Chapter 215: Cicada's Wing

In the hall room, Su Zhou sat weakly on the bed couch. Xiao Man hid behind Chen Trace, peeking out her head. The dim flickering candlelight stretched their three shadows, like their thoughts, constantly shaking.

Chen Trace instructed Xiao Man, "You stay in the room. I'll be back soon."

Xiao Man, pulling his sleeve, said softly, "Young Master, this woman is too fierce. I'll go with you!"

Chen Trace comforted her, "You watch the door. Don't let anyone else come in."

Xiao Man replied, "Oh..."

Su Zhou looked at Chen Trace coldly. "I advise you not to have any wicked thoughts, otherwise your entire Chen family, from top to bottom, will die."

Chen Trace said slowly, "Rest assured, I'm going to get something for your healing."

Saying that, he turned and went out the door. Only after the two wooden doors of the hall room were properly closed did he walk towards the courtyard outside.

Xiao Man said anxiously behind him, "Young Master, go quickly and come back quickly! I'm a little afraid being alone with this woman."

Chen Trace raised his eyebrows but did not turn back.

The moment the door closed, Xiao Man straightened up. The panic on her face also subsided somewhat.

As if nothing had happened, she pushed the door open a crack and quietly looked outside. Casually, she said to Su Zhou behind her, "You fierce woman are definitely mistaken. My young master is absolutely not someone who would betray Jing Wang. This afternoon at the Zhang family, Young Master already proved it..." Before she finished speaking, Xiao Man turned her head and found that Su Zhou had already quietly come up behind her like a ghost.

Xiao Man used her fingers like a knife to chop at Su Zhou, but Su Zhou's body was like a slippery, non-stick eel. She actually stuck to the chopping arm and flashed behind Xiao Man.

The Emei thorn was again pressed against Xiao Man's lower jaw. With a slight movement, the poisoned Emei thorn would pierce her chin.

Xiao Man was suddenly unprepared and gasped, "You let go of me! We'll go outside to find a place to fight."

Su Zhou said softly, "Don't shout, otherwise I'll kill you too."

She observed Chen Trace through the door crack. Seeing that Chen Trace had talked with the soldiers from the Soldiers and Horses Office for a moment and that no one had come to capture her, she breathed a slight sigh of relief.

Xiao Man muttered, "Relieved now, right? My young master definitely won't betray you, and won't betray Jing Wang."

Su Zhou said deeply, "Knowing a person's face doesn't mean knowing their heart. Even brothers who have been by Wang Ye's side for many years can betray Wang Ye, why couldn't he?"

Xiao Man said helplessly, "My young master isn't that kind of person. From small to big, he couldn't even bear to kill a chicken. Before, he raised two small chicks, and when one accidentally died, he cried for a long time. He's very kind."

Su Zhou laughed coldly, "People change. Everyone in the Jianghu says he is very close to the County Master's heir apparent, but I see that Jing Wang Mansion is already in great disaster, and he isn't sad at all. Doesn't this still prove that he betrayed Wang Ye?"

Xiao Man looked at Chen Trace's retreating figure outside the door crack. After a long silence, she said, "He is very sad. He just doesn't want others to see he's sad, but I can see it."

Su Zhou sneered, "You are the roundworm in his belly."

Xiao Man was silent for a moment, then said calmly, "Hey, everyone works under Supervisor Master together. I kindly saved you, you shouldn't be so ungrateful. Twice you've put your Emei thorn against my neck. What, you really can kill me?"

The candlelight in the room was stagnant for a moment, and the atmosphere became icy cold. Even the charcoal basin in the room seemed dimmer.

Su Zhou said calmly, "You, though just a seventh-rank Candle Attendant, dare to speak to me this way."

Xiao Man opened her mouth, "I... I just aren't as murderous as you, don't like killing people, so I just can't stand up to you. Right, this time I saved you, you still haven't given me the copper coin."

Su Zhou thought for a moment, slowly put down the Emei thorn, took out a copper coin from her sleeve, and threw it into Xiao Man's arms.

Xiao Man picked up the copper coin and examined it carefully. However, she saw that the copper coin was not engraved with the characters 'Jia Ning Tong Bao,' but with the two characters 'Lamp Fire.' "So this is a Lamp Fire copper coin? Can it really be exchanged for two hundred taels of silver?"

Seeing her appearance, Su Zhou doubted, "You've never seen a copper coin?"

Xiao Man stiffened her neck, "Who says I've never seen one? Haven't I seen this one?"

Su Zhou was even more doubtful, "You really haven't seen a Lamp Fire copper coin? Could it be that you previously never took on a task and don't know who brought you into Lamp Fire?"

Xiao Man pouted, "Who are you? Why should I tell you? Right, Supervisor Master hasn't said why we are called 'Lamp'."

Su Zhou sighed, "How can you not know anything? 'Lamp' implies 'home.' When returning home, if there is a lamp at home, it means there are people at home. 'Lamp Fire' is to give us homeless people a home."

Xiao Man lowered her head and put the copper coin into her waist pouch. "Then no need, you all have no home but I do."

Su Zhou, "..." After being happy in the fruit market.

Xiao Man put away the copper coin and warned, "Saving you is saving you, but I warn you not to hurt my young master, not to expose my identity, and definitely not to put the Emei thorn against me again... Hey, you!"

Before Xiao Man finished speaking, Su Zhou had already fainted to the ground.

When Chen Trace returned, he was still carrying two red lacquer food boxes.

Outside the gate of Ming Quan Garden, six soldiers from the Soldiers and Horses Office held torches. Chen Trace handed them the food boxes. "Various generals, it's not easy to come out on duty in this biting cold wind. I've instructed the back kitchen to prepare some food for you. Hurry and eat it while it's hot."

The soldiers from the Soldiers and Horses Office flattered him, "Third Young Master is too kind. How could we still trouble you to remember about food?"

Although Chen Trace was an illegitimate son of the Chen family, to these troops, he was already a high and mighty figure, someone they couldn't reach even if they stood on tiptoes.

Chen Trace smiled and casually asked, "Right, with so many of you here to guard the Chen family, how is the matter of catching people being handled?"

The leading troop at the gate chuckled, "We Luoyang City Soldiers and Horses Office are clear about our own limitations. Proper catching people things still need the Secret Strategy Office to do."

Chen Trace asked carelessly, "Are there any clues at the incident scene?"

The troop answered with a smile, "You asked the right person. Several of us were the first batch to rush there. Xing Lu Street was covered in blood! A thousand-year army soldier was killed until only one was left, and General Wang's chest had been stabbed into a sieve."

Chen Trace inhaled sharply, "So many people were killed. How many murderers were there?"

The troop said casually, "Listening to the Secret Spy Office's living Yan Wang say, there were a total of two murderers, one is a female assassin from Lamp, and there is also an accomplice who drives monsters."

Chen Trace asked with a smile, "Since the Secret Strategy Office is taking action, presumably they can definitely catch them. Has the Secret Spy Office said how to catch them, and when they can be caught? After all, such fierce people roaming free still make people quite afraid."

"Third Young Master doesn't need to be afraid, several of us brothers are guarding you," one troop said honestly with a laugh, "The Secret Spy Office is going to search all the medical halls in the city now. According to them, that female assassin received a heavy injury, and without timely treatment, she's probably cannot live."

Chen Trace said "Mm" and entered Ming Quan Garden with a smile, "Several big brothers have worked hard. I'll go back and rest first."

Several troops hurriedly nodded and bowed, "Thank you, Third Young Master. Please go back and rest quickly."

Chen Trace fastened the bolt of the courtyard door and returned to the room.

Su Zhou was just lying unconscious on the bed couch. When Xiao Man saw him return, she hurried forward, startled and unsettled, saying, "Young Master was gone for a long time! I was in the same room with this fierce woman, I was almost scared to death."

Chen Trace smiled and did not take her words to heart.

The most strange thing about tonight's matter was why Su Zhou could accurately find his room on the escape route.

Finding the Chen family was not difficult, but to accurately find his location within the Chen family, how could a female assassin who was in Luoyang City for the first time and alone do it?

Both Su Zhou and Xiao Man treated him as an ordinary person, thinking he was very easy to fool.

Chen Trace did not expose them either, quietly watching what exactly they wanted to do.

He took out a palm-sized white porcelain bottle from his bosom, as well as a needle and thread box, and handed them to Xiao Man together. "Inside the white porcelain bottle is the mansion's strongest burning knife wine. Use it to clean the wound on the one on the bed, then the wound won't fester."

Xiao Man looked at the needle and thread box. "This is?"

Chen Trace looked at the knife and sword wounds on Su Zhou's body. "Roast the needle over the charcoal basin. After roasting, sew her wound like sewing clothes. As for whether she can endure it, that depends on her own luck."

Xiao Man's eyes widened. "Pouring strong wine on a wound, I've heard of that before, but this sewing human skin with needle and thread, did Young Master learn this at a medical hall? Why have I never heard of it before?"

Chen Trace said "Mm." "Learned it at a medical hall. It's useful."

Sewing the wound could avoid secondary infection, and in about ten days, flesh buds could grow and heal. If not sewn, it might not heal for one or two months.

Chen Trace exited the room and let Xiao Man treat her.

He sat beside the stone table in the middle of the courtyard, quietly looking at his palm.

The next moment, he closed his palm. When he opened it again, there was already a black 'sword seed' floating in the center of his palm.

The black sword seed was like a piece of bamboo leaf, with no sword handle, no sword guard, thin like a cicada's wing.

Chen Trace stroked it with the pad of his finger. The surface was rough, as if cast from black iron, even the edges were not smooth and flat. It didn't look very stylish at all.

He pondered in his heart, "Why is Xuanyuan's sword seed flowing with colorful light, shuttling through time like a meteor? While my sword seed looks just like an unobtrusive iron piece... Is it because I haven't seized enough swords, or haven't raised it long enough?"

Chen Trace tried to control the sword seed with his heart, but that black iron piece swayed in front of him, always somewhat disobedient, and the speed didn't increase.

In an instant, he simply controlled the sword seed to rush towards the wax plum tree in the middle of the courtyard.

His original intention was to pierce through a tree leaf, but the sword seed deviated several inches when it reached the wax plum tree.

With a "Zhi" sound, a wax plum branch stem two fingers thick broke with a snap. When the sword seed returned to Chen Trace's palm, it was intact.

Chen Trace walked forward, lifted his head, and looked at the wax plum branch stem. It was smooth and flat, as if he had just cut a piece of tofu, not a piece of wood.

He lowered his head and examined the sword seed. The cultivation of this sword seed method had finally entered the door, no longer an outsider.

It was just that he didn't know how many more sword intents he needed to seize, how many people he needed to kill, to achieve himself.

With a "Zhi ya" sound, the door of the hall room was pushed open. Chen Trace flipped his hand and put the sword seed back into his sleeve, asking as if nothing had happened, "What happened?"

Xiao Man sized him up suspiciously for a moment, then said, "The wound is all sewn up. You can come in."