Chapter 35: Rising Internal Strife
Jiang Mo suddenly said, "Unbutton your clothes, use a sword to cut a little wound at your heart area, and the child Gu will fly out by itself."
The armored guards looked at each other. After a while of hesitation, someone had already taken off his armor, unbuttoned his clothes, and lightly cut his chest.
The small insects lightly flew out from the cut wound, flew into the air to find the mother Gu, and surrounded the mother Gu.
Seeing this scene, almost all the armored guards immediately took action, unbuttoned their clothes, and cut their chests. Countless gu children flew toward the mother gu in the air, their bodies were more or less stained with blood, dripping on the ground and leaving spots of blood.
Jiang Mo waved his palm in the air. In an instant, the gu insects turned into powder and scattered on the ground.
Looking at Jiang Xu who was wailing in pain, a few sporadic pictures flashed before his eyes.
Five years ago, it was also a winter night. Snow fell from the sky. A playful youth returned to the palace after dark. As soon as he entered the palace, he heard his mother's pained cry.
He hurried to his mother's bedroom and saw her holding her chest in pain. Standing beside her was a devil-like young man.
"Your Concubine Mother is dying!" The youth's smile was as hideous as if it came from hell.
"You... run!" Mother's voice reached the boy's ears, "Go... go and beg the Crown Prince, don't worry about me..."
But the boy didn’t leave. He looked at the demon in front of him, his voice trembling, "What do you want me to do?"
"Put this bug into your body and then do things for me obediently." A small black bug in a crystal box appeared in the palm of the youth's hand. The bug fluttered its wings in the box, staring at the boy greedily.
The boy stood still. The youth smiled and waved. A servant came to him and roughly tore open the collar of his chest, revealing his pale and tender skin.
"No... don't! He... he is only twelve years old. You can't do this... kill me. Kill me!" The mother struggled like crazy to stop it, but was pressed to the ground by the guards.
The boy's body trembled slightly. Fear emerged in his eyes. He knew that something terrible would happen. Although he had the ability to escape, he looked at his mother and didn’t resist.
The youth opened the box and placed it on the boy's chest. As if it smelled delicious food, the black bug jumped up excitedly and climbed onto the boy's chest. Then, it quickly drilled into the boy's skin, leaving a deep bleeding wound.
The boy's pupils instantly contracted. His heart seemed to be stepped on hard. It was so painful that his whole body was numb. His body softened and he knelt on the ground.
The youth turned and left, leaving only some cold word, "You should be glad that you are a martial arts genius. Being useful is the only value of your life. In this palace, useless people... don't deserve to live!"
Three months later.
The bright moon in the sky shone on the body of the woman in the room. The face of the body was distorted by pain, while the eyes were wide open and had tears hanging in the corners of the eyes.
When the moon finally disappeared, the youth flew out of the window, ran along the roof, and suddenly jumped down. He swung his sword and stabbed at the youth who was drinking tea.
But suddenly, his body spasmed. He fell from the air, landed heavily on the ground, and spurted out a large mouthful of blood.
The few guards rushed out and punched and kicked the youth who was already unable to get up.
"Enough," the youth stood up, put the small golden box in his sleeve, turned around, and looked at the youth coldly, "Don't beat him to death. I still count on him to help me do a lot of things!"
He suddenly laughed, "With his current skills, he can break through the ninth level before he is twenty years old, right? No... maybe earlier."
...
One night not long after, the youth knelt in front of a man in a yellow robe.
"Please, Crown Prince, kill Third Prince!"
"I am willing to pay any price, including my own life!"
The man laughed, "Do you not care about your own life?"
"No one in this world cares about me. I don't care about anyone, including...myself."
"I live to get revenge. For me, life now is more painful than death."
The man became solemn and said slowly: "Live. This is my first order."
...
Jiang Ge walked in front of the armored guards and stated in a clear voice: "Now that you are free, is there anything you want to do?"
Hearing this, the armored guards all turned their eyes to Jiang Xu, whose voice was hoarse from yelling around.
They have been tortured by the Heart-Devouring Gu for a long time. The longest time was five-six years, while the shortest time was a year or so. Although they were forced to obey orders, how could they not have resentment in their hearts?
At this time, they only wanted to do one thing.
"You...what do you want to do?" Jiang Xu looked at the armored guards who surrounded him and said in panic.
The armored guards' smiles revealed a hint of murderous intent.
"The Fifth Prince and Third Prince have a murdered-mother grudge and only slashed Third Prince with one swipe. Of course, we won't slash more."
"Come on, I will only slash one time and stop at that. Our grudges end there."
"After being tortured for many years, it’s mercy to only slash once!"
"I heard that the little palace maid from back then was killed by Third Prince? It's a pity that a perfectly fine girl had become a pile of minced meat. The innocent Fifth Prince got wrongly blamed and almost beaten to death."
"Third Prince, isn't it more interesting to watch your body turn into a pile of minced meat while alive?"
"Be gentle. It will be boring if he dies like that!"
...
After a long time, the armored guards finally stopped their actions and left the yard together.
Jiang Ge waited outside the yard and sighed, "Doing this in our Jiang family's ancestral hall probably making the ancestors of the Jiang family cry!"
The armored guards lowered their heads, not knowing how to respond for a moment.
Then they heard Jiang Ge say, "Still, I forgive you. I won't pursue this matter. You have suffered a lot over the years. Now you can do what you want. Although I have always been at odds with Third Prince, the deceased is the greatest. I will do my best for him. Each of you can get 100 taels of silver from me. No one will stop you from going anywhere in the future."
After a long silence, an armored guard suddenly declared, "I am willing to be loyal to your Highness, Crown Prince!"
When he spoke, many armored guards followed in suit, "We are willing to be loyal to your Highness, Crown Prince!"
Jiang Ge smiled, "But I am different from Younger Third Brother. I can only accept those who are truly loyal to me. If you are loyal to me, I will not betray you. If you betray me... I will kill you without mercy! But I will not use despicable means to control or threaten you. Before you betray me, I am willing to believe in your loyalty and will always believe in it!"
The armored guards shouted in unison, "We are willing to be loyal to your Highness, Crown Prince until death!"
Jiang Ge glanced at Jiang Mo and saw the sight of his closed eyes, tight frown, and violently shaking body.
"What's wrong with you?" Jiang Ge was slightly startled, "Isn't your gu already removed?"
Jiang Mo's toes fiercely touched the ground and he flew up with the force and entered the empty ancestral hall.
A loud "boom" was heard in the ancestral hall. An invisible air wave gushed out of the ancestral hall, causing the surrounding walls to collapse. For a moment, even the air seemed to stagnate.
Through the broken wall, smoke and dust could be seen billowing in the ancestral hall. The entire ancestral hall collapsed.
When the smoke and dust cleared, Jiang Mo's figure appeared in the ruins.
Everyone's eyes were fixed on Jiang Mo, with strong shock in their eyes.
"Is this... witnessing the ninth level breakthrough?"
"Ninth level breakthrough... so scary."
"The ancestral hall is gone!"
"This seems... unimportant."
There was a little more vigilance in Jiang Ge's eyes. He walked toward Jiang Mo and asked, "What are your plans next?"
Jiang Mo saw through his thoughts at a glance and calmly replied, "I have no interest in what you are planning. You can do whatever you want. I will not help you or stop you. But there is one matter... how do you plan to deal with Noble Concubine Meng?"
Noble Concubine Meng was Jiang Xu's mother and an accomplice of Jiang Xu's evil deeds over the years.
Jiang Ge smiled, "Her son died suddenly and tragically, so she will naturally be overly sad. I heard that she has always been in poor health. Afraid she won’t live long!"
"Like this... it makes sense." Jiang Mo nodded.
Jiang Ge's eyes suddenly became sharp, staring straight into Jiang Mo's eyes, and confirmed again: "You... definitely won't help him, right?"
He didn't mind Jiang Mo too much. But now that Jiang Mo broke through the ninth level out of the blue, he had to be on guard.
"I have suffered a lot over the years," Jiang Mo said slowly, "When I was suffering and about to die, did he help me?"
Jiang Ge's mouth corner smiled deeper, "Indeed, when you were forced by Jiang Xu to admit that you killed the palace maid, he knew about it and had went with the flow, letting you bear the crime. With such a heavy punishment, ordinary people can't stand it for three days, but he wanted you to be punished for seven days. Basically wanting to kill you. If I hadn't privately instructed the executioner to secretly give care, you would be beaten to death."
He sighed "He knew that you and your mother were planted with the Heart-Devouring Gu, but he doesn't care and lets you fend for yourself. And now, even if you have the ability to help him, you won't do it, right?"
Jiang Mo gently raised his right hand, looked at the deep scar on his hand, and slowly responded, "What you love to do has nothing to do with me, you don't have to tell me."
Jiang Ge finally smiled with relief, turned around, and waved to the dark guards and armored guards behind him, saying, "Follow me!"
...
When the people of Tancheng were happily making dumplings at home, the palace was already a river of blood.
The Imperial City Guards fought with the Dark Guards and Armored Guards until dawn and finally lost. Seeing that the situation was over, the surviving Imperial City Guards chose to surrender.
The emperor sat dejectedly on his throne, like a tiger with all its teeth pulled out.
“Third Younger Brother's armored guards are powerful. As expected of carefully selected experts. It's a small team of 400 people, but they are more powerful than an army of 5,000 people. In recent years, he had recruited experts from all over the world and used the Heart-Devouring Gu to control them to work for him. What a headache!" Jiang Ge wiped the blood on the sword and put it back into the sheath. The sound of metal collision made the emperor raise his eyelids and sighed.
"Your secret guards aren’t bad, better than I thought." The emperor remarked with a bit of sadness in his eyes, "Your Third Younger Brother... died?"
"He died tragically." Jiang Ge didn’t hide it and even exaggerated his tone.
The emperor was silent for a while and asked, "What are you going to do to me?"
"After Royal Father abdicates, I will build an underground palace for Royal Father to enjoy your old age. All of Royal Father's Noble Concubines will go into the underground palace to accompany you... except Noble Concubine Meng." Jiang Ge said.
"Concubine Meng? What are you going to do to her?"
"Jiang Mo wants me to kill her to avenge his mother, so I can't help but comply. But don't worry, Royal Father, she won't die too painfully, but she won't die too easily either. After all, I have to give Jiang Mo an explanation."
The emperor was slightly stunned, "Why do you listen to Jiang Mo?"
"Oh, because he broke through the ninth level."
"He broke through the ninth level... why didn't he come to save me?"
"... You have the nerve to ask?"
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