"Who's there?!"
Ye Qianfan turned his head.
Sure enough, a narrow crack had opened in a wooden window that had been tightly shut!
An eye peered through the crack. Though the eye itself was hard to make out, the dark silhouette behind it was far too obvious!
Slam!
Tap, tap, tap!
Realizing he had been spotted, the man hurriedly pulled the wooden window shut, and the sound of footsteps immediately followed.
Ye Qianfan and the others hurried toward the front courtyard in pursuit. They were currently beside the well in the rear courtyard, while the window was in the row of rooms behind the ancestral hall!
"Don't run!"
"Stop right there!!"
However...
By the time Ye Qianfan and Shen Lang rushed out...
The man had already slipped into the woods outside the ancestral hall with practiced ease and vanished!
The two of them caught only a glimpse of his back. Finding a villager who knew the terrain in these unfamiliar woods would be impossible.
So Ye Qianfan decisively gave up. "Brother Shen Lang, stop chasing!"
"He probably knows something. Are we just going to let him go?"
Shen Lang was reluctant to give up.
"We won't catch him," Ye Qianfan said. "He knows this area much better than we do. If we rashly follow him into the woods, who knows what dangers we'll run into!"
"Our main task right now is to find the Old Almanac and clues. Let's not grow extra branches on this stem!"
"Besides..."
Ye Qianfan paused, the corners of his mouth curling slightly. "I already know who he is!"
"Who is he?"
Shen Lang looked at Ye Qianfan in astonishment.
After all, they had only caught a glimpse of the man's back. Never mind seeing his face clearly—they hadn't even been able to make out his