Chapter 34: Powerful Officials
Jiyin County, Dingtao County, official temple.
"Dog slave, you'd better beat me to death, otherwise I will let you know when I get out..."
At this time, a man with disheveled hair was being hung up and whipped.
"What do you know? Do you know your grandfather's ruthless work?"
In the dark prison cell, a black-clothed swordsman and penman waved his whip and whipped it hard a few more times.
The screams were unbearable to hear.
In the cell next to the execution cell, Li Qian trembled and trembled as he listened to the sound of the whip. Only today did he realize the dignity of the swordsman and penman.
That day, he dragged the corpse of the county official and threw it in a cart, which caused a commotion in the county temple.
The county official who was supposed to order Li Qian to come to the temple now has his body lying on the car.
The county officials were not surprised. They never expected that Li Qian was so strong and strong because of the custom of the Han family.
But I was shocked, but no one came to pick up Li Qian.
On the one hand, the county soldiers and officials in the county temple are all descendants of powerful locals and are very familiar with Li Qian.
On the other hand, they were also dissatisfied with the county governor. The county guard was too harsh. He persecuted the loyal Li family just for a trivial matter.
Among the many county officials, there was an assistant with a bronze seal and a yellow ribbon waiting for him to issue an order. He was Wei Jing, the meritorious official of this county.
Among the officials of a county, the meritorious officer is regarded as the "most powerful person in the county". When the county guard has something to do, it is basically the meritorious officer who takes charge of the county affairs.
Such a prestigious position can naturally only be filled by the children of powerful families in this county.
This is the case for the man named Wei Jing. He comes from the Wei family from Juyang, Jiyin, and his ancestor is the Changle Weiwei of this dynasty.
As a first-rate disciple of Jingguan Jiuqing, Wei Jing has a certain demeanor that is different from his colleagues.
They often have banquets, and Wei Jing often chants after drinking:
"Life is destined to last forever, and death is as sudden as the dust. Why not take advantage of the masters and seize the important road first."
He also likes to play Tie Ruyi with spitting pot for fun.
Every time there is a banquet, I don't know how many saliva pots will be broken, but everyone in the county thinks that he is elegant and suave, and they flock to him like a duck.
All the heroes and celebrities in the county were regular guests at his banquet in Wei Jing, and Li Qian was no exception.
Therefore, Wei Jing naturally did not want to embarrass Li Qian. He only asked people to help the dead county official into the official temple, and then took Li Qian to pay a visit to the county governor Zhang Chong.
At this moment, Zhang Chong was listening to his old wife's words.
His wife is like him, tall and fair, and she is his treasure. But now Yibao is losing his temper:
"You are an old man. He works as a county guard in Jiaozhou and earns 50 million yuan in three years.
You have been the prefect of Lu for four years, but you have never brought anything home, and you have to support so many servants.
What's the use of those poor people? Why not use my family to ensure that when we return to our hometown, we will be rich in gold and pearls. ”
Zhang Chong was troubled by his wife's thoughts. He had no doubt about his old wife's promise.
If one of Lao Wife's clan members is appointed to manage the property, not to mention a thousand cars of property after he leaves office, even a few hundred cars won't be able to fit into it.
Just because the old wife comes from the Hou family in Mi County, Henan County. Her family has been in business for generations and has accumulated tens of millions of money.
But he still couldn't help but scold:
"The man you are talking about is called Sun Fen. He went to the South China Sea to become an official and made enough money, but in the end he was taken over by Liang Ji. I have told you a long time ago, more money is a disaster."
It's okay if you don't say this, but when you say this, the old wife becomes even more angry:
"Stop fooling around. You just have learned a lot about family law. You have yin and yang in your brain. If you don't make money, you are stupid. Money is a curse, so why are so many people taking advantage of it?"
These words made Zhang Chong furious, but he was speechless.
Fortunately, at this time, the meritorious Cao Wei Jing came to pay him a visit, and he immediately left as if running away.
As soon as he entered the office, he saw Wei Jing and all the Cao officials there, the elite of the county, that's all.
There is another person kneeling below, dressed in plain clothes and carrying a thorn tree, it is Li Qian.
Zhang Chong was secretly happy and was about to sit upright in the hall when he suddenly saw a dead body in the corner outside the hall, which looked familiar.
Without a few more glances, Li Qian would have kowtowed.
"In the Ming Dynasty, my servant Li Qian is guilty. The first crime is that he was good at commanding troops to cross the border. The second crime is that he accidentally killed the county official. He knew that he would not be forgiven, so he begged for death."
After Zhang Chong heard this, he had one thought:
"What? Kill the county officials, who was killed?"
Thinking again about the familiarity he had just glimpsed, he immediately realized that Li Qian had actually killed the horse Kuai he was delivering the order to.
Immediately, Zhang Chong was sweating.
He immediately looked outside the temple, where there were figures of people, and then looked at the officials below, who were looking at him with eager eyes.
He didn't care much. He raised his butt and ran towards the back corridor of the temple.
Only Li Qian and many county officials were left looking at each other.
Sitting on his knees next to Wei Jing was Bian Chong, the military commander.
He came from Yuenju County and was from a middle-class family, but he was brave and capable of doing things. He was promoted by Zhang Chong as the commander of the army.
Bian Chong listened to Wei Jing and said doubtfully:
"Brother Wenhan, my lord, what's going on? You were sitting just fine, why did you suddenly run back to the back of the hall? Are you in a hurry?"
Wei Jing was thoughtful and asked the county guard to lead him to Zhang Chong behind the corridor.
The governor is the captain of the county guard. He is a native of Zhang Chong. He is known to be brave and powerful. He was appointed as the governor by Zhang Chong and came to Jiyin with him to take up the post.
When the subordinate governor led Wei Jing to find Zhang Chong, the back courtyard was in a panic.
While Zhang Chong called his servants to pack the carriage, he was busy packing the valuables into boxes. When he saw one of the servants was still holding on, he scolded her and asked her to quickly pack the valuables for his wife. After a busy day of work, Zhang Chong was gasping for breath. When he saw Wei Jing coming, he slapped his forehead and said:
"Wenhan, hang my official seal and ribbon under the mulberry tree in the corridor. While I am removing the seal and ribbon, you will be in charge of county affairs."
Wei Jing said hurriedly:
"Lord, what's wrong with you? What happened?"
"What's the matter? What did you say it was? You Jiyin are really powerful.
The local tycoons dare to kill my county officials with open fire. You tycoons dare to come to me directly with the murderers.
If I don't resign in a wise manner, I'm afraid I will be in the same accident as the county official who was in the hall. ”
Wei Jing was frightened. He never expected that the county governor would have such an idea.
Zhang Chong cannot be blamed. It was Wei Jing who had miscalculated and should have directly sent Li Qianxian to the temple prison at that time.
Wei Jing immediately knelt on the ground, kissed Zhang Chong's hakama, and cried:
"Lord, please calm down. This is because the servant is behaving uncontrollably. The servant thought that Li Qian had a longing for his hometown, and didn't want him and the lord to get too stiff.
So I took it upon myself to bring him to pay homage to the lord, but I didn't want to put him in danger. Death penalty. ”
After saying that, he took off the Jinxian crown on his head, took off his robe, neatly placed them aside, and bowed respectfully to the ground to apologize.
Wei Jing just lay there, and Zhang Chong was also thinking about how much of Wei Jing's words were true.
After a long while, Zhang Chong asked leisurely:
"Do you think Li Qian killed the county official out of anger, or did he kill him accidentally?"
Wei Jing thought for a moment and said seriously:
"My lord, the key to this matter is not why Li Qian killed the county officials, but the fact that he threw himself into prison. He came here to seek death. Otherwise, he would have gone on the run if he had killed the county officials."
"Want to die? Why?"
"For the sake of the family, I know Li Qian's temperament, and what I want most is to promote the family. Therefore, my lord does not need to be afraid of Li Qian, because he has a bond."
At this time, Zhang Chong suddenly realized that he was being suspicious.
Then he ordered his disciples to stop cleaning up and restore it as soon as possible, and then he took Wei Jing back to the hall.
All the Cao officers in the hall were waiting anxiously when they saw Wei Jing coming back with Zhang Chong, and they all took their places again.
"Ahem"
At this time, Zhang Chong regained his previous calmness. After he scolded twice, he spoke directly:
"Li Qian, since you know that you will not be able to escape the death penalty, I will say no more. I just hope that you will think more about your relatives and friends. Here comes someone! Take Li Qian to the prison. Qiu Hou will ask and behead him. .”
Li Qian didn't say a word the whole time. He only trembled slightly when Zhang Chong talked about his relatives and friends, and then he was taken into custody by the county soldiers.
Then for more than ten days, some tribesmen, except Li Dian, bribed the knife and pen officials of the prison temple and brought in some clothes, quilts and food. After that, Li Qian was not asked to go there again.
But even if there was no shortage of food and wine, Li Qian still looked troubled at this time.
I was locked up in there for more than ten days, listening to the torturers who tortured me all day long.
Just to squeeze the last bit of money from those prisoners. And some do it just for fun, just to play.
Sure enough, once you become a prisoner, you are no longer a human being. You are just a chicken, duck, pig, or dog, to be slaughtered by others.
But these and the mental torture Li Qianzheng suffered are not worth mentioning.
As we all know, waiting to die is scarier than dying directly.
Li Qian somewhat understood why all criminals had to wait until later in the year to punish them.
At this time, the swordsman named Dong had just finished flogging a young knight and was walking to the edge to drink water when he saw Li Qian who was resting with his eyes closed.
Not sure what he was thinking, he came up across the wooden threshold, kicked Li Qian down, and mocked:
"Hey, he is indeed a hero from our Cheng family. He can sit upright in this place.
But why are you pretending to be a celebrity? In this place, you will cry when I ask you to cry, and you will laugh when I ask you to laugh. ”
After saying that, he whipped him and said, "Cry for me."
Li Qian suffered a terrible disaster, and his skin and flesh were torn apart with a whip.
But here and now, is there any difference from the scene where he brutally tortured the water bandits in the military tent that night?
Li Qian was whipped, but he only looked at the man named Dong.
He didn't know this person. In the past, he looked down upon such a low-class food-fighting official.
But today, he stared at him intently, determined to remember this person in his mind.
The man named Dong was offended and said something to cheer him up:
"You damn ghost, you still think you are the same as before. How dare you show me that I can't kill you now."
As he said this, he asked Lun to come over and whip him again.
But the whip was blocked by a tall man.
The man named Dong was about to scold him, but when he turned around and saw this man, he immediately stopped his foul language, dropped his whip, and knelt on the ground.
It turns out that this tall man is the commander of the county, Cao Cao, Wenwu, and his immediate superior named Dong.
Wenwu was from the Cheng family of Jiyin, and happened to be from the same hometown as Li Qian.
He did not come alone, to be more precise, he came with the county magistrate Zhang Chong and others.
Wen and Wu ignored the knife and pen official named Dong, but immediately asked the people below to unlock the door and ask Li Qian to come out.
Li Qian was still puzzled when he saw Zhang Chong, the prefect taking fat steps, grabbed his hand and said:
"Brother, you have suffered."
What's going on?
Naturally, Li Qian didn't know that all this stemmed from the impact of the solar eclipse on Kyoto that day.
The fate of this little fish was once again decided by the dragon-tiger fight in Kyoto.
(End of chapter)