They All Died!

The windblown sand grew fiercer, stinging as it got into their eyes.

Many prisoners instinctively began rubbing their eyes, rubbing until tears spilled out.

"Are we... hallucinating?"

They asked themselves this.

Someone had actually broken free of those indestructible shackles?

And killed the officer leading the escort?

They closed their eyes, then squeezed them shut again.

Dimly, they could even make out flashes of blades and swords amid the windblown sand.

"Shhk!"

"Shhk!"

Their vision flickered between light and darkness, but the sounds of blades piercing flesh reached their ears with unmistakable clarity.

The air carried the smell of blood as well.

"Achoo!"

Only when someone sneezed did the prisoners fully open their eyes and see the scene amid the sand.

Where had everyone gone?

Where were the officers responsible for escorting them?

Blood flowed out, vividly red.

But this was a scorching desert, and the little blood that reached the ground was quickly sucked dry.

Only a faintly visible bloodstain remained.

After a long moment, all the prisoners screamed as though they had gone mad.

Finally, their gazes settled on a handsome young man holding a long saber and gently wiping it clean.

He brushed aside his filthy, tangled hair, revealing a refined, handsome face.

"You're free."

He took a key from inside an officer's clothing and tossed it to them.

Then he strode away.

He left the stunned prisoners rooted to the spot.

After a long moment, they rushed toward the key like madmen, scrambling to unlock their shackles.

Although the relay station where Ning Que had just rested was the last one along the escort route, that was not quite the whole story.

That description was not entirely accurate, because a small fortified enclosure also stood at the edge of the desert where the prisoners were kept.

Yellow sand filled the sky, and the walls were yellow from top to bottom. Sand and dust drifted through the air, making it impossible to breathe.

An ocher flag planted atop the wall proclaimed that this was their destination—the Skull Prison!

"What's your business?"

Seeing Ning Que emerge alone from the yellow sand, the guards at the gate immediately stopped him.

"I'm a prisoner who was supposed to be sent here to serve his sentence."

Ning Que grinned, his face refined and handsome.

The two soldiers at the entrance turned pale at his words. "A prisoner? Why are you alone?"

"They all died."

"What about Commander Huang, who was escorting you?"

"He died too."

"They all died."

"..."

Ning Que had said "They all died" twice.

The first time meant that all the prisoners had died; the second meant that all the officers had died.

He alone had survived.

The two soldiers exchanged glances, realized something was terribly wrong, and hurried back inside the prison.

Ning Que stood alone amid the raging sand, a warm smile on his face.

He knew that for an entire prisoner escort to perish, with only him arriving to report in, would be an enormous shock.

For the people at the Sky Prison, the impact would be immense!

Everything about it was downright eerie!

For instance, how had those prisoners and officers died?

And why had he alone escaped unharmed?

And, more importantly, since he had survived, why had he still come to report to the Sky Prison?

Wouldn't anyone normally have fled long ago?

This was the desert, where heaven was high and the emperor far away.

If a prisoner escaped, no one could find him.

Of course, there was no need to search, either.

Because no one could leave the Skeleton Desert alive!

Soon, the gates in the wall slowly opened, and a stern, middle-aged man in armor walked out.

He was Wu Pengfei, the warden of the Desert Sky Prison!

Staring at the harmless-looking, smiling young man before him, Wu Pengfei knitted his brows so tightly that they nearly formed three deep vertical lines.

Instead of sending Ning Que straight into the desert, he took him to a gloomy interrogation room.

Piercing screams kept coming from all around, while the candlelight on the walls cast reflections of terrified, twisted faces.

The assortment of iron implements made the scalp prickle, yet Wu Pengfei brought Ning Que, who had traveled so far, a bowl of water and a bowl of rice.

"Eat. You must be starving after the journey."

As Wu Pengfei spoke, he studied Ning Que.

Ning Que wasted no time on courtesy and began eating in great mouthfuls.

"Can you tell me now? What happened on the road?"

Wu Pengfei's gaze was as cold as cold iron. "What happened to the officers and prisoners on the journey? Did they encounter some natural disaster? Or some powerful expert? Or..."

"Did they die at your hands?"

Wu Pengfei paused, then voiced the question he had wanted to ask most.

Ning Que grinned, revealing a neat row of white teeth. "They encountered a terrible sandstorm. They all died. I was the only one who survived."

"..."

Wu Pengfei was silent for a while before asking again, "Then why didn't you run?"

"If I ran, wouldn't you come after me?"

"If I got caught, my crime would only become more serious."

"..."

Ning Que's answers were seamless, without a single crack. He had thought through all these questions before coming.

"..."

Wu Pengfei's brows furrowed even deeper.

He kept feeling that something was wrong with Ning Que, but he had no evidence.

Still, no matter how he looked at it, only one of the many prisoners who should have been escorted here had arrived. This was far too serious.

If word reached Capital City, they would all lose their heads.

Wu Pengfei examined Ning Que's crimes, and his gaze sharpened noticeably when he saw "single-handedly slaughtered a family of thirty-six."

His suspicions about Ning Que deepened.

But the same problem remained: no evidence.

He could only send Ning Que into the deepest reaches of the Skeleton Desert.

Escorting someone into the Skeleton Desert was no pleasant assignment, either.

The two guards responsible for escorting Ning Que sighed repeatedly.

The deepest reaches of the desert were the most dangerous and the farthest away, making the journey terribly risky.

Fortunately, they encountered no danger along the way. Once they dumped Ning Que there, the guards left.

Ning Que brushed the dirt off himself and stood up.

Night was already approaching, and a fire glowed nearby. Clearly, someone had lit it to keep warm.

Ning Que instinctively walked toward it.

Yet behind him, a dense cluster of blood-red eyes appeared.

Looking closer, he discovered that they belonged to prisoners who had been dumped here!

They had lived here for some time and had become like this.

Their eyes were blood-red, thick with bloodshot veins.

The middle-aged man leading them stood in the center, his entire body densely covered in brands of the word "kill," making him look utterly ferocious.

He looked at Ning Que and asked in a low voice, "What are you in for?"

"Murder."

Ning Que spoke flatly.

"I killed a family of thirty-six."

Ning Que added this.

At those words, even the desert air seemed to freeze.

The man covered in "kill" brands narrowed his eyes slightly and stared at him with hostility.

"My turn to ask."

Ning Que looked at him and asked, "Do you know someone here named Ning Yuanzhou? Tell me where he is."

"..."