Xiao Xueya: “…”

Who said the Crown Princess was benevolent, wise, magnanimous, and virtuous?

They must have misspelled “lacking virtue.”

Tie Ci picked up the plate and smiled as she handed it to the attendant on her right: “Go, take this to General Manager.”

The attendant carried the plate over.

Qi Lingyuan glanced at Xiao Xueya’s slightly cracking expression, withdrew his gaze, and looked at Tie Ci. Tie Ci stroked her teacup and said sincerely: “Prefect Qi, I know it’s not easy being a parent official here. If you have any difficulties, take this opportunity to bring them up with me.”

“Thank you for Your Highness’s consideration.” Qi Lingyuan cupped his hands, “Xi Zhou has lax customs, many insect disasters, and excessively hot climate. Crops often fail, so we need court relief every year. This official is deeply ashamed. However, fortunately, since taking office in Xi Zhou, I have managed to govern diligently with support from all quarters, maintaining stability in this region without daring to trouble Your Highness further.”

“It’s naturally best if there are none.” Tie Ci praised, “The prefect carries out Heaven’s will above and comforts the ten thousand people below—your toil and merit are great. I toast you.”

Qi Lingyuan’s face lit up with radiance. He hurriedly raised his cup first and drained it: “Your Highness is too kind!”

Tie Ci’s teacup rested at her lips as she took a light sip.

Qi Lingyuan set down his wine cup with a satisfied smile.

Tie Ci also smiled, looking at him with an almost benevolent expression.

No matter how composed Qi Lingyuan was, being stared at so benevolently became unbearable, and he couldn’t help asking: “Why does Your Highness look at this official so?”

Tie Ci smiled: “Watching to see when you’ll collapse.”

“…”

After deathly silence, there was a crash as Qi Lingyuan suddenly overturned the table and retreated violently backward.

Behind him was originally a railing, and beyond that lake water, but at this moment the railing suddenly lowered, and he seemed about to fall into the lake.

However, as soon as his body rose, his legs went soft and he collapsed, while his raised hands also fell powerlessly.

He fell to the ground, looking up at Tie Ci in panic, his awkward face already turned iron-blue: “You… how did you…”

“How does the doctored wine taste?” Tie Ci asked gently.

Qi Lingyuan suddenly twisted his head to look at his own wine cup.

He was also a clever man and immediately understood: “You switched…”

Tie Ci smiled: “The wine was fine—the problem was in the water. Bringing up such a disgusting plate was meant to tempt me to drink water, so I conveniently had you drink some too.”

Her using the insects to tease Xiao Xueya was actually to divert Qi Lingyuan’s attention. In the instant Qi Lingyuan turned to look at Xiao Xueya, she teleported over and poured some tea into Qi Lingyuan’s wine.

She sent away the right attendant to prevent her from possibly seeing and exposing this.

The left attendant seemed to have favorable feelings toward her, so she kept her. Sure enough, the left attendant had no reaction.

Tie Ci wasn’t afraid of her calling out either, but since she didn’t, the other party’s position was clear.

She had even given Qi Lingyuan one last chance, but unfortunately he was determined to court death.

So she had no choice but to treat him to wine.

As for Xiao Xueya’s side, he never drank alcohol anyway, and in the insects Tie Ci had sent over, the bamboo worms in the plate spelled out the character for “water.”

Xiao Xueya wasn’t a fool—naturally he wouldn’t touch that water.

Qi Lingyuan struggled to crawl toward the water, suddenly smashing a nearby dish: “Attack!”

Before his words fell, countless water splashes erupted from the lake, sword qi like rainbows rushing toward the pavilion in the center of the lake.

On one side of the stone platform, the attendant who had delivered the insects also changed expression, drew with her backhand, cold light like snow hanging inverted above Xiao Xueya’s head.

A figure flashed—Tie Ci was already on top of the pavilion, holding Qi Lingyuan in her hand, with Chi Xue and Dan Shuang standing beside her.

The attendant who had shown favor turned and jumped into the lake.

Tie Ci stamped her foot, and the pavilion collapsed with a crash.

This buried several assassins who had rushed into the pavilion.

With a splash, the attendant who had attacked Xiao Xueya was kicked into the lake by him, her body bending in mid-air as blood sprayed wildly.

Tie Ci stood atop the pavilion ruins, holding Qi Lingyuan up for display to those in the lake.

Those who were about to rush out froze in the water.

Qi Lingyuan roared: “Don’t worry about me! Kill them! Avenge my son—”

Accompanying his shouts, whistles sounded continuously as more figures rushed out from the courtyard.

But before those figures could step onto the platform, whooshing sounds cut through the sky. Black arrows exploded into countless blood flowers at the assassins’ backs. Some arrows continued through bodies to pin into the stone platform. The platform cracked in all directions, filled with blood, looking from afar like a shattered blood arrow extending toward the lake center.

Tie Ci stood at the arrowhead of this blood arrow, slowly saying to the shocked Qi Lingyuan: “Who is your son?”

“You killed him!”

“I’ve killed many people.” Tie Ci said, “Speak up and die understanding.”

Qi Lingyuan only stared at her with blood-red eyes. Tie Ci felt even more awkward.

“Then I’ll guess.” Tie Ci said, “The one who tried to poison me a few days ago and was ultimately killed in the river—was that your son?”

Qi Lingyuan said hoarsely: “Wasn’t it you who harmed him!”

Tie Ci shook her head: “He was silenced by someone. As for who silenced him, you should be able to guess. I just don’t understand—as a branch member of the Qi family, how could you willingly be used by others? Your son was at least a young master—why would he personally risk tracking and assassinating me?”

The young servant who had been with Tan Xiuyue, who was killed after successfully poisoning and jumping into the water—at the time, the guards Tie Ci had sent back to investigate the Tan family hadn’t returned with a report, so Tie Ci didn’t know who he was. But now, combining this with Qi Lingyuan’s actions, she could guess the other party’s identity.

It was simple. This servant was recommended to Tan Xiuyue by her eldest aunt, meaning the Tan family had been tempted and bought in the capital, secretly bringing people to follow her southern inspection tour. This planted agent was planning to strike on the road, but when she left the main force, their plan was ruined, so they used Tan Xiuyue again and found a way to catch up with the ship. This showed the other party had considerable influence in the capital. Now this assassin was dead, and immediately Qi Lingyuan suddenly attacked her, claiming revenge for his son—who this son was became obvious.

But the Qi family was after all the former Chief Minister’s family, with several officials from main and branch lines in court. How did they get mixed up in these affairs?

However, Xi Zhou officials who could maintain their positions were likely colluding with local forces. The Qi family might be deeply involved.

Qi Lingyuan laughed bitterly: “You act perversely and ruin people’s futures. My son valued loyalty and righteousness, wanting to avenge his good brother, so he took action personally, only to be harmed by you, this treacherous person! Say no more—go ahead and strike, send me to reunite with my son!”

With that, he closed his eyes.

Tie Ci suddenly grabbed his hand and stuffed it into his mouth.

Qi Lingyuan screamed. His teeth, prepared to bite his tongue for suicide, clamped down hard, making his hand bleed profusely.

Xiao Xueya, who had rushed over, saw this with an indescribable expression.

He had seen responses to assassination attempts, but never seen a Crown Princess respond to assassination like this.

Call her careless—her vigilance was frighteningly high. Call her vigilant—she was completely relaxed, always handling everything with ease, toying with him while poisoning others, killing while joking, displaying a true composure of laughing and chatting while dispersing storms.

This was also the alertness and composure that could only be developed by someone who had weathered many storms.

Recalling her words about the Xiao family “not being human” and being “used to it,” Xiao Xueya felt even more conflicted.

Tie Ci impatiently threw Qi Lingyuan to the approaching guards: “Capture some alive for interrogation back on the ship.”

Qi Lingyuan suddenly let out unclear laughter.

“Return to the ship! You’ll never return to the ship again! Your ships, your soldiers, your people on the ships—they’re all gone now! All buried with my son!”

…

The Xi Zhou ferry was twenty li outside the city, surrounded by mountains with wilderness all around. Since the ferry had been cleared today, there were even fewer people about.

The river surface was completely calm, with over twenty warships connected end to end, almost filling the entire wide river.

The ships were also peaceful now, with the drilling navy returning to their cabins to sleep.

A sail appeared far off on the river.

It was a sizable ship, though only one, and by its design appeared to be an ordinary merchant vessel. The navy lookouts on the treasure ship were accustomed to such ships and paid little attention.

That ship gradually approached, appearing to ride low in the water.

The lookout soldiers on the treasure ship began signaling with flags and flares, indicating the other ship should not approach carelessly but stop one li away while they sent a small boat for inspection and to guide it around.

But the other ship acted as if it hadn’t heard and instead increased speed.

Many people suddenly appeared on the ship, windows snapping open along the hull as people threw black barrel-shaped objects overboard. This made the ship even faster.

The lookouts on the treasure ship were still confused—the other ship’s speed was incredible, a completely reckless charge. He had just sounded the whistle when that ship was already close.

At midnight, even with whistles, gathering troops quickly was impossible, but the treasure ship’s gunners were always at their posts. Xiao Xueya’s men were as bold and fearless as Xiao Xueya himself. The gunners immediately began loading gunpowder to fire a shot and be done with it.

But loading, igniting, and firing cannons took time. The gunner calculated that by the time they fired, the enemy ship would be very close, and if it exploded, fragments might damage the treasure ship.

But that was fine—the treasure ship wasn’t afraid of mere fragments.

As he bent to load gunpowder, he heard a tremendous howling sound from above, along with crackling sounds like fire burning.

Just as he was about to light the fuse, a hand suddenly pressed down on his. Looking up, he saw Mu Si’s stern face.

Mu Si was looking at Tie Ci’s ship.

That ship also had a cannon-like device, but it looked more like a giant slingshot. Just moments ago, when that ship had begun accelerating, the launching device had already been loaded with a huge burning fireball.

Now that fireball howled through the air, trailing a massive fiery tail, and slammed hard into the ship ahead.

“BOOM!”

The tremendous sound knocked the gunner to the ground, and even the solidly packed gunpowder in the cannon was shaken out, scattering everywhere.

The entire river seemed to shake. Everyone’s ears rang, unable to hear anything, seeing only rolling black smoke obscuring their vision and pressing down heavily, making them worry the sky had been punctured and was falling.

Then came searing hot wind hitting their faces, choking and suffocating. Someone stumbled to their feet and saw ahead on the water: raging fire reaching the sky, red light filling the river—the entire Fuguang River seemed to be burning.

Everyone was alarmed.

These were all people familiar with cannons and firearms. They all knew that to burn like this instantly, the ship must be full of fierce fire oil!

This was an oil ship planning to die together with them!

It intended to ram directly into the treasure ship, and after destroying it, could damage the other connected ships too.

Even if it couldn’t ram them, once the treasure ship fired at close range and it exploded, the result would be the same.

Fortunately, the Crown Princess’s ship had the fastest reaction, launching the fireball immediately and making the suicide ship explode outside the danger zone.

But the crisis wasn’t entirely over yet.

Many small fast boats rushed out from the burning ship like locusts, charging toward the warships on the river.

The people on those boats wore iron armor and held black tubes connected to huge wooden boxes fixed at the boat sterns, with pump-like devices behind the boxes.

Someone realized: “Fierce fire oil containers!”

Many of those boats were damaged or even burning, but the distance between them was already close—they could definitely crash into their targets before burning up.

There would be no time to escape.

If the iron chains were really all locked up.

But now, the enemy was just seeking death in vain.

A ship commander gave the order. With a clatter of chains, the disguised connections immediately released. The ships, with their disciplined and extremely flexible speed, turned, separated, and sailed away from the current area.

The suicide squad boats rushing forward like arrows suddenly found emptiness before them and fell into confusion.

The next instant, countless fireballs rained down from the sky.

For suicide squad boats loaded with fierce fire oil containers, this was disaster.

But they had gotten what they asked for anyway.

The river surface burned with countless fire points again, with continuous sounds of people falling into water accompanied by heart-rending screams.

The people on the warships showed no emotion, because if they hadn’t received the Crown Princess’s warning, hadn’t listened to her advice to secretly unlock the chains, hadn’t had her ship react quickly, they would be the ones struggling in the fire now.

And besides the ship full of fierce fire oil, the enemy had even prepared a second wave after being bombed, still sending a second wave of suicide boats fearlessly. This enemy would have destroyed the entire Nanyue navy that the General Manager had painstakingly built.

The entire navy looked gratefully toward Tie Ci’s ship.

Then their eyes widened in shock.

A small boat had somehow escaped the fireball attack and silently crashed into the Crown Princess’s ship from a tricky angle.

The suicide warrior on that boat instantly sprayed all the fierce fire oil and struck flint.

Flames shot up half the sky, surrounding the Crown Princess’s already small ship.

Fortunately, the people on the Crown Princess’s ship reacted quickly too, with those on deck jumping into the water to escape.

The soldiers on the treasure ship who had been bumping shoulders with Murong Yi’s men just two days before all lowered ropes to help.

With a splash, a figure shot up from the water surface, drawing a beautiful arc through the air and landing lightly on the treasure ship like a flying whale, earning sincere cheers from the soldiers.

Murong Yi turned on the ship to watch the burning vessel, a strange glint passing through his eyes.

Mu Si glanced at him.

He shook his head slightly.

Mu Si said: “Is everyone up? Let’s count heads now!”

The guards who came up and Murong Yi’s people each reported numbers. After counting, they all said everything was fine—no one left on the ship.

Suddenly loud banging and cries for help came from that ship.

Murong Yi seemed to suddenly remember something and changed color: “Oh no, that married couple!”

Wan Ji stepped forward quickly: “They were sleeping before and must not have had time to jump into the water, then got trapped by the fire. I’ll go rescue them!”

Murong Yi said without argument: “I’ll go!” He doused himself with a bucket of water and ran along the gangplank toward the ship already surrounded by flames.

Wan Ji stopped, frowning. He felt something was strange.

Since this side had been prepared and struck first, with even the treasure ship completely undamaged, how could they have controlled the situation but then let His Highness’s ship suffer this disaster?

Thinking again that everyone from the ship had made it up except they’d forgotten that married couple… he suddenly felt uneasy.

Mu Si walked past him, patting his shoulder: “Less talk, more action.”

Wan Ji accepted the teaching solemnly.

On the ship over there, Murong Yi rushed aboard and immediately saw someone bursting out from the end of the cabin. Chi Qingbo was disheveled, his head wrapped in cloth, holding what seemed to be the unconscious A’li Teng, gritting his teeth as he charged outward. But the mast had already burned through and was crashing down directly toward Chi Qingbo.

Chi Qingbo vaguely sensed something, looked up in horror, his desperate eyes reflecting the ever-enlarging mast.

But he never let go of A’li Teng in his arms, only lowering his head and hunching his shoulders, as if trying to use his not-very-strong shoulders to bear this sudden calamity for his wife.

The next moment a figure flashed, accompanied by a tremendous cracking sound. Heavy wind swept overhead, and moments later the heavy object crashed three feet behind them as half the cabin collapsed.

Chi Qingbo lifted his face covered in blood, sweat, and ash, seeing in the fire-filled sky a figure walking calmly toward them.

…