Banquet 1.2
As the auction entered its second half, the atmosphere subtly shifted.
Whenever Jiang Zhaoyan raised his paddle, several guests would voluntarily put down their bidding paddles, and some would even raise their glasses from afar, smiling and saying in German, French, or Italian—
"Wishing Mr. Jiang and Mrs. Jiang a long and happy marriage."
Jiang Zhaoyan smiled, neither admitting nor denying, his slender fingers casually twirling the bidding paddle.
Fan Jinci stood beside him, his face indifferent, as if those ambiguous blessings had nothing to do with him.
"No explanation?" Fan Jinci glanced at him.
Jiang Zhaoyan chuckled, his voice low and deep: "Explain what? Say we're not that kind of relationship?" He tilted his head slightly, his breath brushing against Fan Jinci's earlobe. "But they seem more willing to believe that."
Fan Jinci withdrew his gaze expressionlessly, tapping his fingertip lightly on the auction catalog: "Whatever."
Lot 23 – an 18th-century enamel pocket watch with a line of small inscription engraved on the inside of the case back:
Time will tell who the real hunter is.
Jiang Zhaoyan's gaze lingered on that line of text for a moment, then he raised his sign: "500,000."
The room fell silent for a few seconds.
Suddenly, a white-haired Russian tycoon smiled, put down the sign, and said in heavily accented English, "Since it's what Mrs. Jiang likes, I won't compete for it."
Several Asian buyers nearby chimed in, with one even joking in Chinese, "Young Master Jiang has good taste; his wife and the pocket watch are a perfect match."
Fan Jinci: "..."
Jiang Zhaoyan chuckled softly, his fingers gently resting on Fan Jinci's lower back, his voice audible only to the two of them: "It seems the whole world thinks we're a perfect match."
Fan Jinci gave him a cold glance.
As the auction drew to a close, a waiter suddenly brought over a note.
Jiang Zhaoyan unfolded it and his eyes instantly turned cold.
The note read: "Young Master Jiang, the pocket watch you photographed contains something that might interest you—about 'M,' about Ryan, and also about... your 'Mrs. Jiang.'"
The signature is a simple line drawing of a silver eye.
Fan Jinci noticed his unusual behavior and turned to look at him: "What's wrong?"
Jiang Zhaoyan calmly folded the note and stuffed it into his suit pocket: "It's nothing, someone just wants to give us a 'wedding gift'."
At 9:17 p.m., the auction reached its climax.
The crystal chandelier suddenly went out, plunging the entire venue into darkness. A commotion erupted in the crowd; some gasped, others frantically searched for their phones to light their way.
Jiang Zhaoyan almost instinctively reached out and grabbed Fan Jinci's wrist, pulling him behind him—
The next second, he felt cold metal pressed against his lower back.
"Don't move." Fan Jinci's voice was frighteningly calm. "There's someone two meters behind you."
Jiang Zhaoyan was taken aback, then chuckled softly: "...It seems I was overthinking it."
In the darkness, he could feel that Fan Jinci's breathing was steady and normal, and his hand holding the gun did not tremble at all.
The moment the emergency lights came on, screams pierced the venue.
On the auction stage, the organizer, Richard Kraus, slumped in his chair with an antique scalpel stuck in his chest—the very same scalpel from the set that the mysterious man had previously bought and given to Fan Jinci.
His throat was precisely slit, and his blood soaked the auction catalog, spreading a dark red stain on the page for "18th Century Surgical Instrument Sets".
Jiang Zhaoyan narrowed his eyes, his gaze sweeping across the venue—
The man in the silver mask disappeared.
Despite the security personnel's attempts to stop him, Fan Jinci put on gloves and walked toward the body.
“The time of death was no more than three minutes.” He lightly lifted the victim’s chin with his fingertips. “The cut was at a 15-degree angle. The murderer was holding a knife in his left hand and was about 185cm tall.”
Jiang Zhaoyan, standing behind him, suddenly bent down and picked up a card from the ground:
"To true collectors: Death is the most perfect art."
The signature is still a silver eye.
Back in the hotel suite, Jiang Zhaoyan locked the door and pushed a glass of whiskey in front of Fan Jinci.
“It’s not for you,” he chuckled. “It’s for cleaning your gun.”
Fan Jinci glanced at him coldly, but still took the wine glass and began to disassemble his sidearm.
“You knew something bad would happen,” Fan Jinci suddenly said.
Jiang Zhaoyan loosened his tie, his smile not reaching his eyes: "All I know is that someone really wants us to accept that 'gift'."
He opened the hidden compartment of his pocket watch and took out a yellowed photograph—
The photo shows two boys standing at the entrance of a laboratory. One has cold and aloof gray-blue eyes, while the other has a smile in his phoenix eyes, exuding nobility and arrogance.
The date written on the back is: July 15, 1993.
At 1:23 a.m., Fan Jinzi stood before the floor-to-ceiling window, the cigarette between his fingers flickering in the darkness. Outside, Vienna lay in the stillness of the night, the distant church spires gleaming coldly in the moonlight.
The case wasn't under their jurisdiction—the organizer was Austrian, and the local police politely but firmly asked them to leave the scene. Jiang Zhaoyan didn't seem to care much and took him directly back to his private villa in the suburbs.
The phone screen lit up, and a video call request from the criminal investigation team popped up.
Yu Yan's face filled the screen first, and in the background, Wen Lin's loud shouts could be heard: "Brother Fan! Brother Jiang! Are you guys alright?!"
Before Fan Jinci could speak, Jiang Zhaoyan had already leaned halfway out from behind him, casually draped his arm over his shoulder, and chuckled at the screen: "What, worried that I won't take good care of your family's forensic doctor?"
Yu Yan's eyes instantly turned cold: "Take your hand away."
Li Weimian's voice came from the side, as calm as ever: "The cut on the corpse's throat is very similar to Chen Haisheng's method in the 'Fisherman Case,' but more precise." Situ Jin silently held up an electronic report: "I detected Q-7 toxin metabolites in Richard's blood. He must have been exposed to it for a long time before his death..."
The video suddenly froze, and Jiang Zhaoyan's fingertip "accidentally" pressed the network switching button.
"The signal is bad." He hung up the call without batting an eye, his nose almost brushing against Fan Jinci's ear as he looked down. "Want to go to the terrace for a smoke? The ashtray is over there."
Fan Jinci turned away to avoid his breath and said coldly, "No need."
.
Fan Jinci had just finished showering, his hair still dripping wet. He opened the bathroom door while drying his hair, only to find Jiang Zhaoyan leaning against his bedside, flipping through a German medical journal. "There's no water in my bedroom bathroom," Jiang Zhaoyan said, looking up with a smile that showed no apology.
Fan Jinci's gaze swept over his half-wet black hair and obviously freshly changed bathrobe, his voice indifferent: "You can go downstairs to shower."
“It’s too far.” Jiang Zhaoyan closed the magazine, her gaze falling on the undried water stains on his collarbone. “And it’s cold.”
A brief silence fell over the room, broken only by the soft sound of water droplets falling from the ends of hair onto the carpet.
Finally, Fan Jinci turned and walked to the wardrobe, tossing him a dry towel: "Ten minutes."
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