The death of the imperial envoy within the jurisdiction of a feudal prince was both a covert scheme and an overt ploy.
The three eunuchs in embroidered python robes from the Imperial Seal Directorate were well aware of this. However, the assassin’s sheer determination was beyond their expectations. Choosing the assassination site at Beian Town, just a stone’s throw from Liangzhou City, seemed reckless—yet this very act of seemingly irrational folly gave the assassin a glimmer of hope.
As predicted by Imperial Guard Commander Qian, the first to strike was the pair of men and women seated across from Eunuch Liu, the Seal-holding Eunuch.
Twenty paces, two screens.
When a figure tore through the first screen with a blade in an instant, Commander Qian, already prepared, rose to his feet and drew the golden saber bestowed by the emperor—a symbol of his status. As the assassin charged forward, cleaving the second screen in a straight path, Commander Qian did not retreat defensively. Instead, he advanced, delivering a swift slash toward the assassin.
His technique was simple, yet its momentum was overwhelming. A single strike, worthy of his reputation as the “Horse-Cleaver of the Capital.”
Commander Qian’s blade style discarded all superfluous flourishes, favoring ruthless efficiency over intricate finesse. It carried the essence of returning to simplicity—the pinnacle of martial mastery. In the world of blades and swords, there was always a debate between technique and intent. For instance, Li Chungang, whose swordplay was said to rival the ethereal grace of Lü Dongbin, and Deng Tai’a, whose killing techniques reached unparalleled heights. Or Yu Xinlang and Lou Huang, both disciples of Wang Xianzhi in Wudi City, who illuminated two distinct paths to sword mastery. Among the great blade masters, Mao Shulang, who claimed mastery over all blade techniques, and Gu Jiantang, who surpassed his predecessors with just two moves, stood as legends. Commander Qian, long confined within palace walls yet seasoned in both the martial world and battlefield, clearly followed Gu Jiantang’s path—seeking to kill with the fastest strike over the shortest distance.
Such ruthless efficiency, often deemed lacking in martial virtue, was common on the battlefield but rare in the refined duels of the martial world. Li Houzhong, the “Snow Hut Spear Saint” among the Four Sages of Liyang, was infamous for his creed: “No mercy in battle, no hesitation in thrusting, no quarter when victorious.” Beneath his famed spear, “Great Snow Cone,” few survived, earning him the moniker “Madman of Three No’s.” Though his combat prowess ranked among the top of the Four Sages, his reputation suffered, dragging his Snow Hut down to barely a second-rate sect. The “Music Sage” of Jiagu Terrace once remarked, “Li Houzhong’s martial skill is vast, but his martial virtue is scant,” disdaining association despite their shared status.
True to form, Commander Qian ended his foe with a single slash. If the assassin had split the screen in two, then Commander Qian cleaved the man and his weapon down the middle.
Unfazed by the near-bone-deep gash on his shoulder, Commander Qian exhaled sharply and drew a fresh breath. Under normal circumstances, even with the upper hand, he would not have killed such a skilled assassin in an instant. But his all-out strike, trading injury for death, contrasted starkly with the assassin’s reserved strength for follow-up moves. This exchange left Commander Qian with only minor injuries, his combat strength intact. In martial duels, the difference between victory and death was vast. Clearly, Commander Qian, familiar with both the martial world and battlefield, understood this—unlike the assassin, who lacked battlefield experience.
Behind Commander Qian, Eunuch Liu, the Seal-holder, remained unmoved, calmly raising his cup to drink.
Eunuch Song, the Directorate Manager, gripped the edges of his chair, his plump cheeks trembling, lips pale as he muttered under his breath.
Eunuch Ma, built like a northern giant, had already set down his chopsticks and risen when Commander Qian struck. With steady steps, he positioned himself beside Eunuch Liu.
This seemingly unremarkable Assistant Eunuch showed no joy at Commander Qian’s brutal kill. Instead, he quickly warned, “Beware!”
Ever vigilant after sensing the anomaly on the tavern’s third floor, Commander Qian had been waiting for the assassin’s true backup. Even his seemingly hasty breath was a feint to lure them out. Thus, when the eerily calm woman—who left a deep impression—lunged forward almost simultaneously with the man’s bisected corpse, emerging straight from the split body in a grotesque and bloody spectacle, Commander Qian was ready.
He greeted her with a slash faster than she anticipated—another mountain-cleaving strike. The female assassin made no attempt to block with her sword, instead thrusting straight for Commander Qian’s heart.
Her gaze was icy, her slender arm holding the three-foot blade utterly steady.
She killed with chilling composure, and faced death the same way.
Perhaps this was what a true master assassin looked like.
Though Commander Qian twisted slightly at the last moment, avoiding a fatal strike, the emerald-tipped blade still carved a bloody groove across his chest.
As for the ruthless female assassin, she fell to Commander Qian’s second slash. Though the blow didn’t bisect her as before, the force sent her corpse crashing through a wine table, scattering dishes and wine in a chaotic mess.
She lay in a pool of blood, a crimson line slowly forming from her brow to her abdomen.
Near her head, a shattered wine jar spilled its contents silently across the floor.
She died with wine.
From start to finish, neither she nor her companion uttered a word.
This silence was far more chilling than any battle cry.
Rumors spoke of the emerging “Deer-Slaying Tower,” regarded as the eleventh great sect of the martial world, specializing in training assassins who killed as casually as cutting grass. They took money to eliminate targets—be they high-ranking officials or renowned martial masters—and never stopped until the job was done, even if it meant sending wave after wave of assassins. After each kill, they severed the head as proof to their employers. It was said that the assassin who killed Wang Mingyin outside Xiangfan for the young Prince Xu Fengnian, and the one who later slew the celestial-tier master Liu Haoshi, both hailed from the legendary ninth floor of Deer-Slaying Tower. But with Xu Fengnian’s rise to the pinnacle of the martial world, the truth became an eternal mystery—shrouded in fog, with no answers from Deer-Slaying Tower, and no one daring to ask the young prince directly.
Having slain two likely Deer-Slaying Tower assassins, Commander Qian, pale and trembling, quickly tapped key acupoints on his chest to redirect his qi, isolating the poisoned wound. Though this saved his life for now, it left him unable to fight further. Fearing more hidden assassins, he turned urgently. “Honored Eunuchs, we must leave at once.”
From the first assassin’s strike to Commander Qian’s warning, mere moments had passed.
Then, a furious roar erupted from beyond the screen to Eunuch Liu’s right, followed by a weathered voice booming above the three eunuchs and Commander Qian, dripping with triumphant malice: “Eunuch dogs of Tai’an City! You dare strut into our Northern Liang territory and think to leave?!”
Eunuch Song, his bulky frame wedged into a rosewood chair, recoiled in terror, nearly toppling backward.
Eunuch Ma, who cut a heroic figure without his crimson python robe, had somehow moved to Eunuch Liu’s right side. Glaring at the sword-wielding figure descending upon them, he clenched a fist at his abdomen and sneered, “We’ve been waiting for traitors like you!”
Eunuch Liu, seated like an unshakable mountain, glimpsed the white-haired swordsman and sighed faintly before downing his cup of green-ant wine.
The remaining figures from the table behind the right screen rose with their elder, soaring over the screens like a swarm of butterflies—a dazzling yet deadly sight.
Most hadn’t retrieved their weapons from the racks, which was why Commander Qian hadn’t initially marked them as threats. To him, they were just ordinary martial artists, gossiping about Xuanyan Ziyi’s enlightenment atop Snowy Ridge or the rising star of the Four Young Masters. But an inexplicable dread gripped him as he tightened his grip on his saber, eyeing these supposedly respectable yet decidedly second-rate “assassins.”
The elderly swordsman, diving like a lion upon a rabbit, suddenly found his vision blur.
A force like a hammer striking a bell slammed into his chest, sending him flying back faster than he’d come—dead before he hit the ground, blood streaming from his orifices.
His corpse crashed into a white-robed young woman behind him, toppling a screen and sending them both sprawling across a wine-laden table before sliding to the floor. The woman’s fate was unknown.
Commander Qian barked, “Beware beneath the screens!”
Of the nine at the table, only eight had leaped over the screens.
The missing one was surely the final, deadliest gambit.
First, two lives sacrificed as a diversion. Then, feigned weakness. Finally, the true strike.
This meticulously orchestrated assassination was ruthlessly precise, each step leading inexorably to the next.
Commander Qian’s realization came swiftly, as did Eunuch Ma’s reaction. But the ninth assassin, emerging leisurely from behind the screen, moved like a ghost. His strike was earth-shattering—a mere toe-tap propelling him forward like rolling thunder, twin short swords hidden in his sleeves leaving trails of brilliant white light.
Thanks to Commander Qian’s warning, Eunuch Ma dodged just enough to avoid fatal wounds, though two bloody holes still pierced his chest.
Enraged yet grinning, Eunuch Ma, undiminished in aura despite his injuries, seized the assassin’s head and slammed it into the wall like driving nails.
The assassin slumped against the wall, a smile on his lips.
As if he’d already glimpsed victory.
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