Before the assassin attacked Lu Qian, in a small building facing the street, a large, burly man of imposing presence crushed a teacup with one hand.
“Someone dares to make their move at the same time as us... Fine. The sect’s grand plan is like an arrow on the bowstring—it must be released. Give the order. Follow the plan. Let them kill to their heart’s content in Siji Lane.”
“Heh, looks like there are still some capable people in the Dayin royal court. Before we make our formal move, we’ll have to draw their attention to Siji Lane first.”
As Lu Qian’s clothes were suddenly torn, he felt a strong wave of malice.
Among the crowd, he spotted several skinny, short men.
From their eyes flashed a mocking, playful arrogance.
As his clothes were shredded, those skinny little men quickly melted back into the crowd, disappearing without a trace in the blink of an eye—faster than ground rats fleeing.
Immediately afterward, chaos erupted.
Several sharp glints of cold light suddenly lunged at Lu Qian’s vital spots.
They were several ordinary-looking middle-aged men, with unremarkable features and plain clothes.
Holding short swords and daggers, expressionless, they fiercely attacked Lu Qian.
A glimmer of spirit light flickered in Lu Qian’s mind, but he didn’t sense any true malice from them.
No malice, yet they struck a deadly blow at him?
These assassins weren’t part of the same group as those who tore his clothes!
Lu Qian extended both hands from his sleeves, grasped his spear shaft, and spun his body on the spot.
The spear twirled rapidly around him.
“Clang clang,” came the crisp sound as several sharp attacks were deflected by the spear shaft.
The man who attacked twitched violently in his right hand, almost losing his weapon from the impact.
They glared at Lu Qian in shock, then immediately switched targets, striding back into the crowd and wildly slashing their weapons in all directions.
“Pfft,” came the sound as a dozen or more screamed in pain and fell.
Those who had just attacked Lu Qian continuously waved their left arms, firing volley after volley of small, fist-sized pellets in all directions.
Along with dull explosions came bursts of flame flying about.
One by one, shops and houses along the street were set ablaze.
Among the onlookers, more and more people were hit by these pellets.
White phosphorus and oil stuck to their bodies, quickly igniting them, turning these poor souls into fiery torches wailing in agony.
These burning people ran wildly all over, the terrifying phosphorus flames rapidly setting even more alight.
It was the dead of winter—everyone dressed thickly.
Fur cloaks, silk robes, cotton-lined clothes—all perfect kindling.
In just a few breaths, on the streets near Qifang Garden, at least a thousand people were blazing up in roaring flames.
The air filled with dreadful screams.
From farther away came the sounds of chaotic uproar.
At least a hundred gardens suddenly caught fire, black pillars of smoke shooting up to the sky.
In the blink of an eye, fierce flames leapt up.
Even Heaven seemed to join the ruckus—a gust of wind howled down from the north, fanning the flames.
A blaze leapt fifteen yards in a flash, quickly spreading from one building to the next.
At that moment, the young lords and ladies who had once been cheerfully watching the spectacle suddenly fell into panic.
“Put out the fire! Quick, put out the fire!”
“Who’s setting fires? Which bastard is doing this?”
“Help! Help! Someone’s killing! Someone’s killing!”
Lu Qian gripped his spear and kicked down a few scrambling, shouting people nearby.
Then he vaulted into the air, landing atop a small building by the street.
A group of onlookers on the rooftop shouted excitedly, but before they could act, Lu Qian kicked each one hard, sending them tumbling down the building one by one.
More and more palace guards scrambled onto nearby rooftops and buildings, frantically looking around in confusion, unsure of what was truly going on.
From the nearby tall buildings, unlucky spectators fell screaming as arrows shot out from the shadows.
Bathed in the flickering firelight, they became prime targets, struck in vital spots.
Each screamed in pain before Plum-petal-like they plummeted off rooftops.
Within moments, more than three or five hundred archers dressed in black with black scarves covering their faces appeared on rooftops all around.
They held longbows, moving in small groups, randomly shooting arrows in all directions.
They had no specific targets; wherever crowds gathered, they loosed their arrows.
“That’s the standard strongbow of the Imperial Guards!” a palace guard commanding officer shouted hoarsely beside Lu Qian.
With a sharp whiz, several long arrows shot toward Lu Qian’s side.
With one hand, Lu Qian caught an arrow.
The shaft was cold and heavy in his hand, with a three-sided arrowhead at least three inches long, exquisitely crafted with backward-facing wolf-tooth barbs.
The arrow shaft’s end was adorned with high-quality black carved feathers—not flimsy goose feathers or chicken down.
Most importantly, near the arrowhead was a stamped serial inscription.
But someone had ground down all the markings.
This was indeed a Dayin Imperial Guard standard carved-feather arrow!
Arrows rained everywhere amid the surging crowd.
The piercing whistle of the three-edged armor-piercing arrows filled the air as the heavy projectiles fell.
Once hitting a person, they could pierce straight through with ease.
“Pfft!” victims screamed as one by one they collapsed.
Around rooftops, such archers numbered at least several hundreds.
They fired indiscriminately all around.
With every breath, hundreds of people were struck and fell wounded.
Now and then, arrow shafts flashed with sparks of fire in the darkness.
These archers also launched flaming arrows toward distant buildings, setting even more gardens ablaze.
Silver bell-like laughter echoed around, faint and eerie, like thin steel threads teasing out everyone’s deepest, darkest suppressed emotions.
From all directions, many of the young lords and ladies who had just come out to watch had already lost their minds.
A subtle fragrant scent wafted through the air.
Many who smelled it felt suddenly energized, as if injected with potent stimulant.
With that silver bell laughter stirring them up, unwittingly more and more people lost control, raging wildly, slashing whoever was near with reckless abandon.
Luo Qingzhou and several of her subordinates rushed to Yin Xing’s side.
Poor Yin Xing’s royal guards had been hacked down nearly half; amid the chaos, someone had slashed him twice—one blow on his shoulder, another on his backside.
Bloodied all over, Yin Xing howled curses rough and foul, sounding no different than a common street thug.
But even at this critical moment, Yin Xing too fell into madness.
His set of Fuyáo Fist techniques burst out with fierce power, and at least twenty or thirty unlucky souls around him were beaten hard, coughing up blood as they collapsed.
After all, as a Dayin royal prince, he had endless resources to squander.
Although Yin Xing had never seriously trained martial arts since childhood, relying on royal backing, he was still a top expert at the Twelfth Vein of the Meridian Opening stage.
With a single punch, he could easily kill a bull.
Luo Qingzhou guarded the maddened Yin Xing, crying and shouting desperately, “Your Highness, something’s wrong! Someone deliberately stirred up the riot! This is a conspiracy! A conspiracy!”
“I don’t care about your damn conspiracies! Protect me while I break out!” Yin Xing punched a heavily tattooed barbarian warrior, sending him flying over ten yards, then kicked down a black-skinned soldier wielding a curved blade rushing at him, foam flecked at his mouth as he roared at Luo Qingzhou, “If I make it out alive, you’ll have merit with no guilt! But should I die here, I’ll have your entire families wiped out! Wiped out! Wiped~~~ out~~~!”
Shouting “wiped out” repeatedly, each time he bellowed a word, a cluster of dark blue energy erupted from his fists, forcefully knocking down the chaotic crowd around him.
Yet, the more Yin Xing acted this way, the more attention he drew in the frenzied crowd.
Suddenly, seven or eight plain-looking, unremarkable men burst out from the chaos, their blades and swords flashing cold light, slicing fiercely at Yin Xing amid piercing wind sounds.
On several neighboring tall buildings, a dozen archers simultaneously focused on Yin Xing, shooting arrow after arrow like rain.
Luo Qingzhou and the others shouted in unison: “Protect the prince!”
They fought with all their strength.
Several charging assassins were slain within a few strikes, and arrows aimed at Yin Xing were deflected by Luo Qingzhou’s sword swings.
Liu Wu, who cowered near Yin Xing with weak personal strength, kept weeping and wailing.
Luo Qingzhou and others barely had time to care about this poor soul.
Some stray arrow, slightly off target, suddenly struck Liu Wu’s thigh with a “pfft,” followed by a piercing scream as the arrow pierced through, pinning him to the ground.
Lu Qian glanced at the man frantically throwing punches on the street—Yin Xing—then looked back at the wider chaos.
The silver bell laughs continued.
The fragrant scent grew thicker and spread further.
With a sudden flick of his wrist, Lu Qian sent the carved-feather arrow, which had been in his hand, soaring back with a sharp whistle many times fiercer than it was when released from the bow.
A scream echoed as on a small building over ten yards away, an archer was struck through the neck by the arrow and toppled headlong.
Raising his steel-tipped spear, Lu Qian shouted loudly to the palace guards gathering nearby, “Someone’s sabotaging and deliberately stirring up trouble! Those archers—kill them if you can, capture them if you can!”
The sound of arrows cutting through the air suddenly grew thunderous.
One of Lu Qian’s casually thrown arrows killed an archer, instantly making him the target of near twenty archers shooting his way.
This sudden attention outshone even that given to Yin Xing.
Arrows hissed as they rapidly approached.
Lu Qian vaulted into the air, stepping on arrows as he flew toward the nearest small building.
His steel spear tore through the air with a dull hum and a flash of cold light, stabbing deeply into an archer’s chest.
Lu Qian’s sudden attack sparked a counteroffensive by the nearby palace guards.
Palace guards were all strong talents, at least at the Foundation Establishment entry-level stage.
Together with grapplers and commanding officers, they quickly cleared the archers from several rooftops nearby.
On the rooftop of Youhuang Pavilion, Zhu Yu’s eyes flickered as he watched the chaotic scene in Siji Lane.
He winked at Bailu beside him.
Bailu squinted, nodded gently, and smiled faintly, pouring the ruby-red wine from her glazed cup onto the ground.
“Boom!”
A building about a hundred yards away, over ten yards tall, was reduced to burning rubble as it collapsed under the blaze.
Amid the chaos, Luo Qingzhou raised her right hand toward the sky, launching a pellet that soared up.
With a mighty explosion, a pool of blood red light erupted dozens of yards across, hanging a hundred yards high in the air.
Dense drumbeats sounded around.
High-pitched shouts came from afar: “Imperial Guards are acting! Anyone who blocks the way will be killed without mercy!”
“Charge!”
“Charge!”
“Those who dare obstruct—die!”
(End of chapter)