It was deep into the night. Henry rarely slept. He now lay on his bed—apparently sleeping a sound sleep, but actually listening carefully.

Creaaak.

His suspicions were right. Around dawn, Henry’s tightly locked door creaked open slightly. Through the gap, masked visitors quietly approached his bed like shadows. The men exchanged hand signs with each other and nodded. Then, one took a cloth soaked in sleeping medicine from his pouch and covered Henry’s nose and mouth.

After a while, the man removed the cloth and peered over Henry’s face to examine his eyes. At that moment, however, Henry grabbed the assailant’s wrist and whispered quietly, “That won’t do.”

Shing!

Confused, the rest of the men quickly unsheathed their swords. The man Henry had grabbed tried to shake him off, but Henry’s grip was stronger than he expected.

“Argh!”

Thud!

The man eventually could not withstand Henry’s tightening grip and fell to his knees in pain.

“H-how…!”

The poison was strong enough to put an elephant to sleep. They were certain that the poison had entered Henry’s respiratory tract, so they could not believe he was still conscious, let alone putting up a fight.

“I’m sick of all these little poison tricks… hey, how long are you guys going to just stand there and keep watching?” asked...