Shao Mingyuan had never approached Shuying Nunnery, but he had gazed at it many times from outside Dafu Temple.

Miss Li lived there, so he had to firmly memorize the route in his mind.

At this moment, he ran swiftly, leaping through the mountain forest like an agile leopard. He didn’t take the usual path from Dafu Temple to Shuying Nunnery, but chose the route he had previously outlined in his mind.

This path was almost like walking on a cliff, yet it was the shortest route.

In a few bounds, Shao Mingyuan had reached the outside of Shuying Nunnery.

The gate of Shuying Nunnery was tightly closed, with only plum branches extending beyond the wall.

Shao Mingyuan leaped up and climbed over the surrounding wall. One glance was enough to fill him with horror and fury.

Almost without thinking, he drew a dagger from his leg binding and flung it with his hand.

The dagger flew straight toward the man’s temple.

If this angle hit the villain, it would certainly frighten Miss Li, but Shao Mingyuan could only make this choice.

The villain’s skills were still unclear. If he aimed for the back of his heart and the man dodged, the consequences would be unthinkable.

Qiao Zhao gripped the hairpin in her hand tightly, staring at the man and refusing to close her eyes.

She wouldn’t escape. Either life or death.

Suddenly, everything before her eyes was stained red, and thick blood sprayed all over her face.

Qiao Zhao’s hand holding the hairpin suddenly loosened. When the man toppled toward her, she burst forth with surprising strength and pushed him hard to the side.

The man had a dagger embedded in his temple, his death grotesque. When Qiao Zhao pushed his upper body aside, his lower half was still pressing down on her.

Only then did Qiao Zhao feel overwhelming nausea like a bursting dam.

“Get away, get away!” She desperately pushed at the corpse weighing down her legs.

A tall figure blocked the piercing sunlight. Shao Mingyuan bent down and pushed the man’s corpse away, asking gently: “Miss Li, how are you—”

Qiao Zhao directly rushed into Shao Mingyuan’s arms. She rushed so fiercely, and Shao Mingyuan was completely unprepared, so he stepped back half a step while holding her.

The moment the girl threw herself into his arms, a strange sense of familiarity arose spontaneously. The soft, trembling body made him unable to think much as he directly lifted her.

“Shao Mingyuan, Shao Mingyuan—”

“I’m here.” Shao Mingyuan’s voice trembled slightly as he instinctively held her tighter.

He felt he might have done something wrong. But at this moment, how could he put her down?

“Shao Mingyuan, couldn’t you have aimed somewhere else?” Having calmed down, Qiao Zhao felt somewhat embarrassed by her earlier weakness.

“I’ll take you to wash your face.”

“Put me down. Go quickly and see how Master and the others are.”

“First, let me take you to wash your face.” Shao Mingyuan carried Qiao Zhao with large strides to the water tank by the wall, ladled out a scoop of water, and poured it down.

Qiao Zhao quickly caught the water with both hands to wash the blood from her face. As for the blood splattered on her body, she had no time to clean it and urged, “General Shao, go quickly and check on Master Wumei. I fell earlier, and my legs have no strength. I’ll wait for you here—”

Before she could finish speaking, she couldn’t help but cry out softly because the man beside her had lifted her by the waist.

“We’ll go together.” Shao Mingyuan said decisively.

Qiao Zhao opened her mouth but ultimately didn’t object.

That night when she sprained her ankle, it was Shao Mingyuan who had carried her to Dafu Temple. Being coy at this moment would be pretentious.

“Which room does Master Wumei live in?”

Qiao Zhao pointed: “When Master takes her afternoon rest, she’s always in that room.”

Shao Mingyuan hurriedly carried Qiao Zhao over and directly kicked open the door.

The two doors swayed back and forth, and the room was empty.

“The thin blanket on the bed is scattered,” Qiao Zhao said.

The shadow brought by the villain hadn’t yet dissipated, and the girl’s voice couldn’t hide its trembling, but the current safety of Master Wumei and the others forced her to temporarily forget these things and focus only on what she could see.

“There’s also Master Jingxi. Usually, Master Jingxi rests in the next room.” Qiao Zhao struggled a bit. “General Shao, put me down and go quickly to check next door.”

“Mm.” Shao Mingyuan put Qiao Zhao down and turned to go out.

Qiao Zhao examined Master Wumei’s living quarters.

A low couch, a prayer cushion, a wardrobe standing against the snow-white wall—besides these, there was only the sandalwood bonsai placed on the desk by the window.

Qiao Zhao quickly looked around and vaguely felt something was wrong.

She couldn’t say exactly what was wrong, perhaps it was just a girl’s mysterious intuition, but it made her heart inexplicably tense.

Due to excessive fright, Qiao Zhao didn’t have much strength. She reached out to lift the thin blanket on the low couch and stared at it for a while, then turned her gaze elsewhere.

The floor of this meditation room, where Master Wumei took her afternoon rest, was laid with wooden boards, and there was a not-very-obvious drag mark on the floor.

Qiao Zhao’s eyes suddenly contracted.

Master Wumei was very clean, and Master Jingxi swept this meditation room every morning and evening. Under normal circumstances, such drag marks couldn’t possibly appear.

The drag mark was extremely faint. Qiao Zhao bent down and followed the drag mark forward, finally stopping in front of the wardrobe.

Qiao Zhao straightened up and stared motionlessly at the tightly sealed wardrobe. After a long while, she reached out and grasped the copper ring.

The copper ring, already bearing traces of age, felt ice-cold to the touch. Qiao Zhao quietly took a breath, no longer hesitating, and suddenly pulled open the wardrobe.

A huddled person fell directly onto Qiao Zhao, knocking her to the ground.

“Shao Mingyuan—” Qiao Zhao shouted.

Almost instantly, Shao Mingyuan rushed in.

“Don’t push hard, it’s Master Jingxi!” Even in such an unexpected situation, Qiao Zhao maintained her last bit of rationality.

Shao Mingyuan carried Jingxi to the low couch and bent down to help Qiao Zhao up.

“Miss Li found Master Jingxi in the wardrobe?”

“Yes, she… is she already—”

“Her body isn’t rigid.” Shao Mingyuan analyzed calmly.

“Let me examine her.” Qiao Zhao bit her lip.

Shao Mingyuan immediately stepped aside.

Qiao Zhao looked at him helplessly: “I don’t have the strength. Help me over there.”

“Oh.” Shao Mingyuan directly carried Qiao Zhao over.

Qiao Zhao: “…” Was this man getting increasingly comfortable with carrying her?

Jingxi’s hands were bound behind her back, and her eyes were tightly closed.

Qiao Zhao first looked at her complexion, and her highly anxious heart relaxed slightly. Then she felt her wrist and couldn’t help but show a relieved smile: “Wonderful, Master Jingxi has only fainted.”

Qiao Zhao reached out to untie the rope binding Jingxi.

Shao Mingyuan suddenly spoke: “Something’s not right about this situation.”

Qiao Zhao’s hand paused as she looked up at him.

The young general seemed afraid the girl before him couldn’t accept it, so his voice was very soft: “I just went to check the other rooms. Those nuns are all dead, all killed by having their throats cut while lying on their beds.”

With Qiao Zhao’s keen mind, hearing Shao Mingyuan say this, she suddenly looked at the unconscious Jingxi.

If all the other masters had been killed, why was Master Jingxi alone still alive?

She immediately reached out to examine Jingxi’s neck. The side facing her was clean and unblemished.

Qiao Zhao gently turned Jingxi’s head to the other side, and her eyes suddenly contracted.

A shallow wound ran across it, and the wound had already coagulated and was no longer bleeding.