On the third day, dawn was just breaking.
"Third Master Huan, someone is here to see you."
The Rongguo Mansion gatekeeper came to the courtyard to announce the visitor.
Jia Huan had not slept all night. He threw on a robe and headed for Rongguo Mansion's main gate.
A youth carrying a Sword Case on his back waited quietly.
"Misty Rain Tower?" Jia Huan asked, puzzled.
"Here." The sword-bearing youth produced an Embroidered Uniform Guard Command Token.
It was Scholar's Waist Token!
"Let's go!" Jia Huan's expression turned grave.
Inside Misty Rain Tower.
Twin Whips and Scholar were covered in wounds. Upon seeing Jia Huan, they struggled to rise.
"Boss!"
"What happened?" Jia Huan hurried over. Both men's arms and thighs were mangled and bloody.
"Bring your finest ointment. I'll trade martial arts for it!" he shouted at the Hunchbacked Old Man behind the counter.
Only then did the old man turn and enter a hidden room.
"Boss, Twin Whips and I met up and headed back to the capital, but a band of masked men ambushed us along the way. Fortunately, we'd traded a First-Rate Martial Art for two veteran martial artists to accompany us, so we narrowly escaped disaster. When we received word that you'd been dismissed, we didn't dare enter the capital directly. We traded another manual to travel with Misty Rain Tower's caravan."
"Here's the physical evidence. The witnesses are still on the way."
Scholar pulled a stack of written confessions and secret letters from inside his robe, trembling all over from the pain.
Jia Huan took the black ointment the Hunchbacked Old Man handed him and personally applied it to his subordinates' wounds.
"Boss, we can do it ourselves." Twin Whips hastily tried to refuse.
"Don't move!"
As Jia Huan treated their wounds, he said: