Under everyone's watchful eyes, Daoist Fayuan drew blood from the fox and smeared it on the muzzles of several dogs. But after the time it took to drink a cup of tea, the dogs showed no reaction whatsoever, and Gu Wei began to grow nervous.
The time it took an incense stick to burn passed, yet the dogs still showed no change. Gu Wei's face turned increasingly ugly. "Impossible! That's impossible! I saw them go into heat earlier with my own eyes!"
After another two cups of tea, Daoist Fayuan shook his head. "This fox blood has no aphrodisiac effect. I'm afraid this fox..."
Although Fayuan left his sentence unfinished, everyone present understood his implication.
Magistrate He's tiger-like eyes widened in an instant as he glared viciously at Gu Wei beside him.
Gu Wei's back was already soaked in cold sweat. Feeling the overwhelming pressure rolling off Magistrate He, he dropped to his knees with a thud. "Your Honor! The blood test clearly worked when I did it earlier!"
Magistrate He stared down coldly at Gu Wei. "A case as major as the Bloody Corpse Case, and you dare try to bluff your way through?"
He was already somewhat aware that the head bailiffs under him ran rampant and preyed on the common people, but he never imagined Gu Wei would dare pull tricks with the Bloody Corpse Case. Wouldn't that drag him down to ruin along with him?
After all, if he had truly handed over the fox Gu Wei caught and the Hao family noticed any flaws later, a barrage of impeachments from the censors would follow, and his black gauze hat would surely be lost.
At the thought that his official post had nearly been ruined by this wretched scoundrel before him, a surge of killing intent welled within Magistrate He.
Scared entirely out of his wits, Gu Wei knelt on the floor and kowtowed incessantly to Magistrate He, weeping and pleading his innocence with every knock of his head.
Gu Wei suddenly thought of Chu Qiguang, who had just insisted on testing the blood, and cried out loudly, "It's all Chu Qiguang! He was so adamant about testing the blood—he must have tampered with it to frame me!
"Chu Qiguang! Was it you, you vile villain, who framed me?!"
With that, Gu Wei lunged violently toward Chu Qiguang, his strength as a martial artist of the second realm erupting in full force as gusting fists swept toward Chu Qiguang.
"You still dare act so brazen?!" Magistrate He snorted coldly and struck Gu Wei across the face with a direct slap. Under that terrifying force, the air detonated with a rapid crackle, and Gu Wei went flying backward, crashing to the ground.
"You are relieved of your post as head bailiff.
"Men! Drag him away."
Hearing that his position as head bailiff was gone, Gu Wei's face turned ashen in an instant. Over the years in Qingyang County, he had operated with impunity across both the licit and illicit worlds entirely by virtue of his status as head bailiff. Once stripped of it... who knew how many would kick him while he was down and push the collapsing wall over on him? It was more agonizing than death itself.
Tears and snot streaming down his face in sheer terror, he sobbed and screamed as he was dragged away, "Your Honor! I'm wronged! I'm wronged!"
Watching Gu Wei being dragged away by the yamen runners, Chu Qiguang knew the man was finished.
Hiding nearby, Qiao Zhi watched the head bailiff being hauled off like a dead dog, feeling a wave of smug satisfaction. *Hmph, this is what happens when you cross us demons. So what if they're a county magistrate or a Daoist temple? Aren't they still dancing in the palm of Chu Qiguang's hand?*
Chen Gang looked at Chu Qiguang with sheer adoration, thinking to himself that he definitely had to stick close to Brother Gou from now on. Being a demon was far more glorious than drifting through the martial world.
Beside them, Magistrate He showed no pleasant face toward Chu Qiguang, who had exposed Head Bailiff Gu. Leaving the county vice magistrate to handle the remaining matters, he returned to the yamen's inner quarters on his own.
He Xian looked at Chu Qiguang with embarrassment and said, "Brother Chu, I never imagined that Head Bailiff Gu would dare pull something like this."
Daoist Fayuan, on the other hand, looked entirely unperturbed. "Those who serve in the yamen have always been audaciously bold—deceiving their superiors and fleecing their inferiors. It's no surprise he'd do such a thing."
Chu Qiguang could not help glancing at Daoist Fayuan. *When it comes to fleecing people, your Daoist temple is even worse.*
Daoist Fayuan added curiously, "Come to think of it..." He looked at the fox's corpse and remarked, "This fox is male. Who would have guessed Hao Yongnian had a taste for that?"
Chu Qiguang replied, "...I did hear rumors that he was overly intimate with his page boy at times, but I never imagined he was that sort of person."
Although the magistrate had left, the county vice magistrate was equally capable of overseeing the Bloody Corpse Case.
The subsequent procedures followed routine. The vice magistrate conferred with Chu Qiguang: once the Hao family's reward silver arrived, Chu Qiguang would be allocated two hundred taels, on the condition that he keep quiet about Head Bailiff Gu.
As for the remaining two hundred taels of the three hundred originally earmarked for Head Bailiff Gu and his runners, it naturally went into the pockets of the Daoist temple and the magistrate.
Knowing that after running around all this time—killing, dumping the corpse, cleaning the crime scene, and cracking the case—he would only end up with two hundred taels once the money arrived, Chu Qiguang grew increasingly dissatisfied.
He thought to himself, *Only two hundred taels for all that... With this much time, I might as well have made a few more trips to my brothers' places. Selling a bit of Naobaijin would have earned more than this.*
Chu Qiguang sighed inwardly. *It's all because there are too many middlemen, the bureaucracy is bloated, the process is too slow, and red tape runs rampant... These are all systemic problems.*
Next, inside the county yamen, he met the victim's family who had rushed over... the Hao family.
The representative of the Hao family who came to the yamen this time was Hao Yongnian's elder brother, Hao Yongtai, a dark-skinned, burly fellow whom Chu Qiguang had previously seen at Yinglue Academy.
The moment Hao Yongtai saw Chu Qiguang, he expressed profuse gratitude. Hao Yongtai was far more upright than his younger brother Hao Yongnian, having devoted himself entirely to martial arts since childhood, with the demeanor of a martial fanatic.
Upon hearing that it was Chu Qiguang who helped deduce that a fox monster was involved and ultimately found its corpse, he felt immense gratitude toward him.
Beside them, He Xian chimed in, "Brother Hao, you should have seen it. Brother Chu's knack for tracking monsters and unraveling the case was truly uncanny. If any more monsters show up in the county in the future, we could hand the hunt right over to Brother Chu."
"It was all luck," Chu Qiguang replied with a modest shake of his head. Then, with grief in his eyes, he said to Hao Yongtai, "Brother Hao, my condolences. Just a few days ago, I shared drinks with Yongnian, wishing him success in earning the rank of wusheng in this year's martial examinations. Who could have thought that in the blink of an eye, we would be parted forever by death?"
"Alas, I told him long ago to stop chasing skirts, yet he was still seduced by a fox monster." Hao Yongtai sighed and cupped his hands toward Chu Qiguang. "Thank you for this, Brother Chu."
Just as Hao Yongtai had his servants carry up the one thousand taels of reward silver and hand it over to the yamen for distribution, Chu Qiguang spoke up. "Young Master Hao, I wonder if I might forgo my share of the reward silver in exchange for something else?"
"Oh? What would you like instead?"
"I have heard that the Hao family's library has an extensive collection, fully stocked across the classics, histories, philosophical treatises, and literary anthologies. I would like permission to borrow and peruse them."
Chu Qiguang thought to himself that compared to two hundred taels of silver, it was far better to seize the opportunity to consult a prominent clan's collection, study this world's history, and search for traces of the Secret Register of the Purple Mansion along with it.
Moreover, borrowing books meant visiting the Hao residence repeatedly, and with Chu Qiguang's methods, building ties with the Hao family would be effortless.
That way, not only could he find avenues to make money through the Hao family later on, but he could also find a way to secure their recommendation for the martial examinations.
Compared to two hundred taels of silver, Chu Qiguang valued an opportunity to enter the circle of Qingyang County's prominent clans far more.
*After all, Brother Hao can't have died for nothing. His family should take good care of me in return.*
Chapter 59