Seventy-two, suspected of silencing one person

  "Wen Zhou's family has a niece, who is now at the prime age for marriage. They are currently selecting a talented young man from their province as her husband. Yu Youhu's heart was moved, and he was preparing to gather his gifts and go ask for her hand in marriage!"

  "What a heroic beauty!"

  "Exactly, exactly."

  In Wuwei Prefecture, a rumor suddenly arose, and the spreaders of the rumor were none other than the group of bailiffs, runners, and attendants who were colleagues of the prefectural judges.

  "This is strange, could it be that this Wen Prefecture judge wants to pretend to be serious?"

  Upon hearing the news, Jia Taiji felt a sense of wonder in his heart. In this officialdom, there were all sorts of strange and bizarre things happening. If Wen Zhou really changed his mind overnight and wanted to take Yu Guozhen as his son-in-law, he wouldn't find it too unexpected either.

  He was still following Yu Guozhen's orders, gathering information and sending back anything he thought was useful through the people Yu Guozhen had sent.

  Jia Taiji let out a sigh at this thought.

  Passing on the message was a dull and annoying task, he listlessly stood up, exchanged greetings with his classmates, and wandered out of the door.

  Walking through the streets, he came to a newly opened noodle shop in the south of the city. Sniffing the aroma of the big bowl of noodles, Jia Taigi couldn't get excited. He walked in: "Same as yesterday, give me a bowl of mutton noodles... put less chili peppers!"

  At this time, chili peppers had already been introduced to the Ming Dynasty, but when seasoning, Sichuan pepper was still used more often. Jia Taiji didn't like Sichuan pepper at all, but in order to pass on messages, he had to come and eat a bowl of Sichuan pepper mutton noodles every day.

  "Alright, come on in, Jia Du! Your old seat is still here, I've been keeping it for you!"

  Jia Taiji walked into the inner room and was stunned as soon as he reached the door: "Yu... Yu... How did you come here?"

  He saw Yu Guozhen eating mutton noodles and sweating profusely.

  "Sit down." Yu Guozhen said with a smile.

  "Yes, yes."

  "Eat."

  "Yes, yes."

  Jia Taigi was afraid of death, but that didn't mean he was a coward. However, when facing Yu Guozhen, he always felt a sense of being overwhelmed by a formidable enemy. Although the young man in front of him was at least one generation younger than him, he still didn't dare to breathe loudly and could only respond with a humble "yes".

  His opponent appeared here, making him feel sudden at the same time, and also felt a strange sense of danger.

  "These past few days you've done extremely well." Yu Guozhen finished a bowl of noodles, put down his chopsticks and smiled: "However, I still need more useful information, related to this Wen Zhou case. You must use your best efforts, don't lose out on your benefits."

  "Yes, yes."

  "So, we're off." Yu Guozhen called out as he walked away. After he left, Gao Erzhu from another table came over with a smile and nodded at Jia Taigong, saying: "From now on, I'll come to see you from time to time, please take care of me, Director Jia."

  "I don't dare, it's better for Second Brother to take care of Little Three."

  Jia Taiji smiled and said, "This is Gao's second son. He has known him for a long time. This guy is ruthless and doesn't bat an eye when killing people, just like his taciturn old man."

  Gao Erzhu smiled slightly, pursing his lips. He no longer had a tall stature, and in terms of appearance, he resembled his mother, the so-called "Mizhi's aunt", Gao Shuzi being from Mizhi, thus making him appear somewhat delicate and refined. When he smiled with pursed lips, Jia Taigong felt that his sharp eyes were like knives, as if they were scraping back and forth on his own body, sending chills down his spine.

  "It seems that my performance over the past few days has been satisfactory to Master Yu, and from now on, Senior Gao will be my direct superior... Ugh, I'm a proud man, but listening to Uncle Ma Ye's orders is still acceptable since he's really my superior, but now I have to listen to this arrogant little brat Senior Gao..."

  Jia Taigi was somewhat unwilling in his heart, although he was afraid of Er Zhu, but not really convinced by Er Zhu. If it were Gao Bu Ping who came, that would be slightly better, but Er Zhu was also more than ten years younger than him!

  Just then, Gao Er Zhu, who had originally gone out, suddenly turned his head back and smiled at him: "There is one thing to congratulate Jia Dou Tou on. It won't be long before Jia Dou Tou becomes the chief of the Wu Wei state."

  This remark left Jia Taigui stunned for a moment, feeling inexplicably puzzled. Currently, the head of the No-Action State's constabulary was indeed Ma Ye Shu, a man who could navigate with ease between the governor, vice-governor and state judge, and he himself was just a small-time constable under him; let alone taking his position, he couldn't even pose a threat to him.

  However, Gao Er's words seemed to have a deeper meaning, and Jia Taiji couldn't guess the reason behind them.

  He was at his wit's end, walking alone on the road, when suddenly a catcher came running in a flurry, and as soon as he saw him, he exclaimed: "Jia Taigi, how are you still here? Something has happened, something big has happened!"

  Jia Taiji's heart skipped a beat, he felt his mouth dry and tongue parched, it took him great effort to calm himself down before asking: "What's wrong?"

  "Rascal, rascal...... Hey, Old Rascal has really become a rascal this time." The catcher originally wanted to address him as "Uncle Ma" as before, but then thought that this person was already dead and had been burned with paper money, and could no longer act arrogant in front of himself. So "Rascal" immediately became "Old Rascal".

  "What, he...he...died?"

  "Right, Ma Zi finally died, damn it's evil, he originally didn't have a big capacity for liquor, yet he dared to drink so much and directly got drunk to death." Old Ma turned back into Ma Zi.

  "What?!"

  Jia Taigi had thought of many possible scenarios, but never the possibility of "drunken death". Ma Ye Shu was a man with a large capacity for liquor, how could he die from drunkenness!

  "What time did he die of intoxication?" Jia Taiji asked, his face changing color.

  "It was just a short while ago that his corpse had been sent to the barracks." The catcher smiled and said, "Don't you go take a look?"

  "Pshaw, what's so great about being dead?"

  Jia Taigi cursed a sentence, but his heart was jumping with excitement.

  "It won't be long before Jia Du becomes the chief of the Wuwei Prefecture."

  Gao Er Zhu's words echoed in his ears again, he felt a little disheartened and walked back towards his home, after a few steps, thinking it wasn't right, he turned around and rushed to the government office instead.

  "Old Jia, have you gone mad?" The yamen runner looked at him and cursed under his breath, but didn't hear any response from Jia Taiji. He rubbed his head in confusion: "What's wrong with Old Jia? Did he really go to see Mazi for the last time? I've never heard that Mazi took care of him, on the contrary, it was always some troublesome things that made him run around!"

  He felt something was wrong, so he followed Jia Taigi to the yamen. But Jia Taigi ran very fast and soon disappeared from sight. When he arrived at the yamen and asked, he learned that Jia Taigi had taken Lao Ya with him into the courtroom.

  When he followed him into the classroom, Lao Weng was saying in a low voice: "...so, I said, it must be death from drunkenness...hiss, people who die of drunkenness are not many, but also not few, every year I encounter two or three!"

  "Could it be... some kind of poison, with symptoms identical to death from intoxication?"

  "Hmph, yes, that kind of poison is called wine." The old doctor couldn't help but glance at Jia Taigong: "Wine is a poison that pierces the intestines, lust is a steel knife that scrapes the bones. Haven't you heard this saying?"

  Jia Taiji originally felt relieved, but after hearing the words behind his back, he suddenly slouched again, as if carrying a thousand-pound burden.

  The reason is simple, Ma Ye died... too normally.

  Jia Taigi can be certain that Ma Ye Shu died at the hands of Yu Guozhen, or at least was killed by someone sent by Yu Guozhen. But what method did Yu Guozhen use to make Ma Ye Shu die from drunkenness?

  The coroner has already said that there are no recent injuries on Uncle Ma Ye's body, nor is there any evidence of the internal injuries that these corrupt officials and police are experts at inflicting. In other words, Uncle Ma Ye willingly drank the wine and died from intoxication...

  Jia Taigi was worried at this time, not whether he could replace Ma Ye's position, but whether he would die of drunkenness like Ma Ye!

  "Yu Xiao Ye, what kind of method did he use to make this deadwood willingly drink himself to death... He was always extremely cautious when drinking before, although his capacity for liquor was vast, he rarely got drunk, even with the strongest wine, it would only be three bowls... Unless the person persuading him to drink was a high-ranking official like the prefect or the vice-prefect, could it be that... Prefect Zhang wanted to silence him?"

  It's no wonder that Jia Taigi suspected something was amiss, the matter was indeed too strange. He thought about it repeatedly and concluded that only Zhou Pan, his superior, would persuade him to drink excessively, and Ma Ye Shu couldn't refuse, otherwise how could things have turned out this way?

  Thinking of the recent rumors in the city, Jia Taigi stroked his chin and then shook his head. It's impossible. If the provincial judge wanted to silence someone, the first person he would look for would be Jia Taigi himself, not Ma Ye Shu!

  "Yu Xiao Ye... has a mysterious and unpredictable move!" Jia Tai Ji's body suddenly shook, and at this moment, excitement began to replace fear: "If he really has a way to make Ma Ye Shu that dead ghost drunk to death, then maybe I can really go to the ancestral tomb to burn incense sticks and become the chief catcher!"

  He was just an ordinary catcher, and it would be good to get 20 or 30 taels of silver a year. But if he got the position of general catcher, he might get 2,000 or 3,000 taels a year!

  Those with a slightly better heart only eat the plaintiff and defendant, while those with a blacker heart simply think that as long as there is no backing or connection, they can devour everything!

  As for listening to Yu Guozhen's orders... what a big deal, it's like being a prostitute, only idiots care whether the one riding on their back is a romantic scholar or an oil-selling youngster.

  "As long as I don't offend Master Yu and don't cross Second Brother Gao, I can keep this position of Head Catcher. With the support of the Yu family and those fierce Yu family guards at my disposal, what thief can't be caught? Moreover, Master Yu has always been generous, if I do things for him, naturally I won't lack rewards, didn't he just reward me with a boatload of plain cloth not long ago?"

  Thinking of this, Jia Taigi suddenly felt relieved and no longer worried about whether he would die from drunkenness. Instead, he looked forward to when he could truly become the head of the Wuwei State's capture team.

  Thank you

  Thanks to wood and bamboo, jbt308 for the reward, still asking for Sanjiang tickets.