February 18

A few days later when the trees still shed their leaves and the night turned chillier, a man was sitting atop a strong big branch of a tree. There was a white wined jar in his hands with the carving of great decorative vines. The street was shaved of its people and occasionally, only a few scrubs here and there rustled along with the wind.

Yet, the midnight eyes of the man turned, like it could hear what the ears couldn't, to the invisible noise of boots padding and imprinting the autumn dirt. A big red nose and squinting eyes appeared out of the vagueness of the shadow towards the tree. When he spoke, his adam apple bobbed anxiously, "There's a job. The pay is high but you have to meet the client directly."

"Why?" His tone was almost mocking, slightly angry at the messenger as well for not making it clear that he was to not reveal himself before any of his clients.

"That, I do not know. He is a rich client. You must go."

"Rich?" When had the town had any rich people since the last time?

"He will give a hundred gold leaves if you just meet him. I couldn't see his face because it was behind his veil. Will you go?"

The man drank his wine silently, and in that silence, his eyes glinted as if he had a dangerous thought.

The guy with his big nose urged feeling colder by any minute, "It has been a while. Your pouch will fly in emptiness soon. He waits for you at the great house of Tian."

"It will continue to be even if I go."

This, the messenger did not know how to comprehend and the shadow had lept quietly onto the roofs nearby.

-

When he arrived and stood in the courtyard, he only looked to the front door of the abandoned main room of the great house. His midnight rope fluttered calmly and his lime-green sword flashed like a giant firefly. Someone finally stepped out of one of the rotten pillars as he opened his mouth, "Satin clothes would you still wear when you hid your thin face."

The client snorted noiselessly as he took off the bamboo hat with a black veil dangling in front like that of a dark curtain. "Ignorant as you still sound when you assassinate and speak of justice."

"You're a man of high status, truly, General Gu because you call my 'purging off evils' as 'assassination' so loosely."

When Gu Changming heard this, he was strangely still surprised that the man had come to know his identity just as he also had. "Evils, you say? What has made you the judge? Perhaps your sickness in the head? Do not pretend you call them 'clients' collecting fee in your removal of evil beings."

Wan Mingyue did not move but his face was dark against the shadow of the moon. He looked down at the ground for a brief moment and what came out of his mouth, Gu Changming was struck with, "You came for the Midnight Magnolia but here you are, busying with a petty criminal like me. Pardon me, have I been this important?"

"Both of you, I will catch. Lest you smear the earth rotten."

"You can't," He raised his head slowly. "Both of us, you can't catch."

Gu Changming took a heavy footstep forward. He felt his indignation rose like fire roasting dry woods. Ever since he had conversed with this guy, every part of him had been constantly poked at. However, his voice was cold and spicy, not loud at all, "May I compliment you for your high as the heaven of a confidence?"

"You have made a mistake. As far, it has already been the sixth murder," Wan Mingyue told all this with his hooded gaze and straight pale face. He was watching the way the other person's expression slowly was altered. "You came here for the fifth murder, the one that happened in January."

Gu Changming suddenly remembered the scroll he had fastened around his waist at the back. He sneaked a hand, not so sneakily, to feel for it and shockingly, it was still in its faithful position. As his breathing turned heavy, he squinted at the mysterious figure before him with his annoying calm, and collected face. "Speak now of how you acquire this information." He did not call him a spy because, this information, he had yet only told himself and only a bit to his cousin. There was only one answer. He-

"I have seen him," he stoked his sleeve and pulled at it when the wind blew. "The fifth victim."

As time continued to tick and the sign of deep midnight approached, General Gu stood inside his black and purple satin of thin clothing because the fire was him and he was the fire. At the moment, he was burning bright inside with a frame as dangerous as the color of his eyes. The air seemed to shift, its sick humidity of danger reeked the chilly air.

Of course, Wan Mingyue felt this. After all, he was a water-based element. Yet, he was not scared as he gazed at the burning coal of a human before him and spoke whatever he wished to speak without any regard to the other, "This is why you cannot catch him. You are always a step too late for a General. You have thousands working for you and your father but you cannot catch a murderer. You have even missed a clear sign of abnormality. You have come here to correct the mistake and yet, you are stuck with arguing like a child of your own importance and pride and the corruption of your system. Until the seventh victim stares dead at you in the eyes, will you realize how incompetent you are?"

Now, the fire in Gu Changming pounded at his door like an aggravated tenant. He had felt the impulse to slice his head while he was speaking of those ignorant words. But by the time he reached the part mentioning the seventh victim, did he feel a bucket of cold water poured all over his inside. His eyes, circled by red rims, flickered to the ground and he almost ground his teeth to the dust. It was not that he had forgotten to search for the missing victim, but he couldn't. After a few days spent searching the local court for information on family registrations, there was none that went by the name, Fu Long.

General Gu had not said a word in defense when the assassin lept out of the courtyard like a shooting star in his quiet but outspoken manner.

One thing he had left him with was many restless thoughts to mull about.

February 20

Two days passed by, Baiduu Inn still opened its door merrily like any other day. At a particular time of the clock, a tall and aloof customer moved his fine leather boots across the finely swept floor towards the table across the painting of a magnolia branch. Everything was the same. Not that he expected to be any different when it was just a few days ago. The young servant boy having recognized him, particularly because of his temperamental mannerism, decided to go and fetch a new set of tea.

Wan Mingyue was eating this time because he had come earlier than the last meeting, his usual pale and slim cheeks had small lumps of food that were barely visible. They stopped chewing when the midnight blue eyes saw their unexpected guest. "..."

"Tell me where Fu Long lives and I shall turn a blind eye on what happened at the inn."

It was quite long before the other spoke, in a calm tone, "What happened at the inn?"

Gu Changming shut his eyes but he shoved his annoyance back along with the bobbing movement of his adam apple. "Where does he live? I cannot find his name registered in the town book."

There was a tiny sound like a snort from across the table. When General Gu turned his head up to look, the aloof face was not touched or disturbed. Surprisingly, Wan Mingyue spoke at that moment, "Who told you his name is Fu Long?"

The question made him remember the night when the sixth murder was discovered. It was when he readying his horse and combing its white mane of a few sticky crumps of dirt, the horse he had a great liking to even dirtied his slender hands. Suddenly, there was a young disciple behind him sticking his arms to bow with great fear and respect like General Gu was the sect master.

 "General, General," he called like a worried mother hen. "This lowly disciple has a request to make. I have pondered over this matter time and time again and I have decided that this matter should no longer sit in my chest anymore lest another life is lost by my hesitation and stupidness. Will General Gu spare a small stick of your valuable time to hear this humble one out?"

"Speak."

"Last month, my fellow student disciple, surnamed Fu Long, has requested a trip to his hometown in Meijing, for,  his sick mother was predicted to die of chronic illness on her bed." He sighed loudly at once, seeming to finally get to his main concern, "He had sent a written letter of finishing his mother's burial and his expected arrival in the next few days not exceeding the first month. However, he has yet to return and there was no letter written back until now." Then his mouth opened and closed in great difficulty.

General Gu said it for him, "Very well, I shall look into it myself."

When he was about to leave on his horse, the young disciple wept, "General, please catch the murderer! If he came for my friend and my elders, it will soon come for me! I do not wish to die-"

He had ridden off then, hearing less and less of the weeping of one's self-interest but the words were hot in his mind like a furnace. He looked upon Wan Mingyue once he finished the story and the other man simply drank his tea and finished his meal. A young servant boy came to drop him a fresh set of tea in which he ignored. "Is there a reason for a fellow who was desperate to save his own life to lie about something like this?"

"He didn't lie. The victim was the liar."

It didn't take long to stomach this, "What is his real name?"

Wan Mingyue glanced at him with obvious eyes that said 'Why should I tell you?'. However, all his debate with himself was internal and he spoke at last, "Tan Xue. He was born out of wedlock to a servant."

"Wedlock or not, he doesn't need to change his name to enter a sect."

"It's not for the sect. He hated the name given by his mother. A son that would return to the sect as soon as his mother was buried, did it not strike to you that the child hated his parents?"

It all made sense now. But, how then? How then did Wan Mingyue know all this?

"Are you two acquainted?"

"I have knowledge of everyone in this town."

Gu Changming gulped his tea, silently grateful that he had something to warm his throat. "Then tell me this, how did you know he was the fifth victim? And, why haven't you checked upon his home or report this to the authority? Very well, that last question let me guess. It's none of your business. The first question, you have to answer unless you are the killer."

Wan Mingyue blinked unhurriedly, his face never changed as he spoke all this time as if it mattered not to him. "I found him dead before February."