Wen Zhuo’s pupils contracted sharply, and he twisted aside to dodge the full-force strike, the blade grazing past him by the narrowest margin.
Behind him, A Mei swung her left hand, launching three sleeve arrows in a straight line, but they struck the cane Wen Zhuo held up before him and scattered to the ground.
Upon entering Yonghe Gate into Daming Palace, Wen Zhuo had already had his blade confiscated, and his personal guards were not permitted to accompany him inside.
His only weapon was this wooden cane that helped him walk.
A Mei sneered: “Prince of Wei, you carry no blade, you’d best surrender yourself.”
“Against the likes of you two, this prince has no need of a blade.”
Wen Zhuo’s words were cold and merciless, reducing the two of them to nothing but dust beneath his feet.
Fu Ying, hiding behind the screen, listened to every sound in the hall, her heart pounding with terror.
Although she could not see the newcomer’s face, that rich, resonant voice struck through her like a blade to the heart, shaking her to the core, sending shiver after shiver through her trembling body.
From the little they had said, Fu Ying roughly understood the situation before her.
The Northern Di had been crushed by the Prince of Wei, Wen Zhuo, left utterly unable to fight back, and had lost the vital stronghold of the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun, their century-old foundation collapsing into ruin.
With such a blood feud [1]such a blood feud (xue hai shen chou, 血海深仇) Idiom, a deep, bitter hatred born of a grave wrong jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3270237_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3270237_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], }); between them, Shang Jue and Shang Zhi naturally hated the Prince of Wei to the bone, and so had sent A Mei and A Ling to lure him alone to Xianqing Hall, meaning to take his life in this empty, deserted place of Buddhist worship.
Still, there was something strangely familiar about the Prince of Wei’s voice, as though she had heard it somewhere before.
With danger hanging by a thread, Fu Ying’s memory grew hazy, and no matter how hard she tried, she could not place it, her mind instead filled with worry for A Mei and A Ling.
……
A Mei gripped her dagger tightly, aiming for Wen Zhuo’s neck, and with a reverse grip slashed fiercely at his throat.
A Ling, too, launched a series of successive strikes, the flash of his blade rippling outward like light glinting off a lake’s surface under a breeze.
Wen Zhuo no longer dodged, instead blocking every lethal attack with his cane, his movements clean and precise, without the slightest hesitation.
His martial skill was extraordinarily deep, however varied and unpredictable the two assassins’ swordwork, he neutralized it all without the least effort.
The white jade Guanyin, dignified and merciful, holding her pure vase and willow branch, watched silently over the flashing blades and the storm of steel unfolding before her.
“It’s over.”
After a few exchanges, Wen Zhuo suddenly parted his lips.
Three words, weighted as heavily as a thousand jun, drifted through the air amid the clash of blades, reaching every ear in the room.
A Ling’s sharp sixth sense sensed danger, and he gripped his blade tighter, preparing to end things quickly.
But before he could bring his blade down, Wen Zhuo had already found the barely perceptible opening at his side.
The cane thrust hard into his right abdomen, producing a horrifying crack of shattering bone.
“Ahh—”
A Ling collapsed at once, crying out in agony, his back curling up like a shrimp, cold sweat instantly covering his forehead.
“Brother!”
A Mei’s eyes went wide, and she let out an anguished cry, swinging her blade forward in an attempt to cover him.
In the instant she left herself unguarded, a large hand suddenly closed around her throat, lifting her entire body and pinning her hard against a pillar of the hall.
“Ergh… cough… cough…”
Wen Zhuo, having practiced martial arts for years, possessed astonishing strength. A Mei’s throat, crushed tight beneath his one hand, could draw no breath, and she could only produce broken, choking coughs.
Her feet dangled in midair, and as though drowning, deprived of oxygen and blood, her arms flailed weakly, unable even to grasp at the fatal grip around her neck.
Wen Zhuo looked mockingly at the person before him now on the verge of death, like some fierce, savage beast eyeing its dying prey with predatory intent.
He loosened the grip of his hand slightly. “This prince will ask one last time, who sent you here?”
A Mei’s face had gone ghostly pale, her lips turning purple, her body’s desperate craving for life forcing her to suck in two gasping breaths.
“You dog……”
A Mei’s eyes shifted downward, trembling, glaring in defiance at the man who held her pinned against the pillar, and with what little strength she had left, she cursed through gritted teeth: “You… will die a wretched death……”
As though he had already anticipated she would say something like this, Wen Zhuo asked nothing further, and slowly raised his right hand, the one holding the blade.
“Since that’s how it is, you may go die now.”
Seeing that the very weapon about to kill her was A Ling’s own blade, the one he had cherished and never let out of his hand, A Mei’s eyes clouded with mist, her vision beginning to blur.
In an instant, the blade drove into her heart, plunging fiercely straight through her body.
With force enough to move mountains [2]force enough to move mountains (yi shan ju yue, 移山舉岳) Metaphor, an overwhelming, immense physical force jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3270237_1_2').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3270237_1_2', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });, half the blade’s length drove into the pillar, pinning A Mei’s entire body suspended against it.
A Mei’s wide-open eyes were shot through with blood, her eyes bulging as though about to burst, before she could utter one final sound, her breath left her.
Wen Zhuo released her throat and withdrew his hand with utter indifference.
With no support left, A Mei’s head drooped forward, her eyes still filled with terror and despair that had not had time to fade.
Wen Zhuo turned around without a flicker of emotion, picked up the dagger she had dropped on the floor, and walked slowly toward A Ling, who lay curled up nearby on the ground.
A Ling’s ribs had just been broken.
The shattered bone fragments had pierced his lung, and no matter how hard he tried to draw breath now, his lung could not expand at all, leaving him in the depths of unbearable agony.
Wen Zhuo looked at the dying man before him, his cold, dark eyes utterly devoid of feeling.
In less than a quarter hour, he would suffocate to death on his own. Killing him directly would take unnecessary effort, and his blood might splatter and stain his clothes, drawing unwanted trouble within the palace.
“Hmph—”
A thin, chilly smile touched the corner of Wen Zhuo’s eyes, and he withdrew his gaze, like an autumn wind sweeping away withered leaves, leaving A Ling to endure his suffering to the very end, until death took him.
Xianqing Hall fell instantly silent, without a sound, so still one could almost hear the wind passing overhead.
On the left side, the tall, heavy ink-wash screen cast a shadow across the floor, sheltering a small, delicate body that would not stop trembling.
Fu Ying desperately clamped a hand over her mouth, suppressing her low sobs, but the tears she held back still seeped out through her nose, a pain that cut to the bone.
She squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face between her knees, unable to bear witnessing the brutal killing and the passing of life just beyond the screen.
When A Mei and A Ling had first come to Shang Jue’s side, Fu Ying had still been young, and naturally knew them well.
Only a moment ago, the two of them had spoken of rescuing her, helping her escape Chang’an, and now, they had already met their end.
Their combined attempt to assassinate the Prince of Wei had failed, and instead they had been mercilessly killed by him in return.
The Prince of Wei……
It was known throughout the realm that the Prince of Wei was peerless in valor and had won illustrious military honors, but ever since suffering a hidden attack last year that left his left leg afflicted, his temperament had turned extremely cold and cruel, brutal and bloodthirsty.
Hearing it a hundred times could not compare to seeing it once [3]hearing it a hundred times could not compare to seeing it once (bai wen bu ru yi jian, 百聞不如一見) Idiom, seeing something firsthand is far more convincing than any amount of hearsay jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3270237_1_3').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3270237_1_3', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });, today she had truly experienced what it meant for someone to kill without mercy, drenched in blood.
Only, right now, she was utterly powerless herself, barely able to protect her own life, let alone speak up for the injustice done to them.
Fu Ying clenched her fists, pressing a hand to her chest, trying to ease the grief and sorrow within her.
Suddenly, a bone-chilling cold crept up her spine.
Ahead of her, a powerful, overwhelming presence enveloped her, an unprecedented sense of oppression bearing down from above, wrapping her in completely, leaving no gap.
A strong sixth sense told her someone was watching her.
Fu Ying jerked her head up, and seeing the man who had suddenly appeared before her, her face drained of color in terror.
The strings of jade beads on her step-shake hairpin, swung by the force of her sudden movement, struck hard against her cheek, leaving a stinging red mark.
Only now did she see the Prince of Wei’s face clearly.
That face was cold, proud, and utterly aloof, refined and otherworldly, its exquisite features seemingly carved with the utmost care by the finest craftsmen under heaven, noble and distant.
Had he been born in an earlier age, he would have rivaled even Pan An and Wei Jie in beauty, without a doubt.
This was not the first time Fu Ying had seen this face!
A memory from nearly a year ago surged up from the depths of her mind, and in the residence outside Yunzhou, that young master of outstanding character slowly rose before her eyes once more.
The face of the man before her now matched his completely, only tempered further by the passage of time, his features now more deeply carved, more strikingly sharp and imposing.
No wonder she had felt such a sense of familiarity the moment she heard the Prince of Wei’s voice.
So it had not been an illusion at all——
Xuexi, it turned out, was the Prince of Wei of Great Yong.
Back then, meeting him by chance in the wilderness, she had saved his life out of compassion, hidden him in her home, and even come to feel something for him.
Later, he had raised an army to campaign north, crushing the Northern Di, routed and left in complete disarray [4]routed and left in complete disarray (da de luo hua liu shui, 打得落花流水) Idiom, utterly and decisively defeated jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_3270237_1_4').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_3270237_1_4', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });.
Her homeland had fallen, and she herself had gone from a noble princess to a lowly hostage, her life hanging by a thread, her fate uncertain.
In the depths of many quiet nights, she had imagined countless times what it would be like to meet him again someday, but she had never once anticipated it would happen in such an absurd, abrupt scene, with such a vast, unbridgeable gulf now standing between their two identities.
Fu Ying could hardly believe what was unfolding before her, her pupils trembling, her heart twisted into knots.
What fate had in store for the next moment, no one could know.
She had become fate’s puppet, toyed with in its very hands, and just when she least expected it, it had loosened the strings, letting her fall and shatter into pieces.
……
The moment Wen Zhuo had entered Xianqing Hall, he had already sensed someone behind the screen.
He had assumed it was some accomplice of the two assassins, never expecting instead to find a frail, delicate woman, her leg seemingly injured, curled up on the floor.
Her amber eyes were veiled in a mist of tears, two lines of clear tears streaming without pause, sliding down her cheeks and gathering in full droplets at her chin.
Whatever had happened to her just now, her clothing was messy, only a belly wrap covering her chest, exposing a large expanse of pale, flawless skin.
Those red-rimmed eyes, that face like a pear blossom in the rain, unexpectedly, it overlapped with a slender, sorrowful figure buried deep in his memory……
The sharpness in Wen Zhuo’s gaze shifted abruptly.
“State your name.”
His command was decisive and merciless, his tone brooking no argument, utterly unlike the gentle, refined young master of before.
Time and circumstance, like a forge, could shape a person entirely into someone they had never been before.
Suppressing the overwhelming loss and pain in her heart, Fu Ying moved her lips and said: “This concubine is Fu Ying, come from the Northern Di, currently residing at Chonghua Hall.”
Hearing the words “Northern Di,” Wen Zhuo’s sword-like brow trembled faintly, and a powerful thought took root in his mind, flaring up like a flame catching dry kindling.
Following this thought came the image of a burned, ruined residence, along with the charred, unrecognizable corpses of several women, piecing together into a hazy, unreal scene that surfaced before his eyes.
The restless flame that had just flared in Wen Zhuo’s heart gradually died down as he forced himself to remain calm.
It could not be her……
She was already no longer of this world……
It was merely a resemblance in form, the world was vast, and there was no shortage of two people who happened to look alike.
Wen Zhuo took a deep, composed breath, and turned his gaze once more toward the frail woman crouched on the floor.
“Shua—”
A Mei’s snake-patterned dagger appeared suddenly right before Fu Ying’s eyes, its tip only a few inches from piercing straight into them.
Wen Zhuo held the blade, pointing it directly at Fu Ying, his eyes like a hawk’s, murderous intent radiating from him.
“You’ve seen what you shouldn’t have. This prince cannot let you live. In this final moment, if you have any last words, speak them to this prince.”
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