"Wait!" Jiang Cheng stepped forward and grabbed the maid by the wrist. "Where are you taking us? Why is the path getting more and more secluded?"
The maid's eyes were unfocused, and faint tear tracks still marked her cheeks. She seemed not to have recovered from her earlier fright. "Y-you... What are you doing? Let go! Or... or I'll call for help!"
"Go ahead. You could scream your lungs out and no one would come to save you!" Shao Tong put on a lecherous expression that suggested he was an old hand at this. "Heh heh, and I'll tell you this: the louder you scream, the more excited I get."
Everyone knew he wasn't quite right in the head, so no one paid him any attention. In the end, the steady, sensible Zhang Qizheng stepped forward. "Tell us the truth, and we won't make things difficult for you."
Only then did the maid understand. She shook her head at Jiang Cheng and the others, explaining, "You're not from the marquis's residence, so you may not know. The residence is laid out like this. Houye likes peace and quiet, and there aren't many people serving in the residence to begin with. On top of that, he has no wife or concubines. The residence is usually quiet and deserted. The place I'm taking you to now is the mortuary on the grounds."
Everyone froze at the word "mortuary." Yao Shunyu frowned deeply. "What nonsense are you talking about? Who keeps something like a mortuary inside their home?"
But before the maid could reply, Tang Qisheng nodded thoughtfully. "There have been cases in history of mortuaries being set up in private homes, but the reasons were always unusual."
"That's right, that's right. Quanfu's body is in there." The maid nodded frantically, as if