Menace

"Hey, wait. If you've come to protect me, then what about Yao'er and A Chun..."

Bu Wuchen suddenly asked.

"Even with me gone, there are others who'll do their utmost to protect them."

As she spoke, the young bodyguard's expression remained wooden, as though carved from ice and stamped from snow.

"Come to think of it, you really do have a few tricks up your sleeve;"

"Not only does Xia Nuoyi cradle you in her palm, even Dean Zhou treats you like a treasure."

Bu Wuchen smiled smugly and adjusted his hair with a thoroughly pretentious air. "Ah, this damned talent of mine~"

It only made the young bodyguard roll her eyes repeatedly...

Those four ill-intentioned fellows, however, silently sneered to themselves, Hmph, so what if your pill-refining techniques rival the uncanny craftsmanship of gods and ghosts?

Once we enter the Night Forbidden Forest, you'll still be a lamb awaiting slaughter before us!

Speaking of which, thank goodness Young Master Lin took into account that this Bu fellow has that Demoness and Dean Zhou protecting him, and didn't plan to strike in the city or along the way.

Otherwise, once the charge of 'assassinating a specially sponsored student of Blood Dragon City Academy' was proven, the consequences...

Neither Young Master Lin nor even the entire Lin Lineage could bear them!

Although the Night Forbidden Forest had quite a reputation for being eerie and terrifying, it wasn't far from Blood Dragon City.

Heading west out of the city gates, aside from a handful of human hunters, Bu Wuchen encountered only a few wild beasts and two low-rank mystic beasts along the way.

They appeared baring their fangs and brandishing their claws, looking imposing and majestic, only to be dispatched cleanly by the young bodyguard before they could swagger about for even three seconds...

Bu Wuchen's party spurred their horses onward and soon reached their destination-

Around the patch of ground beneath their feet, trees, flowers, and grass still flourished lushly;

But looking straight ahead, around the road wide enough for four or five carriages to travel abreast, there was nothing but desolation stretching beyond sight!

Th-this couldn't be the legendary sight of a 'mirage,' could it?

Bu Wuchen muttered inwardly.

"How much longer are you going to stand there gawking?"

The young bodyguard said coldly, "We're here. Dismount!"

"Huh? Oh..."

Throughout the bumpy journey, although the young bodyguard had been very careful, the two of them sharing one horse had inevitably made some physical contact.

Ordinarily, with her cold temperament, she would have kicked the other person off the horse long ago!

Yet now, she merely spoke to Bu Wuchen in a slightly colder tone, which already qualified as extraordinarily "gentle"!

As she tethered the horse, the young bodyguard said, "Listen. The restrictive power of the Night Forbidden Forest only targets human cultivators. It has no effect whatsoever on mystic beasts."

"Once you're inside, do not venture more than eighteen li deep;"

"Otherwise, with your... with all your cultivation levels, you'll certainly end up as food in a mystic beast's jaws."

Finally, this peerlessly cold beauty added in a voice only Bu Wuchen could hear, "I still feel there's something off about this mission. Watch yourself."

With that, she leaped onto a large tree on her own, lay down, and closed her eyes to rest.

"Senior Brother, could we hurry inside? Staying here too long makes me... makes me scared."

The girl deliberately put on a soft, pitiful look and spoke in a coy voice.

Through their intermittent chatter along the way, Bu Wuchen had learned the names of his companions-

The somewhat pretty girl with the affected, sugary voice was named Feng Jieshuang;

The boy of medium build with side-parted hair was named Li Duanfeng;

The boy whose left arm bore a hideous, snake-shaped scar stretching from wrist to shoulder was named Qiu Chaoyang;

The shortest one was named Qian Dali.

All four were top students in the academy's advanced class, possessing cultivation at the Qi Observation Realm ninth layer peak!

As it happened, the former young master of the Bu Lineage had initially been classmates with the four of them.

Unfortunately, Bu Wuchen had just been demoted to this cold frontier city back then, and his heart had long since been filled to the brim with resentment and unwillingness. How could he have had any interest in befriending new classmates?

"That's right, Senior Bu. At night, the Night Forbidden Forest becomes a deadly land where human cultivators face ten chances of death and none of survival!"

"We'd better hurry inside, shouldn't we?" Li Duanfeng said ingratiatingly, with a hint of anxiety.

"Uh, you just said it's only dangerous at night. It's still morning."

"Besides, you said earlier that the client who posted the mission was annoyed by my sky-high asking price and deliberately gave us a time limit of just one double-hour."

"Then we probably won't even need to wait until dark. Once that double-hour is up, the mission will be judged a failure..."

Bu Wuchen asked in puzzlement.

"That's a little complicated to explain."

Feng Jieshuang said coyly, "Why don't we head inside first? We can tell you about the peculiarities of the Night Forbidden Forest while we search for the mission items, Senior Brother. How does that sound?"

"Sure. Let's go."

The instant they stepped onto that desolate road-

A sudden boom rang out, like thunder from a clear sky.

Bu Wuchen felt his feet grow light, and his entire body seemed to be dragged by a strange force as he plunged headfirst into a distorted spatial gateway!

From the young bodyguard's perspective, five living people simply vanished into thin air;

Only the clear footprints leading onto that desolate road proved that they had just been there...

Meanwhile, inside the Night Forbidden Forest.

Before Bu Wuchen's eyes, the vast expanses of desolation were long gone;

In their place was, astonishingly, a lush primeval jungle!

No wonder everyone had chosen to dismount and proceed on foot before entering;

Ordinary horses couldn't run at all in such dense woods.

The moist air that greeted his nose carried the distinctive, fresh fragrance of plants, leaving Bu Wuchen thoroughly amazed. "Holy freaking moly, this really isn't as simple as a mirage."

A coy voice suddenly reached his ears. "Senior Brother, thanks for making the long journey. Have some water?"

"Sure, thanks."

Bu Wuchen thanked her, casually accepted the waterskin she offered, and was about to raise it to his lips.

He failed to notice that Feng Jieshuang's peach-blossom eyes were filled with the sinister smile of a successful plot.

Drink, drink. Just one tiny sip, and you'll die without anyone being the wiser!

Then we'll pin your death on the mystic beasts in the Night Forbidden Forest, and wash our hands of it completely. Hahahaha...

But as Bu Wuchen brought the spout to his lips, the young bodyguard's words suddenly flashed through his mind: There's something strange about this mission. Watch yourself.

Then he recalled how, because of his shallow experience in the world, he had nearly been done in by the poison the Lin Lineage's patriarch had put on the banknotes...

Bu Wuchen instinctively stopped what he was doing.

In that brief moment of hesitation, an intense, murderous menace suddenly came from beside him, making every hair on Bu Wuchen's body stand on end!