Lighting a restaurant at night was a science in itself. Not only were there shaded lamps and lamp stands on all four sides of every pillar and at various points along the walls, but each table also had a sheltered lamp at the corner nearest the windward side.
Those sheltered lamps, however, were designed for tables under normal conditions. Half the window beside Yi Shuyuan's table was open, and the semicircular wind guard could not keep out the wind and rain slashing through it. The lamp had long since gone out.
Yi Shuyuan simply pushed open the half of the window on his side as well. The movable supporting rod slid down to the bottom and propped it open, keeping the wind from blowing it shut.
Seeing Yi Shuyuan open the other half of the window instead, the man sitting opposite him laughed.
"Aren't you afraid the wind and rain will get into your food?"
"Keeping half the window shut doesn't do much anyway. I might as well open it all and enjoy the cool air."
With that, Yi Shuyuan returned to his seat.
"Whoosh, whoosh."
The soft sound of the wind seemed a little more distinct, but strangely, although opening the window should have let in more wind and rain, they seemed to have eased instead.
Or rather, they had grown gentler. The other tables were less affected too, while the summer night gained a pleasant coolness.
Only then did Yi Shuyuan properly study the man before him. He was around forty, dressed in a short jacket and long trousers, with a headcloth tied over his hair and no fringe. His clothes were blue-gray, his face square, and beneath his rather ordinary features was a beard about the length of a fingernail.
He had something of the wandering martial