The moment Village Chief Huang rushed out of the back door with the yellow-faced boy, he heard a horrified shout: "Shoot!"
With the sound of this shot, more than twenty crossbow arrows shot out, shrouding Village Chief Huang inside.
It has to be said that this Huang Village Chief is probably the most powerful among the Huangpis. Even though he was surrounded by crossbow arrows, he very decisively threw the yellow-faced boy in his hand forward. With a bang, he actually turned into A weasel, as big as a big dog, took advantage of the opportunity for the county soldiers to fire their crossbows, pierced left and right, and escaped from the encirclement.
The yellow-faced boy didn't even make a cry before he was hit in the chest by several crossbow arrows. In an instant, he turned into a weasel and fell to the ground.
"Let it run away! Chase it!"
Seeing this scene, Sun Bisheng couldn't help but feel angry, and immediately ordered the county soldiers to hunt down the yellow-skinned boy who turned into a village chief.
At this moment, a voice was heard from above the village: "Bold monster! Catch him quickly!"
In an instant, the yellow bird hanging over the village fell towards the ground. As it fell, the yellow bird grew larger and larger, and at the same time, blazing flames erupted from its body, turning into a fire bird. .
"Taoist priest! Even if I die, I will let you..."
The yellow leather man was locked by the fire bird, but he was hit by the fire bird before he could even utter the curse words.
There was a loud bang, and Huang Pizi was submerged in the flames of the violent explosion.
When the fire light dissipated, Sun Bisheng stepped forward and saw a charred weasel lying dying in the crater blasted on the ground.
Sun Bisheng didn't have any mercy at all. He stepped forward and stabbed him with a spear.
The weasel actually jumped up from the ground at this time, trying to escape.
Obviously, he was not directly killed by the fire bird, and he still breathed a sigh of relief. He originally planned to wait for Sun Bisheng to come forward to check, drag him into the water, and take him away in a wave. His death was not in vain.
But it happened that Sun Bisheng had been fighting in the northwest for a long time. He looked heroic on the surface, but in fact he was extremely cautious. He didn't give Huang Pizi a chance at all and just shot him.
Under such circumstances, it was naturally impossible for Huang Pizi to pretend to be dead and could only run for his life.
However, due to the previous firebird bombardment, Huang Pizi was severely injured. He tried to escape at this time, but it was too late. He was pierced by Sun Bisheng's spear in the air and killed on the spot!
By the time Fang Xiaoyue and the county magistrate Cui Changshou walked into Huang's house with the government servants, the fighting here was completely over.
Seeing this, Sun Bisheng hurriedly stepped forward and reported the results of the battle in an excited tone: "Reporting to Mr. Cui, a total of six yellow-skinned monsters were killed in this battle. One of the monsters turned into a village chief and gained a lot of people's wealth. Please come with me. .”
The two of them followed him to the Huang family warehouse.
There are two warehouses in the Huang family. The outermost warehouse is filled with rice, which is as much as two hundred stones, which is more than 20,000 kilograms of rice, about ten tons.
This is almost enough to feed a thousand people here for twenty days.
Of course, this little bit of rice is nothing, the key is the warehouse inside.
The warehouse inside was piled with bags of flour, but there was a whole world under the wooden boards below.
There were actually a pile of silver ingots, more than a dozen gold ingots and several boxes of old wild ginseng.
Seeing the silver and gold, Cui Changshou's eyes immediately lit up. He hurriedly took a few steps forward, grabbed a piece of silver and looked at the bottom of it.
Fang Xiaoyue naturally wouldn't think that Cui Changshou was blinded by money.
To say that the total value of these silver and gold is only two to three thousand taels of silver at most.
Even if he had to divide the spoils, Cui Changshou could only share 30% of the spoils.
After all, Sun Bisheng must be divided, Fang Xiaoyue is the judge and the initiator of this matter, and he also wants to be divided, as well as the county soldiers and government officials outside.
Therefore, Cui Changshou was definitely not excited about this little money, and Fang Xiaoyue followed him immediately.
Then he saw the words "Tongfeng County Treasury Silver" engraved on the bottom of the silver.
In an instant, Fang Xiaoyue understood.
This is the stolen treasury silver.
He remembered that just three years ago, a big incident occurred in Tongfeng County.
The tax money that was originally escorted to the provincial capital was stolen from the bank.
Even the most powerful headhunter only found a mouse hole in the bank.
As for the silver guards who guarded the bank, even though they were tortured, they did not admit that they had taken the tax money.
And no stolen tax money was found in their home.
Because of this incident, the then Tongfeng County Sheriff and a large number of officials were disgraced. Among them, Ambassador Cang, who was in charge of the bank, was imprisoned and questioned. In the end, he became the scapegoat for this incident. His home was confiscated and he was also exiled. Thousands of miles.
As for the county governor, because of this incident, he was deemed unfit for use by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, so his official career was interrupted and he was transferred to the bitterly cold northwest for appointment.
In fact, it is said that even His Majesty the Emperor heard about it.
In short, this eucalyptus was also full of weird legends among the people at that time, which added a lot of material for restaurant storytellers.
It is conceivable that if this case is broken, not only Cui Changshou, but also Sun Bisheng will make great contributions.
Apart from anything else, it is necessary to get an official promotion.
In fact, at this time, even Sun Bisheng reacted and looked at the four characters at the bottom of the silver with sharp eyes. He was probably already thinking about how to write a memorial to report his merits.
Then the three of them started discussing in the warehouse.
Fang Xiaoyue first expressed his position that this case was only solved by the county magistrate and the inspection team, so he was just following the others.
There is no doubt that Fang Xiaoyue's attitude of not taking any credit satisfied the two adults.
The two adults then had a heated discussion on this matter and finally reached an agreement.
Cui Changshou, as the county magistrate, strategized after receiving the report from Fang Juren, and Sun Bisheng, as the patrol inspector, also charged ahead.
Therefore, Cui Changshou takes 70% of the credit and Sun Bisheng takes 30%.
Fang Xiaoyue had no merit, but Cui Changshou would also secretly point out some of Fang Xiaoyue's advantages in the merit memorial.
If Fang Xiaoyue does not want to continue the imperial examination and wants to become an official at this time, then he must take some credit for this, and then when the Ministry of Personnel releases officials, he can leave a good vacancy.
For example, the teachings of the blessed land of the Central Plains or the county magistrate of a better place.
And if Fang Xiaoyue wants to continue the scientific examination, he will definitely not be able to take credit for this.
Otherwise, it will have an impact on his future career.
After all, officialdom is all about preconceived impressions.
If Fang Xiaoyue has made meritorious service in this case as a judge, then the officials will probably think that he can do it well.
When he is admitted to Jinshi and goes to Beijing for internship, he will most likely be assigned to the Ministry of Punishment.
It is even possible that when handling the big case, he, who is still a candidate, will be directly appointed as an official.
In that case, Fang Xiaoyue will be in a dilemma.
If you accept the award, you will lose the possibility of continuing the scientific examination.
But if you refuse to be granted an official position, it will leave a bad impression on the officials, which will be detrimental to the future.
Therefore, it was wise for Fang Xiaoyue to choose to take credit for her achievements at this time.
Not only will it avoid the trouble caused by this, but it will also win the friendship of Cui Changshou and Sun Bisheng.
Although after he was admitted to Jinshi, the friendship between the two was just like that.
But at least at this time, the friendship between these two people is still useful.
First of all, my home is in Kuangluo County, and my maternal grandfather, Butcher Zhang, is engaged in the butchering business in the county.
With the friendship between these two people, everything will go much smoother in all aspects.
After the three people agreed in this way, the silver and gold ingots unearthed from the granary must not be touched.
These silver and gold ingots will be turned over as evidence of stolen goods, along with Huang Pizi's corpse.
On the other hand, Cui Changshou made the decision for those boxes of old wild ginseng to Fang Xiaoyue.
Because these boxes of old wild ginseng were not on the stolen list, they should have been harvested by Huang Pizi in the mountains.
After this, Cui Changshou and others came to the entrance of the village. Upon seeing this, Taoist priest Qingyu stepped forward to say goodbye.
Fang Xiaoyue originally planned to take the other party back in a carriage, but was rejected by Taoist Master Qingyu.
After Taoist Master Qingyu left with the little Taoist boy, Cui Changshou immediately arranged for several arrests to accompany Sun Bisheng in the aftermath.
After all, the Huangpizi Temple must be torn down and destroyed, and the villagers of Huangjia Village must also be appeased to a certain extent.
After dealing with this, Cui Changshou got on the carriage with a smile and returned to the county town with Fang Xiaoyue.
Cui Changshou will naturally handle matters such as submitting memorials.
After sending the county magistrate back to the county government office, Fang Xiaoyue did not stay in the county seat anymore, but took a carriage straight back to Yangjiacun.
Calculating the time, there is not much time until I can take the test.
So after settling Huang Pizi's matter, within a week, Fang Xiaoyue said goodbye to her mother and took a carriage to prepare for Beijing.
There are two routes to Beijing.
One is to set off directly from Kuanglu County to the neighboring Heishan Province, and then follow the official road through several provinces to reach the capital.
This route is all overland and has the shortest distance.
The second is to go to the provincial capital, take a boat from the provincial capital pier, go down the Baishui River, and reach the capital all the way. The whole journey is by water, but the distance is longer.
But after thinking about it, Fang Xiaoyue decided to go to the provincial capital and take a boat to the capital.
The reason is that although the water route is longer, taking a boat is much more comfortable than taking a carriage all the way, and taking a boat can travel day and night, which saves a lot of time than traveling by day and sleeping overland at night.
But this time when he went to the capital, there was one more person beside him.
His cousin Zhang Yuanming.
This was something that his grandfather, Butcher Zhang, insisted on stuffing it next to him.
In Zhang Butcher's words, Zhang Yuanming is quite smart. It is better to be a book boy next to Fang Xiaoyue than to inherit the family business and be a butcher.
Besides, Fang Xiaoyue traveled thousands of miles to the capital alone, so Butcher Zhang was worried and asked Zhang Yuanming to follow him so that he could run an errand even if something happened.
Fang Xiaoyue naturally understood what Butcher Zhang meant.
Indeed, the profession of butcher was not a good job at this time.
If you can pass the Jinshi exam, you will definitely need capable people around you.
Instead of taking advantage of outsiders, it is better to choose your own cousin for such an opportunity.
In any case, the relationship between Zhang Yuanming and himself is pretty good.
Departing in the morning, Fang Xiaoyue's carriage arrived in the provincial capital the next afternoon.
Not long after taking Zhang Yuanming to stay in an inn, Qian Laipeng came to visit with gifts.
Even Fang Xiaoyue had to sigh, Qian Laipeng's information was really well-informed.
How long have you been in the provincial capital?
No, this should be the message from the coachman.
Of course, Fang Xiaoyue did not blame the coachman for this.
He didn't pay the other party's salary. The coachman's salary was paid by Qian Laipeng, and the coachman's family still worked in Qian Laipeng's shop.
In this way, he is actually just someone who borrowed money from Lai Peng.
After Qian Laipeng arrived, he didn't waste time. He just said that he heard that Fang Juren was going to the capital to take the exam. He happened to have some connections in the shipping company and helped book a boat so that Fang Juren could go to the capital to take the exam.
Fang Xiaoyue did not refuse, but accepted it calmly.
After all, he had benefited from Qian Laipeng a lot, but not once more.
The most important thing is that he was going to find the boat himself, and Qian Laipeng's relationship was undoubtedly more reliable.
You must know that these days, there are car and boat shops, and there is a saying that if you are not guilty, you should be killed.
Of course, this does not mean that all such people really deserve to die.
But this kind of people are cunning and cunning, often trapping good people, and they are the most tricky and difficult to deal with.
Take the boatmen for example. From time to time, there are boatmen who sail their boats to the middle of the river and take advantage of the passengers to be isolated and helpless, killing them and robbing their property.
Although Fang Xiaoyue is not afraid of this kind of thing, it is still good to avoid some accidents.
After all, his cousin Zhang Yuanming also went to Beijing with him this time. If something unexpected happened, it would be hard for him to explain himself back.
Qian Laipeng came here just to keep in touch with Fang Xiaoyue.
After all, the relationship between people needs to move. If you don't move, the relationship will become thin over time.
What's more, Qian Laipeng is very optimistic about Fang Xiaoyue and believes that his visit to Beijing will surely bring good news.
So after some pleasantries, Qian Laipeng left a banknote as Cheng Yi and left.
After staying one night in the provincial capital, Fang Xiaoyue took Zhang Yuanming to the dock early the next morning.
The coachman will not follow him to Beijing. He will stay in the provincial capital to reunite with his family.
When she arrived at the dock, Fang Xiaoyue came to a boat shop called Shunbo.
Qian Laipeng had already taken care of it before.
So as soon as Fang Xiaoyue reported her name, a pale-faced steward hurriedly invited him in.
After making some tea and entertaining him, they took him on board a passenger ship.
This passenger ship is not too small, but a flat-bottomed boat with about ten rooms for passengers to live on.
The ship owner is a black-faced man.
After the steward of Shunbo Shipping Company boarded the ship, he summoned the ship owner and gave him a few special instructions.
The general meaning is that Fang Xiaoyue is a distinguished guest of the boat company, so she must be treated well and cannot be neglected.
So the ship owner took Fang Xiaoyue to the best cabin, which had two beds and was relatively clean.
This already made Fang Xiaoyue very satisfied.
