The Yellow-Haired Villain in Soaring Phoenix's Novels Also Desires Happiness Chapter 539: Hand Cards

On the increasingly narrow and complicated roads, the carriage continued to race forward at high speed.

High-quality horses and an excellent driver ensured the carriage’s steady advance, while the compartnt, completely refitted with powerful magitech materials, remained perfectly intact even amid the nonstop explosions.

Almost all of the structure and materials had been allocated by Muen toward the carriage’s toughness and defensive capability. As a result, its shock-absorption performance was not particularly good, and so simplification had even been made.

This was a lesson Muen had learned from the previous assassination attempt. No matter how smooth the ride and how comfortable the carriage, none of it could withstand a single slap from the Crowned One.

So rather than sitting a bit more comfortably, it was better to think about how to endure that slap. At least you wouldn’t be jolted to death, but you definitely would be slapped to death by the Crowned One.

Of course, this really made things hard for the noble passenger inside the carriage.

The maid Lavini was still fine, as she had a bit of cultivation to rely on, but this golden-branched, jade-leaved First Imperial Prince Albert, under Muen’s observation, was indeed a completely cultivation-less, blank-slate ordinary person.

That made things especially painful for him.

In nearly every violent jolt that sent him leaping upward, just short of smashing his head into the carriage roof, Albert felt as if every bone in his body had been disassembled and reassembled once more. The silk-brocade cushion beneath him had never felt so useless before. If Lavini were not gripping his arm tightly and helping stabilize him, he felt that by now he would have been completely shaken smooth.

Shaken smooth in every possible sense.

"Are you alright?"

Using his powerful bodily control to quite literally “wedge” himself into the carriage and sit steadily without moving, Muen looked at the pale-faced Albert and asked with a trace of concern.

An ordinary person would certainly not be jolted to death by a carriage spinning, jumping, and racing along the rugged streets of the Lower District—but a sickly ordinary person was another matter entirely.

So after noticing Albert’s suffering, Muen almost imdiately took out a healing magic scroll, at least making sure he wouldn’t die here.

If the Second Prince’s assassination failed to kill the First Prince, only for him to end up being shaken to death by the carriage Muen prepared, that would really be a joke.

"N-no, I’m fine."

Taking a long, relieved breath under the life force of the healing scroll, Albert waved his hand.

"I'm not that fragile yet."

"Good."

Muen handed the healing scroll to Lavini, having her help channel magic into Albert, while he himself slightly lifted a corner of the curtain to observe their surroundings.

"The hardest part of the road is almost over. The explosions should be stopping soon."

"You know them very well?" Albert asked in surprise.

"No. I just don’t think that no matter how capable they are, they could possibly set bombs across such a large area."

Muen’s gaze swept farther away.

"In fact, a large portion of those earlier explosions ca from people hiding on both sides of the road, throwing subsequent explosives. The ones buried in advance only made up a small part. And those ambushers should have already been tied down by my people."

As if to confirm Muen’s words, the explosions outside the carriage gradually subsided, and the ride beca increasingly stable.

And when the explosions finally stopped completely, what drifted over from that direction were faint sounds of shouting and killing, furious curses, screams, the clash of tal—and mixed into the sll of gunpowder smoke... the scent of blood.

"That is..." Albert leaned in to listen.

"A Lower District specialty."

Muen shrugged.

"Gang warfare."

"The scale sounds considerable."

Albert suddenly frowned. "I think I also heard the sound of magitech cannons. Do Lower District gangs even have things like magitech cannons?"

"Well, gangs are gangs. Smuggled goods are always all over the place. Having one or two magitech cannons is pretty normal."

Muen rubbed the side of his nose and said,

"Still, this ti it’s slightly beyond what I expected. Judging by the commotion, the other side probably threw in all of the gang forces they recently absorbed."

"Is it very serious?"

"Serious isn’t quite the word, but..."

Muen unfolded that densely marked map again, suddenly muttering a curse under his breath.

"This isn’t an assassination at all. With this much noise, how is it any different from forcing it head-on?"

"It seems my younger brother is quite clever in this regard."

Albert lowered his head and gave a bitter smile, speaking in a rather complex tone.

"He knows that as long as he succeeds in killing , the series of problems he creates right now won’t be problems at all. How could the emperor of the Empire bear the infamy of fratricide? He wouldn’t. So-called history isn’t it written by the victor?"

"He’s still far from being emperor."

Muen slamd the map hard onto the small table in front of him, ending the unpleasant topic. At the sa ti, the magic stone on the carriage ceiling brightened slightly, allowing Albert, an ordinary person, to clearly see the routes marked on the map.

"Back to the main point. Our biggest problem right now is how to shake off the other side’s surveillance and lock-on again. If we can escape their field of vision and take these small roads, we can successfully reach the banquet venue in under twenty minutes."

"But the question is how to shake them."

Albert also fell into thought. "The carriage is too big a target and has too many restrictions. It can’t hide as easily as a person."

"Exactly. That’s the problem."

Muen sighed.

At the root of the problem was the fact that Prince Albert was just an ordinary person. If he had enough cultivation—even being around a third-rank martial artist would suffice—the group could split up. While Muen found a way to delay the enemy, others could escort him on foot to the destination, which would be far more reliable and concealed than relying on a carriage.

But Albert had not the slightest cultivation. He couldn’t even use magic, which ant most magitech tools were useless. Sending guards to escort him on foot would likely end with him being struck down by unknown AOE damage amid chaotic fighting, dying without anyone even knowing how.

"If we can’t shake off their sight, then this battle will completely turn into—"

"Boom!"

A sudden violent jolt abruptly cut off Muen’s words. He quickly steadied himself, lifted the curtain at the front of the carriage, and asked,

"What happened? That didn’t sound like an explosion—"

The question didn’t even have ti to finish.

A corpse that sprayed warm blood collapsed slowly right beside Muen.

It was the driver.

A single arrow was embedded squarely in the center of his forehead. One could still faintly see the fear and unwillingness lingering on his face.

Blood flowed freely, painfully eye-catching.

"Damn it—anti-magic arrow!"

Muen imdiately realized the first flaw in the carefully prepared carriage.

Although the compartnt’s defensive formation could cover the entire carriage, without the protection of magitech materials, relying on the formation alone made it impossible to fully block specialized anti-magic weapons.

That was how the driver had died.

And once the driver was dead, the carriage’s speed dropped at once. Without anyone guiding them, the horses also beca clearly panicked.

"What happened..."

"Don’t worry about it. Protect yourself!"

Muen called back toward the rear, then imdiately jumped out of the carriage and grabbed the reins.

"Hyah! Run, now!"

Muen snapped the reins. The pressure of authority contained within his command made the horses—carrying thin traces of dragon blood—submit instantly and continue sprinting forward.

But during those few breaths when the carriage briefly slowed, out of the corner of his eye Muen had already caught sight of several shadows pressing in and surrounding them.

"So it really is the case?"

Muen murmured, finishing the words he hadn’t managed to say before.

"Once we can no longer shake off the other side, this battle will completely turn into... a contest between hand cards held by both sides."

For a ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) fleeting mont, before Muen’s eyes, the district shrouded in endless night seed to transform into a gigantic card table.

And Prince Andrew sat on the opposite side, calmly tossing down a hand card.

Then—

Now, it’s your turn to play.

He grinned viciously, as if making that gesture.