Royal Offspring

The next morning, within the vast martial training grounds of Nishang Residence.

A thin morning mist still drifted through the air.

Xu Yan stood on the grounds paved with exceptionally hard black stone. His arms trembled slightly as they circled his body and rested upon his shoulders before rising above his head, forming the Five Flowers Crowning the Summit hand seal.

He was clearly practicing the Li Clan Body Tempering Art.

Boom!

One foot stamped down like a fierce tiger. His black robe snapped in the wind as Xu Yan felt every meridian in his body throb and his vital blood boil.

Brilliant golden energy coiled around him. With a single palm strike, the savage force made even the air tremble faintly!

A crisp crack sounded within his body.

Another segment of turbid meridian had been opened. He had now opened twenty-six segments.

"Phew—"

After taking a deep breath, his rippling black robe gradually fell still, and Xu Yan withdrew his technique.

Seated in the small pavilion at the edge of the training grounds, Xu Yan casually drank tea and rested, still flipping through a Daoist book in his hand.

After a while, noisy voices and hurried footsteps came from outside the training grounds.

As if deep in thought, Xu Yan closed the Daoist book and looked toward the arched gate of the grounds.

A sturdy youth clad in a red-and-black scholar's robe charged in with great vigor. Behind him followed a group of eunuchs and maidservants, their expressions distressed as they tried to persuade him, yet none dared stop him.

"Move! Get out of my way! Why are you blocking me!"

"Fifth Prince, morning lessons at Great Yin Academy are about to begin. If you do not go now, it will be too late, and the teacher will scold you again!" Eunuch Wei pleaded humbly, his face pale.

"What is wrong with missing one day? Let that old fool scold me if he wants. Let him scold all he likes!" The Fifth Prince flung his sleeves and spoke in a rough voice.

After rushing into the training grounds, he looked around, then fixed his gaze on Xu Yan, who was drinking tea in the pavilion. Xu Yan was also looking at him.

The Fifth Prince placed his hands on his hips, a smile hanging from the corner of his mouth. Squinting at Xu Yan, he raised a brow. "You are Xu Yan, the adopted son of Prince Wu'an?"

"Your Highness, what guidance do you have for me?" Having heard Eunuch Wei call him the Fifth Prince, Xu Yan rose and clasped his hands calmly.

"Hmph!"

The Fifth Prince raised his brows. Without another word, he suddenly stomped one foot against the ground.

The red-and-black scholar's robe draped over him immediately flapped violently in the overbearing spiritual power. Like a great eagle taking flight, he abruptly struck a palm toward Xu Yan.

The tyrannical spiritual power rushing toward him made one's hair stand on end.

"Fifth Prince, Young Master Yan is a scholar and is not skilled in divine abilities!" Eunuch Wei shouted, but he still did not dare stop him. Like Qin Nishang, the Fifth Prince was the biological son of His Majesty and the Empress, a descendant of the High Ancestor's line.

In all of Great Yin, who would dare incur their displeasure?

What did I ever do to provoke you?

Xu Yan frowned, his expression distinctly displeased.

As he spoke, the Fifth Prince had already come swooping down with a howl. The tyrannical spiritual power in his palm shrieked; if that strike landed on someone not trained in martial arts, it would likely smash their whole body apart.

Xu Yan's meridians trembled, and the vital blood throughout his body instantly boiled.

He did not use spiritual power. Instead, he met the attack head-on with the physical strength of the Li Clan Body Tempering Art.

A fist wrapped in brilliant golden energy collided with it. With a boom, the two tyrannical forces met, directly shattering the small pavilion as dust and broken stones flew everywhere!

Xu Yan's gaze darkened. He curled his palm into a claw and seized the Fifth Prince's wrist.

He had been a mercenary for decades in his previous life. Setting aside everything else, his close-quarters combat skills were not to be underestimated—at the very least, he was far more practiced than this fourteen- or fifteen-year-old youth before him.

Then his right leg suddenly exerted force, and a kick carrying the strength of his entire body shot toward the Fifth Prince's chest!

The Fifth Prince was greatly alarmed. In astonishment, he glanced from the corner of his eye at his right wrist, caught in Xu Yan's grip. It felt as though a tiger had bitten him; the terrifying force left him unable to break free for the moment.

That kick aimed at his chest, wreathed in golden force, made the air hum and quake. The Fifth Prince's hair crown was blown off, and his black hair streamed and danced wildly!

"Hey, wait a moment!" the Fifth Prince immediately shouted.

Too late.

Xu Yan's kick had already landed, though he held back a little.

Bang!

He sent the Fifth Prince flying more than ten meters away, where he landed on the black stone training grounds and fell flat on his backside.

"Urgh—"

The Fifth Prince's face twisted with pain. Clutching his abdomen tightly, he curled up like a shrimp and cried out on the black stone grounds.

"Your Highness!"

Eunuch Wei and the maidservants looked both startled and shocked. They hurried over, surrounding the Fifth Prince and asking after him anxiously.

"Get lost! Why are you all crowding around here? I am fine!"

Seeing this, the Fifth Prince quickly came back to his senses. Looking dusty and disheveled, he got to his feet and shoved aside the maidservants and eunuchs nearby.

"If Your Highness wished to spar with me, you could have informed me beforehand. I have plenty of free time," Xu Yan said with a smile, spreading his hands.

That kick of his had been neither too heavy nor too light, and he had held back some force. These royal offspring had worn gold and silver from childhood and practically ate heavenly treasures and precious medicines like candy. Xu Yan's kick could not truly injure him.

Besides, this Fifth Prince was even younger than Xu Yan. He had likely only begun cultivating not long ago.

Hearing Xu Yan put it that way, he pursed his lips and forced out an awkward smile, clutching his abdomen. The words he had intended to say seemed to lodge at his lips, unable to come out.

Just then, Qin Nishang's voice came from outside.

"Qin Longxiang!"

Upon hearing that voice, the Fifth Prince shuddered as though a mouse had seen a cat, his entire face turning pale with fright.

He immediately kicked Eunuch Wei beside him in the backside. "Take me away, quickly! To the academy!"

Without hesitation, Eunuch Wei immediately grabbed the Fifth Prince's wrist. The two vanished in a flash, their figures like ghosts as they sped away close to the ground.

Several breaths later, Qin Nishang, dressed in a red gown, leaped over the outer wall and landed in the training grounds.

Now that she had returned to Dragon City, she had changed into a princess gown today. When she was not fighting, she looked dignified and noble enough, but the moment she opened her mouth, that atmosphere vanished without a trace.

"Where is he?" Qin Nishang frowned as she looked around. Her gaze swept to one side, where she saw the shattered pavilion, and she immediately asked, "Xu Yan, did he attack you just now?"

"I exchanged a few moves with His Highness," Xu Yan replied truthfully with a smile.

"That little bastard. When I catch him, I will definitely teach him a proper lesson," Qin Nishang said indignantly, clenching her fists.

Xu Yan did not ask further. That Fifth Prince had come looking for him early in the morning and attacked without a word.

For a fourteen- or fifteen-year-old youth, doing something so thoughtless and headless was perfectly normal.

Xu Yan guessed it was probably because of Prince Wu'an's Residence. In recent years, Xu Fei's reputation had grown ever greater. He had opened up territory and expanded lands, his military achievements nearly reaching the point where there was no higher title left to grant. In the future, he would continue taking the Ten-Thousand Mang Mountains, another tremendous military achievement.

When that time came, how would the court view Prince Wu'an, who was in the prime of his life and laden with military merit?

Within his territory, heroes gathered like clouds, while Moat Dragon's more than one hundred thousand elite soldiers were like a great blade planted in the earth.

Among Great Yin's nine princes, Xu Fei alone possessed the strongest military force, and he was even a prince of a different surname. Only Emperor Jiaguang could still sleep soundly; had it been any emperor of previous generations, they would have begun restraining Xu Fei long ago. How could they allow his power and reputation to swell ever more wildly?