Chapter 335: A Hundred Faces (2)

Wang Su had been as tight-lipped as a clamped clam since entering the prison, refusing to speak.

It was said that the only request he had made was to see Le Wuya alone.

Since he'd made a request, Le Wuya went to see him.

The prison was still there, but it no longer looked the same.

After Qiu Sinian left, the new prison warden, Lan Ying, was cruel and ruthless, known for his brutal torture methods.

When Wang Su fell, Lan Ying also ended up in chains.

The current warden, though young, was unusually composed. He personally led Le Wuya through the long, gloomy corridor toward Wang Su's cell.

Le Wuya walked along, looking left and right, finding it all quite a novelty.

When he'd founded and run this prison, it had been cold, but relatively simple and clean.

It wasn't that Le Wuya was kind-hearted.

When dealing with stubborn holdouts who refused to confess, he never minded granting their wishes and letting them truly face the "mountain of knives and bed of nails," even savoring their screams with his meals.

But he didn't want his men soaked in blood and filth day in and day out, lest they get into the bad habit of being unable to interrogate without using boards and whips.

Learning good habits is hard, but bad ones come easy. He always valued the talents under his command.

Now, this prison had changed beyond recognition.

Probably because a new warden had been hastily appointed, the prison felt a bit fresher, but only a bit.

The cell bars were more than twice as thick as before, all scratched up by bloody fingernails. The air was thick with a stale, moldy, damp stench of death that had built up over the years. Even though every nook and cranny had been scrubbed clean, the base of the walls and corners still had stains that looked like blood or mud.

This was no longer a prison for imperial clansmen, high-ranking ministers, and serious criminals who needed a joint trial by the Three Judicial Offices. It was a bare execution ground, less like a place for the living and more like a waystation to hell.

No matter how cleanly it was washed, the stench of death in the air couldn't be scrubbed away.

...This time, Lord Wang Su had really gotten lucky.

When the new warden stopped, Le Wuya turned to look and took a moment to recognize the figure squatting behind the bars as the once immaculate, impeccably dressed Wang Su.

Disheveled and filthy, Wang Su sat sprawled out, looking up with contempt. After staring for a moment, he let out a cold laugh.

"Lord Wenren, you've come?"

The moment he spoke, his expression stiffened slightly.

Three figures stepped out from behind Le Wuya: Zhang Yuanye of the Grand Court, Yu Xiuqun of the Ministry of Justice, and An Qile, a Supervising Secretary of the Ministry of Personnel.

Wang Su's expression turned cold.

He'd clearly sent word for Le Wuya to come alone...

"Wang Su, have you misunderstood something?" Le Wuya said lazily, as if reading his thoughts. "You are a prisoner. Why would I come to see you privately? What if you chat with me about some trivial nonsense and then run off to spread rumors, claiming I tried to coax a confession out of you? Even with three extra mouths, I couldn't clear my name."

With that, Le Wuya ignored him and ordered, "Drag him out, get him cleaned up, then come find us for the hearing. Looking so filthy—what kind of image is that?"

Then he turned his back and walked off, muttering under his breath, "What's a prisoner got to be so proud about?"

An Qile, fiery-tempered and fond of Le Wuya's free-spirited ways, covered her mouth to stifle a laugh.

Le Wuya had brought his own tea, from Nanting. The four of them gathered in the reception room, having a good time.

An Qile sighed, "Lord Wang was always such a dignified man. How could he lose his nerve and sink so low once he got to prison?"

Zhang Yuanye added, "When I came to this prison before, it was full of weeping and wailing. Today it's quite peaceful—otherwise, I really couldn't have drunk my tea."

Yu Xiuqun, only a Vice Minister of modest rank and quiet by nature, focused solely on savoring the tea, sincerely praising, "What fragrant tea."

Le Wuya's gaze swept over the other three, sure that Yu Xiuqun was the only honest one among them.

The other two—even Zhang Yuanye—were seasoned schemers who'd long mastered the art of subtlety.

Both had already realized that today's hearing might involve more than just the four of them.

The prison had been thoroughly cleaned inside and out.

Wang Su's deliberate display of destitution was nothing more than an attempt to lull people into complacency, to make them think he'd lost the will to resist.

Moreover, the prison wasn't easy to get into—you had to submit a memorial and get the emperor's approval to enter.

In other words, the emperor knew exactly when Le Wuya would be coming.

In other words, it was highly likely the emperor himself might deign to visit this humble place, dipping his imperial claws into the muddy pond, to eavesdrop on their conversation.

Clearly, Wang Su had used up the last shred of his connection with the emperor to convey something of great importance.

Zhang Yuanye and An Qile had both sensed this and deliberately hinted at it to Le Wuya.

Le Wuya said little, just singing the praises of Nanting tea, until the new warden entered to announce that Wang Su had been washed and groomed, no longer offending noble eyes. Only then did the four get up and head to the hearing chamber.

Wang Su's face had been cleaned up thoroughly, and he sat in a chair in shackles, his head now exposed without the tangle of disheveled hair to cover it.

Le Wuya opened calmly: "Wang Su, do you confess your crimes?"

Wang Su met his gaze, a strange smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

Zhang Yuanye frowned: "Wang Su, if you refuse to answer, why did you call us here?"

Wang Su didn't even glance at Zhang Yuanye, staring fixedly at Le Wuya. After a moment, he spoke in a hoarse voice: "In the past, you were inside, and I was outside. Now, how the tables have turned."

Zhang Yuanye's scalp tingled as he immediately understood the implication. He turned to look at Le Wuya, then, sensing something, quickly averted his gaze.

The honest Yu Xiuqun questioned: "Wang Su, what do you mean by that?"

Le Wuya leisurely returned Wang Su's murky old eyes, a faint, ambiguous smile playing on his lips as he twirled the thumb ring on his finger.

"Le Wuya, in these days of imprisonment, I've come to understand something. If I am to be defeated, I would accept it at your hands," Wang Su leaned forward, a fanatical light blazing in his eyes. "I simply want to know—how exactly did you return from the dead?"

Zhang Yuanye no longer wished to hear his mad ramblings, nor did he want the most honored person in the world, who might be secretly watching, to take Wang Su's wild accusations against others to heart.

He rose abruptly: "Truly incorrigible!"

Zhang Yuanye turned to Le Wuya: "Chief Censor Wenren, there's no need to argue with a madman. Let's—"

Le Wuya gently patted his hand.

For that one who deigned to come in person, it was proof that suspicion had already taken root.

Of course he'd be suspicious—what else would you expect?

Sure, he could just walk away, easy as that.

But if a dragon's suspicion were allowed to swell unchecked, and it came to claw him to death one fine day—that'd be a real problem.

Since the dragon was suspicious anyway, he might as well point it in the right direction.

Zhang Yuanye caught Le Wuya's eye and, for some reason, felt oddly calm. Almost against his will, he sat back down.

But the second he sat down, Le Wuya's words almost made him jump out of his seat.

"How did I come back to life?"

"Good question."

"The answer is simple—I had a backup plan before I died. I trained myself, used alchemical pills, and focused my spirit and energy. Thanks to Maning Tianmu's blessing, I didn't have to go through reincarnation. I stayed in the mortal world, waited for the right chance, then killed someone, took over their body, and was reborn."

Wang Su was speechless.

He'd expected Le Wuya to deny it or just walk off—never to hear him confess so openly.

The room went dead silent. Le Wuya let out a derisive chuckle: "Lord Wang, is that what you wanted to hear?"

"If you want to hear more, let me tell you this: the dead do keep their spirits, so don't think your debts die with you. There are three hundred miners down below, waiting with shovels, ready to dig you up and kill you again."

Hearing Le Wuya say that, Zhang Yuanye's tense back relaxed a little.

That nearly scared him to death.

He'd said it so convincingly that he almost believed it.

After his rant, Le Wuya remembered to tell the stunned clerk: "Write this down exactly—he just admitted he lost."

He then looked at Wang Su, whose face was starting to fall apart, and asked: "Lord Wang, one more question—does this count as you confessing?"

"Le, you rebel!" Wang Su barked. "No matter how smooth you talk, you can't hide your treacherous heart! You plotted to bring me down just to clear your own name! Don't even think about it! You've committed treason, disrespected the Son of Heaven, and killed prisoners—you'll be cursed for ten thousand years!"

"Me, plot to bring you down?" Le Wuya remained unruffled. "You give yourself too much credit. If you hadn't been so eager to stir things up, who could have brought you down?"

Le Wuya looked at him, completely calm: "What I'm really curious about is—why do you keep mixing me up with Le Wuya?"

Before Wang Su could answer, Le Wuya nodded gracefully: "Ah, I get it. You're jealous of me, and you're jealous of Le Wuya too."

Wang Su: "...?"

Seeing his face get even uglier, Le Wuya smiled sweetly: "Sorry, did I hurt your feelings, my lord? Let me say it again."

"You're jealous I moved up so fast—unlike you, you old crook, who spent your whole life studying and scheming, and at an age when you've got one foot in the grave, you're still just a second-rank official. What Le Wuya and I have in common is that we both had the emperor's favor and shot straight up. You hate it so much you have to lump me in with him..."

Wang Su stared at Le Wuya—or rather, Wenrenyue—and his vision went blurry, until he couldn't tell who was standing in front of him.

The ugly truth he'd kept buried started to surface.

He was jealous, alright. Jealous enough to die.

Seeing him stunned from the verbal beating, Le Wuya smirked and casually added fuel to the fire:

"Oh, and one more thing—remember when I first joined the Censorate, Lord Wang gave me four characters: 'Hold yourself like jade,' saying they were worth a thousand gold."

"Looking back, you really practice what you preach, my lord—except you added one extra character to 'hold yourself like jade.'"

"You're a jade dildo—slipping into every crack, stabbing whoever you see, obsessed with the lower parts, always using dirty tricks and underhanded schemes. Now that you've been thrown away, that's your fate. Since you keep saying you'll accept your fate, do you accept this one?"

An Qile, who was sitting in on the hearing, couldn't help but snort with laughter.

Le Wuya glanced at the other three and saw them all doing the same thing—covering their mouths with their left hands, trying hard not to laugh.

Wang Su, who had always prided himself on being a clean and upright official, had never been talked to like this. His old face turned bright red, and he almost collapsed into his chair, his voice shaking as he sputtered: "Vulgar! Utterly vulgar!!"

Le Wuya gave him a bright smile, then stood up slowly and gracefully: "Gentlemen, let's go. Give Lord Wang a minute to calm down—we don't want him to die of anger."

After they left, Xiang Zheng, who had been listening from behind the wall, took off his hood and leaned back in a chair padded with thick, soft bearskin.

Xue Jie stepped up at just the right moment to massage his shoulders: "Your Majesty, this place is cold and creepy. Should we head back to the palace?"

Xiang Zheng thought for a long moment, then asked: "What is Maning Tianmu?"

Xue Jie lowered his eyes: "This old servant is embarrassingly ignorant—I really don't know which deity that is. From the way Lord Wenren said it, it sounds made up."

"Whether it's made up or not, we'll find out once we look into it."

Xiang Zheng sat thinking for a long time, until a shiver ran through him and his body ached, before he snapped back to reality. He pulled his blanket tighter and stood up with some effort.

There was one more question he couldn't bring himself to ask.

Wenren Yue had called Wang Su a "thrown-away jade dildo"...

That "thrown-away" part—could it be about him?

Xiang Zheng felt a wave of disgust, cold spreading from his heart to his whole body.

Why would he say something like that?

Had rumors like that already spread out there?

Le Wuya was, after all, the most beautiful man of this era—so a rumor about him, while gross, wouldn't be too hard to look at.

But if someone started rumors about him and Wang Su...

Xiang Zheng's scalp tingled, and he didn't dare think about it anymore.

And this prison—he had no reason to come back to.

...

Walking out of the prison, Le Wuya said goodbye to the other three, then looked up at the bright sky and sun, letting out a satisfied breath with a smile.

Thanks to Lord Wang Su—who, with his own dignity and the emperor's last bit of goodwill, had handed Le Wuya another chess piece.