Impératrice douairière Xiaoxuan

Chapitre 50

"Your Highness, this was discovered down below; it looks like there's a mine shaft." Wu Zichu handed the pickaxe to Ning Jin.

"A mine?!"

Ning Jin and Zhan Zhao's expressions immediately turned serious.

Zhan Zhao glanced at Mo Yan, who was listening to the news. Mo Yan helped Bai Yingyu sit down on the rock and turned to him, saying, "It was sealed up and abandoned many years ago."

"Is it an official mine or a private mine?"

"It doesn't look like a government-run mine."

The doubts in his mind grew larger and larger. Zhan Zhao propped himself up and said in a deep voice, "I'll go down and take a look."

Mo Yan hesitated for a moment, then looked him over and said, "It's just an abandoned mine, nothing special."

“I’ll go down too,” Ning Jin said.

The mine was pitch black. Wu Zichu lit a tinderbox and walked at the front, followed closely by Ning Jin, with Zhan Zhao and Mo Yan bringing up the rear. Mo Yan hadn't wanted to come in; she'd already sensed the dampness at the entrance, and given how long it'd been abandoned, she was sure it was teeming with snakes, insects, and rodents. But Wu Zichu was probably only concerned with Ning Jin; Zhan Zhao was injured, and she was worried about him, so she reluctantly followed.

After walking a short distance, the sound of rushing water could be heard... The ground underfoot gradually became wet. The mine sloped downwards, and the water level slowly rose, almost covering everyone's feet.

"Could this water be the spring that leads to Sanshuipu?" Ning Jin muttered to himself. "They were mining, but they accidentally struck a spring vein?"

What he said was exactly what Zhan Zhao was thinking.

"Your Highness, please be careful."

Wu Zichu suddenly stopped, his tone somewhat strange. At his feet lay several corpses, their tattered clothes revealing empty spaces beneath, their flesh long since devoured by rats and ants.

Ning Jin had never seen this before, and his stomach churned violently. He turned his head to the side and dry heaved.

"What is that?"

The cave was cramped, so Mo Yan stood on tiptoe, trying to peek over Zhan Zhao's shoulder. Before she could see anything, Zhan Zhao suddenly covered her eyes with his hand, and she heard him say softly, "Don't look."

Mo Yan suddenly understood what was ahead.

"I want to get out!" Her voice was low, with a hint of sobbing.

She longed to run out of the cave immediately, but she wondered if there were any more corpses lying in places she couldn't see. The thought that there might have been some on the way here made her legs go weak.

"I'll go out with you."

Zhan Zhao waited until she turned her back before releasing his hands from her eyes and instead taking her hand in his.

His hands were warm, the opposite of hers which were sweating profusely. Mo Yan steadied herself and followed him with great difficulty toward the door.

Ning Jin finally stopped vomiting, and when he turned around and saw that Zhan Zhao and Mo Yan had already left, he felt a pang of sadness: "That girl... Cat really cares about her."

Upon hearing this, Wu Zichu didn't know how to respond, so he could only look at him with a smile.

"What are you looking at me for!" Ning Jin glared. "Hurry up and see who these people are and why they died here!"

Wu Zichu squatted down and examined the clothes on the corpse. He hesitated and said, "They look like clothes worn by ordinary people."

"Are they miners?"

Ning Jin asked, his gaze wandering aimlessly, never looking down at the ground.

"Most likely."

A short while later, Zhan Zhao returned.

"What happened to that girl?" Ning Jin asked casually as he made room for him.

Zhan Zhao smiled slightly: "It's nothing, I was just feeling a little unwell." He then squatted down and carefully examined the remains.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Mo Yan leaped onto the slope as soon as she exited the cave, believing that the farther away from the corpses the better. Bai Yingyu noticed her pale face and asked curiously, "What happened?"

“There’s that…that corpse inside.” Mo Yan had barely uttered those two words when she felt a wave of nausea wash over her and couldn’t help but lean against a tree and vomit.

Bai Yingyu's face paled upon hearing this; the events of this trip were something she had never even imagined before. The saying "Home is best, even for a thousand days; but travel is difficult even for a single day" was absolutely true.

Before long, Zhan Zhao and the others returned. Ning Jin's face was pale and ashen, looking extremely unwell. Zhan Zhao had just examined the corpse; there were cracks in the ribs, clearly indicating murder. The decomposing body had polluted the water, which was from the spring that flowed into Sanshuipu.

"Your Highness, who opened this mine? And why was it abandoned?" Wu Zichu wondered.

"Isn't it obvious?" Ning Jin picked up the water pouch, seemingly wanting to hand it to Mo Yan who was still nauseous, but hesitated. Seeing Zhan Zhao step forward and pat her back, he turned away in annoyance and took a sip himself.

Wu Zichu was somewhat puzzled: "Is it obvious?"

Ning Jin did not answer, but turned to Bai Yingyu: "Miss Bai, do you still remember where your father was promoted to after his three-year term as county magistrate ended?"

Bai Yingyu was slightly taken aback: "My father was promoted to Vice Prefect of Mingzhou at that time."

“After one term as county magistrate, he can be directly promoted to sub-prefect.” Ning Jin chuckled twice. “He wasn’t appointed by the late emperor. For him to be promoted to sub-prefect, it would be absolutely impossible without spending money; and it would also be absolutely impossible without spending enough money.”

"Your Highness means..." Wu Zichu understood somewhat, "Bai Baozhen opened a mine privately in order to amass wealth."

Bai Yingyu's face flushed red, and she trembled with anger: "You... what makes you think this mine was opened by my father?"

Ning Jin glanced at her, unmoved, and asked indifferently, "If he didn't open it, how would he know to seal off the spring?"

Bai Yingyu was stunned by what he said. Back then, she was still young, and her father doted on her. She could never have imagined the extremely cruel things that had happened behind the scenes. At this moment, everyone's eyes were on her, as if she were being pricked by thorns. She stood blankly by the tree for a long time. After learning about her father's death, all the grievances that had accumulated in her heart surged up. Suddenly, she burst into tears and cried uncontrollably.

This startled everyone, who didn't know what to do.