Chapter Twenty-Eight: The Little Princess of the Jiang Dynasty

Jiang Ling had already gone to call Jiang Che and Jiang Jiu early in the morning to handle a case. To move about conveniently, all three of them had changed into plain clothes. Jiang Ling took the pass granted by Prince Jiang and drove straight to the scene in the city without hindrance, where two guards stood watch.

Strangely, apart from the two corpses, there was not a trace of blood at the scene—not even the slightest clue except for the footprints of those present.

“Well? Any leads?”

The coroner set down the tweezers in his hand.

“Your Highnesses, these two deaths are most peculiar—neither by poison nor by external wounds. I fear we must investigate from other angles.”

“This bailiff looks unfamiliar. Was he recently promoted?”

An assisting officer produced a list.

Every spring, a small group of people from the outer city would be selected to come to the imperial city for observation and learning. Due to their lack of experience, they typically ran errands for the more seasoned officers. The following spring, those who performed best would be promoted and dispatched elsewhere. All their identities were always thoroughly checked and recorded.

“Your Highness, please take a look.”

The roster was complete: “Liu Ji, Song Qiu, Shi Zhe…”

“Ah, found it! Look here!”

Jiang Ling pointed at the last line.

“Ji Hekun, native of Shaoxi, outstanding in solving cases, no parents, no wife... no children… how tragic.”

Jiang Che rapped Jiang Ling lightly on the forehead. “Keep reading.”

“His five senses are different from ordinary people. He’s the only one in his group with the ability to solve cases independently.”

The three exchanged glances, a suspicion forming in their hearts—perhaps Ji Hekun had discovered something and was silenced because of it.

While his two brothers spoke with the officials, Jiang Jiu slipped away to examine the bodies.

The two corpses had been there for some time. To preserve the crime scene, nothing had been moved, and a faint stench now hung in the air. Their skin had turned dusky.

Covering her nose and mouth with a handkerchief, Jiang Jiu tried to block out the smell.

Ji Hekun’s eyes protruded slightly, and his lips were tinged with purple—normal signs. But the faint red lines beneath his fingernails struck her as odd.

“You there,” Jiang Jiu called the coroner over.

“What’s with these red markings under his nails?”

The coroner replied, “Your Highness, these are common, especially in the elderly—usually a sign of exhaustion or illness. Rare in the young, but not unheard of. I’d venture Ji Hekun seldom rested from his investigations.”

Jiang Jiu picked up tweezers and lifted the white cloth to touch Ji Hekun’s fingers—they were already stiff.

Turning to the other body—Dou Kou—she found the nails clean, with only a bit of dirt caught underneath.

Jiang Jiu thought perhaps she was overthinking things.

“Jiu, let’s go. A scout just reported a lead about your assassination attempt the other day—plus, you ran into Lady Dou Kou that evening. There might be a connection!”

Jiang Jiu lowered her handkerchief and smiled faintly at her brothers. “Alright.”

As her right hand fell, she accidentally brushed Dou Kou’s sleeve. Startled, she quickly looked down.

Suddenly, something flashed. She looked again—nothing.

Was she imagining things?

She mimicked the motion, and once more, a glint.

[Master, it’s the fingernail!]

No longer caring that Dou Kou was a corpse, Jiang Jiu, as she touched the fingernail, discovered a thread—so fine and subtle it could be easily missed unless she concentrated.

With a thought, she quickly tucked the silver thread into her space and turned away.

The thread felt soft, like the ones used for embroidery. But such fine silk—she doubted any existed within the Jiang Kingdom.

Throughout the journey back, Jiang Jiu was eerily quiet. Seeing this, neither Jiang Ling nor Jiang Che dared disturb her.

They had just learned that the items left behind by the assassin on the night of the attack were all common cloth and ceramics found in the city.

But a scout, while searching for clues, had accidentally scraped his arm on a piece of the cloth and, upon rising, found a thin wound on his arm. A thorough search revealed a nearly invisible silver thread hidden in the fabric’s lining.

Repeated tests showed that the thread, when lying flat, felt like nothing. But when pressed or struck, it became a deadly weapon—shooting out at high speed toward the nearest person or object.

The scout’s description matched the thread in Jiang Jiu’s possession almost exactly.

A memory surfaced—just days before, while resting in the imperial garden’s pavilion with Shen Yueru, Jiang Jiu had watched her embroidering. Bored, Shen Yueru began explaining embroidery to her.

Now, in hindsight, it was fortunate that she’d been awakened by a cat and overheard their conversation.

That day, as she dozed, a white cat leapt into the courtyard, knocking over a flowerpot and startling Jiang Jiu awake.

“Jiu, you nearly dozed off while I was talking,” Shen Yueru teased.

Rubbing her bleary eyes, Jiang Jiu tried to appear alert. “Not at all,” she retorted, grimacing at the white cat.

Shen Yueru laughed, seeing Jiang Jiu’s disinterest in the intricacies of embroidery. “Jiu, do you know the three most famous types of embroidery threads in the world?”

Jiang Jiu shook her head. She never embroidered—how would she know?

“Well then, they are brocade thread, satin silk, and the rarest and most extraordinary—golden silkworm silk.”

At the mention of golden silkworm silk, Jiang Jiu was intrigued. She knew the golden silkworm as a medicine, but had never heard of its silk used in embroidery.

Shen Yueru paused her work, pinning the needle to her pouch, and smiled. “Most of our clothes use the first two types—common and well-known. But golden silkworm silk came from our former neighboring country, Ziliao—the only land that raised golden silkworms.”

“Why doesn’t Jiang Kingdom raise them?” Jiang Jiu asked.

“Because Jiang Kingdom never mastered the method to turn the delicate, easily-broken golden silkworm silk into durable thread. Sadly, after King Ziliao rebelled and our emperor suppressed the uprising, the technique was lost. Even the only piece of golden silkworm embroidery is locked away in the treasury.”

“True golden silkworm silk is so fine and nearly invisible, often hidden by seamstresses between the linings of clothes for discreet embellishment.”

Jiang Jiu felt a pang of disappointment at such a treasure being lost. “If it’s hard to find and strong, has no one tried using it as a weapon—to kill unseen?”

“Alas, it’s too late for that. If the technique hadn’t been lost, perhaps I’d have seen golden silkworm embroidery with my own eyes. It remains an unfulfilled wish for many seamstresses…”

Jiang Jiu thought it a waste for such a material to be used merely as thread.

Now, recalling all this, it seemed as if everything had been preordained.

Speaking of Shen Yueru—she remembered being rather cold toward her at the banquet last night. She wondered how Shen Yueru was faring now…