Interrogation

The capital, in a dim room.

Xiao Fan sat in an icy iron chair, his eyes covered by a black cloth, his hands shackled in cuffs.

The stench of this place was particularly foul. The air was thick with a sour, rotten, bloody odor that made him faintly nauseous.

He did not need to guess what kind of place this was.

The most dreaded place in the entire capital... the Shadow Pivot Court dungeon!

Not long ago, he had followed Ji Xuanyuan into the city. Yet after only a few steps, they had encountered a group of men in black with dark armor.

Xiao Fan recognized their attire at a glance: the Shadow Pivot Court's Black-Clad Guards!

Within Great Liang's Shadow Pivot Court, black robes were the official uniform, equivalent to formally appointed field operatives. Gray robes, meanwhile, belonged to temporary staff outside the official establishment. They had no fixed uniform, only a token.

The Black-Clad Guards had demanded to take Xiao Fan away for questioning. Even Ji Xuanyuan, a prince, had been powerless to stop them.

As the common folk said, from high-ranking nobles to ordinary civilians, anyone who entered the Shadow Pivot Court's offices would lose a layer of skin even if they did not die.

The Shadow Pivot Court's authority could almost be said to be limitless beneath the Emperor... they could meddle in and investigate every matter in all of Great Liang.

Even princes like Ji Xuanyuan, or even the Crown Prince, had to submit to an investigation by the Shadow Pivot Court if necessary.

If he had to compare it to something, it was no less formidable than the Embroidered Uniform Guard of the Ming Dynasty in the history of Xiao Fan's previous world.

After that, Xiao Fan had remained blindfolded the entire way. No one answered him when he spoke, and even now, no one had told him why he had been arrested.

Needless to say, it was most likely connected to the ambush at Golden Glow Mountain.

"Cases like this should normally be handled by the Court of Judicial Review. Why has it alarmed the Shadow Pivot Court? Could something have happened to Brother Wang?"

The Brother Wang he muttered about was Wang Jun, the Black-Clad liaison in the Shadow Pivot Court responsible for contacting him and assigning tasks to temporary workers like them.

As he quietly calculated in his mind...

Creak!

The door slowly opened, and a thin middle-aged man walked in. His hair was slightly disheveled, and heavy dark circles ringed his eyes.

"Wang Jun is dead. Why don't you guess again why the Shadow Pivot Court intervened in this matter before the Court of Judicial Review?"

What?! Wang Jun was dead? The moment those words fell, Xiao Fan's pupils contracted violently! No wonder the Shadow Pivot Court had gotten involved.

"Forgive this lowly one's dullness. I cannot guess."

The man removed the black cloth over Xiao Fan's eyes, then unhurriedly dragged over a wooden chair and sat down opposite him. "Kid, do you know where this is?"

"I do. The Shadow Pivot Court dungeon."

The man yawned. "You gray-robed men know quite a lot. Don't be nervous. As long as you cooperate with the investigation, you may be released soon enough."

As he spoke, his expression suddenly sharpened. "But let me make the ugly truth clear first: do not lie here. The consequences will be severe."

"Ask whatever you wish, sir. This lowly one will speak all he knows and hold nothing back!" Xiao Fan met the man's eyes directly, without the slightest fear.

The man gave Xiao Fan a brief once-over, his voice low and magnetic. "Let me introduce myself. I am Liu Jiashan, acting captain of Team Seven, Division Three of the Shadow Pivot Court's Black-Clad Guards. I brought you here because there are some questions I need to ask."

Team Seven of Division Three... wasn't that Wang Jun's team? No wonder he knew I was gray-robed, Xiao Fan analyzed inwardly.

"Mm... please ask." Xiao Fan nodded lightly, steadying his emotions.

Candlelight flickered in the dim room. Liu Jiashan's eyes were deep, like an abyss.

Those pitch-black eyes seemed capable of seeing through flesh and piercing the soul, making one tremble inwardly and fear to tell a lie.

"Two months ago, the convoy you were with went missing in the Golden Glow Mountain region. The entire convoy vanished from the face of the earth—neither the living nor the dead could be found."

"The task Wang Jun gave you should have been to escort the convoy safely to Jiang Prefecture... yet today, you returned to the capital alone with the Fifth Prince."

"Please explain the entire course of events."

Xiao Fan recalled the incident at Golden Glow Mountain and swiftly sorted through it in his mind. "In reply to your question, sir, this is what happened..."

Afterward, Xiao Fan calmly recounted what had happened. Aside from his bizarre maneuver against the woman in black and the fact that he possessed the Misfortune Poison Value System, he answered everything else more or less truthfully.

Savage bandits... Night Erosion... the woman in black... criminals preying on criminals...

Liu Jiashan had initially remained calm, but the more he listened, the more his scalp tingled. Was this kid telling a storybook tale? It had only been an ordinary escort mission—did it really need to be this absurd?

"Mm... so you're saying that, as a ninth-rank Qi Refining martial artist, after encountering a massacre by savage bandits, Night Erosion, and a mysterious black-clad assassin, you still escaped death and saved the Fifth Prince?" Liu Jiashan voiced his doubts.

Xiao Fan sighed softly. "Every word this lowly one has spoken is true. There is not half a falsehood among them. If you do not believe me, sir, you may ask the Fifth Prince to verify it."

"Mm, there is no need for you to say so. We will naturally verify it with His Highness."

Xiao Fan had finished giving his account and cautiously asked, "Then... may I leave now?"

"You may, but before that, I must first confirm that you have not lied."

"How will you confirm it?" Xiao Fan immediately had a bad feeling.

Liu Jiashan opened the door. "Come with me."

In the dim dungeon corridor, Liu Jiashan walked ahead while Xiao Fan followed behind. Before long, they arrived at the interrogation room.

The table was laid out with a dazzling array of instruments of torture, while old bloodstains still clung to the four walls. It was enough to make one's scalp crawl!

A man with an effeminate air was already seated in the interrogation room. The robe he wore, embroidered with blue skies and white clouds, was remarkably distinctive, completely unlike the usual red-and-black official uniform.

"Come, sit."

Liu Jiashan pointed expressionlessly at the iron-framed chair in the middle.

"M-My lord, every word I said was true. There wasn't even half a lie!"

This atmosphere... this scene... It would have been impossible for Xiao Fan not to be scared. After all, he really had concealed some information.

In ancient feudal society, torture to extract confessions—and even beating confessions out of the innocent—was commonplace. Even if one told the truth, the suffering one was meant to endure still had to be endured.

What was more, he carried a heaven-shaking secret: he was a transmigrator, and he possessed the Calamity Poison Value System!

As someone who had transmigrated from a modern civilized world, he had only ever seen ancient tortures on television. To actually experience them in person, not wetting himself on the spot was already admirable.

Only now did he finally understand the terror of ancient torture!

Seeing him like this, Liu Jiashan scratched his messy hair. "Don't be nervous. So long as you don't lie, I personally don't like using torture. It's too crude."

Then his tone shifted. "But then again, if you utter even half a false word later..." As he spoke, he casually picked up a bloodstained iron saw and gave it a shake.

Xiao Fan's Adam's apple bobbed. Forcing himself to remain calm, he gritted his teeth. "Please ask your questions, my lord!"

He understood that at a time like this, he absolutely could not look guilty.

"Eunuch Li, if you please." Liu Jiashan made an inviting gesture toward the gloomy-faced eunuch.

Eunuch Li raised one hand in an orchid pose. His phoenix eyes suddenly widened; his black pupils vanished, leaving only the whites of his eyes.

In an instant, a chill wind howled through the room like ghosts weeping and wolves wailing!

Xiao Fan's vision blurred, and his consciousness seemed to be drawn away by some unseen force, slipping beyond his control.

Yet in the very next instant, his consciousness, on the brink of losing control, abruptly settled down and returned to his command.

What kind of move was that? Xiao Fan was instantly baffled, but he did not dare reveal it, much less ask.

The only thing he could determine was that Eunuch Li was a ranked sorcerer! What he had used just now was likely some kind of Netherworld spell.

At that moment, Eunuch Li spoke. "Lord Liu, you may begin the questioning."