After Jiang Hanyun paced in the courtyard for a little while and glanced in the door for the seventh ti, Li Xuan couldn’t sit still anymore.
He wondered if he had offended his superior again. Is this woman going to beat up?
"Xiaowei!"
Li Xuan carefully held the Sound Conch given to him by Lady Jiang, then he walked out of the door to ask, "May I ask, do you have any matter to discuss with this subordinate?"
He cautiously observed Jiang Hanyun’s facial expression. If anything seed amiss, he would imdiately call for Lady Jiang’s help.
When Jiang Hanyun saw him coming out, her pretty face blushed a bit and she said, "Nothing much. I’m just enjoying the beautiful moonlight while taking a stroll here."
Li Xuan looked up at the sky, only to see it covered by dark clouds. The starlight was completely blocked. The sky was pitch black.
Li Xuan was stunned for a while. Is this woman blind? Or is she just teasing ?
Then he recalled the infamous incident of Zhao Gao calling a deer a horse. What happened to those upright ministers who disagreed with him? They either got exiled to the frontier or executed gruesoly.
So, Li Xuan decided to go along, "Indeed, the moon tonight is really bright and captivating. No wonder Xiaowei is in such a good mood."
"Pfft!" Jiang Hanyun let out a laugh and her face turned even redder. She stamred, "I actually had sothing to discuss with you, are you free tomorrow afternoon--"
At that mont, Peng Fulai rushed excitedly into the courtyard.
"Qianzhi, there are clues!"
As he spoke, Peng Fulai excitedly shoved a jade talisman into Li Xuan’s hand, "Take a look at this."
Li Xuan took a glance, then asked with uncertainty, "This is a ’Tayin Talisman’? Where did you get this?"
"Of course it’s from Shendu Departnt. Didn’t you ask to look for possible clues about the palace theft case? This is what I got from there. Take a look inside—"
Just as Peng Fulai was speaking rrily, there was a loud ’bang’ in the courtyard, with dust and smoke rising everywhere. Both him and Li Xuan were startled. They then noticed that Jiang Hanyun had punched a nearby pillar.
The terrifying strength of Jiang Hanyun was fully revealed at this mont. The pillar was naturally shattered into dust. Then the building behind them also fell down after a loud ’rumble’.
Li Xuan couldn’t help but swallow, the sweat dripping from his forehead, "Xiaowei, did your subordinate do sothing wrong? Right, you were about to tell sothing?"
He was hesitating whether or not to use the Sound Conch to call for Mrs. Jiang’s help.
"It’s fine! You did nothing wrong, my mood was just slightly off."
Jiang Hanyun glared at Peng Fulai, then with a cold snort, she walked out of the yard.
Peng Fulai was stunned for a while, then with a stiff neck, he turned to Li Xuan, "Did I offend the demoness? Why was the Xiaowei looking at just now as if she wanted to slaughter ?"
"How would I know? But she did look very angry."
Li Xuan stroked his chin thoughtfully for a while, but he couldn’t figure out why. In the end, he decided to scare Peng Fulai a little, "I guess either you and Zhang Yue haven’t been dutiful enough at work, or it’s because you went out drinking with Ma. Either of those must have provoked the tigress. She must want to discipline you guys but is holding back."
Peng Fulai’s face turned pale, as if recalling so painful mories. Looking at the ruins behind Li Xuan, his legs seed to tremble.
"What should we do? The most unfortunate thing in my life must be getting assigned to Mingyou City."
"Zhang Taishan got fooled into coming here by us, and he hasn’t complained yet."
Li Xuan chuckled, then turned to look at the Jade Talisman in his hand.
He pondered for a mont, recalling the thod to activate the ’Tayin Talisman’, then he placed a hand sign on the Jade Talisman and recited the word ’Appear’.
The ’Tayin Talisman’ imdiately emitted a blue light, projecting a ’three-dinsional holographic’ image in front of Li Xuan.
The image was of a palm-sized copper bowl. It was simple and elegant, with gorgeous decorations.
"A copper bowl?"
Li Xuan looked at it with so doubts, "Is there sothing wrong? It just looks a little nicer. Wait, this seems to be an imperial item?"
Only after a while, he realised that the decoration on the bowl, was a five-clawed golden dragon.
At this ti, Peng Fulai also finally cald down, then he looked at Li Xuan in surprise, "This copper bowl is not just a little nicer. Even among the imperial items, this is the top-tier. This is Cloisonne, only seen after the current Prince ascended the throne, also known as ’copper-bodied wire enal’."
"It’s said that the craft of making this is extrely special, which makes it very difficult to produce. Today, the cloisonné pieces that have reached the public are less than a thousand pieces all over the Yangtze River, and most of them were bestowed by the royal family. Moreover, look at this dragon pattern, so exquisitely made. Don’t you feel anything?"
Li Xuan was taken aback, he really didn’t understand much about it. Because he ca from modern tis, his era was saturated with all sorts of fanciful crafts, and he had seen so many different dragon and phoenix designs, none of which he had ever cared about.
Ever since he ti-traveled, utensils in Earl Chengyi’s mansion have always been luxurious, and he thought it was normal.
"So, are you saying that this might be one of the stolen treasures?" Li Xuan felt a jolt in his spirit and asked, "From where did the Shendu Departnt get the imprint? Where is the real object?"
"In the black market! Soone from the Shendu Departnt infiltrated the Yangzhou black market and saw soone selling this. The seller there probably knows its worth, so only shows it to regular custors and those from Nanyang, but no one has taken it yet."
Pointing at the image, Peng Fulai said, "It’s not ’probably’- this is one of the stolen bronzes. I just looked through the inventory of items the second prince brought to Nanjing and found this. It’s called the ’Jinsi Cloisonne golden Dragon Cup’, there are nine pairs of these which are used as sacrificial vessels for the Xiao Mausoleum."
Li Xuan couldn’t help but lift an eyebrow, thinking that this clue was much easier to follow than the previous three.
"Black market in Yangzhou? Which one? Could it be Chuancheng, the one we have been to several tis before?"
——In Li Xuan’s mory, Chuancheng is located at the confluence of the Yangtze River and the canal.
rchants and private boat owners dealing in the black market will bind dozens of large ships together at dawn every day, turning it into a floating city on the water where people can buy and trade goods.
This must be the most hated place by the Court, as the silks, porcelain, jade, private salt, paper, weapons, etc., traded annually by rchants from all over the country through this black market are worth millions of teals.
Besides, there are all kinds of cultivation tools and rare treasures, also worth a fortune.
Therefore, from the Hongwu to Yongle years, the Court tried many tis to destroy and capture it, but all attempts have been unsuccessful. Because these boats can gather and disperse at any ti on the big river, they can disintegrate at any ti, and they have a deep background and are well-inford. Even the Court can do nothing about them.
After Yongle, as the Jin Dynasty declined progressively, they could only let it be.
"Of course, it’s Chuancheng. The substantial black market in Yangzhou is the only one." Peng Fulai chuckled, "In any other place, we from Liudao Division would have stord in and arrested people."
But Li Xuan felt a headache again: "Can we still get into that place now? Old Peng, can you still get the city entry permit?"
The smile on Peng Fulai’s face gradually stiffen: "I’m afraid it would not be easy!"
The so-called City Entry Permit is a certificate to enter Chuancheng, sowhat like an invitation. Every month Chuancheng would send them out, and only the guests approved by Chuancheng can get it.
They used to be wealthy and lavish, getting an entry permit was easy. But now they are of official status and desserted by the people in Chuancheng.
Especially the Liudao Division, which had had many disputes with Chuancheng in the past.
"If it’s about going to Chuancheng, I have a solution."
With these words, Luo Yan entered from the yard, "I know so people there who can help us sneak in."
Li Xuan’s eyes lit up, and he stared at Luo Yan. He thought of what Jiang Hanyun had said, Xuanying Tower’s evaluation of this man—extensive connections, sharp intelligence, and in-depth knowledge of both the legal and illegal sides of south Zhili, knowing these city foxes and social rats like the back of his hand.
At this ti, Luo Yan’s gaze fell on the ruins behind them, and his expression was utterly stunned: "What happened here? I was only away for a short while, how could this house be torn down?"
※※※※
What Li Xuan didn’t know this ti was, at the end of the Yangtze River, on the bank of the East Sea, on a vast ice floe floating on the sea, a middle-aged man suddenly moved, and forcefully pulled up his fishing rod.
In the next mont, a huge golden abalone broke out of the water under the man’s force and then landed heavily on the ice.
This golden abalone was as big as a man. After it hit the ground, it kept struggling, trying to turn over. Its whole body splashed out nurous high-pressure "water jets", "water guns", making the surrounding ice full of pits and bumps.
But as the middle-aged man waved his sleeve, it was quickly encapsulated in a block of cold blue ice, following the lead of the other two golden abalones ten feet away.
"Again it’s less than three hundred years old——"
The middle-aged man was quite disappointed. He glanced at this man-sized golden abalone, as well as the other two golden abalones that had also been frozen nearby, slightly larger in size, and his face was filled with frustration.
"This woman really talks nonsense. Golden abalones that are three hundred years old have not yet turned into spirits. Does she know how rare that is? "
The middle-aged man complained, and then looked at the completely dark sky, scratch his head helplessly.
"Forget it, if the years are not enough, make it up with quantity. Three golden abalones of two hundred to two hundred and fifty years old, I, Jiang, will not be unjust to him. Just don’t know how outstanding this young man is, causing such a fuss for to go through, haha, haha——"
At this mont, there was a sudden ’crack’ sound under his feet. The ice floe of a hundred feet in a circle, was suddenly covered in nurous cracks, and then shattered with a loud noise.
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