Chapter 133

Chapter 133: Need Help?

That night, the moon was bright and the stars were thin. Yu Zhi Yi lay under a tree and looked up at the sky. Though the air was chilly, she did not feel it. The starlight seemed bright one moment and dim the next.

Suddenly, Du Zi Heng stepped into the courtyard. Yu Zhi Yi only gave him a lazy glance, then looked away.

She did not ask why he came. Du Zi Heng was used to her cool manner. He spoke first and said: “I heard about the Yu Clan. The assistant at Jing Prefecture is my senior brother. I have asked him to help investigate. Do not worry. It will not be long before your name is cleared.”

Yu Zhi Yi shifted her eyes and said: “You do not suspect me?”

Du Zi Heng copied her and looked up at the sky. He found the stars beautiful tonight. Just looking at them made his heart calm. Sadly, he did not have a lounge chair.

He answered in a steady voice and said: “If you really wanted to deal with them, why bother with all this? With your skill, you could make it so they were beaten and never learn who did it.”

Yu Zhi Yi clicked her tongue and said: “No wonder your brain almost won top scholar. It works far better than those people in the Yu Clan.”

In her past life, some in the Yu Clan also entered officialdom, but they were mediocre. They lingered two full terms without the least hope of promotion. If not for Minister Yu and her help, Yu Meng Qin and Yu Ming Yu, the two brothers, would have topped out at sixth rank.

Du Zi Heng paused and thought, [Is she praising me?] The corner of his lips lifted, but soon fell again as he asked softly: “You mean I could have won top scholar?”

Yu Zhi Yi said: “Yes.”

Du Zi Heng pressed his lips together and thought back to exam day. He knew he had not been in good form. If he had done better, he might really have taken the crown. But it was too late now.

Yu Zhi Yi did not explain more. She spoke lightly and said: “Thank you for caring, Young Master, but it is not needed. Soon they will have no mind to care about who beat them.”

She had not been talking nonsense when she spoke of their bribery and graft. Even if Yu Chun Yue had started moving assets as soon as he got word, he could not shift much in so short a time. In this age, some people do put money in banks, but most feel safer keeping it under their own eyes. The Yu Clan was the same. They put only ten million in the bank. The rest they hid as gold, silver, and jewels in the underground vault of their new manor. A simple search would expose them at once.

In the Imperial Palace, Consort Yu knelt and begged as she said: “Your Majesty, you cannot raid the senior minister’s home over thin air rumors. If anyone can smear others with empty words, then in our Great Sheng Empire everyone will live in fear.”

When Consort Yu heard the news, the emperor had already called the minister of the Court of Judicial Review into the palace, clearly planning to raid Yu Chun Yue. If such massive graft was proven, at the very least Yu Chun Yue would be beheaded. As for the rest of the Yu Clan, they might not die, but they would not live well.

Consort Yu had already lost a strong maiden family once. She could not lose her natal clan now. Without power, one might still rise again. But if her natal clan truly had no one left, she would be alone from then on. Besides, she knew the truth about the Yu Clan. If there had been no embezzlement, where did the gifts worth tens of thousands of taels come from every year? Because she knew, she could not let the emperor investigate.

She bent lower and cried as she said: “Your Majesty, for the sake of the child in my belly, please leave my Yu Clan a little dignity.”

The emperor looked at Consort Yu with a dark face. He truly liked her. They had loved each other as youths, childhood sweethearts who promised to be each other’s only one. Later, he became the emperor. An emperor cannot have only one woman. Even if he could control himself, the court would not allow it. Back then Yu Chun Yue was only a sixth-rank small official, not yet a minister. Without help from other great houses, even if he gained the throne, he could not sit steady. So he broke his word.

But his heart was soft. Knowing he had broken their promise first, he doubled his favor toward her. For years, no matter how she acted, he did not truly get angry. Even when she nearly moved against the empress, after he learned the truth he treated it as a petty quarrel between women. He only took back the noble consort rank he had planned for her, fined her one year’s stipend, confined her for a few months, then let her out. He did have true feeling for her and could not bear to see her sad.

He sighed and said: “I will not touch your brother.”

Consort Yu let out a breath and went weak, sliding down. The emperor rushed to hold her and said: “Quick, summon the imperial physician.”

At Yiluan Charity, Li Feng looked at the young woman before him, very uneasy, and asked: “Miss, can you really help me?”

His clothes were washed clean yet very worn. Some places were rubbed thin and almost split. He could not afford new ones. He unpicked what was left of his parents’ and his wife’s clothes to patch his own, or wore his father’s old ones. Luckily, before his family went under, they had a little property, so there were many old clothes. That was how he made it through those bitter winters without freezing. He had once been a high-spirited youth. Now he was timid. Only the wish for revenge still burning in his eyes made him look like a normal person.

Yu Zhi Yi nodded and said: “Yes.”

Li Feng lowered his voice and said: “Do you know I have offended a big shot?”

If even the county magistrate was willing to be that man’s lackey, then that man was no small fry. It was not that he did not trust this miss. He simply could not believe a pie would fall from the sky into his lap.

Yu Zhi Yi thought for a moment, then answered seriously and said: “He does not count as a big shot.”

Li Feng froze, then turned to leave without a word.

Steward Wu Shan was stunned and called out as he said: “Young Master Li, why are you leaving? Are you not seeking justice?”

Li Feng’s eyes flared with anger and he said: “I am only a cornered nobody at the bottom. I am not worthy to be the plaything of a rich family’s miss.”

Wu Shan was baffled and said: “Young Master Li, what are you saying? When did our mistress ever treat you as a plaything?”

Li Feng shouted back and said: “Even the magistrate tries to curry favor with that man. How can he not be a big shot? Yet in your mouths he is nothing?”

He had read books and knew there are always people above people. But in his twenty-some years, the biggest official he had seen with his own eyes was a magistrate. Anyone above a magistrate must be amazing. The young miss before him looked under twenty. She was young, but her tone was not small. Also, in his experience, he had only heard that this dynasty had women officials. He had never pictured them clearly. He only took them as symbols, like a good-luck emblem.