After bidding farewell to the Third Prince, Shen Yang, and Zheng Hui, Han Qian carried the secret decree back to Yandang Promontory Manor.

Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Lin Haizheng had ridden their horses into the manor slightly earlier. Seeing Han Qian arriving by boat, they led their horses to the dock to greet him, asking:

“Your Lordship summoning us to the manor at this time—is there something you need to instruct?”

“Follow me,” Han Qian said, looking at the barely rallied expressions on the faces of Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Lin Haizheng. Without saying much at this moment, he walked straight toward the official residence, indicating the three should follow.

Over ninety new rooms had just been built on the promontory’s southern point, divided into two medium-sized walled compounds on either side of the river port dock. Between them was a dock that could simultaneously berth four thousand-shi sailing ships, along with warehouses capable of storing up to one hundred thousand shi of grain or equivalent materials.

Expending such great effort to rush the expansion of Yandang Promontory to this scale within four months, and having to maintain this construction pace for another month before abandoning it all to temporarily leave—just thinking about it pained Han Qian’s heart.

Returning to the official residence, Han Qian had Zhao Ting’er bring out secretly stored Qingming new tea to brew for everyone to taste.

The Han family’s servants, household troops, and their family members at the manor totaled fewer than three hundred people. Combined with communal sleeping quarters provided for fleet personnel, cramming one thousand people into the manor was already extremely crowded. This time, temporarily housing five to six thousand people required setting up tents in every available space inside and outside the manor.

Now that the five to six thousand people had all boarded ships and left, the mess they left behind would take several days of cleaning to look somewhat tidy.

Currently, only Han Qian’s residence in the manor remained unaffected. High and thick courtyard walls blocked the cold wind outside. An iron stove was placed in the courtyard, filled with coal briquettes. When Han Qian entered, the water in the iron kettle had just boiled, crackling and spurting misty white steam.

“The northern cold current blows in, the afternoon sun is dim and yellow. At times like this, being able to drink a cup of good tea is most comfortable. Don’t you all agree?” Han Qian sat around the stove with everyone, asking with a smile.

“Our state of mind still stops at listening to ditties—we haven’t yet caught up with Your Lordship’s pace,” Gao Shao joined in the conversation.

Seeing how much forced effort hid beneath Gao Shao’s cheerful smile, and seeing Tian Cheng and Lin Haizheng were the same, Han Qian smiled inwardly. He had previously kept everything under wraps, believing they had endured tremendous torment over the past half month or more.

Scheming to extract and privately pocket the Feng family’s hidden wealth, versus immediately leaving Jinling with family and fleeing to Xuzhou, were completely different matters.

The former seemed like a grave crime, but ultimately, if the Third Prince truly ascended the throne and learned of this, would he care that they pocketed some small money to support their families? Even if their crime was to be punished, it couldn’t possibly be a capital offense, much less result in clan extermination.

The latter was completely different—entirely a do-or-die proposition with no middle ground.

Moreover, they likely still worried whether they could bring their families when fleeing—sometimes family members were what they couldn’t bear to abandon most.

Han Qian didn’t want to continue testing their loyalty. He took out the secret decree from his bosom, passed it to them to read in turn, and said: “I know you’ve harbored too many doubts these past days, but before having His Majesty’s formal decree, I couldn’t leak even half of this matter. That’s right, I am planning to lead everyone in fleeing back to Xuzhou, but this time it’s ‘fleeing under imperial decree’…”

“Your Lordship, you’ve nearly worried Gao Shao to death. If you hadn’t brought this out soon, look—Old Tian’s temples would have turned completely white,” Gao Shao slapped his thigh and sighed deeply. They never imagined that what had kept them sleepless and without appetite for over ten days was actually such a matter.

“Within the Prince’s Manor, only His Highness, Lord Shen, Lord Zheng, and five others—Jiang Huo and Yuan Guowei—know. They will coordinate with our ‘escape.’ Before Yang Qin leads the fleet to Jinling again, you must prepare everything,” Han Qian said, continuing to mention what they would need to do next after the shock on everyone’s faces had slightly faded.

Since this was an “escape,” besides “enticing” a group of people, they also had to “entice” away a batch of supplies and even armor with Shen Yang and others’ “coordination.” All this would need to be specifically executed by Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Lin Haizheng.

The shipping guild currently possessed thirty-six ships, divided into fast and slow vessels. Slow ships might need a month to reach Xuzhou, but the eight new fast sailing ships, after delivering the first batch of people to Xuzhou for disembarkation and returning to Jinling, wouldn’t even need a month.

In other words, before the end of November, they had to complete all preparations before the escape. This would include deceiving and controlling ordinary Left Bureau scouts and soldiers.

Because it was impossible to bring all Left Bureau scout family members, Han Qian couldn’t extravagantly hope ordinary scouts would have the same high degree of personal loyalty to him as Gao Shao and Tian Cheng.

However, before Emperor Tianyou ultimately completed military preparations against Tanzhou, he couldn’t spread the truth on a larger scale. The rhetoric and control of ordinary soldiers (Left Bureau sons) during the escape process and after escaping to Xuzhou, while ensuring sufficient morale to help him integrate Xuzhou’s forces, would be extraordinarily complex!

This would be the main burden shouldered by Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Lin Haizheng.

However, the three of them now felt as if a weight had been lifted. With the secret decree in hand, they were acting under imperial orders. Taking a step back—if they could bring wives, children, and family to Xuzhou, even if Han Qian truly had other intentions, they would have far fewer concerns.

Zhao Wuji, Xi Fa’er, Guo Nu’er, Xi Ren, Zhao Ting’er and others were indifferent. At this moment, they even felt somewhat regretful in their hearts.

Han Qian had rendered great merit without reward, while the Feng family suffered great disaster for minor crimes. If there was truly an opportunity to escape to Xuzhou and henceforth ignore the court’s orders, at least they wouldn’t have to worry about the Han family possibly becoming a second Feng family in the future.

Regardless of what thoughts and worries everyone harbored, at this moment they finally reached consensus. By dusk, having discussed the next action plan, Han Qian let Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Lin Haizheng return to the city first.

Han Qian had just returned to the small courtyard where he lived, just wanting to rest a bit and truly comfortably drink tea before dinner, when Xi Ren walked in, saying: “You’re truly like a ram now—so many people have their eyes on you! There are people everywhere seeing through the flaws. I even doubt whether this matter can truly deceive Tanzhou!”

“Who’s come knocking at the door?” Han Qian pondered Xi Ren’s tone and asked.

“Besides Miss Yao, who else could it be? She runs over here all the time. Might as well marry her as a concubine!” Xi Ren said.

“No, no—I already can’t manage serving you two. Want things to be even more chaotic?” Han Qian cried out in distress.

“…” Xi Ren glared at Han Qian with reproachful anger, ignored his words, and stamped her foot as she walked into the inner room.

Xi Ren was only nineteen this year, but her figure was much more womanly than Zhao Ting’er’s. Han Qian stared blankly for a moment before walking out of the courtyard. Seeing Zhao Ting’er talking with Yao Xishui at the hanging flower gate, he said: “Miss Yao, you frequently come calling. People who don’t know might think you have feelings for me.”

This age inherited the previous dynasty’s customs—the separation between men and women was far less strict than in later generations. But Yao Xishui, with her singing girl background, now as Zhang Ping’s adopted daughter, frequently calling at the door would naturally make outsiders think she had something going on with Han Qian.

Yao Xishui glanced at Han Qian. Seeing that at his indication, the guards in the front courtyard had all withdrawn, she lowered her voice and said: “Your Han family’s layout in Xuzhou has already taken shape. When will you jump out of this whirlpool and go to Xuzhou?”

Han Qian wouldn’t reveal the deceptive stratagem to Evening Red Pavilion. But as the party most clearly aware of his layout in Xuzhou and his movements in Jinling, it was perfectly normal for Evening Red Pavilion to guess he might flee to Xuzhou at any time.

Han Qian calmly stared at Yao Xishui: “The Feng clan members harbor worries and fears, undertaking hardships to relocate to Xuzhou—this is human nature. Although this matter benefits my father’s governance of Xuzhou, Xuzhou ultimately remains the court’s Xuzhou. My heart always remains with His Highness. I don’t know what Marquis Li and Madam are worried about? Could it be that now, whatever I do, I must report everything to Marquis Li and Madam?”

Yao Xishui had never in this lifetime seen someone as shameless as Han Qian. Everything had been seen through by them, yet he could still act as if nothing happened and spout nonsense to their faces. She continued questioning: “An assassin broke into the Prince’s Manor at night and was killed by Your Lordship’s confidant Tian Cheng, with no one else present. Can Your Lordship say this wasn’t all arranged beforehand? And over this past half month, the various types of rumors—currently probably only Your Lordship could barely manage such a thing. Your Lordship schemed with elaborate effort to deceive thousands of Feng clan servants to Xuzhou, yet can still claim utter loyalty to His Highness?”

Han Qian stared at Yao Xishui’s excessively beautiful eyes, asking with playful mockery: “Miss Yao is so eager to understand this matter—do you want to follow me to Xuzhou?”

Seeing Han Qian mocking her while still trying to divert the topic, Yao Xishui asked calmly: “You and your father can occupy Xuzhou—you probably haven’t forgotten who facilitated this matter?”

Seeing Yao Xishui actually knew how to play the emotional card, Han Qian smiled faintly: “I’ve cleaned up so many of your messes—isn’t that enough? Must I keep cleaning indefinitely? Moreover, Evening Red Pavilion has operated for so long—what intentions you truly hide, I’ve never pursued relentlessly. Can’t you give each other a bit of space?”

Yao Xishui was rendered speechless by Han Qian’s retort.

Regardless of whether others acknowledged it, she knew clearly in her heart that Evening Red Pavilion and the Han father and son were in a relationship of mutual exploitation. Could they still fantasize that Han Qian had an obligation of loyalty to Evening Red Pavilion?

Since their relationship had completely severed from the Jingxiang campaign onward, their joint support of the Third Prince was merely cooperation between both parties going forward.

Yao Xishui took a deep breath and said: “Whatever Lord Han wants to do, you may act willfully without informing us. But we’ve poured so much of our heart and soul into His Highness—wanting to know what expectations Lord Han truly has for His Highness is also human nature.”

“Even if you’re certain that my father and I have the intention of treating a valuable commodity as something rare, do you think we would easily abandon such a commodity?” Han Qian wanted to distance himself from Evening Red Pavilion’s entanglement, but at this time he couldn’t directly break with them. For now, he still needed to say some words to stabilize them.

“I hope everything is as Lord Han says,” Yao Xishui said, looking at Han Qian with half-belief. She knew Han Qian had never truly been controlled by Evening Red Pavilion, nor was it clear how long their cooperation could last.

“Ting’er, have Du Yijun bring over the compiled ‘Book of Heavenly Crafts.’ Miss Yao has called at the door—we can’t let her return empty-handed and make me seem heartless and ungrateful toward her…” Han Qian said to Zhao Ting’er.

After this “escape,” whether Han Qian was willing or not, with the support of Consort Shi, the workshop, warehouses, riverside money shop, and Yongchun Palace estate would basically all be incorporated under the Prince’s Manor Inner Bureau’s jurisdiction. This wasn’t difficult to predict.

For this escape, besides Left Bureau elite scouts and Left Bureau sons, Han Qian would also entice away a group of master craftsmen. But currently on Evening Red Pavilion’s side, even Zhou Yuan who was most skilled in construction and craftsmanship was, in his eyes, still far from qualified. To avoid the possibility of the workshop grinding to a halt, he needed to teach the construction and handicraft techniques involved in the workshop to Yao Xishui and her people in advance.

During Han Qian’s idle days in Jinling, besides having Du Yijun and Du Yiming copy books from Jinyun Pavilion’s collection, he also had the brothers, under the guidance of Chen Jitang, Zheng Tong and others, begin compiling an encyclopedia-style “Book of Heavenly Crafts,” collecting contemporary techniques as well as those he had improved in construction, agriculture, and handicrafts.

Contemporary writings on construction, agriculture, and handicrafts mainly consisted of only a handful of works like “Kao Gong Ji,” “Shanshan Ling,” and “Qi Min Yao Shu,” with extremely simple wording and many deficiencies or even errors in illustrated examples.

The “Book of Heavenly Crafts” Han Qian ordered Du Yijun and Du Yiming to compile was written as much as possible in an entirely new format. Of course, the project was also immensely vast. Currently, they had only finished compiling the construction and craft techniques involved in Qiuhu Mountain Workshop, since this was the most mature system at present.

Seeing Han Qian never forgetting to tease her, Yao Xishui was naturally displeased. But looking at the thick hundreds of pages contained in a wooden box, written with specially made dipping ink pens, with content several times richer and more detailed than any previous craft book, complete with precise and detailed illustrated explanations, Yao Xishui held it in her hands and knew its weighty significance.

Qiuhu Mountain Workshop currently employed around one thousand workers, producing over three million catties of coal briquettes monthly. Adding other outputs, the monetary value exceeded two thousand strings.

Perhaps compared to the confiscation of the Feng family property, this still seemed insignificant, but given the extremely low productivity of this age, it was already quite considerable.

Additionally, two months ago, the Prince’s Manor had also merged the armor workshop into the workshop. The water-powered bellows and hydraulic forging hammers produced by the workshop could save the input of over three hundred able-bodied laborers.

Once this system’s construction and craft techniques were thoroughly understood, not only could the five or six similar streams at the southern foot of Baohua Mountain under Taowu Camp Military Bureau’s jurisdiction be utilized, but the large-scale estates secretly controlled by both Junzhou and Evening Red Pavilion could similarly be replicated. The benefits to Evening Red Pavilion and the internal strength of the Prince’s Manor would be extremely obvious.