At six o’clock on Saturday morning, as the golden autumn sun rose over the vermilion walls of the Imperial Palace, three hundred civil ministers, military commanders. Foreign tributary envoys gathered on the vast white marble expanse of the Grand Imperial Morning Court Plaza, waiting for the weekend audience bell.
At the front of the civil officials stood seventy-year-old Prime Minister Lin [Warmth: 68/100]. Stroking his snow-white beard as he chatted quietly with Academy Dean Kong about the miraculous five-copper walnut chicken stew at the Royal Academy Canteen. Across the aisle, burly First Prince Qian Ba yawned and stretched his thick neck in his ceremonial robe, while fifty yards away beside the Eastern Palace side-gate stood Second Prince Qian Ye.
Qian Ye looked as if he had aged ten years in a single night.
A thick white silk bandage was wrapped around his swollen right cheek to hide the missing front tooth and the red spatula imprint from the Astral Tower. Dark purple bruises ringed his bloodshot eyes, and above his golden crown, his Regressor Halo flickered dimly at 38%. All night long, he had paced the floor of his study waiting for his thirty Rank 4 Early.
Royal Blood-Hound Assassins to return with the Thousand-Year Frost-Star Crystal—never dreaming that not a single one had reported back!
