JOY OF LIFE

[VOLUME 2] chapter 94: The Functionary Wins The Queen of Flowers

After the killing on Niulan Street, Fan Xian had a number of things on his mind. Teng Zijing had already left for the countryside to recuperate, and it was unclear whether he might be left handicapped. The families of the three dead guards had received sufficient financial compensation, and even the relevant court departments had issued them an order of commendation. The guards were buried in the tombs of the Fan Clan, just outside the capital; if Fan Xian were allowed to leave the city, he naturally would have gone and paid tribute.

The bloody incident had taught him that surviving in this world was no easy task, and it was not enough to simply invite guests to banquets. So he needed to have control of forces that belonged directly to him, such as Wang Qinian, Fan Sizhe, and his own martial arts training.

Now he had changed the period he spent meditating in the capital from midday to evening. Often half-awake, he felt that the zhenqi at the xueshan point in his spine was like a body of warm water, comfortably rinsing out every part of his body. It seemed almost as if the volume and concentration of his zhenqi had increased to

some extent.

The fact that he had been able to kill an eighth-level master alongside two female assassins seemed almost inconceivable to him. He had checked the zhenqi circulation of Teng Zijing and discovered that there was no one in the world who trained in the way that he did. This realization had not made him feel panicked in the slightest. Since he could kill an eighth-level master with his slender dagger and his hidden crossbow, it showed that his zhenqi was extremely useful.

He was different from others who had trained in martial arts in this world. He did not hold to the idea that levels of ranking were insurmountablethe big guy's bloody guts sprayed out along the floor had shown him that. If you were ferocious and prepared enough, would the five grandmasters even pose a threat?

But he had not begun on the second badao scroll. His gaze fell on the box tossed into a nook in the corner of the room. After he had come to the capital, he had seemingly forgotten about this item that his mother had left him. It seemed that he would have to go find a key at some point.

Si Lili, a key player in the assassination attempt, was still on her way to the city after having been arrested, but a decree had flashed across the city as quick as lightning. The decree was issued from deep within the palace. It regarded Fan Xian. In the current context, the content of the decree seemed highly unusual.

"In accordance with the will of Heaven, His Majesty the Emperor thus decrees..." He watched the court eunuch's lips flap as he spoke, but he could not make any sense of what he was saying, as the proclamation was written in highly formal classical language. Kneeling in the lobby of Fan Manor, Fan Xian feared that the eunuch's spittle would land on his face, and watched uneasily as it pooled on the green floor tiles below him. The imperial proclamation was finally read aloud in its entirety, and under Lady Liu's instruction, Fan Xian did what was expected of him by the rules, calling out "may His Majesty live ten thousand years!", thanking him again, and taking the proclamation from the eunuch. With no anger at all, Lady Liu handed the eunuch a banknote worth a sum of silver, and, satisfied, he departed.

"Where do I put this thing?" Fan Xian asked Lady Liu, clasping the edict in his hands. "I can't hold on to it forever."

Lady Liu laughed and took it from him. "We receive a lot of proclamations at the manor. But you can't just call it 'this thing'. There's a special room in the manor where we store them." Over the past few days, there had been what seemed like an odd harmony between Fan Xian and Lady Liu. It was a product of the circumstances they found themselves in, but neither knew how long it would last.