Chapter 464: Infiltration

The group entered the ice cellar of the Dali Temple.

Faint white mist began to emerge from between their mouths and noses.

At this time, it was already autumn, and the temperature in the ice cellar was frighteningly low; however, these people all possessed cultivation, so the surrounding cold air could hardly invade their bodies, and only the moisture in their breath would turn into mist upon meeting the cold.

This ice cellar was originally used by the Dali Temple to store corpses, and within the enclosed space, the stench of corpses lingered for a long time, as thick as if it could not be dissolved.

Ge Hengtai personally led the eccentric old man surnamed Guo to a corner of the ice cellar.

He pulled out the Fire Folder he carried with him and lit a Candle Lamp on the stone wall; in the cold air, the candlelight shivered like a flickering eye.

They saw that not far away, on the ground illuminated by the candlelight, sat a rectangular Wooden Box.

The Wooden Box was slightly longer than a human body, but it looked nothing like a coffin, because the Wooden Box was flatter, not even one-third the height of a coffin.

Ge Hengtai pointed at the Wooden Box and said to the old man surnamed Guo, "It is right there!"

The old man's eyes moved, and carrying his pitch-black iron box on his back, he walked over.

Jiang Zhe, Lu Geng, and Yang Yi stood not far away, all staring intently at the flat Wooden Box placed on the ground.

The old man walked to the box, set down his black iron box, and opened the lid of the Wooden Box; immediately, his aged, turbid eyes twitched, for inside the Wooden Box was nothing but a pile of rotting flesh, barely distinguishable into upper body, lower body, and head.

After opening the lid, a thick stench choked the old man, causing him to cough a few times.

But after the three coughs of "cough, cough, cough," the old man had already completely calmed down; he fished out a key, opened the black iron box at his feet, and took out a pair of small tweezers.

Jiang Zhe, Lu Geng, and Yang Yi were standing not far away, and with the flat Wooden Box placed on the ground, the position where they stood allowed them to see the contents of the Wooden Box quite clearly.

Under the dim candlelight, it was clearly a pile of rotting flesh inside...

Not long after the Wooden Box was opened, the surrounding stench of corpses seemed to grow even thicker; Yang Yi was fine, but Jiang Zhe and Lu Geng both felt somewhat nauseated and had already used their internal energy to enter a state of breath-holding.

The old man half-squatted there, fiddling back and forth between the Wooden Box and his black iron box...

He used the tweezers to extract some rotting flesh from the Wooden Box, placed it into a bowl of amber liquid, and observed the changes in the rotting flesh.

After a few breaths, a flash of doubt crossed the old man's eyes.

He fished a brown Porcelain Bottle out of the black iron box, sprinkled some Medicine Powder into the bowl containing the rotting flesh, and observed it again, finding that there was still no reaction.

The old man used the tweezers to extract bits of flesh from various parts of the pile of rotting flesh in the Wooden Box and threw them into the bowl...

In the blink of an eye, about the time it takes for an incense stick to burn had passed, and the old man was still squatting there, busy; however, fine sweat had already begun to bead on his forehead, which had several worry lines.

Jiang Zhe's expression, which had been calm at the start, slowly began to turn somewhat anxious.

He remembered the old man saying that if it were fast, he could have results in a moment.

Jiang Zhe hesitated for a moment, then paced over, leaned in, and asked in a low voice, "Pharmacist Guo, how is it? Have you made any discoveries?"

The old man was clutching a cyan Porcelain Bottle; seeing Jiang Zhe speak, he turned his head, glared at him, and said coldly, "Why don't you do it yourself?"

The muscles on Jiang Zhe's face twitched, and he retreated in some embarrassment.

After Jiang Zhe retreated, the disgust in the old man's eyes dissipated and he returned to calm; he slowly unscrewed the stopper of the cyan Porcelain Bottle in his hand and poured a cyan-black liquid into the bowl before him.

As the liquid entered the bowl, a wisp of faint cyan smoke immediately drifted up from the rim of the bowl and dissipated in curling wisps...

Jiang Zhe and Lu Geng were in a state of breath-holding and did not smell it, but Yang Yi caught a whiff of a thick fragrance, and his nose twitched. The fragrance was a strange scent, a mix of rich floral notes and the smell of meat.

"This fragrance has no toxicity, but it has a certain hallucinogenic effect; do not inhale too much!"

The old man's aged voice suddenly rang out in the dim, cold, and eerie ice cellar; Yang Yi could not help but tremble, and he immediately entered a state of breath-holding as well.

Time passed bit by bit, and Jiang Zhe grew increasingly impatient, but he did not go to ask the old man again, though he could not help but pace back and forth in the silent space.

His restless footsteps echoed back and forth in this eerie environment like a ghost messenger from hell.

Jiang Zhe suddenly stopped, stared at Liu Shushan who was standing behind the others, and asked, "Shushan, how much time has passed?"

Liu Shushan was startled, glanced at the old man who was still squatting before the Wooden Box, and said, "Senior Brother, I estimate it has been about an hour..."

Just then, the old man suddenly stood up, let out a long sigh, and used an old towel to wipe the fine sweat from his forehead.

As soon as Jiang Zhe saw the old man stand up, he immediately leaned in again and tentatively asked, "Pharmacist Guo, are there results?"

"Mm, there are results," the old man replied, putting down the towel.

"How is it?" As Jiang Zhe asked the old man, he subconsciously glanced at Lu Geng not far away.

The old man answered in a hoarse voice, "He was not poisoned!"

"What?!" Jiang Zhe thought he had misheard.

The old man said again, clearly, "Li Shensi was not poisoned!"

A faint smile appeared on Lu Geng's face; at that moment, Duan Rong's determined gaze flashed through his mind, and he thought to himself: This kid really has some tricks up his sleeve.

"You wouldn't be mistaken, would you?" Because of his shock, Jiang Zhe's voice was clearly several decibels higher.

His mission in coming here was to pin the blame on Duan Rong and implicate Zhu He, but the premise of all this was that Li Shensi had died of poisoning! On this point, when discussing matters at Qingling Peak, Ge Rusong and the others had spoken with absolute certainty and were very sure of it.

Influenced by this, Jiang Zhe had almost taken it as fact, but now that he was being slapped in the face in public, he was indeed unable to react for a moment.

The old man snorted coldly, glanced at Jiang Zhe with contempt, and said, "This old man's work is done; I shall take my leave!"

After the old man finished speaking, he shouldered his black iron box and strode away.

"You..." Jiang Zhe looked at the old man's back, feeling a surge of frustration.

But he quickly calmed down; this Pharmacist Guo was a person personally selected and sent by Elder Sun Fuga of the Medicine Pavilion, so there could absolutely be no mistake—which meant that this corpse had indeed not been poisoned.

Jiang Zhe looked at the Wooden Box not far away, his eyes flickering; suddenly he turned his head to look at Ge Hengtai and asked in a deep voice, "Officer Ge, can it be confirmed that this corpse is the body of Li Shensi?"

Ge Hengtai had also heard the words of the Pharmacist surnamed Guo just now, and his own expression was not very good; hearing Jiang Zhe ask him, he immediately cupped his hands and replied, "Reporting to you, sir, this subordinate has sent trusted men to guard this place day and night. This is indeed the body of Li Shensi!"

"This..." Jiang Zhe turned his head to look at the pile of rotting flesh in the Wooden Box again and immediately fell into a state of disarray...

"Since it is the body of Li Shensi, why did the examination show no poison?"

At this moment, Jiang Zhe was truly at a loss.

If Li Shensi had not been poisoned, not only would he not know how to proceed with the judgment of this case, but even the trouble Ge Rusong and the others were stirring up in the Elder Council now looked like a joke.

Could it be that they had been wrong from the very beginning?!

Duan Rong was sitting by a window on the second floor of a teahouse.

From here, he could see the main gate of the Privy Council.

While sipping clear tea, Duan Rong would occasionally glance at the main gate of the Privy Council diagonally across from him.

Before long, he saw a slender figure step out of the Privy Council's main gate, stretch beside a tall stone lion, and only then walk slowly down the stone steps.

This person was none other than the Secretariat Commissioner of the Privy Council, Zhu Peng.

Watching Zhu Peng emerge, Duan Rong smiled slightly, placed a piece of broken silver on the table, and rose to head downstairs.

He had come here specifically to wait for Zhu Peng.

He had reckoned that this kid would absolutely not be working diligently in the Ya Men; once he had checked in, he would surely run off.

As Zhu Peng walked down the stone steps, a minor official from the Privy Council had already led his horse over from the side gate; Zhu Peng mounted his steed, waved his hand at the official, and then, with eyes half-closed, sat on the horse and swayed along the street.

When Zhu Peng reached the shade of a tree at the street corner, a person suddenly flashed out from behind the large tree, giving Zhu Peng a start. But when he looked closely, it was Duan Rong.

Pulling on the reins while on horseback, Zhu Peng laughed, "Aren't you staying at my Seventh Uncle's Separate Courtyard? Why have you suddenly popped up here?"

Ever since Duan Rong had been staying at Zhu Zhengfu's Separate Courtyard, Zhu Peng had not visited him once; it wasn't that he didn't want to see Duan Rong—truth be told, his several interactions with Duan Rong had all been quite pleasant.

He just didn't want to step foot in Zhu Zhengfu's house again!

Standing under the tree with his hands behind his back, Duan Rong smiled faintly, "I am here, of course, to wait for you."

"Wait for me?"

"Yes. Staying in that Separate Courtyard is boring; I miss your Cool Pavilion. Could you invite me to have a meal at the Cool Pavilion?"

Zhu Peng glanced at the layered clouds on the horizon; as the saying goes, each autumn rain brings more cold, and in this late autumn weather, the chill was gradually rising. He had long since stopped the waterwheel in front of the Cool Pavilion in such weather.

If anyone else had made such a request of him, he would certainly have thought the other person was losing their mind. But because it was Duan Rong who said it, no matter how unreasonable it was, he didn't dare to snap back for the moment. The reputations of the Star Picker and the Thunder God Duan were, after all, the real deal.

Zhu Peng said, "In this kind of weather, you want to eat at the Cool Pavilion?"

"Yes!" Duan Rong said with a firm tone, "The Cool Pavilion is quiet."

The Cool Pavilion was adjacent to a pond with an open view and nothing to obstruct the surroundings; it was the environment of the Cool Pavilion that Duan Rong had taken a fancy to.

"Fine!" Seeing that Duan Rong was not joking, Zhu Peng agreed immediately.

Zhu Peng jumped off his horse, led it to Duan Rong, and said, "Get on, the horse is yours to ride."

Duan Rong did not stand on ceremony and mounted Zhu Peng's steed directly.

With Duan Rong on the horse and Zhu Peng personally leading it, the two turned into an alleyway along the street and headed toward Zhu Peng's residence.

Back at the residence, Zhu Peng ordered the kitchen to prepare dishes, personally warmed a pot of yellow wine, and carried a plate of sliced cold beef and peanuts into the Cool Pavilion.

The waterwheel was not turning, and without the splashing sound of water around the Cool Pavilion, it was even more silent; in the pond, the withered lotus leaves were half-decayed...

The two drank yellow wine while watching the autumn scenery in the garden.

The hot dishes were soon served one after another; Duan Rong picked up a piece of steamed fish with his chopsticks, the meat was incomparably tender, and after sipping a cup of yellow wine, he suddenly looked at Zhu Peng and said, "Send someone to call Zhu Cheng over."

Zhu Peng was startled and said, "What for?"

Duan Rong said, "Why? If you call him, will he not come?"

Zhu Peng said, "That's not it. But that kid should be quite busy lately; if I call him to drink, he definitely won't come."

Duan Rong said, "Just say there is something urgent and tell him he must come over."

Zhu Peng looked at Duan Rong; he suddenly felt that Duan Rong really did have something urgent. Because he knew that Duan Rong never joked, let alone call them together to drink for no reason.

Zhu Peng immediately called his trusted aide and instructed him to go to the Dali Temple to summon Zhu Cheng.

After nearly the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, and with Duan Rong and Zhu Peng having already left the table in a mess, Zhu Cheng finally arrived late.

Zhu Cheng's expression was somewhat unpleasant; before he even stepped into the Cool Pavilion, he looked at Zhu Peng inside from the steps and shouted, "What is it? To insist so urgently that I must come over..."

As Zhu Cheng walked to the entrance of the Cool Pavilion, he saw that there was another person sitting opposite Zhu Peng, and when he focused his eyes, it was actually Duan Rong.

Zhu Cheng immediately hurried forward and knelt down, calling out, "This subordinate pays respects to the Lord!"

Zhu Peng was stunned for a moment; he didn't know why, but every time he saw Duan Rong, he couldn't remember to pay his respects. Seeing Zhu Cheng prostrate himself, Zhu Peng saw that he was about to slide off his stool to kneel as well.

Duan Rong, however, kicked him from under the table, then fixed his gaze on Zhu Cheng at the entrance and said, "Rise, Zhu Cheng. Today, we only speak of personal friendship, not rank."

"Yes, Lord!" Zhu Cheng rose upon hearing this.

Duan Rong laughed, "Come, Zhu Cheng, sit here! However, you are a bit late; the main dishes have already been polished off by the two of us."

Zhu Cheng sat before the table and said, "I did not know it was the Lord who called me. I had some matters at the Ya Men to handle before I could come."

Duan Rong picked up the wine pot to pour a cup for Zhu Cheng and said, "I know you are busy; if there were nothing, I would not have called you."

Zhu Cheng took the wine and drank it in one gulp, then sat there with lowered brows, waiting for Duan Rong to speak.

Duan Rong said, "Both of you, put aside the work at hand; for these next few days, follow me to do some work."

Zhu Peng asked, "What work?"

Duan Rong said, "To capture the spies within the Shenyun Prefecture."

Zhu Peng asked blankly, "What spies? Whose spies?"

Duan Rong looked at the silent Zhu Cheng and said, "Do you still remember the Zhu Shizhong case from half a year ago? That group of craftsmen was poisoned to death in the Dali Temple prison by your Temple Supervisor, Zhou Wei."

Zhu Cheng poured himself a cup of wine and downed it, saying, "And Zhou Wei was also killed."

"The trail ended there," Duan Rong said. "Actually, I know who killed Zhou Wei."

As soon as Duan Rong said this, Zhu Cheng suddenly raised his head and looked at him in shock.

For the past half year, he had been investigating this matter in secret, but he hadn't found a single clue. Moreover, Duan Rong's use of the word "actually" meant that he had known at the time.

Zhu Cheng asked with a fixed gaze, "Who killed him?"

Duan Rong did not answer him, but instead looked at him and asked in return, "Zhu Cheng, are the people under your command all trustworthy?"

Zhu Cheng said, "Because of the incident with Zhou Wei, I have vetted everyone under my command and transferred away anyone suspicious. The ones remaining should all be trustworthy."

"Is that so?" Duan Rong chuckled, revealing a noncommittal expression.

Zhu Peng seemed to hesitate for a moment and said with some difficulty, "Our Privy Council has assigned me other work as well..."

Duan Rong said, "I have already sent someone to inform Chen Shanmeng and your Commissioner Lin; you two are being requisitioned for these few days, so you don't need to worry about your work."

Zhu Peng finally smiled and said, "That's good!"

At the entrance of the Dali Temple, there were many Outer Sect Disciples coming to handle appointments today; the pockmarked-faced man was busy at the entrance until the afternoon before he slowly stood up, flipped through the documents in his hand, discovered that everyone on the list had already arrived, and then tidied up the paperwork on the simple table, held it in his arms, and turned to enter the Dali Temple.

He walked briskly along the veranda and soon arrived at his own small room, where he put away the paperwork, preparing to rest for a while and drink some tea.

Just at this moment, a knock-knock-knock sound rang out at the door.

The pockmarked-faced man's expression shifted, and he walked over to open the door, only to see the Dali Temple Temple Rectifier Zhu Cheng standing at the entrance with a blank expression; seeing him open the door, he said, "Clerk Hu, I, Zhu, have a matter I would like to discuss with you for a moment; I wonder if it is convenient?"

The pockmarked-faced man was startled, then understood and said, "Please come in, my lord!"

Zhu Cheng stepped through the doorway and looked around.

The pockmarked-faced man pulled out a round stool and said, "The place is cramped, please sit, my lord!"

Zhu Cheng glanced at the round stool but stood there motionless, asking with a cold face, "Clerk Hu, how many years have you been at the Dali Temple?"

The pockmarked-faced man smiled and said, "I've forgotten the exact number. How should I put it, at least five."

"Is that so?" Zhu Cheng said, "Then you have truly hidden yourself deep!"

Zhu Cheng suddenly turned to stare at the pockmarked-faced man, whose smile froze on his face, and he said, "My lord, I do not understand a single word of what you are saying."

Zhu Cheng leaped, and a palm was already struck toward the pockmarked-faced man's dantian.

He used his full strength the moment he attacked, because Duan Rong had already told him that although this pockmarked-faced man appeared frail, he was actually at the True Qi Realm Third Layer, which could be considered a top-tier expert in the secular world.

(End of this chapter)