The mastermind behind it all

After confirming that Uncle Shui was inside Treasure Pawnshop checking the accounts, Xu Zhengyang hurried straight to Cloudwater Residence.

Cloudwater Residence's main gates were shut tight.

Xu Zhengyang vaulted over the wall with ease and crouched cautiously beside the ornamental gate to survey his surroundings. Once he was certain no one was there, he rushed into the main room.

Tea bowls, pancakes, and pastries sat on the table, but the tea had gone completely cold. Three sets of bowls and chopsticks rested on the counter nearby.

Xu Zhengyang knew that three people always stood guard at Cloudwater Residence.

Two were guards from the Xie Residence, named Zhou Ji and Li Dao.

The third was Chen Mo, the head instructor of Yongsheng Martial Arts Hall.

Three sets of bowls and chopsticks for three people. That matched.

"It looks like Wenjie was right. Xie An really did take all three of them away..."

Xu Zhengyang had just breathed a sigh of relief when he heard faint sobbing from the rear courtyard.

Was someone coming?

Xu Zhengyang immediately leaped up onto a roof beam.

He hid for quite some time, but no one appeared. Instead, he began to find the sobbing terribly familiar.

A Shan!

Xu Zhengyang dropped to the floor and hurried straight to the rear courtyard, where he spotted A Shan outside a south-facing room.

A Shan was wearing a ragged homespun skirt. Her legs were bound with rope, and with both arms gone, she could only lie on her stomach and laboriously lap at a bowl of thin gruel on the ground.

Hearing footsteps approach, A Shan instinctively assumed it was one of Xie An's people. She barely raised her head and kept licking up the gruel.

"A Shan!"

A Shan jerked her head up, her eyes widening in disbelief.