Nine Minutes

The knock came at just the right time.

Mo jumped, feigning confusion as she turned to look at the corpse to avoid answering the question. The next second, she heard Xing say from outside the door, "Mo? You forgot your necklace outside, do you want to take it back?"

She instinctively reached out to touch her neck, but then immediately remembered what disgusting things her hands had just touched.

Besides, speaking of necklaces, she currently wears three—only one is for decoration, the other two are offerings.

The demon realized this was just an excuse for Xing to call her out, and immediately cried out in alarm, pulling her hand back. "It wouldn't be that diamond-encrusted butterfly pendant, would it? When did it go missing!"

Gao Yiling: "What's wrong?"

"My necklace—uh, it's nothing, your dad is fine as he is. I'll go out and take a look." Mo Yi seemed extremely concerned about the necklace, but he suppressed his anxiety, successfully leaving Gao Yiling with no reason to stay. She hurriedly opened the door, looking like she was in a real rush, and immediately met Yu Xing's gaze.

Yu Xing subtly glanced at her, seeing that she was alright, except for some suspicious filth on her clothes and a stronger smell of decay, and tentatively raised her hand. "Is this it?"

He had nothing in his hands, but by using the angle, Gao Yiling could not see it at all.

The demon said gratefully, "I didn't even realize it until you told me, thank you..."

As he spoke, he walked out of the room, letting out a sigh of relief as if he were almost completely exhausted.

The stench in the room seemed to have faded, or perhaps their noses had simply gotten used to it.

Gao Yiling followed her out, bowing slightly. "Thank you for your trouble! Um, there's still some time before the meeting, why don't you go out and wander around some more?"

It wasn't appropriate to stay any longer, especially since there was an unstable element in the house, and the demon wanted to share what he had just seen with his temporary ally... This time, the three of them left decisively, saying goodbye to Gao Yiling before heading off.

"Wait a minute," Gao Yiling said suddenly, glancing at the closing door, "When you're out and about, remember not to go to the East District. It's weird there, there's..."

Her mouth opened and closed, but the words after "have" were indistinct, as if they had been lightly erased by something.

The door was slammed shut by the demon. After it was closed, the three of them left without saying a word. They first retreated from the stairwell, then passed through Yan Li's formation and left the community.

Outside the formation, a few divination practitioners could be seen not too far away, walking hurriedly, looking for something, and their expressions were not good.

Yu Xing guessed that they might have just been ripped off by Yan Li, and he didn't know whether they had agreed or not.

The townspeople acted as usual, showing no signs of anything amiss.

Once they were far enough apart, the three stopped in a small alley. Yu Xing asked, "What did she say?"

Hua Subai: "What is it?"

Demon: "Ah, what is it?"

It seems no one heard it.

"Perhaps the information she wanted to tell us wasn't allowed to be directly revealed, so our understanding couldn't capture that word." Hua Subai shrugged. Yu Xing glanced at him and noticed that he had put on a pair of thin leather gloves at some point. The gloves had a cool sheen, and the floral patterns appeared and disappeared with his movements.

Casually withdrawing her gaze, Yu Xing said calmly, "The East District is all about information."

The guide's "Don't go" could be translated as "danger" to ordinary people, but to the deducers it would be translated as "There are important clues there, you'll have to go sooner or later," and they both understood it.

However, it still depends on the situation; Gao Yiling's stance is the biggest variable right now.

Mo hurriedly told Yu Xing and Hua Subai what had just happened, patting his sleeves in disgust as he spoke, and wiping his fingers on a white cloth used to cover a broken tricycle in the alley.

After checking both sides, a detail came to light.

"It felt like only a minute or two had passed outside." Hua Subai didn't even need to consciously recall; Yu Xing had only said a few words to him—and he remembered every single one clearly.

As he spoke, he glanced at Yu Xing out of the corner of his eye. Seeing that Yu Xing still didn't want to talk to him, he took over the information exchange and continued to the demonic pathologist, "He was worried that something had happened to you, so he kindly went to call you. He wanted to check if you were in danger, but as soon as he called you, you came out and even gave us a 'get out of here' look."

"But according to you, you stayed inside for a long time?"

"Compared to yours, it definitely took longer. I thoroughly cleaned that corpse." Mo Du didn't want to recall that disgusting feeling. "At least ten minutes!"

The timing is wrong.

"There's a possibility... you were in 'reality' at the time, and your perception of time was different from ours." Hua Subai pondered for a moment, "If time in Nanshui Town is also chaotic, that would be utterly detestable."

The lines between reality and illusion were already blurred, and with time added to the mix, one can imagine how uncontrollable things would become.

Yu Xing listened in silence. He had a feeling that Hua Subai seemed to have suddenly become much more proactive, as if he was deliberately putting on a show.

The demon didn't want Nanshui Town to become more complicated. She was good at prying into the truth, but she wasn't good at managing time.

"Oh, right." Her eyes suddenly lit up, "When Xing called me, I received a Side Quest and haven't had time to look at it yet."

There were no tasks in the bedroom, but they appeared after I left, which is a bit strange.

His demonic gaze froze slightly on a point in the void, and after a few seconds he said, "The mission requires me to clean Gao Yiling's father's body again within seven days... uh."

Her expression turned grim. "This time, the corpse has noticed that I can see things others can't. Next time I go, I'm afraid I won't be as safe as I was this time."

However, with these gains, it's not a bad deal.

At least they saw what this town was hiding.

"Don't worry, next time... I'll go with you." Hua Subai comforted her with a smile, "With me here, it won't be so dangerous."

Demon: "Huh?" Why did the boss suddenly stop pretending?

Facing the demon's wide eyes, Yu Xing waved her hand in front of it and smiled, "I've thought of a possibility. What time is it, system?"

Although the system is not constant, the task countdown is always running, making it easy to estimate the time.

The demon, confused, said, "If you convert it, it should be 11:18."

Hua Subai's eyebrows twitched.

Having already calculated her system time, Yu Xing's smile deepened, "11:09."

Demon: "Hmm?"

"Our time is 11:09," Yu Xing said, adjusting the painting tube beside her. "Exactly, nine minutes off, which is about right up to our understanding of time difference."

Hua Subai asked in surprise, "Could it be..."

Yu Xing couldn't be bothered to watch the exaggerated acting; Hua Subai wouldn't react like this when he was truly surprised.

He said, "There's a nine-minute gap between us, a gap that even the system acknowledges."