Searching for the Lonely Umbrella

The north wind carried snow particles, beating against the paper windows of the inn like fine sand. This "Fengxue Inn" at the foothills of Taihang Mountain has only one guest left tonight. He was sitting in the corner, wearing a long washed blue cloth gown and holding an oil-paper umbrella across his knees. The umbrella surface was broken in several places, but the frame was still straight. When the waiter came up to refill the tea for the third time, he secretly looked at the guest - he was in his early thirties, with handsome features, but an inexorable tiredness in his expression, as if he was a traveler on a long journey, and as if he had been on the road all his life. "Sir, would you like to add more charcoal?" The waiter asked cautiously. The man shook his head slightly and looked out the window at the vast night. At this moment, the sound of horse hooves came closer and closer, and three fast horses stopped in front of the inn. The waiter went up to meet them, only to see three men in black clothes striding in, with long knives on their waists and snowflakes on their shoulders. The three of them glanced across the lobby, landed on the man in the corner, and exchanged glances with each other. "Senior Guest, we have been looking for you for three months." The black-faced man in the lead held down the handle of the knife and his voice was as cold as iron. The man known as "Shen Ming Ke" slowly picked up the tea bowl, took a sip, and then looked up at the three people: "Oh?" "Fifteen years ago, Jinling Lin Mansion took seventy-three lives. You should have an explanation." Shen Ming Ke put down the tea bowl and gently touched it with his fingertips. Crossing the handle of the umbrella on his lap: "The government has already made a conclusion on Lin's case." "Conclusion?" The black-faced man sneered, "The government said it was a rogue bandit, but we all know that that night, fragments of a paper umbrella's ribs were nailed to the pine tree in the Lin family's backyard.