On their way back to the domain, Xu Yi felt somewhat uneasy and asked, "Did I cause trouble?"
"No. What trouble could you cause?"
"When I argued with the envoy, I shouldn't have said I was from the Xu family, and I definitely shouldn't have told them my name."
Her arriving at that conclusion on her own saved Wei Yuan plenty of explanation.
In truth, even if Xu Yi revealed her identity, it was no great matter. She was a daughter of an aristocratic clan. Never mind colluding with horse bandits—a matter so small it could barely be any smaller—even if she committed murder, she would not face death so long as a passably plausible excuse could be found. And if the victims were commoners, there would not even be a need for an excuse; a payout would settle the matter directly, and not even a particularly large one at that.
In fact, Wei Yuan had been contemplating Yuan Qingyan's purpose in sending envoys the entire way here.
After turning it over in his mind, Wei Yuan felt the most likely possibility was to fabricate charges against him. If Wei Yuan could not restrain himself and struck back, it would play right into Yuan Qingyan's hands.
The boundary stone had been established by Wei Yuan. As the master of the domain, Wei Yuan was rightfully the commandery governor, unchanging for a century. Only after a hundred years had passed, or if the domain lord transferred it to another, would the governor be replaced. Only then would the court appoint a governor, and the domain would formally fall under Great Tang governance.
This was the established precedent of Great Tang: the pioneering domain lord enjoyed exclusive rights to all revenues for the first hundred years. After a century, once an ordinary boundary stone matured and no longer required a domain lord, the territory would revert to Great Tang.
Wei Yuan had established Qingming, and the stakes were too immense for even the King of Jin to resist stepping in to seize it. If Wei Yuan were merely a disciple of some minor sect, they could have simply arrested and removed him. But Wei Yuan was a disciple of the Palace of Grand Beginning, highly valued by his sect, and a figure who had caught an Immortal Monarch's eye. He could not be dealt with arbitrarily.
If the King of Jin wanted to bring Wei Yuan down, he had to find a justification that could pass muster. Thus came the appointments of Niu Jinbao and Yuan Qingyan, and Yuan Qingyan had sent envoys to provoke and curse them precisely to find a scapegoat whose death could pin charges on Wei Yuan—saving himself from having to sacrifice his own neck like Niu Jinbao.
The moment he figured this out, Wei Yuan immediately had men pursue the envoy delegation to wipe them out completely.
Nor was it a simple matter of killing them and walking away. All armor and weapons were transported back to the domain for centralized disposal, while the corpses were hauled to a small lake to the northwest to be discarded. That small lake lay outside the domain, its waters teeming with countless bloodthirsty, ferocious beasts. Tossing two hundred corpses into it would reduce them to nothingness in less than half an hour, leaving behind not a single trace.
Since Yuan Qingyan wanted to pin charges on Wei Yuan's head, Wei Yuan would make sure dead men told no tales.
From now on, not a single envoy sent here would ever return alive. An envoy like the one just now could have his plucked eyes and severed tongue healed through Daoist arts. Even in death, as long as a wisp of residual soul lingered in the corpse, or if someone in the party possessed soul-gathering techniques to store the soul, a great deal could be extracted upon their return. Those were living witnesses.
Wei Yuan would ensure that every envoy embarked on a one-way trip, leaving Yuan Qingyan with neither witnesses nor material evidence.
Of course, this was only a temporary measure; it did not solve the root problem. For instance, if Wei Yuan were in Yuan Qingyan's shoes, he would not have sent an envoy at all. He would simply take a few subordinates who displeased him, slaughter them, throw their bodies outside the domain, claim Wei Yuan had murdered them, and report it straight up the chain.
The entire process would not require the domain's involvement in the slightest, leaving no room for interference.
You, Wei Yuan, claim you were framed? Fine. If you have grievances, go plead them before the King of Jin.
Charges were easy enough to handle, but Yuan Qingyan's blockade of the grain routes was an exceedingly venomous move that struck straight at Wei Yuan's weak underbelly. Wei Yuan had turned it over again and again without finding a viable solution. In truth, the history books were not without methods for dealing with famines; it was just that unless pushed to the absolute brink, Wei Yuan was unwilling to resort to them.
Returning to the main peak, Wei Yuan asked Xu Yi if she had vented her frustration. Her cheeks flushed slightly, and she nodded before fleeing in a fluster, like a startled fawn.
Wei Yuan then left the main peak to seek out Sun Yu.
In just a few days, Sun Yu's courtyard had expanded considerably. It was now a five-courtyard compound, complete with a garden cultivated with dozens of varieties of Western Regions flora.
A pond had been newly excavated in the yard, within which swam over a dozen creatures of varied forms. Only three looked like fish; the rest were bizarre and visibly ferocious.
The pond full of fish and strange creatures appeared to coexist peacefully, each idling lazily and stirring only on occasion. Yet in Wei Yuan's eyes, every creature in the pool radiated a dense, dark green aura—every one of them was a spiritual creature. Murderous tension lay coiled beneath the calm; each was cautiously seeking a flaw in the others.
Sun Yu walked out of the house carrying a large slab of pork and casually tossed it into the pool.
A great plume of water suddenly detonated from the pond. Countless silhouettes darted back and forth like lightning, and in an instant, that slab of pork—meat and bone alike—vanished without a trace!
As the column of water splashed back down, the dozen or so aquatic creatures returned to their tranquil repose. Had he not witnessed it with his own eyes, Wei Yuan would never have believed that these beasts could tear apart and swallow half a pig in less than a single breath. Never mind ordinary creatures; even a cultivator with completed Body Casting who fell into this pool would face near-certain doom.
Sun Yu was busy curing the sick and saving lives every day; it was truly a mystery where he had managed to get his hands on these things.
Spotting Wei Yuan, Sun Yu wiped his hands and asked, "What brings you here?"
"There is a grave matter I'd like to ask Martial Uncle Sun's help with."
Sun Yu ushered Wei Yuan into the house. Once inside, Wei Yuan laid out the current grain shortage, then asked whether Sun Yu had any solutions.
Sun Yu said, "The best approach, naturally, is to grow our own grain, and specifically grain native to the Western Regions. Over the past few days, I've been studying the medicinal herbs native here, and along the way, I looked into the properties of local spiritual flora as well. Some herbs and grain are separated by only a thin line. However, the living environments of Shamans and humans differ too vastly. Several toxins commonly found in everything throughout this realm are essential to the Shamans, but lethal poison to humans."
Sun Yu had attempted to transplant over a dozen medicinal herbs into the domain to observe their changes, but it had only been a short time; obtaining results was still a long way off.
After discussing it with Sun Yu for a while, Wei Yuan learned that whenever humans expanded into the Western Regions in the past, they essentially transformed the ambient realm first before sowing human crops; no one had yet succeeded in transplanting Shaman food.
Every year, humanity imported vast quantities of herbs from the Shamans, several of which could be called immortal medicines. Yet what they sought was actually the unique toxins and worldly vital qi contained within.
As for animals, the options were somewhat broader. A few varieties of frogs and fish were barely edible. But the easiest to obtain, and perfectly safe to eat, was a palm-sized beetle—the very type Wei Yuan had often seen in Quliu Town. The locals liked to roast them over a fire.
Sun Yu's initial motive in transplanting herbs and raising savage fish and ferocious beasts was not to search for better medicines, but to harvest violent toxins in preparation for his future revenge.
As their conversation progressed, Wei Yuan realized that the Dao Foundations of Sun Yu's lineage were almost all tied to medicine. Sun Yu's Dao Foundation was an alchemical furnace; any pill that passed through it gained several degrees of added potency. Yet anyone who assumed Sun Yu could not fight would be gravely mistaken.
Sun Yu's Dao Foundation could be split into three parts: alchemical fire, the furnace, and the pills within, each possessing distinct wonders. Mixed into the alchemical fire were poisons Sun Yu had refined over many years, exceptionally lethal at destroying Dao Foundations. Smashing people with the furnace carried immense concussive power. As for the pills within, whether benign remedies or deadly poisons, they could take on the appearance of peerless, renowned elixirs, complete with pill veining and pill resonance, making them impossible to guard against.
However, there were plenty of capable fighters in the domain at present, so there was no need for Sun Yu to step forward just yet—sparing their enemies from dying in such a humiliating fashion.
Wei Yuan had not come to Sun Yu placing hopes on research that was barely a few days old; rather, he wanted to explore another possibility.
With a solemn expression, Wei Yuan said, "I want to know: if the worst-case scenario occurs and we don't have a single mouthful of food left, what should we do?"
Sun Yu went silent for a moment. "Do you truly want me to speak plainly?"
Wei Yuan nodded.
Sun Yu straightened up and pointed outside the courtyard toward the mortuary grounds. Although the Shaman corpses had already been cleared away, leaving only an empty field, Wei Yuan understood his meaning.
Sun Yu said, "I've studied every Shaman race. Among them, the poisonous monitor is the most useless; its entire body is venomous and carries fatal diseases that have no cure once contracted. Ordinary Shaman warriors offer very little usable material, though certain internal organs can be used, such as the liver. The most useful are Shaman Scholars and the personal guards of Great Shamans; almost all of their organs can be used, and the brains are exceptionally nourishing."
This conclusion caught Wei Yuan somewhat by surprise; he had assumed the order would be the reverse. But Sun Yu was an authority on the subject, so Wei Yuan accepted his assessment.
Sun Yu added meaningfully, "How can war not claim lives? From the perspective of heaven and earth, all living beings are equal; those who have not achieved immortality are mere ants. So if we speak of utility, humans naturally offer the most that can be used."
Wei Yuan remained silent for a long moment before asking, "Is that the only way?"
"There is one other method that could provide a temporary reprieve, though it treats the symptoms, not the cause."
"Please tell me." Wei Yuan felt as though he needed to clutch at every straw.
Sun Yu said, "I happened to discover several potent herbs that can be formulated into a special anesthetic. A single drop can knock out hundreds or thousands of ordinary people, keeping them asleep for several days. In a coma, the human body's consumption is extremely minimal. If we truly run out of grain, we could gather those who aren't currently needed and administer the anesthetic. That would at least buy us ten more days."
"How much of this anesthetic do you have, and are there any side effects from taking it?"
"The side effects remain unknown for now, but the few who tested it are still alive. As for quantity, if I run a few more batches in the furnace, it should be enough to knock out tens of thousands."
Wei Yuan's knitted brows relaxed. This was the first piece of good news he had heard in the past two days.
Noticing Wei Yuan's expression, Sun Yu asked, "Are we truly about to run out of grain?"
"It's not certain yet, but our opponent has cut off all our supply lines. I must prepare for the worst."
Leaving Sun Yu's residence, Wei Yuan stopped by the Liang rice fields to inspect them before returning to the main peak. In truth, he knew of one other place with grain: the Western Jin military encampments.
Wei Yuan unrolled a map and slowly drew two sweeping arcs that converged behind Quliu Town, enveloping the entire settlement within.
If the day came when food ran out entirely, Wei Yuan was by no means an inflexible pedant. He would rather lead a hundred-odd thousand people to die in battle on the sands than watch them starve to death.
When that time came, Wei Yuan would show Yuan Qingyan just how many holes riddled that defense line thousands of li long. He would also teach him how brutal a real battlefield could be. A mad dog was only mad because it had not been beaten ruthlessly enough.
Chapter 183