Chapter 333: Chapter 134: Public Indignation
A chunk of Cui Wei’s scalp was torn off, and he screamed in pain. He fought back with all his might, but he was no match for the Scholar.
The gaunt, withered Scholar looked like a piece of rotten wood, as if he would snap in two or topple over with the slightest push. His frailty was heart-wrenching to behold.
Yet at this moment, the old father erupted with boundless strength, his only desire to tear Cui Wei limb from limb.
His poor daughter... there hadn’t been an untouched piece of flesh on her body when she died. She wasn’t even left with an intact corpse.
’It’s all my fault, all my fault!’
’If I weren’t so useless, how could my daughter have ended up in that den of demons!’
’I thought it would only be a year. Who knew that when we parted, it would be forever.’
The memory of his daughter’s face and smile made the Scholar’s heart clench in anguish. A sinister, vicious light flashed in his eyes. Driven to the extremes of hatred, he became like a man-eating demon and bit off one of Cui Wei’s ears.
"Aargh! My ear!"
Cui Wei writhed on the ground in agony, while the Scholar laughed through bloody tears. "You’ve only lost an ear! My daughter lost her life!"
He collapsed to the ground, wailing and sobbing in agony.
Outside the government office, the officials, students, and common folk alike all screamed in shock at the Scholar’s actions.
Many of the women and children covered their eyes, screaming as they stumbled backward. "Blood! So much blood!"
Inside the courtroom, blood pooled on the floor. Between the maddened Scholar, Cui Junrong, who was trembling like a frightened quail, and Cui Wei, who was writhing on the ground in pain—it was a scene most people could not bear to watch.
Zhao Jing also reached out to cover Chen Wanqing’s eyes. "Don’t look. You’ll have nightmares."
But Chen Wanqing pulled his hand away. "The wicked are getting their just deserts. This is a relief to see. I’m not afraid."
The courtroom had erupted into chaos. Even Mr. Sheng, the Magistrate, had seen enough. He slammed his gavel and ordered the Scholar to state his grievance.
The Scholar suppressed his grief and began to tell the story of how he had lost his daughter.
As it turned out, the Scholar’s name was Zhang Lanshan. His ancestral home was in Shun’an County, the southernmost county of Xinghuai Prefecture.
Five years ago, he traveled with his wife and daughter back to his ancestral home to take the county-level examination.
Unexpectedly, upon reaching Guyuan County, his wife was struck by a severe illness and became bedridden. To pay for her treatment, they exhausted all their travel money. They even pawned the jewelry his wife and daughter wore, but it was still to no avail.
Just when he was so destitute that he was about to start begging in the streets, his daughter, Zhang Xue’e, resolved to sell herself into servitude to raise the Silver Coin for her mother’s treatment.
Zhang Xue’e was their only daughter, the apple of their eye. Naturally, the couple forbade it.
But Zhang Xue’e could not bear to watch her mother waste away and die from her illness. When her parents weren’t looking, she found a broker and sold herself.
When Zhang Lanshan and his wife found out, their grief, despair, and guilt were indescribable. But in the end, his wife’s life was the priority. Zhang Lanshan took the money from his daughter’s sale and hired a renowned physician. Perhaps his daughter’s filial piety moved the heavens, because this time, his wife gradually began to recover.
Once his wife’s condition had stabilized, Zhang Lanshan went to the government office in person.
By that time, Zhang Xue’e had been chosen by the new County Magistrate’s wife and had entered the Guyuan county government as a maidservant.
Zhang Lanshan was unable to see the mistress of the inner residence, so he specifically requested an audience with Mr. Cui.
He did not ask to take his daughter back. He only pleaded with him to treat Zhang Xue’e well, promising that he would return to buy her freedom and take her home as soon as he became a Scholar.
Mr. Cui readily agreed, adding that out of respect for Zhang Xue’e’s profound filial piety, he would ensure she was treated kindly by everyone in the household.
Zhang Lanshan left with a heart full of worry. He threw himself into his studies and, with a stroke of good fortune, managed to pass the county, prefectural, and college examinations in one fell swoop, earning the title of Scholar.
To buy back his daughter’s freedom as quickly as possible, Zhang Lanshan accepted an offer from a private school, agreeing to teach there for five years in exchange for a certain amount of Silver Coin.
With the Silver Coin in hand, he and his wife immediately set out for Guyuan County to buy back their daughter’s freedom.
But to their shock, when they arrived at the Guyuan county government and asked for Zhang Xue’e, everyone denied that such a person had ever been there. The government office guards treated them like troublemakers, beating and cursing them as they drove the couple away.
The couple had nowhere to go. Their hearts filled with dread, they didn’t dare stray far from the county government, instead waiting quietly in an alley across the street in the hopes of seeing Mr. Cui.
That night, however, a young maidservant secretly ran out from the county government to meet them.
The young girl was sobbing uncontrollably. "You have to leave!" she gasped out between sobs. "If you don’t go now, your lives will be in danger! You’re one step too late... Miss Zhang has already met with misfortune. Her body was thrown into the mass grave. If you go look now, you might... you might still find her body intact."
