Tang Dynasty Prison Administration

077: The Lianhua Case in Qingzhou

At this moment, something very important suddenly popped into Su Wen's mind, and he whirled around, shouting, "Buddy!"

This shout brought a shop assistant rushing over. Upon seeing Su Wen, the assistant immediately bowed and said, "You just said that your hair ornament shop has branches in many prefectures and counties throughout the Tang Dynasty, right?"

Seeing Su Wen's angry expression, the waiter nodded somewhat timidly.

Su Wen asked, "Do you know which prefectures and counties your shop is located in during the Tang Dynasty?"

The waiter frowned and said, "This, I..."

Su Wen frowned, staring intently at the waiter, and said, "Have you thought this through? I am Su Wen, the acting governor of Qingzhou, the vice minister of the Ministry of Justice's Criminal Justice Department, equivalent to the vice minister of the Court of Judicial Review, the chief minister of the Ministry of Justice's Criminal Justice Department, the former magistrate of Luoyang County, the county lieutenant of Jiaoshui County, and a professor of criminal justice!"

The waiter, startled by Su Wen's introduction, immediately knelt on the ground. Su Wen asked, "Have you thought this through?"

Startled by Su Wen's words, the shop assistant immediately replied, "I know. Master took out a map in the room earlier and looked at it. The counties with red dots on it are the ones that already have flower shops!"

Upon hearing this, Su Wen said, "Take me to his room, and also go and summon the people from the county government!"

The man was so frightened he trembled all over.

Seeing that the florist beside her was also trembling with fear, Cheng Nianci smiled slightly and said, "Floral florist, don't be afraid, it's not your fault. I don't like lotus flowers. Please wipe them off for me and replace them with chrysanthemums. I like chrysanthemums!"

The florist readily agreed, and Su Wen followed the shop assistant to the second floor, arriving at the door of a room.

Su Wen pushed the door hard, but it wouldn't open. He kicked it several times, and sure enough, the lock was really strong, but the constables kicked it open with one kick.

After much effort, Su Wen kicked open the door and was greeted by a picture of a pair of Buddha statues hanging on the wall. Su Wen immediately frowned and began rummaging through drawers and cabinets to find it.

The waiter outside was so frightened that he didn't dare to move an inch.

Su Wen searched for a long time before finally finding a small cabinet in a cabinet by the bedside. He put it on the table, and seeing that the cabinet was locked, Su Wen hurriedly took the cabinet downstairs and threw it heavily on the ground. Unexpectedly, the cabinet was quite sturdy and could not be broken at all.

Su Wen stomped on the cabinet several times, and after seeing the damage, he picked it up and tore it apart with his hands.

Upon seeing a stack of papers inside, Su Wen quickly took them out. Because of the commotion Su Wen had just caused, many women who were originally decorating their hairpins came out to see what had happened.

Su Wen glanced at the crowd and said, "The government is investigating a case. No one is allowed to leave the flower shop without permission. Anyone who disobeys will be executed!"

Everyone was startled, but no one dared to move.

After Su Wen took out the paper, a large map came into view. Su Wen spread it out on the ground and saw that it was a map of the entire Tang Dynasty.

The map was densely packed with county and prefecture figures; wherever a red dot marked a location, that was a flower and hair ornament shop. Su Wen looked at the shop assistant beside him and said, "Bring me a pen!"

The waiter responded and hurriedly turned to get it.

Just then, a constable rushed over with a large group of men. Upon seeing Su Wen, he said, "Young Master Su, we have arrived!"

Su Wen frowned and said, "Search for them. Pile all the money, medicine, powder, and similar items from the entire shop into the main hall. Also, immediately send someone to the Sima residence and have him send an urgent message throughout Qingzhou to arrest the owner of the hairpin shop. I only want him alive, understand?"

The constable nodded and replied, "Yes!"

Then one of them turned around and hurriedly ran outside, and a large group of constables began to search the entire flower shop!

Su Wen then took the pen from the waiter and began to connect the dots on the map with red dots.

As the constables piled up all the silver and medicine powder, Su Wen finished drawing the map in his hand. When he saw that the map, when connected, formed a dragon, Su Wen got goosebumps all over.

Because the location of the dragon's head, which is near Chang'an, is connected to form a large knife, the person behind the scheme actually wanted to cut off the dragon's head.

Upon seeing this, a constable standing nearby widened his eyes in shock, speechless, his face filled with terror!

Looking at the painting, Su Wen said, "Go to the Sima residence immediately and have Sima deliver this painting to the Emperor with the utmost urgency. Also, have the Emperor immediately order the closure of all flower and jewel shops within the Tang Dynasty. Remember, all money must be confiscated!"

The constable responded, took the map from Su Wen, folded it neatly, and hurriedly ran outside.

Su Wen then turned to look at the pile of silver coins and the neatly arranged powder behind him. He turned to the shop assistant and asked, "How long has this much silver coin shop earned?"

The shop assistant replied to Su Wen, "Our hair ornament shop has only been open in Qingzhou Prefecture for a little over a month, and our daily income is about ten taels of silver!"

"Ten taels of silver?" Su Wen was greatly shocked upon hearing this.

A monthly income of ten taels of silver—what a terrifying figure! If that's the case, wouldn't the annual income of all the flower shops in the entire Tang Dynasty be an enormous sum?

Such a large number is enough for them to form a sizable army!

Su Wen looked at the shop assistant to the side and said, "Come here and tell me what all this powder is."

The waiter responded and tiptoed to Su Wen's side, squatted down, smelled the items first, and then introduced them to Su Wen one by one.

The shop assistant stopped when he came across a small box, about the size of a palm. He smelled it several times and looked at it several times, but still couldn't identify it. He looked at Su Wen and said, "I've never seen or smelled this before!"

Su Wen looked at the box and asked, "Where did this box come from?"

A constable bowed and said, "It was found in a secret compartment in the upstairs room where obscene pictures were hanging!"

Su Wen picked up the box, examined the powder carefully, then dipped his finger in it, sniffed it, and immediately frowned. The powder smelled entirely of flowers and herbs, making it impossible to distinguish the scents.

Su Wen didn't think much of it, just dipped a little bit in and licked it with his tongue.

Even if it's poison, licking a little bit won't be a big problem, since there were no real drugs at that time, and they couldn't possibly extract them!

After just one lick, Su Wen quickly spat it out.

Su Wen frowned immediately and whispered, "Di Ye Jia!"

Besides the smell of blood, Su Wen realized that the other party had used poppies, human eyes, and other things to make a powder, which was used to control people.

No wonder those believers turned out like that; it turns out they were using this thing to control people. It would take at least several years to turn someone like that. It seems that in order to speed things up, those people were fed so much that the toxicity was so great that it caused complete brain damage, making them unable to distinguish between reality and illusion, and turning them into walking corpses!