As soon as she turned around, she saw Ye Jingchuan hurrying toward her with Chang’an and Changxing. Upon seeing her, he first stopped in his tracks, then directly bypassed her to order Qing Tao and Qing Luo: “You two, take her with you and leave by small boat.”

The situation was several degrees worse than even the worst they had anticipated. Song Chuyi looked at the scattered bloodstains on his frost-white robe embroidered with cloud patterns and asked him: “Someone has boarded the ship?”

Chang’an thought to himself, isn’t that obvious? The bow at the front had been blown through. No matter how capable his young master was, he couldn’t possibly plug up holes everywhere, right? Why would people blow up your ship? Wasn’t it precisely to board it?

Ye Jingchuan’s gaze passed over her, his brows furrowed tightly: “That ship behind us is also suspicious. When it rams into the stern later…” This already leaking, damaged ship would probably be reduced to dust.

Song Chuyi turned to glance backward, then looked back at Ye Jingchuan: “You plan to stay here with these sixty men and fight them to the death?” When they came, they had brought nearly half of the imperial envoy’s guard detail, precisely because they feared those people wouldn’t take the bait. Now the people had taken the bait, but their forces were scattered. If everyone left, they would inevitably have to split up. But on this endless river surface, how would they leave? And how many people would fail to escape? When their forces were scattered, how would they go back to rescue Zhou Weizhao and Ye Jingkuan? Therefore, Ye Jingchuan calmly nodded: “We need to seize the only intact ship.”

“But first we have to get past this immediate crisis.” Song Chuyi surveyed the ship’s hull all around, then turned to ask Ye Jingchuan: “How many people do we still have?”

Ye Jingchuan wiped the sweat from his forehead. Having spent two years in Fujian, although he still carried some youthful energy, it was only a trace. When it came to military matters, he had always been shrewd. Hearing this, he answered without hesitation: “They just reported the count—we haven’t suffered losses.”

The men were all hidden in the lower hold. Since no one had launched a frontal assault yet, there wasn’t much to lose. However, the thirteen Imperial Guards reassigned from the Imperial Guard had already been dispatched by Song Chuyi to escort Madam Yu and Cui Hualuan and the others.

Song Chuyi nodded and strode past Ye Jingchuan toward the bow. The bow had already been blown beyond recognition, but the other side wasn’t much better off either—their bow had likewise been smashed to pieces. Song Chuyi stood watching for a moment, then pointed at two small boats placed beneath that large ship: “To capture the bandits, first capture their king. Watch those two small boats.”

That this large ship dared ram straight into them meant there must be someone in charge inside. Since they could make decisions, capture them first and worry about the rest later.

Ye Jingchuan didn’t hesitate: “I’ll go myself.”

His words had barely fallen when the ship’s body shook violently again. Changxing, nimble-footed, ran to the side and stuck his head out to look, his face turning pale with shock: “Many more small boats have surrounded us.”

This group really was willing to invest heavily, using so many people to besiege them. Song Chuyi estimated the numbers, then turned and nodded to Ye Jingchuan: “You go and capture the person in charge on their side. I’ll hold this position first.”

Chang’an opened his mouth. Although he didn’t view Sixth Miss Song favorably, that was because he felt indignant on behalf of his young master. He himself had no opinion about Sixth Miss Song personally, and even less wanted her to die like this. He couldn’t help but say: “But these people are about to attack any moment now. You’re just one person—how can you hold this position?”

Song Chuyi looked steadily at Ye Jingchuan: “You take your personal troops and go. When my aunt reaches shore, Hongfa will naturally go find the local authorities. Leave me fifty men. I’ll do my utmost to hold out until you return.”

The person in charge who had rammed the ship clearly didn’t want them to discover their true identity. Seeing that their ship had sunk, they planned to leave first, having these death warriors cover the rear. Song Chuyi couldn’t let them escape so easily.

Ye Jingchuan also made a decisive decision on the spot: “Taking so many people with me is inconvenient. With sixty men plus my personal troops, that’s one hundred thirty people total. I’ll take forty people with me. You keep the rest. I hope when I return, you’ll have been able to preserve their lives.”

Not waiting to set up planks again, he leaped down with the men he had selected, quickly disappearing into the night.

Sounds echoed across the water surface. The ship Song Chuyi stood on rocked even more violently. She steadied herself by gripping the ship’s planks and methodically instructed Changxing, who had stayed behind to help: “Go have them continue bringing up the prepared hot oil.”

At the same time, she ordered Qing Luo: “On the second floor, there are many long hooks with barbs. They were originally on the ship when we came. Take people to retrieve them.”

Changxing moved extremely quickly. This hot oil had been prepared all along. In no time at all, he led people in bringing it all up in one swift motion. Seeing that people had climbed almost to the top, he poured it down over their heads.

Although there had been some delay, the oil’s temperature was still extremely high. Even from a distance, Changxing could hear the sizzling sound of flesh being burned. Hearing the strange cries one after another, he breathed a slight sigh of relief in his heart—this hot oil still had some effect. No matter what, they should hold on first until the young master returned.

His heart, which had been suspended in midair, had relaxed for less than a moment when he felt something was wrong. The bow area swayed a few times, and suddenly a large group of people surged out from the opposite ship—the other side had actually circled around to that ship first, wanting to cross over from there. Now that the two ships had collided and the bows were stuck together, coming across from there would be much easier.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to worry for too long before he saw the first wave of people who surged over start screaming like slaughtered pigs—Chang’an was leading people to pour oil onto the opposite side as well. However, pouring across was much more troublesome than pouring straight down, with quite a bit splashing onto themselves, and moreover, the oil was limited after all.

The dozen or so people Qing Luo had led to retrieve the long hooks had all arrived, each person’s arms full of large bundles of iron-cast hooks with barbs. Song Chuyi loudly ordered them to be distributed, herself retreating to the back, having the soldiers with long hooks disperse and surround the area on all sides.

That group of people had just barely avoided the hot oil and were still helping each other up and trying to stand steady on the floor that was slippery everywhere with oil. At that moment, the soldiers on Song Chuyi’s side who were holding long hooks began to move. Most of those people were wearing ordinary clothes, extremely easy to snag with the barbed hooks. As soon as they were hooked, the soldiers would quickly pull them forward, and the people beside them would strike with their blades.

That group of death warriors famous for being tough-tongued and skilled didn’t even have a chance to display their abilities, and were beaten almost to pieces.