Chapter 88: Crab Fight

Inside Tian Ergeng's residence.

In the rear hall, a large gilt-bronze basin engraved with sea beasts held a shallow pool of clear water.

Two green-shelled mitten crabs, bestowed by His Majesty, were leisurely blowing bubbles within.

To them, this mirror-bright bronze basin was the entire world.

The fierce sea beasts on the basin walls were the towering mountains of their realm.

Suddenly, a few grains of soybean meal fell from beyond the "sky," sinking to the bottom and releasing an enticing aroma.

The brief peace was shattered.

The two mitten crabs moved almost simultaneously, brandishing their giant claws and crashing violently together.

Water splashed everywhere in the basin as a silent, brutal struggle unfolded.

They grappled and tumbled, straining with all their might, intent only on killing the other to monopolize the bounty fallen from heaven.

At last, with a faint, crisp crack, one of the giant claws of one crab was torn clean off at the base.

The victor raised the trophy in triumph, tossed it aside, then crawled toward the soybean meal as if no one else existed and gorged itself.

The defeated crab, its claw severed, dragged its broken body and fled in panic to a corner of the basin wall, hiding in the shadow of a fierce sea beast, motionless, as if already dead.

The lens pulls back.

This gilt-bronze basin was merely an inconsequential ornament in a corner of the hall.

The entire hall was floored with thick Persian carpets that muffled every footstep into silence.

In a corner stood a waist-high red-copper incense burner shaped like an immortal crane, burning the finest ambergris; blue smoke curled upward, its scent serene.

On the wall hung an authentic work by the master Tang Yin, a freehand landscape painting.

Every object here exuded a profound depth of heritage, utterly beyond the comparison of any common nouveau riche.

Tian Ergeng, Regional Military Commissioner of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, stood before this golden basin.

He wore an ordinary sapphire-blue plain Hangzhou-silk straight robe and held a few grains of soybean meal in his fingers, watching everything in the basin with cold indifference.

The fight just now had been provoked by his own hand.

He had stood here for half a shichen, motionless as a stone statue.

Until a steady voice came from behind him.

"Father, the list has been fully compiled."

Only then did Tian Ergeng slowly turn around.

His son, Tian Yuanyin, Assistant Guard Commander of the Left Office of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, stood bowing several paces away.

He too wore a flying-fish robe, yet he utterly lacked the awe-inspiring authority that Tian Ergeng possessed without any show of anger.

"Mm."

Tian Ergeng merely grunted through his nose, his gaze returning to the golden basin.

The victorious crab was still feeding greedily, oblivious to everything around it. And the one in the corner, its claw severed, remained utterly still and silent.

The room sank back into a silence so oppressive it was hard to breathe.

Tian Yuanyin, young after all, could not hold back and spoke again, his voice tinged with confusion and urgency.

"Father, must we truly go this far?"

He stepped forward and lowered his voice: "Once this roster is submitted, it will nearly destroy half of our family's influence!"

"In the future, we will no longer be able to suppress the other factions within the Guard."

"Yesterday, that scoundrel Zheng Shiyi even went in person to pay his respects at the Luo residence. Who knows what they discussed behind our backs!"

As if he had not heard, Tian Ergeng continued to stare at the golden basin and asked flatly, "How goes the intelligence plan I assigned you?"

Tian Yuanyin opened his mouth, wanting to plead further, but meeting his father's icy gaze, and cowed by years of accumulated authority, he ultimately dared not say more.

He lowered his head, cupped his hands, and said, "It is finished. Your son consulted the military texts left by Grandfather and sought out some of the old household retainers from those years to question them. Everything has been compiled."

This time, Tian Ergeng did not even bother to make a sound.

The hall was unbearably silent, broken only by the faint sound of soybean meal occasionally falling from his fingers into the water.

The wounded crab remained huddled in the corner, not moving at all.

After an unknown length of time, a servant hurried in from outside, bent low, and whispered into Tian Ergeng's ear:

"Master, our men below have seen... seen Wang Tiqian leave the Eastern Depot and enter the palace."

Tian Ergeng's cold, indifferent eyes suddenly contracted!

He spun around and fixed the servant with a deathly stare, his voice kept extremely low but carrying an authority that brooked no doubt: "Did he enter the palace on his own initiative, or was he summoned by His Majesty?"

The servant trembled under his stare and hastily replied, "Reporting to Master, it was... it was an edict from the palace first. Eunuch Wang only left the Eastern Depot after receiving it."

Hearing this, Tian Ergeng's taut body unconsciously relaxed, and the dense, impenetrable cloud of worry between his brows seemed to dissipate a fraction.

He waved the servant away, then added, "Dispatch more men. The moment he leaves the palace, report immediately!"

"Yes!"

The servant, as if granted a great reprieve, bowed and withdrew.

Tian Ergeng turned back once more to gaze at the golden basin.

The victor was still enjoying its feast, utterly unaware that danger was approaching.

And in the shadows of the corner, the seemingly resigned, clawless crab was using its remaining legs to brace its body.

Silently, inch by inch, it crept closer to its unsuspecting kin, approaching from a blind spot in its vision.

Qianqing Palace.

Zhu Youjian took the warm towel a palace maid handed him, casually wiped the sweat from his forehead, then took the warm tea another maid presented and drained it in one breath.

Moments before, he had just returned from the parade grounds of the Valiant Guard Camp at Di'an Gate.

Covered in dust, his heart full of exhilaration.

There was nothing particularly special today — just a routine inspection.

Sun Yingyuan truly was impressive; he took first place in the drill competition again today. His Majesty summoned him in person for a few words of encouragement, then asked in detail about how his family was settling in the capital, whether he was getting used to studying in the palace, and so on.

Apart from that, there was the squad that came dead last in the previous grand competition — the one led by Wu Fangrui.

No one knew what method he had used. Last time, internal strife had broken out, with the Platoon Officer and several of his File Leaders brawling on the spot, the situation utterly out of control. Yet today, they had vaulted all the way up to twenty-seventh place.

Zhu Youjian found this intriguing and simply established an extra "Most Improved Award" on the spot, with a prize equal to that of tenth place. Wu Fangrui and his men were so moved their faces flushed crimson, and their mountain-roaring cries of "Ten thousand years!" provoked no small resentment from the other squads.

As for his own archery skill, it was the same as ever — at sixty paces, he could only hit three or four out of ten arrows, showing no improvement whatsoever.

But Zhu Youjian was not discouraged.

It was just like the Valiant Guard Camp: although the drills of each battalion still had occasional flaws, they had ultimately entered the proper track.

The seeds he had sown had already sprouted. Now, he need only quietly wait for them to take root, blossom, and bear fruit.

Zhu Youjian sat back down before the imperial desk, looking at the four stacks of memorials arranged in neat order upon it, his spirits high.

"Companion Gao," he said, pointing to those stacks of memorials, "have today's memorials been graded according to the system I set forth earlier?"

"In reply to Your Majesty," Gao Shiming said, cupping his hands, "there are one hundred and ninety-eight memorials in total today. The Grand Secretariat and the Directorate of Ceremonial have each graded the memorials."

"Of these, according to the Grand Secretariat's grading: one is marked jia, ten are marked yi, eighty-five are marked bing, and one hundred and two are marked ding."

"According to the Directorate of Ceremonial's grading: two are marked jia, nine are marked yi, seventy-nine are marked bing, and one hundred and eight are marked ding."