CH 51

You Must Not Die

"Gasp-!"

"Your Majesty!!!"

For those who practice martial arts, all swords and shadows will slow down. Chen Yan's pupils widened and he shouted, opening his arms to block in front of Yan Yuan. Yan Yuan pushed Chen Yan away, his palm condensing internal force, and the arrow immediately stood still in the air. The transparent orb condensed inside grew bigger and bigger, and when it exceeded his palm, the internal force caught the arrow feather and flew towards the roof not far away. The dead soldier who was lying in ambush on the tiles rolled down, the arrow plunging backwards into his neck, his eyes wide and unseeing.

It was enough that he had been defeated by his lover, but he had not expected to be attacked again halfway back to the palace. Yan Yuan was in a bad mood, these people have some nerve.

Since he was a child, he had been named the crown prince, a position that was equivalent to being in a constant state of turmoil and bloodshed, and many people coveted that position and wished for his death. Yan Yuan grew up in a pampered and spoiled environment, but he never missed his martial arts training. He did not like to use weapons, and his hands would become calloused after practising too much with swords, so he only practised martial arts and internal strength. The late emperor searched for a master who was very good at martial arts, and found him a master who created his own internal martial arts technique, called the Palm of the Heart, in which internal force is concentrated in the palm and when it hits the enemy's chest, it will shatter the heart, lungs and blood vessels and kill him.

Yan Yuan hated fighting and killing, which was an insult to his identity. With his guards at his side, he would never personally fight until he had to, but today he really needed to find an outlet for his anger. Pushing Chen Yan's old bones under the carriage to hide, he avoided the long sword thrust by the assassin on his left and slapped his palm against the wrist of the assassin, who immediately saw a black palm mark on his wrist and his sword fell in response.

Yan Yuan kicked the other man who rushed in from the right, and flipped up in the air, his white clothes flying. When he landed, he kicked an oncoming assassin in the chest and he fell down with a scream. Yan Yuan used his strength to leap up and stomp on the heads of five assassins in quick succession, causing their cheeks to deform and causing them to spit out a mouthful of blood as they collapsed.

This time, he went out of the palace in a very low-key manner, with only ten guards at his side, who followed the carriage in disguise and should not be distinguishable from the servants of an ordinary and wealthy family. The man behind the assassination attempt knew so much about his journey, so if nothing else, he had a spy beside him.

Half of the ten guards were dead, and only four or five were left fighting for their lives beside Yan Yuan. The number of assassins who had fallen was far greater than that of the guards, but because there were so many of them, as soon as a small number died, more came out of the deep woods beside them, which were their main ambush point.

In the middle of nowhere, there was an abandoned courtyard in the distance and no one was around. The assassins were so powerful that they seemed to be determined to kill him, and the only way out was to kill them.

Yan Yuan's inner strength and the wind of his palm landed on the assassin's chest, ending his life with a palm strike. Blood spurted out of the assassin's mouth and splashed in the air, landing sporadically on his eyelids and eyelashes. Yan Yuan’s originally pure peach blossom eyes were as cold as snakes.

He had already thought about who was behind the assassination.

Not many people around him knew of his true strength, including the guards, who probably thought he was just an unarmed emperor. To go to such lengths to send such powerful soldiers to kill an unarmed emperor meant that he must know him well.

Who else could it be but his good brother, who was thousands of miles away?...

Yan Huo Hang.

The name was gnawed in his mouth as Yan Yuan's men became more and more ruthless.

The guards were amazed to see him so skilled, but perhaps they were inspired by his morale, and their ambition was boosted, so Yan Yuan led them to fight their way out. The corpses on the ground gradually piled up into a small mountain, and Yan Yuan, red-eyed, grabbed the sword in the hands of the young guard beside him, held it with both hands, and swung it down diagonally from above, cutting the neck of an assassin who was rushing towards him, splashing blood everywhere.

The last of the assassins fell.

All the men were exhausted, the guards recovered from their fright, their legs were weak and they were happy. They looked at Yan Yuan and said in a trembling voice.

"Your Majesty... we have won!"

"Humph." Yan Yuan raised his hand and wiped the blood from his face, his long and slender eyelashes were stained with red, set against his pale and snowy handsome face, he actually looked like a demon. He curled his lips into a smile, snorted in response, threw away the dirty and stained longsword in his hand and turned around, his voice was a little slightly tired and mute, "Go."

Chen Yan crawled out from under the carriage with a sobbing face. The assassins were aiming at Yan Yuan, they didn't pay any attention to him as an old, immortal eunuch, and even if they did, they didn't bother to spend any effort on him. He was lucky to be the best in the scene, unharmed, and pounced on him to ask if Yan Yuan was alright.

Yan Yuan was hit by a few swords on his arm, the rest of the body was unhurt, however the sword seemed to have been drenched with something, to the extent that he was so weak that his mind became slow to turn. He vaguely seemed to hear the sound of a sharp arrow cutting through the air from behind him. He stopped in his tracks and felt a chill in his heart before he had time to turn back to look.

"Hmmm..."

His body froze and he looked down in surprise to see that the arrow feather had penetrated his heart and the basalt arrow was stained with his blood.

No wonder it was so cold...

"Your Majesty!!!"

"Your Majesty!!!"

It all happened so fast, so fast that it caught everyone present off guard.

The sneak attacker, seeing that he was right on target, retreated from behind the concealed trees at the first sign of success.

Chen Yan and his guards rushed up to help him, but Yan Yuan's body still fell inevitably. There was a mist of blood before his eyes, and he could not see anything.

He had heard that before one died, one would look back on one's past life, and at that moment, what appeared in his mind was Xuan Long's face.

The way the man had smiled.

The way he was shy.

The sullen look.

Xuan Long seldom smiled, but when he did, he was actually very gentle, and his cold, hard silhouette would melt like an iceberg. Perhaps it was because he was not used to making that kind of expression, so it was always a little stiff, but it made him look handsome and cute in a different kind of way.

When he is shy, his face does not reveal much emotion, and he will unconsciously avert his eyes from his gaze, looking untouched, when in fact his reddened ears had already revealed his emotions.

His silent look was too dull, but that didn't stop him from wanting to get close to him, especially in bed, where he always pushed harder on purpose, wanting to see an expression other than his expressionless face. Seeing his bewildered look for him, the difference he made in Xuan Long's mind was always a source of achievement for him.

In fact, Yan Yuan had been inwardly resisting Xuan Long's attraction for some time, and he could not understand how he could remember the smallest details so clearly, even clearer than the little bits and pieces of time he had spent with Ning Zhiyu.

Yan Yuan closed his eyes, the cries in his ears causing him quite a headache, his brow wrinkled slightly as he exhaled a faint sound.

"... Chen Yan, shut up."

As he spoke, blood gushed out of his mouth like running water. Chen Yan immediately silenced. Yan Yuan half-opened his eyes, a trace of clarity returned to his eyes. Above him were the shadows of the trees in the sky, the sky was grey, and the shape of a single crow passed by with a mournful cry.

It was clear to all that it was too late, and that the bumpy carriage would only hasten death.

Chen Yan looked at the emperor he had grown up watching with old tears. Yan Yuan reluctantly moved his fingers and took out the packet of dragon scales in a black cloth bag from between his own wide-sleeved robes and dropped it to the ground.

"Take the dragon scales back... to A'Yu."

"You tell him... I… what I originally promised… him... should be... impossible to do..."

"Your Majesty..." Chen Yan and the guards suppressed their sobs.

Yan Yuan never thought that his life would end at the age of 19. He used to say that he would protect Ning Zhiyu for the rest of his life and that he would stay with him until he grew old, but naturally those promises could not be kept.

Strangely enough, at the last minute, the person he wanted to see most was Xuan Long. Perhaps it was because he was the one he was most sorry for in his life.

Although he had not fulfilled his promise to Ning Zhiyu, he had cheated and used Xuan Long from the beginning to the end, and had never given him any warmth. The dragon was foolish enough to trust him, and even now he was willing to listen to a few words of pampering and submission from him and then pulled out his scales and let him go back to save his beloved.

He treated him really well… It’s a pity he can never see him again.

Yan Yuan used the last of his strength to give his last words and told Chen Yan to go back to the palace and fetch the holy decree behind the plaque on the desk in the imperial study, which was the decree to enthrone the new emperor. On the day of his accession to the throne, the emperor would appoint the most suitable crown prince in his mind and hide the decree in the imperial study in case something untoward happened and chaos broke out in the court.

Chen Yan choked back a sob and responded.

Yan Yuan felt tired, he wanted to go to sleep, but he felt reluctant, he was still so young, he still had his ambition to rule the world, he still had people he wanted to meet, so how could he die like this?

But how could a mortal not follow his fate?

The cries in her ears gradually faded away, became ethereal, and finally disappeared completely, as if they were blocked by a boundary capable of isolating sound, and Yan Yuan heard the low, trembling voice of a man in his ears.

"… A'Yuan."

Yan Yuan raised his heavy eyelids, and there was only a blurred shadow in front of him. The man was dressed in basalt clothes. He could not see the other man's face, so he could not see the tears that adorned his eyes.

Yan Yuan opened his mouth with difficulty and coughed up blood, "A'Po... is that you?"

"Am I... hallucinating?"

"It's me." The man said.

Yan Yuan heard Xuan Long's voice and couldn't help but laugh, his chest was heavy with large splatters of blood, and the blood in his mouth seemed like it couldn't be stopped.

"A'Po, look... I treated you.... so badly...."

"Now... I'm getting my retribution."

"You're relieved..."

"Then... don't be mad at me... Okay?..."

"I am not angry." He heard Xuan Long say.

"That's good... that's good..." Yan Yuan smiled with an ashen face and a breathless smile.

"A'Po... if there is another life, I will treat you well."

"I know... I owe you."

"I owe you..."

He spoke slowly and closed his eyes, his breath no longer there.

Xuan Long knelt beside Yan Yuan and gently pressed his cold hand to his face, as if to warm him. Without blinking, tears flowed from his cold turquoise eyes, and he repeated in a low voice:

"I am not angry."

I am not angry, you must not die.