The Tang Dynasty’s Female Forensic Doctor-Chapter 695: Side Story Three: Xiao Jiu -

Chapter 695: Side Story Three: Xiao Jiu Chapter
Xiao Song’s Confession
I am the legitimate son of the Xiao clan, the ninth in line.
Ever since I can remember, I’ve been watching, with my wise grandmother, the exquisite "performances" within the inner court, where people’s ugly hearts were laid bare by their greed or struggle for survival.
Most of my childhood was filled with such sordid ugliness that I longed to escape, leading me to be extremely rebellious in my youth.
Perhaps it was because I saw too much of women’s frightful aspects that I instinctively resisted getting too close to them.
I recall once discovering that one of my father’s concubines was inappropriately intimate with a steward. Liu Qingsong bet me that if they were given a secret place to meet, the little concubine would surely fail to keep her chastity. I didn’t believe it, as the Xiao clan’s rules were strict, and my father was also a man of imposing authority, so even if she was infatuated with someone else, she shouldn’t dare to be unfaithful.
However, after I set a trap and they unwittingly fell into it, it turned out just as Liu Qingsong had said, and I witnessed a live erotic spectacle.
When my father found out, he was furious and poisoned the concubine before dragging me to the ancestral hall to be punished.
I hated him for raising his hand against his own legitimate son because of a base woman!
The more it hurt, the clearer my head became, so I mocked him, "You can’t even keep your woman’s heart, and having become a cuckold, you fly into a rage and take it out on me? Do you think this will restore your dignity?"
He was so angry he almost had a stroke, and his punishment became even more merciless.
He was righteous all his life, but I despised him for his handling of this matter.
Because of this, our father-son relationship turned so sour that it became utterly irreconcilable.
At that time, my youthful temperament not only resented his beating me over a concubine but also looked down on his way of concealing his embarrassment, so even while bedridden with injuries, I repeatedly infuriated him to no end.
Eventually, in a fit of rage while I was still not fully recovered, he sent me to the battlefield as an ordinary soldier.
I knew he was impulsive and prone to bursts of anger, and his action was more out of a moment’s fury, but I still couldn’t forgive him and didn’t want my life to be arranged by such a man. Hence, I fought fiercely to prove myself in the army camps.
As the number of people I killed on the battlefield increased, my heart became ever more tranquil.
I knew my grandmother and mother sent people to look after me in secret, but with the distance being so vast, as a common soldier, I still suffered many hardships. I climbed the ranks step by step, reaching the official post of Zhao Wu School Captain, a sixth-rank military officer, with a promising future ahead.
Then, my family pressured me to marry, an arrangement that was made long ago.
I detested those women raised in the conflicts of the inner court, yet my background did not allow me the luxury of choosing according to my own will, and I felt responsible for making the girl wait until she was eighteen.
Who would have thought that upon my return to Chang’an, I would never make it back to the border?
Unexpectedly, the bride died on the way back from the wedding procession! This incident alarmed the Ministry of Justice, yet despite all the investigations, no conclusion was reached.
I had never met Madam Du nor had we exchanged wedding vows, let alone developed any affection, but she was still my wife in a sense, and I could not tolerate her dying under my watch.
So I stayed in Chang’an and sought a position in the Ministry of Criminal Justice. Although reluctant to rely on my family’s power, I understood that from the day I was born, I was already marked, and my path in officialdom was destined to be much smoother than that of a commoner. So, I didn’t want to deceive myself.
Due to both my family and the military merits I earned on the front, I was smoothly appointed to the Ministry of Criminal Justice, starting as a regular sixth-rank official.
It turned out that I had some talent for solving cases. Unfortunately, in the beginning, my lack of experience and the perpetrator’s clean execution of the crime meant it took me several years without any leads.
But as I solved many other cases, my rank within the officialdom increased, and with it, my exposure to its ugliness grew.
It was then I realized that I had merely jumped from one fire into a hellish furnace. Withdraw? From the moment I stepped into officialdom, I bore the glory of my clan on my shoulders. In the Xiao clan, there are no cowards.
In the Lanling clan school, portraits of the Xiao clan’s high officials hung, all of whom held immense power. I knew that, a hundred years from now, having one’s portrait displayed in the Xiao clan was the best destiny for any descendant, as it was for me.
But I cannot be as upright as my father. If there is a situation where I clearly know there are many better solutions, why should I always put my fortune and life at risk in a head-on collision?