Seeing that he was about to leave, Li Jingsheng hurriedly grabbed his sleeve: “Hey, I was just joking! With such a huge thing like Eldest Senior Brother going missing, how could I just stand by and do nothing?”
Xi Feng really couldn’t bring himself to trust this guy’s sweet talk anymore: “Let go! I don’t need your help, I’ll go find him myself!”
Mo Yu pulled Li Jingsheng back from trying to grab the other’s arm and pointed out the crucial question of the whole matter: “How do you know Eldest Senior Brother is missing?”
With that question posed, Li Jingsheng reacted as well. Right, what if the other person had simply left first or gone out?
Why was Xi Feng so dead set on concluding that he was missing?
Xi Feng’s attention was instantly hooked by this question, and he stopped bothering to bicker with Li Jingsheng.
Dragging both of their hands, he urged, “You guys, come with me.”
Without breaking his stride, he turned left and ducked into the room where Eldest Senior Brother had stayed the previous night. Once inside, he finally released their hands and demanded, “Did you smell anything?”
Mo Yu stood there without reacting much, but Li Jingsheng played along enthusiastically, taking a deep sniff before nodding: “Smelled it, quite fragrant. What kind of spice is this? It actually smells pretty nice. Wait, Eldest Senior Brother doesn’t usually use perfume, does he?”
Realizing this person had finally caught onto the main point, Xi Feng nodded heavily: “Right! Eldest Senior Brother doesn’t use perfume normally, so this scent doesn’t belong to him!”
Without missing a beat, Li Jingsheng countered, “Well, what if Eldest Senior Brother suddenly started liking it? I have to say, Eldest Senior Brother has pretty good taste.”
Xi Feng honestly wanted to crack this guy’s skull open to see what on earth was packed inside: “This scent really isn’t Eldest Senior Brother’s! This scent was left behind by the culprit!”
“The culprit? What culprit?”
Prompted thus, Xi Feng finally remembered he had forgotten to explain the situation to them.
“Actually, we have a mission down the mountain this time.”
Nodding in acknowledgment, Li Jingsheng noted that he had already guessed as much.
“Mm, and then? What’s the mission?”
Too lazy to bicker over the other’s attitude, Xi Feng continued, “Linxian Town is the closest town to the immortal realm, so it has the tightest ties with us. In the past, this place was also the safest, without a single major incident in over a decade. However, missing person cases started cropping up here a few days ago.”
“Initially, only two people were reported missing: one was a newlywed groom on his wedding night. Rumor has it someone saw him heading toward the bride’s room that evening, but the bride insists she waited all night and never saw him.”
“The other is a scholar preparing for this year’s provincial examinations, whose disappearance was only discovered by his classmates a week after he went missing. Eldest Senior Brother said he didn’t have much of a presence, his family doesn’t live here, he didn’t talk much on ordinary days, and he didn’t even have any friends, yet he suddenly started staying out overnight. At first, his classmates thought he was just busy, and it wasn’t until a full week passed without him returning that they realized something was wrong.”
“Eldest Senior Brother suspected that more than just these two might be missing, so over the past few days, we checked on the local vagrants here as well, and four vagrants have gone missing too.”
“However, because the entire immortal realm has been busy preparing for the martial arts tournament lately, Sect Master Master assigned the task to Eldest Senior Brother and me.”
Listening quietly for a good while, Mo Yu finally asked after Xi Feng finished speaking: “So you suspect this is the work of a single individual?”
Xi Feng nodded: “Yes.”
Mo Yu’s eyes turned deep and fathomless, carrying a natural, oppressive weight when fixing a steady gaze on someone: “Why?”
Li Jingsheng possessed truly limited intelligence, and following standard novel tropes, anything tied to a murder mystery generally pointed to premeditated foul play by a specific person. Thus, he automatically accepted Xi Feng’s information as pointing directly to a true mastermind.
Yet he had forgotten one crucial detail. Every conclusion requires a reason.
So, tilting his head alongside the others, he asked Xi Feng: “Right, why?”
At this point, Xi Feng genuinely realized he had some structural flaws when it came to recounting events. Blushing, he stammered, “Because in every room where they went missing, there was a strange fragrance. People said the scent smelled harmless enough, but the coincidence was that every room where someone disappeared had that exact strange fragrance. Of course, that’s just what the informants said. By the time we got there, the scent had long since dissipated, so I have no idea what it actually smelled like.”
“But now, a strange fragrance has suddenly wafted out of Eldest Senior Brother’s room. Don’t you think that’s too much of a coincidence?”
“Besides, Eldest Senior Brother always tells me wherever he goes, but today he left without a word. So I’m guessing Eldest Senior Brother must have been abducted by that culprit!”
With those words, the room fell into a quiet hush.
Mo Yu kept his lips pressed tightly together without uttering a sound, while Li Jingsheng racked his brain trying to recall the plot of the original novel. He had read the book too fast and honestly couldn’t remember whether this arc existed in the original work.
Though speaking of the original, he had already altered quite a few minor details. After all, the original owner would never have taken the protagonist out shopping in the book.
Failing to arrive at any conclusions through thought alone, Li Jingsheng decided to consult his personal cheat, Xiao Yu: “Hey, Xiao Yu, can you track down who the culprit is through this scent?”
Xiao Yu was still holding a grudge over the previous night, so it answered with deliberate sarcasm: “Thinking of me now? Why didn’t you go ask Mo Yu?”
Coaxing it, Li Jingsheng flattered, “How could he ever compare to you? His spiritual roots haven’t even awakened yet! Our Xiao Yu is both wise and courageous. Tracking down a petty little culprit like this will be an absolute breeze!”
Pleased by the flattery, Xiao Yu let go of its annoyance over the previous night and simply declared, “Naturally! This fledgling little succubus hasn’t amounted to much yet, how could I possibly fail to find it?”
Realizing Xiao Yu was successfully placated, Li Jingsheng began pondering its words: “A succubus? We’ve already dragged the demon race into this?”
Xiao Yu reassured him: “Just a newly formed little succubus, no real threat to speak of. Jin Yunhao can handle it entirely on his own. You guys don’t even need to go, and going might just end up being a distraction.”
Li Jingsheng was just about to agree, planning to find a way to stall them until Jin Yunhao returned, when Mo Yu spoke up a step ahead of him: “Does Senior Brother Xi have any leads?”
Caught off guard by being directly addressed, Xi Feng blinked: “None. I don’t know much about spices. This is my first time smelling this fragrance too.”
As he spoke, an idea seemed to strike him: “However, we can go ask around the nearby spice shops and see if anyone has bought similar aromatics recently!”
Pondering for a brief moment, Mo Yu ultimately nodded: “We can do that.”
He then shifted his gaze to Li Jingsheng, his dark eyes sparkling brightly: “What does Senior Brother think?”
Just as Li Jingsheng was about to start muddling the waters, he got cut off. At this point, saying anything else would feel inappropriate, so he smiled and nodded as well: “I think this method works too.”
In the blink of an eye, the group arrived at the largest spice shop in the vicinity, rumored to have the most comprehensive collection of aromatics in the entire town.
The moment the three of them stepped inside, their senses were overwhelmed by an eye-watering array of spices, various herbal scents rushing straight into their nasal cavities.
Xi Feng produced a fragrance-retaining talisman that had absorbed the scent beforehand and presented it for the shopkeeper to sniff. True to Li Jingsheng’s expectations, the shopkeeper shook his head, saying he had never smelled anything like it.
After all, if the culprit was truly a succubus as Xiao Yu had claimed, the scent was most likely an innate skill of the creature. How could an ordinary spice shop possibly carry an identical version?
Having finally found a lead only to hit a dead end, Xi Feng kept his expression sullen ever since stepping out of the spice shop.
Li Jingsheng could fully empathize with his frustration, but he couldn’t just blurt out clues, especially since Xiao Yu had warned that going might cause them to become dead weight.
The three of them stood in silence by the roadside. Li Jingsheng didn’t need to guess to know the other two were racking their brains over how to find Eldest Senior Brother next. Though he very much wanted to help, considering Xiao Yu’s advice, he ultimately chose to remain silent.
In truth, he also understood why Xi Feng had sought him out. Mostly because the boy knew Li Jingsheng possessed higher combat power and wanted an extra layer of insurance.
Yet only Li Jingsheng himself knew how much actual combat power a swapped-in substitute like him truly held. Even if he tagged along, he couldn’t guarantee he’d be of any real use.
The cries of hawkers echoed endlessly, and not far away, the savory aroma of roast chicken drifted right to the tip of Li Jingsheng’s nose, making his mouth water.
“Wanwan Sister, you can’t catch me!”
Just as Li Jingsheng was contemplating whether to go buy one and taste it, a child holding a small pinwheel came careening straight toward him without paying attention.
With his eyes fixed firmly on the roast chicken stall, Li Jingsheng hadn’t noticed his surroundings at all, leaving him completely unprepared as the kid plowed directly into him. To make matters worse, the child carried quite a bit of momentum, causing Li Jingsheng to lose his balance and start tipping backward.
Right before he fell, Li Jingsheng instinctively threw his arms around the child who had crashed into his chest. The next second, his backside made solid, intimate contact with the ground, and a sharp pain flared across his lower back. He had definitely taken a hard knock.
Startled by the sudden turn of events, the two companions froze for a fraction of a second before Mo Yu reacted first, quickly striding to Li Jingsheng’s side.
“Senior Brother, are you alright?”
The young man’s red robes splayed out across the ground as he sat there, arms still protectively wrapped around the child who looked utterly dumbfounded. Hearing the question, Li Jingsheng first released the thoroughly startled toddler, then rubbed his aching lower back with one hand while grabbing onto the hand Mo Yu extended to push himself slowly back up.
“I’m fine, just took a bump. Let’s check if this kid is hurt first.”
Squatting down, Mo Yu completely ignored the child and instead reached out to gently massage the spot on Li Jingsheng’s lower back that had just taken the hit.
The placement was spot-on, and the pressure was neither too heavy nor too light, instantly easing the aching pain significantly.
The gesture left Li Jingsheng blushing furiously with embarrassment, but since the boy was helping him out of kindness, he couldn’t very well snap at him, so he shifted his focus back to the child in front of them.
The toddler looked to be around four or five years old, with chubby, rosy cheeks and lavishly embroidered clothing, evidently a young master from some prominent household.
“Little friend, are you okay?”
Initially frozen like a statue, the child stared at Li Jingsheng for a moment before breaking into a wide grin, replying completely off-topic: “Gege. You. You’re so pretty!”
Blindsided by a compliment from a toddler, Li Jingsheng laughed and pinched the little one’s cheek: “Thank you.”
Unable to stand watching them dawdle any longer, Xi Feng yanked the child up and demanded, “Where did you come from? Where are your family members?”
Seeing how fierce the stranger looked, the toddler immediately pouted and looked away: “Don’t know.”
Xi Feng: “You.”
By this point, the pain in Li Jingsheng’s back had mostly subsided, so he pushed himself up with Mo Yu’s aid. Seeing Xi Feng about to bully the child, he immediately pulled the toddler away: “He’s just a kid, what could he possibly know? Are you expecting him to confess just because you look fierce?”
Xi Feng’s retort choked in his throat: “You.” After stuttering for a good long while, he grit his teeth and hissed, “Why are you always taking his side?!”
Completely baffled as to why a grown man like Xi Feng was picking a fight with a toddler, Li Jingsheng retorted deliberately, “I take the side of whoever is younger! What? Are you younger than him?”
Right as he finished speaking, someone not far away shouted the name Xiao Qi, followed by the sound of hurried footsteps and a hand reaching for the child.
Lowering his gaze, Li Jingsheng saw the toddler tugging at his sleeve while looking up with a grin: “Gege, Wanwan Sister is here to find me.”
Lifting his eyes, he spotted a young woman frantically searching the surroundings with a panicked expression.
Li Jingsheng immediately scooped up the child and gave a wave, prompting the toddler to call out obediently, “Wanwan Sister, I’m right here!”
Hearing the call, the woman looked over, her tense expression instantly melting into relief.
“Xiao Qi, you scared me to death! If you run off like that again, I’m never bringing you out with me!”
Hurrying over, the woman scooped the child into her arms, scolding him with a gentle, pampering tone while frantically running her hands over the little boy to check for any injuries.
What she failed to notice was that the moment she approached, all three of them froze dead in their tracks as if struck by lightning.
Li Jingsheng glanced back at his two companions, and from their expressions alone, he knew all three of them had arrived at the exact same realization.
The fragrance emanating from this woman was precisely that strange fragrance.