Chapter 220 – Underground Palace

Translator: Coca5156

Editor: Drea

Following the two masked men, Su Nian managed to ditch the people that wanted to kill him. He then entered a carriage that was prepared by the masked men.

The two masked men remain silent throughout the entire journey. They travelled until sunset before the carriage stopped in front of a house.

Su Nian got off and automatically followed one of the masked men into the living room. When he saw the person in the living room, his jaw dropped, “Your Highness, how come it is you?”

“Why can’t it be me?” Rong Yuan looked at Su Nian’s shocked face with a slight amusement, his voice was sympathetic as he said, “The feeling of being assassinated by the woman you love must not be great right?”

“Nonsense! The Princess will never treat me like that!” Su Nian argued back. His agitated tone resembled someone who was trying to cover up his heartbreak but failing.

He had protected her for over ten years but she tried to kill him just because of one failed mission. How tragic was that?

Seeing the weakness behind Su Nian’s mask, Rong Yuan shrugged, “Really? Then maybe I’ve heard wrongly. But if I had heard wrongly, then how would I know where and when your Princess and her brother plotted to kill you and shut you up? Could it be that someone else wants to kill you? That would really be a coincidence.”

Rong Yuan chuckled as Su Nian’s expression became darker. Rong Yuan was clearly making fun of him for not being able to accept the truth. But compared to this, what troubled Su Nian more was...

“Your Highness, aren’t you going to marry the princess? How can you spoil her plans and save who she wants to kill?”

Rong Yuan did not answer his question but instead praised him, “You are really stubborn. Look at the situation you are in and you can still worry about the Princess. If Ding Rou were to know how loyal you are to her, I wonder if she would still have gotten rid of you?”

The answer was...yes!

The light in Su Nian’s eyes seemed to diminish with this answer. When he went to find Ding Rou after he had failed his mission, he had seen the disgust and murderous look in her eyes before she managed to cover it. But he had believed that after ten years of protecting her, even if she did not see him the same way he saw her, she would at least feel some sort of attachment to him. It was the reason why he shamelessly requested to stay by her side.

He never thought that his request would lead to Ding Rou wanting to get rid of him. Only someone that had gone through the same betrayal would understand the pain he felt when he realised that the people after him were sent by Ding Rou.

“Since Ding Rou is so heartless towards you, don’t you want to take revenge?” Sensing that Su Nian had been influenced by his words and was currently in pain, Rong Yuan asked curiously, “You protected her for ten years but ended up like this. I pity you.”

“You...” Su Nian opened his mouth. He had thought that Rong Yuan had been moved by Ding Rou and even wanted to marry her. How could he say things like this? However, the words got caught in his mouth and he eventually kept quiet.

What more was there to ask? Rong Yuan had caught him and knew who he was. Was there anything he did not know? He must also have known what Ding Rou did previously in order to get him to fall for her.

“It is okay if you can’t bear to seek revenge on her.” Seeing that Su Nian did not reply him, Rong Yuan patiently tried another way, “Do you want her to become yours?”

Hearing this, Su Nian raised his head abruptly and looked at him. Rong Yuan was smiling like a fox, “I just need your help on one thing and I will help you get her. She will belong to you forever...”

The next day, it was the last day of the Inter-school Competition. Nie Sang did not let the Xia Kingdom down and managed to clinch the championship for the Martial Teacher category. Yan Liang unfortunately lost to the competitor from the First School and got third place. Nonetheless, results like this brought fame to the Xia Kingdom.

Other than the Martial Student category, the Royal School performed exceptionally, occupying five out of the six top three positions in both the Martial Practitioner and Martial Teacher categories!

With results like this, Pan En was finding it difficult to maintain his smile as he gave out the awards for the top three placings in all categories.

“I’m envious, there has been many talents from the Xia Kingdom these few years.” Giving out the awards they had initially prepared for their students to Gu Lingzhi and friends, Pan En’s heart was hurting.

If he had known this was going to be the result, he would not have added on to the rewards for the top three positions out of his own pocket. He had wanted to boast the North Qiu Kingdom’s fortune. Now, a large portion of it was given to the Xia Kingdom. No matter how sullen he was feeling, he still had to pretend to be courteous and congratulate every winner.

On the contrary, in response to Pan En’s pretentious praise, Rong Yuan acted as if he did not understand and smiled brilliantly, “The North Qiu Kingdom did pretty well too. If not for Liang Xiao underestimating Lingzhi, the positions in the Martial Practitioner rank might be entirely different.”

“Sigh, what is lost is lost. Lady Gu is extremely talented and even if Liang Xiao was prepared he might not be able to go against her Earth-Level Spiritual Sword. He is not ashamed of his loss.”

Although this was what he said, but anyone could hear that Pan En was mocking Gu Lingzhi for using the power of her weapon to win instead of fighting with her own strength.

The last day of the Inter-school Competition hence ended with a war of words between the two of them.

At night, Gu Lingzhi was sitting in her room and sorting out the award she received today. The award for the first place was so abundant that it could turn a penniless man into a rich one. The entire First School was taking in the atmosphere of the end of the competition.

Suddenly, Gu Lingzhi felt a tremble in her legs before the ground she was standing on shook. It was as if an ancient beast was breaking through the ground, causing the entire world to shake.

Wei Hanzi, who was standing guard outside immediately dashed in. Grabbing Gu Lingzhi, she pulled her out of the dorm and ran, “It is not safe here, let’s get out first!”

As she exited her dorm, she saw Tianfeng Jin who had dashed out of her dorm as well. There were more people lining the road outside their dormitories. Everyone was stunned as they stared at the ground.

The ground in the Tianyuan Continent was very dense and earthquakes seldom happened. Earthquakes that were strong enough to shake buildings were even rarer. How could something like this happen?

Soon, Rong Yuan rushed over. Seeing Gu Lingzhi standing unharmed, he let out a deep breath and stood by her.

The strong tremors continued on for fifteen minutes before they slowly became weaker. When the last tremble had died out, a sudden ray of light shot out from outside the Yan Capital south of the First School. The brilliant golden ray was so bright it lit up half the sky and made it seem like day.

“Is that a...Secret Territory?” Rong Yuan frowned as he muttered under his breath. He then quickly calculated how much the Xia Kingdom could stand to gain from it.

To create tremors of this kind, the Secret Territory was definitely not small. It was highly probable that there were gems that could make people go crazy. Wealth touched everyone’s hearts. No matter how strong the North Qiu Kingdom was, with so many people from so many kingdoms present, it would be impossible for them to take everything in the Secret Territory for themselves. He should report back to the Xia Kingdom as quickly as possible.

All these flashed through his mind in a mere few seconds. Rong Yuan had already activated his movement technique and was half dragging Gu Lingzhi towards the direction of the light ray.

There were many others who did the same as him as they rushed towards the light ray. After being dragged along by Rong Yuan for a while, Gu Lingzhi caught on to what he was thinking. She took his hand that was around her waist into hers and used her Sparrow Wings movement technique.

This was all about chance and whoever got there first would stand to benefit the most.

After travelling for almost two hours, the two of them finally saw what caused the disturbance tonight.

It was a huge depression. More accurately, it was the entrance to an underground palace. Gold stones paved the way as the ground subsided and extended even deeper into the ground. The light ray in the sky came from deep in the ground. Even from outside, they could see that this secret territory was not ordinary.

Beside the stairs, Pan En was already standing there with a few others and discussing. Seeing the two of them arrive, surprise flashed through his eyes before he greeted them with a smile, “I didn’t think that the both of you would be so quick. I only managed to get here so quickly with the help of others. It is no wonder one of you is the first place in the Martial Practitioner category while the other is the most likely Martial Artist to become a True God.”

“Second Prince, we don’t deserve such high regard. Our techniques are just slightly stronger that is all.” Rong Yuan replied humbly. His eyes subtly look over the people that were behind Pan En and he was slightly surprised.

In his brief look over, he realised that the Martial Artist with the lowest cultivation in their group was at least of the Martial Lord rank. One of the youths in a purple gown had a cultivation so strong, he was completely unable to sense it. He was at least a Martial Sage in the later stages. More surprisingly was the presence of Demigods. He was probably a senior member of the North Qiu Royal Family.

It was sufficient to deduce the importance of this Secret Territory from how fast they had rushed over.

“Good technique is also a form of strength,” Pan En sighed as a flash of greed appeared in his eyes before they resumed their courteous look, “Seeing the huge disturbance that it created, this Secret Territory is definitely not ordinary. Someone might have even set up traps in the entrance of this Secret Territory. It might be dangerous for us to go in based on our ability. How about we wait until everyone has arrived before we head in together?”

“Okay,” Rong Yuan nodded. Although he did not really trust Pan En, he knew that a Secret Territory of this magnitude would not allow anyone to enter so easily. If not, it would not have created such a huge disturbance earlier.

Knowing that he could not go down for now, Rong Yuan turned his attention to several members who were looking sour.

“May I know who these people are?”

“These are a few of my elders. They were all shocked by the disturbance earlier and came down specially to investigate.”