Red Mansion: After being expelled from the family, I was granted the title of Marquis of Mobei

Chapter 95: Autumn wind sweeps fallen leaves, sign-in cools down
Jia Jue frowned and looked in the direction of the voice, only to see an old man dressed as a butler, about fifty years old, walking in quickly with an extremely angry look on his face.

Zhao Pan'er was stunned for a moment when she saw the person coming, and then hurriedly explained.

"Uncle De, you, you misunderstood. Why are you here? Didn't you accompany Ouyang to Beijing?"

The person who came was none other than Ouyang De, the old servant of the newly crowned top scholar Ouyang Xu.

After listening to Zhao Paner's explanation, Ouyang De said with an angry look on his face.

"If I hadn't come back quietly, I'm afraid I wouldn't have seen you, a whore, like this."

"How can you be so shameless and do this with another man? It's really immoral."

Just as Ouyang De was chattering away, Jia Jue gave him an impatient look, and then Jia Jue's personal soldier kicked Ouyang De in the chest, kicking him directly out of the teahouse and into the yard.

After experiencing takeoff, Ouyang De fell to the ground with a thud and fainted.

Zhao Pan'er was shocked when she saw this.

"Sir, you, me, him..."

Jia Jue waved his hand and said.

"Okay, what's this about you, me, and him? What I told you before, did you think I was lying to you?"

"Do you really think this old guy came back to announce good news?"

"You and I are just sitting here drinking tea in broad daylight, and we haven't done anything inappropriate."

"This old man came in and started talking without thinking. He's clearly trying to take advantage of the situation to cause trouble."

"Come on, tie this bastard to a tree and wake him up."

"promise."

At Jia Jue's command, Ouyang De was immediately tied to the tree.

Then the personal soldier poured a basin of cold water on Ouyang De. Ouyang De woke up with a start, feeling terrible pain in his chest and difficulty breathing.

When he realized that he was tied up, Ouyang De cursed in anger.

"Assholes, you're so bold that you actually dared to kidnap me. Do you know who my young master is?"

"Even the Yuhang prefect has to be respectful when meeting my young master. If you have the decency to do so, please let me go and kowtow to admit your mistakes, or you will be in big trouble."

Seeing that Ouyang De still dared to bark like a dog, Jia Jue said calmly.

"You still dare to shout? Fine, fine, I like people who are stubborn the most. Come, give him twenty lashes first."

"You, you dare, ouch."

Before Ouyang De could finish his words, the guards whipped him.

Zhao Pan'er, who was standing by, felt a little anxious when she saw this, but she didn't know what to do.

After finally meeting Ouyang De, she thought that she could finally get first-hand information and confirm her fiancé's situation and intentions.

As a result, Ouyang De came in and started talking nonsense, which directly offended Jia Jue. He really asked for trouble.

At this time, the sound of whips being swung could be heard in the yard. After being whipped seven or eight times, Ouyang De fainted from the pain.

Jia Jue's personal soldiers were also cruel enough. They splashed cold water on Ouyang De again to wake him up, and then continued to whip him.

After the twenty lashes, Ouyang De's attitude was obviously much better. He looked servile and fawning, and the arrogance he had at the beginning was gone.

Jia Jue looked at Ouyang De calmly and said.

"Old man, tell me now, what happened between Miss Zhao and me just now? What was wrong with it?"

Ouyang De quickly shook his head and said.

"No, nothing at all. I was just drinking tea. My eyes are dim and I spoke without thinking. I hope you will forgive me, please forgive me."

Jia Jue said disdainfully.

"Okay, now tell me who your son is."

Ouyang De said after hesitating for a moment.

"My son is Ouyang Xu, the third place winner in this year's imperial examination and the fiancé of Concubine Gao's niece, Miss Gao."

Jia Jue said calmly after hearing this.

"He's just a third place winner, and his official title is only the seventh rank. But you think you're a big shot just because you've curried favor with Empress Gao, right?"

"Looking at you, a wicked slave, I know that your master is not a good person either."

"I have to teach you a lesson on behalf of Madam Gao, you bastard, to prevent you from ruining Madam Gao's reputation. Come on, cripple this old man's legs."

Ouyang De broke out in a cold sweat when he heard this. He had originally wanted to take advantage of the power of others to intimidate others.

After all, in a place like Yuhang, the prefect is only a fourth-rank official, so moving out the imperial concubine would definitely be enough.

By then, this young man will definitely be scared to death and will have to apologize to me.

But Ouyang De never expected that his first attempt at showing off would fail miserably.

Seeing that Ouyang De's legs were in danger, Zhao Pan'er came to Jia Jue, bowed and said.

"Sir, may I ask you a few questions?"

"Then let your followers take action."

Jia Jue nodded slightly and said.

"Okay, go ahead and ask."

Zhao Pan'er looked at Jia Jue with gratitude, and then came to Ouyang De and looked at him with sharp eyes.

"Uncle De, you just said that Ouyang is the fiancé of Madam Gao's niece. What do you mean?"

Ouyang De felt a little guilty when he saw Zhao Pan'er's eyes, and spoke evasively.

"What else could it be? My son is talented and handsome. Miss Gao has taken a fancy to him and has already made a marriage contract with him."

Although I had received the news from Jia Jue in advance and was mentally prepared.

But when Zhao Pan'er heard this from Ouyang De, she couldn't help but feel a pang of pain in her heart.

She held back her tears and looked at Ouyang De and said.

"What about me? What am I?"

Ouyang De lowered his voice and said.

"Miss Zhao, don't you know your own identity?"

"My young master is now very successful, how can you be his match?"

"You've already found a lover, so why bother talking about this? I have fifty taels of gold in this bag, which is enough for you."

"If you continue to make trouble, what good will it do you if everyone knows that you were once a courtesan?"

Hearing this, Zhao Pan'er was extremely angry, but she didn't know what to do. She was so angry that she fainted.

Seeing this, Jia Jue immediately supported Zhao Pan'er and helped her sit on a chair in the teahouse.

As for Ouyang De, he felt a little uneasy when he saw the scene in front of him.

Just when he was worried about his situation, he saw Jia Jue looking at his personal guard and wiping his neck casually, and then two personal guards walked towards Ouyang De.

After dealing with Ouyang De, Zhao Pan'er woke up after a long time.

When Zhao Pan'er saw Jia Jue sitting not far away, she quickly recalled what had just happened and her heart was filled with inferiority.

Seeing this, Jia Jue said calmly.

"It's not your fault that you've fallen into low status."

"I've checked your information. When you were in Leying, you never sexually assaulted anyone. You're a clean person."

"After escaping from slavery and returning to good life, I also worked in a teahouse, a legitimate business." "For a woman to survive step by step in such a dangerous place and reach today is not easy. Why do you have to be so self-deprecating?"

Zhao Paner sighed and said.

"How could you possibly know the hidden pain in the hearts of women like us who have fallen into the lowly state of society?"

"In the eyes of the world, we are lowly people. Who would look up to us?"

Jia Jue said after leisurely drinking a sip of tea.

“It doesn’t matter whether others look down on you or not.”

"But if you look down on yourself, your life is doomed to be dull and bleak."

"You are a very good woman, beautiful and intelligent, but it's a pity that you met the wrong person."

"Well, now you should give up and wait patiently for me to enter the capital."

Zhao Pan'er felt mixed emotions. After nodding, only she knew the bitterness in it.

In the evening, at Yuhang Wharf, dozens of official ships had arrived at Yuhang.

At the dock, Marquis Zhongjing Shi Ding, wearing armor, saluted Jia Jue and said.

"My Lord, I am Shi Ding, the commander of the Jiangnan camp. I have been ordered to come here and will obey your orders."

"I am wearing armor, so please forgive me for not being able to give you the full respect."

Jia Jue said with a smile after helping Shi Ding up.

"Marquis Zhongjing, there's no need to be so formal. You've worked so hard marching day and night."

"Time is of the essence, so I won't be polite."

"You will immediately follow the previous plan and lead the soldiers of the Jiangnan Camp to take over the defense of Yuhang. I will personally lead 20,000 troops to the Ninghai Navy Camp."

"The general will obey the order."

With Jia Jue's military order issued, Yuhang was destined to have a sleepless night.

Because everything was arranged in advance, everything went very smoothly and all the criminals in the Maritime Customs and Yuhang Prefecture were caught in one fell swoop.

On the Ninghai Army side, Jia Jue also successfully seized the military power of the Ninghai Army, and General Ninghai became Jia Jue's prisoner.

In addition, more than 40 merchant ships that were smuggling goods into the country were seized at the Qiantang County wharf, and smuggled goods worth millions of taels of silver were confiscated.

That night, the entire Yuhang was filled with the sounds of arresting the families of criminal officials, and the people closed their doors and windows for fear of getting into trouble.

It was not until dawn that everything settled down.

Originally, the Supervisor of the Maritime Customs, General Ninghai, the Yuhang Prefect and others were still stubborn, saying that Jia Jue arrested people without any evidence.

However, in front of Zheng Qingtian's confession, these people finally broke down their psychological defenses. They burst into tears and begged Jia Jue to give them a chance.

They also knew that after embezzling such a huge amount of money, the fate that awaited their entire family would not be good, and exile of the entire family would be the best scenario.

After interrogating these leading officials, Jia Jue came to a shocking conclusion.

That is, the Yuhang prefect and others had no idea who the real mastermind behind the tariff case was.

Xiao Yuehou and Xiao Qinyan manipulated the tariff case by communicating directly with Zheng Qingtian, a small character.

It has to be said that Xiao Yuehou and Xiao Qinyan put a lot of effort into this matter.

After all, under normal circumstances, no matter who investigates the case, it is impossible to spend too much effort on Zheng Qingtian.

After all, according to normal thinking logic, people like the Yuhang prefect and the Ninghai general are the focus of investigating officials.

Zheng Qingtian only needs to tell them out, and he can buy a lot of time, allowing Xiao Qinyan and Xiao Yuehou to have time to deal with these things and erase his traces.

However, Xiao Qinyan and Marquis Xiaoyue did not expect that Emperor Yongping would play a trick of pretending to repair the plank road while secretly attacking Chencang.

Jia Jue came to Qiantang County quietly under the pretext of inspecting the navy in the south, and directly defeated Zheng Qingtian.

This resulted in Xiao Qinyan and Xiao Yuehou having their secrets exposed without them realizing it.

At this point, the tariff case is basically a done deal.

However, how to close the case is also a problem.

After some thought, Jia Jue decided to directly define the Yuhang prefect, the Maritime Customs and others as the main culprits in the customs case.

After all, whether it was Xiao Yuehou or Xiao Qinyan, if anything happened to either of them, it would cause a shock to the court and the country.

Jia Jue decided to keep the lid on this matter. As for how to deal with Xiao Yue Hou and Xiao Qinyan, let Emperor Yongping decide for himself.

Once the basic tone was set, things became much simpler.

Jia Jue wrote a report on the case in a fluent manner and had it sent to the capital city at an express speed of 800 miles.

After all this busy work, two days passed.

That afternoon, in the Ninghai Army camp, Jia Jue and Marquis Zhongjing Shi Ding were chatting leisurely.

Shi Ding looked at Jia Jue and said with shame.

"My Lord, as the commander-in-chief of the Jiangnan Camp, the Ninghai Army is also under my command."

"I never thought that something like this would happen to the Ninghai Navy. I truly feel ashamed of your Majesty's trust."

Jia Jue said after smiling slightly.

"Marquis Zhongjing, you are too kind. His Majesty still has great trust in you. Otherwise, His Majesty would not have given me the command of the Jiangnan Camp when I went south this time, and told me that if we needed to mobilize troops, we could just go to the Jiangnan Camp."

"It was certainly not your intention for Ning Haijun to have such an incident."

"And the Ninghai Navy isn't primarily responsible. The crux of the matter lies in the collusion between the Yuhang government and the Maritime Customs, which allowed merchant ships to pass through customs without authorization."

"Don't worry, I have already reported everything to Your Majesty in the memorial."

Hearing this, Shi Ding breathed a sigh of relief and quickly bowed before speaking.

"Thank you, Lord, for your kind words. I am deeply grateful."

"When the Marquis returns to the capital and passes through Jinling, please make sure to stop for two days so that I can show my appreciation."

Jia Jue said with a calm smile.

"Easy to say, easy to say."

"By the way, how is the Ning Navy's internal investigation going?"

Shi Ding said hurriedly.

"My Lord, I have already apprehended all officers and commanders in the Ninghai Navy who were involved in this case, and the internal rectification of the Ninghai Navy has been completed."

"My deputy commander will temporarily assume the position of commander-in-chief of the Ninghai Navy. I will ensure that no problems arise with the Ninghai Navy during this period and that it can hold out until His Majesty appoints a new candidate to take over smoothly."

Jia Jue nodded with satisfaction.

"Very good. Marquis Zhongjing is experienced and wise in his state affairs. No wonder he has earned the trust of His Majesty."

Shi Ding waved his hands repeatedly and said.

"I am only a little clever, but I cannot compare with the Marquis's fierce fighting on the battlefield. It is not worth mentioning."

After the two men boasted about their business dealings, Jia Jue asked Shi Ding to gather the troops from the Jiangnan camp.

As for Jia Jue, he returned to the general's tent and sat quietly on the main seat.

Half a year has passed since Jia Jue returned triumphantly to Beijing.

Just now, the military camp sign-in system that had been silent for a long time once again rang with the familiar gentle female voice in Jia Jue's mind.

"Ding, the sign-in cooldown period has ended. The host is detected to be in the Nanning Naval Camp in the Great Zhou Dynasty. The sign-in conditions are met. Would you like to sign in immediately?"

(End of this chapter)