At early dawn, as the sky first paled, the commandery seat of Xiangrong Commandery remained quiet. On a morning following such a cold night, no one was willing to rise early unless compelled by a livelihood.
At the entrance of the city yamen's main prison, two bailiffs had their necks pulled in, shivering as they cursed the damned weather. Suddenly, one of the bailiffs seemed to hear something. He cocked an ear to listen, and after a moment said, "Sounds like footsteps!"
The older bailiff said, "At this hour, who else would be out besides miserable wretches like us?"
"There really are! Sounds like they're heading right for us!"
Before the words had even faded, a group of figures in black turned the street corner, striding swiftly toward the prison, every one of them masked with black cloth. The bailiffs' faces shifted to panic. Just as they were about to raise the alarm, two crossbow bolts whistled through the air, punching straight through their hearts!
Nearly a hundred men in black leaped into the air and flew into the prison, instantly slaying every jailer they encountered along the way. Once inside, they dispersed and began searching cell by cell.
"Milord, you need to take a look over here."
The leaders among the black-clad men immediately entered the deepest recess of the prison. Several dozen people were locked away here, where the torture chamber was also located. In the chamber hung several men, all of whom had already stopped breathing. There was hardly a patch of intact flesh left on their bodies; their eyeballs had been gouged out, and their tongues severed.
The man in black at the center ripped off his face cloth, revealing none other than Niu Jinbao.
Staring at one of the corpses, his lips trembled. Yet in the end, he said nothing. Instead, he turned and asked the man in black beside him, "What are the master's orders?"
The man in black replied in a cold, mechanical voice, "The lord's words were: if our people are fine, act according to circumstances. If anything happened to our people, slaughter every last one of them."
Niu Jinbao's expression turned sinister and ruthless. Drawing a short blade, he hurried off.
A moment later, the entire prison fell dead silent, the warm, damp stench of blood slowly wafting through the air. Supporting several dozen half-dead survivors and carrying over a dozen corpses, the many men in black emerged from the prison gates and sprinted down the main thoroughfare toward the city gate.
Before long, warning bells clanged into the air. The city gate guards emerged from the gate tower one after another, thoroughly at a loss as they stared down at the murderous throng in black.
One of the men in black shouted, "We are disciples of the White Lotus Immortal Sect! Today we come to manifest the divine might of the White Lotus Holy Maiden! Behold and tremble!"
Several men in black flew forward carrying two large kegs, set them by the city gate in an instant, lit the fuses, and dashed away.
The moment those black-clad men moved, cold sweat broke out on the city defense commandant atop the gate tower. He could tell at a glance that they were all Dao Foundation cultivators, none of them weaker than himself!
Seeing that the men in black had lit something, the commandant did not bother thinking twice and immediately flew off to save his life. Once he fled, the rank-and-file soldiers scattered in panic as well.
A tremendous boom reverberated as a fireball surged into the sky. The blast wave leveled the nearby shanties, sending the city gate flying into the distance and collapsing half of the gate tower itself!
With the city gate blown wide open, the men in black departed without hindrance. Only half an hour later did the commandery garrison finish dawdling through their assembly and cautiously creep over to inspect the scene, terrified that if they moved any faster, the fierce bandits might not have had time to leave yet.
The main prison raided, over a hundred jailers wiped out to the last man, and the city gate blown apart—such an onslaught of crises instantly plunged the commandery governor's mansion into total chaos.
Yet the Commandery Governor was absent, leaving them leaderless. The vice prefect had no desire to wade into such murky waters and made no decisions whatsoever; he merely reported the incident upward while dispatching men to the Southern Military Camp to find the governor. However, every messenger sent was turned away at the camp gates, the soldiers claiming that Lord Zhuang had never set foot there.
In a cold, gloomy stone cell within the Southern Military Camp, Zhuang Zhong sat with his hands and feet locked in dharma-treasure-grade shackles. Scorched patches from thunderfire still marred his face. He leaned against the wall, eyes closed, sitting motionless. The food set on the tray before him remained untouched as well.
Whenever someone entered to change the food, he would say a single line: "I want to see Wei Yuan." But only that single sentence, never uttering a second word.
Meanwhile, Wei Yuan was busy day and night. Centering his efforts on the Southern Military Camp, he dispatched multiple contingents to occupy numerous cities and fortresses along the border between Jin and Zhao, ultimately completing defensive deployments across most of the eastern three commanderies' frontiers, leaving only the easternmost two hundred li open.
Supply convoys streamed out of Qingming without pause, crossing through the Xu family's two commanderies to deliver endless flows of grain and materiel to the Southern Military Camp, which were then forwarded to various locations. Soon, five staunchly defended fortresses rose along Jin's southern border.
Once his layout was complete, Wei Yuan finally decided to pay Zhuang Zhong a visit. By this time, seven full days had passed since Zhuang Zhong had been detained.
Through these seven days, Zhuang Zhong had remained exceptionally unyielding, touching neither food nor water and refusing to submit in the slightest.
When Zhuang Zhong was brought up, this scholar of formerly distinguished bearing looked considerably haggard. With his dharmic powers sealed, burn marks still lingered across his face and body. Yet his expression was calm and resolute as he stood straight before Wei Yuan, neither kneeling nor speaking.
Wei Yuan gave a cold snort and asked, "Standing before this official, why do you not kneel?"
Zhuang Zhong snorted in return and proclaimed loudly, "These knees of mine kneel to Heaven and Earth, to sovereign and master, and to parents! Never have I heard of kneeling before treacherous rebels and scoundrels!"
Wei Yuan countered, "I came here by the King's decree to levy military funds, yet you and yours stubbornly refuse to cooperate. Without provisions and pay, how are the soldiers to fight? Who, then, is truly the treacherous rebel?"
"Scholars holding degrees are granted a share of tax-exempt land to maintain their livelihoods and dignity—it has been so ever since the Great Tang was founded! I merely uphold Tang law and abide by ancestral systems; what wrong have I committed? If Lord Wei wishes to levy exorbitant taxes and line his own pockets, you have plenty of ways. But if you wish to alter ancestral institutions, it is far too soon for you! For defying all natural order like this, are you not afraid that your Wei lineage will die out without an heir?!"
"That is not what Tang law means, nor does any such clause exist in Jin law. Lord Zhuang, petty tricks like distorting the law are useless before me. Furthermore, do all those lands under the scholars' names in this commandery truly belong to them? Hmph, under your name alone, Lord Zhuang, are twenty thousand mu of fertile fields, divided and registered under thirty separate individuals. Have I wronged you? Surely our ancestors never taught you to do that either!"
Zhuang Zhong sneered coldly. "Empty words carry no weight. Do you have proof?"
Wei Yuan picked up his teacup, took a light sip, and only then said, "Proof? Lord Zhuang has long prepared two sets of land deeds—one public, one hidden. If I truly wanted proof, I'd probably have to search several of your secret estates unknown to the world. Where would I find the spare time for that? In truth, finding out the facts is simple enough: I can drag out your dharma idol and roast it over yin fire for a spell. I suspect Lord Zhuang's bones are not quite that unyielding!"
Unmoved, Zhuang Zhong said, "Since Lord Wei is so confident, go right ahead."
Wei Yuan set down his teacup. "Come with me. Let us first visit those relatives of yours."
Wrapping Zhuang Zhong in Dao power, Wei Yuan arrived at the camp's holding cells in a single stride. He then entered the dungeon, taking Zhuang Zhong from cell to cell. Many of the prisoners threw themselves against the wooden bars, weeping and wailing, begging Zhuang Zhong to save their lives, while most kowtowed to Wei Yuan.
Deep inside the cells, several people lay on the ground, completely still.
Zhuang Zhong finally spoke, asking, "What happened to those people?"
Wei Yuan slightly eased his suppression of Zhuang Zhong's Dao power. "See for yourself."
Zhuang Zhong swept his divine sense over them and found that their bodies were already cold, having died who knew how long ago, with gnaw marks visible on the corpses. Shocked and furious, he roared, "Wei Yuan, you dare resort to such vicious butchery! You are cutting off all retreat for yourself—I swear I will never rest until one of us is dead!"
Wei Yuan said, "A dozen or so of my people died in your official prison, so a dozen or so of your kin and friends must die here in mine. Only that is fair. Oh, I forgot to mention: my people were already rescued a few days ago, though some casualties were naturally unavoidable in the process. It seems the man in charge of the penal torture was your son-in-law. His death was rather gruesome."
Zhuang Zhong's expression shifted again before returning to calm. "Lord Wei, telling me all this means you never intended to let me leave alive, I presume."
Wei Yuan nodded. "Originally, I still harbored a sliver of hope, thinking Lord Zhuang might be one who understands the times. But it seems I was mistaken. Lord Zhuang has an unbending spine of iron and will never yield. Even if you were to humor me with false pretenses for now, you would surely strike back the moment you were free. A pity—the Left Prime Minister is about to lose one of his right-hand men."
Seeing Wei Yuan's large hand reaching for him, Zhuang Zhong's countenance finally changed. He wanted to speak, but the world suddenly spun out of control. In an instant, the realm before his eyes shifted into a different world: in the sky hung a vault of dark red blending into black, below stretched an endless ocean, and high above was a full moon, within which opened a massive eye that locked its gaze onto Zhuang Zhong.
Wei Yuan said, "Lord Zhuang, please take your journey. From this moment on, you are parted forever from the cycle of reincarnation."
Zhuang Zhong finally lost his composure and raged, "There was no enmity between us—how can you go this far?!"
Wei Yuan replied, "In private, we have no grudge. But in public duty, our feud is immense. For the sake of the human race across the realm, I must eradicate you—or rather, all of you."
Zhuang Zhong bellowed, "Even if I never loved the commoners like my own children, the tenants on my manors have never starved or frozen to death! They have lived and worked in peace and contentment! Looking across all of Jin, how many could do better than I? What kind of 'human race across the realm' are you doing this for?!"
Wei Yuan said, "At first, I was not entirely clear on it either, but over these past few days, I have finally thought it through. Great clan families like yours, Lord Zhuang, pay no taxes, deliver no grain, and provide no corvée labor. You use silver that should have defended the realm and strengthened the army to nurture talent for your own Zhuang family, seeking to produce officials generation after generation. The public instruments of state have practically become your family's private estate. Oh, the Left Prime Minister is the same, only the offices he treats as private property are even grander. But that is merely a minor matter."
Zhuang Zhong asked, "Then what is the greater matter?"
"You defend ancestral institutions at every turn, yet what you truly protect is your aloof, privileged status—the privilege of exempting yourselves from taxes and grain levies. With people like you occupying every seat in the imperial court, a hundred years from now the human race will remain as it is today; a thousand years, ten thousand years from now, it will still be the same, without the slightest change. Any possibility of fundamental change will be snuffed out by your kind.
"Today, I can forge guns and cannons, train a New Army, and sweep across Ningxi's entire brocade industry from a single territory. Do you think the alien races will never be able to manufacture firearms and gunpowder, that they will never change? When the day comes that revolution rises from below and sweeps upward to the celestial heavens while our human race remains unchanged for ten thousand years, that will be our true dead end!
"That is why I despise your self-sufficient little kingdom so deeply—because it stands in direct opposition to the grand momentum of the human race! This is where true righteousness and greater duty lie.
"Lord Zhuang prides himself on having the talent to govern the world and aid the realm, but aside from forming factions to purge dissenters and endlessly buying up acres of farmland, what else are you capable of?!"
Zhuang Zhong parted his lips, momentarily at a loss for how to refute him.
Wei Yuan said indifferently, "Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. Perhaps one day, when facing such matters again, I will grant a person full opportunity to defend themselves. Not just a single person, but a right to defense for all. But today, Lord Zhuang, you had best be on your way."
The bird head within the moon nodded, indicating it had been hungry for quite a while.
Chapter 750