The mass of footsteps outside the Wu Family estate drew closer and closer.
Firelight shone through the curtain of rain, illuminating ranks of dark figures.
They wore identical regulation armor, carried their sabers in identical positions, and marched in identical step.
The banner raised in their midst bore three large words-the Evil Punishment Office.
Yi Yang stood in the Wu Family's front courtyard, still gripping Mysterious Abyss. The blood on its blade had yet to dry. He narrowed his eyes, glanced through the breach in the courtyard wall, and cursed inwardly:
They got here pretty damn fast.
Outside the courtyard wall, the Pacification Guard were the first to notice something was wrong.
Xu Min was leading his men out through a side gate with several Wu Family stewards in custody when he ran straight into that torrent of black armor. He had only raised his crosswise saber halfway before the dense sea of torches opposite him dazzled his eyes.
There were at least a hundred Patrol Guards from the Evil Punishment Office.
This was no patrol of thirty or fifty men. An entire organized force of Evil Punishment Office elites had marched over, fully armed.
At the sight, Xu Min slowed his steps.
The Pacification Guard behind him stopped as well. Several Patrol Guards searching along the foot of the courtyard wall loosened the ropes in their hands and, as one, looked toward the end of the long street.
At the head of the Evil Punishment Office's ranks, a towering figure strode through the heart of the firelight.
His fierce eyes were like bronze bells, his shoulders broad and his back thick. The unsheathed heavy sword at his waist, repaired five times, slapped against his leg, and his armor clasps clinked sharply.
It was Xiao Zhengyan, Deputy Chief Inspector of