Pulling Out Wig Brings Up Mud

It was afternoon.

Black Pine City, Kaiming's clinic.

A death notice had already been hung at the door:

"In everlasting memory of Mr. Wig Brown. The clinic will be closed for the next few days while his funeral is arranged."

The old wooden house looked even more dilapidated and lonely. Its interior was dim, and the low attic windows, like a pair of eyes, stared blankly and fixedly at the road, waiting for a certain figure to return.

It saw a great deal.

It saw a magic levitating carriage slowly come to a stop, and a woman and a man step out in succession.

The woman was mature, wearing a black hat and veil and a long robe. After opening the door and stepping out, she glanced up and down the road before signaling that the man could come out.

The man was young, around twenty, with silvery-white hair that might have reminded anyone who saw it of Wig Brown's. Its whiteness was not caused by old age, nor was it a symptom of illness.

He walked toward the wooden house and looked at the notice.

His gaze shifted, and the woman behind him to one side immediately spoke, as though she could see everything inside through the entrance hall:

"He's inside. He hasn't gone out."

The man then lifted the door knocker and knocked.

When the door opened, "Mr. Kaiming," his brow deeply furrowed, looked back and forth between the two.

"I'm Roman, Lord Miuan's third son. This is my eldest sister."

The young man smiled at him as he spoke. His introduction was quite simple, as though the person standing before him were not an outsider named "Kaiming," but an elder in the family whom he didn't know very well, yet who would certainly understand who he was.

"Come in."

"Mr. Kaiming" glanced at the woman in black. He found her jarring to look at and didn't dare let his gaze linger.

The door closed, and the inside of the wooden house seemed to become secluded at once, difficult for anyone outside to see into.

The young man named Roman frowned slightly, finding the smell inside unpleasant. He held his breath and fanned the air with his hand in disgust. "It smells musty. What wood has gone moldy?"

"One moment." The woman in black raised a hand and took a wind-element magic array core from her pocket. Gently lifting it, she suspended it behind the man's shoulder.

A swift wind that did not buffet the people inside quickly rushed in and out through the gaps around the door and the shutters.

It left the wooden house cool through and through.

"Have you come for the funeral?" Kaiming asked.

"Of course, Uncle Wig. I'm here on behalf of the family to attend your funeral. It's a matter of noble propriety." Roman smiled again. "Of course, there's one other matter."

Kaiming remained silent and asked no further questions. He had clearly already guessed why Roman had come.

"That sealed artifact has fulfilled its task in your hands. It's time for it to return to the family's embrace." Roman walked farther into the house, grinding his leather shoes against the wool carpet. He seemed to think the carpet was less clean than the soles of his shoes, or perhaps the house was so cramped that he had to take great care not to touch the walls as he walked. His movements were comical.

"What's wrong? Can't bear to part with it? Or, Uncle Wig, do you want to use it once or twice more? I don't think that would be allowed." Seeing that Kaiming hadn't answered, Roman asked casually.

"I'll give it to you after the funeral tomorrow," Kaiming said.

"A reasonable request. All right," Roman said. "A very reasonable request... Are you worried I'll run off without attending the funeral? Is that why you'll only give it to me afterward? Don't worry, I'm not that fond of playing around."

"Tonight I'll put the details of its use in order, and I need it close at hand. And after being used once, it's become somewhat agitated and needs to be calmed. You wouldn't want to take a dangerous 3-0771 back with you. Although it's only a level-three sealed artifact, its destructive power is no less than that of a magister," Kaiming said.

"I see."

Roman stepped closer, his smile broadening as he stared at Kaiming. "But Uncle Wig, you explained too much. You're being a little long-winded."

Kaiming fell silent and said nothing more.

Roman stared at him for a while longer, the two locked in a standoff.

In the end, Roman was the first to lose patience. He waved a hand, intending to leave.

"All right, tomorrow it is. Uncle Wig, remember that it was the family that let you keep it for so long. If not for the family, you would have been unable to stay in Black Pine City long ago. Don't forget the debt you owe the family."

"Of course." Kaiming's expression did not change as he obediently listened to the lecture from someone he was countless years older than.

Roman continued:

"Father asked me to pass on a message, Uncle Wig. Sorry to trouble you to listen."

"If not for the family, the 'Three Proposals to Safeguard the Mental Health of Magic Apprentices' would not have passed so quickly either."

"If not for the family's work within the Northern Plains Province education department, the original owner of your current body, this obscure mental physician, would not have obtained this position either."

"Everything you have now is, at its heart, a gift from the family. It's something no amount of gold coins could buy anyone else."

He seemed finally to have finished. Without caring whether Kaiming responded, he turned and walked out the door.

The woman in black followed behind him. She had remained almost entirely silent throughout.

Once outside, she spoke, seemingly unconcerned that Kaiming might overhear:

"It's not in the house."

Roman's expression did not change. He was still smiling.

"If it's not there, it's not there. We can't just lay hands on him and beat him up. That would be too undignified. We'll talk tomorrow."

The two left Kaiming's clinic and returned to the black magic carriage, soon disappearing at the end of the street.

The three-story wooden house stood quietly. No one knew that it was yearning for Xie Yu, eager to tell him everything it had seen and heard.

Pinewood Inn, ninth floor, room 06, Xie Yu's room.

"Kaiming is about to take a public post at Black Pine City Geomancy Academy?" Xie Yu frowned as he tried to recall.

He didn't seem to have heard about this.

But he remembered Kaiming saying that he had gained a great deal at the alumni gathering. Kaiming had explicitly said that he "hadn't come for nothing."

And throughout the banquet, the person Kaiming had spoken to most, and spent the longest time with, was Fry.

The few other conversations had merely been greetings; he probably hadn't discussed anything substantive.

Xie Yu put down the four books.

He walked back to the bed and picked up the walking stick leaning against the bedside table, asking to confirm:

"Do you remember Mr. Kaiming's conversation with Fry yesterday?"

[The loyal solid-wood walking stick (Affection 100) sensed tension in the air. Thinking you were finally going to make a move against the fake Kaiming, it excitedly told you everything it knew:]

[I remember, I remember! That guy said that all magic academies at city level and above must have a mental health inspector. Forest Academy and Mountain Rock Academy in Black Pine City both added the position. Mr. Kaiming was promised a place at Mountain Rock Academy, and then Fry didn't accept Mr. Kaiming's gift.]

Was that why Wig wanted to replace Kaiming?

Did Wig want to go to Mountain Rock Academy and become this so-called mental health inspector?

"The old man was in the forest ranger's cabin, hundreds of meters away. He could observe the banquet and even hear the secret conversations in its inner circle clearly?" Xie Yu was surprised by the old man's abilities.

[Sealed artifact 3-0771 (Faith 60) said:]

[No. The old bastard didn't do it on a whim, and I can't replace someone else's life anytime and anywhere. It takes a long period of preparation, recording the target's fate in advance. He started preparing for this a year or two ago. And he didn't learn the news by eavesdropping yesterday; he already knew about it two days ago.]

"He actually knew before Kaiming did." Xie Yu knitted his brows, immediately finding a direction for his suspicions:

"It could have been the Brown Family's doing... involving Fry, and even the education department."