Lu Yi looked at Zhou Xian’s rotten and swollen face, his eyes became heavy. After a moment, he ordered YangYue, “Take off his shoes.”
YangYue followed his orders, taking the shoes off the corpse. Although he was very careful, the body was so decomposed that some flesh attached to the footwears came off, the bones were exposed and blood flowed out.
Jinxia immediately felt an uneasiness in her stomach, so she quickly crawled out of the pit, taking off the handkerchief that covered her mouth and nose to breathe in some fresh air.
“Senior, sorry to bother you.” Lu Yi said with respect, turning to face Yang ChengWan.
“Dare not, this is my duty, Yang ChengWan’s duty.” Yang ChengWan promptly replied and limped to the edge of the pit.
YangYue, with no hesitation, held out his hand to help his father down . Since the smell was so strong, Yang ChengWan too used a handkerchief to cover his mouth and nose. Then he vehemently said: “Call Xia’er down here, if she can’t handle it, there’s no need to be a constable anymore.”
YangYue was about to open his mouth to shout but Jinxia had already come down from the other side of the pit. He quickly blinked his eyes, gesturing that his father was not happy.
“Master, I only went up to check out the fengshui* of this grave location, it’s not because I’m weak.”
*[Fengshui = energy, which can indicate your luck or fortune. For instance, placing certain object in a certain direction to increase positivity, or the choice of your coloring, TN]
Jinxia said it with a happy face, covering her mouth and nose again with the handkerchief, in order to avoid the unpleasant smell. She helped Yang ChengWan take out a complete set of equipment for autopsies and patiently waited for him. The thing that confused her was that Lu Yi also stepped down into the pit, standing opposite from Yang ChengWan, without saying a word. It seemed that he wanted to observe Yang ChengWan perform the autopsy.
Was it because he didn’t trust the master?
If he didn’t believe in them, he could make JinYiWei do the autopsy instead, why didn’t he bring any subordinates along? She did not understand at all.
Small silver knives, silver shears, silver pliers, thick silver comb and a number of long and short silver needles. Jinxia followed Yang ChengWan’s orders and handed them one by one to him. Yang ChengWan rolled up his sleeves, then he began working in an orderly manner, starting from the head, then examining the mouth area, splitting open the corpse’s chest and abdomen, and also checking the internal organs, one after another.
The putrefaction smell almost made Jinxia faint, the uneasiness of her stomach was still there, her legs did not dare to move at all, as if they were nailed in one place. The same went for YangYue, who continued to hand the tools over to his father but was also monitoring his legs condition, worried that he could not stand for long.
The sky became cloudy, the wind kept blowing back and forth, then it started to rain a little and small drops of water fell on their robes.
The disease in Yang ChengWan’s leg was an old illness, if exposed to the cold and wetness from the rain, his legs would become painful from day to night and he wouldn’t be able to quickly recover. Jinxia nervously looked at YangYue. He, of course, was worried as well. Seeing that the autopsy was almost finished, he couldn’t stay quiet anymore: “Father, let me. You rest first.”
Yang ChengWan ignored him and continued working with his head down.
Jinxia turned her head to look at Lu Yi, hoping that he would say a few words but he was rather watching Yang ChengWan’s every movement while half of his robe was already wet. Jinxia pretended to cough, but even though she coughed a few times, Lu Yi didn’t even glance at her once. It was Yang ChengWan who immediately glared at her instead and so she stopped right away.
“Master, you’re so honest, you keep on following the orders of those who only know to take advantage of other people.” Jinxia, secretly feeling annoyed, could not think of any way to stop it. She stood closer to Yang ChengWan and tried to protect him from the wind and rain.
After another hour had passed and Yang ChengWan had even checked under his shoes, he finally put down his silver plier and respectfully faced Lu Yi: “Daren, the autopsy is finished.”
Lu Yi nodded, and said in a polite way: “Senior, you’ve worked hard.”
The injured leg could not stand for too long. After relaxing his body, Yang ChengWan felt a little unsteady, hence YangYue promptly catched him and helped him out of the pit so that he could rest. Then he gave his father a water bag to drink. As for Yang ChengWan’s current condition, he was looking way more tired than before, both sides of his forehead had turned pale and his injured leg was stretched out as straight as possible. YangYue crouched next to him, massaging his leg.
“It’s inconvenient to write anything here. After returning home, I will write an autopsy report for Daren.” Yang ChengWan saw Lu Yi walking towards him. He was about to greet him but Lu Yi pinned his shoulder down, so he sat down again.
“No need to hurry…Senior’s leg, when did it start hurting?”
After hearing that, Yang ChengWan was surprised, he thought that Lu Bing had already told his son about it.
Lu Yi carefully looked at Yang ChengWan’s expression, he pushed his bottom robe aside and half crouched, looked straight at Yang ChengWan and asked, “Senior?”
Yang ChengWan made a laugh, light like the wind and soft like a cloud: “I am a very fortunate person who entered the Administrative Prison and could still come out alive. It’s not a matter of hurting my leg.”
At the grave site, Jinxia was assigned with the duty of cleaning up everything. She finished rearranging the corpse’s clothings and closed the lid of the coffin. Seeing that there was no proper tool to use, she used a rock from the ground and knocked back the nails in the right spot, then she jumped out of the pit, took the shovel and filled the pit with soil.
Yang ChengWan went to Administrative Prison? What was he arrested for?
Lu Yi was stunned, his father never discussed this matter, he’d only said that Yang ChengWan was seriously injured while carrying out his duties and that since then, he’d resigned from JinYiWei.
What happened at that time?
Lu Yi muttered to himself, was about to open his mouth but he heard a person jumping toward them.
“Everything’s settled! Master, where are we going to eat?” Jinxia asked with a pity face, clapping her hands to get rid of the dirt.
This disciple! On regular days, she gets hungry easily. Especially now, when two hours of eating time have passed, she can’t help but complain about her hunger… While quietly sighing, Yang ChengWan, with the support of YangYue’s hands, stood up and looked at Jinxia: “What’s the rush? We have to follow Jingli Daren’s orders.”
Jinxia faced Lu Yi, while giggling and said: “Actually, I asked for Daren’s sake. Daren must be hungry, right?”
“Still good.” Lu Yi slowly said.
Although Jinxia bowed her head in respect, in her heart, she secretly thought: “Your whole body is made of ice, of course you don’t need to eat.”
Lu Yi waved his hand to call one of the prison officers to come and asked: “Is there any place to eat nearby? No need to be fancy, enough to fill the stomach is fine.”
The prison officer quickly replied: “In the south direction, in less than a mile, there are many ships passing by and several restaurants, it’s just that…”
“What’s wrong?”
“The port there is not a location owned by government officials, therefore there are many ordinary people, it’s a little bit crowded and the food is rough.”
“It’s just a matter of eating, no problem.”
It turned out to be true. After walking not too far, they had not yet arrived at the port but the noise of people could already be heard, together with the sounds of horse kicks and wheels turning: as busy as it is in a market and completely different from the mass grave site, which was a remote and quiet place. As they continued travelling for a while, a ferry could be seen, not far from a swamp where reeds were moving back and forth in the wind and light rain.
Jinxia, who was on a horse, tried to look far ahead, until the end of the swamp but it was not possible. She secretly sighed and thought that the authorities there had to be bad, if someone would hide in that swamp to kill a person, nobody would even know.
Although meal time had passed, several restaurants still had smoke coming out of their chimneys. The prison officials chose a restaurant, the condition was quite clean, then they led the group inside.
Lu Yi chose a table and sat down.
“We are just assistant police chiefs, it is not appropriate to sit at the same table with Daren, we better sit at another table.” Yang ChengWan said respectfully.
“Going out for work and duties together, there’s no need to pay attention to little things. Senior, please sit down.” Lu Yi stretched out his hand.
Only after Yang ChengWan sat down, Jinxia and YangYue sat down too.
“Try asking if they have hollow meatballs, which are wrapped in pork fat, you know…” Jinxia interrupted while sitting at the other side of the table with high spirit. The prison officials had just called the restaurant waiter.
Lu Yi glanced at her. After examining a corpse that was half rotted, she still had a good appetite.
“Master, what do you want to eat? Da Yang said that in Jiangnan… What was the name of the bamboo shoot, which was steamed with pork? It tastes really good, you should definitely eat it.” Jinxia turned to face YangYue, “Bamboo shoots, what’s the name?”
YangYue ignored her, turned to Yang ChengWan and said: “Father, I’ll go get a heating container so you could warm your feet.” He was worried that his father’s feet would be affected by the cold and he wouldn’t be able to sleep soundly at night.
The restaurant waiter was working at full speed. In a moment only, the food was neatly arranged on the table: steamed mutton, fish head with stewed tofu, grilled red meat… Everything looked really good, and the smell of thick soy sauce was flying in the air.
Pouring a little fish sauce onto the rice, Jinxia quickly ate a few spoonfuls. She raised her eyebrows as she glanced at Lu Yi who didn’t seem to have an appetite. She poked YangYue who was beside her, gesturing for him to take a look at Lu Yi.
“We’ve just examined the corpse that was half rotten anyway, it seems that only you have a good appetite.” YangYue responded to her saying that in a low voice.
“You and Master are fine.” Jinxia secretly glanced over at Lu Yi’s direction and intentionally raised her voice: “Do you remember last year’s fall at the old house in Chengnan? Someone had been dead there for more than a month and nobody knew it… There were so many maggots that they were even crawling outside. This time, compared to that time, it’s really nothing.”
Yang ChengWan raised his head and looked at her for a moment. Jinxia chuckled and said: “Master, you still remember? The corpse was so rotten that even the coroner wouldn’t dare to examine it. You finally had to help them and you had me and Da Yang pick up the maggots, one by one. It took us almost two hours and after we were finished, we couldn’t eat anything for three days.”
Lu Yi was still eating without any expression while the prison officer next to him could not listen to it any further.
“The maggots were covered in blood, all of them white and fat, slithering back and forth, looking like…” Jinxia paused for a moment, then pointed at the white rice and excitedly said: “Like the white rice soaked in this soup. Da Yang, the maggots we picked at that time could be estimated to be enough for four or five people to eat.”
Maybe these words were indeed too heartless. Everyone at the table immediately stopped their chopstick movements, including Yang ChengWan and YangYue.
Prison officer Zhou just put some rice into his mouth, then stopped right away and stared at his bowl of rice that was drizzled with fish sauce. He didn’t have an appetite to continue eating. He slowly put down his chopsticks and displayed an unpleasant look toward Lu Yi: “Jingli Daren, please continue to enjoy, I will go check if the horse has enough food or not.” After saying that, he immediately walked towards the exit.
After forcing himself to drink two spoonfuls of fresh fish sauce, Lu Yi looked at his bowl of rice for a moment then he sighed, put down his chopsticks and stood up, not forgetting to pay respect to Yang ChengWan, “Senior, please continue to enjoy.”
Not being afraid to hide her smile, Jinxia quickly looked down and concentrated on her food. With the corner of her eyes, she saw Lu Yi in the process to exit the restaurant, then she raised her head back up and her eyes met with YangYue’s.
“What are you looking at me for? Let’s eat, let’s eat.” She chuckled.
“Can you still eat?” YangYue angrily said. What he hated the most was ruining his appetite.
Jinxia looked down at her rice bowl soaked with fish sauce, looking sticky. She then remembered again the words she said before, feeling a little hesitant for a moment and finally realizing she didn’t have an appetite either.
Everyone at the table had stopped eating, with the exception of Yang ChengWan, whose behaviour was the same. He continued to eat his meal neither fast nor slow, as usual.
“I just wanted to make him feel disgusted,” Jinxia tried to explain, “Try to remember how he treated us on the ship, I almost lost my life.” Even though her neck wound was already healed, the irritation in her heart still couldn’t be removed.
“Kill the enemy a thousand times, sacrifice three thousand [1].” YangYue shook his head, he pointed at prison officer Zhou, him and her.
*[1 = In this situation, her aim was Lu Yi but ended up making everyone else sick, TN]
“Accident… accident…” Jinxia giggled, “Next time, it won’t be like that anymore.”
Yang ChengWan took a piece of vegetable, shaking his head and said, “Only a few words have already made you stop eating. If i knew this, I would make you eat three meals a day with the coroner in the Capital.”
Jinxia instantly stuck out her tongue, “I’ll go look for the waiter to see if they have any buns to eat.”
She quickly ran away.
Lu Yi looked at Zhou Xian’s rotten and swollen face, his eyes became heavy. After a moment, he ordered YangYue, “Take off his shoes.”
YangYue followed his orders, taking the shoes off the corpse. Although he was very careful, the body was so decomposed that some flesh attached to the footwears came off, the bones were exposed and blood flowed out.
Jinxia immediately felt an uneasiness in her stomach, so she quickly crawled out of the pit, taking off the handkerchief that covered her mouth and nose to breathe in some fresh air.
“Senior, sorry to bother you.” Lu Yi said with respect, turning to face Yang ChengWan.
“Dare not, this is my duty, Yang ChengWan’s duty.” Yang ChengWan promptly replied and limped to the edge of the pit.
YangYue, with no hesitation, held out his hand to help his father down . Since the smell was so strong, Yang ChengWan too used a handkerchief to cover his mouth and nose. Then he vehemently said: “Call Xia’er down here, if she can’t handle it, there’s no need to be a constable anymore.”
YangYue was about to open his mouth to shout but Jinxia had already come down from the other side of the pit. He quickly blinked his eyes, gesturing that his father was not happy.
“Master, I only went up to check out the fengshui* of this grave location, it’s not because I’m weak.”
*[Fengshui = energy, which can indicate your luck or fortune. For instance, placing certain object in a certain direction to increase positivity, or the choice of your coloring, TN]
Jinxia said it with a happy face, covering her mouth and nose again with the handkerchief, in order to avoid the unpleasant smell. She helped Yang ChengWan take out a complete set of equipment for autopsies and patiently waited for him. The thing that confused her was that Lu Yi also stepped down into the pit, standing opposite from Yang ChengWan, without saying a word. It seemed that he wanted to observe Yang ChengWan perform the autopsy.
Was it because he didn’t trust the master?
If he didn’t believe in them, he could make JinYiWei do the autopsy instead, why didn’t he bring any subordinates along? She did not understand at all.
Small silver knives, silver shears, silver pliers, thick silver comb and a number of long and short silver needles. Jinxia followed Yang ChengWan’s orders and handed them one by one to him. Yang ChengWan rolled up his sleeves, then he began working in an orderly manner, starting from the head, then examining the mouth area, splitting open the corpse’s chest and abdomen, and also checking the internal organs, one after another.
The putrefaction smell almost made Jinxia faint, the uneasiness of her stomach was still there, her legs did not dare to move at all, as if they were nailed in one place. The same went for YangYue, who continued to hand the tools over to his father but was also monitoring his legs condition, worried that he could not stand for long.
The sky became cloudy, the wind kept blowing back and forth, then it started to rain a little and small drops of water fell on their robes.
The disease in Yang ChengWan’s leg was an old illness, if exposed to the cold and wetness from the rain, his legs would become painful from day to night and he wouldn’t be able to quickly recover. Jinxia nervously looked at YangYue. He, of course, was worried as well. Seeing that the autopsy was almost finished, he couldn’t stay quiet anymore: “Father, let me. You rest first.”
Yang ChengWan ignored him and continued working with his head down.
Jinxia turned her head to look at Lu Yi, hoping that he would say a few words but he was rather watching Yang ChengWan’s every movement while half of his robe was already wet. Jinxia pretended to cough, but even though she coughed a few times, Lu Yi didn’t even glance at her once. It was Yang ChengWan who immediately glared at her instead and so she stopped right away.
“Master, you’re so honest, you keep on following the orders of those who only know to take advantage of other people.” Jinxia, secretly feeling annoyed, could not think of any way to stop it. She stood closer to Yang ChengWan and tried to protect him from the wind and rain.
After another hour had passed and Yang ChengWan had even checked under his shoes, he finally put down his silver plier and respectfully faced Lu Yi: “Daren, the autopsy is finished.”
Lu Yi nodded, and said in a polite way: “Senior, you’ve worked hard.”
The injured leg could not stand for too long. After relaxing his body, Yang ChengWan felt a little unsteady, hence YangYue promptly catched him and helped him out of the pit so that he could rest. Then he gave his father a water bag to drink. As for Yang ChengWan’s current condition, he was looking way more tired than before, both sides of his forehead had turned pale and his injured leg was stretched out as straight as possible. YangYue crouched next to him, massaging his leg.
“It’s inconvenient to write anything here. After returning home, I will write an autopsy report for Daren.” Yang ChengWan saw Lu Yi walking towards him. He was about to greet him but Lu Yi pinned his shoulder down, so he sat down again.
“No need to hurry…Senior’s leg, when did it start hurting?”
After hearing that, Yang ChengWan was surprised, he thought that Lu Bing had already told his son about it.
Lu Yi carefully looked at Yang ChengWan’s expression, he pushed his bottom robe aside and half crouched, looked straight at Yang ChengWan and asked, “Senior?”
Yang ChengWan made a laugh, light like the wind and soft like a cloud: “I am a very fortunate person who entered the Administrative Prison and could still come out alive. It’s not a matter of hurting my leg.”
At the grave site, Jinxia was assigned with the duty of cleaning up everything. She finished rearranging the corpse’s clothings and closed the lid of the coffin. Seeing that there was no proper tool to use, she used a rock from the ground and knocked back the nails in the right spot, then she jumped out of the pit, took the shovel and filled the pit with soil.
Yang ChengWan went to Administrative Prison? What was he arrested for?
Lu Yi was stunned, his father never discussed this matter, he’d only said that Yang ChengWan was seriously injured while carrying out his duties and that since then, he’d resigned from JinYiWei.
What happened at that time?
Lu Yi muttered to himself, was about to open his mouth but he heard a person jumping toward them.
“Everything’s settled! Master, where are we going to eat?” Jinxia asked with a pity face, clapping her hands to get rid of the dirt.
This disciple! On regular days, she gets hungry easily. Especially now, when two hours of eating time have passed, she can’t help but complain about her hunger… While quietly sighing, Yang ChengWan, with the support of YangYue’s hands, stood up and looked at Jinxia: “What’s the rush? We have to follow Jingli Daren’s orders.”
Jinxia faced Lu Yi, while giggling and said: “Actually, I asked for Daren’s sake. Daren must be hungry, right?”
“Still good.” Lu Yi slowly said.
Although Jinxia bowed her head in respect, in her heart, she secretly thought: “Your whole body is made of ice, of course you don’t need to eat.”
Lu Yi waved his hand to call one of the prison officers to come and asked: “Is there any place to eat nearby? No need to be fancy, enough to fill the stomach is fine.”
The prison officer quickly replied: “In the south direction, in less than a mile, there are many ships passing by and several restaurants, it’s just that…”
“What’s wrong?”
“The port there is not a location owned by government officials, therefore there are many ordinary people, it’s a little bit crowded and the food is rough.”
“It’s just a matter of eating, no problem.”
It turned out to be true. After walking not too far, they had not yet arrived at the port but the noise of people could already be heard, together with the sounds of horse kicks and wheels turning: as busy as it is in a market and completely different from the mass grave site, which was a remote and quiet place. As they continued travelling for a while, a ferry could be seen, not far from a swamp where reeds were moving back and forth in the wind and light rain.
Jinxia, who was on a horse, tried to look far ahead, until the end of the swamp but it was not possible. She secretly sighed and thought that the authorities there had to be bad, if someone would hide in that swamp to kill a person, nobody would even know.
Although meal time had passed, several restaurants still had smoke coming out of their chimneys. The prison officials chose a restaurant, the condition was quite clean, then they led the group inside.
Lu Yi chose a table and sat down.
“We are just assistant police chiefs, it is not appropriate to sit at the same table with Daren, we better sit at another table.” Yang ChengWan said respectfully.
“Going out for work and duties together, there’s no need to pay attention to little things. Senior, please sit down.” Lu Yi stretched out his hand.
Only after Yang ChengWan sat down, Jinxia and YangYue sat down too.
“Try asking if they have hollow meatballs, which are wrapped in pork fat, you know…” Jinxia interrupted while sitting at the other side of the table with high spirit. The prison officials had just called the restaurant waiter.
Lu Yi glanced at her. After examining a corpse that was half rotted, she still had a good appetite.
“Master, what do you want to eat? Da Yang said that in Jiangnan… What was the name of the bamboo shoot, which was steamed with pork? It tastes really good, you should definitely eat it.” Jinxia turned to face YangYue, “Bamboo shoots, what’s the name?”
YangYue ignored her, turned to Yang ChengWan and said: “Father, I’ll go get a heating container so you could warm your feet.” He was worried that his father’s feet would be affected by the cold and he wouldn’t be able to sleep soundly at night.
The restaurant waiter was working at full speed. In a moment only, the food was neatly arranged on the table: steamed mutton, fish head with stewed tofu, grilled red meat… Everything looked really good, and the smell of thick soy sauce was flying in the air.
Pouring a little fish sauce onto the rice, Jinxia quickly ate a few spoonfuls. She raised her eyebrows as she glanced at Lu Yi who didn’t seem to have an appetite. She poked YangYue who was beside her, gesturing for him to take a look at Lu Yi.
“We’ve just examined the corpse that was half rotten anyway, it seems that only you have a good appetite.” YangYue responded to her saying that in a low voice.
“You and Master are fine.” Jinxia secretly glanced over at Lu Yi’s direction and intentionally raised her voice: “Do you remember last year’s fall at the old house in Chengnan? Someone had been dead there for more than a month and nobody knew it… There were so many maggots that they were even crawling outside. This time, compared to that time, it’s really nothing.”
Yang ChengWan raised his head and looked at her for a moment. Jinxia chuckled and said: “Master, you still remember? The corpse was so rotten that even the coroner wouldn’t dare to examine it. You finally had to help them and you had me and Da Yang pick up the maggots, one by one. It took us almost two hours and after we were finished, we couldn’t eat anything for three days.”
Lu Yi was still eating without any expression while the prison officer next to him could not listen to it any further.
“The maggots were covered in blood, all of them white and fat, slithering back and forth, looking like…” Jinxia paused for a moment, then pointed at the white rice and excitedly said: “Like the white rice soaked in this soup. Da Yang, the maggots we picked at that time could be estimated to be enough for four or five people to eat.”
Maybe these words were indeed too heartless. Everyone at the table immediately stopped their chopstick movements, including Yang ChengWan and YangYue.
Prison officer Zhou just put some rice into his mouth, then stopped right away and stared at his bowl of rice that was drizzled with fish sauce. He didn’t have an appetite to continue eating. He slowly put down his chopsticks and displayed an unpleasant look toward Lu Yi: “Jingli Daren, please continue to enjoy, I will go check if the horse has enough food or not.” After saying that, he immediately walked towards the exit.
After forcing himself to drink two spoonfuls of fresh fish sauce, Lu Yi looked at his bowl of rice for a moment then he sighed, put down his chopsticks and stood up, not forgetting to pay respect to Yang ChengWan, “Senior, please continue to enjoy.”
Not being afraid to hide her smile, Jinxia quickly looked down and concentrated on her food. With the corner of her eyes, she saw Lu Yi in the process to exit the restaurant, then she raised her head back up and her eyes met with YangYue’s.
“What are you looking at me for? Let’s eat, let’s eat.” She chuckled.
“Can you still eat?” YangYue angrily said. What he hated the most was ruining his appetite.
Jinxia looked down at her rice bowl soaked with fish sauce, looking sticky. She then remembered again the words she said before, feeling a little hesitant for a moment and finally realizing she didn’t have an appetite either.
Everyone at the table had stopped eating, with the exception of Yang ChengWan, whose behaviour was the same. He continued to eat his meal neither fast nor slow, as usual.
“I just wanted to make him feel disgusted,” Jinxia tried to explain, “Try to remember how he treated us on the ship, I almost lost my life.” Even though her neck wound was already healed, the irritation in her heart still couldn’t be removed.
“Kill the enemy a thousand times, sacrifice three thousand [1].” YangYue shook his head, he pointed at prison officer Zhou, him and her.
*[1 = In this situation, her aim was Lu Yi but ended up making everyone else sick, TN]
“Accident… accident…” Jinxia giggled, “Next time, it won’t be like that anymore.”
Yang ChengWan took a piece of vegetable, shaking his head and said, “Only a few words have already made you stop eating. If i knew this, I would make you eat three meals a day with the coroner in the Capital.”
Jinxia instantly stuck out her tongue, “I’ll go look for the waiter to see if they have any buns to eat.”
She quickly ran away.
