“I do not know.” Earlier, Mo Bai had gone to the Lady of Butterfly Valley and received the medicinal venom beetle. Because the medicinal venom beetle could only survive for an hour or two after drawing blood, he had left very shortly after receiving it and hurried back to purge the Prince’s Gu Poison.

When he left, Feng Jiu’er had still been lying on the Lady of Butterfly Valley’s white jade bed — but even then, her color had already been wrong.

“Tell me exactly what happened.” Yu Jingfeng had originally assumed that Feng Jiu’er must have met with some mishap — that she had likely suffered serious injuries.

He knew he had failed Miss Jiu’er, and that he could only find ways to make it up to her in the future.

But now, Mo Bai’s expression made his heart suddenly seize with anxiety. Dimly, a terrible premonition was rising within him.

Could it be that Miss Jiu’er had…

“Mo Bai — you must tell me what happened. Otherwise I have no way of helping you conceal this from the Prince.”

Just now the Prince had already asked about Miss Jiu’er. Perhaps the Prince, too, had a faint sense of unease stirring within him — he simply had not yet had the chance to investigate.

And yet Mo Bai was truly not suited to telling lies. He simply did not know how.

“Where is Miss Jiu’er right now? What has happened to her?”

“Feng Jiu’er…” Mo Bai drew a deep breath, squeezing his palms tighter and tighter, until at last he said in a low voice, “She has most likely… passed on.”

“Passed on?” What did that mean? What exactly did that mean?

“You tell me clearly right now, damn it!” Yu Jingfeng grabbed him by the collar, his eyes instantly flooding with red.

“Tell me clearly — what do you mean by ‘passed on’? She’s not at — not somewhere anymore? Is she — is it that she’s already left Mo City, or is it—”

“She is dead!” Mo Bai shoved him away with force. Though his bond with Feng Jiu’er was not as close as Yu Jingfeng’s, he had been there, with his own eyes, to witness Feng Jiu’er being harmed.

“She is dead! A venom beetle bores into the heart — there is absolutely no possibility of surviving!”

Mo Bai’s heart was bitter too — truly bitter.

The Prince would hate him. The Prince would never forgive him, not for the rest of his life.

“She is dead. The Lady of Butterfly Valley had the medicinal venom beetle bore into her heart and drink its fill of her heart’s blood — because Feng Jiu’er’s heart-blood is the finest reagent possible for expelling the Gu Poison from the Prince’s body!”

“She is dead. I watched her fade with my own eyes — watched her pulse weaken, until at last… there was no pulse at all…”

When he left, he had already been unable to detect the existence of Feng Jiu’er’s pulse. And even what had remained was barely perceptible.

She was dead. She was truly dead…

Yu Jingfeng could not believe it. The bright, lively girl who had just yesterday been laughing and talking with all of them — she was now gone, her brilliance extinguished forever, vanished from this world.

How was that possible? How… could this be?

“The Prince will lose his mind.” He had never seen the Prince hold anyone in such deep and abiding regard. Never seen him care for anyone so deeply.

If Miss Jiu’er was gone — the Prince truly would lose his mind. They had traded Miss Jiu’er’s life for the Prince’s life. What a cruel thing that was for the Prince.

“Yu Jingfeng — this matter must not reach the Prince’s ears. Not now, at least.”

Mo Bai had already accepted the reality of Feng Jiu’er’s passing. A venom beetle borrows into the heart — there is simply no way to survive.

But he had had no choice. What was done was done — there was no way to undo it.

“There are still toxins remaining in the Prince’s body that have not been fully cleared. If the Prince were to learn of this now, things would spiral completely out of control.”

“Yu Jingfeng, I need your help. Find a way to keep this from the Prince.”

“An entire living person has disappeared — do you think you can keep that from the Prince? Once the Prince is well, how could he not go searching for Miss Jiu’er?”

It was impossible to hide. The moment the Prince recovered, he would go looking for her immediately.

“Tell him that Feng Jiu’er has returned to the Imperial Capital. The Prince must now make haste for Phoenix City to hold it — he cannot spare himself for anything else.”

“As long as the Prince believes Feng Jiu’er is still in the Imperial Capital, he will be able to focus his mind on repelling the enemy. By the time the Prince returns to the Imperial Capital, at the very least a month or more will have passed.”

Perhaps, in a month or more, the Prince will have put Miss Jiu’er from his mind a little.

Perhaps… perhaps… time truly could wash everything away. Could it not?

Yu Jingfeng had not the slightest confidence in that. And besides — to ask him to deceive the Prince like this was something he had never done in his entire life.

The Prince’s trust in him — how could he so squander it? Yet if they did not conceal it — what was to become of the Prince?

Silence settled in, and the air around them gradually thickened, until even drawing breath felt somehow more difficult.

In his heart, there was a dull, quiet ache.

That lively girl. That girl who had at first feigned madness and played the fool, who was sharp and cunning yet wise and brilliant. That girl who so often kept the Prince company, who had at last brought some smiles to the Prince’s face…

Yu Jingfeng felt a real and deep ache in his heart. He and Feng Jiu’er had spent no small amount of time together — even if they were never particularly close, there was still a bond between them.

He thought back to that time — the night they were ambushed — when Miss Jiu’er had shielded him from a hidden projectile with her own body…

And yet now, from this day on, that little girl would never be seen again.

Yu Jingfeng pressed his large palm over his heart, and felt that place twist with a fierce and grinding pain.

He did not know how much time passed before his voice, hoarse now, asked, “Then where is Miss Jiu’er… right now?”

Even if she was gone — at the very least, there was still a body, was there not?

“When I left, she was still in the Lady of Butterfly Valley’s custody.”

“The Lady of Butterfly Valley will certainly not let the Prince learn anything of Miss Jiu’er’s situation. In order to keep the truth from the Prince, she will absolutely not allow Miss Jiu’er’s…”

The words “mortal remains” — Yu Jingfeng could not bring himself to say them. He did not dare.

Mo Bai understood what he meant. “If I have guessed correctly, they will most likely have taken her to the area of the rear mountain — perhaps thrown her casually down… to the foot of some cliff…”

“Ahhh—”

Yu Jingfeng let out a long, sudden cry — and in the very next moment turned and ran like a madman toward the rear mountain.

To save the Prince, they had already taken Miss Jiu’er’s life. And now — how could they let her be left to lie abandoned in the wilderness?

They had gone too far. They had truly gone too far.

Yet — if it were he himself who had to choose? If it were between the Prince’s life and Miss Jiu’er’s life — which one…

He did not know. He truly did not know. Perhaps, before he could even make that choice, he would already have gone mad.

Mo Bai’s heart, too, was heavy with guilt. Seeing Yu Jingfeng charge off, he did not hesitate — he followed.

The rear mountain — such a vast stretch of land. How were they to find her?

Yu Jingfeng searched every ridge of the rear mountain, one by one, before at last finding traces of someone having passed through.

But the traces were faint — so faint that one could tell at a glance they had been left by someone of considerable skill.

Too faint. Barely visible at all.

At last, he found the spot where Feng Jiu’er had been set down. On the branches that had been broken off by hand nearby — there was still a small trace of blood.

Yet there was no sign of Jiu’er. It was clear someone had sat here — but where was Jiu’er now?

Mo Bai had finally caught up, and taking one look at the marks on the ground, his heart was shaken to the core. “She was taken away by someone!”