“The Beauty Hall manager—I went to save her with good intentions, yet she conspired with outsiders to… to… Commander Meng, I am no longer worthy to be your wife. Our betrothal ends here… Such a bitter fate, I have no complaints, but I deeply hate that Beauty Hall manager. Without grudge or enmity, she used such vicious methods. I wish I could become a vengeful spirit to claim her life in revenge…”

The woman’s mournful, desolate voice was like the cool night breeze circling in his ears. The night was slightly cool, but his heart burned with agonizing heat. Meng Hu gritted his teeth while galloping and fitted the hand crossbow from his waist onto his wrist.

His blade was half-drawn, not yet bloodied, waiting to be stained with the blood of that malicious, despicable Beauty Hall manager!

…

A heavy arrow pierced through Meng He’s chest, pinning him firmly to the ground, its remaining force driving three inches into the earth.

This arrow seemed to fly from beyond heaven, piercing through the clamor, leaving only silent shock across the ground.

Jing Hengbo spun around sharply, wanting to see clearly where the arrow came from. By its trajectory, it should have come from behind her, where crowds of guards stood, each looking at the others in horror.

As Jing Hengbo was examining their expressions, she suddenly heard an extremely brief “swish,” followed by Gong Yin’s shout, “Watch out!”

Wind rushed urgently behind her. She instinctively dodged sharply, feeling a chill at the back of her neck as every hair stood on end. A dark gleam grazed past her cheek before being swept away by an icy wind.

Gong Yin’s snow-white sleeves unfurled before her like snow and mist, and a tiny arrow gleaming with dark light clattered to the ground.

Looking back at the arrow that had killed Meng He, she discovered the arrow’s tail had split open—it was an extremely vicious arrow-within-arrow. The archer’s strength was extraordinary; after the arrow pierced through the body and into the ground, the shock split the tail, ejecting the small arrow precisely when normal people would be searching for the assassin with scattered attention.

Gong Yin stood opposite Jing Hengbo, his face somewhat pale. Jing Hengbo noticed tears in his sleeve and hurriedly reached to check his arm, “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.” Gong Yin avoided her hand but grasped her sleeve with his other hand, grabbed Meng He’s corpse, and hurled it into a nearby pond.

This move was completely unexpected. The scene was filled with Meng He’s guards who kept arriving. Seeing their master’s body thrown in, they jumped into the water in panic to retrieve it, splashing into the pond like dumplings, creating a gap. Gong Yin pulled Jing Hengbo and easily broke through the crowd.

Jing Hengbo looked at the direction, utterly puzzled, and reminded him, “Wrong direction! You seem to be heading toward the rear courtyard!”

Gong Yin didn’t answer, leading her left and right until they reached the stable in a side courtyard. He opened the stable door, released all the horses, selected the finest one among them, and leaped up with her.

Jing Hengbo was puzzled. Her teleportation was unmatched, and Gong Yin’s qinggong was first-rate. When encountering danger, they never needed horses for transportation—in fact, horses couldn’t run as fast as she could. What was wrong with Gong Yin today?

Suddenly she remembered that she and Gong Yin had never ridden together before. Thinking this, she felt riding horses wasn’t bad either. Gong Yin actively embraced her waist from behind, and she unconsciously leaned back, her head against his chin, sighing softly.

Their tender moments always seemed to come during life-and-death situations…

The horse burst out. The prefectural office was staffed with runners and soldiers, so there were quite a few horses. Stimulated by Gong Yin’s ice spikes, they neighed wildly and ran about chaotically. The pursuing soldiers instinctively dodged, and amid this chaos, Jing Hengbo and Gong Yin’s horse leaped over the crowd, heading straight for the prefect’s gate.

Seeing the two about to escape, Prefect Lei shouted loudly for interception. Prince Li dying in his residence was already a catastrophic disaster. If he couldn’t catch the murderer or find a scapegoat, he would face extermination of his entire clan.

Unfortunately, Prince Li’s eight hundred guards had stormed into the residence, instantly packing it full. Too many people actually created more chaos. With Prince Li dead and lacking command, some wanted to first retrieve His Highness’s body, others wanted to secure the entire residence and pursue the archer, others wanted to organize troops to first capture that man and woman. Orders came from multiple sources with no clear authority, creating such a commotion that no one paid attention.

Prefect Lei was sweating profusely with anxiety. Just as he was about to call his own runners, soldiers, and constables to pursue them, someone suddenly grabbed his sleeve. A cold, urgent voice spoke beside his ear, “Is there a Beauty Hall manager in your residence?”

Prefect Lei turned back to see a dark, thin man with sharp, penetrating eyes staring at him intently. That gaze was full of killing intent, making Prefect Lei’s heart chill. Then he noticed the man’s half-drawn blade, the crossbow on his shoulder, and his slightly unstable breathing. Thinking of his murderous tone just now, his heart stirred. He quickly pointed in the direction where Jing Hengbo and Gong Yin had disappeared, “That Beauty Hall manager caused trouble and harmed people in my residence. This prefect was about to pursue her—now they’ve fled in that direction!”

The dark, thin man released him without a word, cupped his hands briefly, and quickly pursued them. Prefect Lei watched his particularly agile steps and sneered coldly, thinking this person of unknown origin appeared to be a master. Perfect—this would add more trouble for that pair.

Then he heard commotion from the inner residence and hurried over. His triumphant expression immediately vanished as he stood there stunned.

The earlier confrontation had occurred between the inner and outer courtyards. Those wolf-like guards seeking to capture the murderer had now stormed into the inner residence. Prefect Lei’s wife and daughter were terrified, screaming and fleeing everywhere. Lei Yingying was caught up among a group of big men, bouncing around the courtyard. When the guards saw Prefect Lei’s graceful young daughter, they surged forward with a “whoosh” to “protect” her. After being shouted at by their superiors to retreat with another “whoosh,” what remained in the center of the crowd was Miss Lei with disheveled clothes, scattered hair, missing shoes, and countless purple finger marks on her face. Prefect Lei rushed over in fury, shielding his daughter behind him, glaring angrily at those tough guards. He wanted to curse but didn’t dare, his heart filled with bitterness—Prince Li acted without restraint, and so did his subordinate guards. It was said that women Prince Li tired of were casually given to his guards. His guards loved visiting brothels and were indiscriminate in their tastes. Even at such a time, they didn’t forget to molest weak women. This was still considering Prefect Lei was a prefect—they had merely “passed her around.”

Those wolf-like guards were completely indifferent to Prefect Lei’s anger, didn’t even apologize, waved dismissively, and turned to “pursue the murderer.” A group of guards fished out Prince Li’s corpse, saying they needed to find the finest coffin, and took the opportunity to storm into the main courtyard of the Lei residence’s inner quarters. They took anything valuable and casually smashed anything worthless. Prefect Lei supported his crying daughter and pulled his wife, who was going mad with fright, trembling as he watched his rear courtyard being ransacked. His mood was both painful and regretful—he wanted to burn this group of scum alive and slap himself to death, but he did nothing, only gritting his teeth and watching, seeing his home robbed clean, putting on a smiling face to see off those people as they swarmed away like locusts. When he turned back to look for his sister, he searched everywhere without finding her, finally discovering a person hanging upside down from a frantically jumping horse. After stopping the horse, he found it was Lei Yingying, with one foot caught in the stirrup and already broken, her face scraped beyond recognition by stones and trees during the upside-down dragging, not to mention her disheveled body with countless broken bones—during the chaos, seeing her niece’s tragic state, she had instinctively jumped on a horse to escape, but the half-mad horse neighed and bucked wildly, throwing her off while her foot remained caught in the stirrup, dragging her for over ten zhang. Whether she could be saved was unknown.

The eight hundred guards made a commotion searching the garden for a while, then swarmed out again. Those martial artists or bandits who had attached themselves to Prince Li simply dispersed with the wealth they had looted. As for the regular troops with families in Meng City who had nowhere else to go, some pursued Jing Hengbo and Gong Yin, while others rushed to nearby military camps to immediately report Prince Li’s death and request court deployment of troops to hunt down the murderer.

Puyang City became chaotic almost immediately.

At this time, Jing Hengbo and Gong Yin had already left the prefectural office and abandoned their horse—galloping madly through the streets was too conspicuous.

Gong Yin chose a very concealed place to dismount—a narrow alley at a corner. As soon as they dismounted, Jing Hengbo urgently asked, “Why did you ride a horse today…”

Gong Yin’s eyes were slightly downcast as he slowly straightened up, his face very pale. Jing Hengbo instinctively supported him against the wall. Suddenly they heard a “scraping” sound from behind the wall, like footsteps scraping the ground. She sensed danger and yanked Gong Yin toward her. Using too much force, both fell to the ground with Gong Yin on top of her. Jing Hengbo felt his body seemed to be going soft. Before she could get up, a thunderous crash sounded—the thin brick wall burst open with a large hole. Through the swirling dust, a person stepped through the wall, long blade flashing coldly like lightning striking down through the gray-yellow haze!

This blade came fiercely, seemingly using all the strength of a lifetime, containing anger, enough to cleave both of them in half!

The sound was so violent it had alarmed the pursuing soldiers. At the nearby alley entrance, someone shouted loudly, “There are people inside!” Heavy footsteps charged in.

Jing Hengbo held Gong Yin and rolled sharply. With a dull thud, the hard dirt ground bore a deep knife mark like a small trench, only three inches from her body.

At this moment, dust filled the air and bricks fell. Both sides had to squint their eyes from the choking dust, and no one could see clearly. The assassin behind the wall, having missed with one strike, felt his arm go weak. He immediately raised his arm, several dark glints flashing in succession, covering Jing Hengbo and Gong Yin’s entire bodies.

Jing Hengbo vigorously waved her sleeve, sending large chunks of brick and stone flying to smash the crossbow bolts. Meanwhile, Gong Yin suddenly rose and struck the opponent’s chest with an apparently light palm.

Jing Hengbo saw misty vapor rising around Gong Yin. This palm seemed to draw out his true power like spring water. The surroundings instantly became bone-piercingly cold—even she, accustomed to his cold aura, couldn’t help shivering repeatedly, feeling as if all the blood in her body had frozen instantly. Her eyelashes quietly frosted over, and when she blinked, broken ice fell rustling down.

The sneak attacker reacted quickly. Seeing this palm surrounded by snowy mist, he immediately retreated. He seemed to open his mouth wide to shout something, but couldn’t—the cold was too severe. Bearing the brunt of it, he was actually frozen.

His dark, thin face was thinly covered with ice crystals. Unable to shout temporarily, he could only stare wide-eyed as the surrounding air vaporized and misted into a bewildering white that grew denser, mixing with the gray-yellow smoke and dust until he couldn’t see the opponents’ forms, features, or clothing—only vaguely seeing one person hastily supporting another.

Jing Hengbo supported Gong Yin. She felt something was wrong, very wrong. Gong Yin’s ice and snow true qi was indeed powerful, but he always controlled it perfectly, never making it this cold where even people nearby suffered. This was clearly what happened when true qi couldn’t be controlled. The four words “qi deviation” suddenly flashed through her mind. She turned pale with shock, hurriedly supporting Gong Yin, instinctively reaching for his wrist pulse, then realizing she knew nothing about medicine. But when her fingers touched his pulse, it felt rapid and weak—clearly something was wrong.

Gong Yin said nothing, and his facial expression showed no pain, but she clearly sensed the qi within his body slowly weakening.

This wouldn’t do—they had to leave immediately and find a medical clinic or inn to properly determine what was wrong with him.

Jing Hengbo supported Gong Yin and vanished in a flash.

People had already rushed in, but in the yellow-white smoke, dust, and snowy mist, not even a trace of their movements remained, as if those two people had never existed.

Meng Hu stood rigidly in place, mouth agape, staring straight ahead. After a long while, he groaned.

The words “Master! Female Sovereign!” stopped right at his lips.

Footsteps thundered as a large group of Prince Li’s guards rushed over. The leader grabbed Meng Hu’s shoulder—with a “crack” of breaking ice, his hand came away covered in frost.

“Where are those two people just now! Which direction did they go?” the pursuing soldiers demanded harshly.

This grab broke the ice on Meng Hu’s face, and only then did he catch his breath. But his body still couldn’t move, so he only nudged his mouth toward the direction opposite to where Jing Hengbo had gone.

The pursuing soldiers clamored and chased in that direction. Someone outside the wall shouted sternly, “Black Mountain Division troops have entered the city! Pass the order! Martial law throughout the city! Search all inns, medical clinics, restaurants, teahouses, theaters, and all places where people can hide! From now on, neighborhood chiefs and village heads must conduct house-to-house searches. Any strangers without local household registration will be detained for identification! Close all four city gates and increase military guards. From now until the murderer is caught, everyone in the city may enter but not leave!”