The old man was short and thin, with an awl-shaped face and a long beard on his chin. He seemed to want to dress up as an artist, but he came across as a phoney fortune-teller with a stall on the street.

“This old man is the one who texted Fan Huaying? I was really wrong about him,” Ning Tao thought.

At that moment, his eyes and nose entered the state of looking and smelling. In his sight, the old man’s body was emitting colorful aura, but there was a faint plume of black air swimming in his innate aura. The black air was wicked and fierce, like a serpent that was going to devour people. He didn’t smell normal either. He smelled human, but weak. At the same time, he smelled strongly of snakes.

The result surprised Ning Tao. The old man in front of him was supposed to be a demon, different from Lin Qinghua, who was a new demon. He suddenly came up with an idea, secretly said, “Yin and Yang coexist, and so do the new and the old. Lin Qinghua was diagnosed by the ledger of bamboo slips as a new demon. Then there should be old demons in the world. Is this old man an old demon? Is he a snake spirit?”

Somehow, Ning Tao remembered Ding Ye and the dagger. He wondered if what happened to Ding Ye had anything to do with the old man in front of him.

These thoughts all happened in the blink of an eye. “You’re the man who texted my friend, aren’t you, sir? Yes, I am the one who wants to buy the white snake slough.”

“Then come with me,” said the old man, and led the way.

Ning Tao followed the old man through the stall area to a jade store, and then entered the store.

It was a very ordinary store selling jade, and there were a lot of jade ornaments in the display cases, such as bracelets, necklaces and handlebars, which were priced ridiculously expensive. Behind the counter sat a young woman. As soon as she saw the old man coming in, she stood up, her eyes filled with awe.

Ning Tao also “diagnosed” the woman with the skills of looking and smelling, which surprised him a little. This woman was just an ordinary person and she had severe gynecological inflammation.

Without speaking to the young woman, the old man walked up a simple wooden staircase in a corner.

Ning Tao followed him up to the second floor. Coming out of the stairs, he saw a small room.

A woman in a white dress stood in front of a window with her back to the stairs, so Ning Tao couldn’t see her face. But her back gave a sense of spotless beauty. If she played a role in a costume film, she could probably get countless fans just by her back.

However, when Ning Tao looked at her again, things were different. He saw a black cloud of air swimming in her colorful innate aura, ten times stronger than that of the old man who had brought him here. Her black air was more like a snake, with a snake head and a snake body, like a fierce boa constrictor!

But what was weird about her was that she released more distinct human smells than her snake odor. In a word, she smelled the spring water releasing from spiritual energy, with slight fragrance of flowers, smelling very good.

Then the old man began, “Miss, I’ve brought him here.”

Then the woman turned round.

Ning Tao froze when he made eye contact with her.

This woman was fabulous, just like an ancient beauty coming out of a painting.

But it was her eyes, not her mind-blowing beauty, that left Ning Tao in a daze.

This woman’s eyes were green, as if canyon forest of thousands of years, which was deep, mysterious, fog winding, and blurred. The look in her eyes was not simple either, as if carrying a magnetic field, that made one unable to escape once entranced.

A sneer came over the old man’s mouth. He seemed to know what the woman was doing.

However, the next second, Ning Tao’s Niwan acupoint trembled, and his spiritual power spread all over his body. In a flash, his sanity returned to normal.

The woman’s face broke into a look of surprise.

“What do you mean by that?” Ning Tao asked courtly.

The green in the woman’s eyes receded like the tide and her eyes returned to normal. Her dark eyes were like cold stars in the deep sky, but the look in her eyes was still deep and mysterious, as if to see through others’ mind.

“You looked at me and I looked at you. What’s the problem?” the woman questioned. She had a nice voice, sounding silky and sweet.

Ning Tao’s heart was filled with astonishment. He thought she would not perceive that he was using looking and smelling to “diagnose” her, but she evidently did. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have said that. In this way, he was the first to show disrespect.

“Have a seat.” The woman walked over to the only tea table in the room and carefully held the hem of her dress before sitting down on a futon.

Ning Tao went over, put down his small medicine chest, and sat down opposite the woman.

“Wei Bai, you go out and watch,” the woman ordered lightly.

“Yes, Miss.” The old man, known as Wei Bai, took three steps backward before he turned and went downstairs.

The woman picked up the teapot on the table to make a cup of tea for Ning Tao, and then for herself. Then she took her cup and said softly, “Have tea, please, Doctor Ning.”

Ning Tao remained unmoved.

The woman sniggered, and asked, “Are you worried I poisoned my tea? Did I make such a bad impression on you at our first meeting?”

Ning Tao picked up the cup and sniffed it.

It was the common West Lake Longjing Tea, and Ning Tao didn’t smell any additives.

Ning Tao grinned. “Good tea, and thank you,” he said politely, taking a sip and setting down his cup.

The woman held her hand over the cup, took a sip of tea as well, and then gently lowered the cup on the table. Her every move and even every expression on her face and in her eyes were quiet and graceful, full of classical charm, as if she really came from the Tang or Ming Dynasty.

“May I have your name, Miss?” Ning Tao asked.

“Bai Suzhen,” the woman replied faintly.

“What?” Ning Tao was shocked.

“Haha…” The woman gave a little chuckle. “Why are you so nervous?”

“Then I’m the monk Fa Hai,” Ning Tao quipped.

The woman stopped chuckling, took out a business card, held it in her hands and handed it to Ning Tao.

Ning Tao took the card in both hands and darted a look at it. The name on the card was Bai Jing. Her surname was really Bai. To his surprise, the card listed her as the CEO of New World Technology.

“Oh, Miss Bai, what does your company do?” Ning Tao asked in a casual tone of voice. She had the demon smell, so she was probably a demon. However, she was the CEO of a company, which aroused his curiosity.

“Our company mainly develops and produces new materials,” Bai Jing answered.

Her answer was simple, but Ning Tao couldn’t make a detailed inquiry. After all, it was the first time he had met her. Afterwards, Ning Tao put away the card and cut to the point, “Miss Bai, I think you know why I’m here. Will you show me your white snake slough?”

“Wait a minute. I’ll get it,” Bai Jing said, then got up and left, walking through a small door.

Taking this opportunity, Ning Tao took out his phone and searched New World Technology on Baidu, but what he found was a mess of information with anything consistent. Then he took out the business card that Bai Jing had given him and looked at it. Only then did he realize that there was no company address except a phone number on it.

Ning Tao put the business card away again and gave a wry smile. “How can her company be a normal company when she’s not a normal person? Bai Jing is so mysterious. How did she know I needed white snake slough? Why did she ask me to meet her here?”

Bai Jing must have had a purpose, but he couldn’t guess.

Ring, ring…

His ringtone suddenly sounded.

Ning Tao answered the phone and said, “Huaying, it’s me.”

Fan Huaying’s voice was heard on the phone, saying, “I’ve been in Panjiayuan Market but I can’t find you. Where are you?”

Ning Tao was about to tell him where to go when Bai Jing came out the door and said in a gentle voice, “Doctor Ning, ask him to wait. Not everyone can see me.”

How would Fan Huaying feel if he heard her?

“I’ve already met the person, but she said it’s not convenient to meet. Please wait for me,” Ning Tao said.

“Okay, I’ll wait for you in the parking lot,” Fan Huaying stated and hung up his phone.

Bai Jing went back to the tea table and put a box in front of Ning Tao when she sat down.

Ning Tao opened the brocade box, and a white snake slough came into sight. It was as white as jade. Each piece of the snake scale seemed to be carved with white jade. It did not look like the skin of a snake, but the proud work of a master artist.

The white snake slough also smelled very special, with the aura of spring water from spiritual energy, and faint…

When Ning Tao started smelling, he suddenly shifted his eyes from the white snake slough in the brocade box to Bai Jing sitting opposite him. He remained expressionless, but felt terrified in the heart!

The smell of the white snake slough was the same as Bai Jing’s body. There was a little flower fragrance in the smell of spring water.

Looking at Ning Tao’s surprised look, Bai Jing smiled blankly and said, “That’s the white snake slough you want. You can take it, but what are you going to trade it for?”

“How much you want for it?” Ning Tao asked calmly, holding back his shock and disbelief in his mind.

Bai Jing made a laugh and cried, “That’s funny. Do I seem to be short of money?”

“You don’t want money, so what do you want?” Ning Tao went on.

Bai Jing stared straight at Ning Tao with piercing eyes. “Ding Ye gave you a dagger, didn’t he?”

As Ning Tao speculated, she had something to do with Ding Ye’s illness, as well as the strange story more than 30 years ago!

Calmly, Ning Tao picked up the small medicine chest beside him and put it on the tea table. Then he opened it, took out the rusty dagger and handed it to Bai Jing.

There was a flash of hate in Bai Jing’s eyes, and her dark eyes that were like cold stars suddenly turned green with a scary look.

Ning Tao kept his calm voice and said, “Ding Ye told me a story. I didn’t believe it, but it turns out to be true.” After a pause, he looked Bai Jing in the eye and asked, “Was it you that he stabbed?”