An Old Artisan

After leaving the first private room, Yu Xing didn't continue to the second. Instead, he went over to wait for Yan Li.

It only took a few minutes for Yan Li to come out, too.

There was no danger inside the rooms, but they had already figured out that each one required them to answer three questions of increasing difficulty. There was no need to keep hesitating.

Gu Xing and Bugui had used the time to search the entire second-floor landing. They'd found a few things, so the four of them gathered together and combined what they'd learned.

Yan Li's findings concerned a story about an old artisan in town.

When the artisan was young, he traveled to Nanshui Town and fell for a young woman. After a few romantic encounters, the two married.

The artisan had somehow learned the craft of wood carving. He opened a shop and made a living selling wooden carvings, while his wife was clever and nimble with her hands. Every day, she went to the port district to sell woven bracelets.

They weren't wealthy, but they lived freely.

Then, one day, the young woman went to the port and never came back. The artisan waited until nightfall, but she still hadn't returned. Anxious, he went looking for her. All he learned from the sailors at the port was that a gang had gotten into a dispute with some outsiders who'd come to trade that afternoon. They'd drawn knives and guns, and a beautiful young woman selling bracelets had been killed by a stray bullet.

What happened to the body?

The gang had thrown it into the river to get rid of it.

That was where the story ended. It was another one with no proper beginning or end, and Yan Li deserved much of