66: Chapter 66 The Alliance to Pacify the Rebellion Leads to Chaos Throughout the Land

[ Three years. ]

[ It is neither long nor short, enough for a sapling to grow as high as the eaves, and enough for a group of scrawny children to turn into energetic, growing lads. ]

[ Your bookshop has long ceased to be just a bookshop. ]

[ On that old residential plot in the west of the city, which you obtained from the Green Snake Gang, there now stand three rows of blue-brick tiled houses with a large courtyard in the middle, featuring a well, a jujube tree, and a few vegetable patches in the corner. ]

[ The children call this place the "Lin Family Courtyard". ]

[ There are one hundred and three children; the youngest was abandoned at your shop door when they had just learned to walk, and the oldest is Stone, who is fifteen this year. ]

[ After reaching one hundred, you stopped taking more in. ]

[ It is not that you did not want to, but that you could not. ]

[ For a while, news spread across the three counties surrounding Linyuan City that there was a kind Miss Lin in the city who specialized in taking in orphans, providing them with food, shelter, and teaching them to read. During that time, almost every day someone would come to your door with children; some truly could not survive, some wanted to shed their burden, and some even traveled over a hundred miles to deliver their children. ]

[ You closed your doors after the one hundred and third child. ]

[ Because you had done the math. For one hundred children, just the food alone would burn through nearly a hundred taels of silver a month. Adding clothing, medicine, and writing supplies, it would approach a thousand taels a year. The silver you have on hand can support them for a few more years, but you could not sustain even one more. ]

[ More importantly, your own energy is limited. You have to teach, practice boxing, Cultivate, and gather information at night. If you kept taking them in without limit, you would neither be able to feed them nor protect them; that would not be saving lives, but harming them. ]

[ Stone's martial arts talent exceeded your expectations. In three years, with the sufficient food and System guidance you provided, this teenager who was once as thin as a firewood stick has already stepped into the Houtian Middle Stage. ]

[ Houtian Middle Stage. Fifteen years old. ]

[ This speed would be enough to be called a Genius in any formal Martial Arts Hall. You must know that most of the students you taught at the Qingluan Martial Arts Hall back then might not even reach the threshold of the Acquired realm in their entire lives. ]

[ Stone's progress made you start to seriously evaluate these children. ]

[ You spent half a year evaluating every child over the age of six, and finally, according to their respective strengths, you divided them into several paths. ]

[ For those who wanted to learn martial arts, they practiced basic fist techniques and Internal Skill Mind-Cultivation Technique with you. You would not pass on true high-level Cultivation Technique to them, but a solid Foundation would be enough for them to survive in this chaotic world. ]

[ For those who did not want to learn martial arts, you taught them literacy, arithmetic, bookkeeping, identifying herbs... You poured out everything you knew, and they could absorb as much as they could. ]

[ You were very clear about one thing: you could not support them for their entire lives; eventually, they would have to face this world on their own. ]

[ What you could do was to equip them with teeth and claws before they were thrown into it. ]

[ Besides Stone, four other children showed good performance in the Martial Dao, and over the past three years, they had successively broken through to the Houtian Early Stage. One boy named Zhuzi had extraordinary strength, and another girl named Xiaoyu had agile footwork, bearing quite a resemblance to when you practiced the Body Lightening Technique back then. ]

[ Although the days were not wealthy, they were manageable. ]

[ At least in Linyuan City, no one came to cause you trouble anymore. ]

[ The Green Snake Gang leader, Zhou Gui, was a sensible man. After that time when he paid three thousand taels and a piece of land as compensation, not only did he not seek revenge, but he actively showed goodwill, even sending people to deliver rice and flour during holidays. His calculations were sharp; rather than offending an unfathomable Grandmaster-level expert, it was better to spend a little money to build a good relationship. ]

[ The other Gangs in the city were much the same; they managed their territories, you ran your bookshop, and you all minded your own business. ]

[ Three years of peace. ]

[ But the world outside had long since changed. ]

[ After experiencing an initial year-long period of chaos, the situation in the various provinces of Great Qing had indeed improved. In order to maintain order in their territories, the major School had to shoulder responsibilities that originally belonged to the imperial court; after all, if the people in their territories all ran away, who would they rule over? ]

[ Thus, each School took action to suppress banditry, stabilize grain prices, and appease the common people, and for a time, it really looked like things were on the right track. ]

[ But anyone could see that this was merely the calm before the storm. ]

[ Each School had its own agenda; everyone wanted a bigger slice of the pie, and everyone was secretly expanding their armies and preparing for war. A sense of tension, a "struggle for hegemony among the Schools", permeated the entire Great Qing. ]

[ It was stable for a year and a half. ]

[ And then it exploded. ]

[ That evening, you sat in the shop with a piece of intelligence spread out before you, which you had bought from a traveling merchant for ten taels. ]

[ You read it three times. ]

[ The intelligence read: ]

[ On the ninth day of the third month, the Tianji Pavilion and the Bixiao Sect went to war over the spiritual iron mines in Yuzhou Province. Both sides sent out two Great Grandmaster each; the Tianji Pavilion Master was killed in action, and the Bixiao Sect won a pyrrhic victory. ]

[ On the fifteenth day of the third month, the Hanshan Sword Sect of Youzhou Province launched a sneak attack on the Yandang Mountain Villa, annexing its territory of three counties overnight. ]

[ On the first day of the fourth month, Cangyun Sect Leader Senior Brother Gu Changfeng personally went to the capital to meet the Emperor and reached a "King-Protecting Alliance" with the Great Qing imperial family. That same month, the Martial Dao Sect exceptionally opened its gates, announcing the formation of the "Pacification Alliance" with the Cangyun Sect and the Great Qing imperial family. They issued a manifesto to the world, denouncing the various Schools as "separatist rebels" and declaring their intent to restore a bright and clear world. ]

[ From the fourth month to the present, the Pacification Alliance has formed the "Zhenluan Army". The coalition forces won their first battle, having already conquered three major towns in Yuzhou Province. Now, their military force is pointed directly at the territory of the Taiyi Sword Sect, having broken through several counties in a row with unstoppable momentum. ]

[ The Martial Dao Sect. ]

[ This behemoth, which had sealed its mountains and not come out since the Old Ancestor fell, had actually re-entered the game. ]

[ Although there is no Earthly Immortal to oversee them, the Martial Dao Sect has a profound Foundation, and there is no shortage of Peak Great Grandmaster. A starved camel is still bigger than a horse; once these three parties unite, they are the strongest force in the world today. ]

[ You turned the paper over and glanced at the scribbled note on the back. ]

[ "The Taiyi Sword Sect Sect Master has not emerged from seclusion, and the various branch halls are fighting on their own, already collapsed into a disorganized mess." ]

[ You put down the paper and looked up out the window. ]

[ Linyuan County belongs to the sphere of influence of the Taiyi Sword Sect. ]

[ To be precise, the city you are currently standing in is right in the heart of the Taiyi Sword Sect's territory. ]

[ And the vanguard of the Pacification Alliance is less than three hundred li away from Linyuan County. ]

[ You looked up at the window. ]

[ Stone is leading a few children in practicing boxing in the courtyard; every move and stance looks proper, and one can already see some semblance of structure. ]

[ Two months later. ]

[ News flew into Linyuan City like snowflakes. ]

[ The Zhenluan Army advanced with unstoppable momentum, pushing all the way from the north. The Taiyi Sword Sect's defensive line was almost non-existent. News of them conquering several counties in a row arrived, each piece of news more alarming than the last. ]

[ In tea houses, wine shops, and on the streets and alleys, there was discussion everywhere. ]

[ "Have you heard? Qingping County has fallen, just three days ago! The Zhenluan Army took it down in a single day!" ]