Yan Fei

Xu Zhiming asked someone to put a stove in his room, left Yan Zi to warm up in his room, and went out by himself.

Later, the maid brought in a tray of pastries.Yan Zi asked for two quilts, one to spread on the wooden chair and one to wrap herself.

Not long after, Xu Zhiming was caught in a cold wind, stepped in the door in a hurry, turned around and closed the door.

"You... cough... why don't you go back tonight, it's too late."

Yan Zi heard the lingering anger in his words, raised her eyebrows, got up and pulled him onto the wooden chair.The quilt had been roasted by the fire for a long time, and it was already warm. It was undoubtedly the best thing to extinguish the fire when wrapped around Xu Zhiming who had just escaped from the cold wind.

Xu Zhiming gathered the quilt around his body, raised his pale face that was almost bloodless, and faced him silently.

"You bake for a while, I still have something to tell you."

"...That's fine. You want to say...cough, what?" Xu Zhiming buried his face in the quilt and asked in a muffled voice.

"I know," Yan Zi said with a playful smile, "You don't think it's the plum blossom that killed someone."

Xu Zhiming frowned.

"...You really are lying to them. I just thought, how could a spy from Gusu Pavilion be so sloppy—ahem."

Yan Zi twitched the corners of his mouth, fiddled with the firewood a few times, and said, "That doorplate. On the doorplate in front of the Zimei room, there are dark patterns of lotus flowers. And the words on it are slightly sunken, as long as the tactile sense is a little bit supernatural For example, you can feel it, and it is not difficult to distinguish it if you touch it carefully."

"...Lotus refers to Miss Louie."

"Yes. Guess what, I looked at the piece on Miss Louie's door."

"...Is it a plum blossom?"

"Yes." Yan Zi threw a piece of pastry into his mouth and said vaguely, "Every girl in Drunken Fragrance Hall must have a symbol, and these things will be drawn on the house number to distinguish and It is convenient... for the guests at night to distinguish."

"But in fact, I asked my late wife, and she said—cough—many girls don't know about it. Louie and Jinmei are good friends...cough cough...even if Jinmei proposed to change with her Playing around with the house number, she...she shouldn't be too suspicious—even if this request is a bit weird."

"It's also possible that she changed it secretly... That is to say, it is very likely that Miss Jinmei knew about it."

"Why did she change?"

"...The house number is not only for decoration, but also for the guests to identify the door of the girl's room. What if this person doesn't recognize Jinmei or Louie at all, but only recognizes their house number?"

"You mean...it's very possible that what that person wanted to kill at the beginning was actually...Jianmei?"

"Exactly." Yan Zi nodded, "Since the gate of Zuixiang Hall is locked at night, then that person should not risk making noise to pick the lock and escape. Let's go back and look around there What clues."

"Cough... No, we're going now." After saying that, Xu Zhiming was about to get up.

Yan Zi was startled, and quickly stopped him: "What are you doing?! It's so windy outside, so it doesn't have to be like this?!"

He could see that this guy was a sick man, his life was very fragile, and he might poke if he was not careful.He has been busy for so long, and he blows the wind again, so he must not make too much noise right now.

"Ahem...Yan Zi," Xu Zhiming smiled, pulled off the black cloth covering his eyes, gasped, and suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood.He slightly opened his eyes with a faint red color flowing in them, stretched out his hand to wipe away the tears, and said, "It's raining outside, if there is really something that is washed away by the rain, then it will be troublesome."

Yan Zi naturally knew what he was talking about, so with a "tsk", he asked a servant to bring a rather heavy robe, put it on him hastily, pulled it and walked out.

"Wait." Xu Zhiming tugged at him and went to another yard.After a while, Ganu shook his head and walked out timidly behind Xu Zhiming, apparently awakened from his sleep.

"What are you doing with it?"

"It has a better nose." Xu Zhiming licked his lips and said with a smile.

Now it was raining heavily, so Yan Zi had no choice but to hold an umbrella, holding Xu Zhiming by the collar and stumbling towards Zuixiangtang, followed by Ganu with his head down.

The two of them walked to the back of Zuixiangtang's house, where several plum trees were planted, and the petals of the plum blossoms fell one after another as the weather warmed up.

Xu Zhiming turned his head and patted Ganu's head, and said softly: "Go and smell if there's anything wrong, keep your voice down."

Ganu grinned, and immediately ran up, sniffing the ground with his nose.

"This rain will wash away many things." Yan Zi whispered.

"Kanu's nose is fine."

Ganu stuck to the base of the wall, his nose twitched, and when he touched a spot, he turned his head and let out a "owwow".

Yan Zi hurried forward and knelt down to check.I saw a footprint that had already been shaped on the small piece of soil in the turned over haystack.The footprints were not shallow, so they were fortunately preserved and were not washed away by the rain.

"How?" Xu Zhiming followed and asked.

"It's the right footprint, and... there's a small dirt pit, it can be seen that it's that kind..." Yan Zi paused, and pressed the edge of the footprint, "It looks like something fell down."

"In that case, it is very likely that the person who left this footprint was a person who does not know martial arts, and he jumped from a high place. Mr. Yan, where is this?"

Yan Zi raised his head and looked around, and recalled in his mind the scene he happened to glance out of the window in the plum house.

"It should be facing... the house of Miss Jinmei."

"Then, let's make some guesses next—this man escaped from her house after accidentally killing the girl he thought was Miss Louie, because it was late at that time and there were no lights on the porch. He could only move forward in the dark. And he knew Miss Louie—maybe he had asked his late wife before—in short, he chose to touch the door of her as an acquaintance, perhaps because he knew Miss Louie's work and rest, knew She had already fallen asleep at that time. And, in order to put the blame on someone, this person secretly threw the knife in what he thought was Louie's room. As for the escape route, he chose the window. Because even if the person in the room When a person wakes up, he will only scream in fright, and will not look at himself who has jumped out of the window and escaped."

"...Are you always guessing like this?" Yan Zi rolled his eyes at him.

Xu Zhiming shrugged: "Actually, my guesses are often accurate."

"Then what do we do next?"

"Let's follow the footprints."

Although the rain did not wash away the footprints under the wall of Zuixiangtang, it did wash away a lot of footprints along the way along with the smell.Halfway through the two of them, the footprints had basically disappeared. It could only be seen from the depth that the murderer's legs and feet might have been damaged by that jump, and there were no other clues.

The two decided to spend the night in a dilapidated small temple on the street.

The small temple was so dilapidated that there was almost nowhere to sit, Yan Zi searched all over the world and finally found a dry piece of ground under the statue enshrined in the temple.

Ganu circled around the ground and lay down on his stomach.Yan Zi went to get some firewood to light a fire, and then leaned against Ganu and sat down beside Xu Zhiming.

"Ganu is so kind..." Yan Zi sighed.

Xu Zhiming nodded and said, "It was the one who protected me when I was about to freeze to death. It... is not only a wolf at home, but also an important friend to me."

Yan Zi's Adam's apple slid up and down, and looked at Xu Zhiming.

The rain had already lightened, and the light of the moon was more or less able to shine through the clouds.Right now, Yan Zi could barely see the outline of Xu Zhiming's side face with that little light.

I have to say it's beautiful.But he is blind.

"By the way," Xu Zhiming said suddenly, turning his head, which startled Yan Zi, "Did you see where Miss Louie's hair is?"