The projection of the stars shattered into ice crystals in Mou Xuan's pupils. When the compass on his wrist beeped for the second time, three short and two long partridge whistles came from the direction of West Market.
Chen Yao hid her frozen red fingertips in her fox fur collar and watched as Mou Xuan cut his palm with a dagger, the blood dripping onto the compass and condensing into bronze mist.
"The time wrinkle can only last for half a quarter of an hour." Mou Xuan threw the bloody dagger to analyst Yu who rushed over, "Ask Lao Ren to keep a close eye on all the indigo cloth shops in the West City."
As thick fog spread over the city wall, Jiang's informant was overturning the rosewood table in the teahouse.
The tea spilled onto the newly-cut brocade robe of Ren the liaison man, and the celadon bowl broke into seventeen pieces on the brick floor.
"You used false information as bait?" Jiang's informant grabbed the front of the contact person Ren and brought him to the window. The cold wind of December blew in the ice. "Do you know that the kid from the Qi family almost chopped off my right hand to take credit for it?"
The contact person's lower back had already touched the carved window frame, and he could clearly see the poisoned scimitar in the secret pocket of Jiang's sleeve.
Two shadows flashed by at the alley entrance three meters away - it was Analyst Yu and the intelligence team, but they were obviously too late.
"Three hundred dan of old rice." Mou Xuan's voice, wrapped in bronze mist, drifted into the private room, and the frost on his black cloak fell off. "Plus two boxes of penicillin."
Informant Jiang suddenly tightened his fingers, causing the contact person to make a gurgling sound in his throat.
Mou Xuan stood beside the screen against the light. The compass on his wrist turned, creating tiny ripples in time and space. The tea stains on the table were flowing back into the pot at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"Leader Mou is willing to spend money." Jiang let go of the contact and let the contact collapse to the ground and cough violently, "but I want cash."
Mou Xuan took out a gilded box from his bosom, and twenty Swiss gold melon seeds carved with peony patterns jingled inside it.
Chen Yao appeared at the door at the right time, holding a mahogany medical box, and half of a sulfa medicine box was revealed from the velvet cloth.
"This is the deposit." Mou Xuan used his toes to pick up the overturned stool, and the golden melon seeds rolled down to the side of Jiang's informant's boots. "Three days later at midnight, I want to see the defense map of the Qi family's granary."
When Jiang the informant grabbed the golden melon seeds and rushed out, Chen Yao noticed that Mou Xuan's left hand was hanging down and making seals in his sleeve.
A light as thin as a spider's thread flashed in the bronze mist, and a golden melon seed quietly turned into powder - that was a time mark. As long as one carried this golden melon seed, Jiang's informant's whereabouts in the next three days would be reflected on the bronze compass.
"You've already calculated that he would ask for cash." Chen Yao gathered Mou Xuan's cloak, her fingertips brushing over the increasingly clear dark lines on his collarbone, "Using gold melon seeds as a tracker, aren't you afraid that the Qi family's treasure appraiser will see through it?"
Mou Xuan suddenly grabbed her wrist and pressed his calloused thumb on her beating pulse.
The copper bells on the eaves were ringing in the cold wind, the sound of carrier pigeons flapping their wings flew over the triple roofs, and countless golden dots floated in the bronze mist - those were three hundred fake gold melon seeds circulating in the West Market, and each one carried the mark of the time power.
"The real killer is the sulfa kit." The white mist he exhaled when he lowered his head dyed Chen Yao's eyelashes white, "There were three rabies vaccines mixed in that batch of penicillin. Agent He is allergic to dogs."
As the sound of the gong at midnight penetrated the thick fog, seven carrier pigeons flew into the City God Temple from different directions.
Envoy Qi squatted on the eaves and wiped his sword. The eagle pattern on the handle glowed an eerie indigo blue in the moonlight.
He certainly didn't notice that the gold melon seed powder on the soles of his boots was falling as he moved, forming a zigzag route on the roof tiles.
Mou Xuan stood on the top of the bell tower, watching the veins on the bronze compass becoming increasingly clear.
When the copper ring between the third pigeon's claws began to ooze indigo liquid, he suddenly pulled Chen Yao into his arms - the lotus fragrance in the girl's hair was shattered by the ripples of time and space, and the blue bricks under their feet were weathering and peeling off at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"It's going to be windy." Mou Xuan's voice mixed in with the howling north wind, and the compass on his wrist suddenly pointed due east.
At that moment, all the golden melon seeds bearing the mark of time exploded at the same time, and millions of fluorescent points appeared like an inverted galaxy, illuminating the entire city as if it were daytime.
Chen Yao squinted her eyes in the strong light and vaguely saw the shadow of Agent He reflected on the glazed tiles. The outline was clearly that of the young man who had pulled her out of the glacier seven years ago.
The needle of Mou Xuan's compass was vibrating wildly, and the position where the gilded pocket watch stopped coincided completely with the residence of agent He.
(At the final intersection of the star map coordinates, there was a clicking sound of mechanical gears turning under the ice - a secret deeper than the end of the world was awakening) (Continued from the previous article)
As the cheers from below the city wall surged up like a tide, Mou Xuan's compass needle was stuck in the third groove of the bronze pattern.
Chen Yao suddenly reached out and pressed the dark lines on his clavicle, and her warm palm just covered the newly spreading bronze branches.
"Your heartbeat quickened by three beats." The girl raised her face, the frost in her hair condensed into drops of water that fell on the tip of her nose. "What's hidden in Agent He's residence?"
Mou Xuan lowered his eyes and looked at the flickering torches on the city wall. The secret passages marked with fluorescent golden melon seeds were now being quickly taken over by the alliance members.
Analyst Yu ran in the rain holding an oil-paper umbrella. Every time the copper bell hanging on the umbrella ribs rang, it meant that an enemy checkpoint had been eliminated.
"Seven years ago, when the glacier first appeared..." Mou Xuan suddenly held Chen Yao's hand on her collarbone and led her fingertips across the dark veins. "He Yunshen was the first person with special abilities to discover the time rift."
The cheers suddenly rose, and twenty modified sleds dragged the spoils into the city gate.
Envoy Qi's sword was nailed to the flagpole on the city wall, and the eagle pattern on the hilt was oozing blood - the indigo glowed strangely in the moonlight, and it resonated with the bronze mist of Mou Xuan's compass.
Chen Yao suddenly tiptoed closer, her hair brushing across Mou Xuan's frosted eyelashes: "Did you deliberately let He Yunshen get the rabies vaccine?" Her fingertips unconsciously stroked the compass on his wrist, "Can the space-time fluctuations when he has an allergic attack activate..."
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