229: Military drills on a sand table! The Divine Child just wants to yawn!

Great Xia Imperial City, Vermilion Bird Avenue.

This central axis of the Empire, wide enough for a hundred beast-drawn carriages to travel side by side, was now completely cleared and eerily silent, so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

Countless commoners and Cultivators were held back by golden-armored Imperial Guards on both sides of the street, craning their necks, their gazes a complex mix of awe, suspicion, and fanaticism, fixed on the procession slowly making its way towards the depths of the imperial palace.

The procession was arrayed with the utmost solemnity, its Aura like a dragon. Every single guard escorting it exuded an air of iron-blooded, battle-hardened Evil Qi.

But the two people protected at its center were indescribably bizarre.

The woman walking in front wore tattered black robes, her posture lazy and unhurried as if taking a leisurely stroll. That demonically beautiful Aura made it seem like she wasn't being escorted, but rather inspecting her own territory.

And the man beside her... He was being intimately held by the woman, his face deathly pale, his steps unsteady. The whole man looked like he'd been fished out of water, yawning one after another, with a few drops of sleepy tears even hanging at the corners of his eyes.

Su Chen felt his eyelids weighed a thousand pounds.

[My God, why such a grand spectacle? Afraid people won't know the Divine Son of the Su Family has been kidnapped?]

[My face... it's completely lost.]

[So sleepy... my back aches... I want to sleep...]

The procession finally stopped before a majestic, imposing hall deep within the palace, one that seemed to swallow the heavens.

Above the hall's doors, two ancient characters, written with the vigor of dragons and phoenixes, were branded into the Void Realm: 'Qiankun Hall'.

The hall doors were heavy, engraved with intricate patterns of mountains, rivers, the state, and the flow of stars. An Aura of iron and blood, solemn and murderous, rushed forth, making Su Chen stifle half of his yawn.

Inside the hall, dozens of Great Xia generals clad in heavy armor, their Auras as deep and vast as the sea, stood in two rows.

The moment Su Chen and Ye Linghan stepped through the doors, those dozens of gazes instantly nailed onto them. Each gaze carried the iron-blooded Evil Qi of the military, scraping painfully against one's skin.

And beyond the massive war sand table at the far end of the hall—one large enough to encompass the entire territory of Great Xia—stood a peerless figure.

Su Chen's sleepy eyelids, at that moment, uncontrollably snapped wide open.

A woman.

She wore a golden dragon robe with nine phoenixes facing the sun, a purple-gold imperial crown upon her head. Her hair, black as ink, cascaded like a waterfall, flowing smoothly down to her waist.

Her features were breathtakingly beautiful, yet not a trace of coquettishness could be found. There was only the majesty and cold pride ingrained in her very bones, as if she were born to rule over all under heaven.

Those deep phoenix eyes, beneath their majesty, held a brilliant starry sky vast enough to devour everything.

She simply stood there quietly, yet she was already the sole center of heaven and earth, making the sun, moon, and stars pale in comparison.

[Holy shit!]

A 'buzz' went off in Su Chen's head, the sleepiness instantly chased away by shock.

[This... this is the Great Xia Empress Ji Hongxue? This is too... too much! This face, this bearing, this Aura... it's against the rules!]

Just as Su Chen's mind was frantically scrolling with thoughts, Ji Hongxue's gaze had already passed over him and landed on Ye Linghan beside him.

Boom!

It was as if invisible thunder exploded in the air!

Two equally domineering, equally self-centered gazes collided fiercely in mid-air. The temperature of the entire Qiankun Hall plummeted to freezing, even the light seemed to distort for a moment!

Then, Ji Hongxue's gaze slowly shifted back to Su Chen's face, which was written all over with 'frailty'.

Her vermilion lips parted slightly, her voice exceptionally cool, betraying neither joy nor anger.

"Divine Son Su, This Emperor's fiancé, we finally meet."

She paused, her tone abruptly shifting, a thread of icy amusement seeping into her voice.

"This Emperor recalls, the last time Your Excellency was at the Myriad Dao Auction in the Celestial Capital... you seemed to be accompanied by this Fairy as well?"

Su Chen's heart skipped a beat.

[Damn, this woman's need for control is outrageous! She even knows who I was with at the auction? Doesn't that mean all my movements are under her surveillance? Too terrifying!]

Before he could think of how to respond, Ye Linghan had already let out a soft, tinkling laugh.

That laugh, seductive to the bone, made every battle-hardened general in the hall shudder in their Divine Souls.

"Little Empress, your eyesight isn't bad."

Ye Linghan, holding Su Chen's arm, deliberately pulled him tighter against herself, like a Devil King declaring ownership. She looked at Ji Hongxue with an intensely aggressive, challenging gaze.

"However, This Seat's man can play with whomever he wants."

"What business is it of yours?"

The temperature in the great hall completely froze solid!

Every single general's expression changed drastically, their eyes filled with shock and hostility as they looked at Ye Linghan!

Was this woman in black robes insane? To dare provoke Her Majesty the Empress so blatantly before the entire court!

A flash of piercing cold light flickered deep within Ji Hongxue's phoenix eyes, but she did not react on the spot.

She knew arguing with this Crazy Woman, who didn't know how many years she'd lived, was pointless.

Her gaze locked back onto Su Chen, her voice rising, filled with an emperor's decisiveness and majesty, getting straight to the point!

"The situation with the Heavenly Demons, presumably you are already clear."

"This Emperor needs a method to break the deadlock!"

As these words fell, the entire hall was shocked.

The group of veteran generals, each with illustrious military achievements, exchanged glances, their faces filled with disbelief.

Her Majesty... was actually seeking national policy advice from this Divine Son of the Su Family, who looked frail and weak, as if he might collapse at any moment?!

And Su Chen, at this moment, just wanted to find a bed and lie down immediately.

Asked this by Ji Hongxue, the accumulated irritation from being dragged out of bed and the resentment from being manhandled instantly reached an intolerable peak.

He let out an earth-shatteringly large yawn, glanced sleepily at the enormous sand table.

It was dotted like stars, marked with dense clusters of military intelligence and key strategies using lights of various colors, making him dizzy just looking at it.

"Break the deadlock? What's the big deal?"

He swayed unsteadily forward and, under the gazes of the generals—some shocked, some contemptuous—lazily drew a large circle in the air above the red zone representing the Nine Li Demon Army with his finger.

"Aren't these just a bunch of annoying cockroaches?"

His voice was slurred, thick with a nasal tone, full of the laziness of someone not fully awake.

"Want to kill them? Dig a big pit, fill it with oil, then hang the largest lightning rod you can find above the pit. Wait for them to stupidly crawl in, then 'crack!'—a bolt of lightning strikes down and they're all roasted, right?"

Every single general in the hall, without exception, was dumbfounded.

Dig a pit? Pour oil? A lightning rod? Roast cockroaches?

What kind of nonsense was this?!

This was a war of national annihilation concerning hundreds of millions of lives, the survival of the Divine Dynasty! And he was comparing it to roasting cockroaches?

This was an insult to them! An insult to Her Majesty! An insult to all of Great Xia!

Several of the more hot-tempered old generals were already so furious their beards and hair seemed to bristle, their fists clenched until they creaked. If not for the Empress's presence, they would probably have rushed forward to hang this arrogant brat up and beat him!

Ji Hongxue's brows also tightly furrowed, just about to question him.

But Su Chen had already impatiently walked to the other side of the sand table.

He randomly tapped his finger ten times on ten key, seemingly unrelated nodes representing the territory of Great Xia.

Then, like a child doodling in the sand, he casually connected those ten light points with dotted lines, forming a pattern that seemed chaotic, illogical, yet possessed a strange, eerie beauty.

Having done this, he dusted off his hands and yawned again.

"Something so simple needs to be made so complicated?"

He swept a look that seemed to say 'idiots' over the generals who were about to explode with rage.

"Alright, it's done. Hurry up and find This Divine Son a place to sleep! I'm dead tired!"

Having said that, he actually, disregarding the petrified crowd in the hall, turned and swayed unsteadily towards the exit.

Still mumbling indistinctly.

"The bed needs to be soft, the quilt needs to be fragrant, and most importantly, no one is to disturb me... otherwise, bear the consequences..."