False Registry Presents Sharpness, Capturing Yin; Blood Butcher Wields Blade, Slaying the Treacherous Crowd

"You're the one who should be leaving..."

Ling Yuan's short blade abruptly stopped at her fingertips, landing steadily in her palm.

"These grain ledgers record your 'merits' in withholding His Majesty's provisions and forging landholding registers to frame Lord Jue. They cannot be touched."

"Utter nonsense!" Yin Chang's heart sank. He knew these visitors had come with ill intent.

He lunged forward, snatched up an iron door bar beside the entrance, and shouted, "Move!"

At this critical moment between life and death, he had no time to care about form. The bar whistled through the air as he smashed it toward the woman's shoulder.

Though he did not excel in martial prowess, he was still a city-defense commander. The blow carried no small amount of force.

But the woman moved far faster than he did.

With a soft whoosh, the short blade flew from her palm, skimming past the door bar.

Yin Chang felt his wrist go numb, and the bar fell to the ground with a clang.

Before he could react, cold light flashed before his eyes again.

Three short blades shot out almost simultaneously, grazing his neck, chest, and lower abdomen respectively before embedding themselves in the wooden pillar behind him. Their hilts still hummed with vibration.

"Pfft... pfft..."

Several fine lines of blood seeped from Yin Chang's collar and lapels, quickly spreading into dark stains.

He looked down. A bloody gash on his neck was running downward; the cloth over his chest had been sliced open, exposing bleeding flesh beneath; and his lower abdomen burned with searing pain.

Every one of those strikes had grazed a vital point, yet each had deliberately left him with one last breath.

"You..." Yin Chang's face turned utterly pale as despair surged from the soles of his feet to the crown