"Li Sheng!"
Li Sheng had been waiting for these words for far too long.
From the moment the posthouse doors were kicked open, from the moment thirty horsemen shattered the curfew, from the moment he followed her all the way down into this pitch-black underground carrying the wooden box holding the Emperor's Sword, his grip on the hilt of his horse-chopping saber had never loosened.
All the way down, the sweat from his palms had nearly soaked through the sharkskin wrapping of the hilt.
He didn't need to be told twice.
Pushing off the edge of the final stone step with his left foot, Li Sheng launched himself forward. Leaning in with his center of gravity lowered, he drew his three-foot-long saber from his waist the instant he leapt into the air.
With the back of the blade facing up and the edge facing down, his opening move was a mountain-cleaving strike aimed straight from the crown of the head down to the collarbone.
There was nothing flashy about this strike; it went straight for the vitals the moment it was drawn, meant to bite into bone.
This clearly showed that Li Sheng was no mere advisor, a fact that had already been proven back in Jiangning.
But Wang Biao's reaction was not slow either.
Having survived in the death row prison for all these years, he had blood on his hands too. In the blink of an eye, he swung his ghost-head broadsword up from his shoulder, holding it horizontally above his head with the flat of the blade facing upward to block the blow with all his might.
Iron clashed against iron.
A deafening crack echoed back and forth across the vaulted ceiling of the water dungeon three or four times.
Even the light of the torches seemed to flicker from the shockwave.
But Wang Biao's wrists held out for less than half a breath.
The spine of the horse-chopping saber was nearly twice as thick as that of the ghost-head broadsword, and its weight was on a completely different level. The capital's top-tier cold-forged fine steel against a roughly smelted iron blank from a military town—there was simply no comparison.
A visible dent was smashed into the spine of the ghost-head broadsword. The webbing between Wang Biao's thumb and index finger tore open on the spot, blood streaming down the hilt.
But the horse-chopping saber did not stop.
The blade slid down along the spine of the ghost-head broadsword, bypassing its handguard.
Wang Biao's pupils shrank to pinpricks.
He saw the light—a sliver of white glare reflecting off the water-like temper line on the blade as it closed in on his neck.
Only one thought flashed through Wang Biao's mind:
It was too late.
The saber sliced into the left side of Wang Biao's neck. It didn't catch on the bone. There was no hesitation. The fine steel blade sheared through flesh, through the cervical vertebrae, and out the skin on the right side, going all the way through.
Clean and efficient.
Wang Biao's body still maintained the posture of raising his sword to block, both hands held in mid-air, the ghost-head broadsword still horizontal above where his head used to be.
But his head was no longer on his neck.
The blood didn't spray from the stump immediately.
For about a breath's time, the cross-section of the wound was exposed to the torchlight, everything laid bare with gruesome clarity.
And then the blood came.
From the two severed major arteries, pillars of blood shot out simultaneously in two directions, spraying against the stone wall. It flowed down the weeping wall, mixing with the filthy water seeping from the cracks, raising a dark red mist over the surface of the black water below.
Wang Biao's head tumbled from his neck.
It first struck the edge of the stone platform with a dull thud, bounced once, traced a short arc, and plunged into the black water beneath the platform with a splash.
Wang Biao's head rolled halfway over in the water, floating face up. His mouth was still open, yellow teeth exposed, his expression frozen as if he had been cut off mid-sentence.
His headless body remained standing for two more breaths.
The ghost-head broadsword finally slipped from his hands, and his entire headless torso toppled stiffly forward.
With this single move, the water dungeon fell entirely silent.
At the very bottom of the water dungeon, the only thing still moving was the blood flowing from Wang Biao's severed neck.
Up at the entrance of the passageway, Chen Kui, the hundred-man commander guarding the death row, and the twenty-odd jailers behind him were trapped in absolute shock.
The crowd was paralyzed; no one ran, no one shouted, and no one reached for the swords at their waists.
They all stood frozen in place, staring in unison at the man holding the saber at the bottom of the stone steps, and the woman standing one pace behind him.
The scattered torchlight illuminated a floor full of silence.
At this very moment, Deputy Lieutenant Qian sobered up.
To be precise, he had sobered up the exact instant the saber severed Wang Biao's neck.
The chipped, coarse porcelain wine bowl he was still holding slipped from his loosened fingers, bounced off his foot, and shattered, the shards spinning a few times on the stone platform. He didn't feel any pain, because all his senses were concentrated in one place—his legs.
They were trembling.
Deputy Lieutenant Qian took a step back.
The sole of his boot crunched on the shards of another wine bowl he had smashed earlier. With a crunch of broken porcelain, he took another step back, his back slamming straight into the damp rock wall behind him.
All those things Deputy Lieutenant Qian had just said about the emperor being far away, about how outside rules didn't work here, and asking if she thought Zhenbei City was her own backyard, were all caught in his throat. He couldn't utter a single word.
Because he clearly saw the blood on the horse-chopping saber in Li Sheng's hand.
The blood ran down the fuller of the blade, dripping onto the stone steps. The sound of every single drop landing felt like a hammer striking Deputy Lieutenant Qian's heart.
Wang Biao was dead.
Chopped down without a second thought.
Not a single unnecessary word was spoken, not a moment of hesitation given.
Deputy Lieutenant Qian lowered his head, not daring to look into Xu Qinghuan's eyes again.
He had killed people in his life, and he had seen others kill. More people had died in this death row than were alive outside, and he had long grown numb to it.
But tonight was different.
The one killing tonight wasn't an executioner of the death row, but a guard beside a woman bearing the Emperor's Sword. The one killed wasn't a prisoner, but the captain of Vice General He's personal guard.
That strike had severed more than just Wang Biao's neck; it had severed the path of retreat for everyone in this death row.
He Minghu's man had been executed right in front of them by the imperial envoy. There was no room for maneuvering here—either the envoy would fall, or He Minghu would fall.
Regardless of who fell, a minor character like Deputy Lieutenant Qian, who just sat in the death row watching doors for others, would be among the very first grains of sand to be crushed.
Li Sheng flicked the blood off his saber.
Beads of blood flew from the tip, hitting the stone wall and leaving several long, thin streaks. He did not sheathe his blade; it remained held horizontally at his side.
Chen Kui fell to his knees on the stone slabs at the end of the passageway, his lips trembling.
"The sky has fallen."
