116: Chapter 108 Those who play tactics have dirty hearts.

The crossroads of the West Market.

The bluestone slabs were soaked through with blackened plasma, and the stench of blood rushed straight to the head.

In the very center of the street, a three-meter-high white wood Execution Platform stood abruptly. There wasn't a single spectator around, only twelve thick bronze pillars with eerie green corpse-oil torches burning at their tops.

A headless Executioner stood shirtless, his body covered in bulging muscles.

He held a large back-opening broadsword upside down with both hands, pinning it firmly into the center of the wooden platform.

In the center of the Execution Platform knelt a man wearing the black official robe of the Underworld.

Two cast-iron chains, as thick as thumbs, brutally pierced through his pipa bones, pinning him firmly to the wooden stake. The man's head hung low, his hair as messy as weeds, and blood dripped down the chains with a rhythmic 'drip, drip' onto the ground.

The third quarter of the Hour of the Rat.

The distant sound of the night watchman's gong rang out right on time. The headless Executioner suddenly tightened his grip on the hilt with both hands and raised the broadsword high above his head.

The blade gleamed with a chilling light as it swung straight toward the back of the black-robed man's neck!

Pei Duo stepped into the West Market archway.

Without a single word of nonsense, she pressed her right hand over the black jade pendant on her chest through her clothes.

I have never cultivated good karma in my life, and I couldn't care less about your Tang Dynasty laws. Today, this execution ground, the Eldest Princess is definitely raiding it!

Black-gold light exploded instantly.

The imperial laws of the Underworld swept arrogantly across the bluestone slabs, directly crushing the entire crossroads. The corpse-oil torches on the twelve bronze pillars didn't even flicker before they all went out simultaneously.

The headless Executioner's movement froze mid-air.

The broadsword was only half an inch from the black-robed man's neck, but it was as if it had been welded in place, unable to descend even a fraction more.

An absolute pressure from the depths of the Huaxia ancestral bloodline pressed down on the Executioner's spine like a massive mountain.

Pei Duo climbed the steps with a very steady pace.

Xu Mo and Lin Sa followed closely behind, guarding her flanks on the left and right.

Pei Duo walked up to the Execution Platform and stared coldly at the massive headless Executioner.

"Step down."

As those two light words fell, the black-gold light intensified!

The headless Executioner's tower-like body trembled violently, and his kneecaps let out an overburdened 'crack'.

With a heavy 'thud', he fell to his knees on the wooden platform, his hands losing strength as the broadsword crashed to the ground beside his feet.

In this extremely humiliating yet completely irresistible posture, he bowed his non-existent head to the imperial power of the Underworld.

Pei Duo walked up to the black-robed man.

She reached out and directly grabbed the two cast-iron chains that pierced his pipa bones.

Black-gold light surged from her palms into the chains.

Spiderweb-like cracks immediately covered the surface of the iron, and then with a 'bang', it shattered inch by inch, exploding into a pile of black ash.

Losing his support, the black-robed man slumped to the ground like a pile of mud.

He struggled to lift his head, revealing a face covered in blood and filth.

"This subordinate... The Seventh Hall Wandering God on duty, Sun Ce." The man's voice was muffled and slurred, leaking air. "Thank you, Eldest Princess, for saving my life."

Pei Duo looked at him, her eyes showing no emotion. "Can you walk?"

"Yes." Sun Ce pushed himself off the ground and stood up through gritted teeth.

He pulled a blood-stained black wooden waist token from his belt and presented it to Pei Duo with both hands. "Eldest Princess, a large army of the Jinwu Guard will be patrolling the West Market soon. I've been lurking here for several days and found an extra-legal dark workshop that the system rules cannot scan. Please follow me."

Pei Duo took the waist token.

The front was engraved with 'The Seventh Hall', and the back had the words 'Wandering God'. It felt ice-cold in her hand, radiating pure Underworld yin energy.

She tucked the token into her sleeve and nodded.

The four of them quickly walked down the Execution Platform and slipped into a narrow alley next to the West Market.

The alley was pitch black, and the high walls on both sides completely blocked out the moonlight.

Lin Sa led the way with the blood-character lantern, its red light barely carving out a small field of vision in the thick fog.

Sun Ce followed closely behind to give directions. Pei Duo walked in the middle, while Xu Mo brought up the rear.

Xu Mo had his hands in his pockets, his fingertips inconspicuously holding the underworld emissary token, his gaze never leaving Sun Ce's back.

The emissary's black robe was tattered, with a large tear on the back where the flesh was turned out.

But Xu Mo wasn't staring at the wound; he was staring at Sun Ce's footprints.

The emissaries of the Underworld were ghost immortals formed from soul bodies; when they walked, their heels didn't touch the ground, and they moved silently as if floating.

But the Sun Ce in front of him made a thumping sound with every step, his heels hitting the bluestone slabs heavily and leaving a trail of bloody footprints of consistent depth.

This is a damn living person's way of walking! Or rather, it's the way of some kind of monster with a physical body.

Xu Mo clicked his tongue, a cold light flashing across his glasses.

"Brother Sun Ce," Xu Mo suddenly spoke, his voice echoing in the empty alley. "The King of Mount Tai of the The Seventh Hall has been getting quite a temper lately. I heard last time that to hit his year-end targets, he even burned through two oil vats in the Eighteenth Layer of Hell."

Sun Ce didn't even turn his head and kept walking, his tone carrying a bit of a bitter smile. "His Highness is indeed anxious. However, if His Highness knew the Eldest Princess was safe and sound, he would certainly breathe a sigh of relief."

His answers were fluent and watertight.

He even knew all about the King of Mount Tai's short temper.

Xu Mo, however, didn't intend to let it go so easily.

He quickened his pace, instantly closing the distance between him and Sun Ce.

"What's wrong with your voice?" Xu Mo continued to probe. "Did you injure your throat?"

Sun Ce sighed. "When I was caught by the system, my throat took a hard hit. My vocal cords were damaged, so my speech is a bit slurred. I've made a fool of myself before everyone."

Xu Mo stopped walking.

He wouldn't go any further.

Hearing no movement behind her, Lin Sa braked instantly, her right hand gripping the hilt of her blade.

Pei Duo also turned around, quietly looking at Xu Mo.

"Vocal cords damaged?" Xu Mo kept one hand in his pocket, his tone cold enough to drop ice shards. "You put on quite a show. You know the internal gossip of the The Seventh Hall by heart, and the waist token is the real deal, too."

"Unfortunately, when you were eating tongues, you didn't quite digest the human vocal system properly."

Sun Ce turned around with a look of utter confusion. "Brother, what kind of nonsense are you talking about?"

"Eldest Princess," Xu Mo stared fixedly at Sun Ce's face, enunciating each word. "You pronounced it as 'Cang Princess'. 'Subordinate', you pronounced as 'Su-xia'. 'Vocal cords', you pronounced as 'Sen-dai'."

Pei Duo's gaze instantly turned cold, and killing intent filled the air.

"When a person's vocal cords are damaged, their voice will break or go hoarse," Xu Mo laughed outright. "But they definitely won't precisely lose every single retroflex sound. Are you glitching out here?"

"Unless, you don't even have a tongue in your mouth!"

The puzzle piece from the second floor of the Guiyun Inn instantly clicked into place in Xu Mo's mind.

That quietly opened paper window, that disgusting chewing sound, and that hand holding half a tongue.

Those who play tactics have hearts that are filthy to the core! The system is even more despicable, using a real waist token over a real skin bag to put on a show of suffering just to stall for time!

"Lin Sa," Xu Mo's voice was extremely flat. "Take off both his legs."

Lin Sa didn't say a word.

The moment Xu Mo spoke, she stepped back half a pace with her right leg, put her weight into her waist, and her S-rank dagger was out of its sheath in an instant.

The blade tore through the air, drawing a blinding silver light as it aimed straight for the popliteal fossa behind Sun Ce's knees!

The bewildered expression on Sun Ce's face vanished instantly.

He lunged forward, his body twisting in mid-air into a pretzel shape that defied the laws of physics, his hands gripping the blue brick wall on the right.

His black robe tore on the spot.

He clung to the wall like a giant spider, his limbs and joints completely twisted in reverse, and a tooth-aching sound of bone dislocation erupted from under his skin.

Pei Duo stood her ground, her right hand tightly clutching the black jade pendant on her chest, the black-gold light flickering.

The fake Sun Ce on the wall grinned.

This grin stretched all the way back to his ears. His mouth was completely empty—sure enough, there was no tongue, only rows of dense, sharp teeth.

Between the teeth were stuck blackened scraps of meat.

The face that belonged to the Underworld Wandering God was peeling outward in an extremely sanity-blasting manner.

"Oh dear, the disguise is off," the monster let out a shrill, mocking laugh, speaking in that strange accent devoid of retroflex sounds. "But it doesn't matter. The Cang Princess's flesh will surely taste much better than that half a tongue."

Pei Duo remained expressionless and spoke coldly.

"Where is my brother's man?"

The monster used all four limbs to scramble up the wall at high speed. "Why don't you guess? Execution at the third quarter of the Hour of the Rat. In our Tang Dynasty, we never use blades to kill. The system is on a whole different level this time!"

It suddenly vaulted onto the high wall and vanished into the thick fog.

Pei Duo didn't give chase.

She turned her head sharply and stared fixedly toward the Execution Platform in the West Market.

The execution ground just now was a decoy! The real execution wasn't there at all! The system had used a possessed monster just to trick them out of their most precious rescue time!

"Xu Mo," Pei Duo's voice was laced with undisguised killing intent, "if the Tang Dynasty doesn't use blades to kill, what do they use?"

Xu Mo's face turned pale as he frantically searched his mental database of historical records.

"Hanging!" Xu Mo looked up, his eyes full of horror. "And... skinning and stuffing with straw! In the West Market of the Tang Dynasty, there is an Old Locust Tree specifically used to hang high-profile criminals!"

In the distance, the night watchman's gong rang out eerily once more.

"Gong—"

"The fourth quarter of the Hour of the Rat, the Underworld Gate opens wide—"