When I opened the file, I found that the government office that was under investigation by Dali Temple for this controversial project clearly had the words "Kaifeng Mansion" written on it.

Now, everyone was dumbfounded.

Zhan Zhao looked at Bai Yutang - this is the first time! I'm checking myself!

"The governor of Kaifeng was not Lord Bao at that time, right?" Bai Yutang asked.

Zhan Zhao nodded, "Well, it seems that before your Excellency was appointed as the governor of Kaifeng, there were several people in this position. I don't know which one it was."

Fifth Master thinks this is not difficult, he can go back and ask Mr. Bao.

They originally thought that the clue was lost, but who knew that they had an unexpected harvest from Fang Jingxiao. Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang were in a good mood, so they left the household department and returned to Kaifeng Mansion.

Before returning to the Yamen, the two of them went to the river to conduct a real survey.

It turns out that the alley where Che Kuai's house was is still there, and it is now a very lively market, next to the river and a small pier.

Both Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang felt that this river was indeed a bit mysterious, but after reasonable use, it had some uses. Because it could be connected to the waterway, it became a medium-sized cloth market in Kaifeng City, and many cloth workshops were opened.

When walking through this street, behind the shops on both sides are tall racks for drying colored cloths. The whole street is colorful and very beautiful.

That small pier has become a shortcut for cloth mills to transport flowers by boat. Dyeing requires a large number of flowers and fruits, and the trucks near the pier are transporting baskets of flowers, which are still very beautiful.

It turned out that the Che family's car dealership was hard to find. Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang walked through the alley. No clues were found, but they got an unexpected gain...

Because there were many cars and horses, Bai Yutang and Zhan Zhao kept out of the way while walking. When Zhan Zhao saw the old house, he went over to look at the signboard and visited several houses. The residents didn't know what car dealer it was.

When he reached the end of the market, Zhan Zhao let out a "tsk" sound, a little disappointed.

Fifth Master raised his hand and pointed to the way back. What does that mean - or should we walk again?

Zhan Zhao stared at Bai Yutang's arm. At some point, a red mark appeared on Wu Ye's sleeve.

"Did you get the dye somewhere?" Zhan Zhao grabbed Bai Yutang's sleeve and looked at it. There was a red stripe on the snow-white sleeve, which looked like blood stains and had a sticky feeling.

Bai Yutang frowned, but he didn't remember that he had touched something red just now. He recalled... When passing by the pier, a cart came out of the alley. When he tried to avoid it, his sleeve seemed to have touched something.

Zhan Zhao looked at Wu Ye's sleeves, his nose moved, and he put the sleeves under his nose and smelled it.

"This smell is a bit familiar..." Zhan Zhao smelled the red trace, and there was a strange smell, somewhere between the smell of grass and fragrance. But the smell was very strong, somewhat like the scent of animal glands such as musk.

When you get closer and smell it, the smell changes. Not only is it not fragrant, it also has a strange rancid smell.

Zhan Zhao wanted to help Wu Ye wipe it, but as soon as he wiped it, the red color turned black. At this moment, Wu Ye's snow-white sleeves were covered with a large black area like ink.

"No!" Zhan Zhao pulled Wu Ye and said to go back and change clothes.

The two of them walked back and when they passed a cloth mill, they saw a worker unloading goods.

Bai Yutang suddenly pulled Zhan Zhao, who was running forward with his head down.

Zhan Zhao stopped and saw Bai Yutang looking at a cart at the entrance of the cloth workshop.

There are two baskets on the car, and a boy is moving them down.

Bai Yutang pointed to a black tree branch that looked like a root coming out of the gap in the basket, and said to Zhan Zhao, "It seems that I just touched that one."

Zhan Zhao also turned around to look, and sure enough... there seemed to be a lot of branches in the basket, some of which were sticking out. The sections were red, and the hands of the porter were black, just like Master Wu.

It's almost the same on the sleeves.

The two looked at each other, and Zhan Zhao suddenly clapped his hands, "Ah! I remember that smell! It's very similar to the tree roots by the well in Che's valley!"

Bai Yutang also thought of those tree roots. What came out after being split by the knife was red blood-like sap. Could it be a dye?

The two of them walked over.

Together we looked up at the signboard, which read "Lan Ji Bufang"

The name sounded familiar to both Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang. There was a Lanji clothing store in Kaifeng city, which sold a lot of red clothes. It was Lin Yehuo's favorite shop. His red clothes were particularly bright and colorful.

, the dyed cloth also has a refreshing fragrance of vegetation, which is deeply loved by the master of Fire Phoenix Hall.

"It should be the same family." Zhan Zhao saw there was another basket on the carriage and opened the lid.

Bai Yutang also looked into the basket - yes! There are tree branches in the frame, some like vines and some like roots. They look very similar to the root system outside the ancient well of Chekuai's family, but this one is greener. And the bottom of the basket is like a dip.

It looked like it was full of blood, and it was bloody red, which looked quite scary.

The boy moving things came over to carry the last basket. When he looked up and saw Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang standing next to the car, he was stunned.

Bai Yutang pointed to the tree roots and asked, "This is..."

"Oops!" The worker saw the black marks on Mr. Wu's clothes and scratched his head, "It's over, it's over. Once it turns black, it can't be washed off..."

At this time, an auntie from the cloth shop came out, took the money to settle the bill with the workers, and was puzzled when she saw Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang at the door, "Master Zhan?"

Zhan Zhao knew this aunt, having met her at the Chamber of Commerce. She was probably the proprietress of the cloth shop.

The young worker pointed at Mr. Wu's clothes and winked at the landlady.

The landlady shook her head, "Oh, you can't wash off the black stains, but you can wash the red ones..."

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang pointed to the tree roots in the basket and asked in unison, "What is this?"

The landlady said, "This is Mo Xin Teng."

Zhan Zhao tilted his head, "Don't you feel bad?"

"No one knows its official name, because the inside of this tree vine is black, so everyone calls it that. Even though it looks ugly, this is the best material for dyeing red cloth, which is very valuable! They are all sold at two prices.

!One stick is more expensive than a basket of rouge fruits!”

"Where does this grow?" Zhan Zhao saw that there was still mud on the vines and asked curiously, "Is it in the ground?"

"This kind of vine grows in the mountains. It requires caves underground and is very humid. The yield is very small. They are all shipped from the southwest, and the freight is very expensive!"

Zhan Zhao took a look at a vine and asked, "Are there only green ones? Are there any black ones?"

The landlady smiled and said, "The black one means it's ripe. This one was sent from a long way, so it was cut when it was uncooked. It had to be kept in a cool place for a while after it was brought in. When the skin turns black, what's going on there?"

The juice can be used to dye the cloth. If the skin is not completely black, it can be used to dye the cloth. The dye will be as black as the fifth master's sleeves."

"Is this thing from the Central Plains area?" Zhan Zhao was curious.

"I guess there are none or very few of them," the proprietress said. "It is said that this thing is symbiotic with the bats in the big cave. It needs the bat's excrement as fertilizer to grow well, so the locals call it bat root."

Zhan Zhao asked the landlady, "Do all cloth workshops use this to dye red cloth?"

The landlady was amused and waved her hand, "How can you not! This is the only one in my family!"

Zhan Zhao blinked - such an important secret, just tell it on the street?

"This thing may not be useful, but it is too expensive, and the process of dyeing cloth is also very complicated. If you don't dye it well, you will end up with black cloth." The proprietress patted herself, "We are the only ones with this skill.

It’s only found in the family cloth shop, it’s a craft passed down from our ancestors.”

Zhan Zhao asked, "Is it passed down from our ancestors? Could it be that our ancestors came from the southwest?"

The proprietress was happy and whispered to Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang, "My grandfather came from the southwest. After arriving in Kaifeng, he made a fortune by dyeing red cloth. Back then, he made wedding dresses for empresses and oirans!"

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang were both dumbfounded. The empress and the oiran... what kind of configuration is this... By the way, there is also Lin Yehuo.

Zhan Zhao asked the landlady if he could buy one.

The lady boss smiled and said, "Whatever you want to buy, you two are so good-looking, I will give you two one!"

After saying that, I ran to get the oil paper bag, picked a big one and wanted to wrap it.

Zhan Zhao pointed to the small root the size of old ginger and said, "This is enough."

The landlady waved her hand and said that the leader of Huofeng Hall always came to take care of the business and was very generous. She would not lose even if they gave this basket to them. She wrapped a big one and handed it to Zhan Zhao, not forgetting to tell her, "If anything happens to this,

Don't rub it on your clothes! Soak it in white vinegar for a day and night, and then wash it with cold water. Also, don't eat it! It's poisonous! Don't use it on fire, it will explode! This is easy to do when there is a fire.

Explode, once it explodes, it will be like a murder scene, with red everywhere!"

Zhan Zhao nodded in agreement, thanked the landlady, and went back with Mr. Wu, preparing to give the roots to Gongsun for study.

…

Although the chats with the landlady were all about a lot of things, there were still some things that Zhan Zhao cared about.

First of all, this ink vine or bat root should be the same plant as the one beside the ancient well of Chekuai's family. This unique vine in the southwest coexists with bats. Neither bats nor vines are native to the Central Plains. Did someone deliberately bring them here?

Where are you raising?

Secondly, the proprietress said that she used this kind of dyed cloth to make wedding dresses for the palace empress and oiran. This is easy to say but actually very difficult to do, because the cloth in the palace is woven and purchased from various places, or it is tribute. In short, it has different origins.

It's very particular. Lanji is not the place designated by the government to purchase cloth. How did the queen in the palace get the red cloth from Lanji? There should be only one way, and that is who gave it to her. Not everyone can give something as a gift.

The person who entered the harem and gave this cloth probably also knows the purpose of the bat root... In short, there may be some clues here.

The two of them returned to Kaifeng Mansion with a piece of tree root. It was already afternoon.

Zhan Zhao and Bai Yutang didn't bother to have lunch. When they entered the house, they saw a group of old men in the yard, cooking pots and drinking wine.

Zhan Zhao gave the tree roots to Gongsun, washed his hands, and rushed to Xiao Wu's room to hug his three tiger cubs.

The fifth master came in to change his clothes. Tianzun held a bowl and curiously followed his apprentice into the house, asking him where he had wiped the ink on his sleeve.

Fifth Master glanced at the meatballs in his bowl.

Tianzun picked it up and handed it to his mouth.
To be continued...