45: The general was furious and the mountains and rivers were stained with blood

In the northern reaches, the wind and sand were like knives.

Inside the commander’s tent, several personal guards formed a human wall with their bodies, blocking the cold wind that poured in through the tent’s seams.

The fire in the brazier burned dimly, casting a faint light on a weather-beaten face.

General Meng Tian, the Pacifying North General, was wiping his saber, which had accompanied him for thirty years, with a coarse piece of burlap.

On the blade, there were three nicks, mementos left by the skulls of three barbarian chieftains.

The tent flap was suddenly flung open, and a dust-covered messenger stumbled in, holding high a scroll with a bright yellow imperial edict.

“General! From the capital… a ‘National Preceptor’s Edict’ has arrived!”

Meng Tian’s motion of wiping his saber did not stop.

He didn’t even lift his eyelids.

“Read it.”

His voice was deep, like two stones grinding against each other.

The messenger unrolled the edict, his voice trembling from fear and exhaustion: “…National Preceptor’s Edict, Pacifying North General Meng Tian, colluded with the enemy and betrayed the state, with irrefutable evidence… the Imperial Army Commander is ordered to immediately muster thirty thousand troops and proceed to the northern reaches, to… to execute him on the spot, and the entire Meng clan shall be imprisoned…”

“Heh.”

A soft chuckle escaped Meng Tian’s throat.

He stopped wiping his saber.

The air in the entire commander’s tent seemed to be instantly sucked dry.

The personal guards who were blocking the wind stiffened, and fine beads of sweat seeped from their foreheads.

Meng Tian slowly raised his head.

His gaze was calm, as calm as a lake frozen for a thousand years.

“Colluded with the enemy and betrayed the state?”

He stood up, his tall figure casting a mountain-like shadow in the dim firelight.

“Three generations of my Meng family, seventy-three male members, all died in battle here. I have seventeen saber wounds and three arrow wounds on my body. I haven’t returned to Tianyong City in thirty years, and I haven’t seen my fiancée, who I never married, in thirty years.”

He walked step by step to the messenger.

“Now, a scholar who hides in the capital, relying on deceiving the monarch to gain power, says I colluded with the enemy and betrayed the state?”

He smiled.

In that smile, there was no anger, only a deep-seated absurdity and desolation.

“I have bled myself dry for this Dynasty, but it wants my life.”

He reached out, took the edict, and without even looking at it, casually tossed it into the brazier.

The bright yellow silk instantly curled, blackened, and then burst into flames.

“Issue my command.”

Meng Tian’s voice spread throughout the commander’s tent and throughout the entire northern camp.

“National Preceptor Wei Shu is a wicked person who harms the country, misleads the Holy Ear, and acts perversely.”

“I, Meng Tian, am raising an army today, not for rebellion.”

He drew his saber, and the blade reflected a bloody, cold light in the fire.

“Only to—cleanse the monarch’s side and execute the traitor Wei!”

The messenger was still kneeling on the ground, not having reacted.

Meng Tian’s saber had already fallen.

A head rolled to the ground, the expression on its face still frozen in shock.

Blood splattered on Meng Tian’s armor, as if adding a fresh plum blossom to this old killing tool… The news spread like a plague throughout the Great Xia Dynasty within three short days.

The General had rebelled.

The Pacifying North General, who had guarded the nation’s gate for thirty years and was hailed as the “Undefeated God of War,” led his three hundred thousand battle-hardened troops south, directly threatening the capital.

Tianyong City was in chaos.

The price of rice soared tenfold overnight.

The usually bustling markets became deserted, with every household’s doors tightly shut.

Patrols of city guards, one after another, trotted along, their hooves clattering on the bluestone, unsettling people’s hearts.

The memorials presented by the Prime Minister’s office piled up like mountains outside the Emperor’s bedchamber, but no one paid them any attention.

The Emperor was still busy with his Immortal Pills and talismans.

At the Praying Immortal Tower construction site.

Jiang Chen stood at the foot of the tall tower, which was already taking shape, his steward’s robe stained with some dust.

He closed his eyes.

In his Array Dao Heavenly Heart’s vision, the entire Tianyong City was like a beehive that had been violently punched.

The ‘National Fate Great Array,’ which had been relatively stable, was now trembling violently.

The golden threads representing ‘public sentiment’ became chaotic, dim, and filled with panic and unease.

And the purple ‘Dragon Qi,’ symbolizing the Dynasty’s lifeline, was forcefully torn open by a huge gash from a murderous aura emanating from the northern reaches, filled with the scent of iron and blood.

The national fate was draining away.

And at the top of the tower.

The National Preceptor Wei Shu was still sitting cross-legged.

However, the pure golden ‘Dragon Robe’ on him, forged from billions of people’s wishes and endless national fate, was now dim, and the black crack on it, caused by ‘personal vendetta,’ was constantly expanding.

More tiny cracks, like a spiderweb, spread along the main crack.

Wei Shu’s face was as pale as paper.

The outbreak of civil war, the unrest of public sentiment, the fragmentation of national fate… all of this was like the most vicious curse, backfiring on him, a ‘Sage’ who relied on ‘national fate’ as his power’s Foundation.

Jiang Chen could feel that Wei Shu was desperately mobilizing troops from other prefectures and counties with his ‘Sage’s’ wisdom, attempting to build defenses and block Meng Tian’s army.

But it was useless.

The county and prefecture soldiers, who had long been out of battle, were no different from paper in front of the three hundred thousand northern wolf-like troops.

The Great Xia Dynasty’s corruption was even more severe than he had imagined.

He, Jiang Chen, had only gently pushed it.

The house collapsed on its own.

The Killing Intent, resentment, and Death Qi on the battlefield… for Cultivators, they were deadly poisons to be avoided.

But for Jiang Chen’s Undying Demonic Heart, they were the purest nourishment.

He didn’t need to do anything.

He just needed to stand here, feeling the boundless negative energy emanating from the distant northern battlefield.

Every beat of his heart was ten times more powerful than usual.

The purified Spiritual Qi, like a trickling stream, nourished his limbs and bones.

He even drew out a wisp of pure Evil Qi, and using the Array Dao Heavenly Heart’s methods, transformed it into an invisible poisonous needle, gently piercing a fragile node in the Great Xia Dynasty’s Dragon Vein.

The Dragon Vein wailed.

At the top of the tower, Wei Shu’s body trembled violently, and a trace of golden blood seeped from the corner of his mouth.

In everyone’s eyes, this was a power struggle between the General and the National Preceptor.

It was a bloody internal strife within the Dynasty.

Only Jiang Chen himself knew.

This was a battle of wits across space between him and that ‘Human Dao Sage.’

His chess pieces were human hearts, schemes, and the blades of those three hundred thousand troops.

His chessboard was the national fate of the entire Great Xia Dynasty.

However, just as Meng Tian’s army broke through three cities in a row, with its vanguard pointing directly at the capital region.

An unexpected turn of events occurred.

“Boom—”

A dry thunderclap exploded in the clear afternoon.

Immediately after, a majestic and awe-inspiring voice, as if from the Nine Heavens above, resounded throughout the Imperial Palace.

“The wicked person has misled the country, and endless warfare rages. I… am ashamed before my ancestors!”

It was the Emperor’s voice.

The Emperor, who had been immersed in cultivating Immortality for twenty years and was almost forgotten, woke up from his dream of Immortality.

An imperial edict, at the fastest speed, spread throughout the land.

“National Preceptor Wei Shu, for bewitching the monarch’s heart and causing great chaos in the world, is immediately dismissed from all his positions and thrown into the Imperial Prison, awaiting judgment!”

“Pacifying North General Meng Tian, for his commendable loyalty and bravery, is ordered to immediately return to the capital, and I… will personally host a banquet to calm his spirit!”

The Heavenly Dao corrected the script.

It used the most direct and crude method to forcibly press the pause button.

Jiang Chen could “see” that the Dynasty’s Dragon Qi, which was on the verge of collapse, miraculously began to slowly heal under this imperial edict.

The murderous aura from the northern reaches also paused accordingly.

Although the ‘Dragon Robe’ on Wei Shu was still damaged, the spreading cracks stopped.

The chessboard was overturned.

He didn’t overturn it.

It was the ‘chess player’ who set the rules who personally entered the game and forcibly placed the pieces back in their original positions.

Jiang Chen stood amidst the clamor of the construction site, slowly raising his head to look at the azure sky.

His face remained expressionless.

Only in his unfathomably deep eyes, the cold excitement burned even more fiercely.

Overturn the chessboard?

Then… let’s burn the chessboard down as well.