Assassination

Wei Yuan Hall!

The Inner Courtyard disciples gathered in small groups.

With Qiu Wenjie joining them, Xu Yang's little group had grown to five. They practiced their boxing together every day.

"Do you know why Lu Ren didn't come today?" Zhang Hong asked quietly.

Qiu Wenjie was curious. "Why?"

Xu Yang glanced across the Inner Courtyard and realized that Lu Ren really wasn't there. A trace of curiosity crossed his face too.

Zhang Hong had brought it up on purpose, so something must have happened to Lu Ren.

"Come to think of it, Lu Ren should be getting married to that young lady from the Huang Family soon, right? Is the wedding today?" Wu Yongfeng asked.

But as soon as he said it, he felt something was off.

If Lu Ren were getting married, even if he didn't invite them, he would have invited the others in the Inner Courtyard. Yet all the senior brothers and sisters close to him were there.

Zhang Hong shook his head. "That young lady from the Huang Family was defiled by Jade Butterfly. How could Lu Ren possibly marry her? But this is related to that."

Lowering his voice, he said, "Because Lu Ren flat-out refused to marry her, the young lady from the Huang Family hanged herself a few days ago. Then the Huang Family had it out with him."

Zhang Yong and Xu Yang, who had both been raised by the Huang Family alongside Lu Ren, didn't know what to say for a moment.

You couldn't exactly call Lu Ren ungrateful. If it had been them, they probably couldn't have accepted marrying someone like that either.

Forget love. It was only a bond of mutual benefit. What love could there be?

Zhang Hong continued, "The Huang Family accused Lu Ren of being ungrateful, while Lu Ren accused them of not caring about his reputation. They argued for days, and yesterday they finally fell out completely. Lu Ren announced that he was no longer an Attendant of the Huang Family and moved out of the courtyard they'd given him."

Xu Yang felt a little wistful.

Back then, the Huang Family had wanted only Lu Ren. Even though Xu Yang had shown talent hardly inferior to Lu Ren's, the Huang Family had turned a blind eye to him. He'd never expected things to end this way.

It could only be called a lose-lose situation.

No matter the reason, Lu Ren would inevitably bear the reputation of being ungrateful, while the Huang Family had lost a genius who might one day achieve Martial Exam Dragon Ascent.

"So this is the genius you treasured like a rare gem? Looks like you've drawn water with a bamboo basket!" Zhang Yong still resented the Huang Family's unfairness, and couldn't help gloating.

Xu Yang frowned. "The Huang Family just let him leave?"

The powerful families of Qingyuan County weren't just rich suckers. If they relied solely on martial artists serving as Attendants, those families would have been picked clean by now. They had powerful experts of their own.

As far as he knew, the Huang Family patriarch was a master at Major Success in Qi Gathering. The Liu Family he served also had plenty of experts of its own.

There were two reasons to hire martial artists as Attendants: first, you didn't have enough martial artists; second, if you had money, you could get other people to risk their lives for you. Wouldn't it be foolish to risk your own?

The rich cared about appearances. Everyone else had commoners risking their lives, while your own people went into battle. No one would take you seriously when you went out to negotiate business deals.

Lu Ren had talent, but he hadn't yet reached Major Success in Qi Gathering. The Huang Family wasn't exactly benevolent; they wouldn't let him take everything and walk away.

Zhang Hong said, "He found backing ahead of time and joined the Gu Family, where Senior Sister Gu Fang is. The Gu Family sent over an expert at Major Success in Qi Gathering to negotiate with the Huang Family. The Huang Family had only just begun to rise. Even if they were unwilling, they could only let Lu Ren go.

"But they say he paid the Huang Family back twice the value of the resources he'd received from them. At least things didn't end too badly."

Xu Yang finally understood why Zhang Hong knew so much. When Jade Butterfly had gone to the Gu Family's home, he'd been surrounded by a group of Gu Family experts. Though he'd escaped with serious injuries, he'd also killed some of their martial artists.

At the time, Zhang Hong had just succeeded in gathering qi. With Sun Tao's arrangement, he became an Attendant of the Gu Family.

Xu Yang couldn't judge what had happened between Lu Ren and the Huang Family. He knew only how things had ended; he hadn't witnessed how they had unfolded.

But whatever the circumstances, Lu Ren had been nurtured by the Huang Family. People would only think he had betrayed them, and his reputation would surely suffer from now on.

Lu Ren had probably wanted to leave the Huang Family for a long time. This incident was likely just the spark that set things off.

After all, even with a Bone Root like Xu Yang's, which no one thought much of, the Liu Family had been willing to offer him such terms to marry into their family. The Huang Family had only given Lu Ren fifteen taels a month. He must have been dissatisfied for a long time.

Some of Lu Ren's behavior had already given the game away.

Though Luo Dehu had failed and left long ago, his influence on Lu Ren was still there.

Xu Yang hadn't thought this matter had anything to do with him. But as night fell, his cousin Zhou Xia came to find him and took him to his uncle Zhou Shunchang's home. Then the matter of the Huang Family marrying their daughter to him came up again.

Unlike last time, the Huang Family wasn't trying to get something for nothing. If he was willing to marry her, they would give him ten taels of silver each month to help fund his martial training.

Zhou Shunchang took a long drag on his dry pipe. After thinking it over, Xu Yang said to him, "Uncle, please tell the Huang Family that I'm not willing to marry for an alliance, and I don't want to get married right now.

"If the Huang Family needs someone, I can leave the Liu Family and become an Attendant of the Huang Family."

He more or less understood what the Huang Family was thinking. With Lu Ren gone, they wanted to place their bet on him instead.

But he had already become an Attendant of the Liu Family. The Huang Family couldn't openly poach him without provoking a powerful family like the Liu Family, so they had to establish a connection through marriage first.

That way, even if he left the Liu Family in the future, the Liu Family couldn't use it as an excuse to make things difficult for the Huang Family. So he simply tossed the ball back into the Huang Family's court to see whether they dared to offend the Liu Family.

Zhou Shunchang nodded. "All right!"

Xu Yang chatted with Zhou Shunchang for a while longer, then headed home beneath the night sky.

Not long after he left, Huang Jin walked out of the room next door.

"Fifth Master, you heard what Ayang said, didn't you?" Zhou Shunchang said, his voice muffled as he continued to smoke his dry pipe.

Huang Jin sighed. "I always thought Lu Ren was arrogant and would be hard for the Huang Family to use someday. It's a pity Second Brother wouldn't listen to me. We let Ayang slip away for nothing."

Xu Yang wasn't willing to marry into the family, and the Huang Family didn't dare poach someone from the Liu Family now.

Huang Jin had favored Xu Yang from the start, but after hearing Huang Ping's analysis, he had still given up on him.

"Let's put this matter to rest. Please tell Ayang that the Huang Family wronged him."

With that, he turned and walked into the wind and snow, his back looking rather lonely.

"The heavy snow is about to seal off the mountains!"

Xu Yang walked across the open plain. Snow fell harder and harder, already nearly up to his shins.

It was nearly the hour of the Dog, approaching the hour of the Pig. But with the snow so heavy, the landscape was still lit.

He stirred his blood qi to fend off the cold wind, and heat rose from his body like steam from a bamboo basket.

Though he wore only a single layer, he didn't feel cold. At his current level, he couldn't exactly shrug off heat and cold, but he could withstand the wind and snow for a while.

"Hm?"

He suddenly sensed something amiss. A heartbeat seemed to sound beside his ear.

Someone was nearby, and very close.

Otherwise, even with his Minor Success in Qi Gathering and senses far sharper than ordinary, he would have found it difficult to hear another person's heartbeat.

He could hear a heartbeat but no breathing. It couldn't be someone who had fallen in the snow and been buried beneath it. Someone was lying in ambush, holding their breath.

The thought had barely crossed his mind when Xu Yang's steps faltered. The snow beside him exploded with a bang.