Chapter 75 My Ajiu picked up a treasure
“Brother Xiong Xiong——! Brother Xiong Xiong——!”
"I found it! I found the home of the stinky smell!"
"Bang--!"
The door of the study was pushed open by her small body.
Xiao Yu, who was handling official business, was startled by the sudden movement. He looked up suddenly, and the murderous intent that had just gathered in his eyes disappeared in an instant when he saw the figure rushing in like a small cannonball, turning into helplessness and a hint of pampering that he himself had not even noticed.
"Ajiu?"
Ajiu couldn't stop and crashed into his arms.
Xiao Yu subconsciously reached out to hug her, steadying her small body, but his brows immediately furrowed: "Why are you running so fast? What if you fall?"
Ah Jiu didn't care about all that. She raised her clenched fist in front of Xiao Yu as if she was presenting a treasure, and spread it out forcefully. Lying in her palm was the strange piece of wood covered with dirt and moss.
"Look! Brother Xiong Xiong! That's it!" she panted. "That's where the bad old man's bad smell comes from! I found it! Am I amazing?"
Xiao Yu's gaze fell on the piece of wood, and his eyes froze instantly.
The distorted human face and strange runes on it made him feel alarmed.
But he did not pick up the piece of wood immediately. Instead, he turned his attention to Ajiu's dirty little hand covered in mud.
"Hand." He ordered in a deep voice.
"Ah?" Jiu was stunned and didn't understand.
Xiao Yu's brows twisted into a knot in an instant. Without thinking, he took out his snow-white brocade handkerchief woven with the finest silk from his arms, which was worth a thousand gold coins. He grabbed her dirty little hand and wiped it bit by bit with great care.
His movements were gentle and slow.
"Are you scratched? Are you bitten by anything?" he asked in a low voice while wiping.
Ah Jiu felt the warmth of his fingertips and the soft touch of the handkerchief, and shrank his neck a little embarrassedly: "No, it's just a piece of broken wood, it won't bite."
Xiao Yu wiped her little hands clean, even picking out the mud from between her nails with his fingernails. He breathed a sigh of relief after confirming that there was no wound at all.
After doing all this, he carefully picked up the piece of wood with a corner of the brocade handkerchief and held it in front of his eyes to examine it carefully.
"Where did you find it?"
"It's right under that rockery! Hidden in a very secluded crevice!" Ah Jiu raised his little face and looked at him expectantly. "Brother Xiong Xiong, I found such an important thing. Does that count as a great achievement?"
"Okay." Xiao Yu nodded. Looking at her sparkling eyes, his heart softened. He couldn't help but stretch out his other hand and gently rubbed her little head. "Ajiu is very powerful, the most powerful in the world."
Ah Jiu was so overjoyed by the praise that she felt like she was floating in the air. She took advantage of the situation and tugged at Xiao Yu's sleeve, whispering, "Then...where's my reward?"
Xiao Yu looked at her money-grubber look, and a faint smile appeared on the corner of his mouth uncontrollably: "What reward do you want?"
"One... no, two roast chickens! And they have to be from Donglaishun! They have to be freshly baked, with crispy skin!" Jiu stretched out two fingers, his eyes full of the image of roast chicken.
"Okay, three." Xiao Yu answered without thinking.
The extra one was his compensation for almost scaring her just now.
Ah Jiu: “!!!”
She was so happy that she almost fainted.
At this moment, the guard's voice came from outside the door: "Your Highness, Censor Qian requests to see you."
"Let him go." Xiao Yu frowned instantly.
"Go and invite the Imperial Master over and tell him that if no one shows up within an incense stick of time, his observatory's funding for this month will be cut in half."
"Yes!" The guard took the order and left.
Not long after, the study door was pushed open again with a bang.
Chu Xuanyi rushed in like a gust of wind, his hair was messy and his clothes were a little askew, obviously he was pulled out of the quilt directly.
"Xiao Yu! Do you still have any humanity? You're disturbing my sleep in broad daylight! I stayed up in the dead of night yesterday researching that case! You..."
His complaints came to an abrupt end when he saw the piece of wood in Xiao Yu's hand.
The laziness and impatience on his face disappeared in an instant. He rushed to the desk in two steps and stared at the piece of wood.
"This thing...where did you get it from?"
Xiao Yu did not answer, but just glanced at Ajiu who was holding his arm and counting quietly, "One roasted chicken, two roasted chickens, three roasted chickens..."
The meaning is very clear: the hero of my family was found.
Chu Xuanyi understood instantly. He carefully took the block of wood from Xiao Yu's hand, looked at it over and over again, even put it under his nose to smell it, and then immediately took it away in disgust.
"Tsk, such a domineering Netherworld energy... Wait!" He seemed to have discovered something, turned the back of the wooden block towards himself, and carefully studied the runes on it that looked like insects crawling.
The study fell into silence for a moment.
Xiao Yu sat at his ease, one hand protecting Ah Jiu in his arms while the other hand tapped the table sporadically. Ah Jiu, on the other hand, was already immersed in the immense joy of having three roast chickens and began to decide whether to have the drumsticks or the wings.
After a long time, Chu Xuanyi raised his head, his face looked ugly as if he had been constipated for ten days or half a month.
He looked at Xiao Yu and shouted weakly, "It's no use. My master is going to die young. I've been working so hard on this little thing in your palace that my eyes are almost darker than a panda's. Your Highness, if you don't increase my salary, I'm really going to go out and sell divination on the street!"
Xiao Yu sat at his desk, pouring a glass of warm water for Jiu. He didn't even raise his eyelids when he heard this, and his voice was as cold as ever: "You have the key to the warehouse of the observatory."
"Tsk, Your Highness, this is boring." Chu Xuanyi sat down on the chair. "How can a gift personally given and one taken by oneself be the same? One is a gift of grace, the other is embezzlement. The nature is completely different. This national teacher is a man of style."
"Let's talk business." Xiao Yu handed the cup of water to Ajiu and motioned her to take a sip.
"Alright, alright, let's get down to business." Chu Xuanyi immediately put away his lazy look and turned serious. He held up the block of wood in his hand and said, "I need to take this thing back and study it carefully. The runes on it are very ancient, and I need to consult the secret files in the Forbidden Pavilion. But what I can confirm now is that the smell on this wood is not poison or spices, but more like a... marking."
"A spiritual imprint that can only be sensed by certain people or things. And our demolition worker... ahem, our lucky star, is that 'certain person.'"
He looked at Ajiu who was drinking water in small sips.
"So what?" Xiao Yu asked.
"So," Chu Xuanyi pointed at Ah Jiu and said in a low voice, "As long as Ah Jiu smells it, anyone among the hundreds of people in the mansion who has touched this piece of wood and has been contaminated with this smell will be found immediately!
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