Chapter 1

Chapter 1

At this very moment, I was standing in the courtyard of a prince’s estate, the sun hanging bright and glaring in the sky, beating down hard enough to make a person dizzy.

This was the birthday banquet of Prince Lin, Chu Ziye, and the female lead, Liu Xiaoman, was currently bringing dishes out from the back kitchen one after another.

It was one of those boring historical romance stories about an aloof prince versus an adorable little cook. According to the original plot, this was Chapter One-Prince Chu Ziye would be attacked by an assassin, and Liu Xiaoman, who happened to be serving food nearby, would bravely step forward and take the assassin’s blade for him. Thus, the high-and-mighty prince would fall in love with the innocent, courageous heroine.

The problem was, the assassin herself did not especially want to do that.

As a law-abiding citizen of the twenty-first century, stabbing someone was a little beyond my psychological limits. Not to mention, I’d been faint at the sight of blood since I was a kid. Back in middle school biology class, when our teacher demonstrated an animal dissection for everyone, I passed out the second the knife went in, and the sound of an ambulance echoed across the entire campus.

Whoever wanted this assassin job could have it. I, for one, could not.

Fortunately, at the point in time I’d transmigrated into, the assassination had yet to happen. Before I alerted the guards of the prince’s estate, I should slip away first…

Wait.

I locked eyes with one of the estate guards.

Why was he looking at me?

My gaze shifted elsewhere-why were all the guards in the prince’s estate looking at me?

Following their gazes, I looked down at myself.

Black clothes, black bamboo hat, a long saber in hand, and an aura of murderous intent from head to toe.

I immediately wanted to kneel before the author.

Friend, I understand that you needed to push the male and female leads’ relationship forward, but could you maybe take basic logic into consideration too? In broad daylight, an assassin dresses herself up like this-were you afraid people wouldn’t be able to tell she was an assassin?!

“Protect His Highness!” the lead guard commander roared. All the guards drew their sabers, and the commander himself was already charging toward me.

I remembered the novel’s setting. This guard commander was called Black Eagle, the First Expert of the Imperial Palace. His Eagle Claw Technique had reached a near-supernatural level; he could crush an opponent’s incoming cavalry saber with five fingers. At this moment, he dove down at me from the pavilion above, his long robe billowing open in the wind. He truly looked like a black eagle carrying the shadow of death.

It was over. I was about to become the fastest-dead transmigrator in history.

Goodbye, Mom, tonight I set sail for distant shores…

I closed my eyes.

A thunderous boom rang out.

I opened my eyes and could hardly believe what I saw-just now, when Black Eagle had rushed in front of me, I’d flailed in a dying struggle, trying to raise my hands to cover my head.

And yet the First Expert of the Imperial Palace had been slapped away by me just like that. He crashed into a distant wall, then collapsed to the ground covered in dust and grime. The eagle radiating deathly menace had instantly turned into a wilted little farm chicken.

I stared at my own hand in shock-I clearly hadn’t used any strength.

More guards charged at me, and I swatted them aside one by one with effortless ease. As I kept swatting, I suddenly understood.

It wasn’t that the guards of the prince’s estate were too useless. It was that the person who saved the male lead had to be the female lead herself. In order to make that logic work, the assassin’s martial arts had no choice but to be set at an invincible level-so none of the estate guards could stop her, and she would be able to rush all the way up to Chu Ziye.

Through the figures of guards flying sideways one after another, I saw Liu Xiaoman’s frightened little face-stop being scared! For the sake of your romance, the author turned me into Iron Man plus the Hulk!

But I really didn’t want to stab you!

And after stabbing you, what good ending could a cannon-fodder character like me possibly have…

How could I protect myself? How could I explain barging into the prince’s estate dressed like this and then beating up all the guards?

In that flash of crisis, inspiration struck.

After swatting away the last guard, I dropped to one knee.

“This common woman greets Your Highness.”

Footsteps sounded. A figure in brocade robes gradually approached and stopped before me, the royal scent of ambergris incense drifting to the tip of my nose.

A guard moved to stop him. “Your Highness, it’s dangerous! Beware of trickery!”

But Chu Ziye waved a hand and said coolly, “With martial arts as high as hers, if she wanted to kill me, she would have no need to resort to such lowly means.”

The guard could only withdraw to the side. Chu Ziye walked up to me, and I knew he was waiting for my explanation.

“This common woman is Lu Xiaoshuang. I lost my parents when I was young. Because I was born with extraordinary strength, my master took me in and raised me. I have trained in martial arts for more than ten years. A month ago, my master passed away. Before dying, he told me to come seek refuge with Your Highness.”

My name came from the character for “frost” on the token at my waist. Everything else I made up on the spot. As expected of someone who had read countless novels, I gave myself a thumbs-up for my ability to improvise a character backstory under pressure.

I was already prepared for Chu Ziye to ask who my master was and why he’d told me to seek refuge here. That would be easy to make up. After all, Prince Lin’s reputation for virtue had spread throughout the land. It would be perfectly reasonable for some old senior of the martial world to greatly admire him.

However, Chu Ziye didn’t ask. He merely nodded.

“In that case, you may follow me from now on.”