Chapter 69: The Culprit: A Fate-Analyst Website

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Chapter 69: The Culprit: A Fate-Analyst Website

“Why did you put it that way?”

Before Chen Yuan could say anything, the Xuekui spoke up first. The boy’s words had sounded rather provocative, almost as though he were mocking Chen Yuan.

The boy froze for a moment before realizing that what he had said could be taken the wrong way. He quickly said, “No, no, I said that wrong. I didn’t mean anything by it. I just meant that the reason the Pen Fairy we summon is so accurate in the first place has to do with fortune-telling, right?”

Now it was Chen Yuan’s turn to be confused. What kind of joke was this? If he knew the answer, would he have come here to ask these people in the first place? Yet the boy’s expression didn’t seem fake. So Chen Yuan asked, “Could you explain exactly how that works?”

He had a feeling that this was where the key lay.

“You really don’t know?” The boy once again spoke without thinking, seemingly oblivious to anything wrong with what he was saying. Ignoring the strange looks from the people around him, he continued matter-of-factly, “We found a fate-analyst website online and ordered a special set of Pen Fairy-summoning supplies from there. Uh, anyway, after using these things, whatever the Pen Fairy writes becomes something we can’t understand ourselves. We have to send it to a master on the website to have it interpreted, and the results they give us are always incredibly accurate.”

In this context, “fate-analyst” was simply the more professional term used for a fortune-teller, more common among practitioners than the general public.

“That’s why I said this should have something to do with fortune-telling. It ought to be right in Master Chen’s field, shouldn’t it?”

The matter had once again led back to a website. Chen Yuan pulled out his phone and asked bluntly, “What’s the website address?”

Why did he have a feeling that things were getting more and more complicated?

The boy gave Chen Yuan the website address, and Chen Yuan immediately opened it on his phone.

The website looked surprisingly professional. Its categories included “Fortune-Telling,” “Feng Shui,” “Changing One’s Luck,” and so on. Chen Yuan walked over to the boy, held out his phone, and asked, “Where did you buy those special items you mentioned?”

As soon as Chen Yuan walked over, Yu Shenliu quickly followed, making sure he stayed no more than an arm’s length away from Chen Yuan. He was making his relationship with Chen Yuan quite clear to everyone around them, practically announcing just how close the two of them were.

Naturally, Chen Yuan saw right through what he was doing, but he was already too lazy to react. As long as this guy was determined to cling to him, he would eventually get what he wanted anyway.

The boy looked at the phone screen, pulled up the page where he had originally purchased the special supplies, and then handed the phone back to Chen Yuan. “These are the ones.”

Under the category labeled “Ritual Tools,” there was a whole selection of products. Chen Yuan gave them a quick scan and immediately spotted the incense and candles the Xuekui had mentioned earlier, a bagua , and paper and pens specifically labeled for summoning the Pen Fairy. It looked like these were the items the boy had been talking about.

“What do you think?” Yu Shenliu asked quietly beside him.

“Hard to say without seeing the actual items,” Chen Yuan replied. “Besides, they burn all the implements they use afterward, so there’s not much we can do except buy some and take a look.”

After saying that, Chen Yuan asked the boy again, “And where can we find the service that interprets the information you receive?”

“Uh, you click on customer service, then take a photo or send it over using your camera, and they’ll tell us what it means. It costs at least five hundred each time, but if you’ve purchased the Pen Fairy-summoning supplies, you get a discount and only have to pay three hundred.”

That was hardly a low price. It was still a little less than Chen Yuan’s usual fee of one thousand, but most of Chen Yuan’s customers were working adults with a certain amount of disposable income. The people playing Pen Fairy here, on the other hand, were still students.

There was another key question.

“Who is it that interprets the information left behind by the Pen Fairy for you?”

“Uh, someone who works for the website? Anyway, they should have some real ability, but they haven’t reached the level of a master yet.” The boy answered based on what he had experienced himself.

“Then when you summon the Pen Fairy, do you write down your questions on the paper beforehand, or do you ask them at the time?” Chen Yuan pressed.

The boy said, “You have to write them down beforehand. They require you to do that when you buy the Pen Fairy-summoning supplies.”

Chen Yuan sighed, put away his phone, and looked at the headmaster standing to the side. “Thank you for accompanying us today. We can basically confirm now that this matter has nothing to do with Shishi Academy.”

The moment he heard that, the headmaster immediately looked relieved. As long as it had nothing to do with his school, that was fine. He had been worried that the matter might implicate them, which would have been troublesome.

After Chen Yuan said this, his initial reluctance disappeared, and he immediately became much more agreeable. “Not at all, not at all. It was nothing, just a small favor!”

Chen Yuan didn’t pay much attention to how quickly the headmaster’s attitude changed, but Yu Shenliu found it somewhat contemptible. His ability to keep his composure was good, though, so none of it showed on his face.

“Yuanyuan, shall we head back first?” Now that the matter at Shishi Academy had come to an end, Yu Shenliu suggested it.

Chen Yuan nodded. “Mm.” Then he turned to the Xuekui and said, “If you want me to keep my promise, just come find me at my shop. You know my business hours, right?”

The Xuekui hesitated for a moment before suddenly giving him a sly smile. “Can’t I come find you at home outside your business hours?”

Before Chen Yuan could answer, Yu Shenliu cut in directly. “Miss Xuekui, you’ve got it wrong. Yuanyuan is one of my people. Not his home, but our home, his and mine. So if Yuanyuan agrees but I don’t, well…”

The meaning of the little hum through his nose was perfectly clear. “So, you get it.”

What kind of thing was he saying?!

Chen Yuan fell silent, but couldn’t help feeling uncomfortable. Yu Shenliu had repeatedly asserted his claim over him before, constantly doing things that embarrassed him, but openly saying something like this in front of everyone was still something Chen Yuan had no idea how to deal with.

Almost for the first time in his life, he felt his face grow hot. Knowing he couldn’t possibly explain himself, and unwilling to look at the expressions of the people around him, Chen Yuan simply lowered his head and stared at the ground. Yet his mind was anything but calm as he continued turning over the question he had been thinking about earlier.

After hearing Yu Shenliu’s words, the Xuekui couldn’t help laughing. She raised her eyebrows. “All right, I get it. I should find Master Chen at his shop during business hours, right? I just wonder if Mayor Yu is going to be standing guard beside him all the time.”

She made him sound practically like a loyal watchdog, keeping close watch over Chen Yuan and refusing to leave his side.

And with that, they said their goodbyes and left.

While they were waiting in the car, Chen Yuan was still mired in embarrassment, whereas Yu Shenliu wore an utterly straight-faced expression as he asked, “Yuanyuan, what do you think about that matter?”

“…Didn’t I say I needed to think it over?”

Clearly, Yu Shenliu had been the one at the disadvantage at first. Even after he had confessed, Chen Yuan hadn’t accepted him. So how had things somehow turned around, leaving Chen Yuan feeling like he was the one at a disadvantage now?

Chen Yuan felt like a frog in slowly heating water, enduring the rising temperature little by little until he was about to be boiled alive. At this point, it almost felt as though he were the one who had wronged Yu Shenliu.

And then, in the very next moment, Chen Yuan’s already complicated feelings became even more complicated.

Because Yu Shenliu said, “…Yuanyuan, I wasn’t talking about that. I meant the fate-analyst website.”

This guy really knew how to get what he wanted and then pretend he hadn’t.

He had made Chen Yuan give up who knew how many boundaries for no reason, yet still put on the face of an upright gentleman and acted as though he had absolutely nothing to do with any of it. Yu Shenliu was getting better and better at this.

Chen Yuan’s ears turned red in an instant. Without thinking too much about it, he wondered how he had managed to misunderstand him. He hurriedly suppressed his emotions and pushed the matter to the back of his mind, completely failing to notice the amused glance Yu Shenliu cast at the tips of his ears.

Then, speaking a little more hurriedly than usual, he said, “Anyway, let’s order some things from that website when we get back. We’ll take a look at exactly what they’re selling first, and then I can try to figure out what’s going on. Although there might be a problem. I’m not completely sure.”

He’s embarrassed. He really is embarrassed.

Yu Shenliu was secretly delighted. That brief flush, followed by the way Chen Yuan had started speaking more hurriedly, proved that Chen Yuan wasn’t actually as unshakable as a still well. If he just used the right approach, he could still make Chen Yuan’s emotions waver.

And seeing Chen Yuan like this made Yu Shenliu want to tease him again and again.

“Something’s wrong? What kind of problem?” Mayor Yu spoke with complete seriousness about the matter at hand, but inwardly, he was savoring what he had just done, the corners of his mouth curling into a strangely smug, rather roguish smile.

“Right now, it’s very possible that there’s nothing special about the supplies the students bought. The key is in interpreting what the Pen Fairy leaves behind. Since they write down their questions beforehand and so on, someone with genuine ability could use that information to figure out the students’ circumstances. So the Pen Fairy is fake, but the divination is real.”

After speaking at length, Chen Yuan’s voice gradually settled back into its usual calm. After all, they were discussing metaphysics, and whenever the subject turned to this, he became serious.

“The questions people ask the Pen Fairy usually aren’t particularly deep, so they should be fairly easy to divine. Whoever is doing this probably isn’t especially skilled. That’s one possibility. But the other possibility is that they really are a highly capable master. In that case, they may already have some sense of what is going to happen in their own lives. If so, even if we buy the supplies and follow the trail back to them, we might not actually find anything.”

All of these possibilities were on the table. It would depend on what they found once the time came.

What a pity. He’d calmed down so quickly. But compared with all the previous times, this was probably the biggest emotional reaction Chen Yuan had ever shown. After all, this time he had been the one to let his imagination run in that direction. Compared with teasing him himself, this approach seemed to work even better. Maybe after a few more times, he really could get the reaction he wanted?

While already planning things out in his head, Yu Shenliu nevertheless said, “Whatever the result, we should still buy one of those Pen Fairy-summoning sets and give it a try first. We can’t just not do it because there’s a chance we won’t get anything out of it, right? There’s still a chance it’ll work.”

Chen Yuan said nothing. Instead, he thought of Murphy’s law: if something can go wrong, no matter how small the possibility, it will eventually happen.

When it came to fate, a possibility was often enough to determine the final outcome. Especially for someone like him, if he hadn’t thought of something, that would be one thing. But once he thought of such a possibility and had a premonition about it, that meant things would inevitably unfold just like the thought that had suddenly occurred to him.

Even if he had other premonitions, those were things he experienced regularly and could very well be the result of rational interference. But a premonition that suddenly surfaced out of nowhere was harder to explain.

Yet once his thoughts went in that direction, Chen Yuan couldn’t help thinking of something else.

If something can go wrong, no matter how small the possibility, it will eventually happen?

Originally, he had truly regarded Yu Shenliu as nothing more than a friend. Before, he had merely wavered for a moment and therefore hadn’t rejected him outright. But things really were developing just like Murphy’s law suggested. His resolve was crumbling bit by bit, and now, it seemed he really was about to set foot on a path he had never once imagined himself taking.

This feeling was utterly helpless.

He seemed to have a vague sense of foreboding. Chen Yuan desperately tried not to dwell on it.

What if this premonition came true too? What would he do then?

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