After Su Ruhan left, Mu Xueshi sat alone staring blankly at the small jar in his hand.
After a while, something suddenly struck him.
Before he fainted earlier, the Third Prince had seemed to be in terrible condition. Mu Xueshi clearly remembered rushing toward him. Yet the moment he got close, the Third Prince had violently shoved him away.
Then he disappeared.
The thought made Mu Xueshi’s face pale instantly.
He placed the ointment jar on the bed and rushed outside without another thought.
But the moment he stepped out, he realized his legs were weak as cotton. His entire body felt drained of strength.
Worse still, he was completely unfamiliar with the layout of Linhan Palace. Not a single person could be seen nearby to ask for directions.
Left with no choice, Mu Xueshi could only run anxiously in the direction he thought led outward.
Unknowingly, he had headed toward the back mountain.
A heavy stench drifted from the forested slopes—an unbearable odor of decay and death. The smell forced its way into Mu Xueshi’s nose and throat.
Covering his nose, he tried to skirt around the hill.
But the interior of the hill was shrouded in thick mist.
The fog seemed to appear from nowhere, without warning. Worse still, it grew denser by the moment, pressing against his chest until breathing itself became difficult.
Mu Xueshi hurriedly turned back along the path he had come from.
Yet the fog did not thin.
Instead, it thickened.
It soon became obvious that the mist was anything but ordinary. Not only did its density increase, its color darkened as well—until at last the world around him vanished entirely.
He could not even see his own hand before his face.
Groping blindly through the fog, Mu Xueshi suddenly struck his knee against something hard. Pain shot through half his leg, leaving it numb.
Grimacing, he crouched down and rubbed his knee.
Only then did he realize he had collided with a gravestone.
Mu Xueshi had never been a superstitious person. Back when he was still a student, he often joined classmates in volunteer grave-cleaning activities. Tombstones held no particular terror for him.
He lifted his leg to continue forward.
Suddenly, something caught around his ankle.
He tried shaking his foot free—but whatever it was refused to loosen.
Mu Xueshi assumed it was some creeping vine or tangled weeds. When he failed to shake it off, he crouched down again to remove it by hand.
The moment he saw what had wrapped around his ankle—
Mu Xueshi completely lost control and screamed.
The beautiful face that usually carried a carefree expression was now twisted with pure terror.
Two severed arms.
They were drenched in fresh blood, as though they had just been hacked from a body.
The hands, their bones clearly defined beneath the skin, were gripping his ankle with frightening strength.
Mu Xueshi dared not try to pry them loose.
Because the sensation on his leg felt as hard and cold as stone.
A tide of horror swept through his body. He did not dare move a single inch.
Although it was broad daylight, the dense fog made the place darker than night.
Mu Xueshi desperately wished this was nothing but a nightmare.
But the sharp pain in his leg kept dragging him back to reality.
Even after being frightened nearly to the point of collapse, one thought still lingered stubbornly in his mind.
The Third Prince.
If the prince had been poisoned because of him, then he had to find the Second Prince and retrieve the antidote—no matter the cost.
Taking a deep breath, Mu Xueshi shut his eyes tightly and reached down to his ankle.
He prepared himself to tear those hands away.
But after fumbling around for several moments—
He touched nothing.
Mu Xueshi slowly opened his eyes, trembling.
The two severed arms had vanished.
The thick fog blanketing the mountain had also dispersed without a trace.
His mouth fell open in disbelief.
Standing not far away, dressed in a pale blue robe and wearing a calm expression, was the Third Prince.
Just a few hours earlier, he had been the one who had drawn the poison from Mu Xueshi’s body.
And throughout everything that had just happened—
He had watched silently from the side.
From Mu Xueshi stumbling about Linhan Palace like a foolish child… to the terror he felt when confronted with the fog created by the Golden Silkworm Gu and the phantom arms formed from a venom-born illusion.
The Third Prince had observed it all with cold detachment.
Futile Devices Scans 
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