In the prison, Liu Anping and Mrs. Miao were separately locked up in the innermost cells. Since their case was related to an incident that happened ten years ago and the victim was the third master of the Gu family, the Marquis of Qiyang, the matter was of great significance. Lord Guo, the Minister of the Court of Judicial Review, didn't dare to make a decision on his own. He had already sent people to Yangxin Town to retrieve relevant documents.
Liu Anping and Mrs. Miao faced each other and cursed each other with the most venomous words. In another cell, the entire Feng family was there, all of them looking terrified and constantly begging for mercy, except for Liu Qinting.
Liu Qinting sat in the corner, oblivious to everything around her. She didn't seem to have suffered much physical abuse either. She just hugged her knees and stared blankly outside. It seemed as if she wasn't really looking outside but was lost in some empty thought.
Gu Liyue was brought in by Gu Junyan. Lord Guo scolded, "Silence!"
Liu Anping paused for a moment. Looking up and seeing Gu Liyue, he quickly shouted, "Liyue, I'm your uncle. Liyue, it was my fault before, but I'm your uncle. Please forgive me, Liyue?"
Mrs. Miao, who had already quieted down, immediately roared when she heard this, "Liu Anping, you're not a human. You're worse than a brute. You're still pleading for mercy? Pleading for this woman? She killed your son. She murdered your son!"
Liu Anping then said, "Liyue, I know you were forced. I don't blame you for killing Zhenghui. I really don't..."
Gu Liyue tugged at Gu Junyan who wanted to speak, indicating that she would handle it herself. Then she slowly walked up to Liu Anping and asked, "You don't blame me? Your son is dead, and you don't blame me? But look, she does."
She pointed at Mrs. Miao.
Liu Anping immediately said, "Yes, she's bad. It's all her fault. Liyue, she's the worst. She was always mean to you before. It was my fault that I didn't protect you before. I'm sorry. Please forgive me."
Mrs. Miao spat angrily, "Liu Anping, you're unworthy of being a human. That was your own son! Your own flesh and blood! Gu Liyue, you slut. I hate you. You killed my son. I want you to pay with your life!"
"Is your son's life the only life that matters? What about other people's lives?" Gu Liyue shouted. "You occupied other people's houses and bullied other people's daughters. Who's the real monster here, you or me?"
Mrs. Miao was stunned for a moment, then burst into tears and wailed, "Zhenghui, my Zhenghui. It was all this slut who killed you. I wish I could eat her flesh and drink her blood!"
Seeing that Mrs. Miao had gone crazy and lost all sense of reason, Gu Liyue sighed slightly and said to Gu Junyan, "Brother, she's crazy. What kind of punishment should she receive for what she's done?"
Gu Junyan waved his hand, ordering someone to gag Mrs. Miao and lock her up in another place. Then he said, "For occupying other people's property and abusing other people's children without causing death, she'll be beaten with twenty strokes of the cane and exiled five hundred miles for two years. Since she's also an accessory to a murder, she'll be exiled a thousand miles for three years. If the situation is verified, she'll finally be exiled to a bitterly cold place and won't be allowed to return for three years."
Gu Liyue nodded. "Even if there's no charge of being an accessory to a murder, she'll still be exiled, right?"
"Yes. Even so, I won't let her off easily. Don't worry. I'll choose a good place for her exile."
But Gu Liyue shook her head. "She's selfish, but there's no need for a harsher punishment. Just sentence her according to the law."
Gu Chengzhi asked in surprise, "Aren't you angry, sister?"
Gu Liyue said, "Angry? It's not worth it. The past is over. She's deeply guilty for killing my parents, but the one who really deserves to be cut into a thousand pieces is not her, but Liu Anping! Even a tiger won't eat its own cubs. At least Mrs. Miao still remembers that Liu Zhenghui is her son. But what about Liu Anping?"
Liu Anping was startled and stammered, "Liyue, but I... I'm your real uncle! It's all her fault. It's her fault!"
Gu Liyue turned to ask, "It's her fault? Did she tell you to kill my father?"
Liu Anping's face turned pale. He stepped back repeatedly and didn't dare to say a word.
Gu Liyue sneered. She asked the jailer to open the cell door and walked in. Gu Junyan stayed close by to protect her.
"Mrs. Miao is really vicious. When I was a child, I remember every single thing she did to me clearly. She's not a human. Just because I wasn't her own child, she beat and scolded me. She made me go hungry and cold. In the coldest winter, she made me do laundry and other chores. She even forced Nurse Yun to take in laundry jobs outside. But what about you? You knew all this. Did you do anything? She has no blood relation with me. I hate her to the core, but I don't care about her at all. You're different. You're my uncle, the only relative I had in the world at that time!"
Liu Anping's hands and feet were in shackles. He had nowhere to retreat and shrank into a corner, shaking his head desperately. "I didn't do it. I didn't do any of it..."
There were tears in Gu Liyue's eyes. "After my parents died, I had no one to rely on except Nurse Yun. Nurse Yun told me that I had an uncle and that you would take care of me and raise me. But what happened? Instead of a stable life, we were pushed into the abyss by my own relative! Uncle? What a great uncle. My uncle is like a jackal, cruel and heartless!"
Stung by Gu Liyue's words, Liu Anping knelt on the ground and wailed, "It's not like that, Liyue. I didn't want this either. I really didn't, Liyue... I didn't expect him to die. I just wanted to scare him with that case. I secretly told the thieves his whereabouts. He was so capable. He should have... he should have been fine..."
Gu Liyue glared at him angrily. "You colluded with the thieves?"
Liu Anping grabbed his head in pain. "I just made a little mistake. I took a little money from others and said a few words for them... After all, even an upright official has trouble handling family disputes. There's no clear right or wrong... But Gu Xian insisted on saying that I was bending the law for personal gain. How would I know so much? I didn't have any money. I just wanted to earn a little more to support my family..."
Nurse Yun gestured and made sounds, trying to communicate. Gu Liyue nodded. "Nurse Yun said that at that time, my father made you a constable in the town and you were paid a regular salary."
Liu Anping's eyes were bloodshot. "Why? With a wave of his hand, he could settle down in the town. I only got four qian of silver a month. What could that do? You could live in Cangyun County if you wanted and go to Yangxin Town if you didn't. But what about me? It's not fair. I just thought it was unfair. Since I had a little power, why couldn't I profit from it? I wanted to live like him, to make my family and myself live better. What's wrong with that?"
"So you killed my father?"
Liu Anping calmed down. After a long while, he said listlessly, "I'm sorry to you. I killed your father... I ignored you not because I didn't want to care about you, but because your eyes were exactly the same as your father's. She wanted you to move to the back. I did feel sorry for you, but every time I saw you, I was scared. It was better to let you live in the wood - shed and eat in the kitchen..."
Gu Liyue took a deep breath. "What about my mother? Why wasn't it enough for you to kill my father? Why did you have to kill my mother too? My mother was your own sister!"