Dusk.
The twilight was like wine, and the evening drum was sounding in the Imperial Capital, reaching the seventy-second beat.
When it reaches eight hundred beats, the sky turns dark, the nine gates close and lock the city, and one cannot enter or exit without documents from the Six Ministries.
Outside Anding Gate of the Imperial Capital, citizens returning home stopped before the city gates.
There were scholars carrying book boxes and strong men pulling coal carts, all pressing against the drumbeats to return to the city, yet they unwittingly gathered before the gates, looking at the capture order posted on the city wall.
A middle-aged literate scholar slowly read aloud: "The criminal Chen Ji attempted to assassinate the Crown Prince, registered in Shuntian Prefecture, aged eighteen…"
Someone exclaimed: "Assassinate the Crown Prince? Such audacity!"
