CH 98

Chapter 98: Unwilling To Be Tied Up In A Bundle On A High Shelf.

After attaching itself to the waiter, Hundun walked towards the city wall and looked up. The clear blue sky looked crushed against the ancient red wall of the Capital. Hundun stretched out ‘his’ hand and touched the wall, when suddenly, the wall lit up and cut off ‘his’ fingers.

“Tch.” Hundun stared at ‘his’ bloody hand without feeling any kind of pain. Then, Hundun murmured: “Consider yourselves well prepared.”

After saying this, Hundun looked around for a while, and then went east. Soon after arriving at a deserted forest, Hundun climbed an extremely dangerous cliff, but thanks to that, he was able to see a huge iron umbrella standing on the cliff.

This iron umbrella was covered with a warning of death for those who touched it. The intricately carved umbrella frame was covered with yellow paper talismans, while the umbrella handle was embedded in the earth, to an unknown depth.

This was the Demon Seal Formation.

Hundun stared at the formation through the waiter’s eyes and reached out to touch the handle of the umbrella. Unexpectedly, the hand that touched the umbrella turned into a bloody mush that fell to the ground.

This time, however, Hundun did feel the pain. Hundun frowned and shook ‘his’ arm, covering the stones on the cliff with black blood.

After thinking about it, Hundun created an illusory arm and left the waiter’s body.

The second Hundun was out of his body, the waiter fell to the ground. As he got up in a daze, the waiter held his head and said: “Huh? Why am I here? Where am I?”

Suddenly, a hoarse voice rang inside his ears: “You want glory and wealth, don’t you?”

The waiter was startled: “Who-?! Who is talking?!”

The voice continued: “It doesn’t matter who’s talking. What matters is that I can turn you into a rich man.”

The waiter looked around, as if trying to see the ‘person’ who was talking to him.

“Look up.” The voice spoke once again.

When the waiter looked up, he saw a huge iron umbrella pointing straight to the sky. Although he was surprised to see such a huge umbrella in a place like this, what surprised him the most was….

That the umbrella’s handle was made of gold!

As the sunlight fell on the golden handle of the umbrella, it shone so dazzling it could turn anyone blind. The waiter was so stunned to see the gold that he couldn’t stop himself from approaching it. However, before he could reach it, the waiter stopped.

“What is it? Isn’t that what you desire the most? As long as you take this umbrella away, you’ll have enough money to spend for several lifetimes.” The voice of temptation arose inside the waiter’s ears.

However, the waiter only felt that it was all too strange, so he said: “But, it says that whoever touches it, they will die. I won’t risk my life for money. Besides, who the hell are you? Er’guodan, is that you?! Hum! Did you really think I would be fooled by you? Just you wait, I’m going to hit you really hard when I see you! I’ll beat you-….”

Before the waiter could finish his words, he started screaming desperately. After all, his right arm inexplicably fell to the ground, turning into a filthy puddle of blood! The waiter covered his arm with his other hand in utter pain. As his face paled, he staggered back a few steps. The cliff was extremely steep and dangerous, and since the waiter’s footsteps weren’t steady, when he stepped on some debris, he fell down the cliff, tragically dying in the mountain stream.

Although the waiter saw the umbrella’s handle being made of gold, in reality, it was clearly made of iron.

Meanwhile, floating mid-air, there was an eerie black cloud. This extremely bizarre black cloud suddenly muttered in a hoarse voice: “It seems that I have to find someone with a bigger obsession….”

…

Last night, after saying goodbye to her father, the King of Bei’an County, in the courtyard, Yu Muyao quietly returned to her room to rest. She only woke up again when someone interrupted her sleep.

As soon as she opened her eyes, she saw a man dressed in black from head to toe standing right in front of her bed. Scared, Yu Muyao hurried to grab the jade pillow and swung it towards him.

The man dressed in black reached out to pull down his mask: “County Princess! Don’t be afraid, it’s me!”

At that moment, Yu Muyao recognized the man as one of her father’s confidants. She stared at him with surprise.

“County Princess, let’s go now. There’s no time to explain.” The man dressed in black shouted in panic.

It was just dawning outside, and the sky was still tinted with an eerie dark blue.

Since the man in front of her was a subordinate of her father, whom her father had always trusted, Yu Muyao wasn’t afraid. She simply got up and got dressed as fast as she could. Then, she asked: “What’s going on? Did something happen?”

The man dressed in black didn’t tell her, nor did he let her take her luggage, he simply took Yu Muyao outside her room.

“Wait! A’Ling….” Yu Muyao wanted to call her personal maid, A’Ling, but the man covered her mouth.

“County Princess, no! We have to go find Madam. I’ll tell you everything afterwards.”

After saying that, the man pulled Yu Muyao away with a tough attitude.

Taking advantage of the hazy night in the early morning, they avoided the people in the mansion. Soon, they arrived at the wing room where the King of Bei’an County and his wife lived.

The man dressed in black knocked on the door several times, but no matter what, no one replied. The man dressed in black couldn’t wait any longer: “Sorry to disturb the Madam,” he said as he pushed open the door.

Although Yu Muyao thought this wasn’t appropriate, she didn’t stop the man and followed after him. However, as soon as the man walked into the room, he turned back to cover Yu Muyao’s eyes and pulled her outside.

But it was already too late….

Yu Muyao had already seen it.

Inside the wing room, hanging from a white silk, and with a chair thrown to one side, lay the dead body of the Madam of Bei’an County. She had hanged herself, hanging from the beam.

Everything was so sudden.

Yu Muyao’s body trembled nonstop. Without knowing where she had gotten her strength from, Yu Muyao managed to yank herself free from the man and ran into the room. Once there, Yu Muyao knelt on the ground.

“Am I dreaming? What is going-what is going on? Wasn’t Mother still fine yesterday? Where’s my Father? Where’s my Father?!!!” Yu Muyao suddenly pinched her wrist as hard as she could, bruising herself to feel the pain and confirm whether this was real. At the same time, Yu Muyao desperately shook her head, chanting over and over again that this was nothing more than a nightmare.

Yet, it wasn’t a dream, nor was it an illusion.

It was the tragic and bloody reality of not knowing whether they had succeeded or failed.

The man dressed in black stopped Yu Muyao from further hurting herself and said: “County Princess! The County King failed to seize power by force last night! The Madam must have known that the ruthless Empress Dowager wouldn’t spare the lives of the Nine Clans, so she retorted to this. County Princess, we have to hurry and leave this place, we have to escape from the Capital! Don’t be afraid, the King of Bei’an County has already prepared a way for you to escape, and I won’t let anything happen to you. Let’s go now!”

However, Yu Muyao didn’t listen at all. Instead, she grabbed the man dressed in black and asked him in a loud voice: “Where’s my father?! Is he still alive?!”

At first, the man dressed in black was reluctant to say it, but in the end, he couldn’t withstand the County Princess repeating those questions over and over again. He could only say: “The County King has died in the tumult of war.”

Yu Muyao froze in place, as if she had forgotten how to breathe and cry.

“County Princess, let’s go now! The people sent by Empress Dowager Xianyi must already be on their way here.” The man dressed in black was so anxious that he even pulled Yu Muyao’s hand.

As he walked, he suddenly heard the sounds of smashing and people screaming coming from outside.

The man’s face changed, and he decided to take Yu Muyao away by force.

However, Yu Muyao suddenly stopped. As soon as she opened her mouth, she choked up and burst into tears that fell down like the raindrops of a heavy storm: “I can’t leave.”

“County Princess?!” The man screamed in surprise.

Yu Muyao wiped her tears and bowed at the man in gratitude: “Thank you for everything, but there’s a law in our Dynasty that dictates that if a rebel escapes from their Residence, their entire family, including the servants, will be sentenced to death. Absolutely no one will be left alive. If I leave now, I won’t be saving anyone. My Father has made the decision to seize power through a coup, so the result of this act of rebellion also falls on my shoulders. I cannot harm the innocent lives of the servants of the Residence of the King of Bei’an County.”

The man dressed in black froze in place.

He stared at Yu Muyao. He saw her going to hug the dead body of her mother and cover it with a quilt. He watched her wipe away her tears again, only to reveal a determined look.

“You should go now. Don’t get implicated in this.”

After Yu Muyao said her last words to the man dressed in black, he turned around and left the Residence.

‘She’s so determined, so calm, and so lonely.’

He still remembered that time, at the hunt, when a younger Yu Muyao pointed at the sons of the Generals and said with righteous indignation: “Why can they ride a horse and I can only travel in a sedan chair? What makes me inferior to any of them?”

Hot blood was hard to cool down. Even after several years after that event, she was still the same Bei’an County Princess who had never been willing to be locked in her boudoir1 for the rest of her life.