After these words, Hou Longtao was stunned and full of regret.

It turned out that a plan that I thought was completely unpredictable was actually full of flaws. Just finding someone to cooperate with me was completely wrong!

I actually ignored that Li Ling was a local from Huguang and a village party... This relationship that was enough to unite into forces in the court, and it would naturally apply to the local area. And I actually wanted to use pressure and promised benefits to make this guy take the risk of killing his boss and then blame Li Ling? This is really as stupid as a tiger's skin.

Li Ling finally spoke at this time: "To be honest, your plan is considered sinister. On the one hand, he attracted Fang Shan to have the military officer who had already had interests in exchanges with you and colluded with each other to shock the audience; on the other hand, he also persuaded Cao Dianli to murder the magistrate of County Zhou, and then framed everything on me, an outsider who had just arrived in the county.

"And you have made a backup plan early and asked you to arrange for people in the county government here to testify, so that my charge of killing the county magistrate Zhou became as proof as a mountain. It was really clever. But you found the wrong person, or the wrong place.

"Although this Cao Renqi Cao Dian official has never met me, his father has a good relationship with me. This time I wanted to go to his house to visit. As a result, because the Zhou County Magistrate invited me, I gave up for the time being, and then such an accident happened... Of course, if you knew this earlier, know my relationship with Mr. Cao, and know that Mr. Cao was the master who was in charge of criminality by my teacher, you might not have made such a decision rashly."

Yes, this Cao Renqi is the son of Cao Jin, the master who went to Jiangcheng County with Wei Liang.

Cao Jin was originally from Huaibei, and was from Qingshan County. It was not good for the imperial examination. In the end, he only passed the imperial examination and was unable to go further. He did not want to be a small official with little future. So he simply relied on his connections in the imperial examination to join those senior officials who had considerable status in the court and became his assistants.

After that, as he gradually grew older, he could no longer continue to follow his home and was planning to return to his hometown to retire. As a result, Wei Liang came out of Huaibei and was recommended to be a master of this future pillar of the court. It was not until Wei Liang was transferred to Jiangnan to serve as an official, Cao Jin returned to his hometown Qingshan.

Over the years, although Cao Jin was only an aide, his qualifications in the officialdom were quite good. Therefore, even though the Cao family had no power in the county, and even if Cao Renqi failed to pass the exam for a scholar, his Cao family soon became a force that cannot be ignored in Qingshan County. Cao Renqi also served as a clerk in the county government office, and his prestige was even above the clerks.

Hou Long should have done this. After hitting a wall on Zhou Huanchen, he quickly made such a vicious plan, and then he thought about finding someone available from the county government. As a result, he found Cao Renqi's head, because as far as his secret son of the Imperial City Office said, if anyone in this county government had such courage and ability, it would be Cao Dianli.

Of course, he did not tell the whole plan, but only through some arguments and the statements obtained from the Zhou County Magistrate, Hou Longtao's entire conspiracy was guessed by Cao Renqi and his father Cao Jin.

Even if Hou Longtao wants to deal with other people, Cao

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The family didn't plan to wade into this muddy water; now that he knew that he wanted to harm Li Ling, Cao Jin would naturally be even more unlikely to fulfill his wish. Instead, he took the opportunity to make a plan and decided to trick Hou Longtao into it.

Of course, more importantly, they planned to take this opportunity to dig out the secret spies of the Imperial City Secretariat who had been hiding in the county yamen. This can be said to be something that is as difficult as major yamen today who want to do it, but it is difficult to do.

In recent years, the power of the Imperial City Department has indeed expanded rapidly. In the capital, their power is increasing, and they also mean to take away many of the powers of the Ministry of Justice and the Censorate; and in the local area, it is their increasing secret reports and through these spies to control the every move of the local government.

This is something that no local officials cannot accept. If they are staring at anything they do in the yamen and report it at any time, then what are they the ones they are the ones they are? Not only do officials not want to be spyed at any time, but those officials who truly control local power are even less willing to have such a spy around them.

However, the secret spy of the Imperial City Department is too secret and has no trace to find, so everyone has no good way to deal with it. But now in Qingshan County, with Hou Longtao's appearance, things have turned around. As the Imperial City Department's tutor, he naturally has the right to use these secrets to do things for him, and it is necessary for him to do this to promote his entire plan. Whether it is the Cao family, the Zhou County Magistrate and other officials, what they have to do is to observe secretly and find out the several secrets who are ready to move.

Now, with Hou Longtao arrested, not only did his overall plan fail, but he also exposed all the secrets. He was eager to stand up to testify, and then took Li Ling, and was eager to take him out to behead him. If he said that they were not Hou Longtao's orders, and were not the secrets of the imperial city, I am afraid that no one would believe it.

Until this time, Hou Longtao finally understood everything, and the expression on his face went from being stunned to being sudden, to being miserable at this moment. He did lose a lot this time, thinking that everything was in control, but in the end he fell into the plot of others. Not only did he fail to kill Li Ling, but he also brought himself and the secret son of the Imperial City.

But even so, he felt that he had a last glimmer of hope, and he might not die. At this moment, he looked at Li Ling: "Li... Lord Li, the official is also doing his order, but in fact he has no malicious intentions towards you... Since the matter has come to this, I will admit defeat. But don't forget that I am from the Imperial City Department. If something happens to me, you will not be able to escape from it. Moreover, you are no longer an official of the court. If you really annoy the masters above, I am afraid that your life will be difficult for you!"

The meaning of these soft and hard words is actually very clear, just hoping that Li Ling can let him go. Many people in the county government also had some intentions. After all, the Imperial City Department was not the ones who dared to provoke easily.

But Li Ling replied to him with a sneer: "At this point, do you still want to use such words to intimidate me? I have given you a chance. After Wei Tianying wanted to harm me in the capital but failed, I did not fight back. But what was the exchange for? It was your ever-intensified plot, the pursuit and ambush along the way, and the frame-up here!

"Now I'll spare you and let you go, I'm afraid I won't need much

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After a long time, what kind of power will you borrow, make trouble, and become enemies with me again. Do you think I, Li Ling, are you a fool who is kind and ruthless and keeps the tigers?” As he said this, his eyes were filled with murderous intent, and Li Moyun and Yang Zhen, who were also carrying the left and right, drew their swords at the same time.

"You... do you really want to kill me? You... have thought about it!" Hou Longtao felt something was wrong and finally struggled and shouted, but wanted to remind others.

At this time, Cao Renqi also spoke: "Of course, Imperial City is not something that I am a little person who can provoke, but what if no one knows that you died in my Qingshan County? There is no evidence, no physical evidence, and no one can find the body, so naturally there will be no worries.

"This is our Qingshan County after all, not your Qingshan County!"

This last sentence made Hou Longtao completely stunned. Just as he was stunned, two swords had already flew from left and right at the same time, crossing and slashing his body obliquely.

It was Li Moyun and Yang Zhen who used the sword at the same time, and the elders and the people from the county government gave a reminder at the same time, how could they still have some concerns? Especially Li Moyun, who had long been full of murderous intentions towards Hou Longtao, but he had shown mercy before because the elders wanted to live, but at this time, he had no worries anymore.

The two of them crossed by themselves. Hou Longtao first paused, then showed an incredible look on his face, and then turned into violent distortion and pain. He opened his mouth to say something, but in the end he couldn't say a word, and he couldn't even scream. The person had already clattered and broke into four pieces, combined with blood and internal organs, and broke into pieces.

This killing scared everyone in the hall, and even Zhou Huanchen screamed. It was not surprising that Hou Longtao was killed, but his death was too miserable. He was really dead without a complete corpse.

As for the eyes of the Imperial City Division who had been stared at the death, their faces were even more earthy at this time. Without any hesitation, they knelt on the ground and kowtowed to mercy: "Sir, please spare me... We just obey our orders, everything is the idea of ​​Lord Hou... As long as you let me wait, I promise that I will not leak today's affairs. We will definitely..." After a while, the foreheads of the few people were covered in blood, which looked really pitiful.

But Cao Renqi was unmoved at all and immediately ordered: "There were foreign bandits who invaded our Qingshan County and wanted to do something wrong. Fortunately, they were discovered by the yamen in time and killed all the thieves to keep the peace of the people in our county..." As he said that, the yamen officers and others picked up their weapons and surrounded them to kill them all.

Unexpectedly, Li Ling spoke at this moment: "Slow down."

His words were quite heavy. Everyone who was about to take action stopped and looked at him in confusion. Cao Renqi also looked over: "Does Lord Li want to keep their living?"

"I still have something to use for them. Why don't I talk to them again? If I can't get it, it's not too late to deal with them again." Li Ling stood up at this time and walked slowly to the few people.

At this time, he seemed particularly calm and confident, because all the initiative was in his hands, because everyone here was his people, and Qingshan County was his home court.

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Chapter completed!