The poplar trees lining the official road stabbed straight into the sky, while the distant outline of the Taihang Mountains was nothing more than a blurred silhouette in the twilight.
The sun had already dipped to the west, hanging slantingly on the treetops, dyeing the entire official road a deep crimson.
Prince Xin, Tang Xuan, was hunched over her horse’s back. Her hair bun had been blown loose by the wind and was now soaked through with sweat.
She wore a set of dark riding attire, her lapel wide open, clutching a letter in her hand.
It had been delivered by urgent courier from the Ministry of War.
Just a few days ago, she had been drinking tea and admiring flowers in the detached courtyard of her fiefdom, thinking her elder sister, the Emperor, should be almost recovered from her illness, thinking she would pay respects in the capital after autumn passed, thinking of how to phrase things to show concern without making her elder sister suspect she was coveting something.
Then this letter arrived.
Wei Yang was mobilizing troops.
Wei Yang was locking down the palace.
When Tang Xuan finished reading the letter, she didn’t even have time to pack.
She just shouted “Saddle the horses!” and charged out of the royal palace with her retainers and domestic servants.
They rode without rest, running two horses to death. The inside of her own thighs were rubbed raw and bloody by the saddle, but she dared not stop.
Given her sources of information, she wasn’t unaware of the news from the capital about her elder sister’s illness keeping her from court.
She had indeed been worried about it, but not anxious.
Her elder sister was in the prime of life. Although she had no daughters yet, she had been trying constantly.
Prescriptions from the Imperial Physicians Bureau were issued one after another, and tribute of tonics from various regions was sent into the palace cartload by cartload.
What if her elder sister recovered? What if she gave birth to a legitimate princess? The Emperor had never been fond of holding court before anyway.
If she rushed anxiously to the capital, what would it look like in her elder sister’s eyes? Coveting the throne? Plotting treason?
Once suspicion arises, it’s difficult to erase.
She had worked so hard for so many years to cultivate the persona of the ‘dutiful younger sister.’ She couldn’t ruin it at this step.
Tang Xuan had never even entertained the thought of succession.
Being a prince was fine. She had a fiefdom, a stipend, freedom.
Once her elder sister gave birth to a princess, she could peacefully be her idle, carefree prince, wanting for nothing her whole life.
But that damned eunuch Wei Yang, how dare he mobilize troops?
This was something the royal family could not accept.
Tang Xuan gritted her teeth, tightened her legs against the horse’s belly, urging it to go faster.
The horse’s hooves pounded on the official road, kicking up a trail of dust that drifted hazily in the twilight.
Her retainers followed closely behind, swords and sabers clattering at their waists.
If only she could get there faster, just a little faster…
“Prince Xin, be careful!”
A frantic shout exploded from behind her.
Tang Xuan whipped her head around. A meteor hammer was spinning towards her face, the iron spikes on its head glinting coldly in the twilight, accompanied by a whistling wind.
The hammerhead traced an arc through the air, growing larger, drawing closer.
Her mind went blank. Her body froze on the horse’s back, forgetting even to dodge.
Clang! A tremendous metallic crash, sparks of steel on steel bursting before her eyes.
One of her retainers leaped up, a long sword cleaving down onto the meteor hammer, deflecting its trajectory.
The retainer herself was sent flying backward from the impact. Though the hammer’s path was altered, its head still grazed past Tang Xuan’s back.
The iron spikes tore through the fabric, slicing open skin and flesh.
Excruciating pain shot from her back. Tang Xuan grunted, a coppery taste flooding her mouth. Her vision went dark, and she spat out a mouthful of blood.
Her body tilted, and she tumbled from the horse.
Thud. She hit the official road, covered in filth.
The wound on her back was ground painfully by the gravel and dirt on the ground. Blood seeped through the fabric, soaking most of her back.
From all directions, shadows surged.
They poured out from the woods by the roadside, scrambled up from behind the slopes, emerged from the bends at both ends of the official road.
Each one was clad in black, faces masked, features and origins impossible to discern.
Blades and swords glinted coldly in the twilight.
They surrounded Prince Xin’s group in tight, concentric circles, sealing them off completely.
One figure stood at the forefront, slender, the right sleeve of her garment empty, tied at her waist with a cloth strip. In her left hand, she held a long sword.
Seeing this, the retainers and servants drew their swords, encircling Prince Xin at the very center, warily facing the crowd.
“Where are you from? Bandits? Or robbers?” The tall woman at the front, Tang Xuan’s guard and the most skilled martial artist among them—a third-rank martial artist—shouted towards the black-clad figures, her expression icy.
“If you have any difficulties, just speak up. We can negotiate.”
The response was only cold silence. The black-clad figures remained motionless, disciplined, their gazes fixed intently on them, sending a chill through the group.
The woman with the missing arm gave a light laugh, wasting no words. She shook her head. “Kill.”
“Kill!!!” The black-clad figures roared in unison, launching themselves mercilessly at the retainers and servants.
The Prince’s guard’s face changed dramatically. She brandished her sword to resist, shouting angrily, “Do you know what crime this is? Do you know she is the current Emperor’s own sister?!”
But these words seemed only to energize the black-clad figures, helping them pinpoint their target.
Chaos erupted instantly. Swords and sabers flew, the clang of metal incessant.
Tang Xuan lay prone on the ground, lifting her head to see the black-clad woman with the missing arm walking towards her.
“You…” Another surge of blood rose in her throat, making her cough violently. Bloody froth spilled from the corner of her mouth. “You dare… kill me? Do you know… what crime this is?”
Her voice was hoarse, laced with anger, fear, and disbelief.
“Extermination of the nine clans!”
“Do you want your nine clans exterminated?!”
The black-clad woman with the missing arm paused, tilting her head as if listening to a particularly funny joke.
Her shoulders shook slightly as a low chuckle escaped her.
“Nine clans?”
“That’s selling it short, isn’t it? Hasn’t this dynasty set a precedent for exterminating ten clans?”
She continued forward, her boots stopping right in front of Tang Xuan.
She looked down at the Prince sprawled on the ground, the tip of her sword hanging by her side, tracing a thin line of cold light in the twilight.
“Crime or not, lawful or not, isn’t it all decided by you people surnamed Tang?”
“Your elder sister says who’s guilty, and they are. You say whose nine clans should be exterminated, and they are.”
She bent down, grabbed Tang Xuan by the hair, and yanked her up from the ground.
Tang Xuan’s scalp screamed in pain. She was hauled up to a half-kneeling position, her neck forced back, exposing her throat.
The black-clad woman with the missing arm let go of her hair and leveled the sword across Tang Xuan’s neck.
The cold blade pressed against her skin, the chill seeping into her pores.
“But today, I’m the one who decides.”
Tang Xuan’s eyes were wide open, the cold glint of the sword reflected in her pupils.
Her lips trembled, but no words of plea came out.
The black-clad woman with the missing arm raised her sword.
Whoosh!
A sharp sound of something cutting through the air came from the distance.
The black-clad woman’s pupils contracted violently. Instinctively, she raised her sword to block.
Clang!
An iron arrow slammed squarely into the flat of her blade. Sparks flew. The impact numbed her arm and split the skin of her palm.
The force behind the arrow was astonishing, knocking her back two full steps.
Before she could steady herself, an extremely swift figure shot out from the woods beside the official road.
The figure left a trailing afterimage in the twilight. The tip of a boot tapped the ground, using the momentum to launch again. In the blink of an eye, it had closed the distance.
Zheng!
A clear, ringing sound, like something being drawn from a belt.
A flash of silver light exploded in the air, like a nimble snake raising its head, flicking its tongue, lunging to bite at the black-clad woman’s left arm.
The black-clad woman raised her sword to block, but the soft sword was too agile. It slid along the blade, bypassed the guard, wrapped once around her arm, and then abruptly tightened.
Blood sprayed.
“Ah!”
The black-clad woman’s scream tore through the twilight.
Her left arm was severed cleanly at the elbow, falling to the ground still clutching the sword, fingers spasming around the hilt.
She staggered backward, blood gushing like a fountain from the stump, dyeing the dirt beneath her feet a dark crimson.
Qin Junyue held a deep lunge stance, a long spear strapped to her back, the soft sword hanging by her side, its tip still dripping blood.
Her expression was icy, her phoenix eyes fixed intently on the black-clad woman with the missing arm, a cold smirk curling at the corner of her mouth.
‘What a coincidence. It’s you again.’
Tang Xuan sat slumped on the ground, trembling all over, hair disheveled, face smeared with blood and grime, her lapel covered in mud and bloodstains.
She looked at the back of the figure shielding her, then lunged forward, wrapping her arms tightly around Qin Junyue’s leg, holding on for dear life, her whole body shaking. “Save me… please save me.”