“How could that be possible?” Qiao Xueying was stunned. However, her face soon lit up in delight as she replied, “Isn’t that even better? You just have to speak the truth, and the villagers will all be cleared of suspicion!”
“How dumb do you have to be to actually say those words aloud?” Zu An looked at Qiao Xueying with scorn in his eyes. “Don’t you know what the implications of speaking the truth are? That’s basically affirming the fact that heaven has decreed the emperor’s death! There’s no way the emperor would let us off if we report it in such a manner!”
“What do we do then?” exclaimed Qiao Xueying. “We can’t say the truth, and the villagers here are innocent too. We can’t possibly force one of them to confess to it so as to be the scapegoat here, right?”
“It won’t be easy to pull that off even if we want to do so,” replied Zu An coldly. “The Qin Dynasty has extremely strict laws. Such grave disrespect to the emperor warrants nine familial exterminations! Who would possibly admit to such a grievous crime, not to mention that they are wronged here!”
“Doesn’t that mean that it’s impossible for us to find the murderer within the span of a single day?” Qiao Xueying felt her heart plummeting.
“There’s a way out of this.” Zu An turned his sight toward the villagers as his voice started turning chillingly cold.
“What way?” asked Qiao Xueying.
“If no one wishes to admit to it, we just have to kill all of the villagers living in the vicinity of the meteor. The culprit has to be one of these villagers anyway, and the emperor doesn’t care too much about the livelihood of his people. With that, we can successfully conclude this case without a hitch,” replied Zu An deeply.
This was how the ‘Antares Occupying the Heart’ incident in the 36th Year of Qin Shihuang’s rule unfolded in history. No one in the village admitted to inscribing those words, so the officials eventually had all of the villagers killed. They would rather exterminate everyone than let the murderer run free.
Zu An was glad that he knew about this piece of history, so he knew the way out of this paradox, allowing him to clear the Heaven Seal far easier than the earlier two trials.
However, Qiao Xueying immediately objected to it,” That won’t do! It’s too cruel. I won’t agree to it!”
Zu An frowned. “You should be aware that everything you see is just an illusion produced by the Heaven Seal. They aren’t real people at all, so what’s so cruel about this?”
Qiao Xueying shook her head vehemently and said, “But from our earlier encounter with them, they feel no different from living humans to us. Even if it’s just an illusion, I can’t bring myself to take the lives of so many innocent people for my own selfish goals. You can say that I’m naive and foolish, but this oversteps what my conscience allows.”
Zu An scoffed in response, “But you sure were decisive when you chose to take my life, huh?”
Qiao Xueying’s face immediately heated up. “That’s a different story! You were bound to be an enemy, not to mention that you’re very hateful too. You can’t possibly expect me to show mercy to you.”
Zu An touched his own face and remarked, “Such a handsome face, and you actually found me hateful? Looks like your eyes are nothing more than adornment on your face.”
“…” Qiao Xueying.
It was then that Lord Wang rushed over and whispered to Zu An in a suppressed voice, “Lord Censor, we’ve interrogated all of the villagers, but none of them admit to knowing how to write. I think we should just…”
He pulled his thumb over his neck, gesturing to kill off the villagers. “The murderer won’t be able to get away this way, and we’ll be able to remain accountable to His Majesty.”
Before Zu An could reply, Qiao Xueying had already interjected, “That won’t do!”
Lord Wang’s face darkened. “Young miss, if you have objections to how I do things, why don’t you propose another solution then? If we don’t kill these people, the ones to die would be us! Lord Censor, you must be decisive at times like this!”
Qiao Xueying tugged Zu An’s sleeves, seeking his support for this matter.
Zu An sighed deeply and said, “Lord Wang, interrogate them once more. If there are still no clues, we’ll figure out another solution.”
“I understand, Lord Censor,” replied Lord Wang with a nod.
Just as he was about to leave, a soldier suddenly rushed forward and reported, “Bad news, my lord! The village chief died in the midst of the interrogation, and his son is causing a ruckus right now. He turns out to be a fairly powerful cultivator, and he has already injured quite a few of our brothers!”
Lord Wang huffed in anger. “Preposterous! How dare he mess around at a time like this? Anyone who tries to obstruct public order ought to pay with his life. Kill him!”
“Yes!”
The soldier was just about to leave the area when Zu An suddenly stopped him. “Wait a moment! How did the village chief die?”
“Lord Censor, the village chief was already ailing in health and the earlier shock worsened his condition. Our brothers might have used a bit of torture on him during the interrogation, but we made sure not to go too far! All the other villagers were able to take it without any problems; the village chief was the only one who suddenly dropped dead!” the soldier hurriedly replied as he wiped off his cold sweat.
Zu An nodded in response. Considering that the village chief was already in poor condition earlier on, it wasn’t too surprising for him to die in the midst of interrogation. It was the standard practice in this era to torture the suspects in order to get them to confess, so the soldiers couldn’t really be blamed for this.
“For the time being, capture his son and lock him up. I’ll deal with him later on.”
“Yes!”
The soldier quickly left the area to carry out Zu An’s order, and soon, Chen Wei found himself surrounded by a platoon of soldiers. No matter how violently he struggled, it was hard for him to deal with so many enemies at once. Soon, his hands were shackled in chains, and he was locked up in a room.
“Are you really intending to kill them?” asked Qiao Xueying anxiously.
Zu An turned to look into her eyes for a moment before asking, “Do you really intend to save them?”
Qiao Xueying nodded right away.
He pondered for a moment before saying, “If you promise to call me ‘big brother’ from now onward, I’ll consider helping you.”
“I…” Qiao Xueying’s face reddened. She was only able to call him that back then because she thought that she was already on the verge of dying and didn’t want to die ignorant. There was no way she could bring herself to call him ‘big brother’ under normal circumstances.
Zu An sighed deeply and remarked, “Looks like you’re all talk. You spoke as if you really wanted to save all of these people, but in the end, you can’t even lower your pride to call me ‘big brother’ for their sake.”
Qiao Xueying huffed angrily. “You’re taking advantage of me!”
Zu An shrugged. “Have I ever claimed to be a saint before? Why would I bother helping a bunch of people unrelated to me if there are no benefits on the line for me? Not to mention, they even tried to backstab me earlier on.”
Qiao Xueying gritted her teeth. “Will you really save them if I call you big brother?”
“Just to be sure, I’m expecting you to continue calling me that in the future,” corrected Zu An. “Also, I’ll only be trying my best. There’s no guarantee that I’ll be able to save them.”
“You can’t even guarantee success, why should I continue calling you big brother? That’s ridiculous!” Qiao Xueying protested.
“Well, you can stop calling me big brother if I fail to save them, but you should at least call me that at the start, no?” asked Zu An with a smile.
“Alright then. I hope that you can hold to the end of your promise.” Qiao Xueying pursed her lips as her face blushed bright red. It took her a while before she finally murmured softly, “B-big brother.”
Zu An leaned a little closer as he asked, “What did you say? You were too soft that I can’t hear you clearly.”
“Don’t go too far!” Qiao Xueying glared at him angrily.
You have successfully trolled Qiao Xueying for +33 Rage!
“What can I do? Your voice was too soft.”