Translator: Henyee Editor: Henyee
This was an assassination, neat and clean. After some careful investigation, Gu Shenwei had a rough picture of what had happened.
There were four main killers, perhaps with another one or two men waiting outside as lookouts, but the ones that did the deed were those four.
From behind the tent, the first killer shot a flying dagger which was collected and taken away later, leaving an indistinct crack. The people in the tent were startled and immediately understood that something was wrong.
Senior Shou was a man of much worldly wisdom but he was the first to panic in the face of death. He had slipped and left clear boot prints on the ground when he desperately ran to the door.
The second killer was already waiting at the door. Instead of slashing at the target as usual, the attacker simply stabbed at Senior Shou’s heart and finished him off in only a moment. The cut was very deep, almost piercing his chest, but the wound was very small, indicating that the killer was ruthless and swift.
Senior Shou had then fallen to the ground without a sound. Half of his body was already outside the tent. He was later dragged back inside.
The saberman Bo Sang had been practicing drawing his saber quickly these days, so when the enemy appeared, he immediately unsheathed his blade and held it fast in his hand, and didn’t let it go even after he was dead. But he had been confused by the hidden weapon flying in from behind the tent. Not knowing which direction the next attack would come from, he had hesitated, and shifted the center of gravity of his left foot once, leaving a deep footprint.
It was probably at the time when Senior Shou was cut that Bo Sang realized the intruder’s identity. He had immediately made the right decision and ran to the hostage, trying to silence him.
The third killer had already burst into the tent at that moment and attacked without hesitation, making a long cut in Bo Sang’s back.
Bo Sang fell but did not die at once. He turned over but just received another stab in the heart.
Kuo Zhen must have been overjoyed. He had suffered a lot these days and was already very weak. At the sight of the rescuers, he immediately burst out with strength and writhed with all his might, moaning with his gagged mouth to show that he was still alive. He would never have imagined that the purpose of these people, like Bo Sang, was to silence him.
The fourth killer came in, whose existence Gu Shenwei wasn’t even sure of. Because the killers had left almost no footprints, the fourth person might not have existed and the one acting might still be the first two killers.
Gu Shenwei felt that if he had been the playmaker, there would have definitely been a fourth person to ensure the assassination process was swift and smooth.
Either way, this person walked up to Kuo Zhen and stabbed him in the throat.
Kuo Zhen had died instantly.
Next, the killers methodically vandalized the corpses, especially those of Senior Shou and Kuo Zhen, who was destroyed beyond recognition to create the illusion of fulfilling a vendetta.
“This is Kuo Zhen?” King Rizhu frowned. He was very familiar with his nephew, but he couldn’t even recognize him now.
Gu Shenwei nodded.
“Maybe it’s not the real Kuo Zhen.” King Rizhu still couldn’t believe that King Kuari was so ruthless to even kill his own brother.
“It must be him. Look at the color of the rope on the corpse, it’s the same as that of the ground. And these marks show that he was lying there for a while before the killers arrived.”
“Are the killers from Golden Roc Castle?”
“No, it might have been Golden Roc Castle who made the plan, but it wasn’t them who carried it out.” Gu Shenwei recognized the familiar process but the saber wound on the corpses didn’t look like a Golden Roc killer’s style.
“When did it happen?”
“Probably this morning. I guess it was about six or eight hours ago.”
That was exactly the time when King Kuari had stopped the Dragon King and invited him to renegotiate in the small tent.
Gu Shenwei finally realized what a mistake he had made.
The enemy’s strategy had been to isolate and drive the Dragon King away all this time. Except for bluffing tentative attacks, the enemy rarely launched a frontal attack. Gu Shenwei, therefore, unconsciously lowered his vigilance and had become slack, and King Kuari’s offer to renegotiate also made him think that he still had some time.
He had guessed Bo Sang and others were in danger, but in order to prevent the enemy from following him to find them, he had not informed them, but revealed the information to King Rizhu, hoping that he could protect the three.
But King Kuari was more decisive than he had imagined.
“We are a bit late.” King Rizhu sighed with a bit of complaint. “You should have told me earlier.”
Too many things had happened that ‘should’ not have, but King Rizhu had also concealed information, so how could Gu Shenwei believe him easily?
“We’re in the same boat now, so we’d better be honest to each other.” King Rizhu quickly stopped blaming the Dragon King who he still needed to rely on. “King Kuari has killed Kuo Zhen, so it means that he’s probably thought of other ways to mobilize his troops. I can’t delay any longer, so give me … lend me the Flame Foal. King Kuari has soldiers, but so do I.”
Gu Shenwei didn’t answer right away. What he was thinking about now were the other three people. Bo Sang had exposed himself; how long could Lotus hide?
“I want to see the Second Consort.”
A gleam of anger flashed on King Rizhu’s face. He knew it was a mistake to have let the two meet. “Does the Dragon King think that I can’t decide?”
“You can decide the arrangement of the meeting,” insisted Gu Shenwei. “I hope that King Rizhu will be present, so that we can be ‘frank and above-board’.”
“You’re just wasting time.” King Rizhu suppressed his anger. “The enemy is on the move, and we are still going to have a meeting?”
“This is very important.”
As for why it was important, Gu Shenwei also didn’t know. But he was sure that the bond between King Rizhu and the Second Consort wasn’t unbreakable and he didn’t want an indirect alliance.
“I’ll arrange it as soon as possible,” said King Rizhu, his face cold as a rock. “When it comes, I want you to hand over the Flame Foal, and also come up with a genuine ‘plan’.”
The plan was to kill King Kuari.
Gu Shenwei returned to his camp and silently waited for the arrival of night. He was a guest of the Royal Court during the day, alone and unable to move an inch. When the night fell and countless tents blocked out the light of stars and moon, numerous hidden paths would show themselves. Only then would he become the master of the Royal Court.
Lotus was far more alert than Bo Sang. Even if she was sneak-attacked, she would not be easily hurt.
As for Shangguan Ru, Gu Shenwei had two clues now. Both King Kuari and the disciples of the Essence Pavilion had suggested that they had kidnapped her, which meant that one of them must be lying. But this wasn’t his biggest doubt. What puzzled him the most was the two parties’ purposes in kidnapping Shangguan Ru in the first place?
Threatening the Dragon King with a woman? The person who had come up with this idea must have lost his mind. Gu Shenwei admitted that he had a special affection for Shangguan Ru, but when it came to the future of tens of thousands members of the Dragon Army, he would never lose his presence of mind through personal feelings. Both King Kuari and people of the Essence Pavilion should have understood this.
Most importantly, King Kuari and Golden Roc Castle had always wanted to force the Dragon King to leave, but kidnapping Shangguan Ru would only cause the opposite effect. If this was the case, it seemed that they wanted the Dragon King to stay.
Gu Shenwei’s heart moved a bit.
Fang Wenshi came in. He hadn’t freed himself from the humiliation of King Rizhu, so the first thing he said was, “King Rizhu is deceiving Dragon King.”
“What have you got?”
Fang Wenshi grinned slyly. “I found a talkative person from King Kuari’s Office.”
Gu Shenwei had ordered Fang Wenshi to buy a mole from King Kuari’s side within three days. It seemed that the counselor had fulfilled his task ahead of time.
Fang Wenshi didn’t agree with the Dragon King’s idea of bribing people at first, but he still faithfully tried.
He was once a guest of King Kuari and naturally knew who was the most favored person around the king. He made a list of ten people but soon eliminated six people who were triumphant for the time being and would not risk their future for a small sum of money.
The remaining four had their own reasons for resenting their lord which Fang Wenshi only knew a little bit about and could not investigate in detail.
Fang Wenshi took the Dragon King’s order very seriously and racked his brains to apply the strategies he had learned on those four one by one, looking for opportunities to make a move.
After several hours of contemplation, however, he still wasn’t able to draw a solid conclusion. Although the four of them were likely to betray their King, they also had reasons to stay loyal. And their fear of King Kuari alone was enough to make them endure all the humiliations they had born.
When Fang Wenshi was feeling deeply remorseful and for the first time felt that he wasn’t fit to be a counselor, he had a sudden flash of inspiration and determined the target of the bribe.
The man was not among the last four at all, he was actually one of the first six Fang Weishi had excluded.
“I finally figured it out.” Fang Wenshi couldn’t help bragging in front of the Dragon King, “It doesn’t matter whether the man has been loyal or humiliated. No matter how big the humiliation is, he can still bear it as long as there are enough benefits. So, there’s no need to analyze his relationship with King Kuari. We only have to look at how much he loves money.”
Everyone loved money, but the risks they were willing to take were different depending on how much they loved money.
Wei Chun had a name from the Central Plains, but even he didn’t know his parents’ origins. As one of the eunuchs around King Kuari, he was not actually a real confident of the king. But he had been castrated and entered the Office since he was little and had served his lord so long that he had enough information to sell.
The most important thing was that he loved money to an extreme and had never refused the gold and silver that Fang Wenshi sent him no matter how much it was.
Fang Wenshi had found a reliable middleman to arrange a meeting with Wei Chu which had been a test. If Wei Chun refused, the buy-out plan could only stop and Fang Wenshi had to try it out on others.
At the appointed spot, Wei Chun came and said loftily, “Do not try to bribe me. I have informed the lord of this meeting, and I’ve been ordered to see what tricks you ‘re up to.”
Upon hearing this, Fang Wenshi’s certainty increased from thirty percent to sixty percent.
“The Dragon King has brought a lot of money with him.”
“So what? The Dragon King has offended my lord; does he still want to leave the prairie alive with this money?”
“I’m afraid it’s impossible.” Fang Wenshi sighed, “Dragon King is too proud, which will kill him. So much money can’t be spent out, what a pity!”
“What do you mean?” Wei Chun seemed to understand something.
“We, after all, are servants. We serve people for money. Since the Dragon King doesn’t care about me, I have to care about myself, right?”
“Go on.” Wei Chun was attracted.
“The Dragon King ordered me to buy some information, at all costs.” Fang Wenshi paused a moment to stress the words ‘at all costs’ before saying, “So I was wondering that if someone were willing to cooperate with me, give me some less important information, and also give me a little kickback … It’s not gonna hurt anybody, is it?”
“This was only the beginning. Once Wei Chun got addicted, he began to say more and more, until sooner or later he will become a real mole.”
Fang Wenshi had only brought back two pieces of information. Wei Chun believed that not only would they not have a fatal impact on King Kuari but might even be helpful to his lord.
First of all, King Rizhu was no longer a secret protector of the Khan. The reason he was able to marry the Khan’s sister and win the title of king was because of his firm control of many tribes in the western part of the Norland. In fact, the Khan had tried to break King Rizhu’s monopoly over the power there but failed.
Second, King Kuari’s men had brought back a woman last night, who was said to have been transferred from the side of Golden Roc Castle.
