Writer's Note: Very early for my usual post but I got work......Well, the crown prince I introduced early on in the story has arrived and passed. With him gone, changes will come to the palace. The second son will rise to become the new crown prince. The fourth prince will soon enter the spotlight as the candidate most likely to challenge the second prince. The third prince is unknown and the fourth prince, Shen Dong, is that much closer to the throne. I'll try to release

Chapter 26: Song Dynasty's Most Wanted

"Move out of the way! Move!" the royal guards shouted as Lance quickly excited the old cemetery and arrived at the inner city districts. As the crowd hurriedly moved, one of the palace guards used a water element art to spray water all over the crowd.

Lance cursed as the water revealed glass over his body reflecting sunlight and hastily bound the bracelet to change his appearance. The palace guards never did see his appearance up close. Right now, he looked like a black-haired man with a small beard growing under his chin.

"That must be him!" one of the two palace guards roared as the third stayed behind to look after the corpse as the fourth had already left for reinforcements.

"Moon Slicer Art," Lance roared, crescent moon blades soaring at the two palace guards six feet in diameter. Lance followed up with an earth practitioner art: Pulse Rock Wave Art. As the two palace guards blocked the moon blades, a tidal wave of earth and stone roared toward them as Lance stomped his right foot onto the ground before rushing into a nearby inn.

"City Guards, he killed the crown prince! Get him!" one of the palace guards ordered as the the two combined forces to block the rock wave with their fire and water element arts. The nearby guards nodded and rushed into the inn. Lance had already ascended the stairs to the sleeping rooms and used his Viper's Dominance Art, blasting open all the doors with his spirit energy. He used his Mirror Mirage Art, turning invisible as he broke his disguise back to Lance Wang. The palace guards and pedestrians all saw the 'face' of the man who killed the crown prince.

As the guards rushed up stairs, Lance entered one of the rooms and closed the door. He stopped his practitioner art and turned back, stunned as he saw a bathing woman in a hot tub stare back at him. His eyes narrowed as two people appeared by the door, their blades held upside down as they positioned themselves before the woman.

"Turn invisible. Quickly," the bathing woman said, the three surprised as they heard the city guards.

"Open the doors and search! He entered one of the rooms!" the voices said, Lance quickly harnessing his spiritual energy and turned invisible as one guard entered the room, his face stunned by the beautiful young woman before him.

"How dare you enter My Lady's room as she bathes," one of the woman's bodyguards roared, the city guardsman's face reddening as her words brought back his senses.

"Apologies. Did you see a man about five foot six with black hair and a black beard beneath his chin?" the city guard asked, his composure restored.

"No. As you can see, I am bathing and my bodyguards are women," the woman in the bath tub answered. "What did the man do?"

"Apologies for the interruption. You might hear this on the street later, but the man committed high treason for killing the crown prince. At least, I heard the palace guards say so. There is no official announcement of His Highness's death," the city guard said, bowing low and quickly shutting the door behind him as he left.

"Why did you not sell me out? You could have gotten a reward," Lance said, stopping his Mirror Mirage Art.

"I have no loyalty to my mother's homeland. They made her a slave after her noble family fell from grace. Besides, I figured you to be the man in V.I.P. Box 7. The same man who mocked the crown prince for buying the Libido Statue. You do realize that a statue making you impotent means your dick will not....glorify itself....and grow with your perverted desires?" the woman asked.

"I know. The Libido Statue, the real one, makes a man impotent. Sterile. That way, the woman does not give birth. he crown prince must have wanted it for its absolute protection. You know, no sexual disease or whatnot. Like I told him before: he wasn't much of a man to buy such a thing," Lance shrugged. "I mean, the statue makes a woman below the Meteor Vessel Stage attracted to you, but your mating part will not enlarge. I never did mate, but having a woman without properly mating with her seems...disappointing."

"So you will give it to me," the woman said. "Such a thing must be destroyed."

"Magical treasures can be altered. I can substitute impotency with sterility. All it takes is a good amount of spirit energy control," Lance said. "Three women at the Element Adept Stage. If you're not loyal to the Song Dynasty, why come here?"

"To carry out the mission you completed," the woman answered.

"You were going to kill the crown prince? At your cultivation?" Lance asked, incredulous. His heart relaxed as he sensed the spirit energies of the palace and city guards head off in different directions from the inn.

"We had our methods. He is a perverted man. An illusion would suffice once he had me, alone, with him in his chambers," the woman said.

"Why kill that perverted fat ass? For a rival nation or empire, such an incompetent living to assume the throne would have been the better option. Killing him would not be good business," Lance assessed.

"One of the women he enslaved into his harem was my mother's sister. His death is personal," the woman answered. "You killed him so consider us even. It would have been difficult, not impossible, for me and my bodyguards to escape after the assassination."

"Then I'll take my leave," Lance said, but the woman held up her hand.

"Join me. You said you could alter the Libido Statue. Prove it. My bodyguards will now return to their rooms," the woman said, Lance stunned.

"....Yes My Lady," the two bodyguards said, also stunned as they left the two alone. As Lance grinned and took out the Libido Statue, quickly bonding with it to learn how he could use it so as to alter it; changes were happening in the palace.

"WHAT! What happened to Shen Bu?" a man in a golden tiger fur robe roared as his fist banged onto his white wood and gold throne. "What happened to my first born son! My first child! He was a lousy, perverted fat ass, but he was my son! MY, Shen Wukong's, SON! The son of the Emperor of the Song Dynasty!"

"Your, Your Majesty. You must calm yourself," the head eunuch said. "Your actions on how you react to this will be assessed by Your Majesty's enemies. Future acts might happen in the future. The killer might have been employed by the enemy. An investigation must be made in secret."

"No! Someone killed my son! My son! I want him found! If the killer is not brought to me by sundown, I will have the families of my son's bodyguards executed for their incompetence! Find him! A reward of one billion, no, one hundred billion demon spirit coins will be given! Even those foreigners will assist after they realize the reward's price after they calculate the currency exchange rate for their homelands! In fact, my son's harem will be given to whoever brings me his head! Find him! Now!" the emperor roared. "Go!"

"Yes, Gong-gong understands," the eunuch said, stating his title in the palace before he left. As the head eunuch delivered the news, the ministers and generals were shocked. None of them liked the crown prince, even those who sided with him, but someone actually killed the crown prince. A hundred billion bounty and the harem of the most beautiful women in the palace, dwarfing the beauties of the emperor's own harem; that was proof how much the emperor loved and tolerated his eldest son.

There was no question the emperor would have indeed made the crown prince his successor. Some silently made offerings and thanks to their ancestors for allowing justice to fall on the perverted prince. Many parents and women silently celebrated the death of the most notorious rapist and some believed the empire was entering a new era. None of them realized the man in question was actually a reincarnated World Serpent in the body of a teenager who just had sex with a woman he met bathing in a hot tub.

After three hours, Lance was fully dressed and bathed. He looked out the window, seeing many people rush toward the central plaza in the capital. It seemed there would be a mass execution. This was the perfect moment to escape. If the emperor had not gone mad with rage, he would have not made the mass execution so large as to thin out his security.

"Leaving so soon?" the woman asked, staring at him. "I was having such fun. It seems you were right about altering that statue. Mm."

"Having hormones is not bad. They could be controlled," Lance laughed. "Thank you the pleasure of your company."

"Will you ever return to the Pangu Continent?" she asked.

"The day I decide to have it razed and usher a new dynasty, perhaps," Lance said and left.

"He's an interesting one, a man with many secrets," the woman said as the two bodyguards appeared. "Did you investigate him, as I asked?"

"Yes. He is registered at the Adventurer's Guild as Lance Wang," one of them said. "D Rank Adventurer as it is the highest one can apply to be without doing any missions whatsoever."

"The crown prince is really dead. His head was cut off and the families of his security guards are scheduled to be executed any minute now that the sun has begun to fall," the other concluded. "What will My Lady do now?"

"We return home and report to Imperial Father. Now is the time to takeover some of the land in the Pangu Continent as its head, the emperor, is in disarray," the woman said, watching Lance Wang disappear in the distance. "Take note of him too. He will make a nice toy for my grandmother. She has eternal youth as she is a peak Earth Mortal and will be able to uncover the boy's secrets."

"And the reason you slept with the boy?" the bodyguards asked.

"He was hot. His body radiated an ancient power. He might even have a Yin Yang Divine Tattoo," she answered as they packed up and vacated their rooms.

"What a day," Lance said as he approached the city gates.

"Halt! No one is to leave the city during the mass execution by the order of His Majesty," a guard said.

"I was never here. You never saw me. You saw the suspect you were told about on your way home after your shift. Take a three hour break. You are very tired right now. Your muscles ache and your eyelids feel heavy," Lance said, using his Light Puppet Art to hypnotize the guard and went through the gate without much trouble at all.

That day, over eight hundred people were sentenced to death. The emperor, Shen Wukong, had gone mad with rage and the Song Dynasty lost one tenth of their rule over the Pangu Continent before the emperor settled down. They eventually took over their lost land, but three weeks had passed and the killer was as good as gone. Their spies informed the emperor that none of the invading nations had a hand in his son's death.

As Lance had calculated, the second prince had become the new crown prince and the fourth prince was recalled back to the palace from the front lines. The real reason was for the emperor to allow the existence of an opposing faction to the new crown prince so as to balance the power among his heirs. Lance had reunited with Mei who was both happy and unhappy when she met the female slave and magical beast panther a few hours before she met Lance.

"We're finally leaving the Pangu Continent," Mei said as they arrived in a port city and took a commercial ship to the southern continent. "Lingqi, are you sure you're okay traveling with us?"

"Yes. Master Lance saved me from a life or slavery. Who knows what my life would have been like had the crown prince brought me to his palace," the seventeen year old answered. "I also wished to venture the world. It is best to travel with my savior than on my own. I would be enslaved again because of my beauty."

"That's for damn sure," Mei muttered as Lance had given her the bracelet he bought at the auction. Lingqi's body was too enticing for her age. Thus, they had bought another disguising magical treasure from the rich caravan they traveled with. It paled in comparison to Mei's as it could only change one's body shape and the color of one's hair and eyes.

Mei's bracelet could let her be any female of any size and color, to the last detail. Even her spirit energy could be changed to appear as another. Still, it served its purpose to make Lingqi appear as flat as a board. Mei was inwardly jealous of the girl two years older than her. Still, Mei's cultivation was higher so it didn't matter as she could protect herself.

"How does it feel to leave the Pangu Continent? You've spent two lifetimes there," Mei asked.

"I don't know. It's all I ever knew. In truth, there was much I didn't know. I didn't know about the Elemental Sovereigns of Darkness and Lightning. I hardly visited a human town, before I razed it. All I did was run, hunt, and cultivate. It was just...where I lived," Lance answered. "I have no loyalty toward it."

"I feel sad and excited," Mei said, gazing back at the port city as it disappeared from view. "I feel sad as I am leaving my parents, Guo Lin, and the rest of the clan behind. I feel excited as I feel like a true adventurer, exploring the unknown and foreign."

"Is that how a person is supposed to feel?" Lance asked, Lingqi and Mei looking at him curiously.

"They do not understand who you are, or what you've been through," the panther purred through their mental link. As it had become his magical beast, it naturally learned of its master's true identities as some memories entered the panther's mind.

Lance grinned as he stared at the water. Perhaps the panther was right. He did have centuries of memories. He outlived many empires and magical creatures and enemies. There was no civilization for him to grow attached to. He had only started to experience emotions he thought he had lost since being human.

"Lance seems...different than most people. He's kind of like a sociopath," Lingqi said to Mei.

"No. Not really. His past is complicated. We will be heading to the southern continent, not the eastern continent. You're okay with that?" Mei asked.

"We're adventuring the world, right? We'll see my homeland, eventually," Lingqi said. "My dad was from the Pangu Continent. I left home to find him and ask why he left my mother alone. I learned he was dead as his clan actually kidnapped him but committed suicide as he could not escape before they tried to marry him to another woman."

"That's kind of romantic," Mei said. "He still loved your mother."

"Yes, but he is dead," Lingqi sighed. "So Lance willl study the Necromonicon he bought?"

"Most likely. If it can help one gain enough power to ascend, Lance would do it," Mei nodded as the two stared at the panther and Lance by the ship's starboard side. "I can never get Lance completely. He's an enigma. Sometimes he makes progress, but old habits die hard. Just be sure not to do anything he forbids. Death would be a mercy. Trust me."

"Right," Lingqi said as the ship's sailed along the wide.