The large table had been split in two and collapsed. After catching sight of the few foreign beauties, these scholars had specially ordered several expensive dishes from the restaurant that they usually couldn’t afford, trying to put on a brave face. But when the table was split by a single slash, everything crashed to the ground with a loud clatter—white-silver coins scattered everywhere. However, money was of little concern compared to the gleaming blade now facing them. One scholar, his neck flushed red, perhaps recalling the sage’s teaching of maintaining integrity even when facing swords and axes, was about to shout when the flat of the blade struck his face. The frail scholar flew sideways, smashing into the neighboring table, utterly ruining the decorum of the place.
Xu Fengnian turned to Wei Shuyang and Yu Youwei, saying, “Shu Xiu and Yuan Meng will take you all to the Lu residence first. I must go to Jiangxin Commandery and inform my elder sister. She will surely come immediately.”
Hearing the commotion, Yuan Meng led ten White Horse Righteous Cavalry (White Horse Volunteers) upstairs, drawing their swords. Xu Fengnian pointed with his Xiu Winter blade at several tables and said, “Yuan Meng, make sure these people drink until they’re full—urine. Split them into two groups and have them feed each other after taking off their pants. If anyone dares to show integrity, knock them out with your swords. If their bones are really that hard, cut them down with swords. Afterward, drag their bodies with horses and dump them at their doorsteps. I’ll leave fifty riders with you. If any armored soldiers from Yangchun city block your way, deal with them as you see fit. Can you handle this small matter properly?”
Yuan Meng, the captain of Feng’s squadron, grinned sinisterly. “If I can’t even handle this, I’ll cut off my own head and use it as a chamber pot.”
Xu Fengnian descended alone, remounted his horse, and said to Ning Emei solemnly, “Leave fifty riders here. The rest of Feng’s squadron will accompany me to Jiangxin Commandery.”
The young prince rode off with the great halberd-wielding Ning Emei. Feng’s squadron arrived in a mighty wave and departed in a mighty wave, treating the kingdom’s laws and the hundreds of armored soldiers in Yangchun city as if they were nothing.
On the second floor, a deathly silence reigned. Occasionally, the body of the scholar from Hutting Prefecture, who had been thrown, twitched slightly, pulling at porcelain plates and creating eerie sounds. Captain Yuan Meng dragged a chair and sat with a swagger, ordering one of the light cavalry to go downstairs and relay commands to the remaining forty riders to be ready for any interference from Yangchun soldiers. Then he raised two fingers and waved them. Simultaneously, the ten light cavalry upstairs raised their sword hilts and smashed them into the heads of ten Hutting Prefecture scholars. Yuan Meng then spat out three words through clenched teeth: “Take them off.” Who could endure such humiliation? Although they were all terrified, no one responded. Yuan Meng frowned, stood up, and seemed to dislike the sight of the scholar who had been knocked down by the prince, using his Northern Liang sword to stab the man in the chest. He withdrew the blade quickly, sending a jet of blood spraying. Several scholars immediately fainted, while others slumped in their seats, their trousers emitting a foul stench.
Old swordsman Wu Jian shook his head helplessly, picked up his wine cup, and went downstairs to continue drinking. Naturally, the few women followed closely, each with a different expression—Yu Youwei was indifferent and cold, Pei Nanwei frowned deeply, Shu Xiu was secretly delighted, while Jiang Ni, unusually, showed no pity. This was because although she was terrified of Xu Weixiong, she didn’t dislike Xu Zhihu. When she was young, she had been brought to the Northern Liang Prince’s Mansion (Northern Liang Prince’s Mansion). Before Xu Zhihu’s marriage, she once encountered a cruel servant bullying a lonely little maid and had held her in her arms, speaking a few warm words. Jiang Ni had always remembered this. After leaving Northern Liang, she heard many terrible rumors about Xu Zhihu and was quite indignant. Moreover, she deeply knew that no matter how unruly the prince was in Northern Liang, his feelings for his two sisters were unquestionable. Especially since their mother had died early, the eldest daughter Xu Zhihu inevitably had to bear many responsibilities. Many years ago, before she married into Jiangnan and before he embarked on his travels, she often saw the two siblings playing and laughing together. Deep down, how could she not wish for such a sister?
Yuan Meng inquired about the residence of the man he had stabbed through the heart and ordered his corpse to be tied up with ropes and dragged by ten light cavalry downstairs to be dumped at his doorstep. A trail of blood was left on the second floor. Yuan Meng scanned the room with his tiger-like eyes, seeing no one else daring to stand up, then smiled sinisterly at the three tables of fifteen or sixteen people. He wiped the fresh blood off his Northern Liang sword onto the table, slowly removing the blood, and asked, “Still not starting? If I have to help personally, I might accidentally cut off your little worms. Don’t cry out then, understand? Take them off! Damn, what bad luck, do you really think I enjoy seeing your worms in pants? The big spear between my legs could make your wives dizzy!”
Sparse sounds of pants being removed came from the second floor, a stark contrast to the earlier Heroic (bold) scenes of loud discussions and grand gestures.
Yuan Meng grabbed a piece of meat and stuffed it into his mouth, grumbling angrily, “You lot made me miss out on the fun with General Ning at Jiangxin Commandery. I really feel like stabbing you all to death!”
The scholars immediately sped up their pants removal.
Yuan Meng wiped his mouth, laughed heartily, his face Ferocious (ferocious), “Wait, if any of you little bastards can’t pee, just stab them to death.”
A few scholars who hadn’t drunk much and thus had no urge to urinate finally couldn’t help but burst into tears.
Yuan Meng gave a sharp glance, and several light cavalry simultaneously stabbed them through. Yuan Meng rolled his eyes, “Told you not to cry. Tomorrow, your whole families will have plenty of chances to cry. You lot, hurry up, finish peeing and drinking, and it won’t be your problem anymore. Don’t waste my time when I could be having fun with the city soldiers. It’d be best if two or three hundred of them came at once, just enough to warm up.”
In a corner by the window on the second floor, a master and servant sat. The master was young and charming, holding an exquisite fan painted with a loquat mountain bird pattern. He gently waved the fan, maintaining a calm and refined demeanor. The servant was a green-robed swordsman standing behind him, eyes closed in meditation. Even when they saw these warriors drawing their swords and killing at will, the master and servant made no move, the young gentleman pretending to ignore everything, simply lightly waving his folding fan. Only when Yuan Meng cast his gaze toward them did he finally curl his lips in disdain, deftly snapping the fan shut with two fingers, preparing to rise and leave this filthy place. As he stood, Yuan Meng, who had been watching the master and servant closely, also rose. The young noble guessed Yuan Meng’s intention, slightly furrowing his brow. With a snap, he deftly opened the fan, revealing the famous seals on it. After this small gesture, the personal servant suddenly opened his eyes, his gaze piercing.
The middle-aged green-robed swordsman was about to act when his expression suddenly changed drastically. Ignoring etiquette, he grabbed his master’s arm and hastily retreated, crashing through the second-floor wooden wall and landing on the street below.
The young noble’s face darkened as he asked, “Wang Meng, why did you do that?”
The swordsman, sensing great danger, replied, “Someone downstairs threw chopsticks like swords, their sword intent reaching the first-rate realm.”
Carried by the swordsman through several leaps into an alley, the young noble once again gracefully closed his fan, lightly patting his clothes as if removing non-existent dust, and said with a smile, “Even a small city like Yangchun has such Master (high-level experts)? No wonder that fellow with the twin swords dares to act so brazenly. Wang Meng, what level of King Kong (Diamond) realm is the expert downstairs?”
The swordsman’s face turned grim. “Perhaps higher than King Kong, already showing some signs of Mystic Revelation (Finger Mystery).”
Only then did the young noble’s expression turn serious. He snorted coldly, walking through the alley. After a moment’s hesitation, he discarded the precious folding fan, its ribs carved from ivory worth at least a thousand taels of silver, saying, “Daring to dirty my fan, this debt must be settled properly. Even with a first-rate expert’s backing, I don’t believe you can leave this Yanzhou!”
At the Lu residence.
Lu Dao Lin, the current head of the Lu family, had a younger brother named Lu Xuanlang sitting in the study, his face dark. A female servant was massaging his shoulders, while another knelt to massage his legs, her touch just right. The two female servants, both strikingly beautiful, were a pair of nearly identical twin lotuses. Together, their combined beauty was even more captivating. Lu Xuanlang was a renowned scholar in Yanzhou, and among the direct lineage (direct line) family members of his generation, there were six in total. Compared to other prominent families in Yanzhou of similar status, the Lus were not overly numerous, but they had produced many outstanding talents. When the previous emperor toured Jiangnan, he had personally praised the Lus, saying that every glance revealed their treasures, and with these words from the monarch, the Lus’ leadership in Yanzhou was firmly established.
The current family head, Lu Dao Lin, was now the Right Sacrificial Official of the Imperial Academy in the capital. Lu Xuanlang managed the family’s ancestral home in Yanzhou. In his youth, he had debated at White Horse Temple (White Horse Temple), defeating many scholars, and later engaged in a heated debate with the old chancellor, who had secretly visited Jiangnan Province, over whether the Six Classics were all historical texts. The debate lasted until the third watch of the night, and the debater, who was not yet famous at the time, turned out to be terrifyingly formidable. Looking back, besides the current Left Sacrificial Official of the Imperial Academy, Huan Shu, there was even the current Chancellor Zhang Julu! Lu Xuanlang’s brilliance was evident in those days. Now older, although he could no longer indulge in the unrestrained behavior of his youth, such as drinking naked in a closed room, he was still hailed as a semi-sage scholar throughout Jiangnan. However, his greatest private regret was marrying a widow, who not only caused the death of his son, the family’s hope, but also brought countless disgraces to the Lu family. Recently, in letters to his older brother, who had insisted on bringing the promiscuous widow into the family against opposition, he had expressed much frustration and resentment. But his brother remained obstinate, refusing to expel the woman from the Lu family.
The four major families in Yanzhou were currently ranked as follows: Jiangxin Yu, Boling Yuan, Hutting Lu, and Gumu Xu. Originally, with the Lu family’s resources, they should have firmly held the second position. However, it was precisely because of this woman, whom he never considered a daughter-in-law, that the Boling Yuan family’s reputation surpassed theirs.
Now, the Northern Liang prince was coming to Yanzhou.
Lu Xuanlang’s anger was mixed with obscure and inconvenient-to-share bitterness. Originally, how could Liu Liting’s wife from Jiangxin Commandery have the ability to attract the attention of the palace lady who wrote the “Nü Jie” (Women’s Precepts)? There was a hidden arrangement of his, intending to endure the pain and perform a radical cure, expelling the troublemaker from the family so she could no longer stir up trouble and ruin the Lu family’s reputation built over dozens of generations. However, how could he have anticipated that before the palace lady could exert her influence, he received shocking news—the lady had been exiled to the Chuncheng Palace by the emperor and completely fallen from grace!
Lu Xuanlang, holding a classic text by the sages, slammed the book onto the table, startling the twin female servants, whose delicate hands trembled, inadvertently increasing the pressure and causing him pain. In his youth, he had practiced Wellness (health cultivation) with mineral pills, and to this day, not only in summer but even in winter, he had to strip and eat ice to dispel the heat. Fortunately, compared to other scholars in Jiangnan who, after excessive consumption of Five Minerals Powder (Five Stone Powder), suffered from boils and rotting flesh on their backs, he was somewhat better off. However, to the scholars of Jiangnan, these were not considered significant issues. Lu Xuanlang endured the pain from his mineral overdose with gritted teeth, but the lowly servants’ improper service immediately earned each of them a slap. Their tender cheeks instantly bore the mark of a hand. Only then did his mood slightly improve. He signaled one of the servants to retrieve the book, gripping it in his hand, coldly saying, “Incense burner indeed—how fitting a metaphor!”
A cold snort came from the doorway: “You knew it would come to this, so why did you do it in the first place?”
The two servants’ faces turned pale, making the handprints on their cheeks even more vivid.
Lu Xuanlang waved his hand in irritation, and they quickly lowered their heads and left, not daring to utter a respectful farewell, simply fleeing in silence. Because the person at the door had always disliked their speaking, claiming it would pollute her ears.
Standing at the door was an elderly woman whose youth had long passed, her expression icy, her face devoid of any auspicious features, making her appear sinister.
The old woman spoke in a mocking tone, “On my way here, I met that Bitch (lowly woman), and she even had the nerve to greet me properly. Such a virtuous daughter-in-law, Lu Xuanlang, only you could have chosen her! What great fortune you have!”
Lu Xuanlang replied coldly, “The eldest brother is like a father; what could I do?”
The old woman cackled mockingly, her voice like a ghost’s wail, “What a light-hearted ‘what could I do’! My son was killed by your so-called understanding!”
Lu Xuanlang angrily retorted, “Quan’er was also my son!”
The old woman sneered, “Lu Xuanlang, you have several sons, but I have only Quan’er!”
Lu Xuanlang slumped, saying, “I need to read.”
The old woman stared fiercely at the man who should have been her lifelong partner, her face twisted with hatred. She turned and threw out a final warning, “Don’t forget who my father was. Back then, you didn’t stop that lightweight widow from entering our home, and that was bad enough. This time, if you dare let that Xu brat into our family, we’re finished!”
After she left, Lu Xuanlang tore the sage’s classic in half, gasping for breath as he leaned back in his chair.
The Butler (house steward) hurried in, his expression panicked, knocking on the door without regard for usual etiquette. His lips were pale, and he bent down to whisper a shocking piece of news that had shaken the entire city.
After hearing it, Lu Xuanlang’s face darkened, his fingers tightly gripping the chair. This Jiangnan scholar, once praised by his father for maintaining calm in the face of major events, now showed a hint of fear, muttering, “What should I do now?”
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