Yelu’s brow furrowed slightly as he waved his hand, signaling all the maids serving food to withdraw, and then he turned to Qimu Ge, "What justice are they asking me to administer?"
"Master, I haven’t had the chance to report to you yet, it’s about Tara’s family."
"It’s the same Tara’s family that falsely accused Chen Jiusi of killing their man last time."
As Qimu Ge spoke, Yelu said, "Oh, him. What’s happened to their family now?"
Qimu Ge said, "They’ve been annihilated!"
"What?! Annihilated??"
Yelu’s eyes bulged out in shock. What kind of joke is this, annihilation, what great enmity could there be!
"What exactly happened, tell me in detail."
At this moment Yelu could no longer remain calm, for an annihilation of a Mulan family was no small matter. If you really looked into it, it could be considered dereliction of duty on his part as Darugachi!
He had to take it seriously.
"That’s what happened, last night, Tara’s family, thirty-six people, were all slaughtered in one night. Only a seventy-year-old granny survived."
"After learning about this, the County Government sent people to investigate early in the morning, but Old Arutai and his group got wind of it beforehand and drove out the County Government investigators. Now everyone is gathered at our mansion’s doorstep, clamoring for us to administer justice."
Yelu said, "Administer justice, hmm, indeed, this cannot be taken lightly. You tell the County Government to investigate thoroughly, and the murderer must be found within three days! We must give an explanation to the local Mulan people."
Qimu Ge said, "Master, there’s no need to search, the murderer has carved their name on the pillar of Tara’s family’s main gate. It’s the Zoroastrian Sect’s doing!"
"The Zoroastrian Sect?"
Yelu’s brow furrowed, "They dare to be so brazen?"
Qimu Ge said, "Extremely brazen. But the problem now is not about catching the murderer, it’s the local Mulan people. They are unanimously claiming that the murderer is not the Zoroastrian Sect, but Chen Jiusi!"
"Chen Jiusi? What does he have to do with this?"
Yelu was baffled, now just pinning the blame, it seemed.
However, Yelu quickly understood the local Mulan people’s plan. Their aim was not really about finding the murderer; they wanted Chen Jiusi to fall from power.
Only with Chen Jiusi’s downfall would they have a chance to lay their hands on the Nan Lake Salt Field and thus gain profits.
But how could Yelu let Chen Jie fall? These Mulan nobles had not yet found out that the main shareholder behind the Nan Lake Salt Field was him, Yelu.
That is to say, the assets these Mulan people coveted were actually his, Yelu’s, and these people were targeting him.
Yelu squinted his eyes and turned to Qimu Ge, "Go to the government office and call for Tang Wannian."
"Wait, and also that Wu Hong."
Upon hearing this, Qimu Ge immediately responded and with that, Yelu said with a smile, "Alright, once Tang Wannian arrives, call in Old Arutai and the others..."
Watching Qimu Ge leave, Yelu’s frown deepened.
Old Arutai was not an easy person to deal with, being the representative of the native Mulan people of the land, and at the same time, he was considered a wise man, known as such by the locals for having lived a long life. Today he was sixty-seven, and his lengthy experience had exposed him to a great deal.
He also represented the interests of the local Mulan people.
The situation in the south and the north was different; the north used a slavery system with the slave owners above all, and the Han people were slaves to the Mulan people.
However, in the Southern Territory, due to the weaker hold of the Mulan people’s rule, they adopted a conciliatory policy towards the Han people. Thus, the Han people had a certain degree of autonomy and the Mulan people could not be too unscrupulous; their interests had to be earned through their own efforts.
In other words, they at least had to manage on their own to acquire more wealth and not just rob openly.
This was the reason why it was difficult for the Mulan people to live in the southern lands because the assets they coveted from the Han people could not be snatched openly but only through connections, by using the government to take over. Moreover, the Han people could just leave and could not be taken as slaves by the Mulan people to manage their shops, resulting in Mulan people, despite having seized the shops, finding it hard to operate them as successfully as the Han did.
The situation was completely different in the Northern Territory, where if the Northern Mulan people coveted a shop owned by Han people, they would just storm in and immediately put a slave collar on the male shop owner, turning him into a dog of the Mulan people.
Their wives and daughters would be sent to the beds of the Mulan masters, at their mercy.
But what about the south?
As a Mulan person, I work hard, through official channels to make your shop mine, and then I have to run it myself? Where’s the justice in that?
Am I not supposed to just sit back and collect money?
Because of this policy, highly unfavorable to the Mulan, many of them had seized a lot of shops but eventually shut them down, leading even more to their impoverishment.
With no recourse, they could only band together, and in the end, they chose a respected ’wise man,’ Old Arutai.
He indeed proved resourceful, garnering them considerable benefits, and this time, Old Arutai had summoned them, claiming another good opportunity to make Silver.
They all came rushing to Darugachi’s Mansion, pleading for Darugachi to avenge them.
As for the grievance, of course, it centered on Chen Jiusi’s alleged murder of their friend Tara’s family.
Soon enough, Qimu Ge returned, followed by a man, none other than the representative of the Mulan people, Old Arutai.
Yelu was seated at a table on the side, sipping a pot of Longjing tea.