The entire court fell silent.
Everyone looked at this old man. In every person’s eyes, there was nothing left but reverence.
He was Da Ning’s Chief Censor. He had never once felt shame for having served Chu before Da Ning, never once felt diminished by the fact that he had served two courts.
He said he was the Chief Censor chosen by His Majesty the Emperor of Da Ning. And so he would do the job properly.
He was a man who could seem rigid and obsessive, even grating — the type you might call someone who made mountains out of molehills. But you could never say he was wrong.
Because he never was.
When His Majesty helped this old man to his feet, every court official present — Xu Ji included — bowed deeply toward him.
The old man had said: *thank you to the Empress, for delivering the long-overdue justice that a wronged Central Plains woman deserved.*
What he perhaps did not yet know was why Gao Xining had done what she had done — because she had told herself: *I am the Empress. This kind of justice is mine to deliver.*
*To be the mother of the nation is not only an honor. It is a responsibility.*
—
Shortly after, the Eastern Warm Chamber.
Gao Xining caught the Chief Censor, who was about to bow to her yet again, and said to him very earnestly: “Senior Gao, I have good news to tell you.”
Gao Youlan asked: “This official does not know — what good news might that be?”
Gao Xining said: “I had Zhang Tang investigate, and as luck would have it — the man who committed that crime is in the Jinjiao delegation that was just expelled. I have already dispatched people to pursue them. Barring any complications, they should be able to bring him back first thing tomorrow morning.”
Gao Youlan was shaken with emotion. For a long moment, he didn’t know what to say.
This was a man who had spent most of his life using words to uphold justice and rectify the court — yet in this moment, he truly did not know what to say.
—
At the same time, at the official guesthouse.
A man from the Dark Warriors named Ganluo stood by the window, expression taut, deep in thought, as though something were weighing on him.
Just then, one of the envoys of the Little Moon Lion Kingdom — a man named Aolou — appeared at his door. Catching sight of Ganluo through the window, Aolou bowed.
“Come in and speak. Don’t bow at me through the window.”
Ganluo shot Aolou a look of irritated disappointment and turned back into the room.
Aolou realized what he had just done wrong. In public, Ganluo’s stated identity was merely a Western Regions merchant who had accompanied the delegation to Chang’an.
And Aolou was a military official in the Little Moon Lion Kingdom’s delegation — third in standing among its members.
The Little Moon Lion Kingdom’s lead envoy was a prince — younger brother to the Little Moon Lion King, named Dong Qianyuan.
The second envoy was a civil official of the kingdom named Man Laiyaman — already an elderly man in his sixties.
Dong Qianyuan was, naturally, the most senior figure. The entire delegation deferred to him. Yet he consulted Man Laiyaman in all things.
Man Laiyaman had spent decades studying Central Plains culture — simultaneously in admiration and in covetous contemplation of it.
He was firmly convinced that Central Plains culture was the most complete culture in the world — whether in its written language, its ritual and ceremony, or the weight of its accumulated tradition.
And so he was equally convinced: if the opportunity ever arose to conquer the Central Plains, the Little Moon Lion Kingdom would at last become the true ruler of this world.
He had always held this view: even if the Little Moon Lion Kingdom developed to its absolute limits within the Western Regions, it would remain only a minor nation in a corner of the world.
Only by occupying the Central Plains — with its inexhaustible resources, its rich land — could one truly cultivate the way of a hegemon.
He was a deeply dangerous man — precisely because he had studied Central Plains culture so thoroughly that his lifelong ambition was to become its *master*.
He had once, in a lecture to his students, stated openly: *if one could occupy a place like the Central Plains, after a hundred years it would no longer have anything called Central Plains culture — because Central Plains culture would have become the culture of the Little Moon Lion Kingdom.*
Aolou was Man Laiyaman’s disciple — and his most fervent devotee.
He also held another position: commander of the Little Moon Lion King’s personal guard.
Among all the Western Regions nations here today, the only two that the Dark Warriors considered worth looking at were the Little Moon Lion Kingdom and the Garlou Kingdom. But the Garlou Kingdom was clearly leaning toward Da Ning — so the only one Ganluo could work with was the Little Moon Lion Kingdom.
Watching Aolou enter the room, Ganluo asked: “What are you here for?”
Aolou bowed and said: “My Lord, His Highness the Prince has sent me to ask — when do you intend to execute the plan?”
Ganluo looked at this man before him — brave enough, but transparently foolish — and his patience frayed.
Aolou was genuinely formidable. Even Ganluo — whose ability was on par with the Great Sword Masters of Sword Sect — had to acknowledge the natural gifts Aolou possessed.
Heaven had been extraordinarily generous to this Westerner — born with immense physical strength, and swift besides. The only thing lacking was that his mind was a bit dull.
If Aolou were also sufficiently intelligent — if his combat intelligence were sharpened to match — then even at Sword Sect, he would be a match for any Great Sword Master.
“I have said before: when the time comes for action, I will send word to His Highness the Prince. You may go.”
Ganluo continued: “Before I have sent word, there is nothing to do.”
Aolou said: “But His Highness is worried that — given how unfriendly the Ning people are being — they may expel the entire delegation before long…”
Ganluo was now actively suppressing the urge to curse.
He said with barely concealed irritation: “Before His Highness the Prince sent you here to ask me, did he first consult with Man Laiyaman?”
Aolou immediately answered: “My teacher went out — said he wanted to take in Chang’an’s scenery, and pick up some books. He says the main reason he wanted to come at all was to buy Central Plains books that he can’t find in the Little Moon Lion Kingdom.”
Ganluo understood at once.
Man Laiyaman had gone out to buy books. The Prince, with nothing to do and not wanting to seem incompetent in Ganluo’s eyes, had sent Aolou over to ask a question.
Except that this *asking a question* only made the Prince’s incompetence more apparent.
He was actually worried that the Ning people would expel the entire Western Regions delegation. *What the Ning people did to the Jinjiao delegation was a warning shot — nothing more.*
If the Ning people had truly intended to expel all the Western Regions envoys, why invite them in the first place?
The whole thing was a show of force — a means of establishing dominance from the outset, even with a hint of arrogance to it.
So that later, when it came time to negotiate trade, the slightest improvement in attitude would leave these Western Regions people feeling like they’d been honored with a great favor.
Man Laiyaman understood the Central Plains mind. On the road here, Man Laiyaman had said as much: *Central Plains people are masters of performance, masters of schemes, masters of calculating the human heart.*
*Dealing with Central Plains people requires more than one layer of caution — because they are full of twists and turns.*
Ganluo said to Aolou: “In the future, whenever His Highness the Prince wishes to ask me anything, let him first discuss it with Man Laiyaman before sending word… You may go.”
Aolou cursed this arrogant Dark Warriors man in his heart a few times, then nodded: “Then I’ll go back.”
Ganluo couldn’t be bothered with him any longer. He waved a hand in dismissal.
After Aolou returned, he relayed to the Prince, with embellishment, how insufferably arrogant Ganluo had been.
Dong Qianyuan was displeased when he heard it.
“He wants me to consult Man Laiyaman in all things? Does he think I’m an idiot?”
Dong Qianyuan continued: “I am here representing my royal brother. *I* am the lead envoy of this delegation.”
Aolou, seeing the Prince genuinely upset, scrambled to soothe him: “That Dark Warriors man is just timid and overcautious. He doesn’t look down on Your Highness.”
“How dare he!”
Dong Qianyuan said: “He presumes to lecture me on consulting Man Laiyaman in everything — as though I need him to tell me? My royal brother said that himself. Do you think I could forget?”
Aolou felt a quiet wave of relief inside. *Who doesn’t know you’re slow, everyone does.*
The entire Little Moon Lion Kingdom knew: Prince Dong Qianyuan was a simple-minded man.
He seemed to have been dropped on his head as a child — or perhaps fallen himself — either way, something in his head didn’t work quite right.
He listened only to his elder brother — the Little Moon Lion King — and did whatever his elder brother told him to do.
There was a story: when Dong Qianyuan was in his teens, the Little Moon Lion King Baolonghua had taken his younger brother to the edge of a cliff.
He told Dong Qianyuan: “I have learned an immortal technique from the national priest. If I tap you once, you will be able to fly.”
And so he tapped Dong Qianyuan and said: “Now you can fly. Walk forward — even if you walk off the cliff, you won’t fall. You’ll rise into the air.”
Dong Qianyuan, without the slightest hesitation, walked straight toward the cliff’s edge without looking back.
Just as his foot stepped off and he had already begun to drop, Baolonghua grabbed him and pulled him back.
Baolonghua roared with laughter: “Of all the people in the world, only my brother would never doubt a single word I say. Only my brother is truly, unconditionally loyal to me.”
Some years later, Baolonghua said: “Brother, you have grown up now. It is time for you to fight for me. I’ll give you an army. Go and destroy the Fenghuang Kingdom.”
The Fenghuang Kingdom was a long-standing ally of the Little Moon Lion Kingdom — thirty years of alliance, forged in the time of Baolonghua’s father. What was more, not long before this, the Fenghuang King had sent envoys to Baolonghua requesting that he allow his daughter to be wed to Dong Qianyuan — a marriage between the royal families, to deepen the bond between the two nations.
Baolonghua had been enormously pleased. He praised the proposal at length and told the Fenghuang envoys: *go back and tell your king to prepare for the wedding — before long, I will send my brother at the head of an army to personally escort the bride.*
He then immediately turned around and had Dong Qianyuan prepare for the wedding, and while Dong Qianyuan was still flushed with joy, told him to take the army and go attack the Fenghuang Kingdom.
“Brother — this is just a way of fetching the bride. It doesn’t matter how you fetch her. Once you’ve destroyed the Fenghuang Kingdom, you can still bring the princess home.”
And so Dong Qianyuan truly marched off with his army to attack the Fenghuang Kingdom.
When they reached the border, the Fenghuang Kingdom’s border troops, thinking Dong Qianyuan had come to fetch the bride, threw open the gates.
Dong Qianyuan led the Little Moon Lion Kingdom’s army all the way to the Fenghuang capital — and forced the Fenghuang King to fling himself from the city walls.
It did not stop there. He had virtually the entire royal family slaughtered — only the princess was spared, and brought back to the Little Moon Lion Kingdom in chains.
When he returned at the head of his army, Baolonghua laughed until his sides ached and praised his brother endlessly for his achievement.
Then, in the very next breath, stripped Dong Qianyuan of all military authority — and personally presided over the wedding of Dong Qianyuan and the Fenghuang princess.
There was a saying in the Little Moon Lion Kingdom: *Even if the greatest sage in the Little Moon Lion Kingdom, Man Laiyaman himself, taught Prince Dong Qianyuan in person — there is no teaching that could grow a single drop of wisdom in that skull of his.*
—