Emperor Hongwei was relatively weak before he ascended the throne, and the concubine was established very late, and before that, the side concubine gave birth to four daughters for him in a row, and the fourth was Princess Tiancheng, and her husband was Yue Shang, the concubine of the horse.

Princess Tiancheng is not favored, and Yue Shang is not a talent in the world, so the couple is very low-key on weekdays, and has been on the edge of the Xungui group, which is often forgotten.

However, on this night, a team of heavily armed Beiwu guards appeared at the gate of the inconspicuous Horse Mansion, which was the most vigorous moment after the completion of this mansion.

"Brother Rui, it seems that something is wrong......"

Zhang Zuofeng, who was guarding the main gate, looked at the cold and motionless Horse Mansion, and said to Xu Rui suspiciously.

Xu Rui also frowned, staring coldly at the gate of the Horse Mansion.

Before coming here, he had imagined many possibilities and had made plans in advance.

According to his estimates, since the horses committed this big crime, they will definitely not be unprepared, they may resist stubbornly, they may break through and escape, or they may be frightened and surrender directly.

But the current situation is that the door is closed, and there is neither surrender nor resistance, which is really a bit strange.

In addition, Xu Rui was very gripping, and he rushed with Zhang Zuofeng's team of men and horses with all his might, throwing the follow-up "army" out of one or two streets, and he didn't have time to complete the siege of the Horse Mansion.

For a while, more than 100 people were at the door, not knowing what to do.

"Hiss......"

Zhang Zuofeng snorted, and suddenly frowned: "Brother Rui, there is a smell wafting out of it, as if it is blood." ”

Xu Rui shook his head: "You can't let him destroy the evidence, crash open the door, and rush in!" ”

Zhang Zuofeng waved his hand behind him, and the hundred or so soldiers immediately drew their long knives and rushed towards the gate.

However, the seemingly heavy gate was not locked at all, and a few soldiers opened with a slight "squeak", revealing a dark inner courtyard.

"Is there an ambush? Or did that guy get the news and run away a long time ago? ”

Looking at this unreasonable scene, Zhang Zuofeng was suspicious.

"Rush in first!"

Xu Rui's eyes narrowed slightly, and he said in a deep voice.

Since Xu Rui said so, Zhang Zuofeng naturally didn't say anything more, and immediately pulled out his waist knife and rushed in with his brothers.

The Pony Mansion is decent, not too big, not too small, everything meets the requirements of etiquette, but at this time, there is not only no one in the Pony Mansion, even the lights are gone, it always gives people a gloomy feeling, which makes people feel furious.

Finally passed through the corridor and came to the main hall, and everyone was stunned.

I saw more than a dozen corpses lying on the ground under the miserable white moonlight, which seemed to be domestic servants and maids, all of whom had killed themselves.

In the middle of these corpses, there was a large sandalwood Taishi chair, on which sat a handsome man of thirty-five or sixteen years old, but by this time he was bleeding from seven knots.

"Xu Rui? Hehe, you came later than I thought, it seems that you are not omnipotent, hey, what a saint statue, you have not lost to me......"

When the man saw someone rushing in, his dilated pupils lifted slightly, and he said something with difficulty.

As soon as he finished speaking, he suddenly laughed faintly, blood was still flowing out of the seven orifices, and with that gloomy expression and low laughter, he seemed to be the evil ghost of hell.

Xu Rui's heart sank, and he walked up to look at this person carefully, only to see that there was an almond smell in his mouth, and his pupils had dilated, obviously he had swallowed a large amount of arsenic in advance, and he was one step late, and he was helpless now.

Zhang Zuofeng took out a portrait, slightly compared the appearance of the person in the painting and the man in front of him, and said in a deep voice: "Brother Rui, he is Yue Shang." ”

Xu Rui sighed, leaned into Yue Shang's ear, and said in a low voice, "Where did the ether you used to kill people come from?" ”

After asking several times in a row, he didn't know whether Yue Shang couldn't hear the sound anymore or didn't want to answer, he just laughed, but the laughter became weaker and weaker until he couldn't hear it anymore, and the brilliance in his eyes was rapidly dissipating.

"He's dead......"

Zhang Zuofeng probed Yue Shang's snort, shook his head and said.

"Hey!"

Xu Rui smashed his fist on the palm of his hand, what he was most worried about was not the real mastermind behind the scenes, and the origin of those ethers.

Such a large amount of ether meant that there must be a traverser lurking nearby, and this unidentified traverser made him inexplicably uneasy.

"Search, don't let go of any corner!"

Xu Rui whispered to Zhang Zuofeng.

"There are corpses here, and there are ...... It's a secret passage! ”

As soon as he finished speaking, there was an exclamation in the inner hall.

Xu Rui and Zhang Zuofeng glanced at each other and hurriedly walked to the inner hall.

The table in the inner hall has been removed, revealing a dark entrance to a secret passage, which looks exactly the same as the one in Tang Jiuguang's mansion, and there is a fishy smell coming from inside.

"That's the smell of blood I smelled outside the house!"

Zhang Zuofeng snorted and said in surprise.

"My lord, come down and have a look."

The head of a Northern Martial Arts guard came out of the entrance of the cave, and he said with a miserable face.

Xu Rui was stunned for a moment, realizing that it might not be so simple in the secret passage, and immediately pulled Zhang Zuofeng into it.

The soldiers of the Northern Martial Guard had already roughly inspected the secret passage and made sure that there were no remaining enemies, but the scene in the secret passage still made Xu Rui and Zhang Zuofeng gasp.

After the short secret passage, there is a cellar that is exactly the same as the one in the backyard of the Tang Mansion, except that this cellar has not yet been cleared, and it is full of hideous torture instruments, shocking bloodstains, and all kinds of pungent stench.

They followed the soldier a few steps forward, and opened a dungeon-like iron door, in which lay the corpses of more than a dozen children, all mutilated and in a horrible death, a few recruits spit out after only one glance.

Xu Rui took out a handkerchief to cover his nose, and carefully observed these corpses, only to see that the blood on the corpses was still bright red, he should have just died, but the wounds on the corpses that had healed made his heart beat wildly.

Most of these children were no more than twelve years old, and the youngest was probably three or four years old, and they had their tongues cut off, and their palms were covered with calluses, and they were supposed to be trained to be dead men who could not speak, but they were killed when the matter was revealed.

"My lord, there is still one over here!"

Zhang Zuofeng said in a deep voice behind Xu Rui, his face was very ugly.

Xu Rui's heart sank, and he hurriedly followed him to the next room.

This room is even more miserable, more than a dozen children's corpses are separated, these children are all boys, quite handsome, but they are wearing women's clothes, and their lower bodies have traces of castration, which should be prepared for powerful people with special fetishes**.

"How much does it cost on the black market?"

Xu Rui asked with a sinking face.

Zhang Zuofeng said: "There are about 30,000 or 40,000 taels that have been castrated like this, and those boys and girls who have not been castrated are probably more than 100,000 taels." ”

Xu Rui nodded, there is no special method for refining estrogen in this world, so unless a very small number of boys and girls are "superb", the other ** will be castrated from an early age to reduce the secretion of male hormones and retain children's and even female characteristics.

"It turns out that Tang Jiuguang's money came from like this, these brutes are really out of conscience!"

Zhang Zuofeng looked at the tragic situation in front of him and couldn't help but reprimand angrily.

Xu Rui didn't speak, and then looked down at several rooms, several of which also had corpses, adding up to about forty or fifty children who died here.

In addition to the dead who had their tongues cut out, the castrated **, there were also slaves who catalyzed their bodies with drugs to make them have developed limbs but low intelligence, and girls who were specially trained to serve men, or to extract information, and so on.

It's just that these children have been exterminated and died tragically in the dungeon, which makes people hairy.

Xu Rui inspected the entire tunnel and suddenly frowned.

"No, the number of corpses is too small, according to the arrangement here, there should be more children."

He muttered to himself suspiciously.

The soldier next to him suddenly pointed to the wall and said, "My lord, there is a dog hole here, hey, there seems to be a sound of fighting in it!" ”

Xu Rui looked back and saw that the dog hole was very rough, and it could only accommodate one passage, and his heart instantly became clear.

He frowned and said, "That's right, go in and have a look!" ”