Ding Songyan had barely taken a step when his eyes, ever scanning out of habit, caught a face with an unguarded expression.

The face belonged to a man in his early thirties wearing a cloth headscarf, his beard shaved clean, the tip of his nose faintly red and blotchy with the look of a heavy drinker.

He was staring at Ding Songyan the way a man stares at a monster that has no business being where it is. The surprise and fear on his face were plain for anyone to see.

The moment their eyes met, the man wheeled around and shoved his way into the market crowd. In an instant he was gone, swallowed up without a trace.

Ding Songyan’s first instinct was to give chase and grab him. But without any martial arts to speak of, his reactions were a beat too slow, and by the time he thought to move, there was no one left to find.

Finding a man he knew to be dead strolling freely outside Dangkang Temple was enough to break his composure completely. The plan is working... Something will stir after this. No need to chase him now... I can only hope Master Yu was ready for it. Ding Songyan stared in the direction the blotchy-nosed man had fled, and fell into thought.

"Brother Ding, what are you looking at?" Xu Chang’an asked, curious.

Ding Songyan collected himself. The headless Wushou cavalry lieutenant from earlier was long gone.

"Looks like a pickpocket got caught," Ding Songyan said, making it up on the spot and directing it squarely at Xu Chang’an.

Thieving never ends well!

The first phone he had ever scraped and saved to buy had been lifted by a pickpocket. It had ruined several months of his life.

Xu Chang’an went pale. He stood on tiptoe and craned his neck in that direction repeatedly.

"I don’t see anything. Where? What happened?"

"They’ve already been taken away," Ding Songyan said, brushing it off.

He turned toward another storyteller’s pitch, outwardly unhurried, inwardly coiled tight with vigilance.

Xu Chang’an trailed after him in a daze, his eye for likely marks temporarily elsewhere.

Hasn’t been caught yet, by the look of it... The ones who’ve been through the yamen a few times are old hands, they don’t scare easily. Ding Songyan gave his neighbor a sideways glance, then settled into the crowd, half-listening to the storyteller’s legends and sagas while letting his gaze drift idly across the scene.

Perhaps because tales of the martial world already read like legend in their own right, the sagas-and-romance storytellers had to draw mainly on mythology and the affairs of ordinary people. The latter, being something listeners could reach out and touch with their own hands, drew a significant crowd, packed so tightly around the pitch that there was barely room to breathe.

Then Xu Chang’an poked Ding Songyan’s arm.

Ding Songyan’s chest tightened. He turned.

The decent-looking but shifty-eyed figure beside him was pointing to one side, voice low.

"Brother Ding. Look over there."

The crowd was too thick to see past. Ding Songyan stepped back a pace or two and changed his position.

He did not need Xu Chang’an to say anything more. He saw immediately who was meant.

She was a girl of sixteen or seventeen, dressed in a plain white round-collar cross-front jacket and a white-trimmed skirt with green edging and many pleats, her hair worn in two hanging loops that fell past her shoulders, lending her a touch of girlish charm.

Her eyes lifted slightly at the outer corners, her chin tapered to a delicate point, her nose was small and straight with a soft, rounded tip, and her skin was pale and smooth as cream. The way she glanced about carried both a lively prettiness and the early bloom of a beauty not yet fully formed, purity and allure coexisting on her face without the least contradiction. The jade-green flower ornament at the top of the silver pin in her hair swayed gently, echoing the jade pendants at her waist that moved with every step.

She simply stood there, drawing glances from every direction.

Those glances would land, pull away, and circle back.

"Something, isn’t she, Brother Ding?" Xu Chang’an murmured admiringly. "At this age already, give it a few more years and she’ll be the kind of face that topples kingdoms."

Then, catching Ding Songyan’s eye, he added quickly, "Of course, she’s still a little short of Sister Qingyan. Just a little."

Heh. At least you know what to say. She really is a little short. In height, specifically... Different styles entirely, can’t really compare. One is bright and delicate, the other is pure and beguiling... Ding Songyan was still ruminating when the storyteller finished his set and began collecting tips.

The girl produced a silver ingot and snapped it into the bamboo tray. By the look of it, a full tael.

"Goodness, what generosity!" The storyteller lit up at once, praise tumbling out of him.

The girl lifted her chin slightly, looking rather pleased with herself.

"I’ll be back tomorrow to hear more."

Free with her money, and not the least bit cautious about it... Still something of a child. Clearly hasn’t been out in the world long... Ding Songyan found himself wondering if he might find some way to relieve this girl of a little silver.

If I don’t earn it, someone else will. Better me than them!

Only then did he notice the maidservant at the girl’s side, dressed in a green silk skirt, trim and pretty.

In the shadow of the girl’s looks, everyone around her had instinctively overlooked the maid entirely.

As he watched, Ding Songyan turned to Xu Chang’an.

"Have you seen this girl around before?"

"Never." Xu Chang’an answered, genuinely puzzled.

If I had, I’d have had it all over Chengyu Lane already.

"She doesn’t look like she’s from this city," Ding Songyan pressed.

Xu Chang’an, still holding his back admirably straight, sounded quite certain.

"Definitely not. A face like that, traveling without a veil, not covering herself the way Sister Qingyan does, if she were local, she’d be as famous as Zheng Zhuxi of the Brightnight Sect by now. And Zheng Zhuxi isn’t even as good-looking."

Ding Songyan lost interest in making money rather quickly, his brow creasing slightly.

When he had first arrived and seen Ding Qingyan, he had been struck by her looks, but had not thought much of it, assuming instinctively that this world simply produced beautiful people as a matter of course. A few days of walking the streets had corrected that impression. Looks like his sister’s were rare, possibly exceptional. In the two days he had been here, he had not seen anyone remotely comparable.

And now, out of nowhere, another girl of the same caliber had appeared. Was that not a little too convenient?

Had all the beauties of the realm decided to converge on Dingjiang Prefecture?

There was something else. This girl clearly loved listening to storytellers. Yet Xu Chang’an had never seen her here in the days before. That meant she had likely arrived in Dingjiang only in the last day or two.

And in those same last days, one other thing had happened: the second son of the Ding family had vanished under strange circumstances and turned up dead in a ruined temple outside the city.

The two things may have nothing directly to do with each other. But the timing sits badly with me. It feels like something is gathering in Dingjiang Prefecture. Winds from every quarter converging on one place. Ding Songyan ruminated quietly in his mind.

Xu Chang’an, meanwhile, was already angling in the direction the girl in the white skirt and her maid had gone.

Slap! Ding Songyan’s hand shot out and caught him by the shoulder.

"Where do you think you’re going?"

Xu Chang’an startled, then said, blinking, "That girl is carrying a fair amount of silver, and she doesn’t seem to be paying much attention to it. No real guard up. I thought I might do a little business."

Seeing Ding Songyan look at him in silence, he added, a little sheepishly, "She’s pretty, yes. But I still need money for food. If I don’t go, someone else in the trade will.

"Besides, she’s not Sister Qingyan. I don’t owe her anything."

Ding Songyan clicked his tongue.

"A girl who looks like that, traveling alone to Dingjiang, and not a trace of wariness on her face, not even a veil. You’d really try that?

"Travel is hard. Long travel is harder still. There are no watch towers on the road.

"The way I see it, a girl like her either comes from a powerful family with skilled fighters traveling close by, or she’s no pushover herself. If you have a death wish, you don’t have to pick today."

Xu Chang’an’s expression fell.

"You’re right!"

He turned to Ding Songyan with something close to reverence.

"Brother Ding, you sound just like my master. In our trade, skill matters, but the most important thing isn’t skill. It’s reading people. Who can be targeted, who can’t, who’s easy, who isn’t. You have to see all of that before you make a move.

"My master has always said that’s where I fall short."

Not skill, not judgment. The real problem is the brain, and yours has room to grow... Ding Songyan kept the thought to himself, patted Xu Chang’an on the shoulder, and said, "Stop going after fruit sellers and old women with needlework baskets. A man who is meant to become a great thief can’t afford to debase himself like that. Even if you made a name for it, you’d only earn people’s contempt."

Xu Chang’an stared at him. After a moment he said, "But then how do I eat?"

You really can’t help yourself, can you? There must be honest work somewhere in a world with a commercial economy that developed... Ding Songyan sighed.

"Rob the rich to feed the poor. Only those who’ve got their wealth through cruelty and greed."

He had not known Xu Chang’an long enough to say more than this. He left the young man to his thoughts, said his goodbyes, and continued wandering outside Dangkang Temple, waiting for whatever change the blotchy-nosed man’s alarm might set in motion, hoping it would bring the hidden danger to a head sooner rather than later.

"Ding Songyan! Ding Songyan!" Someone was calling his name from not far off.

Ding Songyan tensed, turned, and looked toward the voice with a mild smile.

It was a man not yet thirty, his head wrapped in black cloth, a plaster from his own stock stuck to his face, which gave him a comical look.

He was holding up a cloth signboard with two lines written on it: Guaranteed cure for all falls and injuries. One plaster, one copper coin.

No literary flair, but admirably concise... Ding Songyan said nothing and waited for the man to state his purpose.

The plaster-faced man was brimming with excitement.

"Ding Songyan, how come you’re not at your pitch today?"

He pointed at the empty spot nearby.

So that’s the stall I got through the Zhen household’s connection with the guild. I wonder if it can be sublet for cash. I have no storytelling skills left to speak of, though listening just now I noticed this world’s storytellers don’t seem to use the elaborate techniques and stock phrases of the tradition I knew before. Clear speech and a coherent story seem to be enough... But my goal is martial arts, not becoming a talking act. Before Ding Songyan could say anything, the plaster-seller was already rattling on.

"A young lady was asking after you just now! Like something out of a painting!"

Oh? Ding Songyan’s mind produced an image before he could stop it.

"Miss! Miss!" The plaster-seller was already calling out in a loud voice. "Ding Songyan’s here! In all of Dingjiang Prefecture, his historical accounts are in the top three, easily!"

Thanks for the praise. That’s the essence of commerce right there, everyone talking each other up... Sure enough, Ding Songyan found himself looking at the girl in the white skirt again, her maidservant at her side.

The girl came over quickly, without the least reserve, her expression bright and eager.

"Ding Songyan, when are you telling stories today? I want to listen."

Ding Songyan blinked. His thoughts moved quickly. He brought his hands together in a cupped-fist salute.

"Miss, I have been unwell these past few days and had intended to rest. But since you wish to listen, I can manage a passage. Not a historical account, I’m afraid, but a saga I have only recently learned. If it is not to your liking, there is no need to leave a tip."

Historical accounts were beyond him. Stories, on the other hand, he had an entire world’s worth of source material to draw from.

His intentions here were clear and simple. He was not after her silver, nor after the girl herself. He only wanted to establish a connection, leave a favorable impression. Given what her family background might be, a little goodwill at the right moment could be worth more than any amount of money.