Heaven Official's Blessing: Tian Guan Ci Fu (Novel) Vol. 2(65)
Xie Lian smiled. “I am quite the failure. Not like my cousin, already a wrath after eight hundred years.”
Xie Lian knew way too well how to put Qi Rong down. Next to him, Hua Cheng snorted, and Qi Rong’s face darkened for real. He looked between all those present and suddenly spoke.
“This attitude… Did you beg Hua Cheng to kick me around today to settle our differences?”
Xie Lian was taken aback. He thought about the current picture they painted and actually couldn’t argue back.
Qi Rong continued, “Look at you both. The moment I say anything bad about you, whoa! Look how mad he gets. Was he blinded by that holy light from your halo? Yooo, I forgot! Isn’t he already blind in one eye? HA HA ha ha ha…”
Before he could finish, Qi Rong’s own sight went dark again, and his cheek exploded in agony as he spewed blood from his mouth—he got himself socked again! However, this punch wasn’t from Hua Cheng, it was from Xie Lian.
Xie Lian’s fist was faster than the eye could possibly track, and he said coldly, “Just because I’ve never hit you before, it doesn’t mean I would never hit you.”
His punch was a brutal one, and it was a long while before Qi Rong could say anything. He lay on the ground like a mangy dog, pounding the ground as he cackled.
“Cousin Crown Prince, you hit me! You actually hit me! Heavens, our noble, kind, compassionate, charitable crown prince, who’s scared of stepping on even a tiny ant, actually copped an attitude and swung at me! HE’S HITTING PEOPLE! INCREDIBLE! AMAZING!!”
He was outrageously excited to the point of insanity. Lang Qianqiu had never seen anyone whose words and actions were so mad, and he was shocked into stupefaction after witnessing this singular act.
He mumbled, “Is…is he crazy?”
Xie Lian was used to seeing Qi Rong’s madness and didn’t think much of it. “You’ve heard him. He’s insane. He’s unbalanced, so you can’t believe anything he says.”
Qi Rong’s laughter came to an abrupt stop. He schooled his face and sneered. “Don’t be so quick to tell people I’m psycho. Let me ask you: How did Prince An Le die?!”
This was the question Hua Cheng had posed to him, and now he was turning it to Xie Lian instead. Lang Qianqiu’s attention was suddenly focused on it again.
Xie Lian’s mind was collected, but he couldn’t immediately answer. Qi Rong, on the other hand, slowly crawled to his feet and sat, leaning against the kneeling statue.
“After An Le died, I cut open his corpse to inspect it, and all of his organs were pulverized by the vibrations of an exceedingly powerful sword. That’s why, despite not having any external injuries, he couldn’t stop hacking up blood. This was something no ordinary swordsman could do. At first, I thought Yong’an thugs had brought in a special hit man to frame An Le’s death as illness, but now that I think about it, there’s another who has the ability, and who is that, hmm?! Of course, my good ol’ cousin, defender of justice! After all, our Flower-Crowned Martial God, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince, is a holy, pure, one and only, snow-white lotus of the heavenly mountains…”
Hua Cheng stomped on him, and Qi Rong yelped miserably. Lang Qianqiu felt like his mind was going to explode; he held his head, his eyes bloodshot.
“Shut up! Just tell me what you know! Who’s the real murderer? What happened at the Gilded Banquet? And what happened to Prince An Le? What happened?!”
“Lang Qianqiu, why are you still confused?” Qi Rong asked. “Even I’ve pretty much figured out what happened by now. Looks like you really don’t understand the kind of person your shifu is! Come, come, come, let me dissect my good ol’ cousin for you: this former Crown Prince of Xianle went and became Yong’an’s State Preceptor, taught you swordsmanship for five years…”
He’d only spoken a few words when Xie Lian brandished his sword. But before he could charge forward, Lang Qianqiu’s greatsword stopped him.
“Let him finish!”
“You know he’s insane, but you’ll still listen to his nonsense?!”
Fangxin was swung, and even though it was a slender blade, its shock wave almost loosened Lang Qianqiu’s grip on his massive greatsword. But just then, a silver, curved blade flicked Fangxin, hooked it, and pulled it aside.
Xie Lian was startled and cried, “San Lang!”
Qi Rong could see how badly Xie Lian didn’t want him to speak and how desperately he didn’t want Lang Qianqiu to hear the story, so Qi Rong had to do the opposite. He grabbed this chance.
“Prince An Le was our good Xianle boy, very obedient! He heeded my instructions to become false friends with you, but your shifu bumped into us cleaning out the Yong’an rat’s nest at the Gilded Banquet. An Le escaped, you rushed to the Gilded Banquet and saw what happened, and State Preceptor Fangxin became the most wanted man in the kingdom. That’s the story, not a word of it a lie…”
Xie Lian tried to charge forward to shut his mouth a few times, but he was stopped by Hua Cheng every time.
Xie Lian cried again, “San Lang!”
However, Hua Cheng didn’t say a single word as he continued to block Xie Lian. The more Xie Lian wanted to charge over, the faster Qi Rong’s lips moved.
“But you know this saintly cousin of mine, when he saw with his own eyes the people of Xianle committing murder, he must’ve thought: ‘How can this be? That’s not right!’ So, he went to find Prince An Le to educate him a little, but when he sought him out—my GOD, what did he discover? An Le’s massive plot! The plans didn’t stop with assassinating some thugs! There was no way cousin could educate him, so he hardened his heart and killed the last scion of our royal house with his own hands! Afterward, you caught your shifu and nailed him dead in that coffin, and so ended my cousin’s magnificent life as a State Preceptor. Cousin, am I right?”