Qing Xia crouched low and swiftly ran to the shaft, stretching her body. She grabbed hold of the smooth shaft with one hand, then with agile movements, quickly climbed up it.

The Southern Chu people couldn’t be blamed for their carelessness. Such a thin shaft was rarely climbable by anyone, and moreover, the shaft was a full ten meters away from the city wall – ordinary people simply couldn’t use it to climb up the wall. But unfortunately, Qing Xia was not within the category of ordinary people. The slender shaft suddenly trembled, and Qing Xia pushed off forcefully with her feet. A light, graceful figure suddenly flew out from the shaft, falling toward the city wall. The ten-meter distance was covered in an instant, and as the dark shadow approached the top of the wall, she suddenly reached out her hands.

With nimble movements and complete silence, Qing Xia crouched on the city wall like a wildcat, looking around alertly. The wall was tall, and the entire prison was now visible at a glance. Not far to her left front were two hidden sentries, there were two patrol units moving along the main road direction, and in the dense grass ahead, who knew how many hidden posts were concealed. This route wouldn’t work. Qing Xia quickly calculated the directions in her mind, then made up her mind and grabbed the rope that had just been tied to the shaft. Now, the long rope was pulled over from the top of the shaft, crossing over the wall to form a perfect descending rope ladder – without an anchor point, this fifteen-meter height would be enough to kill or cripple Qing Xia.

Sliding down as swiftly as a loach, Qing Xia threw the rope upward and landed outside the wall, leaving only a thread so thin it couldn’t be detected by anyone inside the perimeter wall.

The prison building had a connected design. Qing Xia nimbly pressed against a wall and looked out, seeing several guards patrolling the front gate, and even the rear windows had two armored soldiers guarding them. The strict security everywhere revealed the extraordinary nature of this place. Qing Xia put away her contemptuous attitude and thought to herself that since she was still on the perimeter, she shouldn’t alert the enemy.

After carefully observing the surroundings for a while, Qing Xia selected a second-floor window on the west side. Obviously, the people here thought that being on the second floor and at a relatively high position, they didn’t need to post guards. However, the height of less than eight meters was child’s play for Qing Xia. She looked left and right, then suddenly heard from the seven o’clock direction a sizable guard unit rapidly approaching – probably the hidden posts in the grass. Qing Xia frowned and hesitated no more. She pushed off forcefully with her feet and charged toward the wall. Just as she was about to crash into the wall, Qing Xia lifted her foot and kicked hard against the wall. Her body shot upward with the momentum. After three steps, just as she was losing power, she stretched out both hands and grabbed the window ledge above.

With her body suspended in air, Qing Xia did a pull-up and raised her head. The window was completely dark inside, but from the sounds, she could tell it was empty. At this moment, the footsteps below had reached the corner. With a sudden burst of strength, her body flipped inside, and just then, several disciplined footsteps arrived directly beneath the window.

“Guard, there’s no one here,” a soldier said in a puzzled whisper.

“Did you see wrong earlier?” another voice agreed.

The people below searched around the base of the wall. Only after a somewhat rough voice muttered did they speak: “This is really strange. When I was relieving myself earlier, I saw a black shadow flash on the wall, but now it’s gone. That figure looked quite slender – probably a woman.”

“Really? Guard, it’s so dark and you could still tell if it was a woman?”

“Of course! These eyes of mine are just average at spotting men, but I can identify women with perfect accuracy. It’s all thanks to years of practice with your sister-in-law,” the man said proudly in his rough voice.

“Come on, if you say it was a woman, that’s even more impossible. What woman would have nothing better to do than come to our prison at night? This place – even martial arts heroes couldn’t get in.”

“Boss, could it be a female thief?”

“Go to hell!” the guard cursed roughly, then said sternly: “You’ve been listening to too many stories! What would a female thief come here for – to steal people? What an idiot!”

The group walked away cursing. In the distance, they could still hear the young soldier who had suspected a female thief continue: “Could it have been a female ghost?”

Qing Xia wiped the cold sweat from her forehead. So there really was specialization in trades – no wonder that man had spotted her. Her eyes had now adjusted to the darkness here. After looking around, she saw this seemed to be a storage room. She stood up, felt her way to the door, and opened it gently. Outside was a long corridor with flickering lights and complete silence. Near the corner, a guard was standing with his spear, but his mouth was wide open with bright saliva forming a line – clearly fast asleep.

Carefully walking past the guard, who was sleeping soundly and completely unaware, Qing Xia turned the corner to find another long corridor. Everything around was deathly quiet. Qing Xia quickly ran to the end, where behind a heavy iron door, she could faintly hear people speaking softly. At this point, running back to where the soldier was stationed would be too late, and moreover, the conversation of the two people behind the door might wake the guarding soldier. Turning to see a hidden door beside the corridor, she quickly moved over and reached out to open it.

She pulled hard, but the door didn’t budge at all – a secret lock? Such locks were rare in this era, and even when they existed, they were usually things like Five Elements and Eight Trigrams diagrams that took a lot of time to open. Seeing that the two people behind the door were about to come out, Qing Xia became anxious. She quickly pulled out a thin iron wire from her hair and inserted it into the keyhole.

It was hopeless – she couldn’t open it!

At this moment, the voices behind the main iron door were getting louder, but the small hidden door beside it showed no signs of opening. Qing Xia’s forehead began to perspire slightly. Suddenly there was a mechanical click! There was hope! Qing Xia was overjoyed, and the sound of the main door opening also came from behind.

With no choice, Qing Xia improvised and suddenly braced her leg against the main door while her hands worked frantically to open the secret lock on the small door!

“Huh? Why won’t it open?” the person behind the main door wondered softly.

“What’s wrong? Push harder,” another voice said – low, rough, and rhythmic in tone, clearly someone who had trained extensively.

“Click!” A light sound that seemed like heavenly music to Qing Xia’s ears. She quickly opened the small door, slipped inside, and simultaneously released the leg that had been bracing the main door.

Just as Qing Xia closed the small door, a heavy opening sound came from the main door. Qing Xia didn’t dare even breathe. She heard the person outside say in a low voice: “It might be that after so long, the door has rusted shut.”

The other person agreed: “That must be it. If His Highness hadn’t been so alert, having us seal the main door and use this rarely-used side door instead, yesterday those desperate Qi people might have actually succeeded.”

Qing Xia was startled upon hearing this. Had Qi people come to the prison yesterday to rescue someone, only to fail? No wonder Chu Li had been so busy lately that he was nowhere to be seen. Having imprisoned the Qi Prince, his days must be difficult too. While she was thinking, the footsteps of those two people approached. Qing Xia’s scalp tingled – surely these two weren’t coming into this room? How unlucky could she be!

“Huh? Why won’t it open again?” the previous person said in confusion, his voice rather exasperated.

“Did you take the wrong key?” Since Qing Xia’s iron wire was tightly holding the mechanism, they naturally couldn’t open it.

The other person said rather glumly: “That can’t be right, I didn’t take the wrong one.”

“Forget it, let’s go back and check again. The food will be thrown back at us broken anyway, so there’s no rush.”

The main door opened again, and the two gradually walked away. Qing Xia was delighted – could the entrance to where Prince An was imprisoned actually be in this room? After looking around, she easily found the entrance. An underground passage was clearly visible before her. Qing Xia repaired the mechanism of the hidden door’s lock so those two wouldn’t be suspicious when they returned and couldn’t open it, then went down the tunnel entrance.

Cold air immediately hit her face. Qing Xia instantly knew this passage must lead directly underground – otherwise it wouldn’t be so cold. Southern Chu’s prison was indeed ingeniously constructed – the main entrance was blocked, the side door was remote and hard to find, and the tall building was just for show. The real prison was underground. If not for her good luck today, she might have really been fooled.

After walking about a thousand steps, Qing Xia calculated silently – it was a full hundred meters deep, and she couldn’t help feeling awed. Suddenly, bright lights appeared ahead. Qing Xia hid in the dim lighting of the tunnel, looking toward a brightly lit corridor. Her heart immediately sank like ice – she finally understood why Chu Li was so confident. This was where Prince An was imprisoned, but getting in would be harder than ascending to heaven.

In the short corridor, lights blazed brightly. The entire corridor was only about twenty meters long, yet it had fourteen guards wearing Iron Buddha Royal Guard uniforms patrolling back and forth. With such defenses, never mind a person – even a fly would find it crowded getting in. The only way to enter would be to eliminate all fourteen men. Not to mention whether Qing Xia had the skills and ability to do so, just the question of whether killing these people would alert those above and bring down more guards was a huge problem.

Time slowly passed. Just as Qing Xia was despairing and thinking of charging in for a desperate fight, footsteps echoed behind her. Qing Xia quickly straightened her body, hid in the shadows of the lights, and held her breath.

The two people ahead walked while chatting – they were the same two who had been locked out by Qing Xia earlier, and behind them were actually six more soldiers wearing the same Iron Buddha military uniforms.

A bold plan immediately came to mind. Qing Xia was delighted and took out several prepared stones from her pocket. Counting down silently, she suddenly shot one out with a “bang.” The man walking in front stumbled and fell heavily to the ground, immediately toppling the torches on both sides. Qing Xia moved with lightning speed, instantly flashing behind the last person. Her dagger immediately struck, piercing the artery. The man only convulsed once before dying instantly.