Du, du, du, du!
A dense, rapid sound echoed from all directions around the carriage. It was the sound of crossbow bolts striking the carriage walls, a soul-reaping melody.
In that instant, countless bolts flew towards the carriage where Fan Xian was located, especially that terrifying, powerful crossbow bolt hidden among them, carrying immense force, directly piercing the carriage!
Boom!
The black carriage bounced helplessly, its axle shattered by the power of that single bolt. It hopped among the rocks, looking like a frog waiting to be slaughtered.
However, the carriage did not fall apart.
Fan Xian crouched low on the carriage floor, forcefully circulating the true energy within his body to dissipate the immense impact. He glanced at the large hole beneath the dead coachman's body, somewhat horrified. The power of this giant crossbow was too great, actually piercing through the bottom of his carriage, revealing the rocks and residual snow beneath.
Fan Xian knew how sturdy the Supervisory Council's specially made carriages were. Sandwiched between the inner and outer layers of wood were iron wire cotton and a thin but hard steel plate. If not for this carriage, a collective creation of the Internal Treasury's Third Workshop and the Supervisory Council, protecting him, he would have died long ago in this dense, ice-rain-like crossbow attack.
He listened intently to the whooshing sound of the crossbow bolts outside, knowing that the enemy's primary target was definitely him. Although he wasn't sure how the ambushing enemy had seen through the Supervisory Council's carriage switch, he knew this was not the time to think about the causes and consequences. His ears judged that the speed at which the enemy targeting him was unleashing crossbow bolts toward the valley in such a short time was already exceeding the number used by the Qing army when attacking foreign cities on the battlefield!
Using the means of attacking a city to kill one person!
Such a powerful crossbow attack, such meticulous preparation by the enemy, made Fan Xian feel a hint of death.
Obviously, the enemies in the valley were also surprised that these carriages in the valley were so sturdy, capable of withstanding the power of the strong crossbows.
The rain of bolts continued to fly, and the valley was filled with miserable cries and the whinnies of horses. Upon the initial ambush, the sharp cry that Fan Xian had emitted had already notified his Supervisory Council subordinates. The swordsmen and spies of the Sixth Bureau were quick to react, hiding in the carriages, but the coachmen who stayed outside and the state troops sent from Weizhou did not have such good luck.
Crossbow bolts slammed violently into the bodies and heads of the state troops, into the chests, abdomens, and eye sockets of the steeds, piercing and tearing, separating these living flesh and blood from the life they were attached to.
There was simply no way to avoid it. More than half of the hundred or so state troops died in the first barrage of arrows, and the horses fell screaming in the snow, blood staining the dark snow in the valley, a truly horrific sight.
Everywhere were corpses, everywhere were arrows, everywhere was blood, everywhere was death.
The carriages became the final fortresses for the Supervisory Council members, pitifully enduring in the storm of crossbow bolts and arrows, like a boat in a vast ocean, in danger of being swallowed by a giant wave at any moment. In just a moment, countless black crossbow bolts had pierced into the carriage compartments, embedding themselves deep into the walls, piercing the steel plates, firm and unyielding... The carriages in the valley looked like coffins, suddenly sprouting countless ghostly mold.
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The sound of several more powerful crossbows being cocked, a sound that made one's teeth ache, came from the forest, accompanied by very low, strained breathing.
Whoosh!
That terrifying giant crossbow fired again, only this time not only was it aimed at Fan Xian's carriage, but two more were aimed at the carriages in front.
The strong crossbows slammed into the black carriages. With a loud crash, the carriages bounced again, then miserably overturned to the left!
What immense power.
Fan Xian, hiding in the carriage, felt everything around him turn upside down in an instant. A powerful jolt threw him away from the bottom board of the carriage. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a sharp metal crossbow tip had pierced the carriage wall above him, stabbing in with a grim and terrifying presence, only half a foot away from his chest and abdomen.
A close call. Fan Xian looked at the crossbow bolt made entirely of metal, at the wood shavings and steel fragments it had brought out from the shaft, knowing that the carriage couldn't hold out for long.
Carriages couldn't be too heavy, so in the design, only a very thin layer of steel was sandwiched between the two layers of wood. After all, those strange people at the Third Workshop would never have thought that an enemy would use city-defense crossbows during an assassination attempt!
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Knowing that he couldn't sit still and wait for death, Fan Xian took two quick breaths of slightly sweet air. Taking advantage of the moment when the carriage overturned, he wriggled his entire body out of the hole in the bottom that he had found earlier.
Clearly, the assassins in the valley had not anticipated that Fan Xian would find an exit outside of their calculations, so their reaction was a beat slow.
In that one beat, Fan Xian's toes touched the ground. Not daring to stop at all, he forcefully turned his body, drawing strange lines on the open ground in the valley, running in a zigzag pattern towards the woods on one side of the valley.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, more than a dozen slender but sharp crossbow bolts slammed into the spot where Fan Xian had been, into the bottom of the overturned carriage, into the muddy snow at the bottom of the valley!
The danger had not passed. Fan Xian let out a sharp cry, his whole body flying up, slapping his hand on a blue stone on the ground, narrowly avoiding the second wave of crossbow bolts that were shot at him.
Blue stone shattered, the figure vanished, crossbow bolts shot into empty air!
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Fan Xian dashed into the woods, tearing off the white fox fur around his shoulders and tying it around his left leg. He took out a pill, swallowed it, then took off his black official robes and turned them inside out.
With a slender black dagger drawn from his boot in one hand and grasping the hilt of his sword at his waist, he disappeared into the forest like a ghost.
Before disappearing, he whistled sharply again, but did not turn back to look at his precarious confidantes and subordinates in the valley.
Several officials of the Supervisory Council had already died, all of them killed in that earlier moment.
When Fan Xian's carriage was overturned by the strong crossbow, these subordinates, worried about his safety, disregarded the order Fan Xian had conveyed through his whistle. They forcefully opened the carriage doors and fired crossbows at the ambushers in the valley, trying to buy some time and reach Fan Xian's carriage.
However, the Supervisory Council officials used hand crossbows, which clearly did not have the long range of the powerful crossbows used by those in the forest. And although the swordsmen of the Sixth Bureau were trained to be death gods in the dark, they still had no chance to fight back in the face of such a rapid rain of crossbow bolts.
In just a moment, the crossbow bolts had turned the Supervisory Council officials who had just opened the carriage doors into hedgehogs. The officials' eyes were not closed.
The fastest person had only managed to get six steps closer to Fan Xian's carriage before being pinned to the ground by three crossbow bolts.
Fan Xian saw this scene, but his expression became even more calm, a calm mixed with a hint of pale indifference. Only calm could provide the most effective counterattack.
Counterattack.
When coming out of the carriage, three consecutive swings still resulted in a crossbow bolt hitting his left thigh. Although it only grazed the skin, it still burned like fire.
The fox fur was a little soft, tied around the wound on his thigh, it was just right.
Perfect for a counterattack.
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There were snow forests on both sides of the valley. The sound that had initially alerted Fan Xian's ears was the Shadow's warning. He knew the Shadow was in the forest on that side, so he chose the opposite direction.
He trusted the Shadow's strength. No matter how many people were in the forest over there, the Shadow could either kill the crossbowmen or plunge them into the shadows of death.
And this side of the forest had to be dealt with by Fan Xian himself.
This dense rain of crossbow bolts had to stop, or everyone in the valley would die.
And as long as the rain of crossbow bolts stopped, giving the Supervisory Council spies in the carriages a chance to escape into the forest, Fan Xian believed that the lads of the Sixth Bureau would use the black swords in their hands to harvest the lives of these assassins.
Harvest them clean, leaving no one alive.
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A few hurried whistles came from the snow forest, obviously the enemy had discovered that Fan Xian had escaped into the snow forest and was mobilizing manpower to try to carry out the final assassination.
No one dared to underestimate a Department Head of the Supervisory Council, a ninth-rank expert, so the whistles passing on the command sounded a little flustered. At this time, the crossbow bolts shooting into the valley were also obviously fewer, because the people assassinating the carriages knew that their target was Fan Xian. If Fan Xian didn't die, they would all die.
Although there were fewer crossbow bolts, they still maintained sufficient density and deterrent force, forcing the Supervisory Council swordsmen to stay in the carriages.
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The search and assassination continued. In the snow near the mountain peak, the sound of snow being trampled rang out. A man holding a crossbow vigilantly watched his surroundings.
The snow suddenly cracked open, and a black dagger was deeply embedded in his lower abdomen.
The dagger stirred a little before being pulled out to allow the poison to take effect faster.
The man looked down in pain and despair, looking at the young man in white standing before him. He wanted to call for help, but a black light cut through his throat.
Blood spurted out with a hiss. He clutched his throat, kneeling in the snow. His right hand weakly scraped, and the crossbow bolt in his hand shot into the snow next to his knee. The powerful recoil made his dying body jump before collapsing in the snow, making a muffled sound.
After cutting the man's throat, Fan Xian flew forward indifferently, hiding behind a tree, coldly watching the man's final actions. He felt a chill in his heart. Even in death, he did not forget to inform his companions of the enemy's situation. The Qing Kingdom's army was indeed the strongest in the world.
Breaking through the snow forest and climbing the snow mountain, Fan Xian had already killed more than a dozen people. He felt a little tired, and clearly knew that there were more than two hundred crossbowmen ambushing him this time, and many experts had come. He felt a little strenuous even when fighting. It seemed that the Shadow's side had not yet completely succeeded.
The other side had really paid a great price.
At this time, he had broken through two lines of assassination and had arrived at the area near the mountain peak, because he knew that the powerful city-defense crossbows were set up here. Close to the goal, he didn't care about the warning the man had given before his death. Sneaking and assassination were actually more exhausting than direct combat, so he decided to change his approach.
A dense sound of stepping on snow rang out in the forest. A team of crossbowmen nervously patrolled the area. Half of the crossbowmen were sent to hunt down Fan Xian, and some were suppressing the carriages in the valley. No one thought that Fan Xian would be able to break through two lines of defense silently and come to the top of the mountain.
Because few people in this world knew that Fan Xian had learned assassination and how to prevent assassination since he was a child, this instinct of a stalker had entered his blood.
The snow flew again. A snow line suddenly appeared on the ground, and a snow shadow flashed out from behind a tree, using the falling snowflakes as cover, turning into a straight line that rushed forward!
What speed!
The crossbowmen only felt a blur before their eyes, then felt a chill on their throats. In their nervousness, the crossbow bolts in their hands were shot out randomly.
Du, du, du, du.
Among the crisscrossing crossbow bolts that hid danger, Fan Xian rushed out, the slender black dagger in his left hand slashing across the throats of these crossbowmen. His right hand flipped over, pulling out the long sword he carried on his back and directly slashing out.
His left hand was delicate and subtle, his right hand was overbearing and sweeping.
To the left was a black line, to the right was a bright cluster of color.
Crossbow bolts flew everywhere, shooting into the sky and into the dense trunks of the snow forest trees. Under the outline of this black line and the staining of the bright color cluster, a team of crossbowmen screamed and fell to the ground one after another, blood flowing everywhere.
With a clang, Fan Xian's sword encountered strong resistance at the very end.
Fan Xian's feet did not touch the ground, and he quickly swept back, standing three steps away from that person, coldly looking at the other party.
The other party held a knife in both hands. Although he was somewhat fearful, he still glared strongly into Fan Xian's eyes and shouted loudly to notify nearby partners.
Fan Xian still didn't move, coldly looked at him, and then spat out a word: "Du!"
As soon as the word fell, his black dagger had already shot out, and his person followed this black dagger incredibly quickly... shot out, like a shadow dragged behind the black dagger!
In an instant, Fan Xian came to the person. The black dagger also came to the person's face.
Slightly disturbed by the word "Du", the man gave a loud roar and slashed down with both knives, knocking the black dagger into the snow.
Fan Xian gave a strange cry, his body lifting two feet off the ground, his right wrist flipping over, then stabbed the long sword upside down into the man's opening!
Being able to survive had already proven the man's strength. He retreated three steps, his hands not abandoning the knife handle, but reversed and danced, a flash of knife light flashed past, and he resisted Fan Xian's sword's momentum in the blink of an eye.
With a crisp sound of "Dang".
The knife broke, the man's chest felt stuffy, and he spat out a mouthful of blood. How could he be an enemy to the overbearing true qi attached to Fan Xian's sword.
But he also succeeded in flicking away Fan Xian's sword, giving himself a chance to live.
However, in order to maintain his extremely high speed and body movement, Fan Xian even abandoned his sword!
His whole person rushed up like a ghost, plunging into the other person's midsection. There was no fancy style, but it was an unusually fast and stable palm struck on the other person's chest.
With several "Kara" sounds, the man's chest bones broke inch by inch, his eyes bulged out, and he died miserably in the snow.
Fan Xian turned around and swept up the long sword and dagger from the snow, touched the snow forest with his toe again, fluttered into the treetops of the forest, like a startling goose, never to be seen again.
This fight, only three sounds of "Pa pa pa", the so-called lightning flash, was like this.
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Fan Xian looked at the three strong crossbows under the forest, and couldn't help but feel cold. Sure enough... it was a city crossbow. Countless doubts and anxieties surged in his heart, but at this time his people were still trapped in the valley, and he couldn't think too much.
The ancient, strange, and terrifying city crossbow was installed at the top of the mountain, with wooden discs and iron pivots below for control. The cocking rope and springs required several people to work together to complete. Those huge crossbow bolts were placed next to it.
Fan Xian was attached to the snow forest, squinting at this scene. He couldn't help but think of the powerful impact his carriage had suffered, and of those who had died in the valley.
The city crossbow was still being released slowly and steadily. Two carriages in the valley had been broken, and the Supervisory Council had suffered heavy casualties.
Therefore, although Fan Xian discovered that there were three masters above the seventh rank in the field, he still did not hesitate at all and turned into a large white bird, pouncing towards the three city crossbows.
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"Release!"
The person next to the city crossbow who was obviously the commander suddenly shouted loudly.
What was released was not the city crossbow, but a dense rain of arrows that suddenly shot out from the lower left of the forest!
These assassins were obviously prepared, and Fan Xian was in mid-air, facing this overwhelming rain of arrows, and seemed to have no way to avoid it, but then everyone saw a scene that made them dumbfounded.
Fan Xian tore his right hand and turned his whole clothes over to cover his head and face, and his person, like a stone, fell directly to the ground!
Instead of forcefully twisting his body to change direction, he directly dissipated the true qi in his body!
Let yourself fall to the ground like a falling leaf, a stone, following the laws of nature.
It seemed simple, but the strong vibration during this true qi conversion was enough to break the meridians of most masters in the world, and only a congenital monster like Fan Xian could use this method.
No one thought that Fan Xian could fall down like this, so most of the crossbow bolts shot into the sky and the startled birds in the forest, and only a few crossbow bolts shot into Fan Xian's body, but he relied on the official clothes specially made for him by the Supervisory Council and the extremely tyrannical overbearing true qi in his body to block them.
But Fan Xian still felt as if he had been struck by lightning, and a pain that penetrated into his bones made his eyes turn red. He knew that he had suffered internal injuries, and that the surface of his body had probably begun to bleed.
As soon as his foot touched the ground, his whole body fell down, like a snow fox, sliding quickly along the snow surface, drifting towards the three city crossbows.
The crossbow bolts shot into the snow behind him, densely packed, as if to send him on his way.
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An extremely fast knife came to meet him. Fan Xian turned his wrist, and the black dagger scattered like a black shadow, and in a moment, it collided with the knife fourteen times.
Fourteen times, the crisp sound of "Ding ding dang dang", the swordsman retreated in panic, his face turned blue and white, and he obviously suffered a secret loss, but he finally succeeded in blocking Fan Xian in front of him.
Fan Xian squinted and glanced, knowing that this swordsman must have an extremely important position in the army, and there were two other such masters on this mountaintop.
And what Fan Xian needed was time.
So he retreated, retreated into the arms of the attacker behind him, turned back his wrist, and the black dagger stabbed out from under his armpit.
The person behind him gave a strange cry and abandoned his knife, joining his palms together. At the risk of the poison on the dagger, he clamped Fan Xian's dagger.
It was just that Fan Xian's stabbing force was so great that the dagger finally slipped past the person's pair of palms and pierced a little into the other person's body.
The man roared wildly and slapped Fan Xian's back of head with a palm.
Fan Xian didn't turn his head and returned with a palm.
Immediately afterwards, the dagger was drawn out and returned, using the knife handle to strike the person's face. Fan Xian seemed to have eyes on the back of his head, and the knife handle directly stabbed the person's eye socket.
The person put out his left palm again, blocking Fan Xian's knife handle in front of his eyes, one inch away.
Fan Xian pressed his thumb, and a sharp point on the knife handle stabbed out, piercing the person's palm, then pierced the person's eyeball!
On the shore of the North Sea, even Xiao En had suffered from this trick of Fan Xian's, let alone these strong men in the army.
The person did not cover his eyeballs splashing liquid, screamed wildly, and in the opportunity that he knew he would die, he strongly grabbed Fan Xian from behind!
His left palm and eyes were wearing Fan Xian's dagger, and his right arm tightly strangled Fan Xian's throat.
The swordsman in front also held the knife and slashed, the fast knife was like lightning, and it was directly cutting into Fan Xian's face!
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Fan Xian groaned and with a "Zeng" sound, he pulled the dagger out of the eyeball of the person behind him, and directly stabbed at the swordsman in front.
How could he have thought that the swordsman would disregard his own life and death, give a violent roar, and the knife's momentum did not stop, letting Fan Xian's dagger insert into his right chest.
It seemed that these strong men in the military would leave Fan Xian's body in this valley not far from Kyoto, even if they risked their lives.
However, the left arm that Fan Xian stabbed out was still stretched out straight, holding the dagger in front of his arm, and on his wrist... there was a hidden crossbow!
With a slight sound of a spring, the swordsman, who had killed many of Fan Xian's subordinates with crossbow bolts today, suddenly found that his eyes were black, and then a burst of severe pain came. Only then did he realize that two crossbow bolts had been inserted into his eyes.
Two delicate black arrows were inserted into the swordsman's eyes.
Fan Xian exhaled sharply, and with the strong man behind him, he took a step forward, missing the swordsman's knife edge, and still using his iron shoulder to resist the opponent's right hand. With a "Kara" sound, it was still the swordsman's hand that was broken.
Fan Xian raised his foot and kicked it out.
With a muffled sound, the swordsman in front was kicked ten feet away by this foot mixed with resentment and dominance, and slammed heavily on a tree trunk, his abdomen burst open, which was very miserable.
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And at this time, the third person had finally been killed.
Fan Xian's foot had not yet been retracted.
But he had been waiting for this person all along, and did not pay attention to the person who was holding him tightly behind him, and his right hand had already gripped the hilt of the sword that protruded from his shoulder.
With a "Chi la" sound, the two arms of the person behind him broke together!
Like a plum blossom blooming to welcome the wind and snow, like a small boat fighting the sea in the sea, without the slightest look around in confusion, Fan Xian coldly and fiercely, stabbed with a sword.
The sword's edge trembled slightly, seemingly weak, but in fact stubborn, ignoring the front and ignoring the back, ignoring the left and ignoring the right, winning in advancing without hesitation.
It was Fan Xian's sword that was buried at the bottom of the box, and it was also his most powerful sword when facing the enemy head-on. If it were not for the most dangerous moment, he would never use it.
Si Gu Jian.
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The sword's edge pierced through the throat of the strong man in the army and picked him up in the air of the snow. His eyes bulged and he stared at Fan Xian, his hands drooping weakly, and a pair of scimitars fell into the snow.
Those eyes seemed to be talking, expressing their fear and incomprehension, as if to say, how could such a sword come so silently?
At this time, strange changes occurred again.
Fan Xian picked one person up with his sword, bound one person behind him, and under the snow where he was standing, another person actually came out!
A gray figure came out of the snow, with a faint breath, holding a thin sword, and stabbed it against Fan Xian's back!
This was the real killer.
Fan Xian had lurked in the snow to kill countless people, but at this time he was facing the siege of three strong men, and he was really a bit exhausted, so he didn't notice the strangeness in this snow at all.
At this moment when he was about to win, the enemy's last killer finally appeared.
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At this moment, Fan Xian only had time to take a step forward, and then he felt a tingling pain, which passed from his waist all the way to the back of his neck.
That faint sword directly pierced through Fan Xian's official clothes that could resist ordinary attacks, leaving a long and miserable wound on his back!
The sword's meaning did not stop and soared into the sky, cutting off the belt that tied Fan Xian's hair.
The person who had been stuck behind Fan Xian had already been shaken into the snow by this sword.
And behind Fan Xian had been replaced by the assassin who had been lurking in the snow for a long time.
His back was severely injured, and his long hair was weakly scattered behind him, and there was a sword that was about to take Fan Xian's life. At this time, Fan Xian's mental and physical strength was about to collapse to the extreme, and he could not mobilize the domineering true qi in his body in an instant.
He only had time to look back.
Looking back.
The scattering black hair swung out, weakly hitting the face of the last assassin.
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Where the hair fell, a thin needle was pricked on the assassin's cheek next to the temple, thin and small, trembling slightly, and it seemed that a gust of wind might blow the needle off.
However, the assassin's body stiffened for a moment, and the sword aimed at Fan Xian's heart did not have time to stab out.
Fan Xian made a flat palm and chopped it into the assassin's throat. A burst of blood splashed from the back of the assassin's neck.
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(The boy I like has a head of black and shiny long hair... This chapter was a bit hard to write. The stock market collapsed, and I was little-dumping. Sincerely call for monthly tickets. Always thank you.)