The dead general was kidnapped by his husband and taken to farm.

Chapter 153 Investigation, the man behind the scenes

In the afternoon, the two went to the yamen again.

There were too many petitions submitted. Excluding some trivial matters that were handled by ordinary government offices, there were still many that were related to merchants in Qingping County.

The people cannot afford to offend him, so they can only rely on the county magistrate to seek justice for them.

Their case needs to be retried tomorrow, so the two are in no rush.

Let those people suffer a little more in prison so that they can learn a lesson.

The case came to an end in the afternoon. As soon as the two men walked out of the yamen, they were surrounded by several people.

The guards following behind him hurriedly stepped forward to stop the man from leaving.

"Please forgive my life, sir. I am still young and it was just an unintentional mistake. Whether you want money or something else, we can discuss it. I just ask you to give me a chance to correct my mistakes."

One of the middle-aged men ignored the guards' attempts to stop him and kept pushing closer to the two men, speaking in a pleading tone.

Jiang Shian looked in the direction of the voice, and after examining him for a while, he determined that this person was probably the father of the man named Wen Zhang.

The two men looked about 80% similar, but their eyes were both cloudy and calculating.

Ji Yinghuai stretched out his arm to stop Jiang Shian behind him.

He was worried that these people would get too excited and hurt him.

However, Jiang Shian's eyes fell on the person next to Wen Zhang's father.

There was a man standing next to him, with a number of servants following him. For some reason, Jiang Shian felt that this man looked familiar.

Jiang Shian narrowed his eyes. He looked to be in his fifties, with small eyes, a small nose, a big mouth, and a rather plump figure. His eyes were squeezed into a slit, and his smile gave people a malicious feeling.

He was dressed in a crimson robe with auspicious cloud patterns embroidered on the collar and cuffs with silk thread. Jiang Shian had heard Ji Yinghuai say before that this kind of silk thread was extremely expensive, and not to mention ordinary people, even wealthy merchants had to grit their teeth to afford it.

Jiang Shian had some more guesses about his identity.

The richest businessman in Qingping County is the Jiang family.

He also found the person who corresponded to this face from his memory.

Jiang Boyuan initially wanted to plead for his son, and the pleading expression on his face turned into shock.

He looked at Jiang Shian for a long time without coming back to his senses.

How could this be his foolish nephew?

Others didn't recognize it, but there was no way he could have been wrong.

He will probably remember this identical face until he dies.

He still remembers clearly that day when Jiang Shian fell in the snow and stared at him intently.

Jiang Shian didn't expect that in just half a year, his second uncle seemed like a different person.

As far as I remember, Master Jiang was of good appearance and good manners, and as his biological brother, he was naturally not much worse.

The man now, with a big belly and a face full of fat, is very different from the one in my memory.

Jiang Shian didn't intend to confront Jiang Boyuan directly, nor did he want to admit his identity at this time. He just treated Jiang Boyuan as a stranger and looked away.

There is a lot of time left, and he doesn't believe that he can't catch this old man.

Not to mention Ji Yinghuai, his face was full of disgust.

You have the nerve to come here to beg for mercy when you deserve it. If you had been more disciplined at home, you wouldn't have ended up like this.

If these people were in his military camp, they would have been kicked out with twenty military sticks for what they did.

Ying Mo took a step forward with a cold face and said in a cold voice: "You two worry too much. How to deal with this matter depends on the judgment of the county magistrate. We are both victims and related persons in the case. We will not get involved too much except to avoid suspicion. Instead of wasting time begging for mercy, you two should think about how many bad things you have done before and whether you can make up for it and reduce some of your guilt. Otherwise, the next time we see each other, it will be in prison."

When the people around heard this, they nodded in agreement. This was exactly the truth.

At the beginning, they were worried that the wealthy families in Qingping County were not short of money, and if gold, silver and treasures were delivered to their doorsteps, would they be left with nothing like before.

Look, the gentleman who came this time doesn't care about these things at all. He is also a prince of a country, how could he be short of money?

Ji Yinghuai's identity has been exposed, and the two of them appeared in court together.

Many people outside saw it, and now they are extremely eye-catching wherever they go.

It is impossible to go shopping like before.

Ji Yinghuai told Yingmo to book a room, and the two did not delay for too long on the street and went straight back to the inn.

Some of their belongings were left at the inn where they stayed before. Jiang Shian was too lazy to show up and asked other shadow guards to get them.

I had been thinking of finding out more news about the Jiang family through Shopkeeper Yu, but now things have changed and I don't need Shopkeeper Yu at all. If I go back, I'll have to listen to his false words of goodwill, which is really annoying.

After returning to the inn to wash up, everyone found a restaurant nearby and asked for a private room to sit down and talk.

In just two days, the shadow guards had found out a lot of information. What was certain was that the death of the original owner's father was closely related to Jiang Boyuan, and even the prefect Chen was involved.

The previous bandits disappeared overnight, and the shadow guards finally found some traces after searching for so long.

After dealing with Jiang Wenjing and Master Jiang, the gang disbanded on the spot. They all knew some martial arts and had originally planned to join the escort agency, but now all escort agencies needed to register with the government office. This would make it easier to find someone to take responsibility if the bodyguard ran away or something happened.

Fearing that they would be discovered, they decided to flee to several mountain strongholds and become bandits.

Those who become bandits have either done something bad or have killed people and can no longer make it.

Bandit dens naturally won't check identities. The more shameful things someone has done, the more welcome they are. Otherwise, they would worry that they are spies from the government.

There are quite a few cities, counties and hilltops connected to Qingping County, and there are more than a dozen bandit dens known to the government.

There were very few clues, and there was no evidence on Mr. Jiang's side, so no one could recognize the appearance of those bandits.

Jiang Wenjing left no one alive, and the people who robbed and killed him on the way also disappeared without a trace.

Jiang Shian asked Ji Yinghuai to help write a letter to see if Jiang Wenjing had any more clues.

They can only carefully investigate the time before and after to find out who was involved at that time.

Another thing is the collusion between Jiang Boyuan and Prefect Chen. Prefect Chen has no grudges against the Jiang family.

But he was a greedy man. He had concubines at home and mistresses outside. How could he live such a comfortable life with that little salary? Naturally, he needed money.

Needless to say, this is why he and Jiang Boyuan conspired.

Yingmo told Jiang Shian that they guessed these bandits were related to Prefect Chen and might have been hired by Prefect Chen.

According to the information they obtained from their investigation, the reason why Prefect Chen was able to reach his current position of prefect, in addition to the help from his wife's family, was that he had once participated in a bandit suppression operation. At that time, it seemed that people around him had sneaked into the mountain stronghold and passed on a lot of information, which enabled him to make a great contribution and was directly promoted to prefect.

Now it seems that the facts may not be just like this, but they still need to continue investigating the details.

The other party has done this matter very secretly, and it cannot be investigated overnight. Fortunately, they will have to stay in Qingping County for a long time, so they can investigate it slowly.

Jiang Shian nodded. It was impressive that he had found out so much in such a short time.

If he were to rely on himself, he might not be able to find out so much details.

Looking at the people sitting around the table next to him, Jiang Shian poured tea into his cup, stood up, and said gratefully: "Thank you all for your hard work these days. I will use tea instead of wine to toast all the brothers."

The shadow guards looked at each other and looked at Ji Yinghuai somewhat at a loss.

They were all secret guards trained since childhood and were used to doing these things. Apart from their masters saying thank you for their hard work after completing the task, no one had ever thanked them so solemnly.

This left them somewhat bewildered and they did not know how to respond.

Ji Yinghuai nodded to them slightly, and everyone picked up the wine cups on the table and said awkwardly: "Young Master, you are too polite. You are the master's man, and we should do all this."