Taking drugs feels good for a moment;

taking drugs continuously feels even better.

This was exactly how the Tiger Guards felt right now.

Earlier, the black-clad assassins were arrogant and deadly with their strange and fierce moves, but now, facing these drug-fueled “brutes,” they were as fragile as paper lanterns.

One assassin tried to use his old trick, circling behind a Tiger Guard to slit his throat.

But the moment he moved, that Tiger Guard, relying on his drastically heightened nerve reflexes, without even turning his head, reached back with a huge hand and grabbed the assassin’s head with pinpoint accuracy.

“Got you.”

“Crack!”

A crisp sound echoed as the assassin’s head was forcibly twisted a full 180 degrees. He collapsed limply, his face still frozen with the sinister grin he had before the ambush, making the scene utterly grotesque.

On the other side, two assassins teamed up to attack a Tiger Guard, one striking from above and front, the other from below and rear, coordinating perfectly.

Under normal circumstances, this Tiger Guard would have lost his head within three moves.

But now, he grinned, baring a mouthful of white, sharp teeth, refusing to dodge as the two poisoned daggers stabbed into his body.

“Clink! Clink!”

Two sharp sounds rang out. The daggers, powerful enough to pierce iron armor, only left two shallow white marks on his skin, which shimmered with a golden-red glow.

“Didn’t eat? Is this all the strength you’ve got?”

The Tiger Guard sneered, spreading his arms like an eagle catching chicks, lifting the two stunned assassins effortlessly with one in each hand before violently smashing them together.

“Bang!”

A muffled crash sounded like two ripe watermelons colliding, spraying red and white everywhere.

The assassins instinctively gasped.

They were assassins, not fools.

How the hell could they fight this? The other side was clearly cheating!

..............

Atop the cliff.

Wei Linger’s face had already lost all color.

She watched helplessly as the assassins personally selected by her mother were toppled in waves by Li Mengze’s drugged guards like wheat being cut down.

The scene she had imagined—Li Mengze begging on his knees, trampled and humiliated under her heel—did not appear. Instead, her own assassins were crushed like withered grass.

“Trash! A bunch of trash!”

She trembled with rage, her fingernails digging deep into her palms, yet she felt no pain.

Seeing the last assassin beheaded by the Tiger Guard captain, the situation was lost. A cold fear finally rose from her heart.

Run! She had to run right now!

If caught, with Prince Yong’s fierce protectiveness, even she would not escape unscathed!

Wei Linger abandoned all semblance of county lord dignity. She decisively pulled out a jade talisman from her bosom, intricately carved with complex spatial runes. This life-saving treasure had been procured at great cost by her mother, Princess Zhaoyang. It was invaluable.

Without hesitation, she infused all her spiritual power into it and crushed it violently!

“Li Mengze! Just you wait! I, the county lord, will repay today’s humiliation a thousandfold, a hundredfold!!”

Wrapped by a ripple of warped space, Wei Linger’s figure vanished instantly.

“Trying to run?”

Below, Li Mengze sensed it the moment she crushed the talisman. His gaze sharpened, and with a flick of his finger, a sharp gust of wind shot through the air.

Unfortunately, it was too late. The wind only struck the fading spatial ripple and failed to harm her by a hair’s breadth.

Staring at the empty cliff, Li Mengze’s eyes were cold as knives.

He felt no anger or resentment—he simply noted this score in his little black book.

Some people could not be reasoned with.

Since she couldn’t be caught, he would find a chance to stomp her completely into the cesspool, never to rise again.

“Clean up the battlefield, collect evidence, one prisoner alive, two seriously injured, deal with the rest.”

Li Mengze’s calm voice brought the Tiger Guards back from their drug-fueled frenzy.

“Yes! Pill Master!”

The Tiger Guard captain was the first to respond. Looking at Li Mengze, his attitude had shifted from mere obedience to genuine reverence.

This young Pill Master was not only a divine alchemist but also frighteningly composed.

Facing such a perilous ambush, he had never shown the slightest panic.

Such skill, such temperament—he was truly born to be a great general!

The Tiger Guards quickly moved. They carefully collected all weapons and waist badges from the assassins.

Li Mengze approached the captured assassin leader.

The leader had one useless arm;

his meridians were sealed by the Tiger Guard captain using a special technique. He lay on the ground like a dead dog.

He looked at Li Mengze without pleading—only with a lifeless, gray desolation.

“I won’t say anything.” His voice hoarse and quiet.

“I never asked you to.”

Li Mengze squatted down, took out a jet-black pill from his bosom, pried open the assassin leader’s mouth, and forced it inside.

“This is called the ‘Heart-Eating Pill.’ Just a little toy I brewed for fun.”

Li Mengze clapped his hands, smiling like a harmless neighborhood boy. “It won’t kill you but will slowly eat away at your heart meridians, making you suffer unbearable pain every hour of the day. Oh, and it also stimulates your soul so you can’t even faint when you want to. When you decide to talk, just tell my guards—they have the antidote.”

The assassin leader trembled violently, cold sweat beading on his forehead.

After that, Li Mengze went to the injured Tiger Guards.

Three had been badly hurt protecting him during the fight and now leaned pale against the mountainside.

“Thank you for saving us, Pill Master!” The three struggled to salute.

“Lie down and don’t move.”

Li Mengze waved his hand and shoved several jade-green pills into their mouths without explanation. “Small wounds like this won’t kill you.”

The pills melted instantly. A gentle, pure vitality spread through their bodies. The deep, curved wounds began to heal visibly fast, and their depleted strength rapidly returned.

The Tiger Guards were deeply grateful.

Instant battle-enhancing pills, soul-ripping Heart-Eating Pills, and miraculous healing medicines...

How many amazing things were still hidden in this Pill Master’s medicine box?

Several miles away on a small hill near Soul-Severing Slope,

Li Pingcan sat cross-legged with a plate of melon seeds and a pot of clear tea in front of him, enjoying himself.

His Fungal Lord Domain acted like an all-seeing surveillance system, showing everything happening on the battlefield clearly.

Seeing his son calmly commanding the Tiger Guards, he nodded in approval.

“Not bad, not bad. This kid’s response in battle has some flair, about eighty percent of my style back in the day.”

When he saw his son pull out the poison pill, he nearly spit out his tea.

“Good grief! I taught you the Druid’s Way of Nature—to get close to nature and comprehend life—and what do you do? You learned to use poison! Who taught you that? It sure wasn’t me!”

Though he complained, his smile only grew brighter.

The pupil had surpassed the master!

With the battle over and his son handling everything meticulously without his interference, Li Pingcan stretched contentedly and handed a recording talisman stone to Li Mengze via the Golden Eagle Xiao Fei.

The talisman clearly recorded Wei Linger’s figure.

With a thought, he quietly withdrew control over the killer bee swarm and plants.

The killer bees, once fearless to the point of recklessness, as if suddenly clocked out from work, buzzed lazily back to their hive.

The wildly growing vines and thorns retracted silently underground as if they had never appeared.

Except for the scattered mess and pungent stench of blood, not a trace of natural energy intervention could be found on the entire Soul-Severing Slope.

Li Pingcan patted the dust off himself, hummed a little tune, and vanished into the forest.

“Time to go home and hug my daughter!”

A quiet hero hidden among the shadows.

..............

The night in the capital was supposed to be peaceful.

But tonight, a fierce group tore through the outskirts like a bolt of black lightning, heading straight for Prince Yong’s Mansion. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ novelfire(.)net

Leading was Li Mengze.

Still clad in a green robe, his face bore no warmth. Beside him were the Tiger Guards, their bodies still stained with blood.

Passersby who saw this grim group from afar instinctively avoided them, secretly guessing who had angered Prince Yong’s terrible enforcer.

The guards at the mansion’s gate were shocked to see their captain return covered in blood.

Seeing Li Mengze’s cold face, no one dared to question him and instinctively cleared a path.

“Request to see the Prince, urgent matter.”

..............

Inside Prince Yong’s study, the lights blazed brightly.

Prince Yong saw his Tiger Guards all injured, the dead assassins being carried in, and the assassin leader with sealed meridians, his face clouded instantly.

“Good, very good!”

He didn’t roar but spat the words through clenched teeth.

Everyone present felt a tangible, terrifying aura emanating from this old prince—iron-blooded killing intent honed in bloody battles, suffocating and oppressive.

In his life, he valued promises and face above all.

The people he personally promised to protect had nearly been ambushed and killed right under his nose, on his capital’s land!

This was no mere insult;

it was like ripping off his face and stomping it into the dirt!

“Speak.” Prince Yong approached the assassin leader and uttered a single word.

The leader lifted his head and met the tiger-like eyes piercing into his soul. Trembling, he still gritted his teeth: “Survival of the fittest. Kill me if you want;

I have nothing to say.”

“Spirited.” Prince Yong nodded, a cruel smile appearing. “I like a man with backbone. Bring out the ‘flaying and tendon-stripping’ torture from the dungeon. Let this man loosen his muscles.”

At the words “flaying and tendon-stripping,” the veteran mansion stewards shuddered involuntarily.

This was the cruel torture Prince Yong used long ago to interrogate enemy spies, rumored to make stones talk.

“Prince, there’s no need for such trouble.”

At that moment, Li Mengze stepped forward slowly, taking a small porcelain bottle from his medicine box and pouring out a dull gray pill that looked utterly insignificant.

“This is my newly refined ‘Muscle-Softening Powder.’ It has no other effect except to amplify pain a hundredfold and make bones as soft as noodles. Even if he wants to bite his tongue and die, he won’t have the strength.”

Li Mengze smiled innocently as he popped the pill into the assassin leader’s mouth. “I believe, combined with Your Highness’s methods, this man will soon reveal everything about his ancestors.”

Assassin leader: “...”

Tiger Guards: “...”

Prince Yong twitched at Li Mengze’s harmless smile and the devilishly cruel pill in his hand.

He now doubted whether Li Mengze was a prodigy alchemist or a little devil in human skin.

Half an hour later.

A bloodcurdling scream, unlike any human voice, echoed from the dungeon.

When the assassin leader was dragged out again, he was a puddle of rotten flesh, utterly broken, his eyes filled with boundless terror and collapse.

“It was... it was the county lord of Qingyang County... Wei Linger...”

“She ordered us... to ambush at Soul-Severing Slope... kill on sight...”

“Wei Linger!”

After hearing the confession, Prince Yong’s purple clay teacup shattered in his hand.

“Prepare the carriage! Change clothes!”

He gave the order and turned, heading toward the inner hall.

Moments later, he reappeared wearing a purple-gold python robe symbolizing supreme military merit!

This was an imperial gift from the late emperor. Holding this baton was like having the emperor himself present!

In the entire capital, no one but the current sovereign could stand against him!

His destination was clear—straight to the residence of Wei Linger’s mother, Princess Zhaoyang—Zhaoyang Palace!

Inside Zhaoyang Palace, incense smoke curled gently, warm as spring.

Princess Zhaoyang had just finished bathing and was lazily reclining on a soft couch, letting her maid gently massage her legs, her face full of contentment.

In her eyes, after tonight, Li Mengze—the one who had wronged her daughter—should already be a cold corpse.

“Bang!”

A loud crash rang out as the heavy palace doors, made of golden nanmu wood, were kicked open from outside!

Prince Yong, clad in purple-gold armor and radiating terrifying killing intent, strode in powerfully.

“Pr-Prince Wei...?”

Princess Zhaoyang was startled by this sudden upheaval. She sat up sharply, panic flashing briefly across her face before being replaced by the pride of royalty. “Uncle, what is the meaning of storming into my chamber at this hour?”

“Meaning?”

Prince Yong sneered without even glancing at the trembling palace maids. He threw a pile of things harshly at Princess Zhaoyang’s feet.

“Your Highness should look at these things first before asking me about the meaning!”