Qingyuan Mountain.
Near a deserted temple.
Meng Ruochuan crouched down and pinched up a broken length of reins, then looked toward the carriage frame hurriedly concealed beneath the weeds before him.
More strikingly, if one searched carefully around the area, several corpses could still be found beginning to stink, with flies buzzing overhead.
"They've been dead for some time..."
Meng Ruochuan's gaze swept over the scene, his brows faintly furrowing.
"But there doesn't seem to be any sign of a struggle."
There were not many wounds on the corpses. Most had been killed in a single move.
In this sort of world, finding corpses by the roadside was nothing strange. Passing through this place, Meng Ruochuan had originally had no intention of stopping.
However, when he caught sight of several corpses each missing an arm, his footsteps came to an abrupt halt.
Severed arms...
Recalling the condition of those sect experts at the Qingzhou Prefecture, they too had lost an arm.
The corners of Meng Ruochuan's lips slowly curled upward. "Looks like I took the right road."
He rose abruptly and looked down along the winding, rugged mountain path.
Following this road, the destination should be Yingcheng.
It was a major city, with many people and prying eyes. Naturally, there would be more clues there—and Chen Duan himself might even be in Yingcheng at this very moment.
For this assignment, he had been busy for a long time and had expended no small amount of effort.
He did not linger, striding onward.
However, just as his body was about to move—
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Meng Ruochuan's pupils contracted. He stamped the ground with his toes, leaned his entire body backward, and executed several consecutive backflips, evading the sudden assassination attempt.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Almost the instant he moved aside, three