Chapter 518

The king immediately recalled the Marquis of the Eastern Capital; the court hadn't yet finished discussing the southern 'proposal', when they heard that Chang'an Light Speed City had fallen!

When the King heard the news, he was stunned for a long time, unable to regain his composure; after a while he said an irrelevant remark: "I'm afraid my birthday parade this year can't be held after all—we had agreed to summon the Inspector of Tang back to play."

At that time, Wei Shen was by his side; he rashly got up and patted the King's forehead, asking, "Are you feverish, or have you got your wires crossed?"

The King brushed him off, saying, "If you carefully count, the number guarding Chang'an is at least 420,000; the Jiangxia King claims 200,000, but everyone knows there really aren't that many—his surprise attack couldn't possibly have that many people. Chang'an is the capital; to fall so easily is truly laughable! Others play their good cards to shreds, but Baili Jin is simply incompetent, making people laugh. Did they let the inside and outside cooperate? Even nepotism can't avoid such an outcome." The King felt sorry for Baili Jin.

Chang'an had been breached, and the news seemed to have been breached as well; sometimes one could receive two or three reports in a day.

In the morning they reported that General Lin, the trusted commander of the Ningde Emperor's Tiger Guard, had been killed in action, and that the Jiangxia King had stormed into the Jianzhang Palace; by afternoon they were saying that Baili Jin's fate was unknown, with rumors that he had already fled Chang'an.

The King scoffed at this, saying, "He's probably already been taken care of by that good uncle."

Although the King had long since severed ties with Baili Jin, upon hearing that he might already be dead, he didn't feel good about it.

The King said, "As for the eldest, I won't say more—he got what he deserved. The sixth and seventh are still in the palace; they probably won't have a good ending either." The King had only seen the sixth as an infant in swaddling clothes, and hadn't even seen the seventh; now they're just clueless children.

Xie Yuan's face gave away neither joy nor sorrow: "Your Highness said you wouldn't take the lead in going south, but now the moment has come."

Xue Xiang went even further, stating bluntly: "The Jiangxia King will soon bring up the late emperor's failed northern expedition to make his case, placing himself in the position of restoring order."

Dong Fu said, "The other factions surely can't sit still either; they've already lost the initiative. The Jiangxia King should therefore ascend the throne immediately."

Lu Tong said, "…They'll blame the recent years' hardships on the Ningde and Taihe emperors."

Xie Yuan delivered a decisive blow: "Your Highness, the merit of unifying the world cannot outweigh the guilt of nine out of ten households being empty; but now that the realm is in great turmoil, the only recourse is to fight to end war. The blame for starting the turmoil has been placed on Baili Jun, and now is the best time. Your Highness, we should head south as quickly as possible to stabilize the situation and unify the realm."

The King: ……

The King's other boot hit the ground, and he seemed to suddenly calm down—or perhaps he had long known this day would come, just not that it would come so soon, leaving him little time to prepare.

"Shall we draft the edict? To punish the rebels of the imperial house and support the state?"

When Qin lost its deer, all under heaven chased after it.

Great Jin has come to this point, and the King has reached the time when he cannot avoid taking action.

With the King's utterance of the draft edict, several senior ministers bowed deeply, and the history of Great Jin thus turned to a new page.

Wei Shen, who had fortunately been standing by to watch the whole thing, later said, "That was one of the King's most handsome days…"

The Dongdu Hou swiftly returned from Shanggu Pass to Youzhou, and the King also issued separate orders to Shangyang Pass and Shuofang Pass; all that remained was to study how to fight this battle.

The officials leaned toward letting the Dongdu Hou and Changli of the Xueqi lead fifty thousand Xuanjia cavalry and the fifty thousand from Luoshui Pass south to retake Chang'an, while the other three passes should best remain idle, lest neighboring countries take the opportunity to stir. The King, of course, wanted to lead the campaign himself, so that if there were any mishap with supplies he could still cheat.

Wei Shen calculated for him: "The Jiangxia King claims to have 200,000 troops, but they had already deployed in Chang'an unscathed and basically taken the city; the surrendering troops from the east and west camps of Chang'an probably number 200,000 as well. We have nothing in Chang'an, so attacking would likely be a hard assault; thinking about it, there's still some danger, and it's understandable that the elders wouldn't let you go."

The King looked down equally on all of Great Jin's armies except the northern border forces; he didn't insist on going by slamming the table because he felt that internal strife was meaningless, and not fighting the Xiongnu could still stir his enthusiasm.

Who would have thought that news came from ahead that Baili Jun had rushed to the capital and ascended the throne; his first imperial edict was a bunch of nonsense denying the Ningde and Taihe father and son, truly using the failed northern expedition as an excuse, pushing all recent natural disasters and human misfortunes onto the Ningde Emperor. The Ningde Emperor lacks virtue to hold the position, and his sons certainly don't either. Yet he was shrewd enough to acknowledge the King's achievement in unifying the northern borders, boldly declaring that he would divide rule along the Luo River with the Northern King, after which Great Jin split into Southern and Northern Jin.

Before the King could even respond, word came that the Hanshou Hou had attacked Wuling, slaughtering five or six thousand of the Wuling King's household who refused to submit, and even hung the Wuling King's head on the city gate.

Upon hearing that Baili Jin might be dead, the King remained calm; but upon hearing that the Wuling King had been hung on the city wall, he really became angry.

The King felt heavy-hearted; in his heart, the fifth was still a child who couldn't speak clearly, two years younger than the fourth.

"……This Wuling King was obtained by the fourth elder sister marrying the old Wusun King in exchange, and in the end……"

"I was mistaken; it's not at all a case of internal strife—rebellious ministers and traitors ought to be exterminated!"