Chapter 28: Official

The ice flows accumulated in this inner prison over countless years had already exceeded Chen Ji's imagination... He had not expected there to be so many!

He walked through the corridors of the inner prison, watching as streams of ice flowed into his body. His dantian, sealed by four furnace fires, teetered on the brink of collapse.

The grayish-white ice flows were like flood dragons, letting out roars in this dim inner prison that no one else could hear. They were like the resentful souls of those long imprisoned in a cage, unwilling to let go, seeking to devour Chen Ji entirely.

In this mysterious world, they were powers sufficient to stand above authority and might, yet now they were being stripped away bit by bit.

Chen Ji could feel the chill seeping from his internal organs, but he did not dare show any abnormality while standing beside Yun Yang.

However, as he and Yun Yang passed a cell, he noticed a Bagua diagram incised into the base of an oil lamp on the wall.

Chen Ji suddenly remembered the Bagua diagrams under those lamps with dregs of oil when he was descending the stairs... Each lamp was a prison. As long as the lamp remained unextinguished, the soul would not perish!

He swiftly snatched the oil lamp and gripped it in his palm!

In an instant, the ice flows within his dantian slowly receded like a ebbing tide.

Chen Ji breathed shallowly. Yun Yang turned around in surprise: "What are you doing with that lamp?"

He replied, "This inner prison is too dark; I'm having a bit of trouble adjusting."

Yun Yang sneered, "To think that someone who dares to haggle with me is actually afraid of the dark?"

Chen Ji did not answer. He was merely pondering a question: *Do the ice flows not dissipate after a person dies? Judging by the quantity just now, they must have been accumulating for a very long time.*

No matter how ruthless the Secret Intelligence Division was, they couldn't have killed that many people in such a short period.

It was the effect of the Bagua diagrams!

The Inner Minister, fearing that killing too many people might cause him to be haunted by vengeful spirits, had used the Bagua diagrams to imprison these souls within the inner prison. That was how such massive amounts of ice flows had accumulated over the years.

Chen Ji steadied his breathing: "Lord Yun Yang, please bring the archives for me to examine. To find clues, one doesn't necessarily have to look at current cases; perhaps many secrets are hidden within past ones."

Yun Yang beckoned to the spies: "Give them to him!"

When the spies brought the archives, they were found to fill more than a dozen large wooden crates.

Chen Ji casually took one and began flipping through it while patrolling the inner prison.

Yun Yang sat by a table, sipping tea and waiting, while the spies followed behind Chen Ji.

Chen Ji walked up to a cell door and asked, "Cell Jia-27. Was the Yuzhou Vice Prefect Liu Yaozu once imprisoned here? Where is he now?"

The spy hesitated, unsure of how to address the masked youth before him. After a moment, he whispered, "This... My Lord, the archives state that those who were released walked out of the inner prison alive. If nothing is written, it means they died inside."

Chen Ji was certain that Liu Yaozu had died in the inner prison four years ago.

He walked to another cell door: "Cell Jia-28. Was the Master of Crafts in Luocheng, Chen Mingzhuo, imprisoned here?"

"He died as well."

Moving forward, Chen Ji stopped asking questions and instead silently recited in his mind

"Cell Jia-52, Prefect of Guide Prefecture, Xu Jiawen—dead."

"Cell Yi-1, Magistrate of Shangcai County, Tian Hailong of Runing Prefecture—dead; County Vice Magistrate Xu Dehong—dead..."

As he counted them off, some cells had seen one death, others several.

The more Chen Ji investigated, the more alarmed he became. The archives in his hands were like the Book of Life and Death in the Hall of Yama.

As he continued flipping through the records, he saw that some martial artists and some officials hiding in the streets had also been imprisoned here, but no ice flows emerged from their cells.

He took a deep breath and finally grasped the pattern of the ice flows.

The people who could produce ice flows after death shared one commonality: they were officials!

...

...

The inner prison buried underground was like a massive graveyard; one could not know how many people had died in this sunless place.

This was not the martial world; it was the place where both the martial world and the imperial court were buried.

Chen Ji stood before the cells, the archives spread in his hands and the dark cages before his eyes.

It took him about an hour to finish reading all the archives for the Jia, Yi, Bing, Ding, Wu, Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, and Gui cells. There was no need to look at the rest.

Chen Ji even dared to make a bold judgment: the ice flows obtained at the Late Star Garden that night indeed came from Consort Jing's fetus. The imperial bloodline was inherently superior from birth.

At this moment, standing in this oppressive inner prison, Chen Ji felt a sense of absurdity.

His path of cultivation placed him in direct opposition to the entire Ning Dynasty. To cultivate, there had to be deaths of officials and imperial bloodlines!

From the Emperor to the lowest clerk, the Ning Dynasty held all the power of this realm.

And he was to be their enemy?

Yun Yang was right; one truly cannot let others know what one's method of cultivation is... it is indeed very dangerous.

Yun Yang sat at a table, legs crossed, cracking melon seeds. Seeing Chen Ji stop to think in the corridor, he asked, "Found a clue?"

Chen Ji snapped out of his deep thought: "Not yet."

Yun Yang frowned: "I personally came to fetch you, wasting an hour on the way here and another hour waiting for you, only for you to say there are no clues?"

Chen Ji had come for the ice flows and the archives; he had both in hand, but he could not simply leave.

After a moment of thought, he asked, "How did Liu Shiyu die? Did you kill him?"

Yun Yang shook his head: "No, he couldn't withstand the interrogation and committed suicide by hanging."

Chen Ji frowned: "Is his body still in the inner prison?"

"It is. Do you want to see?" Yun Yang grew interested and tossed the melon seeds in his palm onto the table. "I'll lead you there."

Yun Yang led Chen Ji deeper into the inner prison. They descended several more flights of stairs and passed through several layers before reaching the deepest part, where Chen Ji could even hear the sound of an underground river flowing.

"There, it's inside. There is only Liu Shiyu's corpse," Yun Yang said, holding a torch as he walked in.

Liu Shiyu was about thirty years old, thin of build, with pale skin. His face was deathly white, his tongue protruded, and he had lost control of his bowels and bladder.

These were typical signs of death by hanging; nothing was unusual.

Seeing the corpse, Chen Ji held his breath, feeling a sense of discomfort.

Yun Yang teased, "I thought you were truly omnipotent. How can you not even look at a corpse?"

Chen Ji composed himself: "Lord Yun Yang, being able to indifferently examine the corpse of one's own kind is nothing to boast about... Liu Shiyu did not commit suicide; he was murdered to silence him."

Yun Yang shook his head: "You are wrong this time. I kill many people, so I have more experience in this matter. All his signs of death match hanging: I have helped many people hang themselves. A person who hangs themselves has a deathly pale face, a protruding tongue, and loss of bowel and bladder control; there is no mistake there. You might be thinking, was he strangled first and then hung? No. A person who is strangled has a deep purple face; I am familiar with that too."

"Theoretically, what Lord Yun Yang says is correct," Chen Ji nodded.

"Hmm?" Yun Yang was puzzled.

Chen Ji said, "But all of these can be faked."

The cause of death in hanging is the blockage of the carotid arteries, leading to death from cerebral hypoxia.

Because the carotid arteries are blocked instantly while the veins can still function temporarily, a person who dies by hanging will have a pale face, whereas a person who is strangled will have a deep purple face.

The person who killed Liu Shiyu to silence him must have known this principle, so they faked the appearance of hanging: the tongue can be forced out, acupuncture can cause loss of bowel and bladder control, and precise pressure on the carotid sinus can result in a pale face.

The perpetrator was a professional assassin skilled in faking suicides, but they missed one detail: the feet.

Chen Ji explained, "In a person who hangs themselves, the toes point downward, almost perpendicular to the ground. Rigor mortis sets in after two hours, and even if the body is lowered, the position remains. But look at Liu Shiyu; before he was strangled, his legs were kicking and struggling, so his two feet are fixed in different directions."

Yun Yang looked thoughtful after hearing this: "Is that so... Come, let's go back to the Jia level. We'll bring a death row prisoner here and test it. We'll know then!"

The group returned to the upper level. Chen Ji watched as two spies dragged a death row prisoner over.

The prisoner had soiled his pants before he was even hung.

Sitting at the table, Yun Yang cracked melon seeds and mocked, "These are the civil officials of our Ning Dynasty—appearing iron-willed on the surface, but actually fragile and easily broken."

Chen Ji hesitated: "Lord Yun Yang, what is his crime?"

"Treason; forging household registers and travel documents for the spies of the Jing Dynasty," Yun Yang turned to the spies and commanded, "Hang him from the ceiling. I want to observe!"

Chen Ji wanted to say something, but ultimately chose to keep his mouth shut.

In the next moment, the spies looped a rope around the prisoner's neck, hung him from the ceiling, and kicked away the stool beneath his feet.

In just a few seconds, the prisoner went completely still.

Everyone waited. The corpse hung before them, yet Yun Yang continued to drink tea and crack melon seeds as if nothing had happened, as if what was hanging was not a person, but a pig.

Chen Ji focused solely on flipping through the archives to pass the time.

Two hours later, the spies took the corpse down from the ceiling. Just as Chen Ji had said, the toes were pointed straight.

Yun Yang clapped his hands in admiration: "In the past, we only ever hung people up, we never took them down. I never noticed this detail!"

Chen Ji said calmly, "If someone wants to kill to silence a witness, it means there is a big fish behind Liu Shiyu. The Liu family has more than one traitor; both the second branch's Liu Ming and the first branch's Liu Mingde are suspicious."

Yun Yang frowned: "Liu Gun will return to Luocheng in a few days. If I provoke the Minister of Personnel without evidence, wouldn't I just be looking for trouble? You're not trying to trick me into jumping into a fire pit, are you?"

Inside the room, Chen Ji gripped the oil lamp, the flame dancing in his eyes: "How could I? I am counting on Lord Yun Yang to promote me. It's just that you previously mentioned the danger Jing Dynasty spies pose to frontline soldiers; why are you being so cautious now?"

Yun Yang sighed: "One must learn from one's mistakes. Before, I only knew how to kill. I've only held the position of the Zodiac for half a year; it would be a pity to lose it... The officialdom is not an easy place."

Chen Ji looked at him and asked sincerely, "Lord Yun Yang, you and Lord Jiaotu are skilled at killing. The Inner Minister is supremely intelligent; why would he send you to do something you are not skilled at?"

Yun Yang was puzzled: "True... Could it be that the Inner Minister originally hoped to use our killing intent to take down the Liu family? He sent us here to kill people, so how should I..."

He instinctively reached for the teapot to pour a cup for Chen Ji, but then thought better of it—wait, he had only ever poured tea for the Inner Minister before!

He put the teapot back on the table: "But even if we know someone killed Liu Shiyu to silence him, it will be hard to catch the Liu family red-handed. How am I supposed to continue the investigation?"

Chen Ji shook his head: "There are too few clues at the moment, and I have no good suggestions. However, Lord Yun Yang, don't you find the death of Old Master Liu too suspicious? As soon as he died, you were immediately placed in a passive position. My master was invited to provide a medical consultation, yet his carriage broke down halfway, and he never even saw Old Master Liu."

A bolt of lightning flashed through Yun Yang's mind: "Old Master Liu most likely isn't dead!"