Death Scripture

With a smile, Shangguan Ru finally turned around and looked the Dragon King who was standing in shadow dead in the eye. "So is this what it feels like to be your enemy?"

Gu Shenwei walked out of the shadows. Standing five steps away from her, he shook his head and replied, "No. I don't regard you as an enemy."

Shangguan Ru squinted and peered at him for a while before asking, "Did the wound in your mouth heal?"

When they had parted last in the Royal Court, Shangguan Ru had bitten his lip very hard. After that, many people had given Gu Shenwei a confused gaze, but even Old Man Mu didn't dare to ask any questions.

He raised his hand and stroked his lip lightly. "Just a superficial injury."

"Ha-ha." Shangguan Ru couldn't properly describe her feelings, but when the Dragon King was not around, all she could remember was that sullen, sly face of the Dragon King's. But when they were face to face, the image of Servant Huan would always overwhelm the former's. Yet she didn't dare mention these two words because she feared that the Dragon King might feel humiliated by them.

"Do you want to know what my father said to me?"

"Yes, if I may."

Shangguan Ru raised her head and thought for a while before saying, "He said that he missed me very much and that he regretted his previous decision to have me killed. He also said that that wasn't his true intention, and that he hoped that I would come back to Golden Roc Castle. And then he told me that everything in my room is as I left it, that he and I could start over, and that I'm still the Tenth Young Master."

Gu Shenwei was slightly annoyed as he accused, "You're lying."

Shangguan Ru sighed in defeat. "That's what I wished he said. Actually, he didn't say anything about regret, as if he'd never tried to kill me or my elder brother. Actually he… didn't say anything."

"Nothing at all?"

"He just stood there," Shangguan Ru said as she pointed at a place about three steps away from Gu Shenwei. "He just gazed at me silently and then left soon after. I almost thought that it was just a dream."

"But he did come."

"He did. And he gave me this," Shangguan Ru produced a jade waist token. The color of the jade was green, and there was the word "Roc" carved on the token, which indicated that this was not a "Jue" waist token owned by common killers but a far more superior one. It represented far greater authority in Golden Roc Castle.

Gu Shenwei glanced at it and then said in a gentler voice, "Like I said, you should return to the Land of Fragrance."

"And ignore what's about to happen?"

"You want to be in the war? Fine. Make a choice right now."

"Choice? I've never had a choice. I'll never go back to Golden Roc Castle. Neither will I ever…" Shangguan Ru shook her head slowly as she stopped talking. There were too many impossible things to explain and she was about to break down. "This is why wine exists in this world."

"However much you drink, it won't change anything." Gu Shenwei believed that he had to be cruel at this moment. "Soon, I'll launch an attack on Golden Roc Castle and I'll kill the Unique King and all his followers. If I fail, I'll be the one who dies. This is a fact that cannot be changed by wine or anything else."

After sitting there transfixed for quite a while, Shangguan Ru said, "Duodun's trying his best to win over the cavalrymen you brought back from the Norland. He's very charismatic with the Norland people. You have to be careful."

She was trying to sidetrack him, but Gu Shenwei didn't let her do so. Now that she hadn't returned to the Land of Fragrance but still wanted to stay out of this, she had to face the brutal reality. "I'm still waiting for your answer."

"To what? Oh, right, Golden Roc Castle." Shangguan Ru started contemplating the situation. "Back when my father assigned my brother to the Stone Kingdom at Xiaoyao Lake, I didn't really have to go with him. It was actually my mother who insisted that I go. She wished that I would be able to ask my father to show mercy on behalf of my brother, but… I refused to do that, and my mother was very angry with me. So, to some extent, my father actually didn't plan to have me killed."

Gu Shenwei didn't respond. When it came to a father-daughter relationship, he knew that no argument or explanation from others would help, and that Shangguan Ru had to find the answer by herself.

"But he didn't try to save me either," Shangguan Ru said as she continued her out loud deliberation. "The reason why he came to see me is because everybody's saying that I'm the queen of the Land of Fragrance, and because Duodun, who owns hundreds of thousands of troops as well as Heaven's Pass, claims that he's determined to marry me. There're no family ties in Golden Roc Castle. My father hates my mother, my mother hates me, and everybody else hates my father – they just refuse to show it."

"You're the only one who doesn't hate him." Gu Shenwei's voice was growing even gentler as he spoke. "You don't hate anyone."

"I can't." With two tears in her eyes, they were gleaming exceptionally brightly. "With all of this death and killing, with all those things that I did long ago, what right do I have to hate anybody, anybody at all? To please my father, I once killed the giant roc. To compete with the Horned Dragon Society, I gave the order to take the lives of countless sabermen. They killed each other and suffered from the burning fire right under my nose, even as I watched delightedly upstairs, thinking that this was victory and glory."

Gu Shenwei walked forward. While he was still hesitating, Shangguan Ru suddenly leaned against him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and started crying silently.

He put his hand on her head, but there was not a single bit of weakness in his heart because before he came here, he had anticipated every emotion that might arise in him and had locked them all up in a corner of his heart. But there was still a brief pause in his voice before he spoke, saying, "This is an ugly world, but you're not the worst person in it – at the very least, not worse than me, and certainly much less worse than Old Man Mu."

Shangguan Ru let out a short laugh and raised herself up. Seeing that her tears had soaked a large part of his clothes, Shangguan Ru started wiping it with her hands in embarrassment. She accidentally touched the scars on his body and felt a chill creep down her spine, but she didn't move her fingers away. Instead, they started stroking the scars as she said, "You're not a villain, and Old Man Mu stopped doing evil things a long time ago."

"He only stopped doing evil things because he's unable to do any. If he regains his power, you and I would be the first ones he kills."

"It turns out that it's not easy being a villain either."

"It's not. Your kung fu has to be better than that of others. You have to be more creative, faster, and also more ruthless."

Shangguan Ru drew her hands back. "Sometimes I feel like you're extremely similar to my father."

"The day I entered Golden Roc Castle, I made a resolution to become someone like the Unique King because he killed all my family, which means that he's stronger than my father and my brothers."

This was a naked philosophy of revenge. Upon hearing this, Shangguan Ru felt her heart skip a beat and that this man before her was becoming more and more similar to her father, "No-"

"No," Gu Shenwei said before she could finish her remark. "Whatever the Unique King did to his enemies, I'll do the same. He won't show any mercy, and I won't either."

Shangguan Ru felt as if she had just woken up from a dream. The situation was very simple; it was just that she had been unwilling to think about it all along. "Even if you don't try to kill him, he'll still kill you."

Gu Shenwei nodded.

The look on Shangguan Ru's face went back to normal. "I won't do anything against the Dragon Army's interests, and neither will I beg you to show mercy to my father. That resentment is between you and the Unique King. Golden Roc Castle has been there for many years, and it's about time it fell. But I'm not going to help you destroy it. After I get Shaomin back, I'll return to the Land of Fragrance as soon as possible.

"Please do that," Gu Shenwei said in a formal tone. He still trusted her wholeheartedly, more than he trusted anyone else, although there was no explicit reason behind that trust.

"I suggest you keep an eye on Duodun. He's no simple man. You haven't seen what he did in the Xiaowan Kingdom. Although you're the one who led those Norland troops here, they sincerely support their prince, and their cheers for him were heartfelt. And Duodun didn't let slip a single bit of their emotion."

"There's nothing to be worried about with regards to Duodun." Gu Shenwei was indifferent. "Just like the Khan, he thinks that loyalty is something that people are born with and that he can manipulate it in whatever way he wants. However, he's not the Khan and he'll never be the King of Norland."

Shangguan Ru felt that the Dragon King's calmness was both admirable and annoying, as she asked, "You think that the Court Attendants Army won't pledge their allegiance to Duodun?"

Among the 100,000 plus Norland cavalrymen that Gu Shenwei had gained, the core consisted of the more than 90,000 strong Court Attendants troops. Not only were they the largest faction, but they also possessed the greatest fighting capability. At present, they were stationed in the Royal Court, leveling the hill, guarding the Khan's mausoleum, as well as holding back Prince Luoluo's army that was marching westwards. They wouldn't leave there until there was enough grass to cover all the signs of the mausoleum in the spring of next year.

"Nobody can easily win over the Court Attendants Army's allegiance."

"You'd better have other methods to deal with this. Duodun's better at gathering people under his banner than any of the ten kings of Norland. To be honest, he's even better than you in this regard."

Gu Shenwei didn't say anything. Suddenly, Shangguan Ru blushed and said, "For your information, if I were forced into marrying Duodun, even if it's just a faint possibility, you'll be the one I hate the most in the world."

"That's just Duodun's irrational hopes."

It was already after midnight when Gu Shenwei left. Worrying that he might have wasted too much time in Shangguan Ru's room, he immediately went to Xu Xiaoyi. "The Unique King's in Heaven's Pass."

"What?" Xu Xiaoyi was startled. "How come… There's no sign of it at all?"

"He arrived approximately three days ago and he's probably still here."

"I'll send all of our men right away."

"Don't. He'll know and flee if you do that. I might know where he's hiding."

"Duodun," Xu Xiaoyi yelled in realization, and then he quickly lowered his voice. "Duodun's always been in contact with Golden Roc Castle. Given that the Unique King's no longer in a favorable situation, he must have come here to Duodun for help."

"Duodun despises Golden Roc Castle. He wants servants not allies, so he's not the one the Unique King would go to." Gu Shenwei had another person in mind, but there was not enough evidence to prove it. "How's Mo Chu doing these days?"

"Mo Chu?" Xu Xiaoyi was surprised. Nominally, Mo Chu was the Governor of Jade City and the Commander-in-chief of the 70,000 Norland cavalrymen, but Duodun was the one who was in de facto control of the troops. If it weren't for the fact that Shangguan Ru had inexplicably rescued him, he would still be in prison.

"Yeah, him."

Xu Xiaoyi quickly recalled some information. "Well, Mo Chu's pretty normal and doesn't hang out very often. Occasionally, he'll drink with his former subordinates and grumble, but he's never done anything dramatic, and he's never even been to the army camp either."

"He never came to you or Instructor Shangguan?"

"He didn't. Not even once. Oh, I remember now," Xu Xiaoyi finally saw what the Dragon King was hinting at. "Mo Chu's a cunning bastard. Duodun took away his army and threw him in prison. This old guy definitely wouldn't have swallowed it lying down. But the Tenth Young Master saved his life. How could he just pretend to now know anything about it? Besides, the Dragon King is such a powerful ally, and yet he also acts as if he doesn't care, so obviously he has another plan to take revenge…"

"Send more men to protect Xiao Fengchai and Lü Qiying. Currently, they're very important."

"Yes. What about Mo Chu? Should I monitor him?"

Gu Shenwei decided to pay Mo Chu a visit himself and Xu Xiaoyi's opposition didn't make him change his mind. He was eager to find out whether there was still a gap between his kung fu and that of the Unique King.

And this was exactly such an opportunity.