When Zhang Heng stayed in the southeast city, Cornu tested him with the Balance Blade’s doctrine once. After that, Zhang Heng told Altrus about this matter, which was why he could not lie to Clint in the dungeon.
At the same time, Zhang Heng also realized why Commodus ordered him and Clint to interrogate the assassins. It seemed the ambush wasn’t some random event. They wanted Zhang Heng to expose the existence of the Balance Blade.
In other words, the assassination that took place on the bridge that afternoon hadn’t been led by the Balance Blade. It was a plan that Commodus and Altrus had come up with together. Altrus had no intention to use a representative on the front stage. The person who pretended to be him was supposed to sacrifice himself and put the blame for the assassination on the Balance Blade. With that, they would have a reason to use the empire’s resources to get rid of Balance Blade once and for all.
The whole thing far more dramatic than Zhang Heng imagined.
When Clint and Zhang Heng reported the information obtained from the female assassin to Commodus, he immediately issued an arrest warrant to all the Balance Blade’s members. In order to avenge his most trusted adviser, Commodus even withdrew one hundred thousand gold coins from his vault as a reward.
The Senate also expressed their concern about this matter. A group of nobles led by Dior expressed their condolences for the assassination of Altrus immediately. Since it was inappropriate to use the funds from the treasury as a motivation to capture the murderer, the nobles donated a total of two hundred thousand gold coins to the reward pool.
With all that aside, many were actually happy that Altrus was dead.
Altrus had worked by Commodus’s side for a long time and was regarded as the emperor’s right-hand man alongside Clint. With the death of Altrus, Commodus had lost one of his most trusted advisors, which meant he would have to rely on the Senate more often in the future.
Such a situation was undoubtedly what the group of nobles led by Dior would like to see. However, their happiness only lasted for less than half a day, soon to be taken aback by what they would discover. They realized that they had underestimated the young emperor. With the death of Altrus, Commodus began to purge the high-ranking generals.
Except for civic officers like Sebutul, who had escaped the fate of losing his job because he protected Commodus during the ambush, all the other noble officers were either transferred to other places or retrenched. They were replaced by a group of soldiers who had fought alongside Commodus against the Germanic tribes. Regardless of their different background, they all had one thing in common—their absolute loyalty to Commodus.
In the end, except for the highest commander of the imperial guard, every middle and high-level general was replaced. In other words, Commodus now had complete control over the military forces in the city of Rome. It was already too late when the Senate realized that Commodus had made the changes. Dior and others could only stare at each other.
However, Zhang Heng did not have much time to care about this political turmoil for the time being. Five days had passed since Altrus’ assassination, and the Balance Blade still hadn’t contacted him. For the past five days, nothing happened on his side. This morning, however, Commodus summoned him.
Apparently, he had done well to protect Commodus during the ambush at the bridge, killing three assassins in total. Commodus decided to reward him with a piece of land again. Thus, the landmass Zhang Heng owned now surpassed many noble families who had lived there for a few generations.
The only downside was that the land he owned was quite a distance from Rome. In the event of a future war, his land might turn into a battlefield. Still, his good fortune had made many jealous of him. After all, every advisor had different achievements.
Everyone now knew that Clint would replace Altrus as chief advisor, and Zhang Heng would become the next Clint. Before that, Zhang Heng would need to find a way to fix his conflict with Clint. Clint was now waiting for Zhang Heng to bow at him. Although he still felt that Zhang Heng was a threat, it did not stop him from enjoying the victory that he achieved currently. However, the thing that embarrassed him the most was that Zhang Heng did not look for him for the next few days. He had no idea what Zhang Heng was up to since the latter was away from home most of the time.
But that night, Zhang Heng finally returned to his domus. He stretched out his hand to open the door, then walked toward the front hall when he suddenly halted in his steps. He had sent the slave-girl away almost a month ago. Now, only he and the other two servants who came bundled with the domus as gifts were supposed to be here. The two new servants hadn’t been living with Zhang Heng for a long time, and they had nothing worthy of his attention as well. However, they did do a good job at taking care of the domus.
In the past, when Zhang Heng came home, one of the servants would come out to greet him. Now, he realized how the house was eerily quiet. As he stood in the front hall, he saw moving ripples in a rain puddle shimmering on the wall, reflected by the moonlight.
He even heard the shrill sounds made by the clashing of some kind of sharp weapon. Zhang Heng moved his foot forward and in microseconds, an arrow landed at the spot where he stood just a moment ago. Zhang Heng did not need to raise his head to know that the archer was hiding on the second floor. It was probably the same assassin that assassinated Altrus.
Zhang Heng could never forget his archery skills. He dashed to the marble pillar beside him. Just when he was about to approach the pillar, he stopped abruptly. A scimitar came from behind the cylinder, aiming squarely for his face. If he had not stopped moving just now, he would have been sliced in two.
The threat was not over yet. Although he managed to escape the premeditated ambush by relying on his inhuman hearing and reaction, he did not forget that there was a masterful archer on the second floor. Clearly, he would not miss a golden opportunity like this to land a critical shot on Zhang Heng. As expected, when Zhang Heng started to make a move, the archer took advantage of the split-second he had and released his bowstring.
Hence, Zhang Heng wasn’t only facing the scimitar in front of him, but he also had to deal with the second arrow flying towards him. Without any hesitation, he made a critical decision. Since the scimitar was approaching his chest, he had to deal with it first. He swung his Persian short sword, and at the same time, placed his other hand on the hilt of the second.
The moment Zhang Heng blocked the scimitar, the deadly arrow was about to pierce through his body. The Battōjutsu was performed with lighting speed once he drew the second Persian sword at the last moment. After that, he used the same method he used to deal with the archer gladiator at the Amphitheatrum Flavium. In the end, he managed to deflect the feather arrow aiming at him.
The two assassins had never seen Zhang Heng’s previous gladiatorial performance. When they witnessed this miraculous scene, they were left in bewilderment. This was not something an ordinary human could achieve.
