“Mercy, Your Majesty! Mercy, Your Majesty!”

Upon hearing they were to be executed, several dozen men immediately fell to their knees, kowtowing again and again, begging for their lives.

It wasn’t that they hadn’t protected her with all their heart and strength — it was simply that the intruder’s martial skill had been far too profound; there had been no way to stop him at all!

“He was nothing more than a petty thief. Why take these men’s lives over him?”

From inside the room, Long Feiyan’s cool, detached voice suddenly rang out. “Let them all go back. Having Qing Zhi and Qing Ye here is enough.”

“Long Fei—”

“Yes, Mistress!” Qing Ye cut off Emperor Qiwen’s words, nodding toward him. “Your Majesty, our mistress is not feeling well tonight. Please do not disturb her rest. Please return.”

Emperor Qiwen truly had no other recourse. He could only cast one more deep, lingering look at the firmly shut door before letting out a soft sigh and leaving.

Having narrowly escaped death, the guards each kowtowed toward the Lady’s door in gratitude before, at last, they too departed.

But the very moment they had fully left Li Courtyard, a sudden boom rang out — the door at the back of Li Courtyard, the very one so many had kept watch over, was shattered by a single palm strike.

With two swift whooshes, Qing Ye and Qing Zhi, swords drawn, flew up onto the rooftop.

Stars sank and the moon shifted as a figure in black drifted lightly through the night — the force of that single palm strike was something Qing Zhi could not withstand at all.

The sword in her hand was knocked flying by the force of the blow; with a wet cough she spat out a mouthful of fresh blood, and her body was swept off the rooftop, plummeting heavily toward the ground.

Midair, someone below lightly caught and steadied her; Qing Zhi flipped over and landed firmly back on the rooftop once more, standing alongside Qing Ye, who had been forced back several steps by the same blast of palm force.

Both of them were breathing hard. Qing Zhi especially, having taken a direct blow from Mu Mu, now felt her blood and energy roiling within her, liable to bring up more blood at any moment.

Qing Ye was faring no better either. She had never imagined the Ninth Prince’s skill could be so formidable, far more unfathomable than she had pictured — compared to her own mistress, it was genuinely hard to say who would come out on top.

But the most critical thing now was that besides the Ninth Prince, there was another man here whose skill was hardly any weaker than the Ninth Prince’s own.

Standing together, the two of them radiated a sense of dread so overwhelming it felt as though no one could possibly stand against them.

After steadying Qing Zhi, Long Feiyan calmly stepped forward, emerging from behind the two of them, her face veiled and her robes white — it was impossible to guess her true age at all.

Her figure was so graceful and lithe that she could pass for a girl of barely more than ten years old.

And yet, the pair of eyes that held within them so much weariness and hardship were certainly not something a girl of that age could ever possess.

Her gaze drifted across Zhan Qingcheng and Mu Mu in turn. Faced with such formidable, peerless masters, she remained entirely unmoved, calm and composed.

“No wonder people say that when brothers stand united, their strength can cut through metal. With the two of you joining forces, you could probably sweep through the entire Bei Mu nation unopposed.”

Neither of the two men spoke, but neither did they seem to have any intention of joining forces against her.

“Ganging up on a lone opponent is no act of a hero!” Qing Ye stepped forward, but showed no sign whatsoever of actually intending to fight.

She was clever enough to know that the moment she made the first move, the two brothers would have every justification to join forces.

But if she did nothing, facing her mistress alone, the two of them would likely be unwilling to team up against her either.

So long as it remained one against one, her mistress would not necessarily lose to either of them.

Unfortunately, the man they faced tonight was the Ninth Prince — someone who had never cared in the slightest for the opinions of the world.

With a sharp whoosh, the Ninth Prince struck out a palm of incomparable ferocity — a heavy, lethal blow from the very first move, leaving not the slightest room for mercy.

Mu Mu gathered force in his palm, and the instant Zhan Qingcheng struck, he too leapt up, his five fingers curling into a claw as he lunged straight for Long Feiyan’s face.

The two of them had joined forces tonight not because of their respective stations, nor because together they were nearly invincible — but because the woman before them had hurt Feng Jiu’er, had harmed the one person they both cared about deeply.

Neither had arranged this with the other, nor had they made any plan at all — each had simply come here on his own, only to discover the other had come too.

So even fighting side by side now required no coordination between them at all; each simply did what he himself felt he had to do.

The instant the two brothers struck, Long Feiyan understood the truth of their relationship at once — brothers in blood, perhaps, but their hearts were anything but united.

Heh. How interesting.

Her long sleeves fluttered lightly, her figure appearing delicate and frail — yet the instant the Ninth Prince’s palm arrived, she met it with a thunderous, ice-cold strike of her own.

A short blade had somehow appeared in her hand; with her left she swept it upward, and with a sharp swish, its edge met Mu Mu’s clawing fingers.

In the span of a single heartbeat, the three of them had already exchanged a full move each.

Long Feiyan’s hair was slightly disheveled, but her breathing showed not the slightest disruption; a faint smile, serene as an orchid in seclusion, still rested on her lips, and the light in her eyes had not dimmed in the least.

Qing Ye and Qing Zhi tightened their grips on their swords and lunged at Mu Mu together from either side.

With no one to hold him back, Zhan Qingcheng struck out yet another palm carrying an immense weight of energy, completely engulfing Long Feiyan beneath the force of his blow.

Long Feiyan raised her own palm to meet it, laughing as she spoke. “There is only one Feng Jiu’er. Yet both you brothers care so deeply for her — will the two of you end up turning on each other one day, over a single woman?”

Zhan Qingcheng remained unmoved, his eyes darkening slightly as he bore down with his palm in an instant, the force crashing down like Mount Tai itself — finally wiping the faint smile from the corners of Long Feiyan’s lips.

After all these years in seclusion, the great masters of the martial world had indeed been replaced by a new generation.

The Ninth Prince’s inner strength was vast beyond measure, weighty as the sea itself; this single palm pressed down with a force so dense and fine, yet hard as tempered steel.

It could not be torn apart, could not be cut through — there was nothing to do but meet it head-on by sheer force!

Long Feiyan’s eyes darkened, and beneath the pressure of that single blow, the violent killing intent in her gaze was forced into the open, a cold light blazing forth.

The memory of that day — thousands upon thousands of soldiers, wails of agony covering the ground, rivers of blood — was dredged up from the very depths of her heart.

Hatred, bloodshed, conspiracy, betrayal, the agony of her family’s annihilation — it all felt as though it were happening before her eyes once more.

She had lain low for more than a decade, not for the sake of a stable, peaceful life, but to one day drown her old enemies in blood — to tear every single one of them apart, piece by piece!

“Ahh…!”

The Ninth Prince’s dense web of true energy had already pressed down on Long Feiyan so hard she could scarcely breathe — but in that very instant, she suddenly raised her head, her ten fingers clenching taut, and her inner strength erupted like a bursting flood, tearing the energy pressing down upon her clean in two with a thunderous boom.

Zhan Qingcheng’s hair stirred, his long sleeves snapping back violently as he was forced several steps backward, his footing slightly thrown off balance.

Before him stood a woman of utter coldness, her heart seemingly frozen beneath ten thousand years of glacial ice, the violent killing intent in her eyes fierce enough to tear apart entire mountains and rivers.

“I had no wish to move against either of you right now. But if you continue to press me so relentlessly, then this same day next year will be the day the ones you care for weep over you both once more!”

She leapt upward, her hair whipped into chaos by the fierce wind, her pale hands with their ten fingers like blades. Before her palm strike even arrived, the very air around her seemed to have already transformed into a sharp blade, thrusting straight toward her opponents’ hearts.

The moment Qing Ye saw this, her expression changed at once. “Mistress, be careful — you’re losing control to deviant energy!”

Zhan Qingcheng and Mu Mu both dared not be careless. Whatever had provoked the woman in white, her mind had clearly fallen under the control of her own surging energy.

And the true energy within her was something neither of them could possibly withstand.

Should it fully erupt, no one in this battle would walk away unscathed.