Chapter 2328
Qian Tiandun was not surprised by the results that Fu Li had verified through the Chamberlain. He and Tom Wang had previously believed that there was something wrong with Kim Sang-hyun's performance, and there were many logical loopholes in what happened, but there was always a lack of reliable evidence to prove such speculations.
The reason why Qian Tiandun paid special attention to that detail during the autopsy was because he had done corresponding homework on important figures in Korea before and knew that Li Zhu had not personally participated in any battles. He was actually responsible for launching the palace coup that year. There was someone else who took action. As for the Dingmao Rebellion later, Li Jie was so frightened that he fled directly to Ganghwa Island to avoid the war, without even thinking about going into battle to defend himself against foreign enemies.
Since Li Zhu had never been on the battlefield in person, given his pampered lifestyle in the palace, the possibility of being seriously injured was naturally very slim. It was based on this understanding that Qian Tiandun became suspicious of the true identity of the remains. He informed Fu Li of this clue at that time, and as expected, Fu Li did not disappoint him, and he really followed the clues and found out something.
Since the remains are fake, it can be inferred that a series of information related to the remains are also more or less adulterated. In particular, the credibility of the assassination in the royal study room mentioned by Kim Sang-heon will be greatly reduced.
But although the remains were fake, Qian Tiandun no longer had any hope for Li Zhu's life and death. Even if the assassination in the imperial study room had not occurred, he would not have disappeared for more than a month without any reason. Now that Haihan has controlled the situation in Seoul, but Li Jie has not yet appeared, it is basically certain that the situation is more serious than bad.
Qian Tiandun is more inclined to believe the possibility raised by Fu Li, that is, the rebels fabricated the assassination incident in order to seize power. The fake remains were just to prove that Li Zhu died in the assassination incident, but in fact it was based on the assassination incident. a palace coup. After the rebel party succeeds, they will naturally not let Li Zhu live in the world. Otherwise, once the dead are resurrected, the conspiracy of the rebel party will be automatically exposed to the world.
From Haihan's perspective, this unexpected change of power is not necessarily a bad thing. Compared with Li Zhi, whose ideas tend to be conservative, Li Zhi, who has begun to accept Haihan's development strategy, is obviously a more ideal ruler. After he takes power, he will further tilt Korea's position towards Haihan and serve Haihan. Providing more natural resources and population resources is exactly what Haihan desperately wants to get from North Korea.
But whether the truth of the matter should be continued to be investigated, and how to report the matter to Li Xie, Qian Tiandun had to carefully consider it in order to maximize his interests.
To continue the investigation, Kim Sang-heon and his followers must be uprooted. Regardless of whether they are punished for their crimes, the impact on the current government cannot be ignored. Li Zhen has just ascended the throne, and there are too many affairs that need to be handled by Kim Sang-heon. If he is torn apart at this time, it is likely to cause a new round of civil strife in North Korea.
But pretending not to know and ignoring the investigation results is obviously not Qian Tiandun's style of doing things. This matter must not be kept hidden from Li Xie.
Qian Tiandun thought about it again and again, and decided to meet with Kim Sang-hyun first to see if he would give an explanation before reporting the progress of the investigation to Li Xie. He was also really curious as to why a powerful official like Kim Sang-hun and Choi Myung-gil took huge risks to create such a farce that was difficult to end.
As the Chief Secretary, Kim Sang-heon's office is naturally located in the Secretary-General's Mansion. However, most of these government offices in Seoul are small houses with little ostentation. If there were no signboards hanging at the door, they could easily be mistaken for private residences.
This Si Xian Mansion is no exception, but because Jin Sang Xian has to handle the government affairs on his behalf recently, there are a lot more people coming in and out of Si Xian Mansion. When Qian Tiandun came here, he saw clerks coming in and out with rolls of paper. He thought they were documents sent by various yamen for Jin Shangxian's approval.
Qian Tiandun arrived suddenly, and Kim Sangxian had to stop no matter how busy he was. He suspended handling government affairs and met with Qian Tiandun in the living room.
It is said to be a living room, but in fact it is just half of the room separated from the study room where he works. It only has simple tables and chairs furnished, and it looks very simple. It is hard to imagine that the top official in North Korea today works in such a cramped place and receives guests.
Jin Sangxian asked someone to serve hot tea, and then asked Qian Tiandun why he was here: "General Qian suddenly came to visit. It must be urgent. Is there anything I can do to help?"
Qian Tiandun said: "Regarding the assassination case in the imperial study, my investigation has made new progress, but I would like to listen to Lord Jin's opinion before reporting the case to the king."
Jin Sangxian's expression did not change, and he continued to ask: "I wonder if General Qian has found any important clues?"
Qian Tiandun stared at Jin Sangxian and said slowly: "Our investigation found that there are some problems with the remains provided by Mr. Jin. The deceased seems not to be the king, but someone else."
"Is this happening? I wonder how General Qian identified the remains?" When Jin Shangxian heard this accusation, he remained calm and composed without the slightest panic, and immediately asked Qian Tiandun.
Qian Tiandun did not directly respond to Jin Sangxian's question, but continued with this discovery: "After the accident, Mr. Jin and Cui Mingji both went to the royal study room, so they should not be able to identify the deceased. If the person died that day, It’s not the king. How did the assassination come out of nowhere?”
Kim Sang-hyun responded coldly: "I don't understand what General Qian is talking about. If there is any problem with the king's remains, it should be Cui Mingji who tampered with it."
"You mean, Cui Mingji specially made a fake body and secretly transported it to be buried outside the city? What's the point of doing this?" Qian Tiandun shook his head and said: "It doesn't make sense. I think the rebel party has some reasons. , there was no intention to execute the king on the day it was launched, and the purpose of creating this fake remains was to confirm that the king did die in the assassination that day, to shift the responsibility to the so-called Manchu assassins, and to make the whole plan look more It’s just reasonable.”
Jin Sangxian fell silent and did not respond to Qian Tiandun's inference.
Qian Tiandun continued: "To disguise a palace coup as an assassination, there are too many aspects involved, and it is easy for the news to leak out. Therefore, all the people in the palace who may have come into contact with the truth were taken away in the name of investigation. Presumably These people later became burial objects. The insiders who could leak the secret were all dead, so the assassination incident could be truly confirmed. But the people who made this plan never expected that the king's scapegoat they had found in advance did not even look at it. It looks so perfect, but a flaw will still be seen after a month of death." Qian Tiandun paused and said slowly: "Many people have lost their lives for this matter, just to achieve this so-called assassination. The case allowed the mastermind behind the coup to escape smoothly after success. It’s a pity that a small loophole was left in the end.”
"Before I came to see Mr. Jin, I had already ordered people to seal up the remains, so there was no need to consider whether the evidence could still be destroyed. The new king is a smart man. If he knew that the assassination was intentional, If he creates an illusion, he should soon figure out who is behind all this.”
It was only at this time that Jin Shangxian spoke: "Cui Mingji thought he had a perfect plan, but he never thought that his plan would be exposed in the eyes of outsiders. It is really ridiculous. Although I was coerced by him, I did not take the initiative to expose this incident afterwards. Indeed, Also guilty.”
"At this point, is Mr. Jin still thinking about putting all the blame on the dead?" Qian Tiandun shook his head slightly and said: "In order to make this plan look reasonable, you can only use more lives to fill the gap." Little did anyone know that the more people died in this trap, the harder it would be to control the situation. It seemed that the dead had kept the secret, but in fact it also revealed that there must be a huge problem in this matter, otherwise how could there not even be a living insider. Mr. Jin still doesn’t understand that as long as there is a flaw, there will be flaws everywhere.”
Kim Sang-hyun fell into silence again, but his expression was no longer as calm as before.
Qian Tiandun said: "Of course I can understand that Mr. Jin will definitely not admit the accusation. But I really want to know that important officials in the court like you and Cui Mingji are already in power, and no one can threaten your status. Why do you still take great risks to do such a thing? Is it true that the Manchu Qing Dynasty has promised you great benefits? But no matter how great the reward is, it will not exceed the treatment you receive from being a powerful minister in Korea, right? ”
Kim Sang-hyun's expression finally changed. It was not panic, but anger: "General Qian, Kim will only be loyal to North Korea in this life. Everything he does is for the country and the people, and he is absolutely selfless! Cui Mingji and I Although he has different political views, he is also a patriotic person and cannot collude with the Manchu thieves!”
Qian Tiandun said: "Just patriotism, no loyalty to the emperor? How wonderful!"
For this reason, Qian Tiandun can basically confirm that Kim Sang-heon should have participated in the previous coup to a certain extent, and was not coerced by Cui Mingji as he said. But Qian Tiandun still had no idea why these two people would do such a treasonous thing.
Kim Sang-hyun fell silent for the third time. In today's conversation, Qian Tiandun's words were aggressive, making it difficult for him to answer. Of course, in Qian Tiandun's view, this was a sign of guilty conscience.
Kim Sang-hyun was indeed unable to respond directly to Qian Tiandun's doubts, and it was even less possible for him to explain to Qian Tiandun that the reason for launching this coup was that they believed that King Li Zhuo relied on Haihan to a very dangerous extent, which might affect the Guo Zuo of North Korea used abnormal methods to overthrow Li Zhu's rule.
But from beginning to end, they had no intention of proclaiming themselves kings and replacing the Li dynasty, let alone colluding with the Manchus. Therefore, Kim Sang-hyun was very angry about Qian Tiandun's speculation and considered it an insult.
He and Cui Mingji regarded themselves as patriots. Everything they did was for the long-term interests of the country. They just wanted to overthrow Li Zhu and let the next king take charge of the country. Although they still have differences on the choice of successor, as long as the government is still in their hands, no matter which prince inherits the throne, it will not be too bad.
Of course, in order to protect himself, Kim Sang-hyun later used some means during the execution of the plan, which resulted in the situation developing out of control. In the end, Kim Sang-hyun had to use force to get rid of Cui Ming-gil's group, and he also passed all the responsibilities. It's on Cui Mingji's head.
Although this was an unplanned situation, Kim Sang-hyun took this opportunity to deal with his political opponents and gain the opportunity to dominate the government. It was just a temporary plan change that caused too many loopholes in the process. It was obviously extremely difficult to make up for all these loopholes in a short period of time. As a result, the Haihan people discovered one of the loopholes, and thus traced part of the truth about the assassination case. .
In the original plan, the matter would not be delayed until the Haihan people came to the city. They would announce that they had found out the truth about ten days after the assassination, and then bury the king in a grand ceremony. Afterwards, whether it was the Haihan people who came to investigate or the crown prince When I return to Seoul, I will definitely not start an autopsy at the mausoleum.
However, due to the conflict between Kim Sang-hyun and Cui Ming-gil, Cui Ming-gil only had the fake remains pretending to be Li Jo, but could not grasp the true whereabouts of Lee Jo. He was worried that Kim Sang-hun would cause trouble for him, so he naturally did not dare to do anything. What kind of grand burial can we do? The fake remains can only be buried quietly on the mountain in the north of the city. Although Kim Sang-hyun later secretly dealt with Li Zhu, the time was too different from the assassination case. An insider would know something fishy at a glance. How could they dare to let the Haihan people verify the authenticity, so they could only dig out the fake remains prepared by Cui Mingji. Plan to get by with this.
Jin Sangxian felt that although there were many loopholes in the story he made up, the Haihan people should not be able to find any evidence against him. As long as Li Shi takes over the throne, as the first person in the court, he will naturally have many solutions Erase this experience.
I just didn’t expect that the people were not as good as God, but they were still caught by the Haihan people. Although this evidence still cannot prove what Kim Sangxian did during this period, it has indeed poked a big hole in his carefully crafted story. . If the Haihan people follow the existing clues to investigate, it may indeed involve more people and things.
Of course, Jin Sangxian was not willing to give up, but he still lacked the courage to face the Haihan people. Being bold enough to refute Qian Tiandun was almost the upper limit of what he could do. Moreover, he was not sure whether Qian Tiandun had obtained more evidence when he came to the door so confidently. He would be wrong if he said more, so it would be better to say less.
When Qian Tiandun saw that Jin Shangxian didn't answer, he decided to put more pressure on him: "Regicide and rebellion will implicate the nine tribes. If Mr. Jin thinks this doesn't matter, then I will repay him truthfully."
(End of chapter)