Chapter 137: The Competence of the Rightful Queen

The hand severed by Guan Shiyin had been cut off at the wrist, while the one chopped off by Axi with a single sweep of his sword was severed at the elbow.

Li Yincheng felt his vision darken and nearly fainted, not from the pain, but from sheer rage! Both of his hands!

Axi, standing opposite him, did not hesitate. Seeing that his master was no longer in mortal danger, he raised his sword and charged at Li Yincheng once more.

With the murderous intent bearing down upon him, Li Yincheng retreated alertly while barking out orders, "Shoot! Quick, shoot! Shoot them dead, leave none alive!"

Swish, swish, swish! Arrows rained down like a fine mist.

Left with no choice, Axi turned back, scooped up Li Lingcheng, and fled swiftly.

Li Yincheng stamped his feet in fury where he stood. "Pursue them! All of you, after them! I want revenge! I want revenge—!"

His roaring voice cracked with strain, and the imperial guards fled in terror, scattering in a matter of moments. They ran not only to obey orders, but also because Li Yincheng, having lost both hands and wildly flailing his bare arms, looked like a raving, unhinged ghost.

The pain struck him once more. Gritting his teeth, Li Yincheng drew a sharp breath to steady himself. "Someone come here, bandage my wound!"

No one answered.

He turned around. There was no one left; they had all long since fled.

Li Yincheng swayed with anger. "I'll kill the lot of you! I'll kill you all!" Not a single one of these idiots had noticed he needed his wounds dressed?

Glancing down at his continuously bleeding, severed arms, the piercing agony brought wave after wave of cold sweat to his skin. He bit down hard on his teeth, stretched his neck to bite into a corner of his shoulder, and forcefully tore the front of his robe. Jerking his head back, he whipped the cloth away, then swung his arms up so that the torn fabric covered the stumps. Twisting his arms this way and that, he managed a makeshift bandage.

After this flurry of motion, his vision darkened again. He hurriedly leaned his body sideways against a nearby tree. "Hmph, you think you've defeated me this way? You think this stops me from becoming emperor? Let me tell you, keep dreaming! This empire is mine! Even without my hands, this empire is still mi—ugh!"

Mid-sentence, with his head lowered, he saw the tip of a sword protruding straight out from his left chest.

"Who?" He strained to turn his head to look.

The sword tip abruptly withdrew. His body arched backward from the pull, and as he gasped in pain with a sharp hiss, the tip of the sword pierced through the exact same spot once more with a tearing sound.

*Puff—* Li Yincheng spewed a mouthful of dark blood.

Behind him, Cheng Yurong, bruised and battered, slowly emerged, holding several long swords in her hands.

Li Yincheng's eyes bulged in shock. "Crown Princess..."

Cheng Yurong raised a sword and thrust it into Li Yincheng's chest again. "Li Yincheng, the thing I, Cheng Yurong, have hated most in all my life is this title of Crown Princess."

Instinctively, Li Yincheng tried to kick out and shove Cheng Yurong away, but having lost too much blood and suffering three consecutive stabs, he no longer had the strength even to twitch. His eyes rolled, and he abruptly changed his tune. "Empress! You are the Empress! If you save me, you will be—"

*Swish—* Cheng Yurong delivered yet another stab, striking the exact same spot on Li Yincheng's chest.

Li Yincheng opened his mouth, but the cry of pain he managed was completely devoid of strength.

Cheng Yurong lowered her upper body. Her mocking expression, distorted by her swollen and bruised face, took on a ghostly, ferocious cast. "Empress? Once you're dead, I am still the Empress!"

*You!* Li Yincheng suddenly understood.

Cheng Yurong raised the final sword high with both hands, then drove it deep into Li Yincheng's chest with all her might. "Go to hell, Li Yincheng!"

Li Yincheng's body stiffened, his legs kicked out, and before he could even utter a plea for mercy, his breath ran out.

Cheng Yurong's legs went weak, and she collapsed to the ground with a heavy thud.

Another voice drifted from behind the tree. "Go on, dispose of the body. Remember to change its clothes and slash the face to pieces first."

"Yes, Master." Two imperial guards stepped out from behind the tree.

The voice rang out again. "What? Master?"

The two guards spun around and dropped to their knees. "Yes, Your Highness!"

The man addressed as "Your Highness" stepped out from behind the tree and reached out to scoop Cheng Yurong up into his arms. "Crown Princess, you have suffered these past few years. But all your hardships end completely today. And starting tomorrow, nothing will remain for you except endless, inexhaustible wealth and glory."

"I don't want tomorrow, I want it to start right now."

"Fine, right now it is. How do you want to begin?"

"I want that Tianshan snow lotus from the imperial treasury to heal my face."

"Someone come, fetch the Tianshan snow lotus and deliver it to Lifang Pavilion."

"No, I want to move into the Zhongkun Palace tonight; it's stood empty for years."

"Someone come, warm the chambers of the Zhongkun Palace."

"I want you to sleep with me there tonight."

"Of course!" Dressed identically to Prince Li Yincheng, down to the very same face, the man casually pinched Cheng Yurong's waist.

Cheng Yurong let out a coy laugh, pushing away his face as he leaned in to kiss her. "Not this face, change it back!"

The man refused. "The overall situation isn't settled yet, we'd better play it safe! Besides,"—disregarding her rejection, he leaned in and planted a kiss anyway—"how many times has this face appeared on your bed? Weren't you always imagining my face anyway? So, what you see doesn't matter; what's in your heart is what truly counts!"

"Oh my, such a sour smell of vinegar," Cheng Yurong teased, reaching into the man's robes to give him a pinch. "Talking about me? Out there for over a dozen years, how many women have you missed out on?"

Feigning a groan of pain, the man grabbed Cheng Yurong's hand as she tried to pull it back and shoved it deeper and further down. "I want that too! Yes, right there, wonderful, more!"

"Shameless! Want it? Go find those women of yours!" Cheng Yurong scolded, though she didn't pull her hand out.

Grinning brazenly, the man leaned close to Cheng Yurong's ear, his warm breath brushing directly against her ear canal. "None of them have the skills of the main mistress!"

"Really?"

"Really!"

"Then tonight you aren't allowed to use lingering injuries as an excuse to reject me."

"Don't you worry, before dawn breaks, you won't even have the chance to utter half a word of plea for mercy."

"Shameless!"

"You only like the shameless kind anyway."

"You..."

The couple's amorous murmurs finally faded into the night air and could no longer be heard. In the nearby woods, the two imperial guards who were digging a hole to bury the body looked at each other and simultaneously dropped their shovels.

"My wife, I want to do shameless things too."

"Fine. Go kill those two first, and then occupy the bed—the most important prop for shamelessness."

"My wife, you are so cruel! Why use affairs of state to reject your husband's romantic sentiments? You must be blaming me for making you disguise yourself as a dead imperial guard just now!"

"Don't measure the heart of a gentleman with the yardstick of a petty person! When you told me to slip into the imperial guard uniform during the chaos, how could I not guess you were having me disguise myself as a corpse? How could I not guess that for the sake of realism you'd even personally kick and 'kill' me? And how could I not guess that despite not eating, drinking, or using the latrine all day—hoping to sneak out of the palace to recover my strength—you'd still drag me back to play some undercover spy game behind enemy lines?" Fang Rulai drew a dagger from her bodice, her face twisted in a grimace as she slashed fiercely across the face of a certain corpse on the ground. "Relax, I don't blame you at all!"

With a flash of the blade, blood spurted from the corpse's face, splattering across half of Fang Rulai's own face.

Without wiping it off, Fang Rulai raised her head, bared her teeth, and flashed a smile at Guan Shiyin—a genuine, bloodthirsty smile. "Really, I don't blame you!"

Guan Shiyin swallowed hard and retreated half a step.

Giving him a contemptuous glance, Fang Rulai turned, stripped the outer garments off the crown prince, and dressed the corpse whose face she had slashed in them. "Rest assured, until this whole affair is thoroughly over, I won't waste time blaming you."

Guan Shiyin nibbled his fingertip and muttered, "And after it's over?"

After it was over? Hmph! Fang Rulai reserved her judgment.

Dusting off her backside, she stood up and kicked the stripped crown prince. "Alright, you can send someone to deliver the crown prince to that infatuated woman. No doubt he's waiting impatiently to use him."