In that moment, it seemed as though everything between heaven and earth had frozen in place. Several of Xuanyuan Lige’s wind-blades tore mercilessly through Jun Beiyue’s body — and yet the man showed nothing but contempt, letting the blades pass straight through him, his sword descending slowly overhead.
Xuanyuan Lige had been about to unsling the Blood Zither from his back, but at the sight of this, he stopped himself.
Time was clearly running out, and yet, somehow, Jun Beiyue’s singular, unhurried motion pulled him along, making everything feel as though it, too, had slowed to a crawl.
Then, suddenly — “BANG!” — a thunderous impact!
In an instant, all that slowness snapped back into sharp, violent motion.
Just as before, but even fiercer now — both wind-blade and sword-blade materialized out of empty air at once, directly above Xuanyuan Lige’s head and straight before his eyes, one slashing down, one striking head-on, leaving him absolutely nowhere to escape!
Xuanyuan Lige had barely managed to twist his body — there was no time left to dodge completely!
Amid the flash of sword-light, a muffled grunt escaped him as he was flung violently backward, slamming hard into a tree stump and crashing to the ground!
He glanced down instinctively and saw a deep gash slicing across his waist, blood spreading rapidly across his violet robes — the wound was severe, terribly deep.
Alarmed, Xuanyuan Lige jerked his head up to find Jun Beiyue already standing before him, sword pointed straight at his throat!
“You’re a descendant of the East Sea Gu Clan!” Xuanyuan Lige said coldly.
Jun Beiyue’s icy eyes betrayed not a flicker of emotion — even veiled, one could tell that beneath the cloth lay an entirely blank expression. He didn’t even bother to answer, simply raising his sword again abruptly!
But in that very instant — “BANG!” — an incredibly sharp sound, a wind-blade struck from his fingers, hit Jun Beiyue squarely in the side, forcing him back at once!
“BANG!” Xuanyuan Lige’s hands didn’t stop, wind-blade after wind-blade forcing Jun Beiyue back a full three steps. What he’d mastered was wind-blades summoned from sword-qi — up close, he had little advantage at all.
But the moment distance opened up between them, Xuanyuan Lige immediately found himself at a total disadvantage, as Jun Beiyue’s long sword swept in again — no longer a wind-blade this time, but the cold steel itself, striking true!
Xuanyuan Lige dodged while striking with his fingers, and in an instant the two of them, though barely three steps apart, plunged back into fierce combat.
“I bear you no grudge, no enmity — why press me so relentlessly?” Xuanyuan Lige said coldly, sounding furious, though it was, in truth, a test.
Yet Jun Beiyue didn’t deign to say a single word in response, his blade growing ever sharper, ever fiercer, once again letting Xuanyuan Lige’s wind-blades strike his body without flinching, advancing steadily, step by step.
“BANG! BANG! BANG!”
The sound of the wind-blades striking home was heart-stopping to hear, and yet the man didn’t so much as furrow his brow. Xuanyuan Lige couldn’t help drawing a sharp, involuntary breath — an opponent like this was, without question, the most ruthlessly resolute, and the most terrifying, kind imaginable.
He broke off his attack at once, turning to flee!
But just then, Jun Beiyue finally made a sound — though still not a word, only a thoroughly contemptuous, cold scoff.
He stopped, watching coldly as Xuanyuan Lige fled, letting him get farther and farther away without any apparent urgency at all, his sword-wielding hand moving with such elegant, noble grace — and yet the hand gripping that sword showed veins bulging visibly along its length.
What was he planning?
Suddenly, a sharp “shhk” sound came rushing in from behind. Jun Beiyue’s brow snapped tight, and with a precise sideways twist, he caught the hidden dart in his grip just as Xuanyuan Lige’s retreating figure finally vanished into the night, gone entirely.
At the same moment, a soft rustling sound came from behind him — and then, nothing more. That person, too, had fled.
Jun Beiyue didn’t turn around. The hidden dart in his hand snapped back sharply and embedded itself in the tree stump — it was, unmistakably, the very dark iron dart Ziqing habitually used.
Ziqing had fled the scene as fast as she could. She’d only just found the two of them and immediately stumbled onto that very confrontation. She had no idea whether A’Li could have escaped unharmed if she hadn’t thrown that dart when she did.
Though she hadn’t witnessed the earlier stages of the fight, she understood clearly enough — whoever could force A’Li into fleeing must possess skill far surpassing his own, must have pressed him so hard that he’d had no chance to even draw his Blood Zither, no chance to use his lethal music at all.
Who exactly was that man in black, and why had he targeted A’Li? What grudge could he possibly hold against him?
Ziqing puzzled over it endlessly, all the way back to the inn, and only relaxed once she confirmed the man in black hadn’t followed.
She circled around to the back entrance and slipped back into her room — never realizing that Jun Beiyue had followed her the entire way.
Jun Beiyue settled soundlessly onto the rooftop, watching from a distance as the lamplight flickered on inside Ziqing’s room, her slender silhouette appearing against the gauze window.
A pair of dark eyes, lowered and still, seemed lost, seemed hollow, seemed utterly without feeling.
No telling exactly what he was looking at — not until the light inside went out and her silhouette vanished did he finally move, and even then, he remained sitting there in silence. He sat there the entire night.
When the first ray of dawn light struck him at last, only then was it clear — his black combat attire was riddled through with holes, every one a wound from a wind-blade, faint traces of blood still visible along the tears. Heaven only knew how badly he was actually injured beneath the cloth.
He rose lazily, his cold eyes still betraying no emotion, and turned back toward his own quarters.
The moment Yingzi saw him, he was struck with alarm. “My lord, you’re—”
“Prepare a bath,” he said flatly, exhaustion finally showing plainly across his handsome brow.
Yingzi didn’t dare ask further, hurrying to prepare the water, timidly setting out wound-healing salve nearby as well.
Behind the screen, the enormous bathtub steamed with hot water, wisps of white mist curling upward. Through the screen, one could just make out the final piece of silky underclothing sliding slowly from the man’s powerful frame.
Even through the screen, the sight was scandalous enough to make anyone’s nose bleed — and yet the man himself moved with lazy, unbothered indifference.
Fortunately, Yingzi was long accustomed to attending him personally, and fortunately, Yingzi was a man himself — his heart raced, but he could bear it well enough.
One had to admit — that man’s face was like ice frozen solid for ten thousand years, while his body was like some demon cultivated over ten thousand years of practice.
Yingzi had, at times, genuinely wondered whether no woman could possibly withstand his master’s untamed, wild masculinity — was that why only he had ever been permitted to attend him this closely, all these years?
Jun Beiyue soaked in the water, his powerful, muscular arms resting casually along the edge of the tub. He lowered his head, coldly surveying the wind-blade wounds covering his body, blood rising to the water’s surface, though he paid it no mind at all, tilting his head back lazily, a cold smile touching his lips as he murmured, low, “So you know of the East Sea Gu Clan too…”
After a long while, Yingzi spoke, quiet. “My lord, the Emperor has personally arranged a welcome-home banquet. Guess what arrived by carrier pigeon?”
“What?” Jun Beiyue asked flatly.
“The menu!” Yingzi answered at once. If Emperor Tianhui had known enough to fawn like this now, why hadn’t he bothered before?
His master’s journey there and back — could he still possibly be that same pure-hearted young man, that same Fourth Prince he’d once been?
“Send it to the Princess. Let her decide,” Jun Beiyue said flatly, still leaning back, eyes narrowed.
Seeing this, Yingzi felt compelled to remind him. “My lord, we can’t delay further. Time is tight for Nanzhao — we’ll need to spend a few days in the capital regardless.”
“Send word — we depart after the midday meal. Bring provisions, and don’t stop again until we reach the capital,” Jun Beiyue said flatly, and before Yingzi could even respond, he slowly sank down, disappearing beneath the hot water…