In the dark inn room, four corpses were placed on the bed. Their death conditions were tragic and extremely hideous.

It was difficult for Chen Ji to associate the scene in front of him with the careless and even silly prince.

If a person can disguise himself so thoroughly, how terrifying will the face underneath the disguise be?

Chen Ji whispered to Xifeng: "Go and ask the residents on the second floor if anyone has heard the sounds of fighting or wailing."

"yes."

Xifeng clasped his fists and left, leading several spies to knock on the door one by one.

After a while, Xifeng came back and whispered: "Sir, it's a bit strange. No one has heard the wailing. They should have been killed in an instant and then skinned? So there was no time to wailing."

Chen Ji did not answer, but bent down to examine the body carefully. He opened the eyelids of the deceased, and unexpectedly discovered that there were two copper nails nailed on the pupils of the deceased, and the eyeballs next to the copper nails were bright red.

After a while, he stood up and said: "These four people were skinned, beaten with copper nails, and tortured alive for a long time."

Xifeng was startled: "Dough peeled off before death?"

With that said, he took out a handkerchief from his arms and handed it to Chen Ji: "Sir, wipe the blood on your hands."

Chen Ji wiped his hands and calmly analyzed: "If the skin was peeled off after death, their faces would not bleed so much, and their eyeballs would not be so congested... It's strange, since they were tortured alive, why can't they get angry?

Make some noise?"

In the eerie silence, the spies tightly grasped the handles of the knives at their waists.

Even these spies who were used to seeing killing scenes couldn't help but feel a little nervous and solemn. These four people didn't seem to have been killed by humans, but more like their souls had been taken away by ghosts.

Someone whispered: "There are face eaters in the mountains over my hometown. Legend has it that they like to eat the faces of dead people and pretend to be dead people to continue living."

Xifeng sneered and said with a solemn face: "As a secret spy, you talk about ghosts? How can I, the officials of the Ning Dynasty, be afraid of such filthy things!"

Someone whispered: "Could it be that some official drove a ghost to do it?"

Xifeng kicked him: "The killer must have done it to kill people and silence them!"

Most people in this era are superstitious, and everything that cannot be explained can be explained by ghosts and gods. Even spies who kill without blinking will believe in this kind of thing.

Chen Ji said calmly: "It's not a ghost, it's a human being. I guess the killer's career is very strange. He can control these people and suffer punishment but cannot struggle."

What he didn't say was that according to the criminal's psychological profile, the killer should have suffered similar physical and psychological trauma, which would produce a twisted desire to abuse.

Chen Ji looked at Xifeng: "Who among the career paths recorded by the Secret Service can do such a thing?"

"Some heretical sorcerers may be able to do it." Xifeng frowned and said, "Sir, you have to check the archives in the capital, and you can only see it in the archives area that can only be entered by Haidongqing level. This kind of business

Officials are usually more secretive and rarely go against the government. If we have official status, their 'skills' will be greatly reduced."

"Oh?" Chen Ji was surprised.

This was the second time he heard this statement.

The last time, Lin Chaoqing said to Jiaotu in Liu Shiyu's mansion, "I have the status of a fourth-grade Daning official, so don't show off your trivial skills to embarrass me."

At that time, Chen Ji didn't understand Xing Guan, so when he heard this sentence, he didn't take it to heart.

But now combined with what Xifeng said, he suddenly realized something: the official position in the Ning Dynasty itself was like a way to practice officialdom. The higher the official position, the less afraid of magic.

Xifeng looked at Chen Ji: "Sir, what should we do now? The clue is broken."

Chen Ji remained silent. Before he came, he hoped that the clue would be cut off, but now that the clue was really cut off, he didn't know whether he should be happy or worried.

Should you keep pursuing it, or should you give up?

Seeing that he didn't answer, Xifeng became confused and asked again: "Sir?"

Chen Ji turned around and walked out of the room: "Take me to the inner prison record library. I want to check a file."

He vaguely remembered that when he helped Jiaotu and Yunyang investigate the Liu family case, he had glanced at similar punishment methods in the file, but he couldn't remember it clearly, so he had to take another look.

In addition, he can take away part of the ice flow.

As he was about to leave, Chen Ji suddenly added: "Let's bury these four corpses. We must do it in secret and don't let the news leak out."

…

…

On Luoyi Street in Dongshi City under the dark night, a carriage parked quietly on the roadside. The tall and muscular horses snorted in the cold wind and sprayed out white mist like a tidal wave.

Xifeng stood behind Chen Ji and covered Chen Ji's eyes with a layer of black cloth.

While tying the black cloth, he explained: "My lord, please forgive me, because the Luo City Inner Prison was infiltrated before. Now, the qualifications to enter and exit the inner prison must be specially approved by Lord Golden Pig. Everyone else must be blindfolded when entering or exiting."

"Understood," Chen Ji got into the carriage with help. When the wheels rolled slowly, he closed his eyes and asked, "How long have you been following Mr. Golden Pig?"

West Wind recalled: "Seven years."

Chen Ji said: "You have been following Mr. Golden Pig for a long time. Do you often see Pegasus?"

Xifeng said with a smile: "It's rare for us to see Master Pegasus and his dragon. However, every year during the Lantern Festival, Master Golden Pig rewards his subordinates with banquets. He will come to participate whenever he is in the capital."

The spacious carriage was swaying, and cold air blew in from time to time through the gaps in the cotton curtains.

Xifeng took out a fire stick in the carriage, carefully lit a copper stove and put it into Chen Ji's arms: "Sir, warm your hands."

"Thank you," Chen Ji fumbled and took the copper stove and asked, "Have you seen Bailong?"

While closing the fire stick, Xifeng said: "Master Bailong is rarely seen. His whereabouts are very mysterious. You can only see him on very important occasions. Master Bailong will also wear a mask when he appears. I am afraid that only the inner Only a senior minister would know what he looks like."

Chen Ji was silent for a moment: "What about the sick tiger?"

Xifeng was startled for a moment: "No one has seen sick tiger. This gentleman has no sense of existence like a ghost. Only when the internal minister occasionally says, 'Leave this matter to sick tiger,' will everyone remember that the secret There is such a character in the spy agency."

"Never showed up?!"

"Never appeared before," Xifeng recalled carefully: "At least I haven't seen him since I joined the Secret Service. Six years ago, when Long live the Lord made a tour of the south, all the zodiac signs were guarding him, but there was still no sick tiger. His figure...may also be hidden in the crowd, but we don't know."

Chen Ji asked: "What does the Prime Minister usually tell sick tigers to do? Is it an assassination, or is it to gather intelligence?"

Xifeng glanced at Chen Ji in surprise. He always felt that Chen Ji seemed to be particularly interested in Bing Hu: "Sir, have you heard that Master Bing Hu is about to abdicate? But this position is too far away from us, and it is difficult to win people." There are too many, even with the help of Mr. Golden Pig."

When the carriage arrived in front of the gate of the inner prison, Xifeng jumped out of the car first and helped Chen Wei walk down the narrow downward stairs of the inner prison.

After taking off the blindfold, the flames of the Bagua array lamps on the walls on both sides of the stone path swayed. The inner prison was even more gloomy at night, as if I was walking into hell.

"Sir, which files do you want to see?" Xifeng asked.

Chen Ji tried hard to recall the files he had read: "Jianing seven years, A-level files."

When the jailer brought a big box, he quickly flipped through each page of the file and scanned it ten lines at a time.

Time passed by, but he still couldn't find what he wanted.

Chen Ji raised his head and said, "No, bring the A-level files from the 8th and 9th years of Jianing. You should also look for them together. As long as there are things nailed to the dead body, find them and give them to me."

He had read too many files before, and he could only vaguely remember similar cases, but he couldn't remember which file it was in.

However, one of the jailers found it difficult: "Sir, we are illiterate..."

"Illiterate?" Chen Ji was startled.

He knew that the literacy rate in this era was low, but he did not expect that the secret agents and jailers were also illiterate. Civil servants monopolized the industry of paper and books, and monopolized knowledge. Ordinary people, let alone participating in the imperial examination, might not be able to find a way to become literate.

Xifeng said: "Sir, let me help you find it."

"OK."

The two sat together in front of the oil lamp and looked through the files. The jailer boiled water and made strong tea for them. Until their eyes became sore, Xifeng suddenly said: "Sir, is this what you are looking for? In the ninth year of Jianing, The case of the Wu family’s extermination in Kaifeng Prefecture!”

Chen Ji took the file and saw that it recorded a case in which seventeen members of Wu Zhuo's family, a bank supervisor in Kaifeng Prefecture, were wiped out overnight twenty-two years ago. In the case, after the death of the Wu family's mistress, her mouth, nose, eyes, ears, They were all driven with wooden nails, the kind used in coffin shops to seal coffins.

Not only that, the Wu family’s mistress was also brutally cut off from her private parts.

He looked carefully, but suddenly felt something was wrong: "The file records that the Wu family's household registration should be eighteen people, and one person survived."

Xifeng came over and looked at it: "The one from the bank... This is the person from the 24th Yamen of our Bureau of Ceremonies. The officials who can supervise the bank all have great backgrounds. There must be talented people above. It's a big fat shortage. But it's a bit

It’s strange, our Chief of Ceremonies always protects the weak, one of our own was killed, but we didn’t catch the murderer?”

Chen Ji thought thoughtfully: "Maybe the murderer didn't leave any clues?"

"Then we won't leave the file alone," Xifeng explained: "The rule of our ceremonial supervisor is that even if the murderer is not caught that year, the file must be re-checked every year to see if it can be compared with other cases.

'Combining the case' will not give up until the murderer is caught. But you see, sir, this file is at the bottom of the box..."

Chen Ji said softly: "Unless the murderer is a big shot in the ceremonial prison."

Xifeng was startled and subconsciously took a step away from the file.

Chen Ji was a little confused. The method of the murderer in this case was very similar to that of tonight's killer. But if the murderer was really a big shot in the Bureau of Ceremonies, why did the other party help the prince to kill and silence him?

…

There will be another chapter later
Chapter completed!