Chapter 4050 — She Could Not Swallow This Grievance
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
The moment the enforcers of the Law Enforcement Hall seized her and threw her into the dungeon, Murong Zhen's heart sank straight to the bottom of an abyss. She knew she was finished this time, utterly and completely—any hope of slipping through was nothing but a fool's dream.
This was no small matter. Though Shangguan Lan'er had been rescued safe and sound, the kidnapping of the Heaven Piercer Pavilion's foremost young lady was a crime of the vilest order, and the Law Enforcement Hall would certainly pursue it to the bitter end. She, the informant riddled with suspicious inconsistencies, was the readiest point of entry.
At last, amid that torment of dread, Murong Zhen's anticipated doom arrived: the Law Enforcement Hall had come to bring her in for questioning.
She had long since rehearsed her story in her head, yet she had not the slightest confidence that such honeyed words could fool the men of the Law Enforcement Hall.
She followed her escorts in silence the whole way, and with every step she felt herself draw one pace nearer to death. The despair of a road with no way out crushed the last of her nerves, and suddenly she crouched down on the spot and began to wail. The other prisoners in the surrounding cells turned their heads to gawk with relish, and a stream of flippant whistles rang out without end.
The Law Enforcement Hall experts leading the way were struck dumb for a moment, then exchanged glances and twisted their heads around to look at her, barking, "If you want to cry, cry outside! This is the heart of the dungeon—do you think it's a place for your tantrums?"
"Outside?" Murong Zhen's weeping broke off. She lifted her tear-streaked face—the picture of a rain-soaked pear blossom—to the enforcers. "Aren't you taking me in for questioning?"
The two enforcers laughed at that. "By the rules, we were going to bring you in. But just now Hall Master Gongyang gave the word: we're not to make things hard for an informant. Otherwise, who'd dare bring us leads in the future? So we're not here to question you—we're here to set you free."
"Truly... truly?" Joy burst through Murong Zhen's every pore. She had already given herself up for dead, and to be snatched back from the brink like this left her so giddy with relief that her head spun.
"Of course it's true. Do you think the Law Enforcement Hall is so idle that we have the time to play games with you? Have you cried enough? If you have, get up!" The enforcer curled his lip in exasperation, while bellowing at the top of his voice to make the other prisoners in the cells settle down.
If not for the fact that Murong Zhen was, after all, something of a beauty, he would long since have lost patience and kicked her.
"Uh... yes, yes, this humble woman will get up..." Having made such a fool of herself, Murong Zhen flushed with embarrassment, though inwardly she was quietly puzzled. Since when had Gongyang Jun grown so lenient?
For all these years, the Law Enforcement Hall under Gongyang Jun's command had been notorious for its cold cruelty. Anyone dragged in here, even if innocent, was at least stripped of half a life; in the past decade, more people had died in the Law Enforcement Hall than in the hundred years before it combined.
That remark about not making things hard for the informant sounded reasonable enough in logic, but it truly did not seem Gongyang Jun's style. And one knows one's own business best—now that Shangguan Lan'er, the very person at the heart of it, had returned, Murong Zhen's so-called report was full of holes. Could Gongyang Jun really not see a single one of them?
Baffled, Murong Zhen left the Law Enforcement Hall and went straight back to the Welcome Pavilion, where Kang Jingming was already waiting in her wooden cabin.
"Miss Murong, thank goodness—you're finally back!" Kang Jingming breathed a long sigh of relief to see her return unharmed.