Ning Chen got to his feet and was about to ask when Feng Qizheng suddenly threw himself into a roll, and an arrow flew over where his head had been and buried itself in a tree.

Ning Chen’s face changed at once, and he shouted at the top of his lungs, “Look out, all of you! Enemies!”

Gao Ziping and Chen Chong came charging out of the cave at the sound.

Yang Yongwang and the rest came running out too, hoes and sickles in their hands.

Feng Qizheng rolled up onto his feet and ran, tying his trousers as he went, and still found the breath to shout, “Run!”

Whip, whip, whip!!!

Arrow after arrow came in behind Feng Qizheng.

Feng Qizheng threw himself into a roll, came up clear of the arrows, got up and ran on forward, looking back as he went.

Ning Chen narrowed his eyes and looked. More than a dozen men in close-fitting black were hard after Feng Qizheng, and they moved fast.

Ning Chen said harshly, “Go!”

The word was out, his blade was drawn, and he was running, meaning to get Feng Qizheng out.

“Don’t come over! Every damn one of them is first-rate… Leave me. Take them and run.”

Feng Qizheng was shouting it.

Whip, whip, whip!!!

A dozen more arrows went at Feng Qizheng and drove him rolling along the ground.

The men behind him closed the distance fast.

“Yang Yongwang, take your people and run!”

Ning Chen shouted it. There was no chance he would leave Feng Qizheng behind.

Nor, naturally, would Gao Ziping or Chen Chong.

The three of them ran at Feng Qizheng.

As they came up, Ning Chen threw his hand out and several stones went out in streaks of cold light.

Clang, clang, clang!!!

The men hunting Feng Qizheng swung their blades and knocked the stones away with precision.

Ning Chen’s eyes tightened. Feng Qizheng was right. These men really were first-rate.

Ning Chen watched the assassins come on, and his eyes went cold. “Kill them!”

The assassins had bows and crossbows. Run, and they would be living targets… hand-to-hand, they had a better chance of coming out alive.

Ning Chen had no attention to spare now for who these men were or how they had found them. He pushed off and went at them like a leopard.

The long blade came around trailing cold light and cut at one of the assassins.

The man brought his own blade across to block.

Clang!!!

Ning Chen’s stroke came in heavy and hard, struck full on the blade, and drove the assassin staggering backward.

Gao Ziping and the other two came in behind him.

The two sides were at once locked together.

These men had real skill and their bladework was vicious.

A long blade came for Ning Chen’s throat like lightning.

Ning Chen threw his body back hard, came out of the blade’s way, and cut three times, one after another.

Clang, clang, clang!!!

Sparks flew, the ringing of the metal cut at the ears, and the shock of it drove the man steadily backward.

Before the man could recover, Ning Chen dropped into a roll and went past him at a hand’s breadth.

The assassin let out a low grunt of pain and backed off hopping on one leg, because there was a hole in the other one, and blood coming out of it.

Thud!!!

An assassin took Feng Qizheng’s boot and went flying, and landed exactly in front of Ning Chen.

Ning Chen was not going to let a chance like that go. He swung the blade straight at the man’s neck.

The assassin rolled where he lay, and got out of the way of it.

Ning Chen laughed coldly and swung again.

“Hold!”

One of the assassins let out a low, heavy roar.

Everyone stopped for a moment.

Ning Chen paid no attention to any of it, and the long blade came down at the assassin on the ground trailing cold light.

Clang!!!

Another assassin brought his blade across and stopped the stroke.

“I said hold!”

The assassin who had called it roared again, angrily.

Ning Chen saw the chance was gone, pulled back fast, and fell back to Feng Qizheng and the others.

The assassin who had called the halt let his eyes come to rest on Ning Chen.

Ning Chen was watching him just as hard. The man was forty or so, powerfully built, with a very long face and a sharp eye.

“Who are you? How do you know the Thirteen Ghost-Shadow Blades?”

Ning Chen stopped short. “You know the Thirteen Ghost-Shadow Blades? Interesting… You’ve come to kill us, and you don’t know who we are?”

The man said coldly, “I’ll ask you once more. How do you know the Thirteen Ghost-Shadow Blades?”

Ning Chen’s eyes flickered. “An elder named Tao Qizhi taught me.”

“Uncle Tao? You’re Uncle Tao’s disciple?”

That brought Ning Chen up short. This man called Tao Qizhi his uncle in the craft? Then he had run into somebody who knew him.

He nodded. “That’s right.”

He and Tao Qizhi had never had the name of master and disciple, but he owed the man the gift of the art, and calling him master was not going too far.

Besides, only a fool would say no at a moment like this.

“What’s your name?”

“Ning Chen.”

Not only the horse-faced assassin. Every one of the others stopped dead too.

“Which Ning Chen?”

“Ning Chen, silver coat of the Inspectorate of Great Xuan.”

The whole company of assassins changed color.

The horse-faced assassin was astonished. “The Ning Chen who cut down the Empress’s brother for the people of Chongzhou? Who rode a thousand li and took the King of the Left Court alive?”

Ning Chen nodded. “The same.”

The horse-faced assassin waved his hand quickly. “Put up your blades, all of you!”

The whole company of assassins put their blades back in the scabbards.

The horse-faced assassin said furiously, “Damn it! We’ve been taken in… If we’d known it was you we were sent to kill, you couldn’t have beaten us into coming.”

Then, still shaken, he said, “Thank heaven we didn’t do you any harm.”

Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng and the others exchanged a glance.

Chen Chong said, low, “I never expected your name to be that useful.”

Ning Chen smiled a little. He had heard that men of the jianghu thought highly of him.

Gao Ziping said heavily, “So they’re the Ghost-Shadow Sect. No wonder they could find us.”

Ning Chen asked, curious, “Meaning what?”

Gao Ziping said, “The Ghost-Shadow Sect isn’t the biggest faction in the jianghu, but nobody dares provoke them, because the Ghost-Shadow Sect is the number one assassins’ organization in the jianghu.”

“Ghost-Shadow men aren’t only first-rate fighters. They’re masters of face-changing, of tracking, and of killing quietly.”

“And the Ghost-Shadow Sect is on the Inspectorate’s wanted list too. They’ve assassinated a fair number of high officials of the court.”

The corner of Ning Chen’s mouth twitched. So was he going to own this family connection or not?

The horse-faced assassin said, “Younger Brother Ning, a word aside.”

Ning Chen inclined his head slightly.

“Ning Chen, be careful.”

Ning Chen made a sound of agreement and walked off to one side with the horse-faced assassin.

“My name is Yuan Zishi. You can call me Elder Brother Yuan.”

Ning Chen nodded, and called him Elder Brother Yuan.

The Ghost-Shadow Sect was the biggest assassins’ organization in the jianghu. That was a considerable force, and it would certainly be of use later.

Yuan Zishi smiled. “I never thought the famous Ning the Silver Coat would turn out to be a younger brother of my own school.”

Ning Chen smiled. “If you hadn’t said it, I wouldn’t have known either. Tao—my master never once mentioned his own history to me.”

Yuan Zishi’s eyes turned suddenly hard. “If our uncle took you as his disciple, why didn’t you save him?”

Ning Chen had seen the question coming a long way off. He smiled bitterly. “First, I was deep in a prison of my own at the time and could not save myself.”

“Second, what do you take the Inspectorate for? Somewhere I could save a man out of whenever I liked?”

Yuan Zishi frowned. “You were in prison?”

Ning Chen went through it for him in outline.

Yuan Zishi heard him out and nodded slightly. “I see.”

He turned his head and looked at Feng Qizheng and the others, and murder flickered at the back of his eyes. “Our uncle was killed by the Inspectorate. And those three know what you are to me now. They can’t be left alive.”

Something jumped in Ning Chen’s chest. “Elder Brother Yuan, I’m a man of the Inspectorate myself.”

Yuan Zishi shook his head. “You’re not the same as them.”

(End of Chapter 310)