They tried deciphering the code using this method with many commonly available books, but all attempts failed.
Song Tingfeng and Zhu Guangxiao felt a bit discouraged. The former narrowed his eyes to slits and said, “Ningyan, you’ve suddenly become not so smart.”
It was noticeable that Xu Qi An’s mental acuity had significantly decreased, lacking his usual sharpness.
Xu Qi An raised his head, staring blankly at the crisscrossing beams, and said irritably, “When your friend was feeling unwell for those few days, wasn’t he also particularly listless?”
“Why, why are you bringing up my friend again…” Song Tingfeng felt a bit embarrassed.
“Heh,” Xu Qi An thought to himself, I haven’t slept for thirteen days, how fast do you expect my brain to work? That useless Susu can’t even help me stay alert, what’s the point of keeping her?
However, the advantage of such a spirit wasn’t in its core, but in its accompanying shell.
Keeping a spirit was like having a fish pond, much easier and more pleasant than painstakingly maintaining backup plans like Huaiqing, Lin’an, Fuxiang, and Caiwei.
When the time came, Pond Master Xu Qi An would wield his trident, and whichever fish he fancied, he’d swiftly and decisively spear.
“Why don’t we take a break?” Song Tingfeng suggested.
“Have the station attendant bring some sweets,” Xu Qi An said.
The best way to combat mental fatigue was to consume sugar. Sugar is the only energy the brain can utilize. Most people’s fondness for sweets isn’t because sweets taste particularly good, but because the brain compels the body to ingest sugar.
Xu Qi An needed sugar right now.
The station attendant prepared longan and egg drop sweet soup, raisin pastries, almond tofu pudding… all sweet.
Xu Qi An, the shortest among them, chose the longan and egg drop sweet soup, pushing the almond tofu pudding towards Squinty Eyes. Song Tingfeng immediately perked up, smiling, “Ningyan, how did you know I like sweet tofu pudding?”
Because you look like a heretic… Xu Qi An smiled and said, “Because we’re brothers, right? Seeing you all teary-eyed, I thought some tofu pudding might sweeten your heart.”
Who’s teary-eyed? Song Tingfeng rolled his eyes, knowing Xu Qi An was alluding to Miss Susu’s matter.
Speaking of which, Miss Susu was truly marvelous, a rare girl who could match him for three hundred rounds… Song Tingfeng thought about the soul-stirring encounter in the teahouse’s private room earlier, feeling reinvigorated.
“You wouldn’t understand. You’re a playboy, I’m not anymore,” Song Tingfeng shook his head and sneered, “When you first joined the night watchmen, I advised you to marry Captain Lü Qing, but you hemmed and hawed, refusing. Then you went and got together with Fuxiang. I knew right then you were one of us. If Captain Lü had married you, it would’ve been like a beautiful flower stuck in cow dung.”
Xu Qi An’s mind flashed to Lü Qing’s valiant and heroic image. He said irritably, “Although Captain Lü isn’t as pretty as Fuxiang, calling her cow dung is going too far.”
“I didn’t say she was cow dung, I was talking about you.”
“Then why did you say a beautiful flower stuck in cow dung?”
“…”
After finishing the desserts, since Detective Xu Ningyan wasn’t in top form, Song Tingfeng took the initiative to shoulder the burden of deduction. He cleared his throat:
“Let’s put ourselves in Zhou Min’s shoes. If I were him, I’d hide the codebook somewhere the inspection team could find at any time, but wouldn’t attract attention.”
“Hmm!” Xu Qi An nodded.
“We’ve already checked Zhou Min’s quarters, there were no hidden compartments or suspicious items. We’ve also compared these books he left behind just now,” Zhu Guangxiao said.
Song Tingfeng thought for a moment, stroking his chin, “… Maybe, it’s not necessarily a book? Zhou Min was meticulous, he could probably think of anything we could. Let’s try a different approach. Could it be something that has writing on it, but isn’t a book? Ningyan, do you think that’s possible?”
“Very good, Tingfeng. Your intelligence has successfully caught my attention. You’re a genius wasted on brothel women,” Xu Qi An praised, then asked, “So what do you think it could be? It’s not a book, but it’s among Zhou Min’s belongings. And it needs to have considerable thickness…”
Xu Qi An suddenly paused.
“Is it an almanac?!” Song Tingfeng was the first to shout out.
The diligent and honest Zhu Guangxiao accurately found a thick almanac among the belongings: “Is it this?”
“That’s it!” Xu Qi An exhaled the stale air from his lungs, his eyes brimming with excitement.
It was a book, yet not a book. It was eye-catching, yet ordinary. Based on their analysis and speculation about Zhou Min’s character over this period, Xu Qi An was highly confident that this was Zhou Min’s style.
The three eagerly opened the almanac, starting from the first character, following the clues to count to the 162nd character: Sun!
The “Sun” of the Yimao day.
Then the 347th character, the 4th character, the 1st character, the 2nd character.
Combined: Mo Sun Light Ding Yi Wu!
This was wrong.
Next, they tried the second method, using page numbers instead of character counts.
If using page numbers, then each number would correspond to a certain day in the calendar. The combination was as follows:
Mo, April 6th, January 15th, January 29th, January 25th, January 26th.
“Damn, wrong again,” Xu Qi An threw the almanac aside, cursing, “This approach is wrong, let’s start over.”
“Perhaps we should first decipher the character ‘Mo’ since it’s the only character and it’s at the beginning,” Zhu Guangxiao offered his idea.
The significance of being at the beginning was very important.
Xu Qi An pinched his brow, “Do you have any ideas on how?”
Zhu Guangxiao shook his head.
Xu Qi An asked again, “Does the character ‘Mo’ have any special meaning in our office?”
Song Tingfeng pondered, “The Inspector and Golden Gong Jiang have already studied the code. If ‘Mo’ pointed to some code within the office, Mr. Jiang and the Inspector should have discovered it.”
“What could the Inspector discover? He’s only good at guessing word puzzles,” Xu Qi An scoffed, but the next moment, he froze.
A spark of inspiration flashed through his exhausted mind like lightning.
He remembered a professor of criminal psychology from his time at the police academy who once said that a person’s behavior is closely related to their habits.
When analyzing and profiling a target, the first step is to collect as much information as possible about the person and understand their habits.
Even the most cunning criminals have behavioral patterns that can be traced, and those are their habits.
What was Zhou Min’s habit?
Word puzzles!
Yang Yingying mentioned that Zhou Min liked to play word puzzles with her while drinking… So, when Zhou Min was thinking about how to hide evidence and leave clues, he would habitually lean towards word puzzles… From this, it could be deduced that the single character among the two sets of codes was also a word puzzle. Xu Qi An’s thoughts became clearer and clearer.
Song Tingfeng and Zhu Guangxiao exchanged glances, tacitly maintaining silence. In that instant, Xu Ningyan’s state had returned, as wise and focused as when he was investigating the Sangbo case.
Mo, when broken down, becomes “black” and “dog”… Xu Qi An pinched his brow while asking, “I remember a colleague who went to Huangbo Street mentioned it was a dog market?”
Song Tingfeng made an affirmative sound: “It’s a dog market, what about it?”
Xu Qi An said, “The character ‘Mo’ broken down is ‘black’ and ‘dog’, and the information about Huangbo Street was a clue Zhou Min left in the previous word puzzle game. I think we can make a connection now.”
“You think the code points to the dog market?” Song Tingfeng furrowed his brow, “Then what does this ‘black’ represent? Isn’t it too arbitrary to judge that the code points to the dog market based on just the ‘dog’ character?”
“I have an idea,” Xu Qi An didn’t finish, but went out to call for a station attendant.
“What can I do for you, sirs?” the attendant asked.
“How much do you know about Huangbo Street?” Xu Qi An inquired.
“Ah, Huangbo Street, that place is quite chaotic. It’s quiet during the day, but at night, it’s a mixed bag. All sorts of people are there – thieves, wandering martial artists, even bandits from outside come to that street,” the attendant replied.
Is it dog meat they’re selling there, or something else… Xu Qi An pondered to himself, then asked, “Bandits and wandering martial artists wouldn’t go there just for a taste of dog meat, would they?”
“Of course not. Huangbo Street sells dog meat on the surface, but it’s a black market. They sell things that can’t be seen in the light of day, conducting shady deals,” the attendant said.
“Have you been to the black market?” Xu Qi An asked.
The attendant immediately looked ashamed, stammering, “I’ve been to buy dog meat.”
Why make such an embarrassed expression as if caught in the act of pleasuring yourself when just buying dog meat… Xu Qi An frowned and said, “Speak plainly.”
The attendant said in a low voice, “I visited a private prostitute at stall Xin 6. That’s what ‘buying dog meat’ means.”
Too young, so shy about visiting a prostitute… The three men shook their heads and sighed simultaneously.
“Xin 6?” Xu Qi An asked.
“The black market stalls are named after the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches,” the young attendant said, his face flushed red, feeling as if he was being publicly executed.
Xu Qi An nodded, “I see. You can go now.”
After the attendant closed the door and left, listening to the footsteps gradually fading away, Xu Qi An shrugged, “The situation is very clear now. ‘Black dog’ refers to this black market that hangs up dog meat as a cover.”
As for why White Emperor City would have such a place, conducting shady deals right under the noses of the officials, it wasn’t surprising.
Even the most virtuous city in the world had many black markets.
Huangbo Street wasn’t far from the post station, but it belonged to the outer city and had no curfew at night.
“What do the other codes mean?” Song Tingfeng asked himself and answered, “It should tell us who to find in the black market, or how to find them.”
“The answer is in the almanac,” Xu Qi An said with certainty.
“We’ve already checked that,” Zhu Guangxiao looked at him.
“The almanac idea isn’t wrong, but how could Zhou Min leave such crucial clues in his belongings?” Xu Qi An said, “It’s an almanac from a previous year, not this year’s.”
“Which year?” Zhu Guangxiao asked in a deep voice.
“Guangxiao, today you’re not as clever as Tingfeng. There are so many previous years, Great Feng has been established for 600 years, trying to find the correct almanac would be like finding a needle in a haystack. Zhou Min isn’t that stupid. Since it’s not this year’s almanac, I guess that almanac has some unusual significance for him. Of course, the almanac itself wouldn’t have any special meaning, but the year might, like his birth year and month, or his wedding day. If I’m not mistaken, it should be the almanac from fourteen years ago. Because that’s when Zhou Min was first appointed to Yunzhou.”
The post station didn’t have a fourteen-year-old almanac either, only government offices and bookstores would keep such old ones. To maintain a low profile, Song Tingfeng didn’t go to the government office, but to a bookstore instead.
After about the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, he returned on horseback with the old almanac.
Xu Qi An found paper and brush, spread them out on the table, and thinking his handwriting wasn’t presentable, he pushed Zhu Guangxiao forward to act as the scribe.
They used the previous method, adopting the “which character” approach to decode, but found it still didn’t work. The transcribed characters made no sense.
Then they tried the “page number method”. Page 162 was May 12th, auspicious for opening markets, weddings, moving into new homes, and traveling.
Inauspicious for: praying for blessings, opening warehouses, digging wells.
“Opening markets!” Xu Qi An caught the key information, “It should mean we go to the black market after it opens at night.”
His interpretation was agreed upon by Song Tingfeng.
Then came the second set of codes: 347 4 1 2.
Xu Qi An turned to page 347, the date on this page was January 15th. He glanced at the almanac for that day and suddenly understood, his mind clearing up. He said:
“I get it now!
“162 and 347 refer to page numbers, and 4, 1, and 2 refer to character counts. Tingfeng, look, what are the 4th, 1st, and 2nd characters on this page when put together?”
Song Tingfeng squinted and read, “Ding 15…”
Recalling the information from the station attendant earlier, he blurted out, “Black market stall, Ding 15?”
The puzzle was finally solved…
Xu Qi An and Song Tingfeng felt relieved, leaning back in their chairs and letting out a long breath.
Zhu Guangxiao also put down his brush, feeling relaxed all over.
Xu Qi An walked to the table, took a close look, and said with a surprised expression, “Guangxiao, your handwriting is so ugly.”
Song Tingfeng rushed over to join in, shouting, “It’s unbearable to look at, unbearable…”
Zhu Guangxiao was unconvinced: “Is your handwriting any better?”
Song Tingfeng said arrogantly, “My calligraphy is no worse than a scholar’s. When I was young, I saved money on food to buy paper and ink to practice writing.”
Xu Qi An said, “When I was young, our family was poor. To practice writing, I used a brush dipped in water to practice in the courtyard for twenty years.”
Zhu Guangxiao looked at them suspiciously and handed over the brush, “Then write something for me to see.”
Xu Qi An and Song Tingfeng turned around in unison, arm in arm:
“Let’s go, back to rest. Calligraphy isn’t for showing off.”
“I agree.”
Watching the two leave, Zhu Guangxiao opened his mouth and then looked down at his calligraphy. He silently decided that from now on, he would also practice calligraphy diligently, not wanting to fall behind them in this small team.
Back in his room, Xu Qi An took off his shoes and sat on the bed to meditate, ensuring he would be in good condition when they went to the black market that night.
Perhaps because his brain was too exhausted, he couldn’t enter the meditative state for a long time. His thoughts scattered uncontrollably, difficult to focus.
…Calculating the time, Huaiqing and Lin’an should be receiving my letter soon… I hope that letter can turn Huaiqing’s anger into joy, although I don’t know what I did to offend her… That silly girl Biaobiao will be touched, she’s easier to flirt with than that innocent foodie Chu Caiwei…
As for whether the two princesses exchanged letters in private or if anyone else saw them, Xu Qi An deemed it impossible.
First, Huaiqing and Lin’an had a strained relationship, so there was no chance of them exchanging correspondence. Moreover, the letters he wrote contained some ambiguous sentiments, and young women in this era valued their reputations too highly to share such letters with others.
Second, both Huaiqing and Biao Biao were mature princesses, old enough to conceive and possessing the freedom and authority to send and receive letters. The emperor and the concubines wouldn’t inquire about their correspondence, and no one else would dare tamper with a princess’s letters.
The likelihood of him, a mere copper bell, having his ambiguous letters to the two princesses exposed was virtually nonexistent.
Gradually, Xu Qi An slipped into a meditative state, entering a realm of visualization.