"Go. Act according to the plan!" Everyone else had already dispersed, leaving only Qi Huashan and Gao Qian to board the ox cart. Dusk was approaching; clouds had blanketed the sky, heavy and overcast. Starry rain drifted down, adding a touch of unease.
Qi Huashan was burdened with thoughts, looking somewhat dazed. Gao Qian could not help but laugh. "What's wrong with you?"
At this hour, there were hardly any pedestrians in the streets and alleyways. The ox cart still trundled forward slowly, rising and falling, with only the sound of hooves stepping through mud and water. It moved even more slowly than a man walking.
"I'm a little uneasy. What if..." Qi Huashan was an old constable. It could be said that those beneath him did not know the might of the government, while those above him did not personally enter the front lines—gentlemen stayed far from the kitchen. Many officials still harbored a scholar's lofty spirit and fantasies.
But he had seen too much of the truth of the human world, and could not help feeling frightened.
"What if the tree falls and the monkeys scatter, right? Or rather, if just one person leaks the secret... we'll be unable to carry the burden, right?" Having made up his mind, Gao Qian instead became much calmer. He asked with a cold smile.
"Yes. They may not be reliable..." Qi Huashan said, gathering his courage.
"What you're worried about is understandable. But you need to understand a few things!"
Creak, creak—the sound of wheels rolling across the ground continually drifted in from outside. Ox carts traveled ahead one after another. This cart blended among them, neither showing mountain nor revealing water, looking entirely ordinary.
Yet the topic discussed by the two men inside the cart was even more "dangerous" than