Chapter 36

“I read a news story recently about a city community office that had taken in a disabled, mentally challenged woman for over a decade. The office was finally willing to issue a certificate, and only this year did the authorities approve her household registration. It was incredibly difficult,” Ruan Qing said. “And your situation is even more complicated.”

Realizing that the official route was a dead end, Ruan Qing had a sudden inspiration after watching a video—it was time to invent a backstory for him if he didn’t have one.

“I’m just worried about what will happen if this plan fails,” Ruan Qing shared her concerns with Nian Qi. “If he’s in his nineties… do you think it’s possible he’s still alive? I’m just afraid that if things go wrong…”

Having had extensive experience with disguises and using fake identities in the past, Nian Qi was familiar with such situations. “This is the part we can’t control. It’s up to fate,” he said. “All we can do is our best.”

As Nian Qi began clearing the table, Ruan Qing sent a message to her father to ask for their Grandpa Qi’s phone number, then grabbed her notebook and started outlining a detailed plan. Her fingers flew across the keyboard as she typed, then she turned and shouted to Nian Qi, “Starting today, don’t shave!”

“And your nails—stop trimming them so neatly; let them grow out!” she added.

Once the plan was printed, Nian Qi came over to take a look and raised an eyebrow. “So, the first step…?”

“Let’s go,” Ruan Qing said. “First, we need to buy some clothes.”

“We’ll need to scour for the right ones,” Ruan Qing said. “Change your clothes; we’re getting ready to head out. Oh, wait a second, let me see… Great, my dad just sent me the phone number. You go get changed while I make a call.”

Ruan Qing dialed the number for their seventh granduncle. “Grandpa Qi, it’s Ruan Qing. Yes, yes, Ruan Aihua’s daughter. Do you remember me?”

“Yes, my dad called you yesterday. How have you been? I haven’t seen you in years. How’s the family?”

That simple question, “How’s the family?” was enough to get the person on the other end talking, and Ruan Qing, without the slightest hint of impatience, kept encouraging him with “Mm-hmm, and then?” to keep the conversation going. At first, her granduncle tried to speak Mandarin, which was heavily accented, but gradually, he slipped into the local dialect of their hometown.

When Nian Qi came out of the bathroom, he saw Ruan Qing constantly nodding and saying “Mm-hmm” into the phone.

After a while of listening, Ruan Qing said, “Yes, I asked him to inquire. I’m taking a vacation, and my dad said the scenery in the mountains near our hometown is quite beautiful. I’m thinking about going back for a visit in a few days. I think I only went back once during elementary school, and I haven’t been there since. My dad keeps saying how lovely the landscape is, and I’m getting tempted.”

“No, no, no, it’s not necessary. I’m not used to that; I’ll book a hotel in the county and stay there, then drive to visit.”

“Really, don’t worry about it. It’s no trouble. There’s no need, truly, no need.”

“Alright, alright, I’ll definitely come by for a meal when the time comes.”

After ending the call, Ruan Qing motioned to Nian Qi. “Come over and listen.”

She played the recording; it turned out she had recorded the entire conversation. “Listen carefully. This is the local dialect from our hometown. Do you think you can learn to speak it?”

The elderly man’s accent was very thick and difficult to understand. Even though Ruan Qing had grown up hearing her grandfather speak in that accent, she could only make out about half of it.

However, after listening for just a few minutes, Nian Qi spoke in an accent and asked, “Can you understand what I’m saying like this?”

“Huh?” Ruan Qing was stunned. “You… you… you say a bit more.”

His accent was quite similar to Grandpa Qi, but even harder to comprehend. Ruan Qing strained to catch the words but could only understand about a third of what he was saying; the pronunciation was just too peculiar.

“This isn’t exactly our hometown’s dialect, but it definitely has the same vibe. Where is this accent from?” Ruan Qing asked.

“It’s from Lingcheng,” Nian Qi replied.

“Oh, ancient Lingcheng? No wonder,” Ruan Qing said. “It’s not far from our place, less than 200 kilometers away.”

“But your pronunciation… Oh, I get it now!” Ruan Qing suddenly realized. “You’re using ancient pronunciation!”

The difference between ancient pronunciations and modern ones was enormous, worlds apart from Mandarin. In fact, the extremely rustic dialect spoken by her Grandpa Qi had a tiny bit of similarity. Over the years, even in rural areas, many people’s accents had been influenced and altered, and only elderly folks like her Grandpa Qi still spoke the ancient dialect.

Ruan Qing clapped her fist against her palm. “This is it!” she exclaimed, making a decision. “You don’t need to imitate my Grandpa Qi’s speech. Just use this accent—it fits the storyline better!”

“And use all those formal and archaic expressions too! Terms like ‘this humble one,’ ‘your esteemed self,’ ‘beneath your feet,’ ‘why,’ ‘for what reason,’ and ‘may I ask’—throw them in there! It’ll be perfect!”

“I’m going to change clothes!” Ruan Qing said excitedly, skipping off to her room. Look at how thrilled she was, talking about things being “true to the story.” Nian Qi held his forehead and thought it was a pity she didn’t write novels.

After they both finished changing clothes, Ruan Qing said, “Your look needs some adjustments; it’s too conspicuous.” Since they were creating a new identity, they needed to avoid drawing attention. Details were crucial; they could make or break the plan.

Luckily, Zhao Hao had plenty of hats and masks in various patterns. Nian Qi tucked his hair under a hat and put on a new patterned mask. The two of them drove to a well-known “ghost market” in Jiangcheng. The so-called ghost market was essentially an antique and second-hand goods market, famous for selling fake antiques. A porcelain item might be priced at 12,000 yuan, but even if you haggled it down to 120 yuan, you’d still be getting a bad deal. You had to bargain down to 80 yuan and let the seller settle for 85 to get a fair price.

The market was quite large, spanning three floors, and was a popular spot for people looking to dig up hidden treasures. Once they arrived, Ruan Qing asked a security guard and found the section that sold old-fashioned clothing.

After browsing a few stalls, they picked up a set of blue clothes resembling military uniforms, the kind often seen in period dramas, as well as a traditional Chinese long robe from the Republican era. Ruan Qing also asked the vendors if they had any Taoist robes, searching several stalls before finally finding one.

But Ruan Qing wasn’t satisfied. The fabric was too good, and the fake aging marks were too obvious. It looked fake and didn’t quite fit the story. She whispered her dissatisfaction to Nian Qi, who was rubbing his itchy, hot ear and nodded, “Yes, it looks too fake.”

“But don’t worry, leave it to me,” he said. “I can do a better job of making it look old.”

“???” Ruan Qing was puzzled. “You know how to do that?”

Wasn’t his “skillset” supposed to involve cutting off heads and taking lives?

Nian Qi explained, “You pick up a bit of everything. When you’re constantly on the move, you need to handle things yourself, and you can’t always run back to the headquarters to find a specialist.”

“When you’re out there, you have to do things yourself.”

Fine, Ruan Qing thought, it was time to find out what exactly Nian Qi was skilled at. She made a mental note to investigate him more thoroughly later. Meanwhile, she continued collecting various items that looked old and worn-out, including some broken hairpins, cloth shoes, imitation vintage socks, and torn pants.

“If you show up empty-handed, it’ll be too suspicious,” Ruan Qing said. “Let’s just say you live in the mountains; it’s still a home. When you leave, you should at least be carrying a small bundle to make it look convincing. It also fits the story I’ve designed.”

Ruan Qing was obsessed with her “storyline”—almost to the point of fanaticism. Naturally, Nian Qi complied, buying bags of items as she directed. As they were about to head back, Ruan Qing spotted something interesting. “That one, that one, that one!” she exclaimed and dashed over.

Nian Qi followed her to find a selection of knives—hatchets, sickles, kitchen knives, and even some that could serve as weapons. All of them were rusty.

“These look so authentic!” Ruan Qing marveled.

Nian Qi shifted the bags to one hand, freeing the other to pick up a knife. He quickly realized the truth—it wasn’t even sharpened.

“Of course not,” Ruan Qing said. “If they were actually sharpened, they couldn’t sell them here. They’d be confiscated if found.”

“They’re artificially aged; it’s quite fake,” Nian Qi remarked. The rust covered them entirely, yet there wasn’t a single nick or dent. It was obvious they were newly made knives that had been artificially aged and rusted.

Ruan Qing whispered to him, “It’s about fitting the storyline!” She leaned in close to speak because the market was crowded, and she didn’t want others to overhear. Her warm breath tickled his ear, making it heat up again.

“What I mean is, according to the background I created for you—living in the mountains—you would definitely need a knife or two for survival. How else would you chop firewood?” So, this was her idea of “authenticity.”

Nian Qi endured the warmth in his ear and nodded seriously. “You’re right; it does make it more realistic.” Thus, they left the market with a hatchet and a kitchen knife in hand.

By the time they returned home, they realized they were starving. They had gotten so caught up in their shopping spree that they had missed lunch, so they ordered takeout. While waiting, Ruan Qing went over the “plot” with Nian Qi once more.

Finally, she said, “We must keep control of how everything unfolds, and we have to pay close attention to the details. Always remember, you’re supposed to be someone out of touch with modern times. No, better yet, just act as yourself—forget everything you’ve learned since arriving here. Pretend you just crossed over into this world.”

Nian Qi agreed immediately and began to work on the clothes. “These need a bit more aging,” he said. In his view, his skills lay in assassination, while forgery and aging items were just basic skills. But now he realized that even a modest level of expertise in these areas was quite advanced in modern society. People here were too sloppy with their forgeries.

Ruan Qing suggested, “Why don’t you sharpen the knives too? If they’re covered entirely in rust, it’ll look fake; they’d be unusable.”

Nian Qi was indeed skilled at sharpening knives. Once, Ruan Qing had wanted to cut some fruit but was startled by how sharp the fruit knife was. When she asked, Nian Qi admitted to having sharpened it himself.

“A knife is my tool of the trade,” he said. “Sharpening it is a craft of its own.” Sadly, knife sharpening had become a lost art, replaced by electric sharpeners. The profession of knife grinders had disappeared, and this unique skill was no longer a viable livelihood, which Nian Qi regretted.

That afternoon, they each busied themselves with separate tasks. Ruan Qing booked a hotel and purchased some necessary supplies, while Nian Qi worked on aging the clothes further. By evening, the clothes weren’t ready yet, but the knives were.

The knives looked convincingly aged, not just rusty but genuinely worn. Ruan Qing examined them closely. Some rust remained on the blades, as if partially ground off, and the edges now had a few nicks. But these weren’t what made them look truly old.

She squinted and noticed the subtle details. The placement of the chips along the blade was carefully considered.

“The nicks on the kitchen knife would come from hitting big bones, so they’re positioned here,” Nian Qi explained, “while the hatchet’s chips are in this area because that’s where the force lands when chopping firewood.”

Even the originally dirty and smooth wooden handles had been modified, now appearing rugged and worn, like strands of fibers had been stripped away from a smooth surface, leaving grooves behind. The spots where the “fibers” had been stripped were treated further, resulting in a finish that, though battered, felt smooth to the touch.

The handles were dark and greasy-looking, as if coated with years of accumulated grime. It had the realistic appearance of something handled by a person who wasn’t particularly concerned with cleanliness. The authenticity of it all was striking.