Chapter 21 2. Fairytale gifts

The next day, Shinsuke was still worrying about that incredible incident. Why did that weird ad man attack Yumiko and her brother?The two brothers and sisters are poor, and they don't think they have anything particularly valuable.If Yumiko's brother had already finished his invention, the adman might have acted to hunt it down, but according to Toshiro, he'd only scratched the surface and hadn't made it into something worth stealing. Thinking of this, Shinsuke suddenly remembered the words Toshiro accidentally revealed: "Want to take away the fairy-tale gift that is sent to us every year on this day."

Yes, Toshiro said so. What exactly is a fairytale gift?It is said to be "delivered today every year", yesterday was August 17th, that is to say, every year on August 17th, someone will give some kind of wonderful gift to the brother and sister, and the advertiser wants to get that gift .Is that the case? This matter is full of mystery, and Shinsuke has been troubled by it since morning. It happened to be Sunday, and he was in his flat with the door shut, thinking about it all the time.Just when he was feeling restless, Yumiko came to visit him unexpectedly. "I've made up my mind today, and I'm going to tell you the whole story. I discussed it with my brother, and he also said that we should rely on your great help."

Saying that, Yumiko showed a pensive look. "Hehe, what's the matter? As long as I can, I'm willing to help." "Thank you. We've had all kinds of weird things going on in our house." Then, Yumiko explained the matter.The content is roughly as follows: Yumiko said yesterday that her family was a fairly well-to-do family until five or six years ago. Yumiko's father is engaged in the shipping industry, and he owns a transport ship "Polaris", which is not bad even though it is small.However, five years ago, my father took the "Northern Star" to Qiandao, and encountered a terrible storm on the way back, and sank to the bottom of the sea with the boat.

That happened five years ago on August 17.But that was just the beginning of misfortune.In addition to the shock, the mother died of an emergency.Moreover, my father seemed to have planned some big business and poured all his property into it.When his father died, he left no money behind him.Thus, the brothers and sisters, who were suddenly orphaned by unexpected disasters, fell into the abyss of poverty. However, since then, every year on August 17, someone sent gifts to the brothers and sisters. The sender was not specified. Sometimes the gift is money, other times it is an expensive gem.The siblings had no way of guessing who the gift was.Since this incident has been going on for five years, whenever the siblings mention it, they always say "fairytale gift".They thought that since the gift was sent every anniversary of their father's death, it must be someone close to his father who secretly guarded the two orphans of the deceased.

"So it is! Then yesterday was the day when that wonderful gift came!" "yes." "come yet?" "coming." "Oh? Then the ad man is going to grab it. What, did he take it?" "No. Actually—" Yumiko took a deep breath and continued: "Only yesterday, the gift was not sent to my home, but to my workplace, Chenglin Hall. I was attacked by an advertiser on the way home with the gift! Thanks to you, you helped me a lot!" "That's all right. Oh, is it money?" "no." "Is it a gem?" "No. There is only one letter. Please read it. I don't know what to do, so I came here to discuss it with you."

Shinsuke took the letter handed to him by Yumiko and read: The writing and handwriting of this letter are not very good, but the content is so bizarre that Shinsuke is also dumbfounded. "The so-called half-eared man is the advertiser from yesterday!" "Yes, that's him! That's why I'm terribly frightened. I've talked it over with my brother, but he's too sick to walk. So please..." "Okay! I'll go with you." Shinsuke said resolutely, and then said: "But, Miss Yumiko, what do you think about this? Judging from the mysterious relationship between this incident and August 17, it seems Is it related to the sinking of the Polaris?"

Shinsuke's words told the truth, his imagination and the facts are completely consistent. Not long after, Shinsuke and Yumiko came to Zoshigaya.As soon as I inquired, I immediately found "Seven Star Village".It was a high-end mansion with a spacious courtyard, but for Yumiko and Shinsuke, it seemed a bit gloomy for some reason. "This is the mansion!" "That's right, it says 'Seven Star Village' here." Shinsuke rang the doorbell.Immediately, a stooped old man with white hair hanging down his shoulders came out.When he saw Yumiko, tears welled up in his eyes, and he said in a trembling voice:

"Oh, it's late, miss! It's late!" Upon hearing this, Shinsuke's breath became short of breath, and he said: "Ah? It's too late? Grandpa, is the owner here already..." "Yes. Please come in first." The old servant said, let the guests in, and led them into a living room.In the living room, there is a corpse of a man about 50 years old, and the smoke of incense sticks is slowly lingering around him.When Yumiko saw that person's face, it was completely unfamiliar. "Miss, please take a good look at him. This is the gentleman who sends gifts to you brothers and sisters every August 17th. He is the owner of this place. Yesterday, how much he expected you to come! Until the end of his life, he will return it again." Calling Miss by name over and over again."

The old servant said, just like before, tears welled up in his eyes again. "Miss Yumiko, do you know this person?" "No, not at all..." "That's right, I'm sure the lady won't recognize him. But if you say his name, you may remember him. This gentleman is named Youyuan Denzo, and he is a first-class seaman on the sunken ship 'Polaris'." Hearing this, Yumiko and Shinsuke looked at each other in unison. "Grandpa, why does this Mr. Yuhara use such a strange method to send gifts to the Yumiko siblings every year? Also, what is he going to hand over to the siblings?"

"Well, please listen to me. Last night, the master confessed everything to me when he knew that he would not be able to see the lady again. Then he ordered me to tell the lady what he said..." What the old servant told was a terrible story. Yumiko's father went to Qiandao to do an important secret matter.The secret thing is to go to Qiandao to mine placer gold, which is a huge undertaking.Moreover, Yumiko's father succeeded. He took many bags of gold dust and triumphantly boarded the "Polaris". But he caught up with the big storm.The "Polaris" carrying the placer gold sank to the bottom of the sea with Yumiko's father.At that time, someone escaped safely from the Polaris.

Apart from the Senzo Youhara in front of him, the escapee also had Hachiro Yamazaki as a cook.When the ship was about to sink, the two escaped in a small boat, and took a lot of bags of gold dust and piled them on the boat.In this way, the boat drifted for a few days. During that time, the two fought noisyly to divide up the gold dust. In the end, Youyuan pushed Yamazaki into the sea. Later, Youyuan escaped from danger safely, and took out part of the placer gold to build a house here and settle down.Because he couldn't help the condemnation of his conscience, every year on August 17, the day when the "Polaris" sank, he secretly sent gifts to the Yumiko brothers and sisters. However, the good times didn't last long, and terrible things happened recently.Yamazaki, who thought he had fallen into the sea and died, was still alive. He finally found Youyuan's residence and threatened to share half of the gold dust.However, Youyuan has now repented and rehabilitated. He believes that the placer gold belongs to the Yumiko brothers and sisters, so he absolutely cannot give it to others, so he hides the placer gold. "Wait a minute, please. Is that Yamazaki the one with half of one ear missing?" "Hey, huh, yes, yes." The old servant was startled for some reason, ran his hands through his hair, and immediately went on to say, "I just said, where did the master hide the gold dust. He didn't tell the location." I just passed away, so... what a pity!" Shinsuke suddenly smiled and said: "But, sir, why is this house named 'Seven Stars'?" "This is because there are seven statues of celestial maidens in the courtyard, and those celestial maidens have stars on their foreheads, so they must be star goddesses. The master specially made those statues, that's why the name 'Seven Stars Village' came about, so..." "Okay, please lead us to the courtyard to have a look." Shinsuke and Yumiko followed the old man into the garden.Sure enough, there were seven statues of goddesses standing here and there in the spacious courtyard.Shinsuke walked around among the statues of the goddess for a while, then suddenly remembered something, and turned his piercing eyes to Yumiko. "Miss Yumiko, what do you think of when you see the positions of these seven celestial maidens? Hey! The positions of these celestial maidens are just like the Big Dipper, forming the shape of a handle, aren't they?" "Heh, it really sounds like you said that!" "Also, this is even written in elementary school textbooks. If you think about it, connect the two stars at the bottom of the Big Dipper, and extend the line to the right to about five times the distance between the two stars. Where is it, what's there?" "Oh, I see! It's the North Star!" As Yumiko said, she took a deep breath unconsciously. "Yes, that's right! Then connect these two celestial statues and extend the connection five times. Aha, you will reach the cherry blossom tree! It is under the cherry blossom tree that the "North Star" is buried. The gold dust brought out from the ship!" When Shinsuke hadn't finished speaking, he turned around suddenly, and then rushed towards the old servant who suddenly put on a posture, threw him to the ground unexpectedly, and then rode on him. "Oh, Mr. Usami! What's the matter with you?" "Hahahaha! Ms. Yumiko, you still don't know the real face of this guy. Haha, this guy is yesterday's advertiser, that is, Hachiro Yamazaki, a half-eared man!" As he spoke, he inserted his fingers into his opponent's white hair that fell down to his shoulders, and pulled sharply.Ah!It's a wig!As soon as the wig was pulled away, the left half of the bitten ear was exposed! "That's the guy! He thought that the whereabouts of gold dust was written in that letter, so he attacked you and your brother yesterday, but failed, so he came back here and forced you to question Youyuan. Under the pressure, the other party finally died So he searched all over the house, but he still didn’t know where the gold dust was, so this time he disguised himself as an old servant and waited for you to come here. He thought, maybe Youyuan explained the whereabouts of the gold dust in a letter to you. Just now , I saw this guy inadvertently expressing worry about my right ear, and immediately saw through his illusion. But, this guy is really stupid, after sitting on a boat for so long, he doesn’t even know the secrets of the Big Dipper and the Polaris! Haha Ha ha!" Shinsuke tied up the gangster Yamazaki who was gnashing his teeth and remorse, and smiled happily. The placer gold was indeed buried under the cherry tree. It was of course the property of Yumiko's older brother Toshiro, so now he was free to research. Although the content of his research is confidential, it can be known that it is a very remarkable thing, and it is almost completed now. No one is more pleased with this than two people, needless to say, their younger sister Yumiko and her new best friend Shinsuke Usami. (Translated by Xia Mingyue)