When I got back to my place, the first thing I saw was Jiang Man: "So, did you find Uncle Qi's address?"

"Almost."

Jiang Man sighed and explained to me, "Tonight at dinner time, we went to the canteen to keep watch. We had already found Uncle Qi and followed him, but just as we were about to reach his house, drums suddenly sounded in the village, and then all the villagers sang and danced to welcome him. Uncle Qi joined them. At first, we just watched the excitement from the outside, but then curfew came, and we had no choice but to return to our lodgings early."

"As expected, someone has arrived."

Seeing that my guess was correct, I continued to ask, "How many people came from the village?"

"I don't know. I wanted to go closer to see clearly, but I was separated by the crowd. Some people from the village told me that this kind of welcoming ceremony can only be participated in by locals. We are not allowed to join, so I can only watch from a distance. There were too many people at the scene, and I couldn't see anything clearly."

Jiang Man paused for a moment: "However, judging from the frequency of the villagers' singing and dancing this afternoon, there should have been more than one group of people. If we look at the frequency of the drumbeats, it seems that there were four waves of people."

I was a little surprised to hear that so many people had come to Ping'an Village in one afternoon, but I quickly came to my senses: "Those who are able to enter Fengmen Village are all experts. If they didn't have some skills, they wouldn't be able to come looking for the Miao Jiang Immortal Palace. It's been a while since the news of Fengmen Village was sent out, so it's not impossible that some people went to the city together."

Jiang Man didn't dwell on the issue and changed the subject, saying, "Although we haven't found the exact location of Uncle Qi's house, we've got a general idea. His residence isn't far from here. Should we go and take a look?"

Considering that other teams had already arrived in the village, I quickly made a decision: "This matter should be dealt with sooner rather than later. The rules here in Ping'an Village are rather strange. If we continue to wait, and other teams break the taboos, causing everyone to be kicked out, then it would be a loss."

After discussing it, the group left their lodgings under the cover of night.

Ping'an Village has a curfew. When we went out, the whole village was silent and there wasn't a single pedestrian on the street.

Jiang Man had already planned the route during the day. After leading us downstairs, she didn't take the main road but circled around the wall. Then, she took a small path and entered an alley. Pointing inside, she said, "When we were following Uncle Qi before, he entered this alley, but when he was halfway there, we heard drums outside. So, we can rule out the three courtyards outside as his home. Only two courtyards remain inside, but we don't know which one he lives in."

The monkey offered an idea: "Young Master Duan, why don't we investigate together? We have enough manpower to split the two sides, and together we can take control of the other group besides Uncle Qi!"

"No, we're looking for Uncle Seven only to learn about Ping'an Village, not to offend it."

I rejected Monkey's suggestion: "We're questioning Uncle Seven because we have evidence of his crimes that we can use to blackmail him! But if we arrest other people, why should they keep our secrets?"

The monkey scratched his head: "What can we do then? Are we supposed to stay here all night until that Uncle Seven comes out?"

"Let's check it first."

I didn't answer the monkey's question. Instead, I walked straight into the depths of the yard and squatted down at the entrance to examine it.

Three minutes later, I pointed to one of the courtyard gates and said, "Go into this courtyard!"

Jiang Man glanced at the doorway: "How did you know that Uncle Qi would live here?"

"Speculation."

I pointed to the threshold: "When we met Uncle Qi before, Miao Xiaoxian said that he was in charge of growing grain. There is some grain scattered in the crack of this door, and there are also fine animal hairs on the door frame. It is very likely that he left them when he brought back prey."

"Isn't it a bit arbitrary to draw conclusions based solely on these clues?"

Lin Que sniffed: "Many families in this village keep dogs. Although there are no barking dogs in this yard, the hair might just be left by someone else's dog that ran into the yard?"

I did not deny it: "Of course, the possibility you mentioned exists. We can't go into the courtyard now. Based on the situation outside, we can only speculate that it is more likely that Uncle Qi lives in this courtyard."

The monkey rolled its eyes: "After all this talk, isn't this just the same old routine? If this courtyard isn't the right one, we'll have to detain the person and investigate another courtyard."

"The meaning is similar, but this reduces our risk rather than blindly testing the waters."

I lowered my voice and said, "After we go in, Manjing will stay at the door to keep watch. The rest of you will come with me to catch the person. Remember to keep a low profile. These wooden houses aren't soundproof, so don't disturb the others."

Seeing everyone nod, I drew my dagger and began to pick the lock.

The gates of Ping'an Village all used old-fashioned wooden bolt locks. By inserting a dagger through the crack in the door, the bolt was quickly moved to the side.

Using this method, we quickly made our way from the courtyard into the wooden building inside, and everyone began to search separately.

Uncle Qi's wooden house has two floors. Based on my intuition, I quickly made my way to the room on the left side of the first floor and turned on my flashlight as I lifted the curtain.

The room was empty under the light.

After failing to find the room I was looking for, I went to the room next door.

As soon as I entered, I smelled a bloody odor. Shining my flashlight around, I saw a large table in the room with bundles of fur on it.

As soon as I saw the things on the table, I knew I had come to the right place; this must be Uncle Qi's house.

Since he put his workspace downstairs, it means my guess was wrong; their bedroom should be upstairs.

With that thought in mind, I quickly turned around and walked towards the stairwell.

As soon as I stepped outside, Monkey came downstairs: "Young Master Duan, we found a woman upstairs, but not that so-called Seventh Uncle."

"Let's go up and take a look."

After discovering the fur in the room, I concluded that this was Uncle Qi's residence. I felt that since Uncle Qi wasn't there, he was probably out hunting again. So I quickly followed the monkey upstairs and entered the room they had mentioned.

At this moment, there was only a middle-aged woman in the room, and Lin Que was holding a knife to her neck.

"Put the knife down."

Seeing Lin Que's actions, I waved to him and then smiled at the woman: "Seventh Aunt, we apologize for our late-night visit, but please don't be afraid. We just want to talk to Seventh Uncle about something, and we have absolutely no ill intentions."