Clue
It was nearly evening when they entered the city. The city gates were not closed, but there were more guards on both sides than last time, and they were checking people more thoroughly. Long Tian and Yu Jin were stopped and asked a few questions as they passed by. Long Tian gave a false identity, claiming he had been registered at the city's academy, while Yu Jin stood behind him with his head down, saying nothing. The guard glanced at Long Tian, then at the road behind him, flipped through the register in his hand, and let them pass.
The main street was just as crowded with pedestrians and carriages as when he last visited, but the atmosphere was slightly different—the conversations at the corner tea stalls were a notch quieter than usual, and the notice board on the door had an extra layer of new paper, folded over the old notices. As Long Tian passed the notice board, he caught a glimpse of the Spirit Hall's emblem and some relatively fresh text on one of the papers. He didn't stop to look at it closely, but continued walking for a while before slowing down at the corner of a side street and glancing back at the title of the notice—just a few words: "Iron Guard Disciplinary Notice."
He had never been to Shen Mo's place before. But Shen Mo had mentioned it once; his lodging in the city was a small courtyard behind a secondhand bookstore. The shop wasn't on the main street, but deep in an alley in the south of the city. There was no sign at the door, only a smooth Shitou on the windowsill. Long Tian walked around the alley in the south of the city and saw the Shitou at the end of the third alley. The windowsill wasn't high, and the Shitou was indeed polished, its surface smoothed, like a patina formed by someone pressing their palm on the same spot for many years.
He stepped forward and knocked on the shop door. There was no response from inside. He knocked twice more, still no movement. He listened for a moment, and heard several very light footsteps approaching the door from the inside, but they stopped a few steps behind it. Long Tian didn't push the door open; he just stood outside for a moment, then spoke two words: "Long fish."
The footsteps inside the door paused for a few moments. Then the latch was pulled open. The door opened a crack, revealing an eye that glanced at Long Tian and Yu Jin before opening the door completely. A lean young man, wearing a faded old shirt, opened the door, carrying a scroll with curled edges. He stepped aside to let Long Tian and Yu Jin into the shop, then bolted the door again. Several rows of old books and scrolls were displayed on the shelves inside the shop, the air filled with the smell of old paper and ink, like the soft marks left on the spine of a book after it had been repeatedly turned over over a long period of time.
"Shen Mo came here three days ago." The young man placed the scroll he was holding on the table, his voice neither loud nor soft. "He didn't stay long, leaving only one thing behind." He turned around and pulled an old envelope from under the pile of scrolls on the table. The envelope was unsealed, and he handed it to him, rubbing the edges with his fingers. Long Tian took the envelope; inside was a piece of paper, with fewer words than any of the previous messages, only four characters, the strokes short and concise. "Old friend, Tan."
"Old friend, pool. "Long Tian put the paper away and stood in the middle of the shop, thinking for a while. "Old friend" could refer to Tang San, whom he had met during the Elite Tournament and could be considered an ally; it could also refer to Zhao Xiaopang and Chen Hao, who taught at the academy and could be considered old friends; "pool" refers to an abandoned pool in an old soul-refining field on the outskirts of the city. Shen Mo used the word "pool" instead of writing the place name directly, indicating that this message was not written for the recipient's convenience, but rather as if it was intended to be viewed during transmission.
He thanked the young man and left the shop with Yu Jin. It was completely dark. A few newly lit streetlights flickered in the twilight of the alley in the south of the city, their orange-yellow light spreading through the mist like pebbles submerged in water, gradually sinking into the underlying hue. Long Tian walked back to the main street along the alley, stood by the roadside for a while, and mentally reviewed the location of "Tan". The old Soul Refining Ground on the outskirts of the city had been abandoned for many years, surrounded by wasteland. A section of water was perpetually covered with duckweed and algae; the compass needle would deflect slightly in that area without affecting the normal use of the surrounding area, like a partition designed to separate the two sides.
He turned and walked westward. Yu Jin followed beside him, and the two passed through several increasingly narrow alleys before entering the wasteland on the outskirts of the city. The road surface changed from paved bricks to gravel and then to compacted soil. The moonlight shone on the ground, outlining the withered grass into long, thin shadows, like a torn flag lying flat on the ground, waiting to be pieced back together. Most of the old Soul Refining Ground's walls had collapsed, covered with vines and moss. The iron gate at the entrance was severely rusted, and the chains on the gate had broken into several pieces scattered on the ground.
Long Tian stepped into the courtyard through the gap in the collapsed wall. Moonlight shone on the water in the center of the courtyard, the surface covered with dense duckweed, obscuring the water's depth. He squatted by the water's edge and reached out to brush away the duckweed, revealing a dark reflection beneath the surface, unlike the reflection from a muddy bottom. He squatted on the bank and parted a larger area of duckweed, revealing a uniform grayish-white reflection beneath the surface—like a layer of shallow material that had been deposited on the bottom of the water and was now reflecting the moonlight.
Long Tian walked halfway around the water's edge. Near the south wall, there was a gap about a hand's width between the water and the base of the wall. A short rope end was sticking out at the bottom of the gap, as if tied to something. He squatted down and pulled on the rope end. The other end of the rope was tied to a small oilcloth bag, soaked with water but tightly bound. He untied the knot and took out a small roll of paper inside. Unrolling it, it revealed a hand-drawn sketch, a magnified section near the central marker on a nautical chart—with several thin lines added compared to the corresponding position on the silk map, as if someone had added a partial annotation based on additional information provided by Shen Mo. At the end of one of the thin lines were two characters: "Moon Tide".
Long Tian retied the oilcloth bundle and put it back in its place, tucking the sketch into his clothes. He squatted by the water for a while, mentally comparing the word "Moon Tide" with the earlier "Great Abyss." The sound of patrolling footsteps echoed from the direction of the distant city wall, moving at a steady pace along its base. Long Tian stood up, dusted off his hands, and walked back the way he came. He paused as he exited the Soul Refining Ground's courtyard, glancing back at the water. Moonlight shone on the duckweed, slowly covering the previously cleared areas of water, like an old page being gently turned back to its original position by the wind. He turned and walked out. Yu Jin was waiting for him outside the wall. The two continued westward along the path they had come from. The wind from the open fields of the suburbs whipped their clothes up and down, the constant wind flattening and loosening the wild grass behind them.