Chapter 43 – The Meadows Surprise

Sean knew he was finished. After he landed, with his decades of experience, he borrowed the cover of those leaves that had been rotting for many years, barely masking the smell of his own body, and disappeared silently towards the outside of the forest.

Fan Xian and those seven experts since they were able to follow him all the way across the reeds of the lake to the forest, there must be some kind of thread in himself that the other party can control – Sean blocked his hand to his lips, forcibly suppressing the urge to cough, twenty years of prison life, his heart and veins have been damaged, the distance from the tree to fall, he could even clearly and sadly feel that his brain was actually a bit slower to react than his muscles.

If it was twenty years ago, he believed that he could have easily killed Fan Xian during that fall. Even if there were those seven masters under the tree who made long knives, as long as they were accompanied by this familiar North Sea fog, Sean still had strong confidence that he could easily escape.

It s just that …… everyone has a day when they get old.

The blood gash on his shoulder could not be stopped at all, the strange dagger in Fan Xian s hand, both sharp edges were a bit odd, the blood kept flowing out, Sean felt his body weakened for a while, but his eyes flashed a smile that seemed to see through something, tore off a piece of clothing, and with a single hand, he actually pressed the blood gash down.

His kneecap was also shattered into several large pieces, and the sharp pain stimulated his mind and soul, allowing this dying head of secret agents to still navigate through the thick fog.

After falling down from the tree, the tiger guard leader Gao Da’s slice of snow like blade light cut his abdomen, although he avoided the strange fast, still can’t stop the wound there gradually expanding, black clothes gradually become blood clothes.

Sean’s body suffered many injuries and heavy, but really let him feel unable to resist, or the neck of the fine needle, he did not dare to pull out, do not know what the consequences, just feel the blood gradually condensed up, the speed of the forward march also slowed down.

His pale and withered hand remained firm as he pulled out the fungus block from under the tree, chewed it raw a few times, and swallowed it, this kind of red cedar fungus can replenish blood and disinfect. This dwarf cedar forest was a place he was very familiar with decades ago, so he chose to escape from here, unexpectedly still not escaping that young man’s means.

The sky gradually brightened, but the thick fog still did not dissipate, the white morning light diffused and folded in the fog, emitting a holy flavor.

Blood finally dripped from the body of the old man, fell to the mud ground sound although subtle, but he is clear, those young people are like a lurking tiger like following themselves, at any time may be rushed out, just do not know why the other side is not yet hands.

But Sean knew that he …… was finished.

I don t know what kind of power, supporting this old man who has been tortured for twenty years and suffered several serious injuries today, hard to support his body, crossing this thick fog filled dwarf fir forest, climbing over that mountain, stepping on the extremely vast, slightly wet meadows, and finally seeing the land belonging to the North Qi.

The town called Misty Ferry River shone with a few patches of light in the distant sunlight. Sean sighed and sat down somewhat disheveled and powerless, moving his right leg, which had shattered at the knee, to the left with his hand and coughing twice.

The reflection in that town is glazed tiles, although this is the countryside, can’t afford to use glass, and by definition can’t afford to use glaze, but Sean was clear many years ago, a dozen or so miles behind the town, there used to be a glaze factory, and later on, after it fell into disrepair, the people of the town picked up a few fragments and housed them in their own home’s roofs.

No matter when and where people are, they always need to arrange some light for themselves in a gray world.

Sean did the same, he squinted his eyes and looked at those small glowing fragments, thinking that after twenty years, the small town didn’t seem to have changed much.

On the grassland outside the town, a fight had ended long ago. The group that had come to receive Sean had been slaughtered to death, and about two hundred black cavalrymen, like a lifeless black wall, stood on the side of the meadow, and a few more black cavalrymen traveled through the blood of the battlefield, and when they saw an enemy that was still alive, they made up for it, and the battlefield kept emitting the muffled sound of puffs and giggles.

“Those young men who fell in the pools of blood in the meadow, they should be Tiger’s subordinates, right?”

Sean squinted his eyes at the scene on that side, suddenly feeling a bit tired, coughing again. He had long fully understood Fan Xian’s plan, although that pretty young man still lacked a lot of experience, but the victory was in the boldness to strike, the other party had been chasing him to the Misty Ferry River, and naturally, he was going to plant the evidence on those miserable dead Northern Qi soldiers under the meadow.

A slender dagger was handed over silently, the chill attached to it caused some small goosebumps to rise on the back of the old man’s neck.

“You’re not as strong as I thought.” Fan Xian’s voice sounded calmly from behind him.

Sean pursed his withered lips and said after a bitter smile, “I’m not as strong as I thought I was either.”

“With your experience, it shouldn’t be hard to tell that this is a trap, so why do you still want to jump in?” This was the one thing Fan Xian couldn’t figure out the most during his night of tracking.

Sean didn’t answer him, just remained silent and didn’t tell the young man that he had remembered a little girl and a temple because of those few words Wang Qinian had unintentionally said.

“Why haven’t you done it yet?” Sean was cold and somewhat abnormal, looking at the quiet and abnormal town in front of him, he said, “You and I are both in this line of work, we should know that the longer something is delayed, the more likely it is to produce variables.”

“I just suddenly feel as if I’ve made a mistake.” The dagger in Fan Xian’s hand tightened a bit, and a slight hint of confusion appeared in his eyes that were exposed beyond the black cloth, “I thought that the Eldest Princess would send someone to meet you, but I didn’t expect that it was just the Northern Qi people who came.”

“I don’t know any Elder Princess.” Sean seemed to have long put life and death aside at this moment, just deeply breathing in the fresh air of the meadow, he hadn’t smelled such a natural flavor for many years, in the prison of the Supervisory Court, all he could smell was the smell of rust and hay, after smelling it for so many years, he had really gotten tired, bored and tired of it.

Fan Xian suddenly felt that things were a bit odd, his eyes staring like knives at the pure white hair at the back of the old man’s head.

“I’ll remind you once again, since you want to kill me and have chosen this borderline, it’s best to do it right away, so that you can also plant the evidence on those prisoner hijacking teams down there.” Sean said indifferently, “Otherwise, when the receptionists from Pseudo-Qi arrive, if you want to kill me again, you’ll have to consider the life and death of that colleague of yours.”

Fan Xian narrowed his eyes slightly, this plan to kill Sean on the borderline. It was supposed to be a risk, to be precise, it was risking the life of Yan Bingyun – since the Northern Qi general Shangsugi Hu had sent someone to meet Sean’s escape, then in the midst of a chaotic battle, Sean’s death should be a reason that the young Emperor of the Northern Qi could and must accept – The key lies in the fact that there is always the strong military power of Qing behind the mission. But to Fan Xian’s disappointment, Yan Xiaoyi’s army did not appear on the battlefield, so what was the point of killing Xiao En if he could not kill the Princess?

Not knowing what came to mind, Fan Xian’s fingers holding the dagger were slightly harder, his knuckles slightly blue and white.

“Why do you guys always think I’m still a tiger?” Sean didn’t turn around or glance down at the tip of that outstretched dagger, smiling and muttering to himself, “I’m just a toothless, skinny tiger. It’s just that I know something that others don’t know, so I’ve been able to live on to this day. In Qing, I am a prisoner, in fact, back in the north, I am still a prisoner in Pseudo-Qi, so naturally I have to fight. People live to my age, in fact, already not very afraid of death …… but very afraid of not having freedom.”

“I may have understood a little bit why President Chen was willing to send you back to the country and wanted me to kill you.” Fan Xian didn’t seem to care at all about Sean’s reminder, still appearing to be speaking in a somewhat verbose manner, “This is a trial. Mr. Xiao also once said that my talent is very good and my strength is already very strong, I just have never challenged a truly strong person alone, you are considered to be the first truly strong person that I have ever challenged alone, in my entire life.”

Sean shook his head, still maintaining the stance of a skip sitting and looking at the countryside: “No, I have long been counted as not being a strong person, this journey is just bluffing. As for Chen Pingping ……” this old man suddenly extremely spiteful bias and extremely fastidious laugh: “He actually …… knows nothing. He only knows that he can’t kill me, so he has to keep me locked up, but he doesn’t know why he can’t kill me, and he doesn’t know what he should know from me. He boasts of intriguing and calculating the world, but in reality, he is a poor little fool!”

The old man was so agitated with his speech that he coughed, his wound having long since broken open, and the blood flew about, falling into the fresh grass above.

Somewhere in the grass, it shook slightly in the wind.

“What exactly is your secret?” Fan Xian’s face was expressionless, but he silently shifted his orientation, “What exactly do you know about what’s going on?”

“After locking me up for twenty years, I didn’t even say anything, and even Chen Pingping lost her patience and carried me out as your adult trial prey.” Sean scoffed, “Would I tell you this yellow-haired boy at this point?”

“You’re not even afraid of death, why don’t you dare to tell that secret?”

“There are a lot of things in this world that are a bit scarier than death.”

Fan Xian sighed, sensing that the seven longswords behind him had secretly vanished into the near distance, smiled faintly, and inclined his head to the right to look at the neatly lined up black riders in the distance, with a very appropriate intent.

Suddenly! Without warning, his toes stepped on the meadow, his body had already slid to the left side, a mother needle came out of his hand and stabbed into the grass with a snort!

His person had already reached mid-air, like dancing against the air, the slender dagger in his hand was like a pitch-black poisonous snake, stabbing straight through, straight and incomparable, breaking through the air with a buzzing sound, it really had already condensed all of the hegemonic true qi in his body!

Earlier, the seven tiger guards had secretly occupied favorable terrain, Fan Xian suddenly sneaked in, the seven long daggers were extremely tacitly coordinated to attack that pile of grass, striking up several stalls of white snow, the light cold and eye-catching!

With such might, such sudden action, not to mention the ambusher, even if it was the unfathomable Eunuch Hong in the Qing Palace, I’m afraid that he would be in a sorry state, and would have to leave behind some flesh and blood to pay for it!