Chapter 624: - Humiliating Qian

“Huff! Huff! Huff!”

Heavy breathing, still measured and rhythmic, echoed continuously through the courtyard.

Unless something unexpected happened, Marquis Zheng would always set aside half an afternoon to practice the saber whenever he had free time.

In his previous life, studying hard for university and some supposedly bright future had always felt too vague and distant. Not many people at that age could truly understand what it meant.

But Zheng Fan regularly went in and out of battlefields, and even in ordinary times he had to worry about assassination. The threat of death was real and immediate. There was no more effective or direct spur than that.

The Blind Man appeared at the courtyard entrance and stood there watching Master practice.

A Martial Artist and a swordsman walked two different roads.

A swordsman was a swordsman. What a swordsman pursued was the sword.

A Martial Artist, however, did not necessarily have to use a saber. The reason most Martial Artists carried sabers was simply that the weapon suited their physiques better.

Given the right fit, spears, staves, clubs, meteor hammers, and similar weapons worked just as well.

Marquis Zheng had always practiced the saber.

Even with the Sword Saint living next door, Marquis Zheng had never considered switching schools and trying to play the drifting, ethereal Sword Immortal.

The quality of his weapons had changed over the years, from ordinary sabers all the way to Wuyai, but his original path had never changed.

When he finished, Zheng Fan sheathed the saber.

“Master’s saber technique is growing more refined by the day.”

“That flattery had no sincerity at all.”

“This subordinate truly wasn’t flattering you. I genuinely saw saber intent just now. Master’s talent has already proven itself. It really is excellent.”

Naturally, he could not be compared with Tian Wujing, the Sword Saint, or even Hero Chen.

But Zheng Fan’s aptitude genuinely was very good.

After all, he had reached Sixth Grade in only a few years without stuffing himself with pills and forcibly pushing his cultivation. His path had actually been very steady.

“In a little while, I need to find some time, take a couple of people with me, and go temper myself. I feel like I’m about ready. I should wander around outside and see whether I can at least find the bottleneck first.”

“Take the Sword Saint?”

“But wouldn’t taking the Sword Saint make it too boring?” Zheng Fan asked.

If the Sword Saint came along as a bodyguard, could it still be called roaming the world?

“But Master’s safety is the most important thing. And none of us has any free time.”

The Demon Kings had no spare attention to split off. Every one of them was responsible for an enormous pile of work.

“Taking the Sword Saint is too excessive. I’ll take Hero Chen instead.”

“Mm. Hero Chen is a reliable man.” The Blind Man nodded. “Still, this subordinate suggests Master also take a few of the scouts San’er trained and have them protect you in secret. If anything happens, they can also send word back to you quickly.”

“I’m not going far. Just the Tianduan Mountains.”

“You still need them. If something major happens, we’ll still need Master to make the decision. That is not flattery.”

“Fine.”

Zheng Fan picked up a dry towel and wiped his upper body.

The Blind Man continued reporting.

“Granny woke up. Fourth Lady thinks that while she is awake, we might as well settle San’er’s marriage. Go through the formalities and finish with the serving of tea. This subordinate believes Hu Bamei may turn out to be a very useful piece. She brought us that prophecy. In the future, we may still need to rely on her. She is rather like a Dragon Radar. She can let us seize the initiative. So sacrificing one San’er to bind her with human feeling is worth it. Besides, San’er is perfectly happy to be sacrificed.”

“Fine. Call me when they serve the tea.”

By convention, the elders of both the man’s and woman’s families were supposed to sit together and receive the newlyweds’ tea.

“As for the restrictions left on Tian Tian, or the lingering qi signatures that people once placed on him, this subordinate has thought it through. There are probably only a few possible sources. With Great Yan’s present power, no matter how hollow it may be internally, it is extremely strong toward the outside world. And the heir of the Prince of Jingnan can be called one of the foundations of Great Yan’s future. That foundation can support an empire. It can also bring an empire crashing down.”

“No other concrete news?” Zheng Fan asked.

The Blind Man naturally understood what Master meant.

He shook his head.

“There still hasn’t been any concrete progress regarding Dujuan. Everyone on Mount Tianhu is already dead, and even some of the people directly involved back then disappeared long ago. Judging from the change in the Prince of Jingnan’s attitude toward the court, the Emperor of Yan’s side may not be completely clean. But if this subordinate were the Emperor of Yan, I would never be short-sighted enough to kill the chicken for the egg at that point. That would not be eliminating future trouble. It would be burying a mine for later generations. At the time, the First Prince might already have held command of the eastern expedition army, but Great Yan was still nowhere near the point where the birds were gone and the fine bow could be put away. Most importantly, the Emperor of Yan is not Old Zhu, and Tian Wujing is not Lan Yu.”

“Go on.”

Zheng Fan tossed the towel into a water vat, soaked it, then began wiping himself again.

“Qian probably wasn’t behind it either, because this subordinate genuinely cannot imagine how stupid the Qian would have to be to play a hand like that. If anything, Qian may have suffered the greatest loss from this whole affair and been the angriest party. They must feel terribly wronged.”

“What about Chu?” Zheng Fan asked.

“During this campaign against Chu, we crossed hands with the Phoenix Nest Guards many times and gained a much deeper understanding of that yamen. The truth is, the Phoenix Nest only truly rose to power after the Regent took charge. Before that, it was nowhere near as strong. At minimum, the Chu court did not give it that much support. Many great nobles had also stretched their hands into the Phoenix Nest and divided up the cake. It was only after the Regent took power and rebuilt the yamen that it became clean and unified. When Dujuan died on Mount Tianhu, Chu was still in the middle of the Rebellion of the Princes. By rights, that brother-in-law of yours should not have had the opportunity to arrange something like this. Even though he actually had the strongest motive. At that moment, if Dujuan’s death caused Tian Wujing, the Jingnan Army, and the Yan court to turn against one another, Yan could never have swallowed all the Three Jin lands, and Yan’s blade would never have reached Chu. Better still, it would have diverted disaster eastward. Whether Yan’s fury turned inward or toward Qian, Chu would unquestionably have benefited most. But it is still the same problem this subordinate mentioned before. The Regent may have had the ability, or perhaps some lucky channel, through which he learned Dujuan’s identity. He could certainly have caused trouble. Chu had the capability too. But for the Regent of that time to strike with such precision that every side was left astonished and furious with nowhere to vent that fury? Impossible. That is not something a man can arrange in haste, not even a prince of Chu. The difficulty would be roughly equivalent to the Regent standing atop the ruins of Ying Capital and summoning a genuine living Fire Phoenix rather than merely its spirit.”

“Heh.” Zheng Fan laughed. “After eliminating everyone like this, don’t tell me it was Gou Moli.”

After all, the Savage King had still been seated at the gaming table back then, even if at the time he had gone around calling himself Little Dog and greeting everyone as Grandfather.

“Of course not. If he had possessed that kind of ability, he wouldn’t have spent so many years hugging the Princess’s embroidered shoe and sniffing it.”

“What about the Barbarians?” Zheng Fan asked. “I’ve heard that old Barbarian King has a few tricks.”

“If the Barbarians are possible, then Rome in the West is possible too. Perhaps they sensed that a new great empire was about to rise in the East and decided to trip it in advance.”

Zheng Fan nodded.

The Blind Man smiled and said nothing.

The Barbarians and the West were indeed technically possible.

But that possibility was vanishingly small, because the operation would have been far too difficult.

The greatest problem was simple.

They were too far away.

“Whoever could push this matter into happening should have been somewhere on the board. They could not have been too distant,” the Blind Man said. “Someone like us. In outsiders’ eyes, even now that Master has been made Marquis, our little team still isn’t treated as particularly important. Yet in reality, we are perfectly capable of arranging large-scale conspiracies and upheavals. We even dared knock a Princess unconscious, did we not? So although it looks as though we’ve eliminated all the major powers one by one, there may still be forces hidden beneath the water, just like us now, who have never truly stepped onto the public stage.”

Zheng Fan picked up a robe and draped it over himself.

“There is one more extreme possibility. Hu Bamei’s prophecy said some fellow beneath an icy pool seemed about to awaken. But who knows whether someone on their side already awakened earlier? What if they have... a deaf man?”

The Blind Man heard this and nodded, deeply convinced.

“If we can’t investigate it, then leave it alone for now. Sooner or later we’ll have chances to overturn them one by one, and we’ll eventually hit the right one.” Zheng Fan was remarkably open-minded about the matter. “For now, all of you stay busy developing the foundation. I’ll busy myself figuring out how to improve my own strength. The division of labor is actually pretty good.”

The seven of you help me build one power base.

I alone grind levels for all seven of you.

“Oh, right, Master. There is another matter this subordinate needs to report. I think you’ll like it.”

“Speak.”

The Blind Man took several steps back, clapped his hands, and called:

“Enter.”

Dense footsteps immediately sounded outside.

One figure after another came through the courtyard gate or vaulted down from the walls. In perfect order, they rapidly assembled before Zheng Fan and knelt in several packed rings.

“Greetings, Marquis!”

“Greetings, Marquis!”

More than two hundred men knelt together.

Every one of them wore Flying Fish Robes and carried an Embroidered Spring Saber.

Ever since the brief period when Marquis Zheng had first commanded the personal guards of the then-Marquis of Jingnan, he had been obsessed with this kind of disciplined spectacle.

It was not the “Ura!” that idiot Fan Li loved shouting.

It was the pure pleasure of raising one hand and having every guard around you understand exactly what you meant, move in perfect unison, share one purpose, and be willing to climb mountains of blades and descend into seas of fire for you.

On the battlefield, Marquis Zheng could already call vast numbers of cavalrymen to charge forward and sacrifice their lives for him.

But that was not neat enough.

At this moment, surrounded by a kneeling crowd of “Jinyiwei,” Marquis Zheng genuinely felt a spontaneous wave of satisfaction worthy of some Grand Eunuch Director.

“Master, these men were all carefully selected and trained by San’er. They will gradually replace your original personal guard camp and take responsibility for your security. As for the old personal guards, those suitable for promotion into the army can be reassigned there. Those unsuited to become Lieutenant Commanders but still absolutely loyal can undergo another round of training, change their clothes, and come back.”

Zheng Fan did not answer.

He walked to the nearest soldier and reached out to feel his clothes.

Flying Fish Robes looked extremely cool, especially when more than a hundred men wore them together.

The spectacle was magnificent.

But Marquis Zheng was also a practical man, especially when the strength of his personal guards directly concerned his own life.

Fortunately, beneath the Flying Fish Robe, his hand struck inner armor.

He tapped it.

Judging by the feel and the sound, unless something unexpected was going on, it was refined-iron inner armor.

Excellent defense.

But... very expensive.

They had taken “pretty but useless” and raised it one level, turning it into “pretty and reasonably useful.”

“There are still many refugees outside the city without winter clothes. Plenty have already caught chills because of it. Yet you had the Clothing Directorate make their Flying Fish Robes first.”

“But they look good, Master.”

“My army has only just begun re-equipping. Many soldiers are still wearing old armor, and the patterns aren’t even standardized. Yet you had the Foundry Directorate cast these men inner armor that costs more time, labor, material, and silver.”

“But they look good, Master.”

“These are probably the best scouts San’er trained. After all that training, you dump them beside me as security guards.”

“But they look good, Master.”

Zheng Fan nodded.

Then he smiled.

“They really do.”

He clapped his hands.

“Withdraw.”

Swish! Swish! Swish!

All two hundred men in Flying Fish Robes withdrew in perfect order.

The sound of sabers at their waists and sleeves brushing together was neat, beautiful, and pleasant to the ear.

“We don’t need too many of these,” Zheng Fan said.

“Yes. This subordinate understands.”

“There is one more matter I need to report. Perhaps Master already knows.”

“Speak.”

“The Princess plans to see Qu Peiluo today.”

“I know. She reported it to me.”

“Does the Princess intend to imitate Dayu’er persuading Hong Chengchou to surrender?”

Zheng Fan shook his head.

“First, Qu Peiluo surrendered long ago. Second, I’m not reduced to making my woman use her looks to recruit subordinates for me. One, I would never be willing. Two, does Qu Peiluo deserve that?”

As he spoke, Zheng Fan took out two cigarettes and handed one to the Blind Man.

“The news from the Fan Clan didn’t pass through you?”

“News from the Fan Clan is sent directly to the residence.”

Matters involving the Fan Clan would inevitably touch on Ji Chengjue, and how their relationship with the Sixth Prince should be handled as the situation changed was something Master himself needed to judge.

Of course, the most fundamental reason was that the Blind Man worried Master would get bored. He had deliberately left this one opening so Master would have something to do.

“Next time, integrate those reports too. Let them pass through you first.”

“Yes. This subordinate understands.”

“The Fan Clan reports that Nian Yao personally led a force into the outer territories of the Qu Clan’s fief.”

“Oh?” The Blind Man was mildly surprised. “So quickly?”

“The Azure Luan Army suffered a great defeat at Qingtan and then surrendered. The Qu Clan committed the crime of collaborating with the enemy and betraying the state. It is only natural they should be dealt with.”

“That is true, but the Qu Clan’s wavering itself...” The Blind Man spoke, then nodded. “Perhaps this subordinate has used too many conspiracies and schemes. I’ve become blind beneath the lamp when it comes to things done openly and righteously.”

“So that brother-in-law of mine probably has no intention of starting another war in the short term. He seems determined to turtle up.”

If one wanted to gather strength quickly, one naturally had to unite every faction.

That was what Yan had done when it first invaded the Jin lands.

But now, that brother-in-law of his seemed intent on cutting through the tangled hemp with one quick blade.

Forget the Qu Clan’s enormous crime, which made punishment perfectly legitimate.

Even if the Qu Clan had been spotless, simply holding such a vast fief and once commanding so many private troops would have been enough to make the central court intolerant.

“Will he really do that? The Regent of Chu, like the Emperor of Yan back then...”

Zheng Fan nodded.

“I’ve dealt with him. How should I put it? The feeling he gave me was genuinely similar to standing face-to-face with the Emperor of Yan. And he seems convinced he can live for a very, very long time. I suspect that has something to do with the spirit sealed inside him. More importantly, the way he acts is too respectful of objective reality, and far too calm. During the campaign against Chu, after I burned Jing City, he immediately lay flat and started using our blade to kill the nobles. He even abandoned Ying Capital the instant he decided it was necessary, all to gamble for Tian Wujing’s life. He was certain disaster would strike Yan and Jin, and that Yan’s national strength would not permit the war to expand or continue indefinitely. Now that he has already taken the first step, he will not hesitate over the rest. First, destroy the Qu Clan beneath the righteous banner of punishing treason. Then use other methods, perhaps without even caring how ugly his table manners look, to continue cleaning out the great nobles who have already been hollowed out. Once power is centralized, develop patiently and wait for the right opportunity. Still, I will never live the way he does. Completely without passion. Completely without feeling.”

“So Master sent the Princess to Qu Peiluo because you want to send troops to help the Qu Clan?”

“The Fan Clan’s land around Mount Meng is my bottom line. That was written into the peace treaty. The Qu Clan was never mentioned in the treaty at all. It was an exchange. I sold Qu Peiluo, who had been defeated and surrendered to me, in return for the Fan Clan and Mount Meng continuing to remain independent. I believe that brother-in-law of mine understands where my line is.”

Zheng Fan blew out a ring of smoke and flicked his ash.

“Most importantly, after Old Tian and the main strength of the Jingnan Army withdrew from eastern Jin, we simply do not have the ability to launch an offensive against Chu on our own, much less rescue the Qu Clan. To put it unpleasantly, if the Chu truly hardened their hearts and decided to take back even the Fan Clan’s tiny patch of land, our arm would be too short to reach them. But if he touches the Fan Clan, then I will absolutely have Jin Shuke make trouble from Shanggu Commandery. Forget everyone living peacefully and then secretly trading warhorses afterward. I’ll have Jin Shuke keep sending small cavalry detachments out of Shanggu to raid Chu territory and make his life miserable.”

“When it comes to war, this subordinate cannot see as far or as clearly as Master.”

“So the reason I agreed to let the Princess see Qu Peiluo is... I’m going to release him. Now. I’m sending him home.”

A faint smile appeared on Marquis Zheng’s face.

“I’ll have Ah Cheng separate out some of the Azure Luan Army prisoners and let Qu Peiluo take them back with him. By the time he returns, he should be just in time to see Nian Yao burn the Qu Clan ancestral temple to the ground and slaughter every member of the clan.”

“Master thinks Qu Peiluo will rebel against the Chu court and seek revenge because of that? This subordinate has seen enough ‘filial sons’ by now that I’m not sure things are ever that certain.”

The hatred of an exterminated clan should be irreconcilable.

By rights, that was how it ought to work.

Reality, however, had already produced far too many counterexamples.

And that Regent of Great Chu genuinely possessed the nerve to wipe out a man’s whole clan with one hand while promoting that same man with the other, so long as he remained useful.

“That is why I’m sending part of the Azure Luan prisoners back with him. You need to understand that the overwhelming majority of the Azure Luan Army are members of the Qu Clan or descendants of families that served the Qu Clan as hereditary slaves. Qu Peiluo alone may be able to swallow his hatred. Can an entire army swallow theirs?”

Zheng Fan tossed his cigarette butt to the ground and ground it beneath his boot.

“Since we don’t have the strength to send troops again right now, all I can do is toss another fly into my brother-in-law’s bowl. Let Qu Peiluo, the young lord of the Qu Clan, go back and raise the Pillar of State banner again. Let him gather the remnants of the noble houses who are about to be purged and make some trouble.”

“Then have the Fan Clan provide them a little support?” the Blind Man said. “That really is interesting.”

Once, they had been masters and slaves.

After going around in a circle, the former slaves would now be funding their former masters.

“The Emperor of Yan could trample the aristocratic clans so cleanly because, supported by the two Marquises, he controlled the two strongest armies in Great Yan. But the more important reason was what came afterward. Great Yan won one foreign war after another, raising his prestige while redirecting internal contradictions outward. Back then, both you and I could see perfectly clearly what would have happened inside Yan the moment an external campaign bogged down or suffered defeat. Look at Zuo Jiqian now. He started as a penal soldier from the aristocratic clans, and under me he has already risen to Roaming General. As for that brother-in-law of mine, heh. Where exactly can he redirect his contradictions? Surely he can’t... go beat up Qian?”

...

A camp of the Imperial Clan Guards appeared at the edge of the Qu Clan’s fief.

In the past, that would have been an enormous provocation.

Politically, the private fiefs of the great nobles were sacred.

The great nobles acknowledged the Xiong Clan as the imperial house, but Great Chu beneath Heaven had been conquered by the Xiong Clan together with them.

Naturally, they were all supposed to sit at the same table.

The Xiong Clan’s stool was simply taller.

Theirs were lower.

There had been nobles who declined, were annexed, or were stripped of their holdings.

There had also been Chu emperors who tried to strengthen central power and suppress the great houses.

Some had even achieved real results.

But first, the nobles possessed an instinctive sense of danger. When imperial power pressed too hard, they knew how to unite.

Second, whenever the throne changed hands, princes inevitably needed noble support. So it was common for a father to spend an entire reign shaving away some noble territory and authority, only for his son to hand it back after ascending the throne.

The Qu Clan, however, was different.

Its young lord might have lost and surrendered to Yan on the battlefield.

The Azure Luan Army might even have turned its blades around and become an auxiliary force for Yan.

But the Qu Clan was still the Qu Clan.

Its foundation remained.

The prestige of its Pillar of State lineage remained.

In the old days, even a crime this severe would probably have earned nothing more than three cups of penalty wine and Qu Peiluo’s expulsion from the clan, with the family announcing that he was no longer one of their descendants.

In fact, that was exactly what the Qu Clan had done.

When news arrived that Qu Peiluo had been defeated and surrendered, the clan’s first reaction was to convene a grand family council. The respected elders publicly stripped Qu Peiluo of his status as a Qu descendant and of his place in the direct line, then dispatched men to memorialize the Regent and declare the clan’s position.

Later, when the Yan army under the Marquis of Pingxi began digging up noble ancestral tombs, the Qu Clan became nervous and sent people to make contact with the Yan army.

And would you believe it?

The Marquis of Pingxi actually gave them face.

At the time, Yan was overwhelmingly powerful and Ying Capital itself had burned. So the Qu Clan sent another group to contact the Azure Luan Army and Qu Peiluo, carrying letters and greetings.

The meaning was essentially:

Expelling you from the clan was forced upon us by circumstances. You are still the direct-line young lord of the Qu Clan. You are still a fine son of the Qu Clan.

Betting on both sides was a craft every great noble house understood deeply.

Once the war ended, the peace treaty was signed, and the Yan army withdrew, the Qu Clan once again proclaimed to all beneath Heaven that the unfilial descendant Qu Peiluo had forgotten his ancestors and betrayed the clan.

Then the Qu Clan felt it had done enough.

The new patriarch chosen from another direct branch went before the Regent’s royal carriage to plead guilty once more, weeping bitterly to demonstrate loyalty.

That should more or less have settled it.

Hadn’t things worked this way for centuries?

For a great noble clan, especially one the size of the Qu Clan, even treason could usually be dealt with by admitting fault in the end.

What more did you want?

The Qu Clan believed its conduct had been impeccable and its attitude properly deferential. Some elders had even begun calling for the Azure Luan Army to be rebuilt so they could attack the Fan Clan and retake the Mount Meng region.

They did not want to recover lost territory for Chu.

They wanted to recover their own fief.

Then a force of Imperial Clan Guards flying the banner of the General-in-Chief appeared at the edge of the Qu Clan’s lands.

The entire clan panicked.

They immediately sent people to the military camp to seek information and request an audience with the General-in-Chief.

Every request was refused.

Even when respected clan elders personally appeared, Nian Yao still refused to see them.

For the first time, a truly terrifying shadow descended over the region.

Even when the Yan army had once passed nearby, the pressure had never felt this suffocating.

...

“You really have to go this far?” Xiong Tingshan asked, seated before the Regent.

The Regent continued reviewing memorials.

“Interesting. Whose side are you actually on?”

“I can’t swallow this humiliation.”

“Whether you can swallow it or not, you still have to. You know perfectly well that from the moment that brother-in-law of mine burned Jing City, we could no longer win this war.”

“But it still shouldn’t be like this.”

“This is the best outcome. Fifth Brother, I hope you’ll help me. The two of us, brothers together, should first clean our own house thoroughly. Then let us plant a few more harvests, fill the granaries, let the children run and jump and shout through the courtyards. After that, we’ll take back everything we lost, face and substance alike.”

“Fourth Brother, I feel suffocated. I never thought it would end like this. Truly. I thought I could help you keep the Yan north of us, while you...”

“All right, all right. Go do your work. Hurry back to Wutong Commandery and stabilize the situation there. Suppress one group, but you’ll also need to raise another. Those Shanyue have been conquered by Great Chu for centuries. Their chiefs have spoken the Xia tongue and written Xia script for generations. Put plainly, aside from a few slight differences in appearance, how different are they really from Chu people? We can open the doors of the court and allow them to become officials. Let them become our own people.”

At those words, Xiong Tingshan, once Great Chu’s Fifth Prince and now Prince Dingqin, who had married a Shanyue woman and fathered several children carrying Shanyue blood, suddenly clenched his fists and surged to his feet.

He almost roared:

“Fourth Brother, how dare you do this!”

“Why would We not dare? Fifth Brother, We thought you would see this even more clearly than We do. We even thought you would be happier to see it.”

“This... this is wrong.”

“There is nothing wrong with it. Can you say your own children are not Chu people? Speak the Xia tongue, write Xia characters, observe Chu rites. That makes them Chu. Our south has been in turmoil for centuries. It is time for that to end. We do not intend to be emperor only of Great Chu’s nobles. We intend to be emperor of all the people of Great Chu. So long as the southern frontier can be fully absorbed and the Shanyue problem cut away at the root, Great Chu’s strength will recover faster. Once recovered, Great Chu may even become stronger than it was before. To put it unpleasantly, of all the fertile lands beneath Heaven, one share lies in Yan, one in Jin, five in Qian, and three in Chu. But that three shares in Chu does not actually include our southern frontier. Let the Yan toss and turn as they please. Their foundation is only so large. Let them squander it. If we are competing over the future, We do not fear them!”

Xiong Tingshan drew a deep breath, bit his lip, and asked a very practical question.

“Fourth Brother, you want to let Shanyue enter the court while also suppressing the nobles. Those nobles will go mad. Even the common people may go mad.”

He pointed outside.

“Will the Imperial Clan Guards go mad too?”

The implication was obvious.

Chu had already lost a war, and now the ruler intended to carry out such brutal and radical measures internally.

Would his Dragon Throne truly remain steady?

Hearing the question, the Regent smiled.

“You already know that We have always admired that Emperor of Yan. So We intend to see a worthy man and strive to equal him.”

...

For several days in a row, no member of the Qu Clan managed to see General-in-Chief Nian.

All they could do was stare at his banner flying above the military camp.

A rebuke from an imperial edict, a public accusation, even a formal expedition to punish their crimes would all have been easier to endure than this complete silence.

Finally, one morning, the Imperial Clan Guards moved out.

They divided into several columns and marched directly into the heart of the Qu Clan’s fief.

The Qu lands were vast and heavily populated, but people surnamed Qu were still only a minority.

The arrival of the Imperial Clan Guards left the Qu Clan terrified.

The local commoners, however, were largely indifferent.

The division carrying the General-in-Chief’s banner marched directly to the city containing the Qu Clan’s ancestral seat.

A eunuch holding an imperial edict walked before the army.

Under the gaze of the Qu clansmen and the hastily gathered private troops crowding the city wall, he began to read:

“By mandate of Heaven, the Emperor decrees: The Qu Clan has enjoyed generations of favor from the state, yet failed to repay that grace with loyal service. On the battlefield it surrendered to the enemy and aided the tiger in its predations. By its own actions it has severed itself from its ancestors, from its ancestral temple, and from the dignity of its Pillar of State lineage.”

It was an extremely short edict.

When the eunuch reached that point, he lifted his head.

He looked at the dense mass of people atop the wall.

A cold smile appeared on his lips.

“For this crime, they shall be put to death!”

...

Min’an City stood on Mount Min, a strategic stronghold that had once belonged to the State of Qi.

Qi had been one of the states that arose in the heartland of the Xia peoples during the chaos following the collapse of the Great Xia Dynasty.

Originally, Qi had no desire to become entangled in the wars of the Central Plains. Every opponent there looked fiercer than the last. So Qi simply expanded eastward instead, bullying the Shanyue while enlarging its territory and population.

At the same time, Chu was steadily nibbling away at Shanyue lands from another direction.

Back then, the Shanyue were simply the submissive one everyone could bully.

Eventually the two sides bullied their way into one another.

Qi and Chu even fought a few wars.

But Qi’s main armies had to remain in the west to prevent other states from swallowing it, while the Chu force involved was not the Imperial Clan Guards, merely the private army of one noble house.

So the clashes never became especially large.

Today you tore down one of my camps.

Tomorrow I occupied one of your forts.

Even the proper battles rarely involved more than several thousand men.

Neither side had the energy to establish genuine administration over the newly explored lands. Their main goal was simply to display force before the local Shanyue and make those tribes submit to them rather than the other side.

Later, as Chu’s expansion toward the southwest frontier grew stronger and it could commit more manpower, supplies, and military force, one might have expected Chu to formally attack Qi.

That never happened.

Because the State of Qian was born.

Yes.

The newborn State of Qian possessed abundant martial vigor.

Under its founding emperor, Qian destroyed state after state and completed its internal unification.

Qi became one of Qian’s targets.

At that point, Chu actually became the side supporting Qi against Qian.

But Qian’s armies and generals were formidable in those days.

Qi was eventually destroyed.

Chu and Qian then fought several battles along their border.

Chu failed to gain an advantage.

Qian itself possessed lands so rich that, once Qi was gone, it had little appetite for further external expansion. At minimum, it had no intention of fighting a state-level war against Chu merely for Shanyue territory.

Then, after Qian’s founding emperor died, Emperor Taizong launched a northern expedition and was savagely beaten by the first Marquis of Zhenbei.

From that point onward, Qian’s military strength steadily declined.

Its southeastern border gradually stabilized along the Mount Min line.

In recent years, Qian and Chu occasionally clashed along that frontier, but the conflicts remained manageable.

Most were chain reactions caused by Qian accepting Shanyue refugees while Chu digested its conquered territories.

Later, once Yan began its external wars, even those border clashes vanished entirely.

Minzhou City was the great city of the surrounding region and the main distribution center for local goods.

Even Shanyue from inside Chu territory came to “market” here, bringing mountain products and other goods to trade.

In earlier years, Qian’s military preparedness had decayed badly.

Even the Three Frontiers had been full of padded rosters and ghost soldiers collecting nonexistent salaries, much less the comparatively unimportant southeastern frontier garrisons.

Fortunately, cats had their roads and rats had theirs.

If the court failed to send enough military pay, common soldiers could simply change clothes and become merchants.

First there were official local border markets.

Then there were cuts taken from merchant caravans passing through, which was merely another way of saying smuggling.

For a time, military commerce became a traditional skill among Qian’s army bosses.

Successive Chief Ministers largely closed one eye to it.

After all, if a genuine case of “military men not loving wealth” suddenly appeared, the Chief Ministers and the Emperor might become even more frightened.

Today was the first day of the month, the regular market day.

Qian soldiers in armor began moving goods and organizing caravans in and out.

Some junior officers worked an abacus more smoothly than they handled saber or sword.

A caravan from Chu entered.

Qian soldiers drove away the Shanyue blocking its path and cleared the way.

Every soldier was grinning from ear to ear.

They knew Yan had invaded Chu and beaten it terribly.

Many noble families had been ruined.

Some even had their ancestral tombs dug open by that Marquis of Pingxi.

The badly wounded Chu nobles desperately needed to recover losses.

That meant their goods would be better and their prices lower, all for the sake of quickly converting inventory into cash.

For the Qian side, that meant profit.

What junior officer did not have some family business operating behind him?

And those who did not were usually managing one patch of business for some powerful figure in Shangjing.

When the other side urgently needed to sell, there was even more money to be made.

Several officers actually gathered their subordinates and started brawling over which of them would get the Chu caravan.

They all knew that whoever swallowed this batch of goods would make a fortune.

For a time, the scene became extraordinarily chaotic.

By rights, Minzhou City was a military stronghold.

No matter how corrupt it had become, some shred of dignity should still have remained.

The problem was that over the past two years, the court had twice transferred troops from this region to reinforce the Three Frontiers.

The difficult men.

The ones who still possessed dreams.

The ones unwilling to join the corruption.

The ones who actually knew a little about commanding troops and could train their men into something respectable.

All of them had been pushed out by the local interest groups.

So now, Minzhou City had become a commercial city on Qian’s southeastern frontier.

At that moment, the manager of the Chu caravan, who had been slipping silver into hands and smiling obsequiously at every checkpoint, suddenly pulled out a signal flare and triggered it.

Whoosh!

The caravan workers and the Shanyue who had come to market that day simultaneously drew weapons and fell upon the Qian garrison inside the city.

Outside the walls, a disciplined Chu army appeared and launched its assault against Minzhou City.

Along the southeastern border between Qian and Chu, similar scenes erupted in many places at once.

Inside one military camp, General-in-Chief Nian Yao, who had spent so long at Zhennan Pass being suppressed by Prince of Jingnan Tian Wujing that he barely dared fart, walked out of his command tent.

Today, Old Nian had finally recovered from the Qian the joy of being a general.

Looking at the beacon fires rising in the distance, he stretched extravagantly.

Then he spat hard onto the ground and cursed:

“Damn it, this is what you call a war! This is what you call a war!”

[End of Chapter 624]