The Invincible Bodyguard Starting by Escorting the Doomsday Imperial Princess Chapter 91 : Chapter 91

Chapter 91: Painted Skin Fiend!

“Yes!” Yin Ren clasped his fists once more, then turned, bowed, and withdrew.

The mont he stepped out of the room, Su Wenyuan lifted a hand in a casual wave, and the study doors slowly creaked shut behind him.

Rubbing at his brow, he walked to the window and gazed out at the vast sky beyond. His eyes passed through layer upon layer of rooftops, as though they had already fallen upon the man seated within the imperial palace.

“This realm has already been occupied by the Zhou clan for more than a hundred years. It is ti for it to be returned...”

“This king will first send you his opening gift!”

The mont the words fell, Su Wenyuan took a step forward and vanished directly from the study.

...

On Chen Guan’s side, the two of them traveled for another two days, and the entire journey was strangely calm. They did not even run into a single wild dog ugly enough to resemble a demon.

Nothing like Great Yun, where every few steps so blind fool of a demon would jump out and let Chen Guan loosen his muscles and keep his hand sharp.

Yet that very calm did not make Chen Guan relax in the slightest. On the contrary, it made him raise his guard twelvefold.

Because Great Zhou was never known for producing many demons. What it produced instead were far more terrifying Demonic Beings and Uncanny Fiends.

And once such things appeared, they almost always ca with a killing blow.

Calm was usually nothing more than the prelude to an incoming storm.

Because Chen Guan knew that whether it was the Emperor of Great Zhou’s side or Su Wenyuan’s, two whole days without the slightest movent did not an they were ignorant.

It ant they were preparing sothing.

Luo Li, on the other hand, had spent those two days in complete peace and had visibly regained a good deal of her spirit. That in turn caused her chatterbox nature to flare up again for an entire day.

“Brother Chen, what is the greatest wish of your life?”

“To go where I want to go and see the sights I want to see.”

Chen Guan glanced toward the vague outline of a little town at the end of the official road in the distance and answered with a baffling sentence.

Suddenly—

“Hiiiih—!”

The fine horse beneath Luo Li let out a terrified scream. Its front hooves reared violently into the air, and it threw her straight off its back!

In that split second, Chen Guan flicked out the scabbard of the Horse-Cleaving Saber across his hand, hooked her belt with perfect precision, twisted his wrist, and steadily lowered her to the ground.

Luo Li’s cheeks flushed red, and she glared at Chen Guan while muttering inwardly.

Even with such a good opportunity, he still did not know how to take a little advantage. Just like the dream he spoke of, he really was a useless idler.

Then she angrily scolded the now-cald fine horse in front of her, “What madness are you suddenly throwing for no reason?”

Chen Guan glanced at his own mount, which was just as restless and uneasy beneath him, then looked toward the town hidden deeper ahead within the cornfields. His eyes narrowed.

He imdiately swung down from the horse.

After patting the neck of the frightened horse a few tis, the animal finally cald.

Then he remounted and said in a heavy voice, “Co on. Let’s go ahead and take a look.”

This town lay at what was called a Lower Fork Crossing.

A Lower Fork Crossing was a place bordered by water on two sides, with only a single post road passing through the middle.

The town ahead sat directly on that unavoidable route.

If one wanted to pass through, one either had to take the waterway or go straight through this town.

But the waterway here ran against a swift, violent current. If one had to rely on trackers hauling a boat, it would be slower than walking.

Seeing the solemn look on his face, Luo Li finally realized that sothing was wrong.

She sniffed, and quite unintentionally caught a faint scent of blood in the air.

Clearly, that was what had frightened her horse!

Once the horses stopped panicking, Luo Li imdiately leapt back into the saddle and followed after him, riding abreast with Chen Guan as the two of them advanced.

The farther they went, the stronger that sharp, stinging sll of blood beca, and the quieter the surroundings grew.

Even the scattered chirping of insects and birds that could still vaguely be heard on the road earlier had now vanished completely.

It was the stillness of the grave.

Clearly, sothing had happened in the town ahead.

Chen Guan lightly pressed his legs to the horse’s flanks and slowed the pace slightly.

The mont they reached the stone tablet at the town entrance, a streak of vivid red could already be seen flowing out from a ditch in the mud beside it.

It was not water.

It was blood—so much blood that it had gathered into a stream and flowed here with the lay of the land.

“This...” Luo Li’s pretty face turned deathly pale at once when she saw the sight.

Chen Guan, however, did not stop. He continued riding straight into the town.

The mont they entered, the scene before them could be described as nothing less than a living hell.

A great swath of houses had collapsed. Everywhere they looked, the streets were covered with severed limbs and shattered chunks of organs.

Blood seeped continuously from the mangled remains, staining the bluestone road a dark red before finally flowing into the ditches at either side.

“Th-this... this...”

At the sight of it, Luo Li’s delicate body could not stop trembling, and her stomach churned violently.

“Stay close to !”

Chen Guan coldly reminded her, still expressionless as he urged his horse onward.

As they rode through the town, not a single complete corpse could be found, nor a single living soul.

There were only two half-starved wild dogs at a street corner, tearing at an arm that no one could identify, growling at each other over a scrap of at.

When they reached the crossroads at the center of town, Chen Guan suddenly reined in his horse and swung down from the saddle.

Luo Li was startled by his abrupt action.

But she asked no questions. She jumped down as well, hurried over, and tightly grabbed Chen Guan’s arm.

Chen Guan did not mind. He simply flicked the tip of his foot lightly against the ground, sending a pebble flying with perfect accuracy. It struck the earth beside the dogs with a sharp crack, frightening the beasts away.

Then he crouched beside one ruined corpse and examined it carefully. After that he moved to a second, then a third, then a fourth...

“Brother Chen, stop looking...” Luo Li said in a trembling voice, forcing herself to endure the nausea.

“Judging by how miserable this scene is, the murderer probably has not gone far. Shouldn’t we hurry to the next commandery city and report it to the authorities?”

Chen Guan glanced at her and said blandly, “You ca to Great Zhou to rebel. Now that chaos has broken out within Great Zhou, shouldn’t you be happy instead?”

“And report it to the authorities? I think you’re looking to walk straight into a trap yourself.”

“I...” Luo Li was choked off by his words and felt rather displeased. “B-but if we stay here, what if so passerby sees us and mistakes us for the murderers?”

Chen Guan did not answer that question. Instead, he calmly countered, “Have you seen anything yet?”

Luo Li froze. How could she have dared look carefully just now? She had spent most of the ride here with her eyes half shut.

But since Chen Guan had asked, she still forced herself to endure the revulsion, stiffened her courage, and carefully looked around before answering, “The dead are almost all elderly people, won, and children. The healthy young n must have escaped in advance.”

“The murderer... probably was not fast on foot, so it could not catch those who ran. But it should have possessed enormous strength, because these people were torn apart by raw force alone.”

The corner of Chen Guan’s mouth twitched, and he said flatly, “Didn’t you notice? Their hearts have been dug out!”

“Ah???” Luo Li’s heart gave a violent shudder. In fright, she instantly clung to Chen Guan’s arm like a sloth, her voice shaking. “D-dug out their hearts? H-how cruel does soone have to be to do that?!”

Chen Guan irritably peeled her off. “Could you at least act a little more like soone trying to stage a rebellion?”