[Acting without shame]
The Imperial Guards searching for the prince moved about outside, their voices drifting closer and then fading away.
Madam Hu dared not make a reckless move. Amidst the sound of footsteps, she looked at the prince sitting across from her. The Sixth Prince had long lived in the depths of the inner palace, sickly and withdrawn; it was only recently that he had gained the Emperor’s favor. In her impression, this prince was ignorant of worldly affairs and possessed no connections. How could he possibly know the minute details of the “fox fur” secret her husband had entrusted to his confidant? Even the traitorous henchman was unaware of certain specifics, yet this prince knew everything with absolute clarity.
Had he not stopped them, she and her daughter would already be souls lost to the blade. In their current predicament, it was precisely his unreserved, total disclosure that led Madam Hu to find herself trusting him rather than doubting him.
Ying Fusheng could feel Madam Hu’s scrutiny. In his past life, when Hu Buyu mourned his late wife, he had spoken much of Madam Hu’s character over wine; Ying Fusheng had a fair judgment of her. For a prince from the deep palace to appear out of nowhere and speak such eerie truths, both suspicion and trust were within the realm of reason. Had he been evasive, it would have instead triggered the wariness of this intelligent woman.
As the people outside drifted further away, Madam Hu seemed to reach a decision. She finally spoke: “What Your Highness has said leaves this humble woman astonished. You are different from the prince I have heard of.”
Ying Fusheng saw that the previous wariness in her eyes had vanished. “Does Madam believe that if I spoke such ‘innocent’ words outside of this place, anyone but you would believe them?” He was clean; even if his Imperial Father came to investigate, he was merely a sickly prince confined to his bed.
“Are the people outside looking for Your Highness? Are they also…” ‘Assassins?’ Madam Hu watched him, waiting for his answer.
In the dark of the night, Ying Fusheng’s gaze turned cold, lit only by the dim flicker of sudden lightning. He gave a slight smile. “No. They are the Imperial Guards; they truly are here to find me.”
Madam Hu was stunned.
When the outside world fell into total silence, Ying Fusheng tilted his head toward Madam Hu, rainwater silently dripping from the tips of his hair. “But I came here specifically to find you, Madam.”
Surrounded by piles of cluttered junk, Ying Fusheng sat with a perfectly upright posture. He continued: “I have come this time to point out a path of survival for Master Hu. Madam is bold and attentive; why not listen?”
Lightning streaked down. In the cold, damp woodshed, Madam Hu broke into a cold sweat. She watched the man’s lips move, but the words he spoke filled her with such terror that she shuddered in the rainy night—until footsteps echoed outside the woodshed once more.
“They are here,” Ying Fusheng said.
Madam Hu gasped. ‘Who is here?’
Suddenly, another sound emerged through the curtain of rain—a light, swift sound. Almost the instant Ying Fusheng and Madam Hu heard it, an arrow shot violently into the woodshed with a thud!
Madam Hu was terrified; the people who had attacked them at the Buddhist hall had returned!
The woodshed was small and dilapidated. For assassins, once they failed to find a trail in the mountains, they would inevitably double back to conduct a thorough search. This shed could hide them for a moment, but not for long.
The assassins outside seemed to know they were hiding within. Between the volleys of arrows, the sound of rushing footsteps suddenly charged in.
With the sharp cry of a blade, the door of the woodshed was instantly swept away. The doorframe teeled on the verge of collapse, revealing the people inside and out. An agile assassin appeared, exuding a chilling aura; he spotted Ying Fusheng and the Hu mother and daughter. He leapt into the narrow shed, his blade scraping the ground as he approached the nearest target, Ying Fusheng. “Prince… you should not have appeared here. But now, you cannot be left alive.”
He swung his blade upward, the cold glint reflecting in Ying Fusheng’s eyes.
At the critical threshold between life and death, a sword thrust in from the side. The fierce blade turned abruptly; having pierced through the wall, the sword spun, its edge slashing across the assassin’s throat. Blood splattered onto Ying Fusheng’s face. He remained unmoved. When he looked up again, the debris above his head had been cleared. In the curtain of rain, a youth looked down, his face hidden behind a mask, his eyes sharp with a cold, piercing light.
Ying Fusheng looked at him without a hint of panic, as if he had known all along the youth was waiting nearby.
Qi Hanzhou did not speak. He simply reached out and grabbed the other’s wrist; upon contact, he noticed how fragile the limb he held was. He frowned slightly, shifted his grip down to the forearm, and forcibly pulled Ying Fusheng out of the woodshed, his backhand stroke severing arrows mid-air. Ying Fusheng felt a massive force pulling his arm, and by the time he recovered his senses, he was shielded in the youth’s embrace. He tilted his head and saw he was clad in black; looking down, he saw the boots covered in mud were embroidered with the python pattern exclusive to the imperial family—the Embroidered Uniform Guard.
Around the woodshed, several men in black landed one after another. The circling assassins were all cut down. In the distance, a pale Madam Hu was helped up. A shield wall formed by six men protected her as the parties moved toward the mountains.
Ying Fusheng glanced slightly toward the brightly lit Huguo Temple. The direction the assassins were retreating toward was exactly the temple’s main gate. He lowered his voice and said, “Hu Buyu has a confidant who sent Madam Hu the message and opened the small side gate for her. It should be the carriage driver who escorted her to the temple.”
Hearing this, a cold light flashed in Qi Hanzhou’s eyes. The other’s voice was extremely low, so low that only he could hear it. He did not answer Ying Fusheng directly but instead said, “The Sixth Highness possesses a body of a thousand gold; you should not have involved yourself here personally.”
Due to the feeling of weightlessness while being carried, Ying Fusheng gripped the youth’s collar tightly. Upon landing, he found his body firmly held by the other, his feet not yet touching the ground. He frowned slightly. “This place is not far from the small Buddhist hall. You should not have arrived later than the Imperial Guards.”
He meant that he knew the Embroidered Uniform Guards were nearby all along, which was why he chose to remain silent when the Imperial Guards passed by.
The two lingered momentarily in the rain. The Embroidered Uniform Guards had been waiting in ambush and were now mopping up the remaining remnants of the enemy.
“You should put me down now,” Ying Fusheng said.
Qi Hanzhou frowned but let go, setting him down. He gestured to his deputy and gave a few brief orders; the deputy quickly sped away toward the gates of Huguo Temple.
“Tonight, I and my younger brother merely wandered into the small Buddhist hall out of mischief and happened upon the assassination attempt,” Ying Fusheng said.
Qi Hanzhou raised an eyebrow but did not respond.
Ying Fusheng pulled his sleeves tight, but they were no match for the whistling, cold wind. He tilted his head slightly and spoke in a low voice: “The carriage driver at the mountain gate—I’m handing him over to young General Qi.”
The look in Qi Hanzhou’s eyes shifted subtly.
For the first time, Qi Hanzhou truly looked at this prince whom he had encountered only a few times. The boy was soaking wet, his clothes clinging tightly to his frame. Compared to their meetings at the palace banquet and the Shen residence, he didn’t seem to have gained a single ounce of weight; standing there alone, he looked wretchedly thin and frail. If that blade hadn’t been stopped just now, the assassin wouldn’t even have needed to swing; the mere inch of light from the blade’s edge would have been enough to take his life.
Yet Ying Fusheng wasn’t panicked at all. His breath had faltered for only half a second when he first hit the ground, but he steadied himself quickly. Now, he was brazenly colluding with him on their stories.
Colluding as if he didn’t fear being reported at all.
“The Young General joined the Embroidered Uniform Guard with intent. Four years ago, the souls of You Prefecture’s capital city did not return home…” Almost the moment Ying Fusheng’s voice rose, a small knife halted abruptly against his neck in the rainy night. Qi Hanzhou stood there like a ghost or a god, the blade at his wrist held horizontally; it seemed that if Ying Fusheng said one more word, that knife would take the life of this prince.
Ying Fusheng did not fear the threat at his neck. In fact, as he turned his head, he leaned even closer to the blade. The glinting edge instantly drew blood, which mingled with the rain and trickled down, leaving only his eyes—eyes that appeared gentle yet were sharper than a cold blade. “I will not interfere with the Young General, and I hope the General will grant me a convenience in return.”
In the rainy night, with the slaughter happening in the distance, no one noticed the two of them in the corner.
Qi Hanzhou’s gaze grew colder.
Ying Fusheng looked at Qi Hanzhou calmly, even though another inch of the blade would cost him his life.
After a brief silence, the blade moved away from Ying Fusheng’s neck. He gave a small smile. “My thanks, General.”
Perhaps because the commotion in the woods was too great, the Imperial Guards who had just left doubled back. Qi Hanzhou tilted his head and heard the First Prince’s voice echoing from the mountains. His brow twitched. He raised his hand, about to signal the Embroidered Uniform Guards to restrain themselves so as not to let their night mission be discovered, when he heard a loud cry beside him: “Imperial Brother! Help!”
Deep in the woods, the First Prince heard the sound and immediately halted the guards: “There’s a sound over there!”
The Embroidered Uniform Guards nearby froze. Seemingly not expecting someone to shout so loudly, they snapped their heads back to look at Qi Hanzhou.
Qi Hanzhou hadn’t expected that someone who sounded like they were at death’s door moments ago would still have the strength to scream. It was too late to silence him now; once the Imperial Guards closed in, they would discover the Embroidered Uniform Guards’ tracks.
Not only that, but after Ying Fusheng shouted, the previously quiet and law-abiding Hu mother and daughter actually shouted for help toward the Imperial Guards as well. The Hu women were naturally cautious and dutiful; their current behavior was truly unexpected. Qi Hanzhou frowned at Ying Fusheng, waved his hand to signal the Embroidered Uniform Guards to retreat with the assassins’ corpses first, and leapt onto a tree branch.
As the Embroidered Uniform Guards withdrew, a sharp-eyed Imperial Guard spotted their black clothes: “There are assassins!”
By the time the First Prince arrived with his men, the Hu mother and daughter were soaked and disheveled, looking as though they had been fleeing through the forest in a panic. When his Imperial Brother saw him, a flash of joy crossed his pale face. He took a few hurried steps and collapsed. The First Prince rushed to catch him. “Sixth Brother, you—”
Ying Fusheng didn’t have time to say anything before his consciousness began to fade. The First Prince picked him up, only then realizing how shockingly light his brother was. His peripheral vision swept over the terrified Hu mother and daughter, and he barked at his subordinates: “What are you standing there for? Take them down! Look after Madam Hu!”
The subordinates hurried to lead the Hu women to a nearby wing of the temple to rest. Beside the First Prince, an advisor stepped forward: “Your Highness, those are the Hu family members.”
The First Prince watched the mother and daughter walk away. Supporting his now-unconscious brother as the accompanying imperial doctor rushed over, he said, “I know that, of course…”
Beside a tree on the mountainside, Qi Hanzhou stood leaning against the trunk. The rainstorm had come quickly and vanished just as suddenly. He watched the First Prince take the man away, then finally withdrew his gaze.
An Embroidered Uniform Guard member looked at the Deputy Commander, whose depths were hard to gauge. “Our mission to secretly protect the Hu family…”
“Leave it to the First Prince’s people,” Qi Hanzhou said.
The Embroidered Uniform Guard was still puzzled. “We haven’t identified the mastermind yet…”
“With so many people witnessing Madam Hu being taken under the First Prince’s protection, someone has deliberately pushed them into his sanctuary.” Qi Hanzhou looked toward the Imperial City. Everything tonight had changed the moment the two princes appeared at the Buddhist hall. This was an open maneuver. “Have the others stand down. Those people won’t move again. Something happening at Huguo Temple is a direct slap to the Yun family’s face.”
As he sheathed his blade, he saw a trace of blood remaining on the small knife, and his gaze deepened. “Point the Imperial Guards in the right direction. Hand the Eighth Prince over to them as well.”
……
The guest rooms were brightly lit, and good news arrived one after another.
The Imperial Guards led by the First Prince had successfully found both princes. The Eighth Prince was discovered hiding within the Buddhist hall, while the Sixth Prince had been pursued into the forest by assassins and nearly met a tragic end; the Hu mother and daughter had also been caught up in the ordeal. Upon hearing the news, the Empress Dowager was incensed. The First Prince remained by her side to comfort her and immediately summoned a garrison from the outskirts of the capital to ensure the safety of the Imperial Family.
When the Sixth Prince was brought to the guest room, he was soaked to the bone, and the palace attendants busied themselves changing his clothes. Ying Fusheng kept his eyes open, allowing them to move him as they pleased. Tilting his head slightly, he saw the Eighth Prince sleeping under a quilt in the distance; the latter was unharmed, with only a single imperial physician attending to him. He composed himself, and when he looked up again, his gaze met Empress Xu, who was standing there.
She was still dressed in the simple plain robes worn for today’s prayer. Her eyes were fixed intently on the Eighth Prince, and her usually calm expression was tinged with anxiety.
Suddenly, Empress Xu looked over.
Ying Fusheng did not look away in time, his gaze meeting hers directly.
Soon, Empress Xu averted her eyes and began giving instructions to the attendants.
Ying Fusheng’s constitution was weak, and after being caught in the rain for half the night, he began to run a fever. While the Eighth Prince remained in a deep, unconscious sleep, the Sixth Prince’s temperature rose. Empress Xu stayed by the Eighth Prince’s side, but when she glanced over, she saw Ying Fusheng had drifted into an unconscious stupor. She suppressed her emotions, but by the time she looked back, Ying Fusheng had closed his eyes, his breathing short and labored amidst the surrounding noise.
“Mother…” the Eighth Prince opened his eyes.
Empress Xu was startled. “My son, how do you feel?”
The Eighth Prince was half-awake, murmuring: “Save Sixth Brother… the assassins came, and he told me to hide…”
Empress Xu instinctively looked toward Ying Fusheng.
At the same time, as the lamplight flickered, Consort Ning noticed that Ying Fusheng’s increasingly distinct profile almost overlapped with the silhouette of Empress Xu. Her heart suddenly sank.