[A/N: Changes were made to the previous chapter]
The streets of Blackstone were still stained with last night's blood when the first squad of city guards arrived at dawn.
Their boots pounded down the cobblestones as they rushed toward the scene, led by a captain whose face was pale with fury.
The sight that greeted them made their jaws clench. Broken halberds lay shattered in pieces. Stone walls were cracked where bodies had slammed into them.
And on the street itself, corpses sprawled in grotesque heaps — Fang Xiu, the City Lord's son, his silken robes soaked in crimson; the Xuan heirs, their throats pierced through by jagged steel shards; and nearly a dozen guards, their armor dented and torn apart like toys.
For a long moment, there was a stifling silence between them. The new guards stood frozen, the hairs on their neck rising at the sheer brutality of the scene in front of them.
Then the captain let out a guttural roar, his face twisted with rage.
