Chapter 175 Shock
But when he saw Wang An standing aside, he immediately understood.

There were two yamen runners, one fat and one thin. The thin one had some insight, and when he saw that Wang An had even invited Liu Zongzhou, he immediately knew that the other party had an extraordinary background, and that there might not be a good ending today, so he didn't make any excuses, but just looked dejected.

The fat man couldn't see the situation clearly. When he saw Liu Zongzhou going to the court, he continued to argue loudly.

"What have my two brothers done wrong that the Master wants to arrest us?"

Liu Zongzhou sneered, slammed the gavel and said, "You are such a cunning and treacherous official, you still want to quibble in this situation?"

Although the fat man was terrified, everyone knew that Liu Zongzhou was strict and inflexible since he took office as the governor of Shuntian Prefecture. He knew that if he confessed today, he might end up badly, so he refused to admit it and said, "Please tell me clearly, sir. I really don't know."

Liu Zongzhou glanced at Chongzhen, then sneered: "Okay, I will make sure you die with a clear conscience!"

He then repeated the criminal facts he had heard from Chongzhen. Since Ergou witnessed the whole process, everything Liu Zongzhou said at this time was true.

However, the fat man still refused to admit it, saying only that Wang An was roaring for no reason and disturbing the court at the gate of the government office, and he only went forward to question him in order to maintain public order.

Wang An's behavior seemed suspicious, so they searched him. Unexpectedly, he found out that five taels of silver were suspected to be dirty silver, and they were about to hand them over to the torture chamber as evidence.

The reason for detaining Wang An was that they only suspected that he might be a criminal, so they temporarily detained him.

Although Liu Zongzhou had just taken office, he had to admit that he was very familiar with the court's laws and regulations. He sneered and said, "Without the arrest warrant issued by the Criminal Office, can you detain or arrest the common people in this world whenever you want?"

"If you say something suspicious, you can be searched and thrown into jail. Wouldn't the world be in chaos?"

"It's obvious that you two are extorting money. Seeing that the other party has a lot of money, you want to lock him up in a cell and scare him so that you can extort more money!"

When the fat man saw Liu Zongzhou suddenly revealed their methods, his face suddenly turned pale.

Liu Zongzhou was too lazy to argue with the two men any more. The facts of the crime were clear and the evidence was conclusive. Moreover, in front of Emperor Chongzhen, Liu Zongzhou did not want to give people the impression that he would argue too much about such a small case. He slammed the gavel on the spot, pulled out two command arrows from the sign tube and threw them on the ground.

"Come here, drag them away and give them eighty lashes each, and remove them from the service!"

The so-called removal of service status is equivalent to dismissing these two people from their status as yamen runners.

However, whether to expel him or not was no longer important to Liu Zongzhou, because as soon as Liu Zongzhou finished speaking, he winked at the squad leader in charge of the execution.

The squad leader immediately understood that this was going to be a beating.

However, the squad leader understood the look, and the two yamen runners could understand it. Seeing this, even the thin man could no longer remain calm and shouted, "Sir, you are so cruel. Even according to the Criminal Law, we are not guilty... Woo woo!"

However, before the two men could finish their words, the yamen runners on both sides pulled out a piece of cloth and stuffed it directly into their mouths.

Immediately, all the yamen runners rushed forward and dragged the two men out of the hall.

Soon afterwards, the familiar sound of flesh entering was heard again, but the screams heard in the prison cell patio had turned into dull wails.

Wang An couldn't understand the look in the eyes. It wasn't a execution in front of him, and Wang An really hated these two people, so he didn't have a virgin heart and came out to plead for mercy.

The beating lasted only a short while. Wang An heard the sound of only thirty or forty sticks before it suddenly stopped.

The squad leader who had carried out the execution came back with a bloody stick in his hand and reported: "Your Excellency, the prisoner could not endure the punishment and has died."

Liu Zongzhou stroked his beard expressionlessly and said indifferently, "Are both dead?" The squad leader nodded quickly, "Both dead!"

After saying that, the squad leader stretched out his hand again, showing a bloody ingot of silver and said, "Sir, this is the silver found on the two men. It should be the money that this young man was extorted from."

Liu Zongzhou nodded in satisfaction and said, "It is a relief for these people who know the law but break it and oppress the people to die!"

"Drag him to the mass grave and feed him to the dogs!"

"As for the silver, why don't you return it to the young man?"

The squad leader couldn't help but shudder, and immediately nodded to accept the order.

Wang An stared in amazement at the bloody silver ingot that the team leader handed to him, hesitating and not daring to take it.

After all, the bloodstains on it were too shocking. As people living in a peaceful era, we have never seen such a scene.

Moreover, although the two yamen runners brought it upon themselves, they died because of me in the end.

Wang An still has some psychological pressure.

The four or five young scoundrels before were beaten with fifty sticks but survived, but these two yamen runners died after only being beaten with thirty or forty sticks. In addition, Liu Zongzhou had previously explained the difference between being beaten alive and being beaten dead, so they immediately knew that Liu Zongzhou had given the order to beat them to death.

For a moment, I began to understand the ruthlessness of this great scholar of the Donglin Party.

Seeing this, Liu Zongzhou in the hall frowned slightly and ordered his staff, "Go to my room in the back hall and get a twenty-liang ingot of snowflake silver as compensation for the shock this young man has received!"

Upon hearing this, the aide hurried over and soon returned with a crown of twenty taels of pure official silver.

Liu Zongzhou took it and walked to Wang An, handed it to Wang An amiably, and said, "It is because I did not discipline my subordinates that you suffered such humiliation. I will take the blood-stained silver as it is unlucky!"

"This is the dirty silver I'm returning to you, little brother!"

Liu Zongzhou said this and handed it directly to Wang An.

It’s not that Liu Zongzhou was stingy. As the prefect of Shuntian Prefecture, a third-rank official, he only gave 20 taels of compensation, five taels of which originally belonged to Wang An.

However, in front of Chongzhen, even if Liu Zongzhou had money, he could not spend it lavishly. He could only choose an appropriate figure to save face.

At this time, Wang An was still immersed in the shock of someone's death because of him. It was only after Wang Chengen stabbed him twice that he came to his senses and hurriedly took the silver from Liu Zongzhou.

With a pale face, he smiled and said, "It is really frightening to trouble Lord Liu to spend money!"

Liu Zongzhou waved his hands, pretending to be guilty, "I am the one who should be fighting terrorism. If I hadn't been lax in my management, how could I have let you suffer this injustice?"

After saying that, he sighed again and looked ashamed.

Wang An didn't know how to respond at this moment, so he could only glance at Chongzhen, hoping that Chongzhen would make the scene look better.

(End of this chapter)