Catching a child trafficker

Li Zhengda returned home without even taking the time to change out of his court robes. He instructed his trusted Steward Zhang to bring a few men and wait with him in the storeroom.

Although Steward Zhang did not understand, as a servant—and especially his master's trusted confidant—he naturally followed whatever his master wished to do.

Before long, the sound of the storeroom being unlocked reached them, and Li Zhengda clenched his fists.

The door opened. Sun Minghao wore a dark green brocade robe, held an agarwood fan, and had a lovers' jade pendant hanging at his waist.

He tapped his palm with the fan and instructed the men behind him, "Hurry and put everything away, then leave through the back gate. Don't let anyone see you."

After giving those instructions, Sun Minghao went back outside. A group of men in short brown work clothes entered carrying several chests. No sooner had they set the chests down than they were seized and gagged.

Li Zhengda left the storeroom with Steward Zhang and saw that scoundrel Sun Minghao waiting outside. Without needing another word from Li Zhengda, Steward Zhang went straight over and pinned Sun Minghao down with a grappling hold.

Before Sun Minghao could even understand why he had been seized, he saw Li Zhengda emerging from the direction of the storeroom. His eyes widened, and putting that together with his current predicament, he realized he had been discovered.

Still clinging to a thread of absurd hope, he gave an awkward smile and said, "Father, what's this about? Why have you had Steward Zhang restrain me? Have I done something wrong?"

Li Zhengda could not be bothered to waste words on him. Ever since learning what he had done, even speaking another sentence to him felt revolting.

He simply ordered the steward to take the men and the large chests out of the residence, intending to send them to the Court of Judicial Review. The officials who had come to watch the spectacle happened to witness this scene. One look at those wooden chests was enough for even a fool to know that these were the illicit goods Liu Fen had intended to plant on Li Zhengda.

As the officials looked at the wooden chests and Sun Minghao being escorted under guard, the same thought rose in all their minds: Shen Shixu was terrifying. They absolutely could not afford to offend him.

They all went home to tell their families about it and warn them not to offend Shen Shixu. And so, without Shen Shixu himself knowing a thing, his name became famous throughout the Capital's circles of powerful officials and nobles.

Meanwhile, Shen Shixu was riding a tall, handsome horse through the streets, flanked by the second- and third-place examination graduates!

Today was the Top Scholar's celebratory procession. The shops on both sides of Chang'an Street had long since filled with people, while those who had nowhere else to go stood along the roadside, craning their necks to see just how distinguished the Top Scholar looked.

As Shen Shixu listened to people on both sides shouting, "The Star of Literature has descended to earth!" "As handsome as Pan An!" and "A towering literary talent!" a rosy flush spread over his fair, jade-like face. His small, delicate earlobes turned so red they looked ready to bleed.

He glanced at Yang Mingxuan and Yan Huaimin beside him. Both looked perfectly composed, as though they had not heard the embarrassingly effusive cries ringing in their ears, and occasionally raised their hands to greet the people along the street.

Their reactions made Shen Shixu wonder whether he was making too much of it. Just as he had calmed himself and raised a hand to greet the people on either side, his sharp eyes caught sight of a woman in a headscarf and a floral, front-opening blouse. Holding a sleeping young child, she was squeezing anxiously out of the crowd.

It looked as though a grandmother had brought her grandson to watch the excitement, only for the child to fall asleep. Now she was hurrying to take him home, afraid the crowd's shouting would wake him.

But something about the sight struck Shen Shixu as odd, so he kept watching. Sure enough, he spotted something wrong. Wasn't that woman rather too brawny?

She looked less like a middle-aged woman and more like a middle-aged man dressed as one.

At that thought, Shen Shixu remembered a trade that had never disappeared, from ancient times to the present, and would persist even into the future—child trafficking!

Shen Shixu considered whether he might be overthinking it, but with something this important, he could not simply let it go, even if he turned out to be wrong.

A child was always the most important person in a family. Lose that child, and the family would fall apart.

So Shen Shixu shouted straight toward the woman he suspected, "Catch the child trafficker! That woman in the floral, front-opening blouse and headscarf is a child trafficker! Hurry and catch her! Don't let her get away!"

Shen Shixu was already the center of the crowd's attention. Hearing his words, everyone stirred into action.

No one doubted him. They all followed his description and looked toward the woman wearing a floral blouse and headscarf.

Whether it was a guilty conscience or something else, the moment Shen Shixu finished speaking, the woman took off running with the child in her arms.

Seeing her try to flee, the crowd rushed to block her. One particularly capable fellow took a running start, leaped into the air, and launched a flying kick.

It struck the woman squarely in the back. Even a martial arts master would have struggled to withstand being hit by well over a hundred pounds of weight, let alone this aging woman. A scream burst out.

But that scream was nothing like a woman's shrill cry. It was rough and deep, clearly a man's voice.

Looking again at his unmistakably feminine clothes, the onlookers understood. This man really was a child trafficker, just as the top graduate had said.

No wonder the top graduate had placed first in the examinations. His powers of observation were far better than an ordinary person's—he had spotted the child trafficker from so far away.

Shen Shixu heard the scream too and dismounted. Yang Mingxuan and Yan Huaimin had not expected him to actually catch a child trafficker, and they got off their horses as well.

The three walked through a gap the crowd had deliberately left for them. The moment Shen Shixu reached the scene, he went to check on the little child now held by an older woman nearby. The child was beautiful.

The little face was fair with a rosy glow, fine, thick lashes spread like tiny fans, and the lips formed a slight pout. A pair of gold bracelets adorned the wrists above tightly clenched little fists, while a patched garment had been wrapped around the child's body.

Seeing those gold bracelets, Shen Shixu knew the abducted child came from a wealthy family. He lifted away the ragged outer wrapping, revealing the child's own clothes beneath. They were made of fine Huanhua Brocade.

"This child isn't from an ordinary family. His family must be frantic over his abduction. We'd better send both the child trafficker and the child to the Capital Prefecture at once. His family may be waiting there."

After checking on the child, Shen Shixu turned to the young man who had restrained the trafficker. "You have quite nimble moves, young man. Sorry for the trouble, but could you take this child trafficker and the child to the Capital Prefecture?"

Seeing the Top Scholar, who seemed as radiant as the moon in the heavens, speaking to him, Li Daniu flushed bright red and stammered, "Th-thank you for the compliment, sir. I'll take them to the Capital Prefecture right away."

Shen Shixu smiled and bowed to him. "Then you have my thanks!"