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"King You's elder brother?"

Li Anning's face also showed a look of astonishment.

She had never expected the case to have any connection to King You.

The Capital Governor was King Han's biggest supporter.

King You was King Han's greatest rival.

How could a mere Ninth Grade official from the Ministry of Personnel be involved with both parties… She had thought it was a simple case of home invasion murder, but why did it feel like it was getting more complicated the more they investigated?

Li Anning immediately said, "I'll go ask King You's elder brother!"

This time, Li Nuo did not go with her; it was not appropriate for him to accompany her.

Besides being an arrest officer of the Ministry of Justice, Anning was also King You's sister. Li Nuo, a Honglu Si Prime Minister, certainly had no authority to investigate a King.

Moreover, he was supposed to be aligned with King Chun's faction, so investigating King You was also inappropriate.

When Anning went to King You's Mansion, he returned to the Ministry of Personnel and entered the Archives.

Zhao He had been a Zhanggu at the Ministry of Personnel for over four years. If this was not a simple murder case, perhaps some clues could be found at his workplace.

A Ninth Grade Zhanggu naturally could not have a government office of his own like Lord Father-in-law.

A table in the Archives was his workplace at the Ministry of Personnel.

This government office was shared with another Zhanggu.

There was a drawer under the table which had originally been locked, but it had been violently broken open.

The lock had been smashed by the Ministry of Justice—whatever Li Nuo could think of, they could too. There was nothing inside the drawer but some broken silver, a few pens, an inkstone, and a book of erotic paintings…

Li Nuo flipped through the book of erotic paintings from beginning to end but still found nothing.

The artwork was mediocre at best. If he had been the artist…

Lost in thought for a moment, he shifted his gaze to the table.

The items on the table were clear at a glance—writing brushes, ink, paper, several books. Li Nuo flipped through these books as well, which were all on Confucian classics, probably books Zhao He read regularly. There were many annotations throughout the books.

But these were all useless information.

Li Nuo opened the last book, which wasn't really a book, but a register of the names of Advanced Scholars over the years.

He had looked through this register many times before; he was just flipping through it casually, ready to put it down, when his hand hesitated slightly.

On the page he had opened, someone had drawn several obvious circles with a pen.

Gu Wenhan, Wu Zongguang, Zheng Tianxing.

There were many names on this page, but only these three were circled.

These three names caused Li Nuo's pupils to constrict slightly.

The three men he had circled were precisely the three former officials from the Eastern Palace who had caught Li Nuo's attention.

He carefully flipped through the register page by page and found two more officials who had been specially circled.

One was named He Dong, and the other was Xu Zhi, both Advanced Scholars from the twenty-second year of Zhisheng, which was the Imperial Examination following the one Gu Wenhan and the others participated in.

Although Li Nuo did not know these two.

He had a small suspicion.

Could He Dong and Xu Zhi be former officials from the Eastern Palace as well?

At the same time, he could almost assert that, based on the names Zhao He had circled, his death was definitely not as simple as a burglary and murder.

Li Nuo was very curious about what he had discussed with King You the night before.

Could it be that Zhao He had discovered some secret of King You's and tried to use it to blackmail him, but was instead silenced by King You?

Following the Crown Prince's death, these former Eastern Palace officials had also been dying one by one. The Ninth Grade official who discovered this had also been quickly silenced. Li Nuo had reason to suspect that the Crown Prince's death might not be as simple as it seemed, and that these Eastern Palace officials might have been silenced as well…

It was worth boldly guessing.

Could the death of the Crown Prince be related to King You?

Just as this thought surfaced in Li Nuo's mind, footsteps sounded from outside.

He discreetly tucked the register into his sleeve.

Zhanggu Fang led an official inside and, seeing Li Nuo, paused slightly and asked, "Lord Li, still investigating?"

Li Nuo nodded and said, "Zhao Zhanggu's death was mysterious. I am checking here in the Archives to see if I can find some new clues."

Zhanggu Fang asked, "Found anything?"

Li Nuo shook his head and replied, "Nothing at all."

Zhanggu Fang sighed and said, "It's tragic to think such a thing could happen. Lord Zhao was so young…it really is a pity..."

Li Nuo said, "There's nothing left to investigate here; I'll be leaving first."

Having said that, he turned and left.

After Li Nuo had left, Zhanggu Fang then said to the other official, "Lord Yang, this will be your workplace from now on. Our duty is simple—to look after the Archives, regularly air out the files to prevent them from molding, and assist the Lords in finding documents…"

The new Zhanggu nodded, took a seat at Zhao He's former place, pulled open the drawer to look inside, and then casually flipped through a few books on the table. Zhanggu Fang said, "These were all Lord Zhao's belongings. I'll tidy them up later..."

The official stood up, voluntarily tidied the table, and said, "No need, no need, I can do it. I've been reading these books myself lately, and I see there are some annotations on them. Would it be alright if I took them home to read?"

Zhanggu Fang said, "Lord Zhao has already left, and these things have become unowned. Lord Yang, if you like them, take them back..."

...

After leaving the Ministry of Personnel, Li Nuo arrived at the Ministry of Justice.

Anning had not yet returned, and only Gu Yanran was busy in the government office.

Li Nuo sat in Anning's place and asked Gu Yanran, "Gu, your sentence should be ending soon, right?"

Gu Yanran nodded and replied, "Young master, it ends in one more month."

Originally, her sentence had nearly a year remaining, but during this period, she had worked in the Ministry of Justice in lieu of her punishment, reducing her sentence significantly. In another month, she would be released from prison.

Li Nuo hesitated for a moment then said, "I want to ask about your father."

"My father?"

Gu Yanran was taken aback and then silently lowered her head; the matter of her father was a pain she still did not wish to mention.

The father she had always viewed as great and formidable since her childhood turned out to be a demon with his hands stained with countless blood. It took her a long time to gradually accept this fact.

After a moment of silence, she spoke, "Young master, ask whatever you want, I will tell you everything I know."

Li Nuo asked, "Your father first served in the Eastern Palace, right?"

Gu Yanran nodded.

Although she was just born the year her father became an Advanced Scholar, she certainly knew this important part of his career.

From Gu Yanran, Li Nuo heard a lot about Gu Wenhan.

The year Gu Wenhan left the Eastern Palace, she was only five years old, and she didn't remember much.

Wanting to know the details from that time was naturally impossible, yet that was what Li Nuo wanted to know the most...

At that moment, a figure walked in from outside. Li Nuo looked towards Anning and asked, "How did it go?"

Li Anning shrugged and replied, "King You's elder brother said that Zhao He indeed sought him out that day. He said he no longer wanted to be the arrest officer of the Ministry of Personnel and wanted to join King You's elder brother, but King You's elder brother refused him..."

Li Nuo didn't inquire further.

Zhao He's case was no longer the focus.

What was more important was what he had uncovered before being silenced, and who was behind silencing him?

Li Nuo had realized that the waters were deep and immeasurable; even if he wanted to investigate, he could not do so openly.

Anning stayed in the Ministry of Justice for a while, then went to the Capital Prefecture to summon a few officials.

Li Nuo stayed in the government office of the Ministry of Justice, writing judgments about those officials with a notion of trying his luck.

But the Law Code remained utterly silent.

Unsurprisingly, Zhao He's death had nothing to do with the officials from the Capital Prefecture.

Li Nuo then tried Capital Governor Lin Fuzhi, King You, and even King Han, but the Law Code still did not give him a clear directive.

However, this did not mean that they were definitely uninvolved.

Whether it was the Capital Governor or the two princes, the Ministry of Justice had no authority to judge them; theoretically, the seals of the Assistant Minister of Justice and the Chief of Staff were ineffective on them.

Not only was the Ministry of Justice incapable, even the Ministry of Justice and Zongzheng Si lacked the requisite authority.

For a third-rank official or a first-rank King, only the current Your Majesty of Daxia could judge them.

Instead of focusing on who killed Zhao He, Li Nuo was more curious about who He Dong and Xu Zhi were.

As long as he could find out what Zhao He had discovered, identifying the real murderer would be clear, and the two officials he had marked were undoubtedly an important clue.

Li Nuo did not plan to go through his lord father-in-law directly to access the records of these two men.

Such a direct approach was too conspicuous and might alarm the suspects.

Night.

Li Mansion.

Anning blinked and looked at Li Nuo, asking, "What, go to the Ministry of Personnel now? It's almost curfew, and the Ministry of Personnel is already closed."

Li Nuo nodded and replied, "That's why we have to go now; I've already got some clues about Zhao He's case, and we need to verify something at the Ministry of Personnel."

After another moment of surprise, a look of eagerness appeared on Anning's face, and he said excitedly, "Are we going to sneak into the Ministry of Personnel?"

Li Nuo said, "We need to sneak into the archives of the Ministry of Personnel without anyone noticing."

The Ministry of Personnel had no secrets, nor was it a noble's mansion; the security at night was actually not that strong.

However, Li Nuo still felt somewhat uneasy with just him and Anning going.

Therefore, he planned to bring Jiaren as well, to double the assurance.

The two of them went to Jiaren's room, where Song Jiaren was already preparing to rest. Seeing Li Nuo and Anning enter, she looked slightly surprised. At that moment, Anning quickly walked over and said, "Jiaren sister, don't sleep yet, tonight we three together..."

Song Jiaren was startled and then her face quickly turned red as she said, "No, no, I'm not ready yet!"

Anning was taken aback and said, "The three of us are going together to investigate a case at the Ministry of Personnel, what's there to prepare for?"

Moments later, the three of them, now changed into different clothes, walked out of the courtyard together.

They bumped into a figure head-on, and Song Yiren, surprised, looked at them dressed in black and asked, "What are you doing going out so late?"

Li Nuo thought for a moment, looked at Yiren, and asked, "We're going to handle an important matter, do you want to come along?"