Chapter 29: All Warfare is Based on Deception

Since Fu Wanxi witnessed the members of Wuchang Manor being executed in the public square this morning, she had locked herself inside her room. Carrying a cup of warm milk, I walked down the familiar hallways of the Wuchang Manor's secondary residence towards her room. As this was a secret residence that only the Fu family was aware of, it was left untouched by the Second Prince's cruel schemes.

Nearing her room, I heard an unfamiliar voice coming from behind the closed doors. It sounded like a young man. And he sounded like he was well-acquainted with Fu Wanxi.

"Xi'er, don't act foolish now. Please don't let yourself be poisoned. It's not worth it!" The young man sounded urgent as he pleaded in a raised voice.

"Yihe, I know what I'm doing," replied Fu Wanxi, her voice gentle and calm. "In fact, you should be the one to be careful. What are you thinking coming to see me here?"

I crept closer to listen in, careful not to make any noise with my footsteps. Who was this visitor who came in the night?

"You and I only entered this book to see what was up with the sudden disturbance within. You've already investigated these people and found out that they are also members of the Library Association. Isn't it enough? It's time for us to leave this book and return home."

"Yes, but—there are still some points that I can't figure out. How did they manage to get hold of Lin Jiahe's working draft? Shouldn't it be securely stored in Shibao Ge right now?"

It was as Ji Kai had mentioned a few days ago. The current Fu Wanxi was also a member of the Association of Private Libraries. But Fu Wanxi and her mysterious visitor must be from a different division (for lack of a better word). How else could it be explained that Ji Kai and the others were unaware of her identity?

The voices in the room suddenly stilled. Something in the ominously tensed air told me that my presence was about to be discovered. I reeled back and glanced down the hallway, frantically calculating if there was sufficient time for me to hide myself.

The gap suddenly appeared between the doors and a handsome young man who was dressed like a noble stood right at the opening, with his chest puffed and spine straightened, staring down at me.

At that moment, the sound of the doors swinging open was like a siren wailing when the security system was breached; and the man's suspicious glare was like a spotlight shining down on me—a prisoner trying to break out of jail. Behind him, Fu Wanxi sat by the table looking surprised to see me.

The man studied me closely. "Who are you?"

I blinked at him, my lips struggling to find my own name.

"She said that her name is Shi Ah Yu. Must be your relative," said Fu Wanxi. Seeing that I was still petrified from getting caught in the act of eavesdropping, she answered on my behalf.

"No, I don't have a relative by that name," the man said icily. "Speak, what is your real name?"

I fought against the rising panic in me. "I'm Fang Yuhan. I'm also with the Association, like you. That was just a pseudonym that my comrade gave me as an identity in this book."

Fu Wanxi rose to her feet and came over. "Oh, so that's your real name. No wonder I've heard your friends mention that name sometimes."

"Fang?" he repeated my surname before interrogating further. "Which family are you affiliated with?"

I scratched my ear. "What do you mean? My family name is Fang, so I'm from the Fang family."

Smouldering a glare, the young man shook his head. "You know that's not what I mean."

"She's a member of our family." Ji Kai's clear and steady voice echoed down the dark corridor as he appeared behind me.

I swivelled on my heels, my heart fluttering. Breaking out into a relieved smile, my eyes met Ji Kai's reassuring gaze. He gave me a small nod.

Fu Wanxi clasped her hands together in restrained delight. "Yihe, this is Ji Kai. He's from the Ji family."

"Oh?" The man named Yihe raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "I've never seen him before."

Ji Kai cupped his hands together and dipped his head in a respectful bow. "This junior greets Third Master Shi. I would like to ask you to hear me out. I have an explanation for this whole confusion."

Following Ji Kai into the room, I tried to make sense of everything that I had heard. This man, whose identity was Third Master Shi Yihe, was he a relative of Ruijie? He looked to be only a few years older than us, but he seemed to be a whole generation above us. Perhaps that was why Li Qin, Ruijie and the rest did not know that there were other members of the Association involved in this mission at the same time as we were.

Shi Yihe gestured to "Fu Wanxi" to take a seat at the table before he sat down beside her. As he left Ji Kai and I standing in unnerving silence before them, he even took the luxury of time to refill "Fu Wanxi"'s empty cup with tea. Remembering that there was still a cup of already cold milk in my hands, I stepped forward to place it on the table before scooting backwards to hide behind Ji Kai.

"You mentioned that you have something to explain?" Shi Yihe's gaze flickered over my actions before landing on Ji Kai. Oh right, he gave me the impression of a domineering CEO!

"My name is Ji Kai, and I am the current Head Librarian of Wanshu Lou. The Association—"

"Nonsense!" Shi Yihe interrupted. "The current Head Librarian of the Ji family is Young Master Ji Chu. Who on earth are you?"

Ji Kai inhaled sharply but maintained his composure. In a firm voice, he continued: "I am indeed the current Head Librarian in my family. Perhaps, after my explanation, everything will become clear. Thus, I beseech you to listen to me patiently."

Shi Yihe and "Fu Wanxi" exchanged glances before the former sighed and told Ji Kai to carry on.

"The Association is intending to posthumously publish Lin Jiahe's book, The Eighth Verse, but discovered that there were missing pages in his draft manuscript. As such, a few members of the Association gathered together to carry out a mission in this book in order to record down the missing details to fill in the gaps. Each of us have been tasked to shadow a specific character in the book. For example, our Yuhan here was tasked to follow Fu Wanxi about."

Ji Kai paused to look down at me with a brief smile before continuing: "However, Yuhan realised that there was something amiss about Fu Wanxi and informed me about it. After investigating into it, I discovered that the Fu Wanxi that Yuhan had been shadowing was actually a real person from the real world; and my guess is that that person is Miss Lin Xi—who is sitting right there."

Frowns appeared on Shi Yihe's and Lin Xi's faces as they looked at each other. I could vaguely hear Lin Xi murmur: "What's there to investigate about? Has he never seen me before?"

"How did you know that?" I tugged on Ji Kai's sleeves and whispered so that only he could hear my question. Ji Kai only patted my hand and gave me a smile as if telling me to patiently listen on.

"The reason why I am familiar with both seniors here is because I have seen your photos before. These photos were of you and my great-grandfather. And my great-grandfather is Ji Chu, the Young Master whose name you stated earlier."

"Great-grandfather?" Lin Xi gasped, raising a hand to her mouth. "Little Ji Chu? Your great-grandfather?"

"My family has always been aware of this secret involved in traversing the universes of books. There is always a possibility of meeting other Librarians from a different time period in the same book. This is the case now. In our reality, the year is 2020. In your reality, I'm guessing that it's around the 1930s. If you don't believe me, you can check with my great-grandfather when you return."

It was my turn to gasp in astonishment.

Lin Xi and Shi Yihe were real people living in the 1930s? Was that why Lin Xi seemed clueless when I had tried to sound her out using terminologies from the 21st century?

Eyebrows stitched together, Shi Yihe remained in brooding silence. He turned towards Lin Xi, wanting to discuss with her but she was very much distracted and disturbed.

Lin Xi started counting with her fingers before exclaiming in horror. "What? Ah Yu and I are actually 90 years apart? I'm older by at least 90 years?" She settled her chin into her hands and sulked gloomily, and rambled: "And here I was hoping that I could meet up with my new found friend in reality. I thought that we could meet to go shopping together, have some afternoon tea on the weekend and even go on road trips together."

My facial muscles twitched, not knowing how to react to this strange converging of the past and the present. "Can I ask a question: is the character Fu Wanxi is modelled after you, or did you replace her from the start?"

"Oh, Yihe and I are acquaintances of Lin Jiahe. He based Fu Wanxi off of me, and the Third Prince is modelled after Yihe. That's why both characters look like us. In fact, almost every character in this book is based on a real life person," said Lin Xi, sounding sentimental; but her voice rose suddenly with great insistence: "I only entered the book after the carriage crash and acted as Fu Wanxi from that point onwards—there was no way I would put myself through that ordeal."

The puzzle pieces in my head finally fell in place as I thought of Fu Wanxi's sudden change in behaviour back then.

"But wait," I blurted, my brows creasing. "What happened to the real Fu Wanxi?"

Lin Xi burst into laughter. "You don't have to concern yourself with that. Fu Wanxi and the Third Prince are now... probably enjoying afternoon tea time with Ji Chu in the Wanshu Lou."

I said nothing, but smiled secretly to myself. There was only one kind of tea that Wanshu Lou served to their guests from books.

"Now that you have found out what this group of people have came here to do, are you ready to go home?" Shi Yihe asked Lin Xi, his voice had lost the harshness with which he spoke to Ji Kai and I.

"I still have a present to give to Ah Yu," said Lin Xi, slithering out of answering his repeated request. Grabbing my arm, she gently pulled me towards the inner bedchamber. "Let's go somewhere where they cannot hear us."

"What is it?" I asked curiously once we were behind a thick cloth screen.

"Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you." Lin Xi's eyes sparkled as a mischievous smile appeared on her face. "Lin Jiahe's manuscript with the missing pages—that's not the real final draft. The actual work was actually given to Ji Chu to be kept in Wanshu Lou. That's why it is unpublished."

My jaw dropped. If Li Qin and Ruijie were to know about this, they would be devastated to know that all the time, money and effort had gone to waste. "You mean to say that the book which we are currently in—it's not the genuine The Eighth Verse? So we've been wasting our time all these while?"

She pursed her lips and spoke slowly. "The version that you have is likely to be the decoy which I had deposited with Shibao Ge. It's actually a duplicate of the original manuscript, but I had removed the ending on purpose, along with a few random pages here and there."

Before I could question her motives for doing so, Lin Xi added: "If you want the original and completed piece of work, when you return back to reality, go to Wanshu Lou to get it. As the Head Librarian of Wanshu Lou, Ji Kai has the ownership rights to it."

"To think that what the Association wanted could have just been delivered by a single person this whole time." I laughed dryly. "It's all Ji Kai's fault."

"Well, based on what I understand about the situation with Ji Chu's great-grandson—I wouldn't be surprised if this was a part of the Association's plan to help Wanshu Lou locate their missing Head Librarian," Lin Xi mused, "of course me and Yihe not being part of the plan."

Seeing me in deep thought, Lin Xi smiled again. "As the saying goes, All warfare is based on deception."

***