abcnovels
Chapter 419: Detained
Chapter 419: Detained
Chapter 419: Detained
Inside the City Supervisory Division, several night-duty cultivators rushed out in shock. They watched Chu Liang stride in, carrying the unconscious Su Wei with one hand.
The group of cultivators working for the City Lord's Residence were on Chu Liang's heels, but they hesitated for a moment before swarming in after him. They knew that they wouldn't be able to do anything to Chu Liang once they were inside the City Supervisory Division.
Seeing the group of people suddenly burst in, the several cultivators belonging to the City Supervisory Division were quite alarmed.
The person leading them, a flag-bearing official[1], shouted at Chu Liang, "Who dares to barge into the City Supervisory Division?!"
"Why are you shouting at me?" Chu Liang replied. "I'm here to report a crime."
"Oh..." the flag-bearing official uttered. Then he shifted his attention to the group behind Chu Liang and shouted, "Do not behave impertinently inside the City Supervisory Division!"
"Why are you shouting at me? We're from the City Lord's Residence!" the leader of the group shouted back.
The flag-bearing official was taken aback.
If I can't shout at either of them, who do I shout at?
After thinking for a moment, he suddenly turned around and shouted at his subordinates, "What are you standing there for? Go fetch Seal-Holding Official[2] Ma!"
His subordinates quickly responded, "Yes, sir..."
However, they were thinking, You can't shout at outsiders, so you shout at us, huh?
It wasn't surprising that the flag-bearing official didn't dare continue raising his voice at the outsiders. Be it Chu Liang or the group of cultivators who followed him in after, they all exuded a formidable presence. The flag-bearing official could tell at a glance that they were all at much higher cultivation levels than him.
Naturally, he was intimidated by those he couldn't defeat. This was the City Supervisory Division's domain, but without a commanding officer present, the flag-bearing official needed to maintain caution.
Chu Liang, unbothered by the situation, grabbed a chair and sat down in the main hall. He tossed the unconscious Su Wei onto the ground and pinned the guy down with his foot.
Seeing that, several of the City Lord's cultivators wanted to charge over. "You—"
"Who dares to move?" Chu Liang said coldly. "He's committed serious crimes. Trying to save him means you're shielding a criminal. If any of you step forward, I will stomp him to death!"
Those words left the group of cultivators quite bewildered. They couldn't tell for sure if this young man even cared about adhering to the law.
Nevertheless, seeing their young master under the young man's foot, they understood the situation well enough.
They could only shout with feigned bravado, "If you harm even a single hair on the young master, you'll never leave this place alive!"
"Heh?" Chu Liang uttered.
He immediately stomped down on Su Wei's chest with a thud.
Su Wei was a cultivator of martial arts, yet Chu Liang's stomp was powerful enough to make Su Wei cough up blood. Despite having been knocked out before the stomp, Su Wei was now grimacing in so much pain that it looked like he was about to wake up.
Chu Liang had no sympathy for this deranged murderer.
If the aggrieved souls of the women in the painting hadn't told me about Su Wei, there would have been another tragedy tonight.
With Su Wei at Chu Liang's mercy, the opposing group of cultivators did not dare to provoke him any further.
Yet, someone shouted from the rear of their group, "If you have the guts, stomp on him again!"
"Hmm?" Chu Liang murmured.
As Di Nufeng's disciple, how could Chu Liang let such a provocation slide?
He stomped on Su Wei's chest again!
Crack!
The distinct sound of Su Wei's bones cracking rang out. Just as Su Wei was about to regain consciousness, he passed out again from the pain.
The same person from before shouted once more, "You dared to stomp again? I don't believe you have the guts to do it a third time!"
Just as Chu Liang was about to deliver another stomp, the leader of the opposing group frantically waved his hands. "Hang on, hang on..."
He first gestured for Chu Liang to stop, then he turned to the person at the back of the group who had been shouting at Chu Liang.
The leader asked that person, "Why are you doing that?"
The man answered, "I'm the janitor here at the City Supervisory Division. I was just curious if he'd dare to stomp again... and he actually did, heh..."
"Get out of here! Scram!"
The cultivators from the City Lord's Residence angrily drove the janitor away.
...
The standoff lasted only a moment before a thunderous voice rang out. "Who dares to cause such a ruckus at the City Supervisory Division in the dead of night? I want to see who exactly is so bold!"
A middle-aged man with piercing eyes, dressed in the white robes of the City Supervisory Division, strode in with large steps. His fiery gaze swept over the hall.
The man had a majestic and imposing aura and a high cultivation level, likely the sixth realm. He was Ma Ben, the head of the City Supervisory Division in Wu'an City.
The chief official, the city supervisor, and the general of the garrison were the three most powerful figures in the city.
"City Supervisor Ma," the leader of the group from the City Lord's Residence called out.
He cupped his hands in greeting, and his group followed suit.
The group leader said, "You're finally here."
"Honored Ally Xue," Ma Ben replied, cupping his hands in return.
Seeing that the two knew each other, Chu Liang refused to be outdone. He cupped his hands in greeting too and greeted Ma Ben. "City Supervisor Ma."
"Hmm...?" Ma Ben murmured, turning his head and giving Chu Liang an intense stare. He asked, "And you are?"
Chu Liang answered, "I am Chu Liang, a disciple of the Mount Shu Sect. City Supervisor Ma, I've come here today to ask you to punish evil and uphold justice."
"Chu Liang?" Ma Ben furrowed his brows. "You're that Young Hero Chu who slayed Taowu?"
Chu Liang smiled humbly.
Before arriving at the hall, Ma Ben had already inquired about the situation and decided on a plan of action. He just needed to take down anyone who dared to oppose the City Lord's people. However, upon finding out Chu Liang's identity, Ma Ben was hesitant to go ahead with his plan.
Ma Ben sat down in the seat of honor[3] and slowly asked, "What exactly happened here?"
Honored Ally Xue accused Chu Liang of breaking into the City Lord's Residence in the middle of the night and kidnapping Young Master Su. It was a blatant disregard for the law and morals.
Chu Liang, on the other hand, claimed that Su Wei was guilty of murder and a slew of other crimes. He didn't mention anything about the female ghosts in the painting though.
After hearing that, Ma Ben said unhurriedly, "The City Supervisory Division has no authority to judge cases. You should be taking this matter to the Wu'an City government office[4]. Why have you come barging into my division?"
"You'll have to ask this madman for that," Honored Ally Xue replied, glaring at Chu Liang.
"Naturally, it was to prevent them from silencing witnesses. There are no powerful cultivators in the government office; how could they stop these people?" Chu Liang asked. "I'm young and weak. Wouldn't my sect elders worry if I were to get harmed?"
Glancing at Ma Ben, Chu Liang added, "By the way, my fellow disciple has already left. She should be back at Mount Shu and reporting this matter to our sect elders as we speak."
Hearing that, Honored Ally Xue hurriedly said, "City Supervisor Ma, our young master is Chancellor Su's adopted grandson. The chancellor is very fond of our young master..."
Ma Ben's eyebrows knitted together so tightly that they looked like a baton[5] furrowed tightly. His expression turned grim like dark waters, showing no inkling as to what he was thinking.
After a long pause, Ma Ben finally spoke. "The specifics of the case still need to be verified. Nevertheless, you will not escape punishment for causing a disturbance at the City Supervisory Division. Men, detain all of them! If any of them resist, pin them down! As for Young Master Su, take him to get treated. We'll investigate his alleged crimes afterward."
Upon receiving Ma Ben's orders, the members of the City Supervisory Division stepped forward and detained Chu Liang and the group of cultivators.
Ma Ben handled the situation flawlessly. In this situation where the facts were unclear, he restrained both parties first, leaving the investigation for afterward.
Despite getting detained, Chu Liang wasn't worried. After all, he held a life-saving jade talisman, so there was nowhere he didn't dare to go. As long as he wasn't in a vast hidden realm like the Python Belly City, no one could stop him if he wanted to leave.
As for how everything would be resolved after that—well, that wasn't his concern.
City Supervisor Ma's attitude made it quite ambiguous as to where he stood, but it didn’t matter, as Chu Liang believed that Jiang Yuebai would make the right decision.
Before leaving the hall, Chu Liang gazed at City Supervisor Ma for a moment.
That one look lit the flames of anger in Ma Ben's heart.
This kid looks pretty young. How is he exerting such strong pressure?
I wonder who he learned that from.
...
After Chu Liang and the group from the City Lord's Residence were taken away, Ma Ben returned to the rear hall.
Waiting there for him was a handsome and refined middle-aged man dressed in the crimson robes of a court official. This man was Su Shengyan, the chief official of Wu'an City.
Seeing Ma Ben return, Su Shengyan stood up with a smile and cupped his hands together in greeting. "I've caused you trouble, City Supervisor Ma."
It made sense that Su Shengyan, someone who had used marriage to advance his career, would be an attractive man. Just his smile made others feel like they were being bathed in a warm spring breeze.
Over the years, Su Shengyan had bribed people at every level of the Wu'an City bureaucracy, including the City Supervisory Division.
"Old Su, you've always been very meticulous in everything you do. How could you be so lax in disciplining your son?" Ma Ben sighed. "Today's incident doesn't seem fake. Now that it has caught the attention of disciples of the Mount Shu Sect, it won't be easy to resolve this."
Su Shengyan sighed as well. "Every family has its own troubles."
His son hadn't always been like this.
When Su Shengyan married into his wife's family, his father-in-law's family had scorned and humiliated him. Coupled with his wife's unattractive appearance, Su Shengyan had been deeply discontent. He went on to use his wife's status to raise his own and attach himself to the chancellor.
After that, he turned on his wife and her family. He didn't just divorce his wife and marry another woman. He destroyed the Su Family and left them destitute and homeless. Only after doing all that was he finally satisfied.
However, not long after that, something terrible happened in the City Lord's Residence. The beautiful woman Su Shengyan had just married to be his concubine—his son, Su Wei, had cut her open with a blade, killing her!
It was then that Su Shengyan thought of the indelible impact this incident would have on his son, and the damage was not something he could mend. Over the years, Su Wei continued to commit crimes, time and time again.
Su Shengyan had been secretly cleaning up his son's messes this whole time. Nonetheless, the truth had finally come to light now.
"It would have still been doable if you had kept all of the disciples here, but you let one escape," Ma Ben complained. "Once the Mount Shu Sect hears of this, it will be much harder to cover up."
"I've already thought of an explanation," Su Shengyan replied softly. "My son was merely having some fun with a courtesan. Perhaps they were playing a bit too roughly, causing her to scream. This alarmed the heroes from the Mount Shu Sect who were passing by. That then led to a misunderstanding."
"That explanation might work for me, but will it pass with Mount Shu?" Ma Ben asked.
"That kid from Mount Shu..." Su Shengyan's gaze darkened, revealing a ruthless expression. "At this point, we might as well go all the way..."
Ma Ben was shocked. "You're going to end him?"
Su Shengyan looked at Ma Ben with a baffled expression. "Obviously I meant we should let him go! He's a prodigy of an immortal sect who is renowned across the nine provinces. If he were to die here, it doesn't matter how well you clean up your tracks. You wouldn't be able to bear the consequences."
Ma Ben fell silent for a moment as he thought, Then why did you show such a ruthless expression?
Su Shengyan said quietly, "In any case, my son has already been rescued. As long as they can't find any evidence, it won't matter that they're a sect in the Divine Nine. It's not like they can falsely accuse someone without proof, right?"
1. Head of a small station, second-lowest rank in the Imperial Supervisory Bureau. ?
2. In charge of the city—the city supervisor. ?
3. Special seat that's facing the door. It's reserved for the host/eldest/guest of honor. ?
4. In ancient China, the local government office in a city was usually more like a court of law and jail in one. You can read about them here. ?
5. It's not important, but I'll leave a link here if anyone wants to look at what this weapon is. It's not the western baton, but “baton” was the closest equivalent I could think of. ?