Mei Yilan slowly turned, her gaze sweeping over the shifting darkness. "Well," she said, her voice cutting through the gloom like a shard of ice, "you certainly aren’t the ones who I killed back then." 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

A tall, spindly figure detached himself from the shadows. Wraith-043 stepped forward, the charcoal mask gleaming. As he moved, a suffocating, heavy pressure flooded the chamber, the unmistakable aura of a Peak Golden Core master. He tilted his head, a wide, jagged grin visible beneath the edge of his mask.

"I truly didn’t expect to see you here, Crimson Sword Master," he rasped, his voice a hideous sound like grinding bone. He let out a low, mocking laugh. "I am glad I accepted this contract. To think, I get to be the one to extinguish the woman who humiliated the Thousand-Ghost Syndicate and stained our record with the blood of my seniors."

Yilan’s eyes remained steady, though the memories flickered briefly in her mind. Years ago, during the horrific night of the Shen Clan massacre, she had been a force of nature. While fleeing with a handful of survivors and the young Shen Yu and Lixue, she had been intercepted by wave after wave of Syndicate killers.

She had carved a path through them so brutal and red that the survivors had dubbed her the Crimson Sword Master. Back then, she was a terrifying genius at the Early Stage of the Nascent Soul Realm, a woman whose blade hummed with the song of the stars.

"Do you really think you can kill me," Yilan asked, her aura beginning to stir like a sleeping dragon, "when your betters died at my hands?"

Wraith-043 chuckled, a sound devoid of mirth. "If you were in your prime, I wouldn’t have even dared to step foot in this city. But we know the truth, Crimson Sword Master. After the devastating internal injuries you suffered few years ago, you’ve fallen. A Nascent Soul no more... just a 7th Stage Golden Core struggling to keep your foundation from crumbling."

He spread his arms wide. "And I am not foolish enough to underestimate a legend."

As he spoke, three more shadows coagulated in the corners of the room, presences Yilan had sensed the moment she entered. Two were at the 1st Stage of the Golden Core, their blades dripping with paralyzing toxins, while the third stood at the Peak of the Foundation Establishment.

Mei Yilan didn’t waste another word on breath. She reached into her storage ring, and in a flash of obsidian light, an absolute black blade appeared in her hand. The moment the sword manifested, the air in the room groaned under a sudden, crushing weight.

"Then come," she whispered.

The four assassins lunged simultaneously, a coordinated strike of shadow and steel.

.

.

.

In the arched corridor, the atmosphere was just as lethal. Shen Yu stood his ground, his golden eyes tracking every micro-movement of the two masked men blocking their path.

Lixue stepped forward first, her hand gripping the hilt of her blade until her knuckles were white. "The Peak Foundation one is mine," she stated, her voice trembling not with fear, but with a fierce, protective resolve.

Lixue had recently broken through to the 2nd Stage of the Foundation Establishment, but the gap between her and a Peak expert was a chasm. Yet, her mind didn’t register the danger to herself, only the danger to Shen Yu.

For years, she had watched him struggle with broken meridians, acting as his shield when he was the "weak" young master. That protective instinct was burned into her soul. She would die before she let a single shadow touch him.

Shen Yu didn’t argue. He knew Lixue needed to test her limits, and he knew his own secret strength was more than enough to cover any mistake she made. He drew a spear from his own storage space, the tip gleaming with a cold, predatory light.

"Don’t die, Lixue," he said simply, shifting into a low, aggressive stance.

Shen Yu faced the Middle Stage Foundation assassin, his spear held steady, his 9th-stage Qi Condensation Qi beginning to boil beneath his skin. Lixue drew her sword, the steel singing as it cleared the scabbard, her eyes locked onto the Peak expert.

The corridor erupted in a symphony of clashing steel and whistling wind.

Lixue moved first, her azure robes billowing like a storm cloud. Despite being only at the 2nd Stage of the Foundation Establishment, her speed was unnatural, fueled by a desperate, burning need to keep the assassins away from Shen Yu. Her blade, a thin sliver of refined moonlight, met the Peak Foundation expert’s heavy obsidian daggers with a shower of sparks that illuminated the dark arched walkway.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The Peak Foundation assassin let out a rasping grunt of surprise. "A mere 2nd stage holding my strike? Impressive... but useless!" He spun in a low crouch, his daggers blurring into a lethal vortex aimed at Lixue’s ankles and throat.

Lixue didn’t retreat. She gritted her teeth, her internal Qi surging as she executed the Tang Clan’s Flowing Water Parry. She was fighting above her level, her muscles screaming under the pressure of the Peak expert’s superior weight, but her eyes remained fixed on the shadow. I won’t let you past, she thought fiercely. Not while I still breathe.

A few paces behind her, Shen Yu engaged the Middle Stage assassin.

Unlike Lixue’s frantic, high-speed defense, Shen Yu was a picture of terrifying, cold efficiency. He held his spear with one hand, his posture relaxed, almost insulting. When the Middle Stage assassin lunged with a poisoned rapier, Shen Yu didn’t even parry. He simply tilted his head by an inch, the blade whistling past his ear, and then he stepped into the assassin’s guard.

Thud!

The butt of Shen Yu’s spear slammed into the man’s solar plexus, the blow feeling more like a falling mountain than a human strike. The assassin gasped, his mask cracking as he was sent skidding back.

"Is this all the Syndicate amounts to?" Shen Yu asked, his voice a dark, sovereign rumble. "You are not even able to fight a person a whole realm lower than you?"

The assassin snarled, his Qi erupting in a desperate burst of black mist. "Die, brat!" He threw three concealed needles, each coated in a purple, soul-numbing venom, while simultaneously leaping forward for a decapitating strike.

Shen Yu’s golden eyes flared. In that split second, the world seemed to slow down. He used the Rising Swan Spear Technique. His spear didn’t just move; it hissed, the air around the tip twisting into a miniature vacuum.

Whoosh!

With a casual flick, he knocked all three needles out of the air and caught the assassin’s wrist in mid-air. The sound of bone snapping echoed through the hall.

"My turn," Shen Yu whispered.

But before he could deliver the killing blow, a massive shockwave of crimson Qi blasted through the walls from the master wing, followed by the terrifying, booming laugh of Wraith-043. The entire estate groaned as the Peak Golden Core pressure reached a fever pitch, making the stones beneath their feet tremble.

"Mother!!!", Lixue screamed as she felt the vibrations.