on purpose.
Therefore, the account of Cen Hu stealing the sacred relic and fleeing out of guilt was groundless; and his death on the mountain road was a complete and utter fabrication from beginning to end.
If the theft of the sacred relic was a fabrication, then where would the human bone relics actually be kept? Since the abbot’s chamber already had one hidden room, might there be other hidden doors as well?
Ming Huazhang searched inch by inch along all four walls. As his hands moved across the floor, he faintly sensed that the sound beneath his feet was wrong. He crouched down carefully and knocked on the floor tile with his knuckle.
Yes — beneath this floor was empty space.
Ming Huazhang wedged his fire-starter into the side and drew the short blade he carried at his hip, carefully working it into the crack in the floor tiles. The heavy, ice-cold stone tiles were soon pried up. Ming Huazhang braced himself with one hand on the edge and looked down.
A staircase appeared before him, dark and winding, descending toward a destination unknown.