Under a clear, cloudless sky, a prison cart creaked as it moved forward under the escort of a group of Yamen officers.
Inside the prison cart was a man covered in filth from head to toe. He kept his head lowered, making it impossible to see his expression.
Suddenly, the sky darkened. An eerie wind rose, and the clouds above formed a swirling vortex.
“Boom!”
A strangely dressed woman fell from the sky and crashed directly onto the prison cart. Two wooden slats of the cart were instantly shattered. She lay motionless on top for a moment.
The man inside the cart raised his head in shock.
The Yamen officers escorting the cart were stunned by the sudden event. Among them, two men with sharp, extraordinary gazes reacted the fastest. In just a few breaths, they recovered from their shock, drew their swords, and pressed them against the woman’s neck.
“Who are you?”
The cold shout pulled the woman, who was nearly knocked unconscious, back to a sliver of awareness.
Clearly more confused than the group below her, she struggled to lift her head slightly, carefully avoiding the blade at her neck, her eyes darting left and right as she tried to understand her situation.
Damn it… what’s going on? Where is this?
Tong Shuxue remembered that she had been in the Laboratory, focused on an experiment involving a spatial energy field.
Her memory gradually returned. Wait—when she activated the device to gather the energy field, it seemed to have exploded!
At the moment the energy field condensed, a black hole appeared in the Laboratory—something she had never anticipated. When the energy field exploded, she had been thrown by the energy surge directly into the black hole.
The good news was that she had been brought through the black hole to an unknown time-space—and she was still alive!
The bad news was that there was now a sword pressed against her neck, emitting a cold gleam, while her entire body had no strength. It felt as if it no longer belonged to her; apart from her head, she had no sensation in any other part of her body.
Worse still, she seemed unable to connect with the implanted chip-space within her body. How was she supposed to save herself now?
Had the chip-space been damaged during the black hole transmission?
Seeing that the strange woman who had fallen from the sky remained silent, the Yamen officer who had shouted earlier gave a signal to his men. “Tie her up first and interrogate her slowly.”
Tong Shuxue was brutally dragged down by two Yamen officers and tightly bound.
At first, her body had no sensation, but it gradually began to awaken. Pain spread from her chest downward. Soon, she felt as if her entire body had fallen apart, every bone seemingly fractured, cold sweat soaking her clothes.
She endured the pain and moved slightly. Her left leg was likely broken, and her ribs might also have been fractured.
It seemed highly possible that the black hole had affected her body earlier, which was why she had felt no pain. Now that sensation had returned, she could once again sense the chip-space—but she still could not activate it with her consciousness.
The escort convoy was forced to halt by the roadside due to this unexpected incident. The leader ordered his men to remain vigilant and sent scouts ahead to check for ambushes before approaching Tong Shuxue. His voice was cold.
“What are you? A loyal follower of the War King?”
Tong Shuxue still did not understand the situation and did not dare speak recklessly, afraid that a wrong word might get her killed on the spot.
From this man’s tone, it seemed they were enemies of some so-called War King. She lowered her head, her mind racing, while the man continued speaking.
“Not going to talk? Look at your master now—his hands and feet are already crippled. Even if he is rescued, what use is he? He might not even survive exile in that state.”
He sneered and walked to the prison cart, kicking it violently.
“War King Your Highness, I didn’t expect someone would still try to save you. Touched? Have you forgotten the Emperor’s decree? Whether His Highness Prince Xian lives or dies depends entirely on your decision.”
Tong Shuxue listened in confusion. The information she could gather was extremely limited.
Judging from the environment and their clothing, this was undoubtedly ancient times. As a top scientist from the year 2050, she had somehow been transported into this backward era—utterly absurd.
She looked toward the man in the prison cart—the so-called War King.
As if sensing her gaze, the man who had been keeping his head lowered suddenly looked up at her.
He was strikingly handsome—more so than any man she had ever seen in her original world—apart from being dirty and having his wrists and ankles wrapped in filthy white cloth stained with dried blood.
The War King ignored the interrogator entirely. The interrogator also did not react, as if accustomed to such silence.
Soon, the Yamen officers who had gone ahead returned, reporting that they found no abnormalities.
After hearing this, the man fell into thought, then returned to stand before Tong Shuxue. This time, he crouched down to meet her eyes at the same level.
“Tell me where the rest of your people are hiding. I can spare your life. If you refuse, that’s fine too—I’ll count to three, and then I’ll send you to hell.”
Before Tong Shuxue could speak, the counting had already begun. The pain in her body had become numb.
From the man’s attitude, it was clear he would not believe she had nothing to do with the War King.
Was she going to die right after arriving here? What kind of cursed place was this?!
She desperately tried to activate the chip-space with her mind.
“Three!”
“Two!”
“One!”
The man finished counting without hesitation and drew his sword, thrusting it toward Tong Shuxue.
Just as the blade was about to pierce her chest, five figures suddenly appeared out of thin air beside her. One of them grabbed the attacker’s wrist—
crack!
The wrist was forcibly snapped.
Before the sword fell, it was caught mid-air and, in the next instant, reversed and driven straight into his chest.
The man’s eyes widened in disbelief as he collapsed to the ground, dead.
At the same time, the other four figures dispersed and attacked the remaining Yamen officers. Their combat power was overwhelming. In less than a minute, all thirty-plus officers were killed.
The War King in the prison cart looked on in utter shock. Although his limbs were crippled, his internal strength and senses remained sharp.
These five people who had appeared out of nowhere were dressed similarly to the woman—truly as if they had materialized from nothing.
At that moment, more than ten black-clothed men rushed out from the forest nearby, quickly forming a defensive line in front of the prison cart, vigilantly staring at Tong Shuxue’s group.
Through the human wall, Tong Shuxue looked at the man in the cart. The so-called War King appeared calm, as if unconcerned by their sudden appearance.
From what she had heard earlier, his hands and feet had been crippled—likely his tendons severed.
These people should be his subordinates. Tong Shuxue paid them little attention.
Although she herself was injured and unable to move freely, the chip-space was now functional again. Five machines were already enough to handle the situation. If needed, she still had more units in storage.
If even the machines could not win, she could simply retreat into the space.
The guards protecting the War King, seeing no hostility from Tong Shuxue’s side, carried him onto their backs. Slowly, they began retreating back into the forest from which they had emerged.