The bright moon hung overhead, illuminating the world with its pallid light.
A sedan gleaming silver in the moonlight slowly turned onto Qianjin Road and stopped outside the courtyard of the villa at the very end.
Ji Li sat in the passenger seat, a still-burning cigarette held in his right hand, quietly studying the villa through the window.
It was winter in Shanming, and the trees in the courtyard had already taken on a bleak appearance. A leaf trembled gently in the wind, but it did not hold on for long, drifting down before his eyes.
It fluttered through the air and settled on the withered yellow lawn. The soil had been turned over, exposing the roots of the grass. The mess appeared to have been deliberately dug up.
By contrast, weeds ran rampant in the gaps between the stone paving slabs, growing so thick that the path was almost impossible to make out.
Countless dark cracks split the villa's dull yellow walls, most concentrated at the base and spreading upward. They seemed to branch and multiply, leaving the exterior as hideous as a spiderweb.
Ji Li knew nothing about feng shui, but even an outsider could tell at first glance that this courtyard was anything but a good omen.
"Huang Banxian, when will you get here? Why do I feel there's something wrong with this Wu Zhengsi..."
Anyone could see something was amiss here, and Xue Tingtao immediately asked the question.
Villa No. 1 on Qianjin Road was home to Wu Zhengsi, a renowned contemporary master of Feng Shui and a reclusive sage. Yet the feng shui of his courtyard was so chaotic and decrepit that something seemed wrong no matter how they looked at it.
"I should be there soon. This fucking driver's taking me on a detour...