Yu Jiuling had been absent all this while because Li Chi had sent him to fetch someone.
The golden-armored warrior was impervious to blades and spears. The moment Li Chi realized he couldn’t handle the man, he’d dispatched Yu Jiuling to go for help. Against this kind of heavy-armored fighter, swords and sabers were essentially useless — only overwhelming blunt force would matter.
When Yu Jiuling stepped aside and Miss Ruoling came flying in, the golden-armored warrior’s fate arrived with her.
After her headlong charge, Miss Ruolin slid forward a step. Her great hammer completed a full revolution, gathering tremendous force, and came crashing down on the back of the golden-armored warrior’s skull.
The hammer fell. A dull, heavy boom rang out.
Whatever the golden helmet was forged from, it could not withstand a blow like a mountain collapsing onto it. The hammer struck squarely on the back of the golden-armored warrior’s head. Helmet and skull caved in together.
A wet, splattering sound.
The helmet burst apart. Brain matter and fragments of shattered bone shot outward like crossbow bolts, spraying in every direction.
The girl brought the hammer down — and then stood there, dazed.
A moment later, Miss Ruoling let out a cry, flung the hammer aside, covered her eyes, and fled.
Li Chi quickly told Yu Jiuling to go after her. Gao Xining came running from behind as well, and the two of them helped Miss Ruoling away.
Li Chi looked down at the golden-armored warrior. What had been his skull was barely recognizable as one anymore — completely caved in, caved in and shattered.
Not just the skull. There was a crater in the ground beneath him. The stone slab at the point of impact had cracked and split, with fracture lines radiating outward in all directions. Further out, the flagstones had broken into large chunks. The closer to the center, the smaller the pieces. At the very point of impact, the stone had been pulverized to something resembling powder.
When that blow fell, Dantai Yajing saw it. His mouth dropped open wide enough to fit a large goose egg.
When that blow fell, Dantai Qi also saw it. His mouth dropped open wide enough to fit an entire large white goose.
Father and son were simultaneously struck dumb.
Nearby, Sanding was fighting his way out. Seeing the golden-armored warrior dead, he knew this phase of the plan had all but failed. Even the Shenshe assassins lying in ambush further on had little chance of succeeding now — so at this moment, his best possible outcome was simply to escape if luck permitted.
In truth, he hadn’t known the Yuezhi delegation would act.
This had become an inexplicable tangle of schemes.
And the Yuezhi envoy Pangdi hadn’t known that Sanding’s people would act either.
Had the two of them known of each other’s plans, they would likely have sat down to work things out carefully, and today’s situation might have grown considerably more complicated.
As Sanding fought his way out, he glanced around — and found that the Black Wu man had already vanished without a trace.
Perhaps from the very moment the fighting broke out, that Black Wu man had already slipped away. And almost certainly, he had left smiling.
And so in this moment, Sanding suddenly understood: the Black Wu man had never truly cared whether Dantai Qi lived or died.
The Black Wu man had only wanted to see this situation unfold.
Whether Dantai Qi died or not, so long as the assassination attempt had happened — the relationship between the Western Realm nations and the Chu border army would inevitably change.
Even if Dantai Qi survived unharmed, what the Black Wu man had wanted to see had already been seen.
An assassination attempt doesn’t land in a lake like a stone that causes ripples and then goes still. It would set off a tsunami — a catastrophe — a war between the nations and the Chu border army.
When that came to pass, the nations of the Western Realm would split into two factions: one siding with the Yuezhi and Maoli kingdoms, the other siding with Chu’s border forces. Once each side had chosen their allegiance, countless soldiers would be drawn into that vast conflict — while the Black Wu man sat to one side and watched with great satisfaction.
For the Maoli and Yuezhi, only by killing Dantai Qi would their plan succeed.
But for the Black Wu man, whether Dantai Qi died or not, so long as the fighting started, their plan was already a success.
Yet for Sanding, only now coming to this realization, there was no retreat — and no way back to where things began.
The only thing he could do now was escape as quickly as possible.
But just as he had charged a few steps forward, someone appeared before him — a young Central Plains man who looked quite youthful.
“Get out of my way!”
Sanding roared.
He was the foremost battle commander of Maoli — though his status as foremost had come not from being the strongest fighter, but from being the greatest contributor in the succession struggle that brought Qihuali to power. Still, since he’d once had the capability to lead troops into the royal palace first, he was not to be taken lightly.
In his roar, Sanding threw a punch straight at the face of the young man blocking his path. Aimed directly at his features — if it landed, that impossibly handsome face would be made unrecognizably ugly.
Of course it didn’t land.
Because the young man in front of him was Tang Pidi — one of a kind, in heaven and on earth, the only one of his kind in all existence.
Tang Pidi hadn’t moved from his position from the start, precisely because he’d been waiting to capture the ringleader. The strategy of capturing the chief first — it was the most effective approach in almost every situation.
*Smack!*
Sanding’s fist struck Tang Pidi’s open palm. Tang Pidi spread his five fingers wide to receive the blow, then closed them into a grip around Sanding’s fist. He exerted force, twisting and pulling in one motion — *crack* — and Sanding’s wrist bone snapped.
In the next instant, Tang Pidi drove a kick into Sanding’s chest. The sheer force of that kick was enough to make anyone watching draw a sharp breath.
But Sanding’s hand was still held in Tang Pidi’s grip as that kick launched forward — even as Tang Pidi’s hand simultaneously wrenched backward.
*Wet tearing.*
Sanding’s arm was ripped clean from his body.
In the next instant, Tang Pidi raised the severed arm in his grip and swung it like a club — sweeping it horizontally across Sanding’s face.
Tang Pidi tossed the severed arm aside, then casually reached out and took a long spear from the hands of a nearby armored soldier.
One hand on the spear. He drove the tip downward.
*Thud.*
The long spear pierced through Sanding’s left shoulder, pinning him to the ground. The tip drove through the stone slab and deep into the earth below.
Dantai Qi, watching from a distance, showed little change in expression — yet the shock in his heart had surpassed anything words could measure.
All these years he’d called his own son arrogant and overbearing, but how could any father not feel pride at his son’s exceptional qualities?
He knew very well how outstanding his son was. Among Liangzhou’s younger generation, Dantai Yajing truly had no equal.
Yet everything he had witnessed today had made one thing clear to Dantai Qi: his son Dantai Yajing fell short of Tang Pidi — and fell short of Li Chi as well.
Sanding was pinned to the ground but had suffered no mortal wound, so despite his severed arm and the spear through his body, he could not die — only lie there screaming in agony.
Just then, a contingent of personal guards withdrew from the rear courtyard — clearly wounded men, their armor soaked with blood. The unit commander among them called out: “Report! There are still large numbers of assassins in the rear courtyard!”
Dantai Yajing glanced around the front courtyard. The situation was under control, so he turned and headed toward the rear.
The returning guards all appeared wounded, each man’s armor bearing damage — clearly the fighting in the rear courtyard had been just as brutal.
Dantai Qi looked over the wounded. “All of you, go have your injuries treated.”
The unit commander stepped forward. “On one of the assassins, we found this item. General — it looks like a key to the back gate of the Commander’s Estate.”
Those words gave pause to many who heard them.
If an assassin had been found carrying a key to the back gate of the Commander’s Estate — had someone inside truly been bought off?
The commander approached and handed the item to Dantai Qi. As Dantai Qi lowered his head to examine it, the commander’s other hand suddenly thrust toward him.
A dagger had been concealed in the man’s sleeve. As he drew near, it slid free. He seized it — and drove it straight toward Dantai Qi’s heart.
Dantai Qi’s brow gave the faintest twitch. He shot out a hand and seized the man’s wrist.
“I could see something was off about you long before this!”
At that same moment, Dantai Yajing’s shout rang out — he had returned. In one sweeping slash, he struck the unit commander’s head from his shoulders.
The head flew. The blood from the severed neck fountained outward like a geyser, forming an almost misting cloud of crimson.
Dantai Yajing passed through the blood mist and returned to Dantai Qi’s side. “Father, be careful — these assassins excel at disguise, and there’s no way to guard against them completely.”
Dantai Qi nodded. He looked at Dantai Yajing. “You don’t need to stay here — go and continue pursuing those assassins.”
“Yes, Father.”
Dantai Yajing acknowledged the order, turned to leave — then suddenly spun back around. The dagger in his hand drove into Dantai Qi’s chest with a wet thrust.
The very instant the dagger plunged in, Li Chi had already been sprinting toward them. Unable to reach in time, he leaped into the air and drove both feet into Dantai Yajing’s body.
Dantai Yajing tumbled and rolled away — and as he did, the dagger was wrenched from Dantai Qi’s chest. The color drained instantly from Dantai Qi’s face.
Li Chi rose and moved quickly after him. One kick knocked the dagger from Dantai Yajing’s hand. A second kick drove toward Dantai Yajing’s temple.
Dantai Yajing raised his other arm to shield his temple. He blocked it, but the force of the kick still sent him skidding sideways.
He used that same kick to put distance between them — rolled to his feet, and made immediately for the exit without looking back.
He had only just reached the gate when the real Dantai Yajing came running back from the rear courtyard.
The two Dantai Yajings came face to face.
Li Chi did not pursue. Instead he steadied Dantai Qi and helped him sit, then tore open Dantai Qi’s robe to examine the wound.
Blood was flowing freely — welling out in pulses — and the depth was impossible to tell. But Li Chi let out a quiet breath of relief.
If the heart itself had truly been pierced, General Dantai would likely be failing already by now.
“Fetch the medical officer!”
Li Chi called out.
At the gate, the two Dantai Yajings faced each other for a brief moment. The one who had stabbed Dantai Qi immediately turned and ran. The real Dantai Yajing gave chase — two figures running one behind the other, and for a moment the people in the courtyard were all too stunned to react.
Amid the chase, Tang Pidi appeared suddenly from the side and drove a punch into the fleeing Dantai Yajing’s neck.
The force of that single blow would have toppled a charging ox, let alone a man. The false Dantai Yajing flipped sideways through the air and turned half a revolution — testament enough to the fist’s power. His head struck the ground and he rolled once more before lying flat, scraping along the ground for a full ten feet before coming to a stop. He convulsed a few times and went still.
This was the real Dantai Yajing holding back. Had he not, the punch would have simply killed the man.
A single blow, and the impostor lay unconscious. The state of his injuries needed no elaboration.
The real Dantai Yajing rushed to the figure’s side, pressed his fingers across the man’s face for a moment, then yanked sharply — tearing away a mask.
Beneath the mask was a face that was somehow unsettling even at a glance, enough to make Dantai Yajing’s expression shift.
The man was pallid — likely from Tang Pidi’s blow — and he had no beard, no eyebrows, not a single hair on his head.
This kind of appearance had clearly been deliberately crafted for the purpose of disguise and transformation.
Dantai Yajing seized the man’s collar and tore it open. Inside, as expected, was a set of black night-infiltration garments, and at the collar was a clearly visible pattern of a soaring cloud.
Recalling the Shenshe assassin who had taken poison and died earlier, Dantai Yajing tore away this man’s collar as well.
When the pinned Sanding saw that even this man had failed, he exhaled a long, slow breath. The last flicker of hope in his eyes went dark.
*This* man had been the true killing blow of the day.
*This* man was the first-tier Shenshe assassin sent by the Soaring Cloud Passage.
It would not be wrong to call everything before this — every earlier assassination attempt — mere preparation. All of it staged so that this first-tier Shenshe assassin could deliver a single, certain, killing strike.
Had Li Chi not been at Dantai Qi’s side. Had Dantai Qi not been a battle-hardened veteran with lightning reflexes — perhaps today’s assassination might truly have succeeded.
—