Chapter 474

To be honest, the four words "Dongli God of War" were already enough to earn admiration.

Since he first saw Zhao Changdu, he had only had respect for him in his heart. It was just a pity that such a man was dragged down to this state by the woman in his arms. No matter how he died for Gu Ying today, so what?

This woman had never known everything he had done for her.

And who would have known that the famous regent would live so humbly and pitifully before a woman?

He sneered lightly in his heart and drew out his long sword. The blade gleamed with an icy cold light as he walked step by step towards the man.

He knew that Zhao Changdu was already at the end of his rope.

This one stroke of his sword could easily sever his head.

However, to his surprise, even dosed with anesthetic perfume, Zhao Changdu actually still had the strength to grapple with him for over ten rounds!

He had almost lost his grip on the long sword in his hand!

Han Lin felt his scalp go numb with shock. He retreated several steps, nearly vomiting from the powerful true energy emanating from the man’s body.

Zhao Changdu breathed heavily. Shaken by the long sword, his numb body fell into the pool of blood.

He struggled to stand up and walked to Gu Ying's side, tenderly holding her in his arms.

The cold wind howled. Snowflakes drifted onto the bare branches. The man's long lashes quivered. Pure white snow mixed with blood fell, dropping onto Gu Ying’s pale cheeks.

Exhausted, he let out puffs of white mist with each heavy breath, then took a long inhale, feeling a tearing pain in his chest.

Two daggers were stabbed into his back. The wounds were so painful he found it hard to breathe.

Fortunately, he was hardened by years growing up battling on the warfront, so he could still endure such injuries.

Sweat soaked his head while blood mixed with tears trickled from his eyes.

He rigidly embraced the girl and limped to sit by the door of the dilapidated temple, leaning against the doorframe.

After resting for a while, he slowly lowered his eyelids, gazing affectionately at the girl still unconscious in his arms. The corners of his bloodstained lips tilted into a self mocking smile. “If I had known...I should have just taken you directly.”

“Hate me or curse me all you want.” He sighed softly. “Just don’t let it end like this for you and me.” Han Lin touched the wound on his right arm and licked the corner of his mouth. Meeting the man's bloodshot eyes, such willpower and madness was truly astonishing.

It was just a pity that a hero like him would perish today.

He stepped forward with his sword again.

Jiang Yin stopped him. His handsome face darkened. "Give me the sword."

Han Lin stepped back. “Yes.”

Jiang Yin showed no fear as he strode to stand in front of Zhao Changdu, looking down at him from on high. He found that despite his disheveled state, Zhao Changdu still looked breezy and elegant as he held Gu Ying in his arms, which made Jiang Yin’s heart even more stifled.

Moreover, the sight of him embracing Gu Ying was especially grating.

However, Jiang Yin did not reveal any of this on the surface. He sneered coldly, “Zhao Changdu, you’ve lost.”

Blood covered Zhao Changdu’s handsome face. His large hand gently caressed the girl’s emaciated cheeks as tenderness filled his eyes. He smiled slightly, an open and debonair smile. “Oh? Are you sure I’ve lost?”

Jiang Yin’s face darkened, black as the bottom of a pot.

Remembering Gu Ying being pressed under this man day and night, it was hard to say who had really lost.

Jiang Yin said, “Today, I will send you to the underworld. Don’t blame me.”

Zhao Changdu replied, “This king does not blame you. Winning without valor: when we meet again beneath the yellow springs, this king and little girl still won’t look upon you kindly.”

Jiang Yin was provoked to great anger. “Today I will make you understand death clearly! Zhao Changdu, the biggest mistake in your life is touching my woman!”

Zhao Changdu lazily arched his brow. “Is that why you’ve treated her this way? Only worthless men take their anger out on women. Jiang Yin, it seems I overestimated you before.”

Jiang Yin's mouth twitched fiercely, his inner demons laid bare by Zhao Changdu’s words. “If you kneel and beg me, I may consider sparing your life,” he hissed resentfully.

“Want to see this king lower his head?” Zhao Changdu looked nonchalant as his lips curled into a contemptuous smirk. “I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you. To die under the peony's blossoms, even as a ghost I’ll still be debonair. To die for this girl, I have no regrets.”

Jiang Yin sneered derisively, “Too bad she never loved you!”

“So what if she didn't?” Zhao Changdu was utterly unfazed. “As long as this king loves her, that's enough.”

"She never loved you! From beginning to end, the only one she's ever loved is me!" Jiang Yin trembled violently with anger, with complex emotions tangling around his heart like vines, suffocating his breath. “Today I will kill you! Zhao Changdu, if not for you tainting her, she wouldn't have ended up like this!”

A flash of self-blame went through Zhao Changdu’s brows and eyes as his rough fingertips stroked the girl’s forehead skin stretched over bone. His heart ached as if it would break.

“Gu Ying, it’s my fault. I’m sorry.”

That night, he hadn't meant to lose his reason.

“In our next life, I will atone again.”

Jiang Yin's eyes were pitch black with cold. “You won’t get a chance.” Zhao Changdu smirked, a lazy, rakish smile. “One’s ending as this good-looking head dies for you, why fear death? With no fear of death, come on, stop dragging your feet like a woman.”

Such nonchalance made Jiang Yin extremely annoyed inside. His eyes bored into Zhao Changdu’s breezy, devilishly handsome face. Raising his hand, he swung his sword down swiftly and cleanly, severing Zhao Changdu's head.

The world was silent in an instant.

Not a sound besides the falling snow, gently drifting down.

Jiang Yin looked upon the closed eyes of that head as it rolled to his feet. He suddenly burst out laughing crazily.

He threw down his sword and hauled Gu Ying out from Zhao Changdu’s embrace viciously, throwing her back into the dilapidated temple.

Pulling up the corners of his mouth in a mocking smile, he said, “Come, clean this place up.”

...

After so many years in the broken temple, Gu Ying had rarely dreamed such a peaceful and happy dream.

She slowly opened her eyes, their lifelessness still somewhat blurred. In her daze, she smelled a faint, unfamiliar fragrance in the temple that made her brow lift slightly.

People came and went frequently in this broken temple, and she was long used to all kinds of odors. But she had never smelled this strange yet somewhat familiar scent of sunken perfume before, casting her mind adrift.

She shifted her stiff body but her hands and feet still couldn’t move. Such a defeated expression rarely appeared on her face now.

It just so happened no one came to torment her that afternoon either.

She tilted her head, gazing at the sunset like blood outside the window. In this frozen world blanketed in miles of white, snowflakes danced in the air, a dot of red plum blossoming strikingly on a bare branch.

The sky and earth were left with only pure white.

She clearly felt very cold, wearing only a single garment. But for some reason, her back was filled with waves of warmth.

She struggled to turn her body sideways, sweeping her eyes around the interior of the temple.

The broken temple remained unchanged,

as if someone had come and gone, yet no one had.

Only that faint bloodstain revealed on the doorway made her pupils contract sharply.

In the growing dusk, the courtyard outside the broken temple was piled high with thick snowdrifts.

The north wind cut to the bone, snake-like, drilling into her marrow.

She stared blankly at that inexplicable blood mark as an odd sour sensation welled up from her heart. Her eyes suddenly moistened...

The year was Twenty-Eight Winter during the Tianqi era.

Gu Ying died.

Until her death, she never knew what had happened that afternoon in the Twenty-Sixth Year of Tianqi.