If I Cannot Love Him, I Will Lose the Ability to Love

William Wang Jinling nodded. He wasn’t trying to intimidate Serena Feng—though the news wasn’t confirmed yet, there was no smoke without fire. The bounty was tempting not only to Northlyn, but even within the Wang clan, quite a few were moved by it.

If William weren’t holding the reins, those profit-blinded members of the Wang clan might have used their connection with Serena to strike at her from the shadows.

Men die for wealth, birds for food. All the fighting for power and dominance comes down to chasing riches. With such a fortune at stake, anyone with a chance to grab it would be tempted.

Serena let out a sigh, at a loss for words. Right now, unless she took control of the Assassin Alliance, there was no way out. But seizing the Alliance was no easier than overturning a kingdom.

Back when she encountered the assassin Zuo An and first learned about the bounty, Serena had thought the threat wasn’t that serious. Only now did she realize she’d been far too naive.

A sky-high bounty didn’t just attract assassins—it drew countless others hungry for silver. Just like the Lu clan years ago, wiped out by Westlyn for the sake of money.

For those people, killing her was easy—at least easier than massacring the Lu clan.

William understood the pressure Serena was under, but for her own safety, he had to remind her again: "Serena, you have to take control of the assassin world. If you don't, you'll spend your whole life looking over your shoulder, haunted by the threat of hidden attacks."

He’d brought Serena down the mountain today precisely to make her see just how dangerous her situation was. If she didn’t take it seriously, she could lose her life at any moment.

During her month at Skyvault Palace, Serena had enjoyed freedom and ease, unaware that outside, chaos had erupted because of her. All kinds of factions were lying in wait, just waiting for her to appear.

Every step she took, she had to guard against assassins. Every place she went, she had to send people ahead to check. This wasn’t the life Serena wanted. She understood William’s point, but...

William made it sound easy, but actually doing it was anything but simple. Serena sighed again, not wanting to dwell on such a heavy topic.

"Let’s go take a look ahead." The fighting up ahead had already stopped. No more assassins were coming, which meant William’s dark-guards had won.

Seeing Serena didn’t want to continue the conversation, William didn’t push her. He nodded and followed along.

The closer they got, the thicker the stench of blood. Serena’s expression grew heavier—she knew that because of her, many people on the Nine Provinces would die. Whether they were innocent or not, she refused to dwell on it. If it was her life or theirs, she’d choose to live, even if it meant innocent lives were lost.

As they drew closer, they saw a dozen bodies sprawled across the ground, all dressed in black. Serena couldn’t tell which were William’s dark-guards and which were assassins.

"Did any of your dark-guards die?" Unable to tell them apart, she went straight to the source.

"Yes. Three died." William scanned the bodies and immediately recognized the three fallen guards.

"Which three are them?" Serena searched the corpses for the ones who’d died protecting her.

"The ones with a dark red mark embroidered at the collar are Wang clan dark-guards." The mark was subtle, barely visible unless inspected closely, but once Serena stepped into the pile, she quickly found the three William had mentioned.