The blinding searchlight turned the entire rear courtyard of the medical clinic into broad daylight.
The harsh white light mercilessly pinned Ye Honglian in place, leaving her nowhere to hide.
Great Yan's Number One Assassin and the lofty Netherworld Cult Master was frozen in the most ludicrous tug-of-war pose imaginable.
For a brief moment, it was as though the air itself had stopped moving. An oppressive, deathly silence descended over the courtyard.
Then, after the initial shock came an indescribable sense of humiliation, erupting in Ye Honglian's heart like a volcano.
The instant of being caught red-handed and publicly humiliated transformed completely into a towering fury!
“Delivering takeout?”
Ye Honglian's voice seeped out from behind her mask of a green-faced demon with fangs, sharp as an icy blade dipped in poison.
She let out a cold laugh, the sound carrying an unmistakable murderous intent.
Since she couldn't pull her shoe free, she might as well abandon it!
As Great Yan's Foremost Master, how could she possibly allow a patch of inexplicable glue to bind her hands and feet?
Ye Honglian's eyes hardened. She immediately gave up on the red shoe stuck fast to the trap.
Barefoot on one side, her fair, jade-like foot, she wrenched herself free of the shoe.
Once liberated, she no longer bothered to conceal her strength.
A terrifying wave of true qi that made the heart tremble erupted from her slender body without restraint!
Blood-red qi, solid enough to seem almost tangible, surged outward in a violent storm, sweeping in every direction from her as its center.
The gale howled, whipping her red robes into a furious flutter.
Boom!
With a deafening blast of compressed air, the absurdly powerful glue trap—strong enough to hold even a giant sandworm—was crushed into dozens of pieces under the force of Ye Honglian's raging true qi!
Shattered fragments of glue board, mixed with dirt and bits of grass, shot in every direction.
Ye Honglian touched down lightly on one foot, landing on a clean stone slab ten feet away.
She raised her chin slightly, her entire body radiating an oppressive aura of the Asura.
She had thought her spectacular display of shattering the trap would be enough to intimidate the ignorant little brat on the second floor.
Yet Su Yaoyao, standing in the corridor upstairs, did not even blink.
Dressed in fuzzy pink rabbit pajamas, she cradled a cup of hot milk and blew gently across its surface.
“Tsk, tsk, what a temper. You even threw away your shoe.”
Su Yaoyao took a sip of milk, showing not the slightest mercy with her words.
“Who goes out to assassinate someone in the middle of the night wearing a bright-red dress? Were you afraid people wouldn’t see you? You might as well have hung a sign around your neck and served as a human road marker.”
The corner of Ye Honglian's eye twitched beneath her mask, and the murderous aura surrounding her thickened.
Su Yaoyao's little mouth was like a machine gun with the safety off, rattling away without pause.
She raised a hand and pointed at the mask on Ye Honglian's face, her expression full of disdain.
“And another thing—what the heck is that junk on your face?”
“It’s got a green face and fangs, the craftsmanship is crude, and even the paint is peeling. It screams cheap.”
“That Asura mask… did you buy it wholesale at the market for two copper coins?”
“No, wait. Judging by that crooked, lumpy workmanship, you probably haggled with the vendor and got it thrown in free with a head of cabbage!”
“With the taste of a street-stall bargain like that, you still dare wear it while pretending to be some mysterious master?”
“You’re practically dragging down the average looks of the entire assassin profession!”
Every word struck at the heart. Every syllable was barbed.
Ever since Ye Honglian had founded the Netherworld Cult, had anyone who saw her not been scared out of their wits, dropping to their knees and begging for mercy?
When had a baby-faced little brat who hadn't even grown all her hair been allowed to criticize her taste?
And to demean the Asura mask she regarded as a symbol of her identity, reducing it to a worthless cabbage-market bargain!
Rage completely devoured Ye Honglian's reason.
Her chest heaved violently, and she laughed despite herself in her fury.
“Heh heh… hahahahaha!”
Her icy, bone-chilling laughter echoed through the night, as though it had risen from the depths of the Netherworld.
Ye Honglian lifted her head, the murderous eyes behind her mask locking firmly onto Su Yaoyao.
“You little brat, you’ve got quite the sharp tongue!”
“Let’s see whether your life is as tough as your mouth!”
Before the words had even faded, Ye Honglian moved without the slightest hesitation.
Her hands crossed rapidly before her chest, her ten fingers blurring like butterflies weaving through flowers.
In an instant, dozens of cold glints materialized between her fingers.
This was the signature technique that had made her infamous throughout Great Yan, the deadly art that allowed her to kill without a trace—the Lethal Chain of Throwing Darts!
“Go to hell!”
Ye Honglian flicked her wrist, her wide red sleeves snapping in the night wind.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
A dense barrage of piercing sounds tore through the stillness of the rear courtyard, like the sinister laughter of the Grim Reaper.
Dozens of oddly shaped steel poison darts, gleaming with a ghostly green sheen, ripped through the night.
In midair, they interlaced into a death net so dense that not even a pin could pass through.
Like a green storm of torrential rain, they shot toward Su Yaoyao on the second floor!
The darts moved with astonishing speed, sealing off nearly every avenue of escape.
The eerie green glow made it clear that they had been coated with a deadly poison from the southern border—one that could kill at the slightest touch.
Even an immortal would be helpless after suffering so much as a scratch!
At this critical moment, with danger hanging by a thread and the murderous intent reaching its peak, the tightly closed wooden door leading to the rear courtyard on the first floor suddenly creaked open from within.
“What the hell are you making such a racket for in the middle of the night? Don’t you know I’m sleeping?”
Woken by the commotion in the courtyard, Su Zhen emerged wearing an outer robe, his face full of irritation.
Rubbing his eyes, he looked up while grumbling curses under his breath.
But the instant he looked into the courtyard, Su Zhen froze completely.
His gaze passed straight through the rain of ghostly green poison darts flying through the air.
It locked onto the woman standing in the center of the courtyard—a red-clad, barefoot figure frozen in the stance of someone who had just thrown a dart!
Boom!
Su Zhen's entire body shook as if struck by a bolt of heavenly lightning.
His eyes, still bleary with sleep moments earlier, widened to their limit, his pupils contracting sharply.
That smooth, flowing opening stance.
That distinctive technique of crossing both hands and borrowing the force of one movement to enhance the next.
And that vicious, treacherous method of exerting power, in which every ounce of strength was calculated to perfection!
It was too similar!
Far too similar!
No—it was exactly the same!
Eight years ago, in the imperial palace of the Great Abyss Kingdom, that woman who had appeared so delicate and helpless had used this exact same technique on the night before she left, taking down the palace spies guarding the royal treasury!
Su Zhen would never forget that ruthless silhouette.
The woman who had made off with half his national treasury, faked her death, and vanished—leaving him to search for her, think of her, and hate her for eight full years!
Su Zhen's heart began pounding wildly, an indescribably violent tide of emotion surging straight into his head.
On the second-floor corridor, faced with the deadly chain of poisoned darts descending like an unavoidable rainstorm, Su Yaoyao did not dodge.
She did not even spill a single drop of the hot milk in her hand.
As she watched the ghostly green light filling the sky, Su Yaoyao's brain sounded the air-raid sirens at full volume.
She cursed inwardly in perfectly clear, heartfelt language:
[What the hell? Is this woman insane? She’s using her ultimate move right from the start?! Does she really think I’m a vegetarian?]
With her other hand, she pulled a cylindrical object from her personal space and slammed it onto the ground.
