Still craving peanuts?

The high-mobility military ambulance raced along the rugged mountain road. Suddenly, a massive boulder crashed down ahead, prompting Han Lei to instinctively jerk the steering wheel. The ambulance plunged off the cliff—

After a dizzying whirl and violent jolts, with a heavy thud, the vehicle finally landed in a clearing amidst the mountain forest.

Han Lei felt her head spinning. She reached out to straighten her helmet, took a few deep breaths, and tried to calm her churning stomach.

“Just my luck!”

Muttering, Han Lei opened the door and leaned against the hood, staring bewildered at her surroundings. She took out her phone, intending to call for help from nearby comrades on duty.

Suddenly, the dense woods ahead erupted with sounds of combat, growing closer with each moment.

“Has the mission been compromised?” Han Lei muttered as she crouched to hide, her right hand instinctively reaching for the pistol at her waist.

Moments later, three men burst from the forest. Clad in ancient armor and caked with dust, they fought as they retreated, their swords swung wildly and without order.

Behind them, dozens of men dressed in foreign attire, rugged in appearance, emerged from the trees, brandishing gleaming curved blades.

Swords and scimitars clashed, ringing out with metallic echoes.

“Your Highness, watch out!” came a cry.

Arrows flew, and the three armored men fought desperately to fend them off, but there were too many; two were struck, their already wounded bodies now drenched in blood.

“Your Highness?”

This was a war zone—how could a film crew be shooting nearby? That wasn’t mentioned in the mission briefing.

Staring at the scene before her, Han Lei’s mind stalled. Her mouth hung open, eyes wide, the paint on her face contorted in shock.

“Your Highness, you’re hurt. We’ll cover you—go!” shouted the man with an arrow in his left arm. He shoved the man wounded in the leg, then turned to rejoin the fray, his resolve fierce and tragic.

While Han Lei was still dazed, the man with the arrow in his leg staggered toward the ambulance, collapsing beside it.

Han Lei’s pupils contracted as she swiftly drew her pistol, aiming at him, ready to fire at any moment.

The man looked up, revealing a bronze-hued face. Before she could scrutinize him, the faint scent of blood reached her.

“Is he really bleeding? Not acting?”

Before the man could reply, an arrow shot rapidly toward Han Lei.

Sensing danger, Han Lei, trained as a soldier, reacted instantly—dodging aside and firing a shot.

Her pistol was fitted with a silencer, and after a faint “pop,” the leading pursuer was struck in the neck and fell to the ground.

“Pop! Pop!”

Han Lei fired two more shots, and two more pursuers collapsed unexpectedly, blood holes piercing their bamboo armor.

The area fell silent. The fierce fighting halted abruptly; both sides stared in bewilderment at the three suddenly fallen men.

None could fathom how these men were felled in the melee; some saw only the blood flowing from the wounds.

Only the prince, closest to Han Lei, heard the faint pops. He stared in terror at the smoking, black muzzle in Han Lei’s hand.

Yet, he was a prince; his response was swift. In that brief moment, he regained his composure.

“Our reinforcements have arrived—charge!” he shouted, clutching his wounded leg and struggling to rise.

The prince’s two bodyguards, emboldened by the supposed arrival of reinforcements, raised their swords and attacked. The numerous pursuers, caught off guard, suffered heavy losses.

Moments ago, these foreign-looking men dared to shoot at her with arrows. Han Lei’s fury surged; she fired two more shots, downing another two. The pursuers, ignoring the bodyguards’ counterattack, ceased their assault and turned to stare fearfully at Han Lei.

They finally realized that the figure nearby, helmeted and clad in camouflage, her face painted in vivid colors, was the reinforcements the prince had spoken of.

“What are you staring at? Want to taste a few more peanuts?” Han Lei snapped, glaring at them.

Though Han Lei’s expression was fierce, her voice, soft and gentle with a southern accent, carried no real threat.

The pursuers looked at their fallen comrades, exchanged glances, babbled among themselves, then abandoned the prince and his guards and fled swiftly.

Once the pursuers had vanished, the two battle-weary bodyguards collapsed to the ground in exhaustion.

“Whew…”

They gasped for breath, one turning to check on the prince.

“Your Highness, are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Rest for now,” the prince replied weakly, leaning against the ambulance.

After prolonged tension and combat, outnumbered, they were utterly exhausted—rest was their greatest need.

Han Lei’s mind was full of questions. Once all three had recovered somewhat, she fetched three bottles of mineral water from the ambulance and handed them out.

“Who are you? Why are you dressed like this? And why are you being chased?” Han Lei asked curtly, her right hand still gripping her pistol, her vigilance undiminished.

Did she forget to check the almanac today? How could she be so unlucky? On a routine mission, how did she end up in such a bizarre situation?

“Who are you?” the prince countered.

“I’m a military doctor!” Han Lei pointed to the red armband on her left arm. “Which unit are you from, and why are you dressed like this?”

She bent to pick up the prince’s sword, flicked it with two fingers, eliciting a soft humming sound.

The prince stared at the red armband, bewildered; he couldn’t recognize the simplified characters on it.

“I am Prince Xiao Yao, Zhao Zun. These two are my bodyguards, Ping Chuan and Xiao Zhengfei.”

“What?” Han Lei thought she had misheard.

Prince Xiao Yao? Bodyguards? Was the man before her truly an ancient prince?

Could she have traveled through time?

Han Lei was incredulous; a sinister thought flashed through her mind. Tentatively, she asked, “Hey, you’re not some kind of ghost, are you?”

“What is a ghost?” Bodyguard Xiao Zhengfei tilted his head, puzzled.

“Don’t understand? Then probably not,” Han Lei muttered, dismissing the idea, and turned her gaze to the prince’s arrow-wounded leg.

Without warning, she kicked the prince’s injury. The sensation was real!

“Hiss…” The prince drew a sharp breath.

Xiao Zhengfei, who had been resting, sprang up and drew his sword, pointing it at Han Lei with a furious shout, “How dare you! What are you doing?”

Han Lei felt a chill at her throat—a sharp sword pressed intimately against her neck. The blade was thin and keen, its tip flashing with a faint, bloody gleam, clearly a weapon that had tasted blood.

“N-nothing,” Han Lei stammered, hastily stepping back. “I just wanted to see if you were alive.”

She scratched her forehead and sighed, ignoring Xiao Zhengfei’s anger, and sat down against the ambulance, looking glum.

It seemed she really had traveled through time.

This made no sense.

She, a perfectly respectable lieutenant military doctor in the special forces, an atheist, had somehow ended up here?

All those dramas she’d watched, all the palace intrigue and household scheming she’d learned, and instead of transmigrating as a princess or empress, she landed in some wilderness of an unknown era. How was she supposed to scheme now?

Could it be that fate intended her to… battle in the wild?

Ah, forget it—she’d treat it as a vacation.

Seeing her shift from odd behavior to quiet contemplation, Prince Zhao Zun covertly signaled Xiao Zhengfei, who then sheathed his sword.

Han Lei thought deeply for a while. When it all made sense, she leaned toward Zhao Zun and asked, “Your… Highness. May I ask, what dynasty is this? Or, where are we?”

Zhao Zun, fumbling with the bottle in his hand, answered weakly, “This is the Great Jing Dynasty. It’s year six of Great Jing, at the Northern Pass.”

Before Han Lei could react to his answer, a sudden thud sounded nearby.

“Ping Chuan, Ping Chuan, what’s wrong?”

Han Lei looked over and saw the bodyguard named Ping Chuan collapsed on the ground, his lips darkened, the unopened bottle of water rolling away.

“This is bad—the arrow was poisoned.”