Legend of Zhan Zhao

Chapter 87 The Most Thrilling Accusation

"Detective Zhan, what... what kind of joke are you making?"

When Zhao Wujiu destroyed the elixir, his expression was ferocious, but now it turned innocent and bewildered: "I am not even thirty years old yet. During the 'Ten Directions Ghost Clan' period, I was just a child. How could I be a 'ghost' within the Six Doors?"

"Who said that 'ghost' must be one of the 'Ten Directions Ghosts'? That's just a carefully crafted trick of yours to mislead people!"

Zhan Zhao said, "You actually revealed many flaws, but what's brilliant is that you made up for them all afterward, so that I had suspicions about you for a long time, but I could never pin the real suspicion on you. In the end, I had no choice but to lure the snake out of its hole!"

"Oh?"

Zhao Wujiu's expression turned indifferent, his eyes flashing with an unfathomable light: "Why don't you tell me, what flaws do I have?"

Zhan Zhao said, "The first significant point of suspicion is that on the morning of the day after Su Wuqing disappeared, Lian Caiyun and I went to the Six Doors headquarters to return the Panlong Silk. You shouldn't have said that you saw the two of us leaving Su Wuqing's room the night before last!"

"Why not?"

Zhao Wujiu frowned: "You were indeed in Su Wuqing's room, and then you left!"

"But how did you find out?"

Zhan Zhao said, "You did see us leave in the dark, and I didn't even notice. That would be impossible under normal circumstances."

"Because of the martial arts I practice, I am extremely sensitive to my surroundings. If you appear within my range where I can see you, I will definitely detect you..."

"Unless the strength you've demonstrated far surpasses that of Zhao Wujiu, whom I defeated in front of the Great Xiangguo Temple!"

"Oh, I see!"

Zhao Wujiu scoffed, "But isn't it normal for martial artists to have some trump cards? Like Jiewen's Tathagata Palm, or the finger strike you just made, neither of which have been shown yet, have they?"

"You're right."

Zhan Zhao agreed: "So even if your accusation directly led to a conflict within the Six Doors headquarters, I will only assume that you are hiding your true abilities and have cultivated other martial arts."

"Combined with what Princess Zhaoning said earlier, you, as the adopted son of the Eighth Prince, have been sowing discord and spreading rumors inside and outside the palace, causing discord between the Eighth Prince and his wife. I can only assume that you are two-faced and not a true gentleman."

Zhao Wujiu looked aggrieved: "But it was done by real 'ghosts'! They spread rumors just to make things uneasy inside and outside my Six Doors!"

Zhan Zhao said, "Your explanation is brilliant. For a brief moment, I actually believed it."

"Even if every time the Six Doors acted irrationally and impulsively, in retrospect, it was you who started it. You were even the one who brought Feng Buyu back to the Six Doors headquarters. But because Su Wuqing and Li Wuxing disappeared one after another, this case did involve the old master detective of the previous generation. You are impulsive and easily angered, so I didn't think too deeply about it."

"I even fell for your suggestion and considered why Lu Jiuyuan and Su Wuqing, with their wisdom, couldn't see through the fact that the Six Doors were hiding the Ten Directions Ghost Clan. Is it because the two of them are unclean themselves..."

"Believe for a short period of time?"

Zhao Wujiu narrowed his eyes: "So, you'll soon stop believing me? But just now you accused Lu Jiuyuan of being a 'ghost,' were you saying that on purpose?"

"Yes!"

Zhan Zhao nodded frankly: "If I didn't let you feel that your evil scheme had succeeded, you wouldn't be so eager to take me away alone, reveal your true colors, and prepare to kill me and then frame Lu Jiuyuan, right?"

At this point, his expression suddenly darkened, and he said, word by word, "Just like that day when you apologized to me, you seemed to return to the Six Doors headquarters, but in reality, you rushed ahead of me to the Xuanji Hall stronghold to ambush Elder Pei, and disguised yourself as 'Zhong Kui' to kill him!"

"This...this is outrageous!"

Zhao Wujiu shook his head repeatedly: "How could I have killed Elder Pei? I was with Detective Zhan the night Elder Pei was murdered!"

"Because you are truly bold and meticulous!"

Zhan Zhao said, "As soon as Elder Pei died, I suspected 'Zhong Kui' because I guarded him for three days. As a result, as soon as I went to the main office, the murderer appeared."

"If I wasn't Zhong Kui, whom you had arranged to meet beforehand, how did the murderer know that I left at that time?"

"The answer is simple. I met two people at the main headquarters: you and Zhou Wuxin!"

"And you correctly predicted that after giving me the wrong guidance, I would think about it on the way back, so my speed on the way back would definitely be relatively slower."

"In addition, the lightness skill you usually display is far from your true strength, which is why you dared to take advantage of the extremely tight time difference to kill and commit crimes before I returned!"

"You're using me as an alibi without even realizing it!"

Zhao Wujiu continued to shake his head: "Your deduction is wrong. If I really wanted to kill Pei Handeng like that, I would not only need to be fast with my lightness skill, but I would also need to prepare the 'Zhong Kui' robes and costumes in advance. You appeared by chance at the time, so how could I have had time for all of this?"

"There's enough time!"

Zhan Zhao said, "Because you were prepared long ago to kill Pei Handeng."

"Oh?"

Zhao Wujiu couldn't help but smile slightly: "But why would I kill Pei Handeng? He's a respected senior figure in our Six Doors!"

Zhan Zhao said, "I saw the motive on the spot. If the murderer of Pei Handeng was not 'Zhong Kui' who was afraid of exposing his identity, then the murderer's purpose must have been to make the Six Doors fight against 'Zhong Kui'."

"And when I mentioned that Lu Jiuyuan's coming out of seclusion was a warning to others, you realized that the time was ripe, so you chased after me, said those words to me first, and then immediately went to kill me."

"But you also made a fatal mistake during the crime!"

Zhao Wujiu asked in surprise, "What mistake?"

Zhan Zhao said, "You used Gu Lin's martial arts to perfectly frame 'Zhong Kui'!" Zhao Wujiu's gaze narrowed slightly: "Is that so?"

Zhan Zhao said, "At the time, I couldn't be sure if 'Zhong Kui' was the murderer, but since 'Zhong Kui' had fought with Shen Lan from Qi Yun, and I already knew that 'Zhong Kui' was Gu Lin, the senior brother of Qi Yun who had faked his death, I took the opportunity to question Shen Lan."

"Shen Lan's evasive behavior disappointed me greatly."

"Shen Lan, through martial arts, thought she had recognized 'Zhong Kui's' identity. While painfully trying to cover it up, she also misled me."

"At that time, I really thought that Gu Lin had started to use any means necessary to kill Elder Pei."

"Then it was really not worth it for Old Pei to die."

"To this day, the Six Doors, misled by the false information you deliberately released about Feng Buyu, still regard Madam Gu as 'Zhong Kui' (a legendary Chinese demon-monster).

"Gu Lin showed up without hesitation to clear his mother's name. I then used the boatman to test him and observe his behavior, which led me to deny the theory that 'Zhong Kui' was the murderer."

"Then here's the problem."

"If 'Zhong Kui' didn't kill Elder Pei, but the murderer used a martial art that could mislead his former junior brother Shen Lan, with whom he had spent every day, what does that mean?"

"Martial arts skills can be faked!"

“You shouldn’t have killed Pei Handeng, and you certainly shouldn’t have used Zhong Kui Gu Lin’s martial arts to kill Pei Handeng. This actually exposes a crucial clue—you can imitate other people’s martial arts!”

Zhao Wujiu clicked his tongue, his tone becoming sharp: "Nonsense! Pei Handeng was killed by Gu Lin! Detective Zhan, you can't cover up his crimes just because you have a good relationship with Yunqi Manor!"

"And it's not just martial arts!"

Zhan Zhao ignored him and continued the conversation: "There is another key figure, Feng Buyu!"

"The mastermind behind the poisoning incident at the Daxiangguo Temple's morning service was not only the one who instigated the crime, but also disguised himself as a merchant and gave Dingjue a hard-won, deadly poison, 'Corrosive Marrow Elixir'!"

Zhao Wujiu said, "More than twenty years ago, this poison was brought out by a traitorous disciple of the 'Five Immortals Sect.' After it spread to the martial arts world, it poisoned many chivalrous people who liked to drink. At that time, all the taverns were in a slump. Yi Feng, the 'Flying Swordsman' who was addicted to alcohol, was very dissatisfied and went to the 'Five Immortals Sect' to demand an explanation..."

"Perhaps Yi Feng left behind some 'rotten marrow nectar' back then."

At this point, Zhao Wujiu spread his palms: "Look, with the connection to the Celestial Immortal, it's not surprising at all that Yunqi Manor could obtain 'Corrupted Marrow Elixir'!"

Master Chih-Hong did indeed mention this old news after the incident.

Therefore, if we take Gu Lin, the "Zhong Kui," as the culprit of all the events, given the past relationship between the "Heart Swordsman" and the "Flying Swordsman," we can indeed trace the source of the poison back to this place.

Zhan Zhao asked, "What about the 'Soul-Running Moonlit Water' from the Blackwater Palace?"

Zhao Wujiu said, "I told you before, the Blackwater Palace's poison has spread widely. It's not surprising that Gu Lin could get his hands on 'Soul-Running Moon-Howling Water' while traveling around capturing the former 'Ten Directions Ghosts'. After all, those Zhong Kui paintings were also drawn with Liao Dynasty paper and pigments, weren't they?"

Zhan Zhao said, "One case is indeed true, but two highly poisonous items appearing together, why don't I give a more direct answer—the murderer comes from a martial arts sect specializing in highly poisonous substances?"

Zhao Wujiu chuckled: "It's fine if you think that way, but I still believe that the murderer is Gu Lin!"

"The key is not the poison, the key lies in the people!"

Zhan Zhao said in a deep voice: "Just as it wasn't 'Zhong Kui' Gu Lin who killed Pei Handeng, is it possible that the one who gave him the poison and instigated him to kill was not Feng Buyu, the deputy head of Xuanji Hall at all?"

Zhao Wujiu said, "If it wasn't Feng Buyu, then who was it? The person Dingjue saw was Feng Buyu! Otherwise, as a spy for the Xuanji Hall, he wouldn't have believed the other party's words, would he?"

"So it was you disguised as Feng Buyu!"

Zhan Zhao said, "You shouldn't have instigated Dingjue to commit the crime, and you certainly shouldn't have impersonated Feng Buyu to instigate Dingjue. This actually exposes another crucial clue—you can imitate other people's appearances!"

"However, this is not your mistake."

"You instigated the poisoning case during the morning class, which not only put the Six Doors in an even more dangerous situation, but you also originally planned to make Feng Buyu take the blame and become a 'ghost' within the Six Doors."

"So impersonating Feng Buyu might expose your identity, but you have no choice but to do it."

"Besides, under normal circumstances, even if others also come up with the above information and know that the murderer has these characteristics, they wouldn't suspect you for a while!"

Hearing this, Zhao Wujiu sighed: "Your words are getting more and more mysterious. I am one of the Four Great Constables, the head of the Wind Falcon Hall of the Six Doors! If I really did these things with all my heart, ruining the Six Doors to this extent, what good would it do me?"

"Of course there are benefits!"

Zhan Zhao said, "In fact, Princess Zhaoning had already given the relevant hints, but they were completely ignored."

"The point is not the rumor that you are the illegitimate son of the Eighth Prince, but something else."

"More than a year ago, when Liao spies stole secret reports, it was Zhao Wujiu, one of the Four Great Constables, who risked his life to penetrate deep into Liao territory, pursued them for thousands of miles, killed the Liao spies, and then fought his way back, preventing a major loss to the nation."

"Because of this, the Empress Dowager and the Emperor praised him countless times, which made Princess Zhaoning very angry. She told those around her that she was very unhappy with Zhao Wujiu's return."

"At the time, I thought it was just pointless jealousy, because the elders kept praising Zhao Wujiu, which aroused the dissatisfaction of this golden branch and jade leaf who was originally showered with love."

“Until recently, I guessed a possibility and realized that I had wronged Princess Zhaoning.”

Zhan Zhao stared at the person before him and uttered the most shocking accusation: "Zhao Wujiu, who fought his way back from the Liao Kingdom... is he still Zhao Wujiu?"

(End of this chapter)