The City of Marronligar

It is well known that when Marenliga first took shape, the most important buildings were closely related to the topography, especially the Pearl River, which cuts through the coastal plain and created a piece of fertile soil.The earliest buildings built on both sides of the Pearl River include the temple, Silver Bay Tower, City Hall and other public buildings known for their magnificence, as well as the dreaded prison.

The dark red brick wall and the iron thorns on the wall are reflected on the river surface, together with the cold and majestic statue of the Goddess of Conviction, the prison is surrounded by a murderous atmosphere.The aristocratic mansion on the other side of the river is a scene of wealth and tranquility, and the lines of the statues are also soft.

Pearl River is like this, its silent tolerance often reminds me of history itself.

——Miscellaneous Notes of Silver Bay Tower·Pearl River

"Our prison is really built in a good place. It is quiet and cool, with the Pearl River outside, and the prisoners can still hear the sound of water through the high walls when they are released."

When going down the steps, the dangling iron chain scraped across the brick surface, making a piercing sound.The high or low wailing and cursing of the prisoners echoed in the prison, mixed with the impatient reprimand of the jailer on duty.

"As for the death cell where you are squatting, there is no sound of water, but there is more or less humidity. There are only two walls and a layer of soil between the sewer and here."

The jailer escorted Louis, who was in shackles, through the cold and noisy corridor, and walked step by step to the underground death cell of Marenliga Prison.

The cold and thick iron bars were stained with rust, and the straw piled up on the wooden boards in the corner of the cell as a bed was also sticky and damp, not to mention the large rats running wildly across the bars.

"Hey, you really killed that governor?" The jailer escorting Louis was full of evil curiosity about this quiet prisoner. "Why are you so bold, you dare to attack Governor Morgis."

Louis glanced at the jailer lightly, and his tone was so calm that he didn't seem to be in a prison: "Why, you want to talk to me?"

The jailer spat on the ground: "Hehe, I'm not qualified to interrogate prisoners. You have committed such a serious crime, and it stands to reason that you should be executed immediately. But General Lucien didn't know what he was thinking. Make a decision. But it's a public execution anyway, and it depends on beheading or hanging. Hey, which do you prefer?"

He pushed Louis into the single cell at the end of the corridor, and connected the iron chains of the shackles to the iron rings fixed on the wall. The loud "click" sound of the lock coincided with the dripping water above his head.

Louis looked around, only to feel that the narrow single cell was extremely dark, only the torch in the corridor could cast a little light obliquely, and the other was the lifeless darkness.The space where he squatted when he was young was at least on the ground, and through the small window with iron bars, he could at least see a narrow sky.

The jailer walked out of the cell, locked the cell door again, twirled the key strung together with an iron ring with his index finger, and spoke condescendingly: "Fortunately, the female guard from the infantry battalion greeted me and said that she couldn't talk to me. You want money."

"Cynthia?"

"Well, that's the bitch." The jailer sniffed disdainfully. "According to our rules, even the ordinary prisoners above have to pay some 'care fees' sensibly, or they have to move their nests to a worse place."

Louis sat down slowly with his back against the old wall, stroking the cold and heavy iron chain like stroking a horse's mane, and sneered at himself, "I'm already in death row, so where can I go if the treatment is reduced?"

A death row inmate casually pointed out a logical loophole. The jailer was stunned for a moment, feeling as if his self-esteem had been hurt. He turned and left after cursing a few words in a low voice.

Yeah, how bad could it be?

When I was young, I was imprisoned because of a work dispute.A nobleman commissioned Louis to investigate his wife's cheating partner, but he didn't expect that the mysterious lover was a diplomat from a foreign country, and the scene was once ugly.

In order to protect his face and avoid offending the distinguished guests, the employer resolutely broke the contract and directly treated Louis as an abandoned son.After a while of chaos, the hired bounty hunter was instead thrown into prison for "burglary".If Samuel hadn't opened up the relationship and fished Louis out, he might have to suffer a little bit in prison.

Of course, the "murder of the governor of Marenliga" is not at all comparable to the theft that was accused of that year.The person who put Louis in prison this time was not thinking of quelling the dispute, but of killing him.

The strange thing is that the "evidence is solid", neither General Lucien nor the city hall has issued a death sentence for a long time, and only left the prisoner in the death row without seeing the sun.

There is neither special treatment nor torture, just hang him in the corner of the prison, and send people to interrogate him every few days, asking those repetitive and boring questions over and over again, as if trying to find some meanings from Louis's stereotyped answers. something special.

"How did you sneak into the governor's mansion, and what did you use to kill Governor Morgis?"

——I want to know too.

However, Louis answered eloquently: "I bribed the maid of the governor's mansion, obtained a uniform of the guards through her, and then found an opportunity to sneak in. As for the murder weapon... it was the dagger I carried with me, and I brought it home after committing the crime. The most important thing in my family is a knife, you can find any as evidence."

"Did you bring Mrs. Bella and his daughter out of the governor's mansion?"

——If this is the case, it would be great, and it can be regarded as doing a good deed for them, so that I don't always feel that I am helpless.

Louis actually replied, "Yes."

"Why did you take them away?"

— This answer is really hard to make up.

Louis reluctantly continued to lie for himself (and especially for Chu De): "It was to make two-handed preparations. If the matter was revealed in advance, and I was intercepted by the guards near the fire, I could use their whereabouts in exchange for my own life. I also threatened They said that if they dared to return to Marunliga, I would kill people to silence them."

The death row inmate repeats deliberately fabricated words in boredom, while the interrogator writes and draws on the paper blankly.

Out of kindness, Louis reminded him: "No matter how many times I ask, my answer is the same, so you don't have to record a new confession."

The other party raised his head, glanced at Louis contemptuously, and ended the interrogation without any new results.

Louis knew that these interrogators were sent by General Lucien.

The regional military leader seemed to have doubts about the truth of the case. Even though Louis himself had pleaded guilty, he persisted in organizing futile interrogations, trying to find more evidence, and at the same time trying to delay the execution.

The general will not shield anyone, will not show favoritism because Louis saved his life, and his current efforts are not all based on trust-there are too many strange things in this case, whether it is the disappearance of Mrs. Bella, Or Louis's too calm, almost death-seeking attitude, all hinting at the whirlpool hidden under the surface.

But procrastination is not an option.

After that search and arrest, the news of "caught the real culprit" has spread among the people, and the rumors related to Louis have become the most fashionable topic in the streets and alleys, and many people have already begun to arrange the grievances between him and the Governor's Mansion. Enmity.

Not to mention pressure from City Hall.Lucien knew that most of the merchants in Marenlica had shallow or deep business ties with Morgis. The death of Morgis would cut off part of the chain of interest.The anger brought about by the economic loss turned into hatred and was poured on the murderer.

If Louis insisted on not retracting his confession, and there was no evidence to clear his suspicion, he would "only" be sent to the execution ground for killing Governor Morgis.

Finally, nearly a month after Louis was imprisoned, General Lucien came to the death row in the basement of the prison.

The smell of stalks rotting in the sewage hits the face, and every breath of wind passing through the corridor is stuffy and cold, soaked in the breath of sin and death.

Just like every interrogation in the past, Louis sat on the floor against the damp brick wall, with heavy iron chains hanging on his legs, and the rust water seeped into the straw that made the bed little by little.

Lucien was sitting near the cell door, watching Louis' silhouette half-hidden in the darkness by the light of the torch in the corridor.The fire burned off Lucien's beard, hair and eyebrows, and left a terrible scar on his face.

The general sighed slowly and asked, "The jailers didn't make things difficult for you, did they?"

Louis in the shadow gave a short laugh: "Thanks to you and Cynthia, they treated me well, they didn't beat or scold me, they didn't withhold food, and they even saw some meat every now and then. As a death row prisoner, this treatment is not bad gone."

Lucien nodded stiffly.

Louis really didn't seem to care whether he was executed or not, or the murder of the governor itself.Lucien couldn't help feeling puzzled: Could it be that this man has no nostalgia for the world?

Lucien said again: "Adrian of the Torresso family has approached me more than once, and also approached other people in the city hall, saying that you did not kill anyone."

"..."

"But I haven't seen him for more than half a month. I heard that Mrs. Sophia didn't let him show up everywhere. However, she also asked me to handle your matter carefully. Don't forget that there is still the important task of hunting down the Kurmans. .”

Louis' expression seemed to change slightly.But in the mud-like darkness, Lucien couldn't see his face clearly, and he was too helpless to persuade him.

General Lucien then asked Louis some more questions—cliché questions that were repeated every few days by different interrogators.

Louis' answer was the same as in the past, and he didn't even bother to change his grammar and sentence structure.

The general let out a barely audible sigh again, making him look a few years older.Immediately afterwards, he said suddenly, "Louis, I brought a person and I want you to meet him."

He raised his hand, beckoning to the jailer waiting in the corridor.The two guards immediately understood and brought a man who was not short and wearing a prison uniform into the cell.

The prisoner was unkempt, with a lot of dust on his face, but after wiping his face and shining it with the torch, he could still see his face clearly.

Pointing at the prisoner, Lucien said to Louis: "After you killed Governor Morgis, you temporarily hired a coachman to take Mrs. Bella and her daughter to the mouth of the Mount River. We also captured this coachman. Take a closer look, is it this person?"

Of course Louis didn't know any coachman.He made a gesture of recalling that strange face, and replied ambiguously: "It's probably him, very similar."

Lucien's breath paused.

"Ugh……"

This was the third time Lucien sighed after he entered the death cell, feeling as if all the air in his chest had been squeezed out.He waved his hand, and the jailer led the strange prisoner out of the cubicle.

"The one just now was not a coachman, but my bodyguard."

"..." Louis also froze.

"And they're not alike at all."

Realizing that he had been tricked by Lucien, Louis couldn't help but shook his head and smiled wryly, but still didn't say anything.

General Lucien looked serious and said in a low voice, "Louis, you are not a murderer."

Louis retorted lightly: "No, I am."

"You even mistook the coachman you hired."

"It was too dark that night, so I couldn't see clearly. And I've never been good at remembering people's faces. After such a long time, it's normal to make mistakes."

Lucien knew that Louis was determined to take on this case of murder and arson, but the motivation he described was still the greed that could not be put on the table like "seeking property".

Countless questions circled in the general's mind like a flock of birds: "Why?"

Louis asked back, "What do you mean?"

It was difficult for Lucien to say something like this: "If you insist on this 'truth'... we can only regard you as the real murderer and execute you. The execution ground will be set in the center of the city of Marenliga, and all citizens will listen Upon receiving this news, the heavy charges will make everything you once owned disappear in smoke."

No matter what happened in the past, when the din of the execution ground died down, he would be remembered only for murdering the governor of Marenliga.

Louis pressed the back of his head against the hard wall, and let out a bitter dry laugh in his throat: "But Maren Liga needs a real murderer, doesn't he?"

He looked at Lucien, and there was a bit of sympathy for each other: "General, it is not easy to protect Maren Liga."

Lucien nodded with complicated emotions: "I have realized it a long time ago."

When watching General Lucien leave, Louis rarely used the most serious tone in recent days: "Please remember, beware of us bounty hunters."

Not long after Lucien left, it was Chu De who came to visit the prison with food and drink.

Ignoring Louis' sharp falcon-like eyes, Trud nonchalantly placed the plated meat and vegetables in the basket, a jug of mead and two wine glasses in front of Louis.

He filled two glasses of wine gracefully, drank his own first, and handed the other glass to Louis: "Drink, I didn't poison you." The dangerous smile and the time when he was on the fire boat exactly the same.

Louis looked at Chu De expressionlessly, only looking away briefly as he drank the glass of wine.

After drinking a glass, Louis patted down the wine glass again, and the chains of shackles and chains that were piled up made another sound: "Buy the witnesses and painters, prepare to plant the evidence, and use the power of the city hall to put pressure on the general... see now You should be very happy with this result."

Louis guessed that perhaps Trud had already thought of this step when he burned the physical evidence related to the slave ship incident in exchange for Adrian's life.

Chu De raised his eyes and smiled, showing a bit of innocence to the extreme, "Mrs. Sophia seems to have locked the young master you miss in the mansion to prevent him from running around. His room is fine. Even in the aristocratic district, is it considered high-class? Because of you, he didn't even bother to change the water in the vase, and was always fascinated by the light crossbow you gave him."

Louis clenched his fists.If he hadn't been trapped by the iron chain, he would have picked up Chu De's collar and asked him what he wanted to do.

"Madame Sophia is also in a hurry. On the one hand, the case of the governor's killing, on the other hand, the catastrophe, and the nephew's emotions... But Adrian seems to have seen it, and the lady agreed to let him take his entourage out of the mansion. Ah, it turns out that the Torresso family prefers spicy food, is this the flavor of Heshan Manor?"

It seems that Chu De's eyes and ears have penetrated into the Feishi mansion and sneaked to Adrian's side.

The Torresso family was quite proud of their exclusivity, but most of the servants of the Flying Lion Mansion were local civilians hired in Maren Liga, and it was not uncommon for them to be bought by Chu De.

There is no doubt that Chu De is once again using Adrian as a bargaining chip, warning Louis: Don't do unnecessary things.And that was the person Louis cared about the most, maybe the only one he cared about right now.

Chu De couldn't help sighing: "If it was you in the past..."

"Don't mention it to me." Louis interrupted Chu De roughly. "If you're satisfied enough with what you're seeing now, quickly take your hand away from Adrian."

"Don't worry, I will."

Louis' throat moved, and his hoarse voice was full of exhaustion: "Why do you hate me so much?"

Chu De turned his back to Louis and smiled lowly: "That's a feeling you'll never want to understand."

Author has something to say: The Black Walz - Marvin Kopp