Shen Jian silently edged closer to Wei Shouyi. He didn’t feel even the slightest connection to the unborn child—he only felt a vengeful spirit coming to claim his life!
“Then why did Shen Jian die instead of Zhuang Yuyan?”
Isn’t a vengeful spirit supposed to go after the one who wronged it? Though this whole mess started over a rivalry for favor, the scheme was Zhuang Yuyan’s alone. Debts have their debtors, and grudges their targets—shouldn’t ‘it’ have gotten the right person?
“Well, Zhuang Yuyan’s mission failed, and keeping Shen Jian alive no longer served her purpose. Instead, it just anchored her to the Shen family.
So in the eleventh year of Yuankang, when Shen Jian returned to the border town, Zhuang Yuyan followed him again.
At that time, along the border, the kingdoms of Bei Li and Da Yan were constantly clashing, with skirmishes big and small happening often.
Zhuang Xiu received word from Zhuang Yuyan, and the two of them colluded from within and without. Not only did they cause Shen Jian’s death, but they also cost the lives of over twenty thousand soldiers under his command.
Because of his status and personal skill, Shen Jian was a notable figure among Da Yan’s military commanders. In the end, he died at Zhuang Xiu’s hands. You could say Zhuang Xiu used Shen Jian as a shiny feather in his cap!
Shen Jian’s life became Zhuang Xiu’s stepping stone for advancement.”
“What a shame about those twenty thousand soldiers!”
Shen Jian: What about me? What about me? Plays peanut-dropping emoji.
Yue Fuguang: The scumbag deserves to die!
“Little Zhu, you mentioned earlier that the Bei Li and Western Qiang generals were fighting. What started it?”
“Master, I spiked the Bei Li soldiers’ lunch with one batch of my medicine, and then the Western Qiang troops’ drinking water with another.
Sure enough, the symptoms hit the two sides about the time it takes an incense stick to burn apart.
Just now, as soon as Zhuang Xiu noticed that it was only his own men falling victim, he suspected Feng Wuhuan was behind it.
Because of the medicinal pill’s effects, two men who used to be evenly matched are now getting utterly crushed, and Feng Wuhuan is being ground into the dirt. They’ve become mortal enemies for good.”
Yue Fuguang’s heart stirred. Mortal enemies—perfect. That makes it easier for her to meddle behind the scenes, successfully driving a wedge between the two kingdoms without getting caught.
“Little Zhu, arrange an accident so that both men’s deaths look like the other side’s doing.”
Wei Shouyi and Shen Jian’s eyes lit up. Bao Qianjun, who had been planning to report this to Zheng Feng, turned back instead. Since the Grand Preceptor already had a plan, they just needed to watch it unfold—daring not to interfere and mess up her scheme.
The next day, under Zheng Feng’s guidance, Yue Fuguang made a thorough inspection of the surrounding area. Although Three Forks was nominally her private territory, commoners weren’t banned from settling there.
Along the way, she spotted a few small villages that rented land, growing high-yield grain and various new vegetables.
A hundred-plus miles of Three Forks had even sprouted a small city of several ten thousand people, twenty miles from the Yue army’s encampment.
Yue Fuguang was pleased with Three Forks’ development—and equally satisfied with the progress of those on Chengping Mountain.
The system also showed her the pitiful sight of the Bei Li and Western Qiang allied forces, all suffering from purging and dehydration.
On the third day, just as Yue Fuguang was about to depart, she boarded her carriage to the clear, crisp sound of the system’s death knell.
“Master, Feng Wuhuan died last night.”
“Little Zhu, you work fast!” Though, for someone like her and the system, killing a person wasn’t hard, making it look like the other side’s doing still required some effort.
People weren’t brainless—simple framing wouldn’t fool two kingdoms so easily.
“Master, this time you’re praising the wrong person. Little Zhu hadn’t even put my brilliantly subtle plan into action yet, and Feng Wuhuan was already dead!
Alas! With Feng Wuhuan dead, my elaborate scheme to stir up discord has gone to waste!”
The system had even paid ten integrity points out of its own pocket to buy a brilliant borrowed-knife plan from a newly-met system friend. According to that system friend, its host came from the Xia Kingdom—in fact, the ancient ancestor of the system’s own host—and was brimming with stratagems.
Too bad, compared to her own host, that one was a bit poor.
“If it wasn’t you, then who did it? He couldn’t have just died from shitting himself out of weakness, could he?”
“Master, how did you know Feng Wuhuan died from diarrhea? That’s indeed his cause of death on the surface!”
“Then what’s the real cause? Who made the move?”
“Feng Wuyang, Feng Wuhuan’s cousin. But Feng Wuyang just gave a little extra water laced with Intestine-Cleansing Heart-Purging Pill to the already ill Feng Wuhuan, hoping to embarrass him—or at most make him half-dead from diarrhea.
Feng Wuhuan’s real death was from poisoning. The poison was slipped by a man named He Ming, who used Feng Wuyang’s hands to put it into the water given to Feng Wuhuan.”
“Who is He Ming? Why did he want to kill Feng Wuhuan? Got a grudge against him?”
“Master, you’ll never guess He Ming’s true identity!”
“True identity? Does he have another alias? Someone from another faction in Western Qiang? Someone from Bei Li? Don’t tell me he’s from Da Yan!”
“Hehe, he really is from Da Yan—a spy working for Zheng Feng’s father, Zheng Zicheng. His cover identity was a bandit from Chengping Mountain. This time, when the two-kingdom allied forces conscripted bandits, his stronghold was assigned to Bei Li, so he smoothly joined the Bei Li army.”
“So he became a Bei Li man, then poisoned a Western Qiang general? And used Western Qiang’s own people to do it!
This guy’s a genius!”
If anyone tried tracing that back, it’d be total chaos!
Yue Fuguang’s guess was spot-on. Shortly after her rainmaking team set out, frontline reporter System 07 continued its coverage.
“Master, Feng Wuyang thought his cousin’s death was caused by his own water dose and got worried he’d be implicated. So he took his men and went to confront Zhuang Xiu.”
“He plans to blame Feng Wuhuan’s death on Zhuang Xiu?” Yue Fuguang couldn’t help it—this Feng Wuyang was a real good guy!
“Exactly! Now that Feng Wuhuan is dead, those seven thousand men belong to him. Deep down, the guy’s thrilled!”
When Yue Fuguang’s caravan was fifty miles out and about to have lunch, the system piped up again.
“Master, the news that Feng Wuyang gave Feng Wuhuan poisoned tea has just been leaked. And by a fellow Western Qiang man, no less!
On the surface, this man is Xi Xiang’s planted spy in the army, but in reality, he’s from Bei Li—a subordinate of Beiyue.
He was trained by Xu Changyue, remember him, Master?”
“Of course I remember Xu Changyue, the cuckoo bird.”
“This man counts as part of Xu Changyue’s legacy to Bei Li. But his legacy didn’t fall into the emperor’s or his father Ji Xiang’s hands—instead, it was all scooped up by Beiyue.
And now, it’s finally been put to use.”
This turn of events went beyond Yue Fuguang’s expectations, but the direction was everything she’d hoped for.
By afternoon, when the system updated her again, Feng Wuyang had cleared himself of the murder suspicion and was subtly pointing the finger at Bei Li.
“Little Zhu, keep an eye on things. If He Ming is in danger of being exposed, you must rescue him.”
Yue Fuguang also used the radio in the carriage to have Wu Yong send a telegram to Yu Boming, telling Zheng Feng and the others to keep track of movements on Chengping Mountain and be ready to help He Ming if his cover was blown.
Through wind and rain, when Yue Fuguang set off again the next day, the system once more announced a death.
Yue Fuguang looked around at the familiar scene, the familiar pattern. “Who died this time?”