mesbooks Chapter 276 The Death of the Crown Prince
Chapter 276 The Death of the Crown Prince
The national treasury has been in deficit for years, but the pockets of the aristocratic families have been bulging year after year. Even a fool would not believe that there are no petty, big, or extremely corrupt officials who form cliques for personal gain and collude for interests in the court!
After careful consideration, Huizong decided to hit the nail on the head and use the salt administration as a typical example, so he sent his most trusted person, Crown Prince Chen Xuanli, to Yangzhou to inspect the salt administration.
The Crown Prince was carrying out the Emperor's orders, so he was careful and thoughtful in everything he did, in order to clean up the salt business and restore order in the court.
The investigation revealed that the salt tax was unclear, the actual amount paid did not match the actual amount, and only two or three tenths of it was collected by the court.
The prince secretly collected evidence and planned to present it to Huizong after returning to the capital, but he was assassinated on the way. He was later rescued by a rich lady. After his injuries healed, he secretly returned to the capital.
After returning to the palace, the prince immediately handed over the collected evidence to Huizong and asked Huizong to review it.
As expected, the account books, letters, etc. in the evidence all pointed to a group of Yangzhou officials using salt taxes for personal gain.
Among them, the governor of Yangzhou paid one million taels of silver to the Lin family on a regular basis every year, rain or shine.
You know, the court’s treasury silver was less than one million taels at most!
Huizong Longwei was furious and decided to prepare for a few days before he could hold the Lin family accountable for the annual 100 taels of silver.
The prince was of course united against the enemy, he almost lost his life in Yangzhou! How could the Lin family not be behind this?
Huizong and the crown prince had a good plan, but they didn't know that the empress dowager already had spies around them. When the news got back to the Lin family, it caused a huge shock.
It has come to a critical moment of life and death. The Lin family can no longer care about many concerns and takes action with thundering means!
First, Lin Xiaotian, the Minister of War, reported that the governor of Yangzhou embezzled salt taxes and hid countless silver at home, hoping that Huizong would order a thorough investigation to serve as a warning to others.
Huizong was caught off guard, but since the Lin family was willing to sacrifice the car to save the king, Huizong might as well take advantage of the situation and plunder the house of the Yangzhou prefect to fill the national treasury?
After all, rectifying the government is not something that can be done all at once. If the blow is too harsh at the beginning, it will not only trigger a fierce backlash from the Lin family, but will also provoke other families to band together for warmth, which will be more detrimental to the subsequent division of the families.
Looking at the tens of millions of taels of silver seized from the Yangzhou prefect's home and carried into the national treasury like water, Huizong temporarily put the matter of the one million taels of silver aside.
But the prince was unwilling to give up. After all, he had a narrow escape from death during this salt inspection. If these people dared to murder the crown prince, wouldn't they dare to rebel tomorrow? ! !
It wouldn't be a rebellion, but it would be a conspiracy to murder a country's crown prince... If there is one time, there will be two. Who made the prince insist on holding on to the salt administration issue?
Then, without any warning, the prince suddenly passed away!
Huizong was so grief-stricken and angry that he fainted several times.
However, the result given by the imperial physician was that the prince had a sudden hidden illness. After several rounds of imperial physicians were replaced, they all gave the same answer, so Huizong was helpless.
At the same time, eunuch Chong, who had been taking care of the prince, disappeared mysteriously without a trace.
……
"Your Highness, please send someone to collect Huo Chong's body."
"nature."
After Huo Qingyun said this, he said goodbye to Prince Yan and rushed to Emperor Tianqi's residence.
He had been away for quite some time, and if he didn't go back, Emperor Tianqi and Princess Qingyi would become suspicious.
After Huo Qingyun left, Chen Ji stood there for a while, lowering his eyes and saying nothing.
Huo Chong committed suicide, and "I did not harm the former crown prince" were his tearful words before his death.
Huo Chong said that the late crown prince died very suddenly. He suddenly started coughing uncontrollably, then he couldn't breathe, couldn't speak, and finally suffocated to death.
The reason why Huo Chong disappeared after the death of the prince was because the former prince had left a letter, instructing Huo Chong that if anything went wrong, he should be sure to deliver the letter to the Huo family.
Unexpectedly, as soon as Huo Chong walked out of the palace gate, he found someone following him. The other person was coming with such a fierce momentum that it was unclear whether he was coming for the person or the letter!
In a hurry, Huo Chong hid in a place where the killer could not find him, read the contents of the letter, then tore it into pieces and swallowed it.
Huo Chong’s idea was very simple. If the killer was coming for the person, he could die, but the letter from the former crown prince must not fall into the hands of the killer. If the killer was coming for the letter, then he must not leave the letter behind.
After reading the letter, he heard the footsteps of the killers. Fortunately, the killers did not discover Huo Chong.
After the killers left, Huo Chong disguised himself and rushed to the Huo family.
But what made Huo Chong despair was that there were assassins lying in ambush in front of Huo's door, waiting for him to fall into the trap.
The letter has been eaten by Huo Chong, and he is the only one here who knows the contents of the letter, so he cannot die!
Huo Chong quietly hid among the crowd and lay dormant.
But he thought too simply. Within an hour, the Imperial Guards, led by Lin Yuanfang, began to search the city, and Huo Chong had nowhere to hide!
Suddenly, he thought of a way to leave the city secretly.
The Jing'an River in Kyoto is connected to the moat, so he could sneak out of the city in the water without anyone noticing, as long as the long waterway didn't suffocate him to death! (Write this down, it'll be tested)
Huo Chong was lucky, he successfully reached the outskirts of Kyoto.
Huo Chong was unfortunate again. He did not swim out of the city, but fainted due to exhaustion and holding his breath for too long, and drifted out of the city.
When Huo Chong woke up again, he looked confused and had forgotten his name.
Noticing something strange in his lower body, he could only guess that he was a eunuch, perhaps an eunuch who had escaped from the palace using the waterway.
Huo Chong began to flee. He was penniless and looked fair and handsome, which sometimes increased the risk of being bullied.
After escaping for several years, Huo Chong was abducted by a group of slave traders, wandered around, and finally arrived in the northern border.
Then, he was discovered by Chen Ji's men and locked up.
Interrogation.
no result.
How can a person with amnesia talk about things he has long forgotten?
So, he continued to be imprisoned.
The dungeon was extremely deep and dark. Huo Chong curled up in the iron cage like a bug, being asked the same questions every day.
Why did it disappear when the previous crown prince passed away?
Why did it disappear when the previous crown prince passed away?
Why did it disappear when the previous crown prince passed away?
……
My head hurts!
Huo Chong covered his head and groaned in pain. The dark dungeon seemed like the river where he had drowned many years ago. His memories were shattered in the darkness and pieced together again.
"I want to see Mr. Huo Qingyun, otherwise I won't say anything."
……
The letter that Huo Chong ate recorded the details of the former crown prince's inspection of the salt affairs, including the names of relevant evidence.
However, the evidence was stored in the archives warehouse of the Eastern Palace at the time, and it is likely that it has been destroyed long ago.
Chen Ji and Huo Qingyun originally thought that Huo Chong was bribed by the Lin family to kill the former crown prince, and that catching him would provide witnesses. But now it seems that both the witnesses and the physical evidence have become a thing of the past.
The death of the prince remains a mystery.