Eyes black and white and distinct, filled with murderous intent.
The Embroidered Guard Chief walked over impassively, his wide sleeves dropping down to block the corpse’s eyes as something fell down.
His other hand stopped the giant, then he gently pushed with his foot, moving the two corpses away. “Don’t kick them. What if you kick off some arm or leg? Wouldn’t that disgust you? Besides, these are our comrades. If we can’t properly collect their bodies, must we also desecrate them?”
The giant sheepishly withdrew his foot and turned to search in another direction.
The Embroidered Guard Chief looked down.
On the ice surface, several blood-soaked characters glowed ghastly in the moonlight.
“Kill them.”
The Embroidered Guard Chief raised his eyelids, ground the characters away with his toe, and walked off.
But he didn’t go far, just wandered nearby. Whenever someone searched and approached this area, he would lead them away.
The few searchers were mainly looking for caves, cracks, and other paths on the ice waterfall. People all have mental blind spots—they didn’t want to look closely at the various grotesque corpses, and with so many bodies around, they formed the concept that “this place is full of corpses.” They all tried to avoid the bodies, never thinking to search among them.
After searching everywhere without success, the Embroidered Guard Chief said: “Then it seems they had already slid down and escaped earlier.”
Those who had been on the ice waterfall immediately said: “Right, right, I saw them slide down.”
Those below the ice waterfall were displeased and were about to say they clearly hadn’t seen anyone slide down, when those above said: “Perhaps they had already run off before you slid down. How could you have intercepted them? Or would you rather search this ice waterfall again?”
Those below the ice waterfall immediately fell silent.
“Since that’s the case,” the Embroidered Guard Chief said, “this is not your fault. Return and report, await your masters’ orders. Besides, we don’t know the extent of the Great Prince’s injuries—we should be at his side protecting him.”
No one wanted to stay in this ghastly place any longer, so they all agreed in chorus and left together with the Embroidered Guard Chief.
Cold wind swept across the ice surface. The post-battle battlefield was like a pit of ten thousand corpses.
One corpse half-knelt on the ground, its gaping mouth still frozen in its final dying cry.
Beneath this corpse, two bodies nestled together suddenly moved.
Murong Yi slowly rose, struggling to help Tie Ci up.
In the moonlight his face was pale, looking even worse than the corpse behind him.
He released the hand that had been pressed against Tie Ci’s back, felt her temperature and pulse, breathed a slight sigh of relief, then collapsed backward, sitting right on the corpse. He didn’t mind, casually resting his arm on the dead man’s leg: “Brother, I’m really tired, let me borrow your leg.”
Then he opened the pouch in his palm—the one the Embroidered Guard Chief had dropped to him—and took out a pill.
The pill was golden in color, emanating a rich fragrance that invigorated the spirit just by smelling it.
There was only one pill. Not because the Embroidered Guard Chief was stingy, but because this medicine was inherently rare. Even with his grandfather’s wealth and connections, he hadn’t been able to obtain many. This one had been specifically left with the Embroidered Guard Chief for emergencies.
Without hesitation, Murong Yi pushed the pill into Tie Ci’s mouth.
But Tie Ci’s teeth were clenched tight. Murong Yi chuckled: “Who are you guarding against?” He lowered his head and pressed his lips to hers.
The touch beneath his lips was ice-cold. His heart ached, and a fierce look flashed in his eyes. He simply used his tongue tip to pry open her teeth.
His tongue tip nimbly coiled around hers, pushing the pill into her throat, but he still wouldn’t let go, seeking her tongue tip and sucking it delicately.
His kiss wasn’t urgent or greedy, but delicate and careful, measuring every fraction with his tongue tip, savoring the slight sweetness that belonged to her. His nose tip gently pressed against hers, and even every breath sounded in his heart like celestial music.
Because he knew this moment of unguarded closeness might be brief—every moment that passed was one less moment remaining. This touch of lips and teeth was so precious that after today, perhaps tomorrow there would never be another chance.
The northern wind was biting cold against their faces, but where they touched was warm and moist. He took from her inch by inch, like standing in a frozen snow forest of ten thousand fathoms yet raising his head toward the willow-filled southern shore of spring—southward, always southward.
A slight tickle on his cheek—her eyelashes were fluttering slightly. The medicine was taking effect; she was about to wake.
Reluctantly he released her lips, and also released the hand that had been pressed against her back again.
His face grew even paler, pale to the point of transparency, revealing the faint blue blood vessels at his temples. But this made his features appear even more intensely beautiful, his eyes like they had absorbed the night’s darkness, cold and deep as an abyss.
If Tie Ci opened her eyes now, she would know that Rong Wei was not Murong Yi either—the Eighteenth Prince of Liaodong, with ice and snow as his divinity, and the dark night as his eyes.
The small pouch also contained an iron fan. After his capture, everything on him had been searched and confiscated. Something like an iron fan naturally couldn’t be left with him. The hairpin was only left because it was necessary for binding his hair, and after careful inspection it was indeed just an ordinary hairpin.
Something as sensitive as an iron fan—he wondered how the Embroidered Guard Chief had managed to obtain it.
He used the iron fan to slash, and the ice surface cracked. Holding Tie Ci, he dropped beneath the ice layer, and when falling he even dragged over the big brother who had lent him his leg to block the crack.
The big brother half-knelt over the crack with his mouth open in a cry, seeming to accuse someone of their unconscionable behavior.
This was where the ice waterfall turned and dropped in layers, leaving a small space that could barely hide two people, though they could easily slide down.
Murong Yi sat on the outer edge, stretching his legs to block Tie Ci from sliding down if there was water on the ground. Then he began removing her golden armor.
The golden armor looked heavy but was actually quite light. If not for all the modifications, it should have been even lighter.
This must be her master’s masterpiece. He wondered who her master was. When Murong Yi wasn’t certain of Tie Ci’s identity, he had been very curious about this elder she spoke of with such reverence, always feeling this person was supremely talented—why wasn’t their reputation known? After learning Tie Ci’s identity, this curiosity turned into vague wariness and unease. Tie Ci probably hadn’t hidden her identity from her master, so was everything this mysterious master did—daring to privately teach the imperial heir and cultivating her with all their strength—truly unrelated to her identity? Was their wholehearted support of Tie Ci truly purely out of selfless master-disciple affection?
Murong Yi came from Da Qian’s most powerful, strongest, and most ruthlessly competitive royal family. He found it hard to believe such pure, unrewarded master-disciple sentiment existed in this world.
After all, judging from her master’s modifications of various items and even armor, this didn’t seem like an otherworldly sage indifferent to fame and fortune.
His gaze fell on the golden armor. Looking carefully, he could see that some of the minute connecting points were all carved with extremely exquisite imperial inscriptions—golden and brilliant, supremely noble.
Having been busy with assassination and escaping pursuit, he hadn’t had time to think carefully about previous events. Now, blinded by this golden light, he felt Tie Ci’s identity more deeply than ever before, and many thoughts involuntarily flashed through his mind.
“If I were to have such a good match with the Imperial Crown Princess, I’d just kill her.”
“That would be my wife—of course I’d keep her close to my heart. Close to my heart isn’t enough—I’d have to put her on the altar, in the shrine, on the tombstone. That’s what I call keeping her close to heart.”
“Whoever tries to obstruct my dreams, I’ll kick them aside… no matter who it is.”
“The Eighteenth Prince is supremely talented, the Imperial Crown Princess is a young girl in her spring—writing a few love letters isn’t strange.”
“If I really don’t like her, I’ll just kill her.”
“Isn’t the Imperial Crown Princess just a waste!”
“Both ugly and useless!”
Each sentence slapped him in the face like a door panel.
The tears of regret flowing down his face now were the water that had entered his brain when he was spouting nonsense before.
He suddenly raised his hand and gave himself a crisp slap.
The sound seemed to disturb Tie Ci, and she stirred.
Murong Yi quickly pressed on her neck and forcibly put her back to sleep.
“Don’t, don’t look at me. I have no face now, can’t be seen.”
Tie Ci seemed to resist physical contact even in her coma, uncomfortably shifting away.
Murong Yi’s hand rested beside her neck, suddenly remembering that this person before him had originally been his fiancée, but now he was an unrelated man.
“…When the Imperial Crown Princess returns, how could she bear to let go of someone as handsome and outstanding as me? Hasn’t she been rejected enough in broken engagements? This time she absolutely won’t agree easily!”
“…After falling in love with me at first sight, she withstood enormous family pressure and her parents’ various punishments and tears, insisting on breaking off her previous well-matched engagement. After a year of arduous struggle, today she finally succeeded!”
What to do—he wanted to slap himself again.
Once there was a dream marriage placed before me. I only needed to do nothing and it would be mine, but I personally pushed it away! Then I turned around and discovered the wind had changed direction, and the person had been blown farther and farther away.
Murong Yi sighed and looked up at the sky.
Heaven, this isn’t how you should toy with people.
After sighing for a long time, he found another ginseng pill in the bundle, put it in Tie Ci’s mouth, pressed one hand against her back and one on her chest, and cleanly pulled out the blade.
Tie Ci’s body jerked, and blood sprayed all over Murong Yi’s head and face.
He didn’t bother wiping it off, using prepared cloth from the bundle to press the wound, apply medicine, and bandage it. He tore her undergarment into strips and bound it tightly.
Finally he removed his own clean inner robe and put it on her, then built a fire beside her.
After finishing everything, Murong Yi was covered in sweat and exhaled deeply.
Good—he shouldn’t have injured any internal organs.
This definitely wasn’t luck. It must have been her exceptional reflexes, slightly moving her body at that moment to avoid all the organs.
Then he bandaged his own wounds, took some medicine, didn’t meditate to regulate his breathing, and sat beside Tie Ci, quietly watching her.
He watched for a long time, very intently, as if watching so long and hard could redeem all the longing from before and after.
Then he found flares in the back of the golden armor, left the crack, confirmed there were no more pursuers nearby and his father’s group had left, and only then set off the flares.
After setting off the flares, he returned to the crack and used his dagger to write on the nearby ice surface: “I saved you, don’t forget me.”
Then he looked at Tie Ci one last time, turned around, and slowly coughing, walked out of the crack.
Not long after he left, with a crack, the ice layer above couldn’t withstand the weight of the half-kneeling dead soldier and suddenly split again. The corpse tumbled down, landing right above those words.
The corpse’s knee shattered the ice surface, and a small amount of pale blood flowed out, making the characters illegible.
The corpse leaned back slightly, still with its mouth open, seeming to mock the distance.
…
On the plain, Xia Houchun leaped among the crowd in the distance, continuously waving flags.
Di Yiwei suddenly said: “Pass my order—all infantry who haven’t fallen, remove armor and strip off cotton clothes!”
Everyone stared at her blankly.
Fighting in this bitter cold, removing iron armor and cotton clothes—was this to offer themselves up to be slaughtered or freeze to death?
But Di Yiwei’s orders could never be disobeyed. Those who had disobeyed now had grass three feet high on their graves.
With one command, the infantry who hadn’t fallen began removing their clothes. Then Di Yiwei ordered the Scorpion Battalion to remove their armor and give it to the infantry to change into.
All Abyss Iron weapons were assigned to the Scorpion Battalion, who would be at the front lines responsible for protecting the entire army.
In the distance, Xia Houchun tore off a Liaodong soldier’s clothes and wrote the two characters “bells.”
Di Yiwei already understood.
But she showed no emotion, only saying: “Now we can retreat.”
The officers were stunned again.
They had found the cause of the poison’s activation and controlled it. The Blood Cavalry and Scorpion Battalion’s strength remained. With the remaining infantry, they might not be unable to fight. Why hadn’t they retreated during the most dangerous moment earlier, but were retreating now instead?
With this retreat, wouldn’t the Liaodong soldiers pursue their victory? With morale ebbing and flowing, their already slim chances would be nearly gone.
But the commander’s orders couldn’t be disobeyed. The messenger waved the retreat flags, and the entire army began withdrawing.
Liaodong soldiers were always fierce. Losing two major generals hadn’t made them retreat, nor had they understood why the Da Qian soldiers removed their cotton clothes. Seeing them retreat now, they assumed they were defeated and fleeing, immediately pursuing relentlessly.
They passed over the Da Qian soldiers’ corpses and followed Da Qian’s retreat toward the Five-Color Plain.
The previous battle had been on the west side of the Five-Color Plain. This time it was on the east side, where the terrain was gentler with fewer mounds, more sandy soil, and more streams. Under Di Yiwei’s command, the soldiers strangely didn’t walk on the mounds but preferred to run wildly stepping on the icy streams.
This made them appear even more panicked, causing the Liaodong officers and soldiers to laugh heartily. Some noticed that a small number of Scorpion Battalion troops hadn’t retreated but were being led by the Blood Cavalry along the army’s flanks toward the rear. But because there were so few, they couldn’t form an encirclement, so no one paid attention.
Di Yiwei stayed to retreat last. Dan Shuang and Qi Yuansi refused to retreat: “Commander, we still haven’t found the Imperial Crown Princess!”
“If we can’t find her, it means she’s run far away!” Di Yiwei said calmly. “Leave now, don’t interfere with my encirclement. This is a military order!”
Dan Shuang: “You’ve retreated everyone—what are you going to encircle with!”
Qi Yuansi glared angrily: “Something clearly went wrong in that earlier formation, but you ignored it. You’ve failed the Imperial Crown Princess!”
“Victory and the safety of the army are the best repayment to her. I believe she has the fate to enjoy it.” Di Yiwei waved her pipe lightly. “Those who won’t leave—knock them out and carry them away!”
Rong Pu, who had been rescued, came over and knocked out both of them with one needle each.
He carried a large bundle and calmly handed it to Di Yiwei: “Commander, these are some pills. There wasn’t time to develop an antidote, but these pills can temporarily suppress the toxicity in case of further accidents.”
“Supervisor Rong, everything is fine here. I need you to travel again, catch up with the three armies heading to Cang Tian Pass. No matter what method you use, today’s events cannot be repeated.”
“I can accept the commander’s orders, but I have one request.”
“Speak.”
“I want the commander to immediately assign people to search for the Imperial Crown Princess, and from now on always prioritize the Imperial Crown Princess.”
“Before departure, the Imperial Crown Princess told me this journey was for personal desires, and she didn’t want any Da Qian military personnel to be harmed because of her private affairs. If she couldn’t resolve it herself, sending the army would be a waste of lives. So regardless of success or failure, she told me not to worry about her. I agreed to this.” Di Yiwei looked into Rong Pu’s eyes. “But I respect her public spirit and righteousness, and I can equally agree to you. I’ll send people to find her right now.”
“Let her see your victory and loyalty.”
“Good.”
Rong Pu set down the bundle. Di Yiwei summoned others to escort him from the battlefield to Cang Tian Pass. Xia Houchun was Tie Ci’s guard commander and would lead the guards in searching for Tie Ci.
When Rong Pu left hurriedly, he didn’t even have time to wipe the sweat and bloody mud from his body.
The Da Qian soldiers had already charged into the Five-Color Plain, splashing up large amounts of ice water. But this wasn’t a good retreat direction—the Five-Color Plain connected to cliffs on both sides, wide outside but narrow inside, with a small exit ahead. It would take a long time for the army to pass through and they could easily be caught up.
Soon, the Liaodong army came charging over in dark masses.
Like locusts covering the sky, they rushed onto the Five-Color Plain in a blink. But they couldn’t step on water in winter, so naturally they all leaped onto the sandy mounds.
Just at this moment.
Di Yiwei suddenly let out a sharp whistle.
“Boom boom boom boom”—countless sandy mounds suddenly exploded. Black and yellow figures burst from the ground like poisonous scorpions, blade light snow-bright around them, covering the vast Five-Color Plain.
The Liaodong soldiers who had just stepped onto the sandy mounds were caught completely off guard, watching helplessly as the blade light came from below, like white silk, and felt a chill below.
Some bodies continued charging forward while their heads remained in place.
Some were split in half mid-air, blood raining down with a splash.
More had their feet severed by the ghostly ground-hugging blade light, crying out as they fell and tripped even more comrades. The fallen were then held down by those black and yellow figures who gently drew across their throats.
The intermittent streams between the sand mounds also turned red, gleaming with oily light.
At Di Yiwei’s command, the infantry without poison symptoms and the Blood Cavalry patrolling nearby turned around and charged.
Sandy mounds kept exploding continuously—boom after boom—accompanied by black and yellow figures shooting out and cold white blade light spinning, truly like scorpions emerging from the sand with their venomous tails raised.
Only now did Xia Houchun and others understand why the unit was called Scorpion Battalion.
This was the true Scorpion Battalion.
Fierce, cunning, venomous, skilled at concealment, rolling out from underground.
No one had imagined that the Scorpion Battalion could actually lurk beneath the sand.
This was also why Di Yiwei chose the Five-Color Plain as the location to lure the enemy—seemingly disadvantageous terrain.
The tide of victory immediately reversed.
But this wasn’t the end.
The Liaodong officers and soldiers had their courage destroyed by this round of killing. After heavy casualties, someone finally shouted and fled backward. No matter how the officers shouted from behind or the military police pursued and killed, it was useless.
However, after those people rushed out of the Five-Color Plain, they suddenly stopped again. The fastest group suddenly let out a cry—heart-rending and desperate—and turned to run again!