County Office.
Fan Changyu was detained in the temporary interrogation room. The doors and windows were tightly shut; even the tables and chairs inside seemed to exude threads of cold air.
After sitting for a long while, the chill crept up through the soles of her shoes—layered with two thick insoles—until her feet were nearly numb.
Fan Changyu rubbed her hands together, breathed into her palms, and stamped her feet slightly, trying to warm herself up.
Outside the interrogation room stood two on-duty yamen runners. Fan Changyu had tried speaking to them through the door, but those two were clearly not Captain Wang’s men—they didn’t respond to her at all.
Waiting was unbearable. At last, the door of the interrogation room opened, letting daylight pour into the pitch-dark space. One of the yamen runners at the door said, “You may go.”
Fan Changyu thought Captain Wang must have returned from the search and proven her innocence. The tension in her chest loosened sharply as she stepped out of the room.
When she saw Captain Wang, he was in a fluster, hurriedly giving instructions to the yamen runners. Only then did Fan Changyu notice that even the ordinary yamen runners who served tea and water were now equipped with blades—as if everyone in the yamen was ready to rush out at any moment.
Captain Wang saw Fan Changyu, signaled for the others to leave, and spoke, his brows furrowing so tightly they nearly formed the character “川.”
“Just now, more people came to report cases. Today, aside from Fan Da’s tragic death, several other households were slaughtered as well. The sword wounds on their bodies are identical to those on Fan Da. The killers should be the same group. But only your family was personally visited by the murderers. I don’t know if they learned something from Fan Da’s mouth. When I led men to your house, there were corpses everywhere…”
When Fan Changyu heard that last line, her mind gave a loud buzz, as if struck by tinnitus. She could see Captain Wang’s lips moving, but couldn’t make out a single word.
It took a long while before she barely steadied her spirit.
“My younger sister…”
The moment she spoke, she realized how hoarse her voice was, and how icy her limbs felt.
Captain Wang hurriedly said, “We didn’t find the corpses of your husband or your younger sister. We searched inside and out. We don’t know whether they were captured by those bandits or managed to escape. I’ve already sent men to search, but the heavy snow has buried many tracks. There’s still no news.”
The breath in Fan Changyu’s chest only loosened halfway. She rushed toward the door of the county office. “I’m going too.”
Her parents were already gone—she could not let her younger sister meet the same fate!
Yan Zheng might be injured, but he was a trained fighter. Even when he had been gravely wounded before, he could still deal with Jin Laosan’s gang. If those people lying dead in their courtyard were slain by him—
Then surely he had escaped with Changning. His injuries wouldn’t let him last long. She had to find them before it was too late!
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
The wind swept up fine snow, carrying the scent of blood through the pine forest.
A flash of sword light—then a spray of hot blood burst from a man’s neck, splattering onto the frost-laden trunk of a pine. The man holding the blade collapsed stiffly into the snow. Thick blood clung to the bark, slowly dripping down, pocking the snow beneath with pale crimson pits.
Xie Zheng didn’t spare the man a glance. With a flick of his wrist, every droplet of blood on his sword was shaken off.
Within ten meters around him—only corpses.
Little Changning and the gyrfalcon huddled together, their faces pale-blue from fear or cold—perhaps both. They couldn’t even cry.
Xie Zheng sheathed his sword and walked back. Seeing them, his brows creased slightly. He crouched down and brushed the child’s hand with his knuckles—it was cold as ice.
He glanced down at his own padded coat, already soaked through with blood and offering no warmth, then looked toward a nearby man whose throat he had just slit.
That piece of clothing didn’t look dirty.
He walked over, used his sword to hook open the fur coat on that man, then kicked him as if kicking a sack, sending the corpse rolling a full turn. With another lift of the sword tip, the fur coat landed in his hand.
This sword was one he had seized from a masked man. It felt fairly comfortable to wield, so he kept it with him.
Xie Zheng threw the fur coat to little Changning. The blood-soaked face was paler than the snow on the ground. Then his whole body slackened, leaning against a snow pine, eyes half-closed, revealing exhaustion that could no longer be concealed. Yet his tone remained icy cold: “Put it on. Stay alive and wait for your elder sister to find you.”
In the distance, more footsteps were converging toward the pine forest—several groups. It was unclear whether they were with the masked men or belonged to another force.
Xie Zheng didn’t intend to move further. His strength was completely spent, and with a child in tow, he couldn’t get far.
He decided to rest where he was for a short while—to recover some strength and perhaps hold on a little longer.
“Zheng’er, is the osmanthus cake delicious?”
The light of the sky and the pine forest before his eyes blurred and overlapped. In the haze, he seemed to hear the gentle, smiling voice of that graceful, dignified woman ringing softly in his ears.
Xie Zheng’s eyelids twitched.
Little Changning saw him covered in blood, leaning motionless against the tree trunk with his eyes closed. Terrified that he was dead, she choked out in her hoarse, tear-streaked voice, “Brother-in-law…”
“Don’t make noise.”
His consciousness returned. Xie Zheng frowned, his eyelids heavy, limbs filled with lead.
This feeling was not unfamiliar. The last time he had escaped from the Wei family’s death warriors, he had collapsed unconscious into the snow just like this.
He forced his eyes open. The cloth wrapped around his hand was already soaked crimson. He gripped the sword tightly and drew it down with force.
The twin edges of the blade cut deep into his palms. Fresh blood once again drenched the bandages and seeped through his clenched fists, spilling onto the snow like a scattering of fallen plum blossoms.
The pain at least cleared his mind a little.
Disordered footsteps drew nearer. When a gleaming sword thrust straight toward the child, his own blade met it in a reverse block—there was a sharp clang.
The two blades scraped together, even sparking fire.
Xie Zheng’s gaze turned fierce. As the sword edge slid down to the hilt, he flipped his wrist and slashed a deep, hideous gash across the masked man’s shoulder and arm, then kicked him more than ten feet away.
“Hide behind the tree,” he ordered coldly. The whites of his eyes were streaked with red, like a lone wolf driven into a dead corner.
A dozen masked men stood amid the corpses of their companions, clearly shaken. They exchanged glances, then charged at Xie Zheng in unison, their strikes fierce and aimed at his vital points.
Little Changning hid behind a tree. Though Xie Zheng had scolded her many times not to cry, seeing this, she couldn’t help it—her tears fell like rain. Almost by instinct, she took out the whistle hidden beneath her collar and blew it with all her strength.
The whistle had been made for her by her elder sister. Once, while playing hide-and-seek with other children in the alley, she had accidentally fallen into a dried-up well. Her throat had gone hoarse from crying, yet no one found her.
When her family went searching, she couldn’t even call out anymore.
After that, her elder sister made her a whistle, telling her that if she ever faced danger again, she should blow it so her family could find her.
During this desperate flight with her brother-in-law, she had blown it once in fear—but it had attracted the wrong people, earning her a harsh scolding. After that, she hadn’t dared to blow it again.
The situation was urgent—how could little Changning still care about the scolding from before?
The sharp sound of the whistle pierced through the pine forest, like the cry of a fledgling bird bleeding from its throat.
One masked man noticed Changning and raised his blade, striding toward her. She tried to get up and run, but the fur coat wrapped around her was far too long; after only a few steps, she stumbled and fell.
The masked man lifted his blade to strike—but from nowhere, a gray falcon darted out, crashing straight into him. Its talons, like iron hooks, failed to seize his throat but tore his face to shreds, even ripping away the black cloth that covered it.
From the dense forest in the distance came the faint sound of dogs barking—many of them, by the sound of it—harsh and fierce. The birds roosting among the trees took flight all at once, blotting the snowy sky with a dark, whirling mass.
Changning’s eyes brightened. She quickly puffed out her cheeks and blew the bamboo whistle again, harder this time.
The masked man swung his sword to drive away the falcon and was just about to grab Changning when a whistling gust split the air behind him. Acting on pure instinct, he leaned backward—barely dodging the cleaver hurled straight at his skull.
The black iron blade embedded itself deep in the pine trunk behind him. The tree shuddered; the snow piled upon its cones shook loose and tumbled down, veiling the air and blurring his vision.
In that instant, the masked man felt a sudden chill at his chest. As the blade was withdrawn, blood gushed from the wound in torrents.
He had killed many before, yet when he saw how much blood poured from the gash in his chest, he was still stunned for a moment.
What a ruthless strike.
That cut would drain a man’s blood in the shortest possible time.
Through the falling snow, he lifted his gaze with effort, and his dimming eyes caught sight of the black iron weapon dripping blood.
A pig-sticker knife?
His pupils were already losing focus, and he could no longer make out the figure before him—but it was clearly a woman.
Kneeling in the snow, his head drooped limply. The blood flooding from him melted most of the snow beneath his body, almost twice as much as the others who had died nearby.
It was the first time Fan Changyu had ever used her slaughtering knife to kill a person, and by instinct she used the same method she had for pigs—cut deep, drain more blood.
Extreme tension and a surge of protectiveness sent all the blood in her body rushing to her head. Her fingertips burned and tingled; there was no time for any emotion beyond the urgency to protect.
When Changning saw her elder sister, her lips trembled and she nearly burst into tears—but the situation left no room for it.
Fan Changyu caught sight of Yan Zheng, gravely wounded and already overpowered, another gash torn into his arm. Without even a word to her sister, she wrenched the cleaver from the pine trunk and hurled it at one of the masked men.
Unexpectedly, the man’s companion pulled him aside, and the blade flew straight toward Xie Zheng, who was behind him. Fan Changyu’s heart leapt to her throat.
Fortunately, Xie Zheng reacted with lightning speed, tilting his head aside. The heavy cleaver slammed into the pine trunk behind him.
When he looked over, Fan Changyu’s expression was tinged with embarrassment.
As the snow on the branches came cascading down, she had no time to think—using the same slaughtering motion again, she rushed forward, stabbing several men in succession, while Xie Zheng slit throats with his sword.
Mixed with snow foam, what splattered onto the ground was handful after handful of fresh blood.
When the snow from that pine tree had finished falling, Fan Changyu and Xie Zheng met each other’s gaze. She explained awkwardly, “Just now… I was throwing it at that masked man.”
Xie Zheng said nothing.
Of the dozen or so masked men, more than half had already been killed. He finally had room to breathe. Leaning on his sword, his hair hung in disarray, his face pale as snow, a trace of blood at the corner of his lips. Though he looked as if he might collapse at any moment, his sheer presence kept the remaining masked men frozen where they stood, not daring to make a move.
The sound of dogs barking drew near—three or four hunting dogs burst out from the dense woods, baring their teeth and growling furiously at the masked men.
These were the hounds Fan Changyu had borrowed from a hunter in town. Thanks to them, she had been able to follow the scent of blood and track her way to this pine forest outside the city.
After hearing Changning’s whistle, she had released the dogs and rushed over first.
Fan Changyu shouted to intimidate them: “The county soldiers will be here any moment!”
The masked men exchanged glances. It seemed they too realized that continuing to fight would only end badly for them against Fan Changyu and Xie Zheng, and they quickly began to retreat.
Xie Zheng said, “Catch one alive.”
Almost the instant his words fell, Fan Changyu dashed forward.
This group, dressed like bandits, had killed Fan Da and broken into her home—it was likely they were the same ones who had murdered her mother.
She untied the length of rope from her waist, swiftly knotted it into a lasso as she ran, and flung it toward one of the retreating masked men at the rear. The loop caught his neck, and Fan Changyu yanked hard. The rope tightened in an instant.
The masked man clutched desperately at the noose around his throat, but like a ragged sack, he was dragged backward across the snow by Fan Changyu.
Xie Zheng’s expression shifted slightly as he watched.
Bracing one foot against a pine tree, Fan Changyu hauled with all her strength, dragging as if it were a dead pig.
