Qingyu Case: Female Minister of Dali Temple

Chen Shao heard the hidden meaning in her words and quickly stopped Zhang Boshan from going forward to talk to her.

Whether she was acting or was truly grief-stricken, her words would certainly reveal some information that would not be easily revealed during interrogation.

She needed this information.

Zhao Shan did not notice her actions. He stepped forward to support Zhou and said sadly, "Mother..."

"I know you blame me in your heart," Zhou pushed his hand away, wiping her tears, "Yes, I stopped you from going to her, but I also felt sorry for your weak body. If something happened to you, how could I live with you?"

"Your father had no conscience and died enjoying his life early, leaving me, a widow, to work hard to raise you. I don't expect you to succeed, I just hope you stay safe so that I can give an explanation to your father in the future. What have I done wrong?"

"Mom..." Zhao Shan became even more miserable.

"Let me go," Zhou pushed away his hand again. "Yesterday morning, I saw it was going to rain, so I tried to persuade her not to go back to her parents' home, but she got angry with me and left in a hurry without even eating. Now that something happened, I think it's God punishing her for being unfaithful and unfilial..."

"Mom!" Zhao Shan squatted on the ground in pain, holding his head and said, "Don't say anything more. My sister is gone. Why do you keep saying this about her?"

"I, as her mother, just said a few words to her, and you are unhappy," Zhou pounded her chest and cried, "Have you long been dissatisfied with me for being old and useless, and only knowing how to eat but not how to dig for food? You resent me for not going there for her..."

Zhao Shan knelt down in panic and kowtowed to her, saying, "Mom, I was wrong. Please don't say anything."

"Mother is going to say, even though you don't recognize me as your mother, I still have to take care of you for your father! Her sister Tao passed away in such an unclean way. If mother didn't explain everything clearly in front of all the adults, how can you marry and have children in the future?" Zhou crawled over, pulled him up from the ground, called him "son" and "son" twice, and cried, "Mother is doing this for your own good. Your father was a scholar and was so respected when he was alive, but she couldn't even read two words. I tried to stop you and didn't allow you to marry her, but you insisted on marrying her. Well, mother only has you as her son, so I have to obey you."

"Now that she's married, I have no other requirements for her. As long as she behaves herself and takes good care of you, and gives birth to more children for my Zhao family, I will have given my answer to your father."

"But she..."

"She fought and quarreled with everyone in the village for those few grains of rice in the field in revenge for me not letting you marry her. She wanted to bring shame to your father," Zhou said angrily. "She is dead and gone. Now she has suffered retribution. For your sake, I will not care about her offending everyone in the village. I will explain everything to the adults, and you are not allowed to worry about her anymore."

"My son is so well-read. If he doesn't have sister Tao, he still has sister Li and sister Sun."

"mother……"

Listening to the two people's chatter, Chen Shao quickly sorted out the relationship between this family: an old man, a couple, and two children.

The old man doesn't like his daughter-in-law, his son is often sick, and the whole family almost depends on his daughter-in-law for support.

The daughter-in-law had conflicts with the villagers over food from the fields.

Now that her daughter-in-law is dead, the old woman does not feel sad for her. She only hates that she has brought shame to her both during her lifetime and after her death.

She was already planning to find another wife for her son.

"Old man," after sorting out these relationships, Chen Shao stepped forward to hold Zhou's arm at the right time, and after comforting her with a few kind words, he asked, "After Daniu's mother returned to her parents' home yesterday, when did she come back, and when did the incident happen? Do you know?"

Zhou was about to cry out for injustice again, but Chen Shao quickly comforted her, saying, "Don't worry, old man. We will never wrongly accuse a good person, nor will we let a bad person go."

Zhou wiped her tears and said hello several times before answering, "She went back to her parents' home yesterday and never came back. I thought it was raining heavily and she stayed at her parents' home. Who would have known that she would end up in such a scandal?"

Chen Shao resisted the urge to correct the slander in her words and continued to ask, "Then how did you know about what happened to her?"

Zhou turned away with a red face, tears falling down her face, "Yes, yes, yes..."

After a long while, she still hadn't come up with a conclusion. Instead, she leaned against the wall and burst into tears: "I told him not to marry her, but he just wouldn't listen. Now, how am I going to go down and explain to his father?"

Chen Shao didn't want to comfort her anymore. He turned to look at Zhao Shan and let him answer.

Zhao Shan suppressed his sadness and said, "Uncle Zhou Gen found her when he went to the woods to graze cattle in the morning. I harmed her. I knew she was worried about my poor health and never wanted to stay at her parents' home. I should go find her, I should go find her..."

Chen Shao patiently asked, "Which forest?"

Zhao Shan roughly pointed in the direction of the forest.

Chen Shao looked over and saw that the place he pointed to was roughly between his home and the village. The rain was heavy and the fog was thick, so he couldn't see what was there clearly. He could only make out from the shadows that it was roughly a sparse forest.

Retracting his gaze, Chen Shao said, "Take me to see Daniu's mother."

Zhao Shan turned around, "My sister is here..."

"Don't you think she has embarrassed your father enough?" Zhou suddenly stopped him, knelt down and kowtowed, "The whore has come back and hasn't been cleaned up yet. It must be a disgrace to all the adults. Please allow me to clean her up."

Chen Shao didn't want to criticize her at this critical moment. She turned around and asked Zhang Boshan and others to wait there. After the coroner came, she said, "Old man, now that you have cleaned up, there will be no clues to the murderer. Lead the way."

Zhou could tell that she didn't want to argue, so she moved her lips a few times and resigned herself to taking him to the thatched hut where the body was placed.

Tao A'mei was lying naked on her side on a torn straw mat on the ground.

Her eyes were wide and her mouth was slightly open.

Hands tied behind back.

There is a cut covering more than half of the neck, with the skin and flesh at the edge of the cut turned outward. This is a reaction to life.

Both breasts were scratched.

There was also a huge cut from the chest to the pubic bone.

The cut is straight and neat, as if it was made with one knife.

The skin flap of the wound was slightly curled and bloody, which was an injury caused by the person being on the verge of death or just dying.

Through the incision, you can see that the abdominal cavity is empty.

There was some mud and half-dead leaves remaining in the abdominal cavity.

Maybe because of the rain, there was little blood on the wound.

There were some dead branches and rotten wood stuck in her lower body.

Fu Jiu and Li Tianliu, who were following behind Chen Shao, only took a few glances and turned their heads away reluctantly.

Chen Shao walked around the body twice, squatted down and examined it carefully, then stepped aside to let the coroner check.

The coroner had not yet performed an autopsy. He checked the body from top to bottom and inside and out based on his experience, and then said respectfully, "Sir, the body shows no signs of poisoning or drowning. It should have been killed by a slit throat. Judging from the color of the corpse spots on the body, the murder was roughly around Zizheng."