Chapter 21

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There could not have been a more perfect opportunity.

A surge of heroic spirit rose within Wen Hening. He sprang forward, seized the knife, and hacked away.

But he had overestimated himself. Not only was he weak, his aim was poor as well.

The blade landed crookedly and missed the man’s neck by a little.

Even so, the blow left the man gravely wounded.

Blood sprayed over Wen Hening’s face. In an instant, the stench of it filled his nose and coated his lips.

It was hot and sticky, enough to make him nauseous.

Wen Hening’s mind went blank with a sudden hum.

A moment later, he blinked and suppressed the strange sensation in his heart. Seeing that the man was still alive, he prepared to strike again.

But as he tried to pull the blade back, he realized that it seemed to be lodged in bone.

Frowning, he gritted his teeth and yanked with all his strength. At that moment, a bloody hand suddenly clamped down on the back of the knife.

Wen Hening jumped. Following the hand with his eyes, he saw a face twisted in agony.

Murderous fury surged in the man’s eyes, and his entire face was filled with ferocity.

Wen Hening froze. He swallowed, then raised his brows and forced his expression into something even more vicious. Gripping the knife with both hands, he roared,

“Let go!”

The man snarled, “You’re courting death!”

Ignoring the wound in his shoulder, he twisted around and moved to kill Wen Hening.

Wen Hening had not expected the man to be so formidable. The knife was still embedded in his body, yet he could fight as though nothing had happened.

He did his best to look fierce. Even though his calves were trembling, his feet remained firmly planted. He did not retreat a single step.

Compared with Wen Hening, a complete novice, the man before him was terrifyingly steady and ruthless.

But just as the man was about to strike, an iron whip suddenly pierced through his body from behind.

He had clearly forgotten that Wen Yan was standing behind him.

The ferocity remained frozen on his face, but shock rippled through his eyes.

He slowly lowered his head. Blood gushed from his mouth, and then his legs gave way. He dropped to his knees and gradually stopped breathing.

Wen Yan’s face appeared from behind him, calm and composed.

Wen Hening’s mouth opened and closed several times before he finally managed to stammer,

“T-Third Sister, I’m fine.”

He wiped his face and gave her a smile more painful to look at than tears.

Wen Yan paused, then looked at him with undisguised distaste.

“I wasn’t asking about you.”

Wen Hening wiped his face again. He kept feeling as though something had gotten into his eyes.

“I…”

Wen Yan took two steps back.

“Stay away from me.”

Bathing was inconvenient on the ship, and Wen Yan had no desire to get herself dirty. She wanted nothing to do with Wen Hening, whose entire face was smeared with blood.

Wen Hening felt rather aggrieved. He had just saved her, after all.

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Even if he had missed his target.

Reading the accusation in his eyes, Wen Yan fell silent.

After exchanging a few words with Wen Hening, Wen Yan was about to turn around and continue watching her father interrogate Feng Wu when she suddenly caught the faintest trace of movement and breath—so slight they were almost impossible to detect.

Her gaze shifted and fixed on a certain spot. With a flick of her wrist, she drew out the iron whip and sent it shooting toward the mast.

The motion was seamless, as swift as lightning.

The iron whip flew like a sharp arrow, fierce and unstoppable.

But it was still a step too late. A sleeve arrow passed the whip in midair and struck Feng Wu directly between the brows.

At the same moment, a figure tumbled from the mast, half his head shattered by the iron whip.

Wen Changning, who happened to be standing nearby, witnessed the scene. She went blank, then remembered certain unpleasant images from that night, and her stomach began to churn.

From the instant Wen Yan discovered the hidden assassin to Feng Wu’s death and the corpse falling from the mast, everything happened in no more than a few breaths.

Yet the situation had taken a sudden turn.

Feng Wu had been killed right before her eyes. Wen Yan flattened her lips, her gaze turning cold.

So she had been starving for too long, and that was why her reactions had slowed. She had not even noticed someone hiding there.

The members of the Wen family saw her expression change and did not dare breathe too loudly.

Her father, however, failed to notice any of this. Seeing that Feng Wu was dead, he grew frantic. He felt for the pulse in Feng Wu’s neck, pried open his eyelids, and tried to determine whether he still had even the slightest breath left.

The result naturally disappointed him.

The arrow had sunk almost entirely into Feng Wu’s brow, killing him on the spot.

Wen’s father slumped in despair.

He had been so close—so very close…

Feng Wu’s bones were nowhere near as hard as those of a true death soldier. He was an honest seventh-rank official from the capital.

His rank was not high, but anyone sent to carry out such filthy work must have been promised enormous rewards.

A man who valued wealth and glory so highly would not have been difficult to break.

If only he had been given a little more time, he would certainly have…

At that thought, Wen’s father suddenly realized something.

He rose and hurried to the nearest corpse of an official soldier. Without the slightest concern for the filth, he stuck his fingers into the corpse’s mouth and searched.

After finding what he expected, he withdrew his hand and searched another corpse.

He checked several in succession, and the result was exactly as he had imagined.

Wen’s father pulled back his hand, crouched on the ground, and looked toward Wen Yan.

“There’s poison hidden in these men’s teeth.”

Wen Yan looked at him calmly and confirmed his suspicion.

“They belong to the same group as the ones from last time.”

Every official soldier on the ship had been a death soldier in disguise.

Unexpectedly, the first person unable to hold herself together after Wen Yan finished speaking was Lady Lu.

She had always placed immense importance on manners and decorum, unwilling to let the Lu family’s reputation suffer.

Her head was perpetually held high, and every word and gesture seemed measured with a bronze ruler.

Each day, she would carefully comb her hair with her fingers when no one was watching. If even a single crease appeared in her prison clothes, she would repeatedly smooth it flat with her hands. Even when starving, she ate slowly and chewed every mouthful with care.

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On the few occasions when she had lost her composure, it had only been to avoid danger, when Wen Ruxu and Wen Changning had pulled her into hiding.

But now she broke free of her daughters’ hands, rushed to Wen’s father, seized him by the arm, and demanded through tears and clenched teeth,

“What have you done? What exactly have you done to make them so determined to kill us? Don’t you know that Ruxu will be taking the spring examination soon? He is about to become the first top scholar in the Great Jin Dynasty to achieve honors in all six examinations—something no one has ever done before! Don’t you know that?”

She had endured the night assassins broke into their residence. She had endured the confiscation of their household. Even after learning that Feng Wu had been deliberately sent to kill them, she had endured.

But when she heard that all these soldiers were death soldiers, it was as though a fuse had been lit. She could no longer bear it.

All Lady Lu knew was that from this day forward, every person who passed by her might be one of the death soldiers hunting them.

That person might be a street vendor, a passerby, a beggar, or anyone else.

There would be no peace. She would live in fear from dawn to dusk.

Wen’s father lowered his head in shame and said painfully,

“Wan, I’m sorry.”

Wen Ruxu took hold of his mother and tried to comfort her.

“Mother, don’t blame Father. He did nothing wrong.”

Lady Lu wept, “He has ruined your life!”

Wen Ruxu sighed and smiled.

“Father hasn’t ruined my life. This is merely a temporary hardship. If I cannot overcome even this small obstacle, how can I speak of the future?”

…

Wen Ruxu was mild-tempered by nature, and when soothing his mother, he was gentle to the extreme. In that respect, he greatly resembled his father.

Wen Yan shifted into another position and continued watching the scene of a loving mother and child, a virtuous father, and a benevolent son.

Even in her previous life, she had possessed little in the way of familial affection. After coming to this era, she had never grown close to the Wen family either.

To see two people so deeply attached that they could feel each other’s pain and joy as their own, as though the other’s birth, aging, illness, and death were matters more important than heaven itself—

It was utterly strange to her.

Lady Lu did not cry over the loss of wealth and glory, nor did she cry over her own life hanging by a thread. Instead, she wept over her son’s prospects and honors. Wen Yan found it truly astonishing.

Nearby, Wen Hening saw her staring unblinkingly at Lady Lu and Wen Ruxu and misunderstood her expression.

“Third Sister, Mother only regrets what will happen to Big Brother’s future. Her feelings for all of us are the same.”

Wen Yan cast him a sidelong glance.

“Are you all right now?”

Wen Hening was stunned.

“What else could be wrong?”

Wen Yan said, “If you’re fine, go to the galley and make something to eat. I’m hungry!”

Wen Hening pointed at himself, wondering whether he had misheard.

“Me?”

Leaving Wen Hening standing there in bewilderment, Wen Yan walked over to Lady Lu, who was still crying, and crouched down beside her.

Wen Ruxu looked at her.

“Third Sister.”

Lady Lu and Wen’s father also turned their eyes toward her.

Wen Yan smiled. Then, without warning, she reached out and seized Wen’s father by the throat. Turning to Lady Lu, she said gently,

“Since Mother hates Father so much, why don’t I kill him for you?”

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