Tracing the Source of the Fragrance (Part 1)

Xu Yi was in so much pain he couldn't open his eyes.

He couldn't spare a thought for the bright yellow tassel connecting him to the incense burner; he grabbed the burner, braced himself against the table with one hand, and stood up, trembling and stumbling toward the door to throw it open.

The door swung wide, and in an instant, sunlight flooded in. A hot breeze, heavy with moisture, rushed through the room, sweeping away the thick, lingering smoke.

Xu Yi was in such agony that he could only keep one eye open. He set the incense burner down at the threshold, where the breeze continuously carried away the smoke produced by the burning incense, preventing it from gathering into a dense haze.

At this moment, Xu Yi suddenly noticed that the brass finial atop the incense burner seemed to be rotatable.

He gave the brass top a gentle twist, and a thin layer of brass inside the burner wall rotated, sealing off the interior.

With the oxygen in the limited space inside the burner consumed, the incense extinguished.

Under the gentle breeze, the incense burner gradually cooled until it was cold to the touch, falling completely silent.

Xu Yi grabbed the burner, closed and locked the door, and returned to the room.

He covered his mouth, forcefully swallowing the blood flowing from his tongue, then went to the bedside, picked up Jing Tao's jade pendant, and took a deep, desperate sniff.

Xu Yi's spirituality was activated and transformed by Jing Tao's fragrance, turning into a force capable of healing his wounds.

Xu Yi felt a tingling sensation on his tongue; within seconds, the tingling turned into an itch, and a few seconds later, the itch vanished, and the sharp pain subsided entirely.

"Damn it!"

Xu Yi cursed, finding that his tongue felt fine—perhaps even more nimble than before the injury.

He returned to the table, picked up the teapot spout, and drained the cold tea inside in one go.

"Hoo... hoo..."

He took a few deep breaths, finally exiting his state of shock and calming himself down.

"What... was that I just saw?"

Xu Yi recalled the various images he had witnessed, shivering with dread; the more he thought, the more terrifying it became.

"Could that... have been my future?"

"In the future... will I become such a psychopathic serial killer?!"

Xu Yi pondered cautiously.

"It is true that I cannot endure certain unique fragrances. When I faced Ji Xiao, my spirituality went out of control and turned her into incense."

"Turning people into incense is an ability my spirituality manifests when it loses control."

"If what I saw in that smoke was truly my future..."

"Then it means the ability to turn people into incense can be controlled and actively deployed."

"But... how could I become such a pervert?!"

Xu Yi could not accept it.

He gripped the palm-sized incense burner, rubbing it back and forth.

"What exactly did I just see..."

He asked himself again in his heart.

Now, his mind was clear, and his courage had returned.

"No matter what I just saw..."

"Regardless! I could never become such a psychopathic serial killer!"

As this thought solidified in his heart, Xu Yi noticed that the bright yellow tassel between him and the incense burner was actually glowing brighter.

At the same time, a faint, ethereal fragrance appeared at the tip of his nose.

He was extremely sensitive to scents and immediately identified that this fragrance came from the incense burner.

This scent was very strange; it was nothing like a woman's natural body scent, but rather resembled some kind of plant oil—

It was a little like pine resin, but without the heavy, woody intensity of pine, and certainly not as warm or spicy as resin.

If he had to describe the feeling this scent gave him...

It was an "ethereal scent stained with the breath of trees."

This fragrance was ethereal, devoid of joy or sorrow; smelling it made one's mind tranquil, as if even his mood had been smoothed over.

Although the scent was very faint, it still left Xu Yi intoxicated, lingering in the sensation.

Xu Yi slowly toyed with the closed incense burner while inhaling the fading fragrance, his gaze fixed on the bright yellow tassel connecting him to the burner.

What was this bright yellow tassel, which looked like an aurora?

Xu Yi stood up and walked around the table, but the bright yellow tassel remained lightly tethered to him.

Suddenly, Xu Yi noticed that the jade pendant from Jing Tao in his palm seemed to be glowing as well.

He widened his eyes and held the pendant up to his face, seeing a faint, weak pink light shimmering on its surface.

It looked like the color of peach blossoms.

When Xu Yi focused all his attention on the pink light, it suddenly grew a little brighter.

The intensity of the light was roughly equivalent to that of a one-watt light bulb.

The peach-colored glow from the jade pendant manifested in the air, forming a faint, fragrant trail of tassels.

This pink, fragrant line originated from the jade pendant and extended out beyond the room's door.

Xu Yi looked thoughtful.

He packed up his belongings and followed the pink, fragrant line out the door.

Following the direction of the pink, fragrant line, he passed through the main street of the 38th Shop District and finally stopped in front of the Jing Family mansion at No. 2, 38th Shop District.

"So that's how it is!"

Xu Yi suddenly realized.

"By using this incense burner, I can lock onto objects with a scent and track them back to the source of that fragrance!"

Searching for the root of a scent.

This feeling... was truly indescribable.

It was not yet evening, so it was not the time to meet Jing Tao.

Xu Yi tucked Jing Tao's jade pendant back into his breast pocket and took out Ye Miao's sachet.

After focusing his energy on Ye Miao's sachet, a pale blue trail of fragrant tassels appeared.

Xu Yi followed this pale blue trail, passing through the main street of the 38th Shop District, crossing the Green Duck River Bridge, and walking along the streets toward the center of Puxi City amidst the shrill honking of rickshaws, finally stopping on the road beside Puxi City Central Park.

The trail of fragrant tassels continued forward, disappearing into the massive campus that appeared before him.

The campus was vast, spanning nearly the entire block. The perimeter wall was not a towering, enclosed barrier, but a semi-open landscape wall; as far as the eye could see, there were rows of low, rough-textured, and rustic red bricks, covered in dense layers of creeping ivy.

It had rained just this morning, washing the dust off the ivy, and now, under the sunlight, it appeared lush and verdant.

The school's semi-open wall was not high, reaching only to Xu Yi's chest.

In the middle of the semi-open wall was a black, openwork cast-iron gate, with a small line of artistic Western lettering on its side: "SMH," the abbreviation for the school's full name.

St. Mary's Hall.

Ye Miao had just come to register for enrollment yesterday.

Xu Yi's gaze grew somewhat dazed.

"It's completely different from the old site of St. Mary's Hall back home."

In his hometown, Xu Yi had once visited the old site of St. Mary's Hall near Raffles City in Changning, Shanghai. There, only the bell tower and a few buildings remained, which was a significant difference from the massive campus before him.

Judging solely by its appearance, it was not the same school at all.