AEKMEM chapter 49

This time, the Demon King’s curse was more severe than before. However, since An Qiao’s magical power had recovered to about 60% and his light-attribute magic could alleviate the pain of the curse to some extent, he wasn’t as uncomfortable as before.

He was just a little listless; his eyes and brows were droopy, and he looked even paler and weaker.

The next morning, An Qiao slowly washed up and went downstairs but didn’t see Chu Heng.

Remembering what he had witnessed the night before—Chu Heng’s rare display of fury and rage when he discovered that Jun Yilian of the Jun family had hired four S-rank beastmen to assassinate him—An Qiao’s eyelids twitched.

Then, he recalled Chu Heng’s threat to kill the person who injured him.

An Qiao’s eyelids twitched again.

Even with his special status as the Crown Prince of the Empire, killing Jun Yilian so impulsively and carelessly would cause considerable trouble!

“Where is Chu Heng?” he asked Jiang Qi, Chu Heng’s adjutant.

Jiang Qi lowered his eyes, seemingly oblivious to his surroundings. “A friend of Your Highness’s, Yin Que, is in Blue Star City right now. He wants to discuss some business collaborations with Your Highness.”

An Qiao smiled faintly. “What a coincidence. I also want to meet this friend of Chu Heng’s.”

Jiang Qi: “… ”

He knew it! The Crown Princess definitely wouldn’t believe this excuse. He had asked Chu Heng to come up with another excuse, but now, Chu Heng was telling him to figure out a way to cover it up himself. How was he supposed to do that?

“Tell me, did he go to the Imperial Capital?”

Jiang Qi: “… ”

He did go. Last night, he stormed off to the Imperial Capital, still furious. He should be back by now.

He forced a smile. “How could that be? His Highness really went to see a friend, he should be back in a while—”

“If you don’t believe me, then you can ask him.”

It’s better to sacrifice a friend than for him to do it himself. His Highness should bear the Crown Princess’s wrath himself.

**

“You hired those four S-rank beastmen who assassinated An Qiao, didn’t you?” Chu Heng asked expressionlessly.

“Assassination? What are you talking about, Your Highness? I don’t understand.” Jun Yilian looked puzzled.

“Also, Your Highness, isn’t it a bit too brazen and lawless of you to break into my room in the middle of the night?”

He hadn’t received any news from the four men that night, so he knew the assassination attempt on An Qiao must have failed.

Another failure!

Furious, he locked himself in a soundproof room and smashed things for over half an hour.

He hadn’t expected this to be discovered, much less for Chu Heng to stand up for An Qiao and barge into the Jun family home to confront him.

Chu Heng had completely isolated the room with energy, setting up an energy “barrier.” No sound or movement could escape, and messages couldn’t be transmitted via the personal terminal.

It was late at night, and no one would notice.

Chu Heng used his mental power to conceal his movements, ensuring that no one or monitoring system would discover that he had broken in.

Jun Yi-lian had been startled awake, terrified when he first saw Chu Heng.

But he quickly regained his composure.

Chu Heng likely couldn’t prove that he had sent someone to assassinate An Qiao.

—Even in the worst-case scenario, what could Chu Heng do to him even if he had evidence?

After all, he was the most powerful and talented healer among the younger generation of the Empire—an S-rank elf with the highest healing abilities. There was a strong chance he would soon break through to the 2S rank.

Elves were rare in the Empire, and top-tier elves were considered treasures. There were only a handful of S-rank elves in the entire empire.

Ordinary elves were usually treated leniently if their crimes weren’t too serious. They were allowed to atone for their sins by healing others.

As for S-rank and higher elves, they are only severely punished for capital crimes, such as treason.

All he’s doing now is sending someone to assassinate a failed, useless elf.

Even if this elf is Chu Heng’s crown princess, so what?

Would Chu Heng really turn against the most dazzling and promising S-rank elf for this person?

Even if Chu Heng has evidence, he’ll only use it to control him and make him work for the Crown Prince’s faction unless he’s stupid.

At worst, if Chu Heng completely lost his mind over An Qiao and exposed him, according to the Empire’s elf laws, he wouldn’t be sentenced to death. At most, he would lose his reputation and freedom temporarily, forced to provide mental power treatment to certain people.

Once the storm had passed, those who needed his S-rank elf abilities would naturally find a way to restore his freedom.

“You know what I mean,” Chu Heng sneered.

“Last time, you had An Yuchun make a move—”
He punched Jun Yilian in the face.

“This time, you sent someone to assassinate him—” Another punch landed, still aimed at the face.

Jun Yilian was completely stunned.

Beastmen of the Empire valued manners. Almost no beastman would presume to attack an elf, let alone slap one in the face.

Has Chu Heng gone mad?! How could the Crown Prince of the Empire be so rude as to punch an elf like this?

Using only his physical strength, Chu Heng punched Jun Yilian several more times. “You’ve repeatedly tried to harm my crown princess. Did you think I was dead? Did you think I wouldn’t be angry? Did you think I’d care about your S-rank elf status?”

With his face bruised and swollen, blood streaming from his mouth and nose, and in obvious pain, Jun Yilian hated Chu Heng with a vengeance. Yet, his face remained innocent as he managed to ask, “Your Highness, isn’t there some misunderstanding?”

Just wait! Once he gets out, he’ll expose Chu Heng’s actions. How could a crown prince of the empire secretly use torture against an elf? Even if Chu Heng was the marshal of the Second Army Corps and the heir apparent, he couldn’t blatantly disregard imperial law!

“No misunderstanding,” Chu Heng said coldly.

This time, he had destroyed Jun Yilian’s spiritual sea.

Mental power is the medium and foundation of supernatural abilities. Once the spiritual sea is destroyed, mental power is gone as well, meaning abilities can no longer be used—it’s equivalent to crippling one’s innate talent entirely.

“You…you actually dared to cripple me?!”
Jun Yilian couldn’t believe it. He had never imagined that Chu Heng would be so insane!

Crippling an elf was a major crime in the Empire.
Let alone an S-grade elf, whose existence was of great importance to the Empire!

Did Chu Heng have even a shred of responsibility or big-picture awareness as the crown prince? Did he understand how crucial an S-grade elf’s power and existence were to the empire?

Besides, wasn’t Chu Heng afraid of the Jun family’s revenge? The Jun family is one of the top aristocratic clans in the imperial capital and a force the royal family can’t afford to underestimate. If the Jun family refused to support Chu Heng as crown prince, his path to the throne would be anything but easy.

But then, Jun Yilian finally realized—
He had been crippled.

His greatest pride was his elven bloodline purity of 88%. Before the eldest young master of the An family revealed his bloodline purity of 89%, he was undoubtedly the Empire’s number one elf and its most celebrated flower.

He was the most talented and powerful healer among the younger generation of the empire, backed by the influential Jun family. He would never allow anyone to step on his toes!

Therefore, at the crucial moment of the eldest son of the An family’s awakening, he sent someone to assassinate him, causing the awakening to fail.

He didn’t kill him; he simply wanted to torture the An family’s eldest son. He wanted the once-glorious and proud son to watch helplessly as he became crippled and was scorned and mocked. He wanted him to struggle painfully in the dust and mud.

However, Jun Yilian never imagined that one day he would be reduced to the same cripple he considered shameful.

He was useless…a cripple. What possibilities did his life hold now? He could imagine the pity, mockery, schadenfreude, and disgust in others’ eyes after they learned of his condition.

How could he, proud and admired for his S-rank elf status, possibly endure all of this?

He couldn’t accept the reality of being a cripple or bear the strange looks from others. The Jun family would undoubtedly abandon him and groom another successor.

As a cripple whose healing abilities had been destroyed, would he have any standing in the Jun family? Who would even look at a cripple like him?

How hateful! He shouldn’t have just crippled the eldest son of the An family to make him a laughingstock. He should have killed him. Otherwise, that good-for-nothing wouldn’t have been dragged into Chu Heng’s schemes for revenge and turned him into a cripple as well.

A cripple… Ha! Who would have thought that Jun Yilian would also become a cripple?

“I’m a cripple… I’m a cripple…” Jun Yilian collapsed to the ground, his heart filled with despair and his eyes vacant.

“Not only that.” Chu Heng sneered.

Next, he crippled Jun Yilian completely, leaving him in a “vegetative state”—conscious but unable to react to the outside world and incurable.

“Oh, right. I forgot to tell you,” he said, speaking half-truthfully, before leaving. “If you hadn’t sent someone to assassinate back then, I wouldn’t have a crown princess who is an elf now.”

Sure enough, upon hearing these words, the still-conscious Jun Yilian convulsed violently. His reaction was so intense that he seemed extremely agitated.

How could he not be agitated?

He had sent someone to assassinate him, intending to prevent the eldest young master of the An family from awakening and stop him from stepping on Jun Yilian’s head. However, it inadvertently helped the young master awaken further, increasing the purity of his elf bloodline and causing him to revert to an elf.

He didn’t doubt Chu Heng’s words. During the New Year’s Eve dinner test, An Qiao’s elven bloodline purity increased from 89 to 99, making it possible for him to revert to elven form.

An elf! Despite his desperate desire and countless prayers to heaven, he could never become an elf! Yet his hated enemy, though initially failing to awaken through the assassination attempt, later awakened again and reverted to an elven form!

The eldest son of the An family had thus become an elf. Hadn’t Jun Yilian’s actions been in vain?

Unfortunately, even though he knew that An Qiao was an elf, he couldn’t reveal it because he was in a vegetative state and would never awaken. He could only be consumed by eternal regret.

Seeing Jun Yilian’s reaction, Chu Heng slightly curled his lips, but there was no smile in his eyes.

—He wanted to make Jun Yilian wish he were dead, filled with lifelong regret!

Seeing An Qiao standing there pale and weak with blood trickling from his lips and several dead men lying on the ground, Chu Heng couldn’t control his rage and lingering fear, even though An Qiao claimed it was a relapse of an old injury and that those bastards couldn’t have hurt him.

He knew An Qiao was capable, but what if? What if those people happened to be there when An Qiao’s injury flared up and took the opportunity to attack him? Knowing that Jun Yilian was behind it all and had repeatedly plotted against An Qiao, how could Chu Heng possibly let him go? How could he keep someone with such deep-seated malice toward An Qiao—and the means to act on it—alive?

**

Chu Heng returned to Blue Star City on Water Blue Star the next morning.

He had barely returned to the garden castle where An Qiao was when Emperor Chu Zhengming initiated a video call.

“Did you have anything to do with what happened to the Jun family?” Emperor Chu Zhengming stared at him with an extremely unpleasant expression. Although it was a question, his tone was certain.

After receiving news that Jun Yilian had been crippled and was now helpless, and remembering the assassination attempt on An Qiao in Blue Star City the previous day, Chu Zhengming suspected that Jun Yilian had sent someone to kill An Qiao, prompting Chu Heng’s furious revenge.

Only someone with Chu Heng’s mental strength and supernatural abilities, both at level 2S or higher, could break into the heavily guarded Jun family compound in the middle of the night without being detected and cripple Jun Yilian so quietly that no one noticed in time.

There were very few beastmen in the Empire with supernatural abilities at level 2S, and even fewer with mental strength at level 2S.

And Chu Heng had a motive to cripple Jun Yilian.

To cripple an S-rank elf of immense importance to the Empire without hesitation—that seemed like something Chu Heng was capable of doing.

“What did you say? I don’t understand.” Chu Heng’s expression remained utterly calm.

Of course, he couldn’t admit it. Besides, no one had any evidence to prove he did it.

Chu Zhengming’s blood pressure soared with anger at Chu Heng’s shameless attitude.

“You just crippled an S-rank elf like that? Do you know the consequences will be dire? Every S-rank elf in the empire is crucial. Every year, countless high-ranking beastmen suffer mental breakdowns that require the healing abilities of high-ranking elves. As the crown prince, don’t you know that?”

“Most of the beastmen who suffer mental breakdowns are soldiers on the battlefield. As the Marshal of the Second Army, aren’t you aware that many of them suffer because no elves can heal them? The ability to soothe or cause immense pain, shatter one’s mental sea, and lead to death?”

“Do you know what an S-rank elf means to the Empire?”

Chu Heng’s lips curled into a sarcastic smile. “What does it mean? You weren’t this agitated when the eldest young master of the An family failed to awaken after being seriously injured in an assassination attempt.”

“You mean Jun Yilian was also the one who orchestrated the assassination attempt that caused An Qiao’s failed awakening?” Chu Zhengming immediately understood the implication.

The failed awakening of the An family’s eldest young master had indeed caused a sensation. The relevant departments of the empire had painstakingly investigated the cause, but they hadn’t found any clues.

Unexpectedly, Jun Yilian was behind it all.

However, an elf who has never awakened and possesses only an extremely pure elf bloodline cannot compare to an awakened S-rank elf, the most talented in the Empire.

Chu Heng actually crippled an S-rank elf over this.

This S-rank elf from the Jun family had painstakingly cultivated his reputation, and he was second only to the crown prince, Chu Heng, in prestige among the younger generation in the empire.

“Even so, you shouldn’t have acted so impulsively and disregarded the bigger picture,” said Chu Zhengming, frowning. “You could have exposed his crimes, and he would have been punished by the empire’s laws. His S-rank healing abilities could also serve the empire.”

“Punishment?” Chu Heng scoffed.

Those flimsy sanctions were nothing to Jun Yilian.

Chu Zhengming was amused by his attitude. “You think that, without evidence, I can guess? Do you think those clever people wouldn’t guess it was you—the Crown Prince of the Empire—who did it?”

“The removal of Jun Yilian, this S-rank elf, will definitely cause a huge uproar throughout the empire. As the crown prince, with your impulsive, reckless, and violent actions that disregard imperial laws, how do you expect people to see you, to obey you?”

“You, the crown prince of the Empire and marshal of the army, acted recklessly and impulsively to cripple an important S-rank elf, all for the sake of your crown princess and personal affairs. Do you have any sense of responsibility as the crown prince or the bigger picture an heir apparent should have?”

Chu Zhengming was genuinely angry and truly disappointed.

He knew that Chu Heng valued his Crown Princess greatly, but he never expected him to value An Qiao this much. He never expected him to go crazy and disregard everything just because of An Qiao, even crippling an S-grade elf.

Chu Zhengming wasn’t suggesting that Chu Heng let Jun Yilian off easily for repeatedly attempting to assassinate An Qiao. In fact, he agreed that Chu Heng should expose Jun Yilian’s crimes and let him be punished. However, there was absolutely no need to cripple Jun Yilian—his S-grade healing ability could have been used to serve the empire.

“Then go ahead and strip me of my title as crown prince.” Chu Heng said flatly and indifferently.

“After all, my overall perspective only extends to my Qiao Qiao—”

“I can endure being wronged, but my Qiao-Qiao cannot.”

He was never a good person to begin with. He grew up crawling through danger and chaos on a garbage star and experienced everything. A little grievance was nothing to him. But his proud, beautiful Qiao-Qiao was an elf. He should have been the moon high in the sky or the untouched snow atop the mountain.

He would never allow anyone to defile him in the slightest!

In the distant living room, where Chu Heng could not see, An Qiao—who had sensed Chu Heng’s return the moment his spiritual power had spread—had just happened to “hear” the conversation between Chu Zhengming and Chu Heng through his spiritual power.

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