AUBTN -Chapter 258 Stay

Su Hewan listened to her words, and something deep in her heart—something soft and long untouched—seemed to be gently stirred.

“Yes… humans are emotional beings in the end.”

【In this perilous ancient world, I originally thought I could only survive by relying on a god’s-eye view of history I was familiar with.】

【But I never expected to meet these two people.】

She closed her eyes, and all she could see in her mind was Shen Jue’s figure.

“So am I.”

Su Hewan responded softly.

“In this foreign world where I drift without roots, no matter how large the imperial palace is, it is not home.”

“But now it’s different.”

“Shen Jue and Lu Yan—at some point, they’ve already become our family here.”

“With them… feels like home.”

Beyond a single wall.

In the courtyard, beside a stone table, two men sat facing each other.

On the stone table lay a chessboard carved with intersecting black lines.

Black and white pieces glimmered coldly under the moonlight.

Shen Jue idly toyed with a white piece between his fingers, a faint, almost imperceptible smile forming in his eyes.

With his profound internal energy—and that mysterious mental link—

every word of the conversation between Su Hewan and Yu Qing inside the room drifted into his ears without missing a single syllable.

Lu Yan, seated opposite him, had clearly heard it as well.

The night wind brushed through the bamboo grove, making a rustling sound.

The game was already halfway through.

The battle on the board mirrored the situation in the imperial court—complex, intertwined, every step a killing move.

Lu Yan picked up a black piece with his long fingers.

With a sharp clack, he placed it down decisively.

“I want to stay.”

It was a plain, declarative sentence.

The Jinyiwei commander-in-chief, who had spent half his life navigating the ruthless struggle for imperial power and was utterly loyal to the new emperor…

had, at this moment, developed the thought of withdrawing from the world.

Shen Jue’s hand holding the white piece paused in midair—for a rare half-beat.

He slowly raised his eyes.

A flicker of surprise flashed through them.

He had thought someone like Lu Yan—this stubborn, rigid man, molded entirely by rules and loyalty—would be the least likely to be tied down by worldly attachments.

But that hint of surprise quickly dissolved into a faint, relieved smile.

Shen Jue calmly placed his white piece down.

“What a coincidence.”

“I was thinking the same thing.”

Two men who had spent half their lives as mortal enemies, who once wished nothing more than to devour each other alive—

two peak powerholders standing at opposite ends of the court…

at this moment, in this remote southern frontier courtyard, shared the same thought.

But after the brief warmth came the cold, unshakable reality.

Thinking was one thing.

Doing was another.

Neither of them were naive youths. They understood all too well that the game of power had no such thing as retirement halfway through.

Their killing intent slowly rose again as they returned to being strategists.

Calmly, they began analyzing the greatest obstacle to staying.

“If we disappear without reason, the young emperor will surely go mad,”

Lu Yan said coldly, his eyes fixed on the chessboard.

“The new emperor’s foundation is still unstable. He relies entirely on the balance and mutual support between the two of us.”

“If we both vanish at once, the court will be thrown into chaos. He will turn over every inch of land to find us.”

“By then, the Ten Thousand Great Mountains will never know peace again.”

Shen Jue placed another piece.

“And once it is confirmed that we’ve defected, all the power we’ve spent years cultivating in the capital will be branded as rebel forces.”

“The Eastern Depot and the Jinyiwei will undergo an unprecedented purge.”

Shen Jue lifted his head and met Lu Yan’s gaze directly.

“Most importantly…”

“If we become fugitives who betrayed the court, then the two women inside…”

“will become the families of criminals.”

“They are just delicate young women. Do you want them to spend the rest of their lives hiding under false identities, constantly on the run?”

“Lu Yan, that is absolutely not the peaceful life they want.”

On the chessboard, the situation had already become clear.

The black stones laid by Lu Yan were now tightly surrounded by Shen Jue’s white pieces, with no way forward or back.

Every direction—front, back, left, and right—was a dead end.

It was already a hopelessly lost game.

Just like the predicament they were facing now—appearing to have no way out at all.

Lu Yan’s sword-like brows were tightly furrowed, forming a deep “川” shape between them.

He stared at the board for a long time before finally letting out a sigh.

He reached out, preparing to place his piece down and admit defeat.

At that very moment—

A long, slender hand suddenly reached over.

Shen Jue had actually taken a black piece from Lu Yan’s own stone bowl.

Under Lu Yan’s stunned gaze,

Shen Jue placed it heavily onto an inconspicuous corner of the board—one that had even been considered a dead zone!

“What are you doing?” Lu Yan asked coldly.

Shen Jue withdrew his hand, the corner of his lips curling into an extremely sinister, cold smile.

“Turning a desperate situation into survival.”

He slowly uttered those six words.

“The same goes for the game.”

“And for life.”

Lu Yan froze.

He abruptly looked up at Shen Jue.

Seeing the understanding in his expression, Shen Jue knew he had grasped it.

“We absolutely cannot go missing.”

“And we cannot leave under the charge of treason either.”

Shen Jue’s voice was low, carrying a seductive, dangerous undertone.

“To the court—and to the young emperor—

the only outcome they can accept, the only way to officially end all investigations, and even the only way to protect our former subordinates…”

“There is only one.”

Shen Jue paused, his narrow eyes flashing with ruthless determination.

“Death.”

That single word, spoken so lightly, struck like thunder in the silent night.

Shen Jue leaned forward slightly, staring unblinkingly at Lu Yan.

“Commander Lu.”

“You, me, along with Miss Su and Miss Yu…”

“During the brutal suppression of the remnants of the Southern Border Divine Farmer Valley, we were met with a desperate counterattack from the enemy.”

“In the end, we were outnumbered.”

“To protect crucial evidence, we unfortunately perished in battle—heroic, and with no remains left behind.”

There was a hint of mocking tragedy in Shen Jue’s tone.

“With such a glorious ending, the young emperor will accept it. And it will also evade the Empress Dowager’s claws.”

Shen Jue raised a brow, looking at this lifelong righteous nemesis with a half-smile.

“What do you think of this treasonous, death-escape ending?”

The night wind swept through again.

Lu Yan stared fixedly at the black piece placed in a desperate position on the board.

Then he turned to look at the warm yellow candlelight spilling from the window inside the room.

After a long silence—

The cold-faced executioner slowly unclenched his fists.

A wild, unrestrained light flickered in his eyes.

“Acceptable.”

The next morning.

Shen Jue wrote his final letter on a specially treated parchment scroll.

He arranged a complete escape route for those imperial guards who had followed him through life and death.

At the end of the letter, he stamped it with the private seal of the Eastern Depot’s supreme authority.

The crimson seal mark burned into the parchment.

From this moment on, there was no longer a Nine Thousand Years Duke Shen Jue in this world.

In the next room,

Lu Yan was equally cold and composed.

He carefully sealed a confidential letter into a waxed bamboo tube.

Inside the letter, he handed over several imperial-related secret investigations he had been handling.

He had to ensure that after his “death,” his subordinates would not be purged by the Empress Dowager.

This was the last thing he could do for them.

After finishing everything, the two of them, without prior agreement, walked into the courtyard together.