Pei Gonggui

When Pei Jun jumped off his horse and hurried into the courtyard, he saw that the official censor and the guards of the palace gate were alarmed, and a dozen or so soldiers with swords and swords had already surrounded the person beating the drum. He shouted to stop him.

But the drumming didn't stop.Li Cunzhi, who was beating the drums, seemed to be insane, his old eyes were red, and he held a mallet in both hands. He beat the drum with all his strength. The words were roared out again, causing his black and yellow skin to swell red and purple, but this red and purple was almost the only bright color in his dirty clothes and dust.

Seeing that Li Cunzhi didn't obey the orders, the surrounding guards looked at the officer, and they were about to draw their swords and arrest him.

When Pei Jun saw it, he immediately shouted: "Bold! All the people in the world, who suffer from grievances and cannot achieve self-sufficiency, can beat drums and cry out for grievances, and those who dare to stop will die! The officials, soldiers, and censors should immediately lead and report to the sage. Dare to face each other with swords and soldiers, and force them to stop!"

When the officers and soldiers heard this voice, even if they didn't know Pei Jun, they could still see the ocher golden pheasant's genuine second-grade mending coat on his body, so they didn't dare to move rashly for a while.But when they looked at each other, everyone's faces were extremely anxious: first, they were worried that the sound of the drum would disturb the cleanliness of the inner palace, and they were afraid that they would be held accountable by the palace if they offended the noble; The princess's son-in-law and the emperor's family, Ning Wuhou's family, are even more afraid that this matter will cause a huge wave among the officials and implicate them all.

They wanted Li Cunzhi to shut up and stop, but they were stopped by Pei Jun, and Li Cunzhi, who was beating the drum desperately, seemed to be unable to hear the movement around him at all. , very endless look.

The officer-in-charge couldn't stand it any longer, and hurriedly ran to Pei Jun's side, clasped his fists with trembling hands, and said, "It's all up to Mr. Pei to decide, what should, what should be done?"

With just this one sentence, Pei Jun stuffed the hot potato of beating the drum and complaining of grievances into Pei Jun's hands. Pei Jun frowned and looked at it. in half.

He thought quickly, and remembered that the defense of the palace gate was under the control of the infantry of the Qianfeng Battalion, and the infantry commander of the Qianfeng Battalion happened to be Xiao Lin.

In order to protect Li Cunzhi's safety, he first ordered a guard and said: "The man who beat the drum claimed to be an official of Wuzhou, but he was similar to a wronged person. He beat the drum to sue, and the accuser was a relative of the current emperor. His behavior is really suspicious. And Regardless of whether the report is true or not, his act of galloping into the imperial city is similar to a crime of conflicting with the guard of honor before the imperial court. In this case, it is better to ask Commander Xiao to come in person and take this person who disturbed the palace order to interrogate him. Verify the identity of this person. If the identity is true and this person has been wronged, then he must be pardoned by the emperor's kindness, and the case will be established as an imperial warrant, and Xiantai can decide how to accept it."

Hearing the words, the guards felt quite reasonable, and immediately sent a person to the deacon's mansion to invite Xiao Lin.The censor on the other side was suspicious: "Master Pei, according to the law... the case reported below should be first accepted by our station for investigation. If the person is handed over to the infantry battalion for questioning, the cabinet will be held accountable." Get up, we can-"

Pei Jun interrupted him and said: "This case is no small matter. If you ignore this person's identity and accept it as an imperial certificate, and when it is handed over to the imperial court, it is found that this person is an impostor and a false accusation, which will stain the eyes of the emperor and damage the name of the royal family, then you will be fined." Not only is the cabinet accountable, I am afraid that the emperor will make Longyan furious, can you afford it?"

The officer on duty was choked up by his words, and hurriedly paused.

At this moment, Li Cunzhi, who was banging and beating the drums in the hall, seemed to have finally exhausted all his strength. Suddenly, his old body shook, his eyes rolled up, and he fell to the ground slumped.

The surrounding officers and soldiers were afraid of being involved in the case, so no one dared to step forward to help him.Seeing this, Pei Jun hurriedly went to squat down, sniffed his breath quickly, it was slight but still there, pinched his neck, his pulse was weak, presumably due to fatigue, so he tried to pinch the other person first.

Under a pinch, Li Cunzhi vomited, his eyes finally opened a slit, and he grabbed Pei Jun's hand suddenly, with tears in his eyes, opened and closed his chapped lips, and begged in a hissing voice:

"Help me... Please, please, sir, help me to avenge my grievances... Help..."

Before he finished speaking, Li Cunzhi passed out again, this time no matter how much Pei Jun pinched him, he couldn't wake him up again.

"Come on, call the doctor quickly! Hurry up!" Pei Jun ordered Li Cunzhi to lie down while giving orders to the left and right.As soon as he raised his hand, he found that Li Cunzhi was still holding his sleeves tightly. He brushed it away, and saw that his thin hand was covered with scratches and covered with dust and mud. It was almost gray and black. Where have you climbed and struggled.

As soon as he put Li Cunzhi on the ground, the small door leading to the imperial city in the north of Wengutang opened.A young eunuch ran in, saw Pei Jun standing in the courtyard, bowed quickly, and explained the reason in a panic: "The emperor is discussing matters with the cabinet in the Zhongqing Palace, but suddenly there is a report of someone beating a drum to complain—Pei Jun My lord, what's the matter?"

Pei Jun prevaricated: "He just passed out, and he doesn't know the truth yet. We have to wait for the infantry battalion to check his identity first before reporting him to the imperial court."

While talking, he saw that Li Cunzhi had a very dirty and old bundle tied to his shoulder, which was strangling the air valve in his chest, so he drew a guard's knife, cut off the bundle, and pulled it out from under Li Cunzhi's body.After opening it, it turned out that there was only neatly folded linen in the bundle.

——But if this is a piece of ordinary linen, why do you need to layer it up and tie it tightly around your body?

Pei Jun raised his eyebrows slightly, squatted down, and opened a corner of the linen cloth with the long knife in his hand. He turned his head and saw that there was nothing wrapped in the linen cloth, but was only dyed a strange dark red.

The people in the palace were quite familiar with this color, and before Pei Jun could say anything, the little eunuch beside him trembled: "...Blood, blood book?"

There was the sound of air-conditioning sucking around.Pei Jun threw away the knife in his hand, stepped forward and raised his hand to shake off the bloody cloth—but seeing that the cloth was two feet wide and one foot long, it fell to the ground in a volley, and immediately let out a burst of dull pain. It stinks of blood, but it is covered with dark red and densely packed, but it is not written in complaints, but only the names of people with different surnames, big and small.

The handwriting of these names may be scribbled or jerky, and the shapes vary greatly. Obviously, they were all written by different people. They are all scattered and scattered, but there is only one thing in common—that is, they are all written in blood.Roughly counting, there are at least five or six hundred names, and after unfolding, it can be seen that there are strokes on both the front and back, and the number should be doubled.

The censor at the side was dumbfounded, and asked in a trembling voice: "Could it be...the wronged people really wrote a blood letter and wanted to file a joint complaint? But with so many people, how big is the case..."

Pei Jun furrowed his long eyebrows, and without saying a word, he raised his hand to wrap up the blood-stained cloth full of the names of the victims. His movements were slow and vigorous, and the back of his hand was already bulging with blue veins.After collecting the cloth, he held the blood book in his left hand, approached Li Cunzhi again to rummage through his sleeve pockets and skirts, and finally found the state official's seal and government official certificate to prove his identity.

At this time, Xiao Lin was finally invited. As soon as he entered the Wengu Hall, he greeted Pei Jun and asked, "What's going on here? I heard that someone was beating the drums to appeal for grievances?"

Pei Jun was looking down at the bloodstains on the cover of Li Cunzhi's document, and he didn't answer for a while, but Xiao Lin asked the officers and guards again, and no one around him dared to say anything——

They dare not, and really do not know how to speak about it.

Although the imperial court set up the act of boarding and hearing the drums, it has existed since ancient times, but whoever sounded the drums in the hall last time, I am afraid that no one in the imperial court can remember clearly.

In fact, this Wengu Hall was originally an extremely leisurely place, and the officials who were on duty here were happy to take up their duties. It was all because the Dengwen Drum in this hall had never been played during the Yuanguang period, and naturally it had never been played. Urgent business.

Ever since the Boling Zhang family was in charge of the cabinet in this dynasty, in order to prevent officials at all levels from sitting on a plain diet and not being diligent in litigation, they have already legislated to clarify the level of prosecution, ordering the military and civilians all over the world to file lawsuits from bottom to top, and not to leapfrog the ranks to file lawsuits.If you ignore this law and don't follow the three levels of county, government, and road, but directly sue your superiors, even if what you tell is true, the Jingzhong Judiciary will still sentence the violator to fifty sticks before accepting the case. .

With this law, if the common people are dissatisfied with the local judgment, and they appeal to the government or the Taoist government, but the judgment is not accepted and amended, they will probably not dare to go to the capital again. It was the common people who had the silver to build a road bridge, paving the road and suing themselves in the capital, but the fifty boards of Yue's lawsuit were unavoidable.After finishing these [-] boards, I don't know if I will be able to meet the official lord. Even if I do, there are very few cases where the verdict can be changed. Why is it worth paying for my life?

Mo Ruo forget it.

After all, the common people in the world have been extremely tolerant since ancient times.

In this way, the people dare not sue, the government officials are more and more arbitrarily sentenced, and the local unjust cases are endless, but they are cut off from the imperial city. Not going in half a drop.

This so-called injustice is also, once completed, it will be difficult for even the light to shine in.

Pei Jun took a deep breath and raised his head, turned around and handed the paperwork in his hand to Xiao Lin, who had been questioning him to no avail, and simply said: "It's a big injustice. Xiao Lin, you guard the drummer for me, and you must not Any mistakes." He said, grabbed the blood cloth and was about to leave.

Xiao Lin didn't know the seriousness of the matter, so he grabbed him in a daze: "Where are you going?"

Pei Jun withdrew his hand, took a deep breath and said, "I'll go into the palace."

At this time, they met Xiao Lin face to face, Pei Jun thought that this Xiao Lin had been leading the army all year round, and he didn't know much about the power of officials, and he was afraid that he might miss the case because of his lack of thinking. After thinking for a while, he told him: "This The case involves the emperor's family and relatives, and it involves a lot, and I'm afraid that sooner or later you will have to deal with Sejong Pavilion, you'd better ask someone to invite Prince Jin to come and see it."

Xiao Lin saw that his expression was solemn, he was not like he usually laughed and acted, so he couldn't help being casual, and knew that although his words were exhortations, they were actually warnings, so he nodded solemnly in response to him: "Okay, I will order someone to invite Prince Jin into the palace right away, so you can rest assured." After saying that, he bid farewell to Pei Jun.