Chapter 69: Shut Them Up, It’s That Simple

Chapter 69: Shut Them Up, Simple as That

Li Zhiming knew he couldn't back down, so he walked over.

Sang Yu easily grabbed his hands and, with a little force, pressed him down onto the stone steps nearby.

Li Zhiming's entire body stiffened as countless eyes fell upon him, a wave of humiliation and despair like he'd never felt washing over him.

He closed his eyes, almost in despair.

"Stop!"

Su Yi stepped forward, stopping Sang Yu from undressing him.

Sang Yu looked up, annoyed, glanced over, and said nothing.

A suffocating pressure and coldness rushed at him. Su Yi gritted his teeth and shot back, "Lord Li is the envoy representative of our court. It's been a rule since ancient times not to mistreat envoys."

As if he'd just heard a joke, Sang Yu burst out laughing: "I've even killed an emperor. Rules?"

What?

Everyone's faces changed drastically. They'd come to prevent a civil war, keep Sang Yu alive, stop the King of Nanxun from killing him, and then bring him back.

Judging from what he was saying...

Sang Yu noticed the shock and confusion on Li Zhiming's face, patted his cheek, and said with a smile, "Curious, eldest young master?"

Li Zhiming pursed his lips, staring at him.

He was indeed curious.

But with him pinned down like this, it wasn't the time to be gossiping, and he couldn't swallow his pride.

"Since the eldest young master's curious, I'll tell you."

Sang Yu pinched his earlobe, playing with it like he couldn't get enough. Other than that, he didn't do anything too much, just kept him pinned there, unable to get up.

Before long, Li Zhiming's face flushed red.

It looked like it was from the rubbing and teasing, but only Sang Yu knew how sensitive his earlobes were, and he knew exactly how to pinch them to get the biggest reaction.

Only Sang Yu knew why his face was flushed like that.

That made it even more tempting, and his voice turned low and husky, laced with desire.

"I killed the old emperor. From now on, I'm the new king of Nanxun. I'm not gonna die, got it?"

He said it as casually as if he'd just finished a meal.

Li Zhiming knew Sang Yu's past and didn't have any love for the old emperor anyway. His death didn't matter to Li Zhiming's mission.

But the others didn't know that.

Su Yi stared at Sang Yu in shock, his face full of disbelief: "You... you killed your own father? A son killing his father is an unforgivable sin against heaven. You... you..."

He fumbled for a while, unable to find the right word to describe it.

But the military officer behind him, blunt as always, cursed loudly: "You're nothing but an animal! Just because he sent you off as a hostage, our court never treated you badly. You beast."

"Exactly! A son killing his own father—unheard of. You're a real lunatic."

"No wonder everyone called you a madman. Let Lord Li go now, or don't blame us for getting rough."

"That's right, let Lord Li go! You're worse than an animal, a bastard through and through, with no humanity at all."

"The King of Nanxun was really unlucky, seduced by that old woman and then stuck with that bastard..."

"...!"

Everyone piled on, one after another, as if trying to drown out this father-killing son with accusations and curses.

Li Zhiming didn't have time to stop them.

With a miserable scream, blood splattered across the sky. Everyone immediately shut up, and the air went dead silent.

Sang Yu tossed the sword to the ground without a word, the metal clattering loudly.

"See? Shutting them up—simple as that."

He said it coolly.

Those words were aimed at Li Zhiming.

Li Zhiming was at a loss for words. Knowing Sang Yu's past and his pain, he couldn't bring himself to tell him to be forgiving in the face of his bloody rampage.

He stayed quiet, and the shaken officers snapped back to their senses.

"Lord Li, say something!"

"This bastard's got some nerve! How dare he just kill an envoy? We can't let him break the rules!"

Su Yi, just a scholar, was scared too. He quickly pulled himself together, but he couldn't hold back the furious officers, and he hadn't expected things to go this far.

"Shut up!"

Li Zhiming roared. No one held him back; he stood up on his own.

The one who'd just been killed was one of the officers, blood soaking the ground.

Everyone looked pissed and angry. These were men who lived by the sword, not afraid of blood, but Sang Yu's bold move had caught them off guard.

Once they snapped out of it, their blood was up. Furious, they drew their weapons one by one.

Sang Yu narrowed his eyes at Li Zhiming, acting like no one else was there, looking only at him with a faint, mocking smile: "What, does the eldest young master think I'm worse than an animal and deserve to die too?"

He stood perfectly still.

His hands hung at his sides, hidden in his wide sleeves. Only he knew his fingers were trembling a little.

Li Zhiming calmly met his gaze, opening his mouth to speak. He remembered the nights they'd shared a bed, when Sang Yu, like a frightened bird, had told him about his past.

In that moment, he'd been like a helpless child.

Now, the blood-soaked demon had also been pushed to this point. He was wrong, but it wasn't all his fault.

As an outsider, none of that had happened to him, so he had no right to talk from a place of comfort, or to demand forgiveness and grace.

Of course, even if he did, it wouldn't do any good.

Li Zhiming shook his head: "You don't deserve to die, but neither do the innocent people. You can hate their reckless words, you can punish them, but they don't deserve death."

"Isn't death good?" Sang Yu stubbornly argued, "Once dead, there's no more pain. I'm setting them free."

"That's not a right you get to give."

"Why not? I do what I want, and nobody can stop me." After a pause, he added, "Including you."

As expected.

The two traded words, and Su Yi couldn't help but interject: "Young Master Yu, Brother Li is right. Although I don't know what happened to you, every person's life..."

"Then shut up if you don't know!"

Sang Yu shot him an icy glare, and Su Yi froze, his sentence dying mid-word.

At the sight of his face and hearing him call Li Zhiming "Brother Li," Sang Yu looked him up and down, tilting his neck: "You two are pretty chummy."

Li Zhiming almost reflexively explained: "No, we're just fellow officials in the same court."

Sang Yu clearly didn't believe it.

"Since when has the eldest young master been so diligent? As I recall, he never held a real post—so how could he have colleagues?"

"Well..."

That was true before; he'd only been a figurehead.

It was only after Sang Yu left that he got so bored he started actually going to work, but admitting that in front of everyone was more mortifying than death.

He chose to keep his mouth shut.

To Sang Yu, Li Zhiming's silence looked like a helpless failure to refute—a reluctant admission.

That thoroughly enraged Sang Yu.