Who in the world does not know you?

Chapter 20 If that's really the case

"Kidney deficiency?"

Ning Qi frowned, looked at Qing Chuan, then at Yun Luobai, his throat bobbing as he hesitated, unsure of what to say.

Yun Luobai was frail and sickly from a young age, and later he contracted that damned tuberculosis. In his mind, this disease should not have appeared in a teenager.

If someone is physically weak and frail, and something else happens, it could be very troublesome...

Yun Luobai shook her head helplessly as she caught sight of the solemn expression on Ning Qi's square, bearded face.

"Brother, don't listen to his nonsense."

The delicious food on the table emitted an enticing aroma, but the three brothers barely touched their chopsticks.

"Why aren't you eating? It'll get cold if you don't eat it while it's hot, that's such a waste."

Ye Zi blinked at the three people at the table, talking as she ate, seemingly forgetting her current identity.

She was a pitiful girl who was not well received in the Rouge Pavilion. It was impossible for her to have the opportunity to sit in a restaurant and enjoy delicious food like this. So the other three did not find her behavior strange.

Ning Qi had something on his mind; the murder case that occurred in the Rouge Pavilion was still unsolved.

Yun Luobai also had something on his mind. If the case wasn't solved, the prefect in the yamen would pin the crime of murdering Mu Li on the female thief who had vanished into thin air in the prison. At that time, his father, the prison warden, would definitely be implicated, and it would be impossible to turn a big matter into a small one and let it go.

Qingchuan seemed the most at ease.

He held a grand funeral for Mu Li at the General's Mansion, and cried his heart out in the mourning hall. Now, he's acting as if nothing happened, sipping wine from his glass. His ease and joy are beyond words.

No one understood the feelings between Qingchuan and Muli, nor did anyone understand why he was sad one moment and not sad the next.

In the end, most people will just label his flashes of inspiration as absurd.

Putting down his wine glass, Ning Qi finally followed Yun Luobai's lead and began to discuss serious matters.

"If Mu Li wasn't killed by the third brother, then who could it be?"

"Brother, the way you're saying things makes it sound like I'm the prime suspect... Why would I kill her for no reason? With her dead, I'll even lose a place to listen to music in the brothel..."

Qingchuan was naturally aggrieved. His family's various businesses were managed by the housekeeper Lanxiang. With his wealthy family background, he naturally didn't care that the meager reward he gave to Muli had gone down the drain.

The unequal social status meant that he would never have the heart to kill Mu Li, a courtesan.

Ye Zi's chopsticks, which were holding food, paused in mid-air. She looked up at Qing Chuan, opened her mouth slightly as if she wanted to say something, but hesitated and stopped. In the end, her desire to express herself turned into her appetite.

"Second brother, do you have any leads?"

Hearing Ning Qi's question, Yun Luobai sat up straight and let out a long sigh of relief.

"To catch the murderer, we need to know at the very least what happened in Mu Li's boudoir that caused the murderer to lose his temper and try to kill her. She lives in a brothel and is the most famous courtesan in the Rouge Pavilion. She should be the best at reading people and should never have put herself in a dangerous situation."

"Now that Mu Li is dead, who can know what conflict she had with the murderer that led to her losing her life..."

Ning Qi frowned as he spoke, his gaze constantly shifting between Yun Luobai and Qingchuan's faces. In terms of intelligence, he knew he couldn't compare to his two brothers beside him.

Qingchuan had no intention of speaking. He didn't want to be labeled a murderer. Besides, he seemed not to care who killed Mu Li, so naturally he had no intention of avenging Mu Li.

This behavior contrasted sharply with his grand funeral for Mu Li at the General's Mansion. His gaze lingered on Yun Luobai with interest, as he watched as Yun Luobai answered Ning Qi's questions.

Yun Luobai did not disappoint Ning Qi and Qing Chuan. Although he had only recently come into contact with the murder case, he had already made some progress.

"I should be able to roughly deduce the circumstances surrounding the incident."

Qingchuan looked up at Yun Luobai's calm and composed face, and the latter's relaxed expression made his words seem genuine.

"Qingchuan definitely didn't kill Mu Li, because he wouldn't have bothered to kill her with the hairpin he gave her and drag himself into the mess. But Mu Li was stabbed to death by that hairpin, so Qingchuan is definitely involved."

"Oh? Why are you blaming me again?"

"It's not that I'm clinging to you, but rather that without your knowledge, you've probably already become entangled in someone else's emotional mess."

Yun Luobai rubbed the white porcelain wine cup in her hand, then suddenly turned her head to look at Ye Zi beside her.

Ye Zi continued to eat heartily, seemingly unconcerned about the truth behind Mu Li's death.

When she noticed Yun Luobai's gaze, she turned her head slightly, a look of confusion flashing across her delicate face.

The sounds of vendors calling out their wares drifted down from the window, and the atmosphere around the table suddenly became quiet, completely isolated from the laughter and chatter of the other tables.

"The first thing to determine is whether the person who choked Mu Li unconscious and the person who stabbed her to death with that precious jade hairpin are the same person. In other words, is there only one murderer in this case? If there are two murderers, even if the former did not kill her, he at least had the intention to harm her."

"Second brother, you mean that the first murderer choked Mu Li unconscious, thought he had killed someone, and fled the scene in a panic, while the second murderer just happened to find that Mu Li was not dead, so he took advantage of the situation, pulled out the jade hairpin from her hair, and stabbed her to death? If that's the case, this second murderer probably already harbored resentment towards her..."

As Ning Qi spoke, he suddenly seemed to think of something, and his tone became subtle at the end of his sentence.

"It could be her maid. Even though she's the top courtesan at Rouge Pavilion, she still does servant's work. If she's been mistreated or wronged by a customer, it's quite possible she'd vent her frustration by beating or scolding her maid. Don't you think I'm right, Ye Zi?"

Yun Luobai's tone sounded very gentle, but it was extremely sharp in Ye Zi's ears.

Ning Qi and Qing Chuan's gazes also focused on Ye Zi's slender body. A look of surprise flashed across the latter's face, but her own emotions did not surge at this moment. Instead, she appeared extremely calm.

"If that's the case, then she truly deserves to die."

Ye Zi neither admitted nor denied it; she was simply stating the facts.

Ning Qi, an official, looked serious and tense. He felt that Yun Luobai's words made a lot of sense, and Ye Zi's ambiguous response was very similar to that of the criminals in many past cases.

Qingchuan leaned back in his chair, stretching lazily.

"This is really interesting..."