In the willow grove, I saw a monkey walking towards a figure in the woods, and I quickly stopped him: "Monkey, don't move! Manjing, look at what that person is wearing?"

Manjing squinted and looked at it: "Hemp clothes, just like what the people of Ping'an Village wear!"

Seeing that the three of them were seeing the same thing, I said, "We're all seeing the same thing, so it shouldn't be a hallucination. And look at that person, doesn't he look like Uncle Qi we saw during the day?"

Now that you mention it, it does seem somewhat similar.

The monkey stared at the people in the distance and muttered, "What's that old guy doing here? Is he waiting for the people he's trading with, and has fallen asleep leaning against a tree?"

I didn't know how to answer the monkey's question, so I drew my pistol and carefully moved over.

Upon closer inspection, the person near the tree was indeed Uncle Qi.

At this moment, his eyes were slightly closed, and he looked as if he were asleep.

Seeing Uncle Qi's appearance, I spoke softly, "Uncle Qi, what are you doing here so late at night?"

Seeing that Uncle Seven didn't respond, the monkey reached out and nudged him: "Hey, we know about your business, so let's stop pretending to be silent!"

"Gulp!"

Uncle Qi was pushed by the monkey and his body slammed to the ground.

Seeing Uncle Qi's actions, I knew something was wrong. I quickly squatted down, checked his breath with my hand, and turned to look at the monkey: "He's gone!"

"Dead?"

The monkey frowned and gently pressed Uncle Seven's hand: "The skin is still elastic, but it's cold. Jiang Man told me that after a person dies, they lose their temperature, but their skin is still elastic. It should be between two and three hours!"

Seeing that Uncle Qi was dead, Manjing drew his knife and stood beside me, his eyes warily scanning the surroundings.

"Help, take his clothes off!"

As I was talking to the monkey, I started reaching out to pull off Uncle Seven's clothes.

His coarse cloth clothes were very loose, and it didn't take much effort for Monkey and me to strip Uncle Seven down to only his underwear.

Years of working in the forest have made Uncle Qi's muscles bulge and he is particularly strong.

I turned him over and carefully examined him from head to toe.

There wasn't even a bruise, let alone a scar.

The monkey glanced between Uncle Seven's fingers and shook his head as well: "There's no dirt or skin tissue left, which means he probably didn't fight anyone before he died!"

"His skin color was normal, there was no swelling or bruising, and his expression was not ferocious, so he probably didn't die from poisoning."

Looking at Uncle Qi lying face up on the ground, I was at a loss for words: "How did he die? Was it a sudden illness, like a heart attack or a stroke?"

"I think it's unlikely. If he really died of illness, how could he have no expression at all? Logically speaking, if we are not feeling well, we would sit or lie down. How could we just stand there and wait to die?"

The monkey shook his head: "Young Master Duan, his wife said that Seventh Uncle left the village to make a deal with those people. Do you think it's possible that after those people got the information, they killed Seventh Uncle to cover it up so they wouldn't pay or would leak the information?"

"It's unlikely they wouldn't pay. Who among the people who came from Fengmen Village would be short of a few hundred thousand?"

I thought about it for a moment: "If it's to silence them, that doesn't make sense either! The fact that Uncle Qi came here to meet with those people means that they knew it was a private deal. Their best course of action was to get the information and leave. If they killed someone, it would only alert Ping'an Village. So that possibility is hard to justify!"

"What if the information provided by Uncle Seven is particularly important?"

The monkey blinked: "The other party originally planned to pay for the information, but after contacting Uncle Seven, they realized that his secret was far too important. If their competitors found out, it would seriously hinder their plans. So these guys had a sudden idea to get rid of him and keep the secret forever hidden from Uncle Seven!"

According to Aunt Qi, everyone in Ping'an Village is wealthy, except for this couple. Therefore, the possibility of them bribing others is virtually zero. Killing one person would ensure the secret is completely kept, and it would also drive everyone else out of Ping'an Village, making them the ultimate winners. What do you think?

The monkey's words were reasonable and well-founded, but they also made me feel a sense of crisis: "If your guess is correct, we have already fallen behind in this confrontation, and it will be extremely difficult to investigate the matter of the Miao Jiang Xiang Gong in the future."

"There is a solution, though. How about we go back and tie up the clan chief?"

Monkey, driven by malice, said, "Once news of Seventh Uncle's disappearance spreads, Ping'an Village will definitely take action. Rather than that, we might as well strike first before they do anything, kidnap the Ping'an Village chief, and then we can get all the information we need!"

“Ping’an Village is not as simple as we think. Trying to capture the chieftain in a village with hundreds of people is a pipe dream.”

I glanced at Uncle Qi's body and thought for a moment: "Let's go back to the village first and ask Aunt Qi if there are any other ways to get the information we want. Time is of the essence. We must find out the information we want before we find Uncle Qi missing in the village!"

The monkey looked at Uncle Seven's corpse and asked, "What should we do with this corpse?"

"Leave it here, there's no time to deal with it."

After I finished speaking, I got up to leave, but as soon as I stood up, a flashlight beam shone on my face: "Who goes there?"

When I realized I had been discovered, I raised my pistol without hesitation.

Immediately afterward, the flashlight was moved away, and a woman's voice came: "Duan Shenxing?"

I turned on my flashlight and saw the person who had rushed over. A look of surprise flashed in my eyes as well: "Wei Shengnan?"

Qu Ruilin, standing next to Wei Shengnan, glanced at us, then at Uncle Qi's corpse, and his expression changed instantly: "Duan Shenxing, how ruthless you are! You chose to kill to silence witnesses just to investigate information! Are you trying to make us all pay with our lives?"

"You're the ones who were willing to spend a million to buy information from Uncle Seven?"

I realized what was happening and immediately explained, "You've misunderstood. What happened here has nothing to do with me. We came here to investigate clues about the Miao Jiang Immortal Palace, but people died as soon as we arrived!"

"That's right, you didn't see us commit the crime with your own eyes, so stop trying to pin the blame on us!"

When the monkey saw Song Laosan next to Qu Ruilin, his face was so gloomy it was almost dripping with water: "The corpse is right here, without a single scratch. Even if you want to frame us, you have to produce evidence, right?"