you got on my tail

It was already noon when Bai Xuehe woke up, he really wanted to faint for a longer period of time, after all years of fear, such a deep sleep made him feel very extravagant.

Bai Xuehe moved his joints, only to realize that his hands were tucked in the quilt, and there was a round black snake lying in his palm, the palm was a little wet, the little snake raised its head, revealing its round eyes full of surprise and wet.

Heidan was afraid that Bai Xuehe would scold him for following without authorization, but Bai Xuehe seemed to know it all along, and only pointed his finger at his head. At this time, there was a sound outside the door, and Bai Xuehe raised his hand, signaling him to hide back again.

"Why did you faint suddenly?" Heidan still jumped onto his shoulder, and then suddenly recalled: "Is it because of the big monster before, hey, I knew that the monster pretended to be a good person, and it really wanted to hurt people .”

"What do you know?" Bai Xuehe pushed him back dumbfounded, "Shh, someone is here."

The little chubby snake quickly got into the quilt, but it was Lan Ziqing who came in first. He stopped holding a bowl of hot soup in his hand, and then said: "The doctor said that you are not sick, but you didn't catch it in one breath, just take a rest. alright."

"Master Lan has still caught up." Bai Xuehe sighed exaggeratedly, Lan Ziqing still walked over with a calm expression, put the hot ginger soup in his hand, Bai Xuehe held the bowl in a daze for a while, and didn't take a sip drink it.

"Why don't you drink it?" Lan Ziqing frowned, "I'm not you, so you're afraid that I won't succeed if I poison you?"

"Of course." Bai Xuehe smiled slyly, and said before Lan Ziqing was out of breath, "There is brown sugar in it. Although I like sweets, I don't eat brown sugar at all."

He just woke up from a coma, his cheeks were pale, but Lan Ziqing didn't care about it at all, but put the porcelain bowl aside, and said, "Then what do you want to eat?"

"I don't want to eat anything, let's hurry up and investigate the case." Bai Xuehe turned over and got out of bed, put his swollen feet into his boots, and put the snake into his sleeve calmly, when Fu Jijue came in with some food in his hand , walked in with some hesitation, and placed the porcelain plate by his bedside.

"The prince should be in charge of this case. We haven't asked him what he thinks." Lan Ziqing turned around and was about to speak, but Bai Xuehe immediately pushed back: "The prince's thoughts are the emperor's thoughts, naturally the same as ours."

Fu Jijue could only smile wryly without saying a word, he knew that Bai Xuehe didn't take the conversation just now to heart at all.

"My lord is honorable, the coal mine is full of dead people's bones, it's better for my lord not to go." While speaking, Bai Xuehe had already put on his boots and jacket, and walked out the door without turning his head.

Fu Jijue stayed in the room alone, staring at the snacks he had prepared for a while, he remembered that Bai Xuehe used to be a penny-pincher, but he was not such a stubborn person.

Lan Ziqing was also silent all the way, and arrived outside Xingshan Mine with Bai Xuehe.

After Lan Ziqing ceased to be the county magistrate, before the court had time to make arrangements, Mr. Liu from the county town next door came over. At this time, the mine had been completely cleaned up, and some rotting corpses were lined up outside the mine one by one. It's not summer anymore, but there's still an unsettling rancid smell.

Heidan got into the cuff a few times before Bai Xuehe realized that he was actually carrying this guy with him. He tied his mouth and nose with a towel, then squeezed the cuff tightly and moved close to the corpse.

The corpses have long been rotten, only the scattered clothes and silk can prove their identity, Bai Xuehe picked up a piece and rubbed it in his hand, the piece of cloth should be the cheapest coarse cloth.

"These people should be miners, that is, the inexplicable sound of labor heard by the nearby villagers." Bai Xuehe quickly left the corpse, threw the cloth and towel on the ground and walked away, then asked Liu Xiancheng behind him: " Besides these dead people, is there anything else in the mine?"

"There are also some tools for pulling coal and transporting coal." Liu Xiancheng was considered more responsible, he thought about it and said: "Other than that, there is nothing special. I also sent someone to clean up the tools and put them in the open space outside. My lord You can go and see."

"Not a single living thing?" Bai Xuehe frowned.

"Not a single one." Liu Xiancheng lowered his head and made a sad expression.

Bai Xuehe nodded, and walked around those unknown tools pretendingly. He called a Jinyi guard, and then took out the little snake from his sleeve. Heidan didn't know what to do, trembling with fright, wrapped it tightly around his wrist superior.

Liu Xiancheng was terribly frightened, and Jin Yiwei, who was used to seeing bloody scenes, also frowned. Bai Xuehe stuffed the black egg into his hand with great effort: "This is a snake I raised, it won't hurt anyone."

Seeing that Jin Yiwei was still frowning, Bai Xuehe added: "The moisture in the coal mine is too heavy, it is too young, you can take it back and raise it well, I will go back soon."

Bai Xuehe spoke slowly and patiently, trying his best to make Heitan understand that his instructions made sense, and the little snake really stopped making trouble, obediently lay in Jin Yiwei's hand, and even licked his palm as a gesture of goodwill.

"Call a few more people." Then, he took the map from Liu Xiancheng, "Go into the coal mine with me."

……

The capital city is more cloudy and cold than the south, but in late autumn, there is actually a little snow in the sky.

The Empress Dowager's health improved a bit, but she still regained her vitality. She lay quietly on the imperial concubine's couch to take a nap, with a cloak casually draped over her body, her temples had already started to turn white.

Although Fu Jiying was not the Empress Dowager's biological son, she grew up under her nose, so she knew the emperor no less than her own son.

Therefore, the queen mother does not place any hope in Lan Ziqing, an upright official in the eyes of everyone. Fu Jiying has a sensitive and cold temperament. Whoever checks it will end up being the fish under the emperor's sword.

The queen mother sighed, and slowly turned the beads in her hand. She was weak and would not help. Now I just hope that Xu Yan will stop doing things that disgust Fu Jiying, and hope that Fu Jiying will not kill them all.

"Mother's Queen." Yu Wang Fu Jiheng's voice came from outside the door. The Queen Mother frowned and signaled the maid not to open the door, and then said sternly: "Didn't the Ai family tell you not to come to pay your respects!"

Xu Yan is old, and what is more important to the Queen Mother is King Yu outside the door, who is her only parent and child.After all, Fu Jiheng was only in his early twenties, with a kind and upright personality, so he was not Fu Jiying's opponent at all.

So during the sensitive period of the Xu family's trial, she didn't know how many eyes and ears she had around her, so she could only choose to avoid seeing her youngest son.

"Mother, my son is just here to say hello." Fu Jiheng's young voice was full of exhaustion, the queen mother was slightly moved, and continued outside the door: "When I said hello to the emperor, I said that I wanted to come and sit with my mother, and he agreed. gone."

"Then you, come in." Hearing Fu Jiying's agreement, the queen mother let out a breath and signaled the maid to open the door.

The maid slowly retreated, and only their mother and son were left in the empty hall, or on the surface.

King Yu looked down at his mother, with stubble that hadn't been shaved off on his face, and he looked like he hadn't had a good rest at all.

"Heng'er..."

"Mother's queen." Yu Wang Fu Jiheng interrupted his mother's concern, then put an envelope into her hand, and said with burning eyes: "Mother's queen has not been seen for many days, and Heng'er can only bully you silently. This is me protecting the country." The amulet obtained by the temple for the mother, the mother needs to open it in the Buddhist hall."

"Okay." The Empress Dowager was obviously moved, and nodded hastily, "Heng'er, it's not that mother doesn't want to see you, it's just..."

She swallowed the second half of the sentence, and reached out to touch the handsome side face of her youngest son.

At this moment, Bai Xuehe had already led people into the coal mine, Lan Ziqing was walking beside him, several Jin Yiwei followed behind holding torches, and Liu Xiancheng also led some troops to follow behind.

Sure enough, as Bai Xuehe expected, those hanging coffins were set up in the coal mines to cover up the vents. The air in the coal mines circulates smoothly, and the torches burn steadily, which doesn't seem to affect the work at all.

"Someone deliberately diverted the running water. Drinking water in this coal mine is not a problem." Liu Xiancheng added and wiped off his sweat, "It's just that although I found cooking utensils, I didn't see a way to send food in."

"If it had been planned in advance, the food could naturally be put away in advance." Bai Xuehe replied with a smile, holding the map in his hand and flicking back and forth.

Although it had nothing to do with him, Bai Xuehe still had to keep all this in his eyes.

The person behind the scenes faked the mine disaster and forced innocent people to work in the mine. These people worked day and night without hope, and never saw the light once when they died.

I don't know how much money or power it is for, to be so unscrupulous and treat human life like an ant.

He took a few more steps forward, and his eyes finally stopped on the overturned cart in the mine.

"This is a cart for transporting coal." Liu Xiancheng thought that Bai Xuehe didn't understand, so he patiently explained to him, "Put the cart down, step on it again, the cart can be placed firmly, and then buckle this It is very convenient to pull things away when you open them.”

"I know this is a coal truck." Bai Xuehe looked back at Lan Ziqing, then at Liu Xiancheng, "This is a coal mine, the miners died in it, and the tools used to transport coal were thrown here, don't you think Is there anything strange?"

"Yes." Lan Ziqing nodded, "Where did the mined coal go? If Xu Gao sold them all, there should be an account..."

Cheng Mi's whereabouts of the coal is indeed strange, but Bai Xuehe cares more about another place.

He stared at the map closely, and suddenly recalled the broken white porcelain snake in his mind. It was exquisite and beautiful on the outside, but it was very poor on the inside, because no one could see what it looked like inside except it was broken.

"What are the accounts?" Bai Xuehe interrupted with a sneer, then lowered his head and shook the map, pointing out a place on the map to Lan Ziqing.

"Master Lan, look, this place is called Nanshan." In the gloomy mine, he took a deep breath, "Before coming here, I remember someone said that Nanshan is an iron mine that the imperial court has never mined. And it is connected to Xingshan.”

"What do you mean?" Lan Ziqing was puzzled, but his expression began to change. There was some unbelievable light in his eyes, and the hand holding the map began to tighten.

"The coal never went out from here at all. Naturally, there are no traces of accounting or transportation. Instead, it went directly to Nanshan from the mountain." Bai Xuehe continued to walk forward quickly with burning eyes, "If you guessed right, there is There must be a way to Nanshan Iron Mine."

If coal mines can only exchange money, iron mines are different.

But pig iron will become a sharp knife for killing people after thousands of tempers.