Chapter 264 Assassination
After the prince led his troops to suppress the bandits, he strolled around the streets of Youzhou and bought many local trinkets.
Because the prince was out suppressing bandits this time, he missed the opportunity to celebrate the Qiqiao Festival with Qianhuan, so he personally picked out a beautiful hairpin and planned to take it back to give to Qianhuan as a gift to make up for the Qiqiao Festival.
Because the army was moving slowly, the prince wanted to go back to see Qianhuan as soon as possible, so he took twenty personal guards and Chi Ying and rushed to the capital without stopping.
The remaining people, led by the Crown Prince's deputy general, continued to slowly move towards the capital.
The journey back home for the prince was not peaceful at all. From time to time, a group of assassins would appear to try to assassinate him.
Fortunately, the prince's personal guards were no pushovers and they easily dealt with several waves of assassins.
The closer they got to the capital, the more powerful the assassins sent to kill them became, and they seemed determined to achieve their goal.
That day, the sky was covered with dark clouds and it was about to rain heavily.
The prince who was walking in front of the team stopped his horse and then instructed Chi Ying beside him, "Take two people to the nearby town to buy some raincoats and dry food. The rest of you and I will stay here and rest for a while."
Chi Ying took two of his personal guards to the nearest town to buy a raincoat, while the rest of them found a clean open space and sat down. Some of them took out dry food from their pockets and ate it, some drank water, and some closed their eyes to rest.
Suddenly, the grass and trees in the surrounding woods seemed to sway, and an invisible sense of oppression came from the air.
The guards who were resting seemed to sense something was wrong, and they quickly clenched their swords, ready to fight at any time.
"Zheng..."
In an instant, an arrow flew through the sky from the woods and shot straight towards the prince's chest. The prince sensed the danger and immediately rolled on the ground to avoid the arrow.
Next, countless arrows shot out from the woods, and everyone used swords to block the rain of arrows.
While blocking the rain of arrows, the prince grabbed a few arrows with his bare hands and shot them towards the dense forest. After a few muffled groans, several assassins were killed.
The soldiers under the prince also followed his example and shot the arrows they caught into the dense forest, finally forcing the assassins to rush out of the woods.
Judging from the attire of these assassins, they should be the same group of people who came to assassinate him before. After rushing out of the woods, they went straight to kill the prince without saying a word.
They were all very agile and it was obvious that they were more skilled than the previous assassins.
The prince thought to himself: It seems that the person who wants to kill him this time has spent a lot of money.
The prince used his lightness skills to sway his body, and stabbed the nearest man in black with his unsheathed sword.
Suddenly, there was a sound of swords clashing in the woods, and a melee began.
After a while, it started to rain heavily.
After dealing with one wave of assassins, another wave of assassins suddenly jumped out from the dense forest. By the time the second wave of assassins was dealt with, everyone was exhausted.
However, assassins continued to appear in an endless stream. It seemed that the enemy had made sufficient preparations this time, intending to use the human tide tactics to wear them down until they were exhausted, and then catch them all in one fell swoop.
The prince knew that if they continued like this, no matter how powerful their martial arts were, they would not be able to hold on.
He quickly ordered his soldiers, "The other side has more people, we have to fight quickly and make a quick decision. If there is a chance, everyone should rush out and escape."
A team of personal soldiers were resisting the assassins, while several other personal soldiers were protecting the prince tightly in the middle.
One of the soldiers protecting the prince said, "General, we will help you break out of the encirclement. You can find a chance to ride away first."
The prince did not want to abandon his soldiers and escape alone. "No, how can I abandon my soldiers and escape alone? I want to stand with you."
However, the personal soldier pleaded again, "Master, Dayuan Kingdom cannot do without you. Please consider the overall situation. I am not sorry for my death."
In the end, the prince could not resist and, under the cover of several of his personal soldiers, he fled towards the capital on his flaming horse.
When Chi Ying came back with the straw raincoat, he saw corpses all over the ground. Although most of them were the bodies of the men in black, there were also some of their people among them.
Chi Ying counted and found that except for the two personal soldiers he took away, the other eighteen personal soldiers were all killed.
Chi Ying looked at the corpses of these personal soldiers, his eyes became red and swollen, and he felt extremely painful.
He was afraid that the prince had also met with an accident, so he quickly took two other soldiers with him to dig through the pile of corpses.
After all the bodies were counted and it was confirmed that the Crown Prince was not among them, Chi Ying breathed a sigh of relief.
He quickly said to the other two guards, "You two stay here, dig a pit, and bury our brothers. I will go after the prince right now."
The two bodyguards looked at the bodies of their former good brothers with eyes full of sorrow. Before they went to the town, they were all talking and laughing, but now, they were separated forever.
Although the two were also worried about the safety of the prince, they could not tolerate seeing the bodies of their companions exposed in the wilderness.
Both of them nodded with difficulty, "Master Chiying, don't worry, we will bury the bodies of our brothers properly, and we will catch up with you and the prince as soon as we are done."
Chi Ying jumped on the horse in a flash and galloped towards the secret signal left by the prince. He was extremely anxious and just wanted to catch up with the prince as soon as possible to protect his safety.
The prince suffered a lot of injuries and the assassin was chasing him relentlessly. Fortunately, Lieyan ran fast and always left the pursuers behind him.
Chiying was chasing very fast, but he was still a step slow. After all, the prince's warhorse Lieyan was famous for its speed.
It was also thanks to Lieyan's fast running that he was able to leave the assassin behind.
Seeing that the prince was about to reach the city gate, the assassin could only draw his bow and shoot an arrow from a distance at the position of the prince's heart.
The prince who was sitting on Lieyan sensed the danger and dodged the sword, but he failed to dodge the second one, which pierced his shoulder.
When the assassin saw the arrow had pierced the prince's body, he finally revealed a smug smile. Humph, even if it hadn't hit the heart, the poison on the arrow would have killed him.
The prince who was shot by an arrow held on for a breath and took the token from his arms to show it to the soldiers at the city gate. After entering the city gate, under the effect of the poison, the prince finally couldn't help spitting out blood and fainted.
Qian Bolin happened to be patrolling at the city gate. He knew the prince's warhorse Lieyan. Seeing that Lieyan was carrying an injured and unconscious person, Qian Bolin hurried over.
When he saw that the person on the horse was actually the Crown Prince, Qian Bolin hurriedly escorted him back to Prince An's Mansion, and then went to the palace to report to the Emperor.
The emperor had just finished taking the elixir under the care of Concubine Xue. When the eunuch led Qian Bolin into the palace, the emperor asked, "Commander Qian, what do you have to report to the palace at this time?"
"Your Majesty, the prince of Prince An has returned to the capital after suppressing the bandits. However, it seems that the prince was assassinated and is now unconscious and in critical condition. I can only hurry to the palace to report."
When the emperor heard that the prince was injured, he was shocked, "What? Someone actually dared to assassinate Ziyu?"
The emperor then instructed Li Dequan behind him, "Little Dezi, hurry to the Imperial Hospital to summon the best imperial physician to Prince An's mansion to treat Ziyu. Make sure you save him."
"Yes, Your Majesty, I will summon the imperial physician right away."
When Concubine Xue, who was beside the emperor, heard the news, she couldn't help but raise the corner of her mouth slightly, but she was afraid that the emperor would find out, so she quickly concealed her joy.
In her heart, she hoped that the prince would die quickly, so that the Dayuan Kingdom would be without its god of war general, and their Canglang Kingdom would have one less powerful enemy.