Sitting high in the imperial court, Yin Shuhuai happily contemplated his grand blueprint for development after conquering Jiangnan. Meanwhile, thousands of miles away in Xuzhou, Shentu Yang had already traveled south by warship and gone ashore at Guangling. Looking at Guangling, which had already been reduced to scorched earth, the assembled generals could not help but sigh softly.

Due to the floods in Xuzhou, the local commoners could no longer endure the extortion and heavy levies imposed by the gentry and prominent clans, so they rose up in a furious rebellion. They burned down government offices, slaughtered officials, and stormed the fortified manors built by the wealthy local elites. They killed the tyrannical local gentry and squires, distributed the plundered money, grain, jewelry, spears, and swords to the commoners, and called upon everyone to join them in resistance.

The commoners, who had already lost everything in the flood, stared blankly at the rebel army distributing food and weapons to them, then resolutely accepted the blood-stained grain and blades.

Within a few short days, the flames of war spread rapidly to the various commanderies of Jiangnan. The oppressed and impoverished commoners raised their flags high and joined the rebel army one after another. They turned their sights toward even more heartless and wealthy elites.

However, although the rebel army was large in number, most of them were honest, empty-handed refugees and commoners. They were not as strong as the private soldiers and retinues of the wealthy elites, nor did they have fine iron weapons and armor to protect themselves.

Once the two sides clashed, most people in the rebel army could only use their flesh and blood to resist the armor, sharp blades, and cavalry charges of the elite retinues. They had to rely on human wave tactics to wear down the elite private soldiers trained by the wealthy families. After a battle, the rebel army often had to sacrifice ten or a hundred times their number just to kill a single fully armored private soldier. It truly was a case of killing one enemy at the cost of a hundred of their own.

But who could blame them when the world was so unjust and the lives of the common people were deemed so cheap!

They were not born into nobility like the gentry and elites, but they could still use a worthless life to take the precious life of an aristocrat. Fortunately, everyone is equal in the face of death. Even if the prominent families possessed thousands or tens of thousands of gold pieces, they still had only one life.

When the oppressed commoners completely put their own lives out of their minds to rise up and fight back, the gentry elites, who had never cared about the common people, finally grew terrified. Facing the massive waves of rising refugees, these people finally realized that no matter a person’s status, wealth, or nobility, everyone gets only one life in this world. If you die, everything is truly gone.

The aristocratic clans considered themselves incomparably noble, so how could they risk their lives against a crowd of desperate people. Moreover, even their private soldiers and retinues were scarce and valuable, so they could not withstand this kind of attrition.

Upon realizing this, the wealthy elites, who had previously clamored to chop the lowly peasants into pieces, hid inside their fortified manors one after another. They attempted to wear down the vital forces of the rebel army through a prolonged standoff. They even sent people to contact the rebel leaders, hoping to use plots of sowing discord and dividing them to make the leaderless, supply-deprived rebel army collapse without a fight.

Unfortunately, these aristocratic clans, who usually lorded it over the common people, underestimated the raw fury of the populace.

Although the ancients always said that when the Emperor is angry, millions of corpses line the ground, and when a common man is angry, blood splatters five paces away. Yet when thousands of common men gathered together, how could their collective anger be appeased by blood splatting a mere five paces?

Thus, when Shentu Yang led his army of one hundred thousand into the region, this tragic and brutal scene was exactly what he witnessed. The originally affluent Xuzhou had already been turned to scorched earth. The breached and burned fortified manors were left as nothing but broken walls and ruins. The corpses of the commoners lay scattered across the debris, and even the soil had solidified into an ominous dark brown color. The stench of rot filled the air, with flies and vultures circling everywhere.

As far as the eye could see, white bones were exposed in the wilderness, and not a single rooster crowed for a thousand miles. Only the silent fortified manors stood firm, with billowing wolf smoke rising into the sky above them.

Seeing this sight, the hearts of the soldiers sank. Shentu Yang led twenty thousand heavily armored cavalrymen to gallop along the direction of the smoke, finally arriving before a fortified manor.

The scout team responsible for checking military intelligence returned ahead of the main force to report the situation to Shentu Yang.

They saw countless rebels, or at least people who could be considered rebels, completely surrounding the fortified manor of the Zhao clan of Xuzhou. A rough estimate put their numbers at several tens of thousands. At the absolute outer perimeter were the elderly, weak, women, and children, carrying all their earthly possessions and even positioning wagons, handcarts, and tents on the outside to serve as barriers. In the middle were thin, emaciated elderly refugees with graying hair and beards. Only at the innermost line, confronting the fortified manor’s guards, were the raggedly dressed, able-bodied men.

A rebel army composed of at least tens of thousands of people surrounded the majestic, towering fortified manor like a dark cloud. With such a strange composition of personnel, if it were not for their sheer numbers, they probably would not be able to defeat the private soldiers and retinues that the aristocratic family had spent vast sums of money to maintain.

To say they were just making up the numbers seemed like an insult to the phrase.

However, looking at the scorched earth all around, the widely experienced Yan scouts could also understand why there were so many elderly, weak, women, and children among the rebel ranks.

Since ancient times, if the government did not force the people to rebel, how many commoners would willingly risk the execution of their entire extended family just to revolt? It was a path of desperation where they knew they would die, yet still struggled one last time. How could such a rebel army withstand the Yan elites led by Shentu Yang?

Sure enough, when the elderly, weak, women, and children at the outermost edge noticed the rolling dust clouds kicked up on the distant horizon and heard the thundering hoofbeats of twenty thousand fine horses running along the official road, and then witnessed the heavy cavalry charging from afar like an iron torrent, they could not help but scream out in terror.

“The government troops are here!”

“It is cavalry! It is heavily armored cavalry!”

“How are we supposed to fight this! How can we fight this!”

“Oh, heavens above! Are you not going to leave us even a single path to survive?”

The elderly, weak, women, and children at the outer perimeter were the first to cry out in terror. The frail young children seemed to sense a threat to their lives, and their sharp, piercing wails instantly echoed across the fields, alarming the able-bodied rebel men in the middle and innermost ranks who were confronting the manor guards.

In an instant, a wave of commotion swept through the entire rebel army. The rebel leaders at the very front looked at the approaching heavy cavalry with absolute dread, shouting at the top of their lungs: “Do not panic! Do not fall into chaos! Do not be afraid! At worst, it is just death!”

Inside the fortified manor, the heavily prepared private soldiers and retinues also noticed the commotion outside. Standing on top of the high walls, their field of vision was much wider than that of the refugees gathered below. They saw the approaching cavalrymen at a single glance, and they also spotted the grand Shentu banner fluttering proudly in the fierce wind.

The private soldiers and retinues, who had been defending bitterly for dozens of days and nights, immediately ran down the walls in joy to deliver the news to the inner residence: “The imperial court has sent troops to rescue us! Prime Minister Shentu, the Duke of Yan, is personally leading tens of thousands of elites to save us. Tens of thousands of cavalrymen are fully armored, and they are followed by elite infantrymen holding long sabers. One glance and you can tell it is the famous Yan army. Those lowly starving rebels outside are absolutely no match for them.” The members of the Zhao clan, who had been trapped by a mob of rebels for dozens of days, walked out of the hall with expressions of pleasant surprise: “What did you say? The court’s people have arrived?”

“Thank heavens, they are finally here.”

“Our clan uncle serves as the Grandee Secretary in the court. The Emperor certainly would not sit by and ignore his request. Sure enough, the reinforcements sent by the court arrived quite fast.”

“Those damnable peasants actually dared to rise up in rebellion. This time, I will definitely execute their entire families to make an example of them!”

Learning that the imperial army had finally arrived, the Zhao clan members, who had spent dozens of days and nights living in constant fear, finally put their hearts at ease. They talked over one another to vent their inner anger and humiliation, with the younger generation clamoring for the Duke of Yan to lead the heavily armored cavalry to slaughter the entire rebel army to see if any lowly commoners would ever dare to rebel again.

The head of the Zhao clan, whose hair and beard were completely white, said impatiently: “Let us not speak of this just yet. The imperial court sending a massive army to rescue us means they have had a truly exhausting journey. Quickly open the gates to welcome the army. I wish to host a welcome banquet for the Duke of Yan and all the soldiers.”

After saying this, he changed his mind: “No, it is better if I lead the entire clan out in person to welcome the imperial envoy.”

At the same time, Shentu Yang, who had already reached the outer perimeter of the fortified manor, looked at the trembling rebel army and asked with a frown, “Who is your leader?”

The white-haired elderly, weak, and the women cradling infants looked at the heavily armored Yan elites before them with completely numb expressions, not moving an inch. Only the young children looked at the heavy cavalry with absolute terror, hiding behind their mothers and wailing loudly.

The sharp crying of the children pierced the skies, and the generals rubbed their ears, which were nearly deafened by the noise, collectively feeling that at this very moment, they did not look like government troops, but rather like bandits.

The soldier responsible for relaying orders shouted, “General Shentu asks, who is your leader?”

“It is me!”

A raspy voice came from behind the dense crowd. In an instant, the crowd parted like a tide, and a rugged, able-bodied man in tattered clothes walked out at the front. Behind him followed the similarly ragged rebel soldiers. A group of sturdy men quietly shielded the elderly, weak, women, and children. Even though they were terrified, they still summoned all their courage to face the sharp swords of the Yan elites.

Sitting high on his large warhorse, Shentu Yang studied the rebel leader before him with great interest: “Do you plead guilty?”

The leader’s eyes twitched violently, causing a long scar on his cheek to tremble along with it. He looked up at Shentu Yang, who sat looking down from his horse. Although he was clearly defiant, he still swallowed his anger and replied, “May I ask the General, those aristocratic clans took advantage of the Xuzhou flood to forcibly seize our lands and even drag our wives into their manors to be slaves—are they guilty?”

Shentu Yang smiled slightly and nodded, saying, “If what you say is true, they are naturally guilty.”

“If there is a single false word, may lightning strike me down!” The leader spoke with a face full of grief and anger, then asked again: “May I ask the General, those aristocratic clans committed such massive crimes but received no punishment, and the court even mobilized a grand army to come save them. We commoners were clearly oppressed by them, driven to ruin and the deaths of our families. Now, it is merely a case of the government forcing the people to rebel, leaving us no choice but to rebel. The court did not step forward to uphold justice when we were being oppressed by the elites, yet now, because we have surrounded the manors of these aristocratic families, you want to call us to account. Is this the righteousness of the imperial court?”

By the time the leader reached the end of his speech, he was absolutely furious, his eyes nearly splitting as he roared aloud.

The rebels behind him could not help but grow restless as well: “Our boss is right! The court is in league with those aristocratic clans and will never stand up for us. If we do not rebel, we will be oppressed to death. If we do rebel, we will be killed by them anyway. Since we die either way, we might as well fight them to the end! At worst, we die with our boots on! Killing one makes it even, and killing two makes a profit!”

As soon as these words were spoken, a wave of sorrowful and angry roars erupted from the rebel ranks. It was the cry of a desperate army that knew it was doomed but had no choice but to fight.

The shouts of battle grew louder and louder, crashing against the Yan elites. In an instant, the clatter of blades and the neighing of horses rang out. Hearing the critical keywords, the Yan cavalrymen drew their weapons one after another, tightening their grip on their horses and positioning themselves to charge.

The rebels turned pale with fear, their legs shaking, yet not a single person shrunk back. Instead, they summoned their courage and gripped their weapons tightly, preparing to engage in a desperate, mortal struggle against the twenty thousand cavalrymen.

At the crucial moment, Shentu Yang waved his hand, still looking at the rebel leader with a smile: “You are quite a smooth talker. What is your name?”

“Wu Yang.”

“Did you kill the Governor of Guangling Commandery?” Shentu Yang asked another question.

He originally thought Wu Yang would admit to it cleanly, but to his surprise, while Wu Yang did admit it, he added another sentence: “Zhao Baji told me to kill him.”

Shentu Yang raised his eyebrows in surprise: “Zhao Baji?”

Wu Yang said, “The head of the Zhao clan of Xuzhou.”

Hearing this, the soldiers immediately erupted into a clamor.

What was going on? The head of the Zhao clan told the rebel army to kill his own nephew, the Governor of Guangling Commandery? This kind of secret was unknown even to most of the rebel army. They looked at their leader in absolute astonishment.

Zhou Tai scratched his ear and could not help but say, “If you dare to talk nonsense and play your grandpa for a fool, believe it or not, I will slaughter you right now!”

To his surprise, upon hearing this, Wu Yang simply smiled with disdain: “A real man lives between heaven and earth with a clear conscience. How could I make up lies just to drag out a wretched existence?”

“I have proof,” Wu Yang said, pointing at the gates that were swinging open. “The cowardly grandson who told me to kill the Governor of Guangling Commandery during the chaos was the direct nephew of the favored concubine of the Zhao family’s head butler.”

As everyone knew, the head butler of the Zhao estate was a servant born into the household. He had served the Zhao clan head, Zhao Baji, since childhood, was consistently loyal, and was the most obedient dog under Zhao Baji’s command. If he had not received orders from his master, how could he possibly instruct his favorite concubine’s nephew to bribe Wu Yang and kill the Governor of Guangling Commandery during the chaos of the military uprising?

Wow!

The soldiers could not help but gasp.

So it turned out to be internal legal warfare and family murder!

Hearing this massive piece of gossip, Shentu Yang looked with an amused expression at the head of the Zhao clan, who had originally rushed out excitedly to welcome the imperial envoy but whose face was now completely livid, as well as the bewildered members of the Zhao family behind him.

Zhao Baji reacted quickly, immediately cupping his hands to defend himself: “Duke of Yan, please do not listen to this rebel’s nonsense. Zhao Guangling was my nephew, and moreover, the posthumous son of my older brother. Our Zhao clan is connected by blood and shares the same roots. I treated my nephew as if he were my own son, so how could I possibly collude with the rebel army to murder him? This rebel thief clearly wants to provoke my Zhao clan members to turn against one another and ruin the centuries-old reputation of our family. This man has committed treason, slaughtered meritorious officials, and harbors malicious intent—his crime deserves death! I request the Duke of Yan to execute him on the spot…”

While crying foul, Zhao Baji pleaded with Shentu Yang to kill Wu Yang to avenge the Jiangnan gentry who had died in the rebellion, and to ensure that the Duke of Yan could smoothly win over the hearts of the Jiangnan people.

However, Shentu Yang remained noncommittal toward Zhao Baji’s various hints, continuing to look at Wu Yang with great relish.

“Heaven is my witness, if I am lying, may I be hacked to death by random blades in the middle of battle!” Wu Yang refused to back down and immediately said, “Although I do not know why Clan Leader Zhao wanted to murder the Governor of Guangling Commandery, your aristocratic families have always loved scheming and killing one another. You are talking with your eyes wide open right now, but you should look at whether your own clan members even believe your words.”

Hearing this, Zhao Baji subconsciously looked at the clan members around him. Sure enough, he saw that the people around him had flickering gazes, looking half-believing and half-doubting. However, even so, the highly gossipy Zhao family members still understood what was important. They knew that at this moment, they had to present a united front against outsiders and could not let family scandals be aired in public.

One of the Zhao clan members, wearing a scholar’s cap and looking like a literary student, immediately spoke up to defend him: “Rebel thief, stop trying to sow discord. Our Zhao clan has always maintained a clean family tradition, with loving fathers, filial sons, kind older brothers, and respectful younger brothers. Our clan leader is highly respected, so how could he be someone who secretly colludes with rebels? You have no proof and are trying to defame our Zhao clan leader’s reputation with nothing but empty talk. Do you think all the people under heaven are fools who will believe whatever you say?”

Zhao Baji looked with emotion toward the clan member who was speaking up for him. While feeling grateful for his family’s trust, he also stated that he truly had no reason to murder the Governor of Guangling Commandery, and that everything was just Wu Yang’s deliberate retaliation and malicious slander.

“What a joke,” Wu Yang sneered repeatedly. “I have no connection to your Zhao family. Before this, I had never even met the head butler of the Zhao estate, so why would I frame him? And how would I know who his favorite concubine’s nephew is?”

“Who knows what other sinister plots a rebel thief like you might have? Our Zhao clan has operated in Xuzhou for centuries, and our family elders are renowned across the nation; everyone knows of them. You are also from Xuzhou, so what is so strange about you recognizing the head butler and the people around him? Are you saying that just because you recognize two or three people from our Zhao clan, the centuries-old reputation of our family must be ruined by the words of a rebel like you?”

“You are talking nonsense!”

“You are the one making malicious accusations!”

“…”

Shentu Yang and the soldiers watched the two sides argue until they were red in the face, flinging accusations back and forth. Although he did not know the actual truth of the matter, Shentu Yang immediately ordered the messenger to send the intelligence back to Jixian. Ostensibly, this was because a general in the field should communicate with the court at all times to put people’s minds at ease, but in reality, he just wanted to share this piece of gossip with Yin Shuhuai far away in Jixian.

In truth, the intelligence from the Night Owl spies arrived in Jixian even earlier than Shentu Yang’s report. However, compared to Shentu Yang’s intention of just wanting to share gossip without knowing the truth, the intelligence sent back by the Night Owl spies was far more detailed. The spies, who could hear in all directions and watch everything, had long since uncovered the actual truth. They confirmed that the Governor of Guangling Commandery was indeed assassinated by the rebel leader under the bribery of the head butler’s concubine’s nephew. However, it was not done on the orders of the Zhao clan leader, but rather on the orders of the clan leader’s wife.

The reason for this murder case traced back to the parentage of the Governor of Guangling Commandery.

It turned out that while this Governor was nominally the nephew of the Zhao clan leader, he was actually born from an illicit affair between the Zhao clan leader and his sister-in-law. Furthermore, he had been raised in the manor under the guise of a nephew since childhood, growing up alongside the clan leader’s biological sons.

During this Jiangnan rebellion, the Governor had originally planned to use the cover of the rebel raids to engineer the death of Zhao Baji’s eldest legitimate son to steal the position of Zhao clan leader. However, the news leaked out, and the clan leader’s wife, who accidentally learned the truth, worried about harboring a threat, so she simply struck first to eliminate the danger.

As for why the head butler obeyed the wife’s orders, it was naturally because this butler had secretly admired the wife since childhood…

“This relationship web is truly a mess,” Yin Shuhuai clicked his tongue in amazement, unable to resist complaining to Fan Juan. “I always thought the Grandee Secretary acted in an open and upright manner with the style of a true gentleman, so I assumed the Zhao clan of Xuzhou…”

Yin Shuhuai did not say the remaining words out loud. He merely wrote down these sordid details of the Zhao family with great enthusiasm and sent them via a specialized messenger letter to Shentu Yang far away in Xuzhou.

That night, Shentu Yang woke up suddenly from a deep sleep and immediately noticed the letter lying quietly on his chest.

It featured the same exquisite and beautifully crafted paper and the same lifelike faux flowers. Shentu Yang had already collected quite a few of these letters. He had long since grown accustomed to these ghostly, unpredictable deliveries amid his occasional startles.

Shentu Yang suspected that His Majesty must have a team of equally mysterious spies hidden in the shadows—just like the Night Owl hidden guards from the late emperor’s era.

This explained why Yin Shuhuai, far away in Jixian, was even better informed than Shentu Yang, who was physically present in Xuzhou.

The Emperor had never intentionally concealed this hidden force, and Shentu Yang had never asked too many questions. A surprising level of understanding was maintained between ruler and minister. Reviewing this unspoken understanding during certain quiet moments of the night carried a unique sense of tender warmth.

Wrapped in these tender thoughts, Shentu Yang picked up the paper and gave it a gentle kiss before slowly opening the letter. When he saw the explosive revelations Yin Shuhuai had uncovered in the letter, even someone as calm as Shentu Yang could not help but widen his eyes.

Thus, on the second day after the imperial army arrived in Xuzhou, the dramatic, scandalous gossip involving the Zhao clan leader, his sister-in-law, his nephew, the head butler, and the clan leader’s wife spread across the vast region of Xuzhou as if it had grown wings.

The root cause turned out to be Shentu Yang himself. During breakfast, he could not hold back and eagerly shared the gossip with his inner circle of military brothers. After the meal, he explicitly instructed everyone that they must absolutely never spread the Zhao family’s internal scandal to outsiders.

He did not expect that the assembled generals would similarly fail to hold it back. Upon returning to their units, they each shared the Zhao family gossip with their own trusted deputy generals. The deputy generals also had their own confidants, and those confidants had close comrades-in-arms… Thus, layer by layer, via the phrase “I have a secret to tell you, you must absolutely never tell anyone else,” the entire army of one hundred thousand Yan soldiers learned of this secret.

Since the hundred thousand soldiers knew, the rebels who were staying with the soldiers and being closely guarded by them naturally found out as well. The rebels, of course, had their own families, friends, neighbors, and fellow villagers… Thus, thanks to the massive number of rebels who were deeply passionate about gossip, even the aristocratic families surrounded by rebels in other provinces heard the juicy, dramatic family secrets of the Zhao clan of Xuzhou through word of mouth.

The Zhao clan of Xuzhou, who sat at the very center of this storm of public opinion, turned out to be the absolute last to know.

When the head of the Zhao clan finally heard these rumors, his blood rushed wildly, a sweet taste hit the back of his throat, and he sprayed out a mouthful of fresh blood on the spot.