"Where are we going, sir?" Min Shan asked.

"To catch a criminal!" Xu Qi'an replied without hesitation after leaving the council chamber.

Yang Feng and the other Nightwatchers looked at Xu Qi'an in surprise, while Zhu Guangxiao and Song Tingfeng had some ideas. They knew more than others about the saltpeter mine and the case of the small flag officer.

If Li Yuchun were here, he could probably sort out the plan, but he went to invite Chu Caiwei from the Bureau of Astrology.

"Why hasn't the boss come back yet? Does it take all morning to invite someone?" Xu Qi'an frowned. "Is there any trouble?"

As soon as they left the gate of the Ministry of Justice and mounted their horses, they saw two yellow horses galloping towards them. It was Li Yuchun and Chu Caiwei in a light yellow dress.

Li Yuchun explained, "Miss Chu is not at the Bureau of Astrology. She went to the palace. I waited for her at the gate of the Imperial City for a long time before she came out..."

She went to Princess Chang's place for food again. This foodie... Xu Qi'an smiled warmly, "Miss Chu, it's been a long time. You look even more beautiful."

Chu Caiwei's round egg-shaped face hung a sweet smile, but she remembered her identity and the Nightwatchers around her, so she kept a straight face and just said, "Hmm."

Xu Qi'an quickly explained the plan, "Min Yinluo, you take my golden badge to the east gate of the Imperial City and catch Zhou Chixiong, the hundredth household."

"The rest of us will go to Zhou's mansion to catch him."

They split up because they didn't know if Zhou Chixiong was on duty today. Xu Qi'an had a good reason for this arrangement. The Imperial City was under the Emperor's feet, and there would be no conflict, but it was not easy to catch someone just like that. They needed a waist badge to clear the way.

Therefore, they only needed one Nightwatcher to go.

If they went directly to Zhou Chixiong's house to catch him, he might jump over the wall in a hurry. Xu Qi'an had just used the Heaven and Earth One Cut and his combat power had declined significantly, so he needed two Nightwatchers to accompany him.

...

On the other side, Lv Qing was reporting the situation.

"Lord Liu and gentlemen, if nothing unexpected happens, there may be demons involved in this matter."

This sentence made the officials present turn pale, and Sun, the Minister of Justice, frowned.

One of the officials from the Ministry of Justice didn't quite believe it and asked, "What evidence do you have?"

"A few days ago, I and Xu Qi'an investigated the case of the demon in Dahuang Mountain who swallowed up the local ash households."

"Demon swallowing up ash households?" Lord Liu frowned.

"Yes, in the middle of the year, a demon came to the river at the foot of Dahuang Mountain and swallowed up hundreds of local ash households. I and Xu Qi'an jointly handled the case and found a saltpeter mine that had been completely mined in Dahuang Mountain..."

Lv Qing explained the case of the saltpeter mine in Dahuang Mountain in detail to the officials present.

This was a very good way to delay time because she was not talking nonsense, and the officials were listening very carefully without urging her.

"So when I and Xu Qi'an communicated just now, we analyzed layer by layer and found that gunpowder might not come from the Ministry of Industry, but was related to the saltpeter mine in Dahuang Mountain." Lv Qing said.

Officials from the Ministry of Justice and the county government looked serious. This case involved demons. There were two major camps of demons in Jiuzhou: the various tribes of demons in the northwest and the Ten Thousand Demons Kingdom in the northeast.

The Ten Thousand Demons Kingdom had long been destroyed in the demon suppression of the Jiazi year, and the remaining remnants were struggling to survive.

The demons in the northwest formed an alliance with the various tribes in the north to resist the Great Feng and the western countries.Which demon clan is behind the saltpeter mine?

Liu Gonggong looked at the Chen County Magistrate, who nodded and gave his subordinate an order: "It is true. The yamen just handled this case a few days ago, and Lv Qing was in charge of it."

Liu Gonggong's expression was gloomy. "If we had discovered the saltpeter mine earlier, the Sangpo case might not have happened. Why has the case of demons devouring people been suppressed until now?"

Lv Qing was about to accuse the magistrate of Taikang County of neglecting his duty and disregarding the lives of commoners, but was stopped by a glance from the Chen County Magistrate.

Old Chen sighed. "The demons are too powerful, and even the county magistrate of Taikang can't handle it."

Liu Gonggong snorted. "I will report this matter to His Majesty."

Sun Shangshu spoke up and looked at Lv Qing. "What is Xu Qi'an doing?"

He seemed to have noticed that Lv Qing was subtly delaying time and wanted to get straight to the point without giving her a chance to talk more.

Liu Gonggong pondered and said, "Even if the demon clan has gunpowder, how can they sneak it into Sangpo past the Great Feng Forbidden Army, the city guards, and the gatekeepers?"

"This involves another case," Lv Qing replied.

"Another case?" Everyone was surprised that the Sangpo explosion case was connected to so many things.

Lv Qing explained, "The day before His Majesty's ancestor worship, Liu Han, a small flag officer of the Jinwu Guard, died for no reason at home. It was also handled by me and Mr. Xu. At that time, Mr. Xu speculated that he was killed to silence him, but we did not associate it with the saltpeter mine case."

A small flag officer of the Jinwu Guard was killed to silence him... gunpowder was smuggled into Sangpo... everyone present was smart enough to have no doubts.

"What about that Xu just now..." The officials from the Ministry of Justice and some yamen officials suddenly stood up from their chairs.

"Just now, Mr. Xu remembered this matter and suddenly understood it, so he left in a hurry," Lv Qing said.

Sun Shangshu ordered, "Arrest all the Baihus of the Jinwu Guard and go now!"

With a bang, everyone stood up and rushed out of the council chamber, not caring about knocking over chairs.

At this point, the case had been analyzed very clearly, and catching the internal traitors of the Jinwu Guard was equivalent to achieving a great success.

Lv Qing breathed a sigh of relief and did her best.

If it were just fair competition, Lv Qing would not have helped Xu Qi'an like this. It was just that his situation was precarious, and this case was his only hope of redemption.

Lv Qing felt that she should help as a friend.

She left the council chamber with her colleagues from the yamen.

Only Liu Gonggong and his eunuchs, Sun Shangshu, and the Chen County Magistrate remained in the large council chamber.

Liu Gonggong extended his hand, and the accompanying eunuch immediately dried the ink and handed the book to him.

Liu Gonggong carefully read the contents. The first two pages were discussions of the case between the Ministry of Justice and the yamen, mainly arguing and dry.

It wasn't until Xu Qi'an joined that the case began to be clarified and the suspect was identified within an incense stick's time.

The progress of the case was so fast that Liu Gonggong was surprised. According to the normal process, it would take two or three days to link the saltpeter mine in Dahuangshan with the small flag officer's case.

It seems that His Majesty's appointment of Xu Qi'an as the head of the Nightwatcher yamen was deliberate... Liu Gonggong suddenly realized.

"Xiaoyunzi, from today on, you will stay at the Nightwatcher yamen and be responsible for supervising their handling of the case and passing on messages to me in a timely manner."

Liu Gonggong ordered.

"Yes!" The little eunuch who was taking notes obeyed the order.The Zhou Mansion had a tightly closed black gate.

At Xu Qi'an's signal, Song Tingfeng stepped up to the door and knocked loudly.

"Open up! Nightwatcher on official business."

An old voice from inside the door said, "The master of the house is sick and not seeing visitors. Go away."

Song Tingfeng knocked again, but there was no response.

A deadbeat?

Song Tingfeng sneered, kicked the door with a loud bang, and the solid wooden door shattered, sending splinters flying.

An old man in a blue cloth garment trembled in fear, watching the unexpected guests with a terrified expression.

"Leave two people to guard the gate, and the rest go in with Li Yuchun and Yang Yuchun." Xu Qi'an waved his hand and ordered the copper gongs to charge forward, while he and Chu Caiwei stayed behind.

"You're the lead investigator, why aren't you charging in?" Chu Caiwei tilted her head and looked at him.

"Have you ever seen His Majesty charge into battle during the Shanhaiguan War?" Xu Qi'an replied with a glance.

Chu Caiwei was speechless. She knew he was talking nonsense, but her not-so-bright mind couldn't come up with a rebuttal.

"I was going to give you a powerful pill, but forget it." She said with a straight face.

"A powerful pill?"

"Just to replenish your body, which is deficient in Qi and blood." Chu Caiwei said.

As a Feng Shui master in the wizard system, she was still lifting stones in the yard while Xu Qi'an was sick. Just by looking at his complexion, she knew he was in bad shape.

"Give me one, and I'll treat you to dinner tonight." Xu Qi'an poked her with his elbow.

Chu Caiwei stepped back in disgust, took out a porcelain bottle from her deer skin bag, and threw it at him. "It's enough to last you a while."

Xu Qi'an liked Chu Caiwei's strong character. He walked inside while pouring out a pill from the bottle and swallowed it after chewing it a few times. The pill had a strange taste and was spicy after a few bites. A few seconds later, he felt warm and comfortable in his stomach, and his feeling of weakness had also improved a lot.

"Let me make it clear beforehand, this is the negative effect brought by my secret technique, and it doesn't mean I'm Ruan Xiao'er."

"What is Ruan Xiao'er?"

"Not a good thing."

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They walked into the inner courtyard while talking.

Li Yuchun and Yang Feng greeted them, shaking their heads. "The people are gone."

"The valuable things in the mansion have been taken away," Yang Feng added.

Song Tingfeng immediately grabbed the old gatekeeper, held a knife to his neck, and shouted, "Where is Zhou Chixiong?"

"The master of the house... he, he took his wife and children out of the city for a visit."

"Why did you say he was sick?"

"The master of the house instructed me to say so, and I followed suit..." The old gatekeeper's face was anxious, his legs trembling, and he didn't look like he was lying.

"When did he leave?"

"On the day after the ancestral ceremony..." The gatekeeper swallowed his saliva and begged, "What crime has the master committed? I don't know anything, I don't know anything..."

Xu Qi'an waved his hand, indicating that Song Tingfeng let him go.

He led the team to search the rooms one by one. Except for some valuable antiques and calligraphy that were taken away, everything in the mansion was intact.

"Zhou Chixiong has escaped!" Li Yuchun said in a deep voice.

"It's too early to say that now." Xu Qi'an looked at Chu Caiwei.The beauty with an oval face unexpectedly understood his meaning, leapt gracefully onto the rooftop, opened her clear, shining eyes, and scanned every corner of the Zhou Family's residence.

She wasn't looking for a person, but searching for something else. The focus was on the garden and the stone well.

After a moment, Chu Caiwei leapt down from the rooftop and shook her head. "There are no hidden corpses in the mansion, and no one has died here recently... Hmm, it's possible that it was concealed by special means. You can dig three feet into the ground and search."

"No need," Xu Qi'an sighed. "Whether dead or escaped, this lead has been cut off."

However, it was most likely that they had escaped because the people in the mansion had seen Zhou Baihu leaving with his family.

As they walked out of the Zhou Family's gate, Min Shan and several other Nightwatchers rushed over with their gongs. They were too late to stop them and shouted, "After the ancestor worship ceremony, Zhou Baihu took a long vacation."

Seeing their colleagues' frustrated expressions, Yang Feng let out a sigh of relief. "He escaped."

...

As soon as Xu Qi'an left with his team, the officials from the Ministry of Justice and the local government rushed to the Zhou Family's residence. Seeing the collapsed gate, their hearts sank.

They interrogated the servants and learned that the Nightwatchers had just missed them, and Zhou Baihu had already escaped from the capital.

The officials from both offices felt inexplicably complicated, not knowing whether to be happy or regretful.

...

At dusk!

Liu Gonggong hurried back to the palace before the city gates closed. With the support of his sons, he changed into casual clothes, took a bath, and was drinking tea before dinner when a young eunuch rushed in and said in a soft voice, "Godfather, His Majesty has sent someone to invite you."

Liu Gonggong pinched his brow and said irritably, "I know!"

He took a sip of water, told his son to change his clothes, put on his python robe, and just as he was about to step out of the threshold, he suddenly remembered something.

"Bring the file we brought back today."

The young eunuch went back to get it.

He arrived at the Quiet Heart Palace and was led in after being announced. He saw Emperor Yuan Jing, who was wearing a Daoist robe and had a long beard, holding a book in his hand. He wasn't meditating or working, but lost in thought.

"Liu Rong, I sent someone to supervise the case. It's been a day. What progress have you made?" Emperor Yuan Jing's tone was flat.

Liu Gonggong's heart skipped a beat. He had been working in the palace for decades, and even Emperor Yuan Jing's temperament made him feel annoyed in this posture. Asking about the case was just an excuse. His Majesty was going to throw a tantrum.

Liu Gonggong was scared for a moment, but then he was relieved. He thought to himself that it was a good thing that he had prepared in advance and that he had indeed made some progress today.

"Your Majesty, this is today's summary of the case. I would like to present it to you." Liu Gonggong took out a thin booklet from his sleeve.

PS: Something came up during the day, so the update is late. I'll update first and then edit later. As usual, if there are any typos, I'll correct them in this chapter.