Chapter 647: - The Mastermind!

Sun Youdao did not know who stood behind Prince Cheng Residence.

He had retired long ago. Even the title of Grand Tutor had only been taken up again because, the last time around, circumstances had forced him into an arrangement with Zheng Fan.

In truth, after helping his son manage logistics and getting through Great Yan’s campaign against Chu, Grand Tutor Sun had withdrawn again.

He genuinely had no desire to return to public affairs. His heart had been exhausted for a very long time. All he wanted now was to spend what little remained of his life quietly, accompanied by his old concubines.

Peace and quiet.

Let everyone have some peace and quiet.

Zheng Fan understood that perfectly well.

The Emperor of Yan had left Yanjing and entered the Rear Garden under the name of recuperation, but no one truly believed the Emperor had put down every concern and devoted himself entirely to rest.

Grand Tutor Sun remained in Yingdu, yet in many respects he had already understood the Emperor’s intentions.

That was why Zhao Wenhua and the others had never pulled him into the things they were doing.

But Sun Youdao had once served as Chief Minister of Great Cheng. He had once joined hands with Situ Lei and accomplished something truly great. Men like him possessed instincts and sensitivities almost impossible for outsiders to imagine.

In the Queen Mother’s eyes, revealing information about the mastermind was the best bargaining chip she could offer Marquis Pingxi now.

In Sun Youdao’s eyes, however, that was the true road to certain death.

The person behind the scenes had dared use Prince Cheng Residence to make calculations of this scale, and had even dared calculate Marquis Pingxi himself.

What did that mean?

First, that person was confident he could make the affair watertight.

Second, even if the affair leaked, he was still confident he could guarantee his own safety.

Marquis Pingxi was the sort of man who repaid every slight. Sun Youdao understood that perfectly well.

Truthfully, how many genuine saints were there in this world? A handful, perhaps, and even that number was only figurative. Most people, given the chance to take revenge, regarded sayings like “ten years is not too late” as little more than a cloth covering their shame. If they could settle a grudge tonight, why wait until tomorrow?

But what if one had to endure? What if revenge was impossible for the moment?

Some secrets let you live if you kept them.

Speak them aloud, and you had to die.

Because revealing one secret could expose an even greater secret. And if that greater secret could not be resolved publicly, then anyone who knew it had to keep his mouth shut forever.

No one kept secrets better than the dead.

That was why, in his desperation, Sun Youdao had even shouted the Queen Mother’s personal name.

He no longer cared whether doing so would damage the relationship the Sun family had painstakingly maintained with the Marquis of Pingxi Residence.

People often said no one knew a son better than his father.

The reverse was also true.

Sun Ying had long anticipated that his father might do exactly this.

But Sun Liang arrived one step too late.

The reason was that one of Sun Liang’s concubines had gone into labor that day.

So Sun Liang had not gone to his post. He stayed at home waiting. After the child was born, he went looking for his father so the old man could formally bestow a name, only to discover that Marquis Pingxi had sent men to summon Sun Youdao to Prince Cheng Residence.

One could only say that when a man’s natural talent was insufficient, this sort of timing happening to him somehow felt entirely reasonable.

Remembering his elder brother’s warning, Sun Liang immediately panicked.

The joy of a new life entering the household vanished completely, because there was now a very real possibility that the whole family might soon go down neatly together.

Sun Liang mounted a horse and rushed to Prince Cheng Residence.

But the Marquis’s personal guards outside stopped him.

He shouted and demanded to be let in.

No one budged.

Fortunately, Gou Moli had just entered the city with the army and was bringing Kong Mingde to Prince Cheng Residence. He needed to return the command token and await further orders.

Seeing Sun Liang outside in such a state, without even an official robe and with his hair in disarray, Gou Moli eventually decided to bring him inside.

The three had barely reached the discussion hall when they heard Sun Youdao’s thunderous shout.

Sun Liang’s hands and feet instantly went cold.

He charged toward the hall.

Gou Moli reached out and stopped Kong Mingde, signaling that he should wait farther away.

Kong Mingde understood immediately.

There were things a man at his level was better off not hearing. Knowing them would only create trouble.

So he retreated to the courtyard gate.

Sun Liang, meanwhile, rushed into the hall and immediately threw himself to the floor, kowtowing before Marquis Pingxi.

“Marquis, Marquis, my father is old and his mind has declined. He may have spoken improperly. I beg Marquis to forgive him. Please forgive him!”

By then, Sun Youdao no longer cared about his son’s arrival or behavior.

After shouting those words, his qi and blood had seized inside him. Tightness crushed his chest, and he simply collapsed unconscious.

At that moment, Gou Moli also entered.

He first crouched beside Sun Youdao and checked him.

Then he looked up at Marquis Zheng and shook his head, indicating that the man was not dead.

After that, he took out one of the human pills the Blind Man had once made and slipped it into Sun Youdao’s mouth.

Then he walked over to Sun Liang, patted him on the shoulder, and said:

“Good boy. Go look after your father.”

Sun Liang turned his head.

Only then did he realize his father had fainted.

He scrambled over and checked Sun Youdao’s condition. Finding that the old man was still breathing and still had a pulse, he let out a long breath.

Then, somehow, he began crying.

Marquis Zheng frowned slightly.

Gou Moli moved closer and barked:

“What are you crying for? Help Grand Tutor Sun out and let him rest!”

Sun Liang wiped his tears and nodded.

Then he looked toward Marquis Zheng and nodded hard again.

He lifted his father and carried him away.

The discussion hall finally became quiet once more.

The little interruption was over.

Next came the real subject.

But before that, Zheng Fan first instructed Gou Moli:

“Go arrange the troop deployments.”

“Yes, Master.”

Gou Moli’s martial skill might have been third-rate, but no one would ever believe the former Savage King did not know how to command an army or deploy troops.

Years ago, on the bank of the Wang River not far from Yingdu, Gou Moli had lost to the Prince of Jingnan because Marquis Zheng had launched a thousand-li raid and taken Snow Sea Pass, while the Prince of Jingnan then relied on elite Zhenbei and Jingnan cavalry to force the decisive battle.

At the time, the Savage King had effectively been locked down both strategically and tactically.

Gou Moli did not return the command token.

He left the discussion hall again, told He Chunlai to go inside and attend Marquis Zheng, then took Kong Mingde with him to arrange Yingdu’s defenses.

He Chunlai entered and stood quietly in a corner with his head slightly lowered.

Marquis Zheng leaned forward and looked at the Queen Mother sitting on the floor.

The meaning was obvious.

Continue.

The Queen Mother looked somewhat lost.

She trusted Sun Youdao.

After Yingdu submitted to Great Yan, Sun Youdao had withdrawn in disillusionment, but she was not stupid. She understood that when the final critical moment came, she knew who would genuinely act for the good of her family.

But under Marquis Zheng’s gaze, she found it almost impossible to withstand the pressure.

A woman who had once been Empress of an entire state had now been driven to this point.

Standing in the corner, He Chunlai felt no emotional disturbance at all, even though he was a Jin man.

In truth, much like the Sword Saint, he too was watching and thinking.

As a Jin man, once the state was destroyed and the old order collapsed, what road should he follow?

Perhaps his understanding was not as deep or penetrating as the Sword Saint’s.

But at minimum, he had now seen what those Jin nobles who once stood above everyone else looked like after their fall.

Take this family in front of him.

Looking at them now, one could not help feeling that the Yan ruling the Three Jin lands was perfectly reasonable.

“Someone.”

“This subordinate is here!”

He Chunlai immediately answered.

He was, after all, the only person in the entire hall currently available to be ordered around.

Zheng Fan pointed at him.

“This subordinate of mine is an excellent cook. His Highness should be hungry by now. Prepare a table of food. Nothing elaborate, but make it as refined as possible.”

“Yes. This subordinate understands.”

Cooking was his specialty.

He Chunlai quietly breathed out in relief.

“Prepare a cup of poisoned wine as well. After His Highness finishes eating, we can send him on his way.”

He Chunlai’s head snapped up.

For an instant, he wondered whether he had heard wrong.

He did think this so-called Prince of Jin and Queen Mother were a sorry pair, but was his Marquis really treating them like pheasants, saying kill and simply killing them?

Still, He Chunlai bit the tip of his tongue and answered:

“Yes!”

He left.

All the servants of Prince Cheng Residence were being investigated by Zhao Yanglou, head of the Secret Intelligence Department branch in Yingdu, so even the kitchen was empty.

But it was only a late-night meal.

He Chunlai could handle that alone.

Back inside the discussion hall, after giving the order, Marquis Zheng closed his eyes and leaned sideways against the throne.

He looked at no one.

He spoke to no one.

Let the silence continue.

In truth, this silence was the most terrifying and torturous thing of all.

Waiting to die could drive a man insane.

By contrast, the man who shouted, “Twenty years from now, I’ll still be a good man!” and then lost his head with a clean swish of the blade had a kind of enviable freedom.

I am not going to repeat my threats.

I have already passed judgment on you.

I refuse to discuss it with you.

You yourselves can decide what to do.

Marquis Zheng was not deliberately playing psychological games or putting on an act.

He had simply reached a position, stood at a height, where this kind of pressure arose naturally around him.

As Marquis Zheng himself had said before, he had killed two men surnamed Situ.

He had crippled a Prince of the Ji family.

He had entered Qian’s Shangjing.

He had scraped the gold from the sacred statues in Jin’s imperial ancestral temple.

He had been the man who gave the order to massacre prisoners beneath Yupan City.

And there were far too many other things besides.

Mother and son, think it over yourselves.

Is this Marquis really merely frightening you?

The silence was the first thing Situ Yu could no longer endure.

He Chunlai had not even returned yet, but Situ Yu already seemed able to smell the fragrance of the food.

He turned his head and looked at his mother.

The Queen Mother was fighting an equally violent battle inside herself.

At last, neither mother nor son could hold out any longer.

The Queen Mother spoke.

“Marquis...”

Zheng Fan kept his eyes closed.

No response.

“It is a powerful figure in Yanjing. He is...”

Zheng Fan still did not move.

The Queen Mother had already cried earlier.

Now she began crying again.

But like a child, after crying for a while and discovering that no one paid attention, she gradually stopped.

She bit her lip.

“When Great Cheng was first founded, the late Emperor maintained correspondence with a powerful figure in Yanjing. When Great Yan destroyed the Helian and Wenren families and the Savages on the snowfield began stirring, the late Emperor first wrote to that Yanjing figure and informed him that he intended to lead troops north to stop the Savages. Afterward, the late Emperor gathered the elite troops of the state and marched toward Snow Sea Pass. The armies of Great Yan halted along their line and no longer advanced east.”

Marquis Zheng slowly opened his eyes.

He felt a strong sense of personal involvement in this story.

Because at the time, Marquis Zheng had been the commander of Shengle City.

Great Yan’s cavalry had been at the height of its momentum then.

Everyone had been wondering when they would continue advancing east, destroy the Situ family in one breath, and unify the Three Jin lands.

Instead, precisely because Situ Lei had made that move, effectively exposing his entire rear to Great Yan, orders came down from above forbidding the Yan army from advancing east and provoking him.

Later, after the Situ family’s campaign against the snowfield began going badly, Old Tian led thirty thousand elite Jingnan troops north through Shengle City, crossed the Tianduan Mountains, and conducted an expedition onto the snowfield.

That campaign had, in reality, been launched to support and answer the Situ family.

There had even been rumors at the time that once Situ Lei finished dealing with the Savages, he would lower Great Cheng’s status and submit to Great Yan, becoming one of its enfeoffed regional lords.

A vassal.

Put plainly, Great Yan had fought so many battles in the Jin lands over the past several years, fought the Savages, fought Chu, poured out oceans of money, grain, and conscript labor, and nearly emptied the strength of the entire state in order to establish the Marquis of Pingxi Residence in eastern Jin.

Put even more plainly, it had all been done to patch the hole left behind when Situ Lei failed.

Under the Emperor of Yan’s original design, Situ Lei and the Situ family would remain in eastern Jin, acknowledge Great Yan as sovereign, and help shield Yan from threats coming from the snowfield and Chu.

Great Yan itself would then have been free to gather troops at leisure and march south against Qian.

One could only say that timing, fate, and destiny had their own plans.

Back then, Marquis Zheng had still been following Old Tian.

They had just won a battle when news arrived that Snow Sea Pass had fallen.

Even Zheng Fan had found it difficult to understand.

Situ Lei’s life had been one dazzling reversal after another.

That single stain alone could never be erased.

Blame the rebels.

Blame the brothers Situ Yi and Situ Jiong.

Blame whoever you wished.

You failed to hold Snow Sea Pass.

That was the greatest failure of your life.

To a certain degree, the Emperor of Yan should have possessed several more years and far more national strength with which to calmly arrange the assault on the enormous piece of fat meat called Qian.

Instead, those years and that strength had been consumed.

And once time was lost, Heaven’s timing, fate, and lifespan would not wait for anyone.

“The late Emperor remained in contact with that powerful figure in Yanjing...”

Marquis Zheng continued listening.

He did not simply assume the person being described was the Emperor of Yan.

How to put it?

Even at Situ Lei’s absolute peak, he had never possessed the standing to negotiate with the Emperor of Yan as an equal through private correspondence.

As he listened, Zheng Fan gradually felt something familiar.

He thought of someone.

Not a person in Yanjing.

Someone beside him.

The Blind Man.

Ordinarily, the Blind Man handled letters and all sorts of matters from below on Zheng Fan’s behalf.

Once everything was settled, he would simply give Zheng Fan a brief report.

That powerful figure’s place beside the Emperor of Yan seemed very much like the Blind Man’s place beside Zheng Fan.

“Before the late Emperor died, he personally wrote that man a letter entrusting his orphaned heir to him. After the late Emperor passed away, there were no letters from that powerful figure for a very long time. Until a few months ago. Then letters from that man in Yanjing began arriving again. I saw that the late Emperor always answered him personally, and I believe the replies he sent were likewise written in his own hand. I knew about this. Zhao Wenhua constantly attended the late Emperor in those years. He would only know more than I do...”

The Queen Mother suddenly stopped.

Why had Zhao Wenhua never mentioned any of this, not even when he was being dragged away?

As she herself had just said, Zhao Wenhua knew more about the matter than a woman of the inner palace ever could.

Yet he had remained silent.

And the Queen Mother had never once doubted Zhao Wenhua’s loyalty toward Prince Cheng Residence.

If he had refused to speak, then in his judgment, speaking would only harm the residence even more.

Old Eunuch Zhao had refused to speak.

Sun Youdao had shouted for her not to speak before collapsing.

But she had already spoken.

In an instant, the Queen Mother’s body began trembling.

A delayed, enormous terror swept over her from head to toe.

She remembered something her husband had once said to her while he was still alive:

When an age of great contention arrives, men once no more than weeds and dust may rise from the sea and transform into flood dragons. Princes, generals, ministers, sons of dragons and grandsons of emperors may instead be beaten back into the dust.

The Queen Mother looked at Marquis Pingxi seated before her.

Then she looked at her own son.

At last, she understood the depth of her husband’s words.

“Who is he?”

Zheng Fan asked.

He already knew the Queen Mother probably did not know.

Otherwise she would not be foolish enough to play coy with him at a moment like this.

What?

Did she still hope to negotiate?

This Queen Mother truly could not compare with the Princess of the Marquis Residence, or even the charmingly simple Princess in his own bedchamber.

She lacked political judgment and decisiveness.

But she was not actually stupid.

Zhao Wenhua had tried to threaten Zheng Fan by saying mistreating Prince Cheng Residence would chill the hearts of the Jin people.

The Queen Mother, from beginning to end, had played only on sentiment.

It looked useless.

Even laughable.

Yet it was actually the most practical choice available.

Perhaps she lacked ability and foresight, but she understood that threatening the Yan with the Jin people the way Zhao Wenhua had done would only make the Yan more determined to erase Prince Cheng Residence entirely.

So she was not being deliberately evasive now.

“I do not know. The late Emperor never told me who he was. But the letters they exchanged were kept in the Imperial Study Pavilion. No, it is called the Library Pavilion now. Marquis can compare the handwriting and literary style. Perhaps you will find something.”

Marquis Zheng, seated on the throne, laughed.

The mother and son kneeling below could not understand why.

Marquis Zheng raised one hand.

“Where is the Library Pavilion?”

“Northwest,” Situ Yu answered immediately.

Marquis Zheng nodded.

“According to the usual progression of the plot, it should catch fire about now.”

“Report!”

At that exact moment, a personal guard rushed inside, knelt, and reported:

“Marquis, the pavilion in the northwest corner of Prince Cheng Residence has caught fire. The flames are intense, but there is a pond between it and this side. It should not spread here!”

“Tsk.”

Marquis Zheng nodded and waved for him to withdraw.

Situ Yu immediately shouted:

“Marquis, I didn’t start that fire. I didn’t. You have to believe me!”

Marquis Zheng nodded.

“This Marquis believes you. You do not have the brains for it.”

“...” Situ Yu.

Marquis Zheng leaned back slightly.

He clasped both hands together over his lower abdomen.

Not Little Sixth.

At the time, Little Sixth had probably still been working as a constable in Nan’an County.

No.

More precisely, it would not be one of the Princes.

With Situ Lei’s pride, he would never have maintained correspondence with a Prince of Yan, someone from the younger generation.

Not a Prince.

Yet someone among the people most trusted by the Emperor of Yan, someone who occupied a position much like the Blind Man’s beside Zheng Fan.

The letters...

Let them burn.

Because there were only a handful of possible candidates anyway.

[End of Chapter 647]