just routine business I need to go through,” Zu An said without any
changes in his expression. “I believe you know that we came to
Cloudcenter Duke to appoint a new duke. Before that can happen, we need
to properly investigate all things related to the previous duke.”
“So
that was it.” Gong Pan felt at ease. He said, “Sigh, those brothers
really passed away tragically…” Then, he gave Zu An a rough summary of
the investigations regarding the six individuals.
Zu An paid the
most attention to Chen Zhou’s case. It was initially rumored that he had
been investigating a smuggling case involving the Zhenyuan Merchant
Group, but he had later discovered that it was just a misunderstanding.
It was another group of smugglers who had bribed one of Zhengyuan
Merchant Group’s warehouse managers…
Zhenyuan Merchant Group was
one of Cloudcenter Commandery’s largest merchant groups. They brought
goods from all over the country to Cloudcenter Commandery for sale, and
they also brought various specialty products from the northwest through
Cloudcenter Commandery to all other parts of the empire.
Zu An
thought to himself, Chen Zhou was probably already on his way to deliver
the message to the capital back then. Investigating Zhenyuan Merchant
Group or whatever should just be a pretense. What he cared more about
was what Chen Zhou had left behind.
“What about those soldiers’
belongings? I heard that Sir Gong brought them back,” Zu An took the
chance to ask Gong Pan with a smile.
Gong Pan’s expression changed
slightly, but he quickly replied, “According to normal regulations,
those who die in the line of duty have their belongings stored up. After
all, their cases have not been resolved yet.”
Zu An frowned and asked, “Are those items still in the Military Affairs Manor?”
“That
is not the case; they are currently in Yu Manor. I have not had the
time to hand them over to the authorities yet,” Gong Pan replied. “If
Sir Zu wishes to examine them, then please follow me.”
When he saw
the other party’s skeptical expression, he explained, “I will not hide
this from Sir Zu. Actually, I wanted to see if I could find any clues
from their belongings, to see if I could get revenge for these fallen
brothers. You should also know that all of us were personal guards of
the duke in the past. After something happened to the duke, we were
dispatched to other departments to do these tasks.
“Everyone knows
they were leading figures of the last generation, and would not receive
the favor of the new authorities. That is why no one would really
earnestly examine their cases, and also why I wanted to investigate
their cases myself.”
“Oh?” Zu An was a bit surprised. He continued, “Then I wonder if General Gong has found out any important information?”