Chapter 290: Together to the Yellow Springs

Xie Ningyuan smiled. "Why not?"

Ji Heng retorted without hesitation, "I locked this Array with a thousand-year Moon Stone. Unless you found the Moon Stone, it’s absolutely impossible..."

"Oh, you mean this?"

Before Ji Heng could finish, Xie Ningyuan cut her off.

He held up a stone that glowed with a soft, lunar light and gave Ji Heng a faint smile. "I happened to take a stroll through your courtyard just now. This stone looked quite pretty, so I helped myself to it. Do you want it?"

Ji Heng’s eyes widened. "You... How is that possible? I specifically placed the Moon Stone in a hidden secret room..."

Just then, Yan Zui, who had been pretending to be asleep, couldn’t help but open her eyes. "Ahem... I had nothing to do tonight, so I snuck into your courtyard for another look. I happened to see you coming out of a secret room."

"I casually wedged a small shard in the door as it was closing. You seemed to be in a hurry and left without double-checking."

However, there were other guards in the courtyard. Yan Zui wasn’t confident she could enter the secret room alone without being discovered, so she had planned to wait for Lu Sangjiu and the others to return before exploring it together.

Unexpectedly, her simple, impulsive action allowed Xie Ningyuan to later enter and exit Ji Heng’s secret room with ease. He found the Moon Stone, which was placed within another connected Array and used to lock the Array here.

The moment he saw that Array, he had a good idea of what Ji Heng was planning. He sent a telepathic message to Lu Sangjiu to briefly explain, which is why she had been so confident.

Hearing Yan Zui’s words, Ji Heng completely fell apart. "How could this happen? Then my men..."

"Oh, I killed them all."

Xie Ningyuan’s words were the final straw. Ji Heng completely lost her mind. "I’ll kill you!"

She charged at Xie Ningyuan in a fury. Unfazed, Xie Ningyuan casually tossed the Moon Stone in his hand like a hidden weapon, striking Ji Heng squarely in the chest.

Ji Heng immediately coughed up blood and was sent flying backward, landing right in front of the City Lord.

But now, as the lovers who had just been inseparable in life and death looked at each other again, their feelings had completely changed.

"My lady..."

The City Lord murmured the title, his hand reflexively reaching out to help her up. But he stopped halfway, unable to bring himself to move any closer.

He desperately wanted to ask why, but deep down, he already knew the answer. Asking the question was meaningless now.

And so, on the verge of death, faced with the woman he had once loved to his very bones, he was left with nothing but a silent, shared gaze.

Ji Heng, however, seemed stung by his distant and disappointed gaze. She couldn’t help but shriek, "What’s with that look on your face?!"

"Didn’t you say you would love me forever, no matter what I became? Didn’t you say you’d love and protect me for the rest of your life?"

"And now? You can’t do anything! You’re useless, useless!"

Her shrieks and curses were harsh and jarring, but the City Lord’s expression, surprisingly, grew calm.

As if he’d had a sudden realization, he let out a soft laugh. "It is indeed shameful. I prided myself on loving you more than my own life, but in the end, I never truly saw you for who you are... You’re right to curse me, to mock me."

Shen Yuzhao shot Lu Sangjiu an incredulous look and couldn’t help but inch closer to her. "Little Junior Sister, is there something wrong with his head?"

But Lu Sangjiu seemed to have guessed something. She just shook her head, refraining from her usual mockery of his love-addled brain.

Meanwhile, Ji Heng, who had been hysterical, deflated like a popped balloon after hearing the City Lord’s calm words. Her entire body went limp.

"I was so foolish. How could I have ever pinned my hopes on a useless man like you?"

"I was clearly just one step away from success, and yet..."

She squeezed her eyes shut and murmured softly, "If there is a next life, I hope the heavens won’t be so cruel to me again..."

After speaking, she suddenly opened her eyes and gave a cold glance to the City Lord, who was struggling to crawl toward her, one agonizing step at a time.

She said nothing and didn’t pull away, simply allowing him to desperately grasp her hand.

The City Lord, prostrate on the ground, looked up slightly at the seated Ji Heng, forcing a smile onto his lips.

"Ah Heng... Everything in this world is in the past now. I’ll accompany you on the road to the underworld. If we have a next life, I hope we can just be an ordinary couple."

No one had paid him any mind just now, and he had secretly managed to partially break the seal on his major acupoints.

But now, instead of attacking Lu Sangjiu’s group, he used the last of his Spiritual Power to shatter both his and Ji Heng’s heart meridians.

As their bodies slumped to the ground, they both died, their last breaths gone.

The scene left everyone speechless for a long time.

Although they had brought it upon themselves, the sight was still a lamentable one for those who watched.

Lu Sangjiu sighed softly. "He truly was a devoted lover."

’What a pity he devoted himself to the wrong person.’

With the deaths of the City Lord and Ji Heng, the guards they had been controlling also perished. In the vast City Lord Mansion, the only living people left were the six of them.

Glancing back at the injured members of their group, including Gu Jue, Lu Sangjiu said to Shen Yuzhao, "Third Senior Brother, I’ll have to rely on you and Duoduo to take care of things here. Xie Ningyuan and I are going to check for any other survivors."

Shen Yuzhao nodded repeatedly. "Leave it to me! You two go on ahead!"

He paused, then looked with lingering fear at the courtyard full of corpses and shrank closer to Lu Sangjiu. "But... Little Junior Sister, there are too many bodies here. I’m a little scared."

Lu Sangjiu: "..."

’You weren’t scared when you were killing people, but now you’re scared of a bunch of corpses?’

But then she remembered this was all due to the influence of his Seven Emotions Technique. Now that he had advanced to the Golden Core Stage, he was actually much braver than before, so she couldn’t be too hard on him.

So she decided to offer a few words of comfort, but before she could speak, he added, "Can I just burn them all? They won’t be so creepy then."

Lu Sangjiu: "..."

’Oh, right. He’s a Living Yama. My mistake.’

She swallowed the words of comfort she was about to say. "Before you burn them..."

Shen Yuzhao immediately cut in, "Loot the bodies for valuables first. I know, I know!"

Lu Sangjiu: "...Excellent."

With a complicated expression, she turned to Xie Ningyuan. "I’m leaving this to my Third Senior Brother. Let’s go check the back courtyard."

As they walked, Lu Sangjiu silently replayed the events in Yuelin City in her mind.

Although it had been a close call, they had made it through safely. But to be honest, many things had surprised Lu Sangjiu.

For example... the City Lord had acted a bit too quickly and suddenly.

Judging by his original preparations, he probably hadn’t planned on turning on them so directly. At the very least, he should have tried to stall for a few more days.

Otherwise, there would have been no need to send a maid to monitor them at the beginning, nor to placate Yan Zui by agreeing to let her see Ji Heng.

Moreover, he could have made his move long after she and Xie Ningyuan left the city. Instead, he deliberately waited until nightfall to launch a sudden attack.

It felt more like something had happened unexpectedly, forcing the City Lord’s hand.

’So... what exactly happened?’