As the sun set, night fell.
Passing through a dense forest enveloped by towering trees that blocked out even the moonlight, Mu Chengyan grew somewhat drowsy. His head tilted slightly to one side, his long hair brushing against the floor as his eyes drifted closed.
With a violent lurch of the carriage, Mu Chengyan’s head tipped backward.
A small hand gently caught his head, moving with the utmost tenderness.
Rustle…
A faint stir emanated from the surroundings. Though the sound was minuscule, Yueying picked up on the movement instantly.
“Your Highness… something seems amiss in the surroundings!”
Before the words had fully faded, countless figures clad in black dropped down from the treetops above, brandishing gleaming, cold-edged blades.
Mu Chengyan jolted awake. As he opened his eyes, an enlarged, handsome face retaining a hint of youthful immaturity swam into his view.
“Ah-Xun?”
Jun Xun immediately withdrew his hand, terrified that Mu Chengyan might despise him.
“Your Highness! Stay inside and do not come out!”
“Yueying, what has happened?”
“Merely a batch of elite assassins, Your Highness need not worry.”
It figured, it must be that old hag sending people after them again. Aside from her, no one else would dare target their Crown Prince’s life.
If that old hag weren’t the Crown Prince’s… he would have killed her long ago.
A dark gloom washed over Mu Chengyan’s eyes. Even after reaching this place, she still refused to let him go? Why did she harbor such intense hatred for him?
Leaping lightly off the carriage, Yueying intercepted the swarm of assassins descending from above, his blade cleaving the surrounding trees cleanly in half as they crashed to the ground with a thunderous roar.
Guchen swept across the battlefield like a gale, leaving a trail of lifeless bodies in his wake.
Hidden in the shadows, an archer concealed his presence entirely, unleashing a torrential rain of razor-sharp arrows directly toward the carriage!
“Your Highness!”
Yueying fought desperately to break free from his opponents, but they clung to him like leeches, impossible to shake off.
Clasping the young boy tightly to his chest, Mu Chengyan sheltered him fiercely within his arms.
“Ah-Xun, do not be afraid.”
In an instant, it felt as though he had been thrust back into those chaotic days of warfare, when he had held him in his arms in this exact same manner.
Piercing through the carriage, a sharp blade shattered the wood. Mu Chengyan flicked his wrist, expanding the Sanqing Bell in his hand to immense proportions to form a protective barrier around them.
Seeing the golden radiance flare to life, Yueying let out a breath of relief. Though their Crown Prince’s Sanqing Bell was formidable, its efficacy had always been erratic.
Rumored to be a supreme Buddhist treasure, he had never quite figured out how it had ended up in their Crown Prince’s possession.
Out of the darkness, a figure dropped soundlessly from the treetops, enveloped entirely in a black cloak. Slipping past Yueying, he charged straight toward Mu Chengyan.
With a single sweep of his sword, the carriage was instantly blasted into splinters. The Sanqing Bell dropped from mid-air, landing directly back into Mu Chengyan’s palm.
Jun Xun’s gaze sank. They come with ill intent! Just what kind of person possesses the wealth to hire assassins of this caliber?
Among the ranks of assassins, these operatives belonged to the elite Heaven-tiering echelon.
“Gege, run!”
Sizing the opportunity, Jun Xun grabbed Mu Chengyan by the hand and leaped from the carriage.
“Your Highness! Do not run off!”
Unable to shake his attackers off, Yueying could only watch in mounting panic as the two figures drifted out of his line of sight. Flustered to the point of exposing fatal openings, he took a slash to the arm and plummeted from mid-air…
To think that I, a proud Earth-tier assassin, am about to die in a god-forsaken place like this! But if I die, who will protect His Highness?!
A dark shadow flashed by with the speed of an illusion, catching the falling figure mid-air and pulling him securely into a steady embrace.
Yueying blinked open his eyes to meet a pair of freezing, icy pupils.
“Let me go!”
Glare fixed squarely upon Guchen, Yueying’s eyes blazed with fury.
I refuse to be saved by him!!
Guchen released his grip instantly, sending Yueying plummeting thwack against the ground…
The impact brought tears of agony to his eyes. Thankfully, he hadn’t been far from the ground, otherwise, he surely would have been smashed to death.
Some distance away, the two figures continued their rapid evasion.
Cough, cough, cough…
Running at such a breakneck pace triggered Mu Chengyan’s chronic illness, setting off a violent fit of coughing. Jun Xun halted his steps, bent down, and exerted a sudden surge of strength…
Mu Chengyan felt his body grow light as the youth scooped him directly up into his arms.
Stiffening from head to toe, Mu Chengyan froze in place, unable to move a single muscle. “Ah-Xun, p—please put me down first…”
Before Jun Xun could respond, their pursuer closed the distance.
Setting Mu Chengyan back on his feet, Jun Xun stepped in front of him, using his small frame to shield him.
The attacker’s target didn’t seem to be Mu Chengyan at all, but rather the young boy beside him. A razor-sharp blade flashed through the air, striking out with deadly precision toward Jun Xun!
“Wind God Rope!”
A golden cord shot out from Mu Chengyan’s sleeve, wrapping tightly around the enemy’s blade!
Jun Xun silently retracted his hand. Gege still has a few formidable weapons up his sleeve.
Yet, the Wind God Rope seemed to malfunction once more, and the blade wrenched free with a violent jerk.
Dragging him out of harm’s way, Jun Xun wrapped an arm around Mu Chengyan’s waist to dodge the strike. Simultaneously, a streak of blue light flashed, slicing a deep gash across Mu Chengyan’s arm and staining his robes crimson.
In a split second, the surrounding air seemed to freeze over entirely. A biting, frigid gale whipped through the clearing. The assassin suddenly sensed an overwhelming wave of mortal danger, his sword-wielding hand trembling uncontrollably.
Mu Chengyan furrowed his brows slightly. It hurts…
As darkness swallowed his vision, he lost consciousness entirely.
Gently lowering the unconscious form to the ground, Jun Xun emanated an aura of suffocating black mist, resembling a demon crawled straight up from the eighteenth layer of hell.
His dark, fathomless eyes void of all light, his three thousand strands of ink-black hair whipped about without a breath of wind!
His tightly clenched fists spoke volumes of the volatile fury boiling within him.
The assassin stepped back two steps, his eyes widening in unadulterated horror.
This… this is not the aura of a normal human being…
It seemed his master’s speculation had been entirely correct.
Jun Xun lifted his gaze. Bathed in the moonlight, his expression appeared even more eerie and terrifying.
Want to run? Too late!
Anyone who dared to harm his gege…
Anyone who dared to hurt gege must die!
A bloodthirsty, savage smile curved the corners of the youth’s lips, looking utterly detached from the innocent, clumsy boy he had appeared to be just moments before.
The man’s body locked up completely, a deep, primal terror freezing his dark eyes.
“You… exactly who are you?! Are you human or a ghost…”
“Save that question for when you reach hell.”
Slender fingers closed around the assassin’s neck, exerting a subtle, effortless pressure.
Crack. With a sickening snap, a top-tier Heaven-class assassin was crushed to death in the bare hands of a young boy…
“Your Highness! Your Highness, where are you?”
An anxious cry rang out from the distance. Yueying sprinted over, his wound still unbandaged, desperately searching for Mu Chengyan.
“You… you’re injured.”
Guchen caught up to Yueying, forcing out the words with difficulty.
“None of your business! Hurry up and find His Highness!”
Yueying shoved him aside roughly. Rather than wasting breath speaking, he needed to locate His Highness immediately.
Disgusted, Jun Xun tossed the corpse in his hand into the roadside bushes as though discarding worthless trash.
Stepping back to Mu Chengyan’s side, he dropped to his knees and cupped the injured arm. Ripping a strip of fabric from his own robes, he wrapped the wound gently.
His dark pupils brimmed with aching remorse. “Gege… Ah-Xun has avenged you.”