Seeing that Zheng Miao and Yan Ruoyu hadn't come over for a long time, Granny Cui felt inexplicably uneasy and hurriedly asked Qin Chuan to go to the kitchen with them.
As soon as the two of them arrived at the door of the kitchen, they saw Zheng Miao who was unconscious on the ground. They hurriedly stepped forward to help her up. One held her shoulders, the other patted her cheek, and called softly: "Rou'er, wake up!"
After calling several times, Zheng Miao remained motionless and unresponsive. Qin Chuan became a little worried and stretched out his hand to feel her breath.
Granny Cui calmed down a little. She calmly observed Zheng Miao, and then asked Qin Chuan to hold her up. She stepped forward and pinched Zheng Miao's philtrum, and pricked several of Zheng Miao's acupuncture points with silver needles. Only then did Zheng Miao slowly wake up.
Seeing that his sister was awake, Qin Chuan shouted in surprise: "You're awake! You scared my brother!"
Zheng Miao looked at Qin Chuan and Granny Cui in confusion, and murmured: "What's going on? Why is Ruoyu missing... What just happened... Why is my mind so chaotic..."
After saying that, she shook her head, trying to recall what happened before she fell into coma.
However, no matter how hard she tried, she could only recall some fragmented scenes!
She looked at Qin Chuan and Granny Cui for help, and tremblingly shouted: "Man in black...sack...blood"
Qin Chuan and Granny Cui were both startled when they heard this, looked at each other, and then asked with concern: "Did you see Ruo Yu just now? Where did she go?"
Zheng Miao was stunned for a moment, thought for a while, shook her head, and said dejectedly: "I...I can't remember...I only remember a lot of blood on the ground..." After Zheng Miao finished speaking, she looked like she was still frightened.
"Blood?" Qin Chuan looked at the wet ground. There was no trace of blood at all. He couldn't help but feel confused. He and Granny Cui looked at each other. He was worried about irritating Zheng Miao, so he did not continue to ask.
The two of them helped Zheng Miao leave the kitchen and returned to the room where Ning'er lived.
Nangong Yue set up a simple temporary bed in the corner and said that he would accompany Ning'er in the past few days, allowing Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan to find the missing Yan Ruoyu with peace of mind.
Disappearances occurred one after another in Weiyuan Escort Bureau. Nangong Qin and Qin Hannian couldn't sit still either. The two old heroes discussed it and decided to use their personal connections to search the city for the whereabouts of Yan Ruoyu and the robbers.
The escorts in the escort agency also joined the search team, running around, some posted missing persons notices, some went to door to door to inquire, they were all busy.
However, since Yan Ruoyu disappeared, the group of robbers seemed to have vanished from the world, never to be seen again.
Su Qiqi and others went out with high hopes every day, only to return disappointed.
A few days later, someone reported to the escort office that he had seen a girl who looked very similar to the missing person notice at the gate of Yizhuang outside the city.
Su Qiqi hurriedly asked about the situation at that time, and the man described the scene in detail while recalling it. Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan were overjoyed after hearing this, and rode together towards Yizhuang outside the city.
Arriving at the gate of Yizhuang, Su Qiqi saw that the gate was closed, and there was only a hunchbacked old man sitting on a stone smoking a hookah. Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan hurriedly came forward to bow, and asked politely: "Old man, are you Liu Tuozi who looks after Yizhuang?"
Hearing this, the old man looked up at Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan, nodded noncommittally, and asked, "What do you want from me?"
"Old man, did you see a girl wearing a yellow dress last night?" Su Qiqi replied.
Liu Tuozi squinted his eyes and thought for a while, then nodded: "Yes, I saw such a girl...about the same age as you...with a red ribbon tied on her head..."
"That's right, that's right. Who was she with at the time? Where did she go?" Su Qiqi continued to ask with excitement on her face.
Liu Tuozi thought for a while and gestured: "With a one-eyed man... No, the girl seemed to be unconscious at the time. She was carried by the one-eyed man on horseback and headed north..."
"North?" Su Qiqi looked in the direction of Liu Tuozi's finger and asked doubtfully: "Where is that road going?"
Liu Tuozi was startled for a moment, shook his head and said: "It's hard to say. There are many forks on that road, which can go to Cangzhou Prefecture or Songjiang Prefecture... The old man was going to receive a guest who sent a body, so he didn't pay attention to them. When did they leave? I don’t know where they went…”
Su Qiqi knew that there was no point in asking any more, so she thanked Liu Tuozi and rode to the north with Qin Chuan.
Halfway through the ride, Su Qiqi asked Qin Chuan to dismount and walk together in order to observe possible traces or clues left on the road.
The two led their horses and searched along the road for a long time. Finally, at one of the forks in the road, they found a piece of yellow cloth hung by a branch.
Su Qiqi checked it carefully and determined that it was exactly the same as the fabric of the clothes Yan Ruoyu wore yesterday. The two of them walked a few steps further to the fork in the road and found another pearl hairpin on the side of the road.
Su Qiqi turned over the hairpins several times and said with certainty: "These are the hairpins that Wanrou, Ruoyu, I, myself, and I customized in Qibaozhai. Each one has the last word of our respective names engraved on it." ...Look, there is a word for rain here..." As he said that, he carefully handed the hairpin to Qin Chuan.
Qin Chuan took it, looked at it for a few times, and handed it back to Su Qiqi. Then he said: "It shouldn't be wrong. Should we pursue it further and have a look?"
Su Qiqi looked at the road ahead, nodded, and whispered: "Let's go! Find Ruoyu as soon as possible!"
The two rode forward for a while, but saw that the road was getting narrower and narrower, and not far away, a steep mountain peak came into view.
Su Qiqi reined in the reins and turned to remind Qin Chuan: "The road ahead may not be smooth, we must be careful..."
Qin Chuan nodded slightly when he heard this, and said with a smile: "It's okay, just a few thieves..." After that, he drew out the sword from his back and galloped towards the mountain peak.
Su Qiqi also patted the horse's back and followed closely.
Seeing that the two of them were about to reach the bottom of the mountain peak, a roaring sound suddenly sounded from the mountains and forests on both sides.
Both Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan keenly captured this subtle abnormal sound.
Su Qiqi held a few silver needles on her fingertips and looked intently at the strange movement in the forest.
Qin Chuan followed her closely, holding a long sword in his hand and watching the disturbance on both sides with vigilance.
"Boom--boom--boom!" Several long roars sounded out of thin air. Then, several rays of silver light flew towards where Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan were.
Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan did not dare to be careless, they concentrated their attention and waved their swords to sweep away all the hidden weapons.
After Su Qiqi knocked off the opponent's hidden weapon, he threw out all the silver needles in his hand.
After a while, screams were heard one after another in the forest. Several people wearing black shorts rolled down the roadside, wailing and struggling on the ground!
Qin Chuan watched for a while, and saw that the mountain forest suddenly fell silent, so he dismounted, walked to one of the men in black, put the sword on his neck, and shouted sternly: "Be honest, tell me who you are. ?Why did you want to ambush us?”
The man looked at Qin Chuan's stern expression with fear in his eyes. After hesitating for a moment, he begged for mercy: "Hero, spare your life! We are bounty hunters in Cangzhou. We usually help the government hunt down fugitives, and occasionally do some private work..."
"Oh? Then who hired you to assassinate us?" Qin Chuan increased his strength and pressed the sword edge against the skin of the man in black.
The man in black was so frightened that he trembled all over and begged again and again: "Hero, spare your life! I say, I say! They are some merchants from Beiyi! They paid a lot of money to let us attack the Weiyuan Escort Agency!"
"Beiyi merchants? Let me ask you again, did they say what the purpose of doing this was? Is it a sneak attack on everyone in our escort agency or did they have a clear goal?"
The man in black was confused by Su Qiqi's series of questions. After a while, he shook his head and said: "The purpose... we don't know this. The guest didn't tell us. We usually don't ask... As for who to kill, I don't know. You know, our boss only gave us a few portraits and asked us to wait for our actions..."
"Is that so? Was that woman in yellow clothes also kidnapped by you?"
"This, this...it seems there is no girl in yellow clothes as you mentioned..." As he said that, the man in black took out several portraits from his arms, two of which were of Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan.
Qin Chuan took all the portraits over, flipped them through a few times, and saw the portraits of his father, Nangong Yu, Nangong Yue and others, but there was no portrait of Yan Ruoyu.
Qin Chuan told Su Qiqi about this discovery. Su Qiqi hesitated for a moment, then asked the man in black: "Have you really never seen that girl?"
The man in black thought for a while and said timidly: "I seemed to have seen her last night, and she was taken away by those Beiyi merchants..."
"Are you sure you were taken away by them?" Su Qiqi emphasized her tone. The man in black nodded blankly, then looked at the injured accomplice beside him and said, "Shanzi, you saw it too, right?"
The man in black named Shanzi's eyes flickered and he hesitated: "I, I didn't see clearly..." After that, he looked elsewhere.
Su Qiqi and Qin Chuan both saw the subtle changes in Shan Zi's expression. They stepped forward calmly, intending to get some clues from Shan Zi.
