“Clang!”
The metallic casing struck the ground with a sharp, ringing impact.
Below, Ye Honglian’s lips curled into a cruel sneer.
She assumed it was nothing more than the little girl’s desperate last struggle—a concealed weapon thrown in a final act of defiance.
Before her storm of deadly darts, any resistance was futile.
Dozens of throwing darts coated in the deadly poisons of southern Xinjiang had already closed in on the second floor.
Their eerie green glow illuminated Su Yaoyao’s exquisitely delicate little face.
At this critical moment—
“Boom!!!”
A deep yet ear-shattering explosion erupted in the rear courtyard of the Science Cultivation Hall!
This was not the kind of explosive force that tore through everything like gunpowder. No fragments went flying in all directions.
This was a specially designed military product from the interstellar age.
A high-explosive flashbang!
In the silent darkness of night, the tiny cylinder released a terrifying burst of light comparable to staring directly into the midday sun!
No one had any chance to prepare.
The instant the white light appeared, it ruthlessly tore through the darkness of the entire courtyard.
The blinding radiance surged forth like a tangible tide, drowning the retinas of everyone present.
Ye Honglian’s cold, frigid eyes bore the brunt of it.
She only felt a sudden buzz in front of her eyes. The entire world turned into a deathly silent, blinding white.
A brief, searing pain pierced through her eyes.
The Great Yan's Number One Assassin had lost her sight!
The sudden, powerful flash directly disrupted the circulation of her inner energy.
The poisoned darts that had originally been locked precisely onto their target lost all accuracy.
“Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud!”
A dense series of muffled impacts rang out against the walls of the second floor.
Those deadly darts, each capable of killing with a single drop of blood, merely grazed Su Yaoyao’s rabbit-print pajamas before blindly embedding themselves in the wooden pillars and brick walls.
Not a single hair on her head was harmed.
Down in the courtyard—
The burst of blinding light was accompanied by a fierce shockwave.
Startled and blinded, Ye Honglian raised her left arm to shield her eyes.
A howling gale swept past.
The shockwave billowed her blood-red robes and blew the half-mask depicting a blue-faced, fanged demon slightly askew.
The black ribbon tied behind her head was lifted at one corner.
The red collar of her robe also fell open a little farther to the side.
At that moment—
While everyone else had been rendered blind, Su Yaoyao was the exception.
Her eyes, enhanced through interstellar genetic modification, withstood the flashbang’s optical assault.
Even within that overwhelming white radiance, she could still capture the fleeting images around her.
From her high vantage point, Su Yaoyao’s gaze was as sharp as lightning.
By sheer coincidence, through the opening in the collar created by the shockwave, she caught sight of Ye Honglian’s fair, jade-like collarbone.
Near the left shoulder, there was a very distinctive birthmark.
It was a pale red mark shaped like a crescent moon, its form exceptionally neat and regular.
Under the dazzling white light, it stood out with startling clarity.
Su Yaoyao’s small hand, still holding a cup of warm milk, trembled.
The milk nearly spilled over the rim.
Her clear, wide eyes opened as round as brass bells.
It was as if countless interstellar computers had begun operating at full speed inside her mind, carrying out a frantic data comparison.
The shape, location, and size of that birthmark…
They were exactly the same as the mark in the portrait her cheap dad kept in the secret chamber of the imperial study—where he looked at it eight hundred times every day.
That was the unique mark of the late Empress of Great Yuan—her biological mother!
Shock!
Unparalleled shock!
An invisible groundhog appeared in her mind, clutching its head with both paws and letting out a piercing scream.
Her deafening thoughts poured out without restraint:
【Wait! Holy crap! Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap!】
【When the flashbang illuminated her collarbone just now, what did I see?!】
【That crescent-shaped red birthmark… why does it look exactly like the one in the portrait of my missing mother?!】
【Could this woman actually be my biological mother?!】
Su Yaoyao’s worldview shattered as she roared inwardly.
【No wonder Dad was standing at the door just now, staring at her like he’d lost his soul!】
Her clear, childish voice, filled with boundless shock, was silent in the night.
But every single word crashed violently into Su Zhen’s mind!
At this moment, Su Zhen had also fallen victim to the flashbang.
He had just pushed open the door and was staring fixedly at the red-clad woman in the courtyard.
The instant the white light flared, his eyes were blinded by the intense radiance.
The world before him turned completely white. He could see nothing, and tears of physiological reflex streamed down his face.
But his hearing—and his mind-reading ability—were still functioning!
The groundhog-like shriek in Su Yaoyao’s mind was like thunder from the heavens above.
It struck the crown of Su Zhen’s head and shook his very soul!
【That crescent-shaped red birthmark… it’s exactly the same as the one in the portrait of my missing mother!】
【Could this woman actually be my biological mother?!】
Those two sentences began looping endlessly through Su Zhen’s mind, echoing wildly.
It was as if a heavy hammer had smashed apart the chains sealing away eight years of memories.
That crescent-shaped birthmark!
No one in the entire world knew the appearance of that mark better than Su Zhen.
He had caressed that crescent-shaped mark countless times, day after day and night after night.
It belonged to the only woman Su Zhen had ever loved in his entire life—the beloved woman he had once held in the palm of his hand.
Eight years ago, a bizarre fire had robbed him of his beloved wife, leaving behind only an infant daughter.
He had searched for eight years, hated for eight years, and yearned for eight years.
When he saw that familiar technique with the concealed weapons just now, he had already been ninety percent certain.
There was no way in the world for two people to possess techniques so utterly identical—especially when they also shared the exact same hidden birthmark!
It was her.
It was definitely her!
This demoness who had opened a cult across from him, wearing a mask and pretending to be some mysterious supernatural being—
She was the wife who had supposedly “died” eight years ago. His ruthless wife who had abandoned both him and their daughter!
Although the flashbang had left him unable to see a thing, Su Zhen’s mind had erupted like thunder, boiling completely over.
He could no longer hear anything in his head.
There was only the sentence his daughter had just screamed.
At this moment, the string of his reason snapped completely.
What Great Yan's Number One Assassin?
What enemy territory?
The Tyrant of Dayuan had cast them all into the farthest reaches of the heavens!
At that moment, he had only one thought.
Seize this heartless woman who had abandoned her husband and daughter!
Ask her where the hell she had been for the past eight years!
Su Zhen entered a state of absolute, frenzied berserk fury.
His outer robe fluttered violently in the windless air, snapping and cracking.
Though he was temporarily blind, he relied on the last position of the figure he had locked onto in his mind before the flash had erupted.
With his eyes reddened by furious tears, Su Zhen did not retreat.
Instead, he let out a beast-like growl.
He kicked off against the ground.
The bluestone beneath his feet cracked into a spiderweb of fractures.
His entire body transformed into a terrifying black bolt of lightning.
Like a maddened beast, he hurled himself toward the spot where the woman stood in his memory—reckless and utterly unrestrained!
