Chapter 94: It Turned Out to Be This Thing

Before long, Jin Manjue returned carrying a small treasure chest and a small casket. He placed the items on the table, made a gesture of invitation, and said, “Everything is here.”

Yun Huizhou tapped the chest and the casket with his blade. After confirming from the sound that there were no hidden mechanical gadgets inside, he casually pulled the cloth covering a small side table in Jin Manjue’s room and used it to wrap the chest and casket before slinging them over his back.

Before leaving, he turned back to give Jin Manjue a reminder: “We will be buying the next issue of the rankings. Remember to change them. You wouldn’t want us to pay you another visit someday, would you?”

As he spoke, the hand holding his saber gave a slight flick. The blade slid out a fraction, its bright silver surface glinting coldly under the moonlight.

The light flashed in Jin Manjue’s eyes, causing him to instinctively close them.

By the time he opened them again, Lian Li and Yun Huizhou had vanished.

Looking at the open door, the corner of Jin Manjue’s mouth twitched slightly as he murmured, “Rest assured, you two, I will remember.”

Another soft sound echoed in the distance.

Jin Manjue knew that this time, the two of them had truly departed.

After returning to the inn in the dark, Lian Li climbed straight into bed.

Yun Huizhou, however, felt no sleepiness. He placed the retrieved treasure chest and casket in the corner furthest from Lian Li, lit a candle nearby, and crouched on the floor to begin inventorying the contents of the treasure chest.

Jin Manjue was reasonably generous. However, considering the things he had done and said—which had infuriated Lian Li to such an extent—Yun Huizhou felt that if Jin Manjue hadn’t been generous, he would have likely lost his life long ago to some narrow-minded person, given his level of martial arts.

After finishing the count of the gold beads and gold leaves inside the palm-sized treasure chest, his gaze shifted to the extra casket that had been gifted.

This casket was roughly the size of a booklet, though it was somewhat thicker.

Yun Huizhou picked up the small casket and shook it. He found that the sound from within was muffled, unlike the treasure chest earlier where he could clearly feel hard objects rolling around.

At that time, he had guessed there might be gold beads inside. It was best if they were gold beads rather than silver scraps.

Otherwise, Yun Huizhou truly would have gone back to give Jin Manjue a beating.

Feeling for the clasp of the casket, Yun Huizhou applied a bit of pressure, and the lock clicked open.

He reached inside to feel around—it was actually a book?

Lian Li had his eyes closed and was just about to fall asleep when he suddenly heard a massive commotion from Yun Huizhou, who had been quietly sorting things in the corner.

He was startled awake, hurriedly scrambling up to pull on his clothes. “Did something happen? Did someone break in?”

He pulled back the bed curtains and looked out, only to see Yun Huizhou standing in the furthest corner with his back turned toward him.

The dim yellow candlelight shone upward from below, making the motionless Yun Huizhou look exceptionally eerie.

In an instant, various ghost stories Lian Li had heard in the past flooded his mind, and he broke into a cold sweat from his own imagination.

He steadied himself and called out cautiously, “Yun Huizhou? What’s wrong with you?”

Silence was his only answer. Lian Li pulled his shoulders in and retracted his exposed feet back under the quilt.

After a long while, Yun Huizhou finally responded.

He said, “It’s nothing. I was just a bit surprised to see that Jin Manjue gave quite a lot of gold beads and gold leaves.”

Lian Li gave an “oh.” “What’s in the casket? Did you look?”

“Yes,” Yun Huizhou replied. “It’s silver notes.”

Lian Li didn’t suspect anything; he merely grumbled, “Why put them in two separate containers? Wouldn’t one have been enough?”

“Perhaps he thought the gold beads and leaves would be sufficient at first. Aren’t you tired? Go to sleep,” Yun Huizhou’s voice was flat.

Seeing that nothing was wrong, Lian Li lay back down and moved further toward the wall. “If everything’s fine, you should get some sleep early too.”

“Mm.”

Seeing the bed curtains drop again, Yun Huizhou waited until he heard Lian Li’s breathing become long and steady before softly calling out, “Lian Li?”

The person on the bed shifted restlessly but did not answer; he had likely fallen asleep.

Yun Huizhou’s Adam’s apple bobbed. He looked down at the open booklet that had fallen onto the floor.

The booklet consisted primarily of colored illustrations. Two lifelike little figures were layered together. The faces of the figures were not drawn directly; instead, they were obscured by masks covering the upper halves of their faces.

The lines of their bodies and the details of their hair were drawn vividly. Even without seeing their eyes, one could tell the affection the figures held for each other from their exposed lower faces.

Anyone who saw it would have to sigh in admiration at the artist’s skill.

Of course, it would have been even better if both of them were wearing clothes.

Because the figures were unclothed, Yun Huizhou could tell their genders at a single glance.

Both were men.

Having opened it without any preparation, Yun Huizhou was profoundly shocked.

While he had always known such things existed, he had truly never seen them before.

Seeing this so unexpectedly, the impact was simply too great.

His eyes involuntarily drifted toward the few simple lines of introduction beside the illustration.

He recognized all the characters, but they felt utterly foreign when combined.

After standing there for a good while longer, he finally crouched down to pick up the booklet.

Holding the candle and the booklet, he walked toward the window, intending to go out and burn it.

Yet, after opening the window, he paused. By some inexplicable impulse, he put the booklet back into the casket and walked toward his bundle.

After opening his bundle, he remembered that they often helped each other carry things.

After thinking it over and over, he still took the booklet out and stuffed it into the small pouch he carried on his person, intending to eventually stuff the entire pouch into the bundle carried by Ice Treader.

After tidying up the room, he heard the sound of the night watchman’s signal outside.

It was already the third watch. Yun Huizhou let down his hair and walked toward the only bed in the room.

The weather had already turned somewhat warm. When Lian Li went to sleep, he had been thinking of strange things, so he had wrapped himself tightly in the quilt.

By now, not only had he kicked the quilt aside from the heat, but he had even pulled open his inner robes.

A large expanse of his shoulder and chest was exposed. Because he had been kicking the quilt, his trouser legs had rolled up, revealing his slender, straight calves.

This was merely a common sleeping posture; Yun Huizhou had seen it countless times back on Drunken Dream Island.

But seeing this scene today, he couldn’t help but think of the booklet Jin Manjue had given him, and the two figures within it.

Yun Huizhou didn’t dare let his eyes wander; they could only land on Lian Li’s face. He noticed that Lian Li’s face was flushed pink from the heat, and there was a light sheen of sweat on his forehead.

This caused him to uncontrollably associate the sight with the figures in the booklet, who also had flushed faces and sweat on their brows.

Reason told him not to think about those things; he and Lian Li did not have that kind of relationship.

But human thoughts are sometimes not so easily controlled.

Yun Huizhou stood by the bed for a long time, realizing that as he looked at Lian Li, he simply could not banish the contents of that booklet from his mind.