"So... what exactly is the reason?" Zhang Yinluo glared at Sun Lang, a thread of scorn in her eyes. "Don't tell me you've got a disease where touching a woman's body makes you go into heat and commit crimes?"
"...You, who can guess the truth completely wrong, are impressive in your own way."
Sun Lang sighed and said helplessly, "Anyway, just remember it... It's not that I won't explain — it's that you wouldn't believe me if I did. You definitely wouldn't. And not believing me, you'd most likely insist, in the spirit of seeking truth from facts, on trying it out yourself. Trying it would definitely cause an incident, and then you'd most likely pin the incident on me, and things would get more troublesome — damn, I've seen this whole routine of yours a hundred times. So remember: keep your distance from me, whatever you do."
Zhang Yinluo rolled her eyes. "Putting it that way only makes me more curious... Aren't you afraid I'll try it right now?"
Sun Lang dug at his nostril. "If you try it now, that's the spirit of bravely exploring new things — nothing to do with me. If you try it after I've told you the truth, that's you questioning and testing my word, and then I'd bear responsibility too. The two are entirely different matters, and I'm not carrying that pot... So I've said everything I can say. If you still don't believe me, you've only yourself to blame, and you'll bear the consequences yourself..."
"...You really are practiced at this. Just how many times have you dodged the blame?"
Sun Lang sighed again, seeming wholly unwilling to answer. Zhang Yinluo pondered a moment; a woman's instinct told her something was off, so she sensibly refrained from any "fine, I'll just try it then" decision. Still — what a strange man. Who'd even want to touch him? Far too pleased with himself!
With the three articles of ground rules settled, neither side disputing the result, they set off. Zhang Yinluo, ever thorough, had changed her gear and on the way also made a trip to a horse dealer, renting a swift horse for Sun Lang. The two led their mounts through the bustling market district, then swung up and rode hard for the next destination.
Sun Lang didn't grip the reins or squeeze the horse's flanks; he lounged in the saddle like a wastrel, and the horse, astonishingly, galloped on steady and obedient. Seeing it, Zhang Yinluo praised, "This horse really is spirit-clever and well-behaved."
The errant rolled his eyes but said nothing, only, "First to the Tower of Loyal Valor. The Errant Guild has a dedicated intelligence section — let's dig into Qin Yu's background, find out which outfit she runs with... and beat up Hu Shouxin while we're at it."
"No need." Zhang Yinluo's expression turned a little odd, and she pressed her lips in a smile. "Guild Leader Hu has already handed me the intelligence on Qin Yu, and asked me to pass along that he'll be spending the next couple of days at home with his wife and daughter. If you dare show up within three li of his house, the moment he sees you he'll chase you down and cut you to pieces."
A pained look surfaced on Sun Lang's face in an instant — you straight-up bastard, what a fine excuse to skip town you've found. But damn it, your wife's eight months pregnant and your daughter's only four... as if I'd bother!
Though she didn't know the details, Zhang Yinluo deduced from the errant's face that he'd come off the worse, and her mood couldn't help but brighten. "Let's go. The outfit Qin Yu runs with is called Xiuchun Hall, a not-too-clean gray organization. I've heard the name before — word is they do some shady, dirty business on the quiet, but we've never managed to find evidence..."
Sun Lang smiled. "Not that you can't find evidence — they've just greased the right joints thoroughly enough."
"What a dark mind you have!"
"I simply find this country an eyesore, and I insist on staying here to be a thorn in its side. What are you going to do about it? Young lady, you're naive after all — you've yet to learn the fearsome power of a public intellectual."
The two riders swept off in a cloud of dust, their bickering trailing behind without pause.
"It's right up here." From the city's west to its east, through one main street, around several layers of small lanes, Zhang Yinluo reined in her horse and gazed into the distance. She pointed at a stretch of sprawling dwellings. "That direction. Let's go..."
"I say we stop here." Sun Lang dismounted and worked his joints loose. "Tie the horses up somewhere and we'll walk over."
Zhang Yinluo frowned. "Right here? What if someone leads them off? And it's still a fair walk to our destination. We..."
"Then we play a little game of constable-catches-thief, beat up the horse-thief once we catch him, and reap the double pleasure of bullying the weak and upholding justice." Sun Lang smiled, and explained to a baffled Zhang Yinluo, "Come on, you know yourself they're a gray organization — and what's a thief's most important trait? Cleverness, of course, or you cops would've raided them flat long ago. There are surely eyes and scouts of theirs among these surrounding lanes and buildings. Two of us riding straight up to their nest — how would they not get wind of it? So we sneak into the village, hold our fire..."
With that explained, the head constable caught on a little. "So we hit them with a surprise — show up unannounced and question them, catch them off guard?"
"Question them, my foot. You're not in your constable capacity right now... You're wearing the Inquisition's uniform, so let's learn a bit from the Western playbook, eh?" Sun Lang tirelessly imparted life's truths to the head constable. "When the Blazing Cult's inquisitors handle a case, they're proper Russki about it — results only, never mind the process. The slightest defiance and they beat you first; answer too slowly and they beat you again. Their efficiency is higher than you constables' by I-don't-know-how-much. You've still got some learning to do. All right, all right, I know you hate violence, so we won't barge in and beat people directly — we'll play a little stealth infiltration."
He waved a hand for Zhang Yinluo to follow. The head constable rolled her eyes and hesitated, but under his subtle gaze still turned back, leading both horses to find an inn and board them there.
"You really don't understand the joys of life and the pleasures of fishing."
"...You're inciting a crime."
"What logic is that? Did you know that cold, cool black uniform of yours actually suits the taste of certain masochists? If some pervert suddenly lunged to lick your feet or [beep——] you, would we say you'd incited a crime?" Sun Lang waved a hand. "I'd say anyone with normal values, seeing two horses tied at the roadside, wouldn't get the urge to steal them. It's not as if I'm throwing money on the ground. If a hand reaches out anyway, what's left to say?"
Zhang Yinluo couldn't be bothered to argue and only snorted a couple of times.
"All right, on to business, no more side-tracking." Sun Lang said. "Now then, stealth infiltration... Come, let me first walk you through a few methods of sneaking. The simplest, most convenient, most efficient is the Kang-style stealth method, invented by a master surnamed Kang. The core secret of this stealth school is a single sentence — so long as you kill everyone who sees you, no one will discover you sneaking in."
"..." Zhang Yinluo, who'd actually hoped Sun Lang would offer some useful skill, felt she'd been played. "...Give me a more peaceful method!"
"Then it's this." A moment later, Sun Lang and Zhang Yinluo climbed slowly up the wall onto a rooftop and crouched low, out of sight of the people taking the evening air in the courtyard, ears cocked to the sounds within the house. "We're here as errants to get intelligence, so don't count on the constable's playbook. They've no duty to answer any of our questions, and even if they answer they usually won't tell the truth — unless..."
He turned his head and smiled kindly at Zhang Yinluo. "...unless we fully walk them through some reasoning."
The head constable shivered. "...What are you planning?"
The errant smiled faintly, then reached into the inner pocket of his coat and pulled out a small iron cylinder. "Going straight in the front door easily alarms the snake and lets the real target catch wind and slip away. So we have to find a way to flush them out of their rooms... otherwise the target could easily escape down some hidden passage."
"...What is that?" Zhang Yinluo frowned. "Looks like some single-soldier tactical weapon. A tear-gas grenade? A flashbang? Gas?"
"I'm a law-abiding citizen!" Sun Lang retorted gravely. "How could I use such dangerous contraband! This is a perfectly harmless thing — civilian-made, an everyday household item..."
Zhang Yinluo plainly didn't believe him, but gazing at the small cylindrical iron tin in his hand, it truly wasn't designed in the military style. The tin was printed with the word "Surströmming." Well-traveled as she was, even she couldn't for the moment make out what it meant.
"It's a kind of fish food in a can, very popular in its homeland." Sun Lang smiled warmly, then murmured to himself, "Sure enough, even in a different world, humanity's pursuit of fine cuisine runs the same..."
"What are you saying? What different world?"
"Never mind, never mind." Sun Lang laughed. "Come, let's put it to use... Now, say the slogan."
"What slogan?"
"Why, of course..." Sun Lang pried up a roof tile and tossed the can in, then whipped out the Fire Qilin, aimed at the falling food, squeezed the trigger, and gave a sharp cry. "Heaven-sent justice!"