The Golden Hairpin by Cè Cè Qīng Hán

1 (1) : A Notoriety

Book I

1 (1) : A Notoriety

In the dark night, a rainstorm suddenly poured down. The mountains and forests far and near, the long and short rivers and canyons all lost their outline in the sudden rainstorm and gradually disappeared into invisibility.
The road ahead got more and more blurred. Outside the city of Chang’an, the lilacs planted along the mountain roads were also scattered by the torrential rain. Clusters of beautiful flowers were damaged in the torrential rain and degenerated into mud roads. Nobody could see them at night.

Huang Zixia trudged forward through the darkness of the mountain road. The sky blue oil paper umbrella in her hand broke into fragments in the storm. The raindrops cold as knife pierced through the broken surface of the umbrella and hit her cheek directly.
She just looked up, and without hesitation she left her umbrella on the road and walked on in the heavy rain. The cold rain fell on her body. The sky was dim in the dark night. Only the glimmer of raindrops occasionally reflected the dim scenery in front of her. The whole world was blurred.

At the corner of the mountain road stood a small pavilion. In this dynasty, there were ten li long pavilions and five li short pavilions. In such a dark night of wind and rain, there were three or four people in the pavilion, either leaning or sitting and talking to each other. Chang’an City had a curfew. The city gate would not opened until 5:00 a.m. every day. It was still early then. It must be the people waiting for the gate to open there.
Huang Zixia stepped on the muddy water. She was wearing the most common men’s blue short shirt. Several people inside turned their heads and saw that it was a delicate young man. One of the old men said to her, “Young man, do you want to go to the city as soon as possible? You’re all wet. Come by the fire. “

Huang Zixia looked at his warm smile in the light of the fire, tightened her wet lapel, said thanks and sat down by the fire, two feet away from him. She quietly helped him to add firewood.
Seeing that she only turned on the fire and did not speak, several people turned back and chatted with each other. They talked about all kinds of strange things in the north and south of the river, and the people were even babbling exuberantly as if they had witnessed it with their own eyes on the spot.

“Speaking of this miracle, have you heard of the strange case in Beijing recently?”

“Is the old man talking about ‘Four Directions’ Case?”

Someone immediately said, “Three people died within three months, and they were the people who lived in the South, West and North of the capital city respectively, and left the three bloody words” Le “,” I “and” Jing “. It’s strange and unpredictable, and the terror is extraordinary!”

“Yes, now it seems that the next murder case will be in the East of the city. So people in the East of the city are in a panic. It is said that all the people who can walk have already left. The East of the city is nearly empty.”

Huang Zixia with her pair of fair and clear hands holding the firewood branch, watched the flame without any flicker of emotion on her calm mien.
“Now the world is in a state of turmoil. Not only in the capital city, but also in Shuzhong recently there has been a murder case. Have you heard of it?” One of them, a middle-aged man, was obviously a traveling storyteller. He habitually held a piece of burning wood in his hand, and had a good conversation. “Have you heard much about the murder cases? But this case is the massacre of Huang Min’s family, the envoy of Sichuan! “

Huang Min.

This name as it suddenly entered the ears of Huang Zixia who had been quiet all the while trembled unconsciously; the fire in her hands splashed a bit of spark on the back of her hand sending a pang of sudden pain.