Knowing he had no strength to truss a chicken, the sword-wielder developed a mind to toy with him and was in no hurry to capture him. So he smiled and said, “If you just kneel down and kowtow to me three times, I’ll let you live.”

Zhao Bingzhong looked at him and slowly bent his knees…

The man taunting him couldn’t help but laugh heartily. The man in Judicial Authority uniform outside the door was displeased and reminded him, “Wang Qun, you’d better hurry up. If Administrator Wang arrives, I won’t be able to stop him.”

Wang Qun was about to speak when Zhao Bingzhong had already crouched down. His hand quickly felt inside his boot and instantly pulled out a short dagger.

Wang Qun was startled and stepped back, furious. A lamb to the slaughter dared to resist?

Just as he was about to raise his hand to knock away the blade in Zhao Bingzhong’s hand, he saw Zhao Bingzhong turn the blade upward and fiercely stab it into his own throat…

Wang Qun’s eyes widened. He immediately rushed forward to stop him. The general had said to leave someone alive!

Zhao Bingzhong fell to the ground. He stared wide-eyed at Wang Qun and the others, blood gushing from his mouth in great volumes. But his eyes were filled with starlight—no fear, only infinite regret and attachment.

He was reluctant to leave this world. He hadn’t yet walked before the Great General to tell her how well he was doing now.

But he knew too much. The secrets in his mind were more numerous than those written documents in the room. So apart from Yuan Li, he was the most important person in the entire Jiangnan secret operations.

Only if he died would those secrets truly be safe.

Wang Qun covered his throat trying to stop the bleeding. Feeling his body growing colder and colder, he stood up in angry humiliation and kicked him several times. “Lowly commoner! How dare you seek death in front of me! Lowly, lowly!”

Because of Zhao Bingzhong’s death, Wang Qun had to order, “Quickly notify the people watching Yuan Li to make sure they leave someone alive.” The general said they absolutely must capture someone alive.

The Prince of Langya was truly incompetent. Spies from the north had long infiltrated deep into Jiangnan, and the ringleader even had close dealings with the Administrator’s Office. If Wang Dao weren’t the general’s cousin, the general would have long ago made this matter public and made him suffer the consequences.

Wang Qun angrily kicked Zhao Bingzhong’s body aside and strode into the room.

Han Fu already lay with eyes wide open in a pool of blood. The death warriors were extinguishing the fire, rescuing papers with writing from the flames.

He pulled over a sheet of paper to look at it—all numbers. So he took another sheet, which had not only numbers but also writing beneath them.

Wang Qun frowned slightly. “Have you eaten?”

“One bowl of milk, one plate of cabbage stewed with pork, and a large basin of white flour steamed buns? What is this nonsense?”

Wang Qun tossed the paper aside and looked around. “Search again. The general said there’s a great treasure in this safe house. We must find it.”

Someone opened a door on the side. The equipment inside was astonishing. “Lieutenant, look at this.”

Wang Qun immediately came forward and saw that most of the room was filled with strange and peculiar objects. He reached out to touch them, frowning. “They’re all made of copper and iron. What are these things?”

No one could answer his question. Wang Qun tried to move them and found that with manpower they could be moved, but couldn’t get them out of this room.

He couldn’t help frowning and paced around the room. “Something’s wrong. These can’t be moved. They hid in here for so long—it can’t just be to burn papers. Search again for me. Even if you have to dig three feet down, find it!”

A death warrior remembered that when they burst in, he seemed to see Zhao Bingzhong kneeling on the ground with his back to them. He immediately began tapping the floor.

At this moment, outside, a bang came from the sky. Wang Qun turned his head and saw the firework blooming in the air. His heart skipped a beat as he called out, “Find it quickly!”

The death warriors began prying up floorboards. They didn’t care whether the bricks were loose or not—they just inserted their swords and pried upward. Before long, they pried up a loose floorboard, revealing a blue-yellow machine underneath.

Wang Qun could tell at a glance that this thing was made of copper, at least on the outside.

He immediately took the machine out like a treasure. Just as he was about to examine it, he heard the sound of carriages and horses. He seemed to sense something. After glancing toward the main gate, he said, “Take all the papers. Withdraw!”

They took off their clothes and spread them out. Regardless of what they were, they put anything with writing on it, even half-burned papers, wrapped them up, and left.

Wang Qun held the radio and didn’t look again at the things in the adjacent room that couldn’t be taken.

They had just left when Wang Dao’s men arrived at the back. Seeing the safe house full of sword cuts and blood stains, their hearts jumped in alarm.

Upon entering the room, they first saw Han Fu with eyes wide open, half-kneeling on the ground, then saw Shi Yan lying in the corner.

Both were in pools of blood, appearing already dead. But they still went forward to check, and dispersed to search everywhere.

Before long, a voice came from the back courtyard. “There’s another one here, also dead!”

The person checking Han Fu also said, “He’s dead too. Many things in the room were burned. A few papers fell here.”

But the person checking Shi Yan said, “This person seems still alive. Come listen—is there still a heartbeat?”

They put their ears to his chest to listen, then felt his neck. They always felt there seemed to be some movement, so they decided to stop the bleeding and send him back to the Administrator’s Office for treatment.

Wang Dao saw Shi Yan covered in blood, then heard that the safe house had been breached, that one room showed signs of being burned and the floor pried up. His vision darkened. “He’s forcing me, forcing the Great King, and also threatening Zhao Hanzhang. But how could she be someone who can be threatened? He’s probably caused great trouble.”

Wang Dao anxiously paced in circles. Finally, he decided to enter the palace and plead guilty.

The steward quickly stopped him. “Master, why take responsibility for this matter? It was Second Young Master who broke into the house. He certainly won’t inform on the general. No one knows the safe house was occupied by spies from the north, so naturally it won’t be connected to you.”

Wang Dao said, “You underestimate Liu Yu and Diao Xie too much. Liu Yu must know by now. For Chuzhong to do such a thing in the city while keeping it from me, he clearly not only had help from people in the Wang clan, but also from outsiders. I suspect they were people from the Judicial Authority.”

“At this moment, he can’t wait for me to immediately break with the Great King. Even if he doesn’t say it openly, he’ll put the evidence in Liu Yu’s hands, forcing me to make a choice.” When it came to scheming, Wang Dun was not yet Wang Dao’s match.

He could already guess what Wang Dun would do next. After attracting Liu Yu to the safe house, Liu Yu would certainly discover the identities of those living in the house were suspicious and would quickly guess they were spies from the north.

And Yuan Li’s identity in Jiankang City was already semi-public. Many aristocratic families had connections with him privately. The only ones kept in the dark were the Prince of Langya and Liu Yu.

If Liu Yu dug deeper, everyone would be implicated. At that time, what would the Prince of Langya think?

He thought he was jointly governing Jiangnan with the southern aristocratic families, but in the end, everyone was secretly contacting the north behind his back, including Wang Dao.

The Prince of Langya was already dissatisfied with Wang Dao and suspicious of the Wang clan. After this, he probably wouldn’t trust Wang Dao anymore.

And Wang Dao still wanted to persuade the Prince of Langya to return north. Wang Dun’s action completely severed the relationship between him and the Prince of Langya, trying to force one of them to strike against the other.

Wang Dao said, “Immediately dispatch people to rescue Yuan Li. I’ll write a letter to be sent to Luoyang and delivered to Zhao Hanzhang. I may not be able to leave after entering the palace this time. You relay my order: Wang clan descendants must not cause trouble, must not follow Wang Dun. If there are Wang clan members with the same ambitions as Wang Dun, I won’t stop them, but they must request to leave the clan. After that, whatever they do, I’ll no longer interfere.”