The Emperor Reigns Them All

Su Emei volunteered to stay up, needing to be alert for wild beasts or bandits around and add more firewood if the fire went out. Li Ye did not think too much about it, and was happy to save the effort of setting up defence barriers. He believed the most important rule of survival in the Jianghu was to stay low-profile and hide one"s true strength, just like how one should not show off one"s wealth in public.

Li Ye did not need to do any breathing exercise, he was only taking the time to contemplate the situation in Qing Prefecture while sitting still.

As the center of Pinglu and the commissioner"s crucial prefecture, Qing Prefecture was certainly the wealthiest region of Pinglu. Besides the Taoist sect of Penglai, other biggest sects were located there as well. Black Office once did some research and learned that there were four big families in Qing Prefecture, two of them were established a long time ago, while the other two were new and rising.

In the Tang Dynasty, although civil examinations for government degrees were becoming larger in scale and more prominent, gentries still had greater power in the first hundred years. The most influential one was Helong Gentry, which was a n.o.ble family with hundreds of years of inheritance. When the Tang Empire was established, some gentries in Shandong started rising as well. They gradually developed greater reputations in the royal court, and their strength should not be underestimated.

When the An-Shi Disturbances happened, however, many n.o.ble families underwent immense suffering. From then onward, va.s.sal states were established in many regions, threatening and weakening the power possessed by n.o.ble families. Increasing cases of land mergers caused numerous people to lose their homes, leading to more refugees across the country as well, and that eventually caused the collapse of the Union of Soldiers and Farmers Regime. As a result, the Soldier Recruitment Regime was established. Va.s.sal states recruited refugees to form the Va.s.sal State Army. Not wanting to lose their land and homes again, those refugees united against their unfair treatment in the past and formed a new force in the va.s.sal states, called the Va.s.sal State Army Force, and had been known to be tough and powerful.

They bore hatred against the authority, hence they cherished their own welfare the most. To fight for their cause, many brave soldiers and valiant generals emerged during the battles against the commissioner"s exploitation. As time pa.s.sed, the Va.s.sal State Army grew even more intrepid, to the point if the commissioner failed to take good care of the soldiers or safeguard the welfare of the Va.s.sal State Army, he would be exiled.

Since the uprising of the Va.s.sal State Army, the conflict of interest with established n.o.ble families over the control of land and properties became inevitable. However, no matter how many cultivators there were in all n.o.ble families, they could never compete against an entire army. Therefore, the power of n.o.ble families dwindled even more.

In conclusion, one could say that there were two main reasons for the downfall of the n.o.ble families. One was the rising of civil examinations for government degrees, the other was the establishment of the va.s.sal state. The examinations only became the most influential until the Song Dynasty. Before scholars were prominent enough to take over the status of n.o.ble families, it was still the va.s.sal state that could truly threaten the n.o.ble families.

Among the four powers in Pinglu, or the four families, two of them were n.o.ble families, while the other two were the two most prominent names in the Va.s.sal State Army. Li Ye used to think he still had a chance to gain power because those two families from the army were not on good terms with each other. However, there still was the Penglai Sect in the east—one of the great five Taoist sects in the world.

The head of the Penglai Sect had already reached Level 9 of Qi-refining, and was currently in a retreat to train toward attaining the Spiritual Master Realm. Moreover, everyone from the Penglai Sect was a master with cultivation almost comparable to immortals, even the Regal Guards were below their level. The Penglai Sect was also very influential in Pinglu, and had close ties with all four prominent families, hence it was regarded as the leading sect among all cultivators. If Li Ye wished to have total control over Pinglu, he had to first tackle the Penglai Sect.

Li Ye could kill Liu Xingshen during the conspiracy all due to the power that Penglai"s Golden Spiritual Pill had granted him. Now he had run out of it, and who knew how many there were in Penglai. If he ever fought his way in impulsively and was confronted by a bunch of masters at Level 9 Qi-refining, what should he do?

As a Taoist sect that had the history worth thousands of years in Pinglu, Penglai naturally played a huge part in shaping Pinglu to the way it was today. For that, not even n.o.ble families or the Va.s.sal State Army could make the same claim. Hence, should the two opposing powers fight against each other, they would surely be under the restrictions from Penglai. Also, as the leading sect in Pinglu, any power in the Jianghu had to respect them and follow any of their commands.

To many people, Li Ye was merely a regional official who would most likely be replaced after a few years, and that was the case for many regional commissioners. If they still upheld the integrity of being an official, they would try to make some positive changes and try out the examination for Ministry of Appointments so they could still have a chance to get promoted. If they went not righteous or had no hopes of being promoted, they would tread the path of corruption in order to gain as much wealth as possible before stepping down, and did not care about the damage that they had done to the regions.

That was the root cause of the conflict between regional commissioners and the regional powers—after putting the regions in a miserable state, the commissioners would leave with no consequences. When the local powers were established, they then had to take care of the mess that the commissioners had made. Time after time, it was not surprising that they hated the commissioners so much.

There were five prefectures in Pinglu, named respectively from west to east, Qi, Zi, Qing, Lai, and Deng. Li Ye visited Qi Prefecture as he planned to have "control" over one region first, so it could a.s.sist him to gain control over the entire Pinglu. If he had never experienced time travel, he would have called Qi Prefecture his frontline base. Only when he managed Qi Prefecture well enough would he truly have one power that was under him. With Qi Prefecture under his control, he could also have some room for retreat.

Traveling with Su Emei and Wei Xiaozhuang in the Jianghu of Pinglu would not draw him unnecessary attention, so Li Ye would like to take this opportunity to experience the Jianghu here, in the hopes of finding the key to achieving his goal.

Otherwise, if he entered Pinglu without knowing anything about it, he would definitely feel lost at the complex situation there.

Just as Li Ye was thinking all of this through in his mind, Su Emei had already stopped her breathing exercise.

She remained in her sitting position, yet her mind was in disorder.

These few days in the Jianghu had made a great impact on her, and it was a little difficult for her to comprehend everything within such a short time.

Su Emei kept thinking about all the things that happened these few days, and her mind somehow drifted to Li Ye. He was the stranger that she had spent the longest time with in the Jianghu so far. She might not have found him handsome, but she was never the type to judge a person by their looks. Recalling everything Li Ye had done today, Su Emei became even more curious about him, and about the type of person he truly was.

Li Ye had become the agent for Su Emei to understand this world.

"I just don"t know about his cultivation," thought Su Emei as she kept her eyes closed. "Master always says, in the Jianghu, one"s level of cultivation is always the most important. As long as one"s cultivation level is high, any problem can be easily solved."

Su Emei continued thinking about all types of things, yet she failed to sense that someone had appeared in the darkness behind their carriage.

There were about 10 dark figures closing in on them from all directions, obviously they were good at hiding their movements and whereabouts.

All of a sudden, a bright stream of light slashed across the darkness.

The bonfire in front of Su Emei suddenly burst into bright sparks and was extinguished immediately, everything was then devoured by darkness.

Su Emei stood up quickly out of shock. She grabbed the sword next to her and drew it out immediately.

Before she was able to see clearly what had happened, one burst of blinding light shone on her beautiful yet nervous face and hurt her vision. The light was so bright and dense that it was hard to know what magic device had caused it. Su Emei had to turn her head away and shield her eyes with her hands.

At that moment, three streaks of Sword Qi flew toward Su Emei from different directions, yet she could only see some faint light due to her damaged vision. In no time, the Sword Qi had reached right in front of her face!

Su Emei might not have had any experience in the Jianghu, yet she had plenty of battle experience. Both Wei Xiaozhuang and she had undergone intense training with their master on the mountain.

She would never forget those pitch-black nights when Xiaozhuang and her master broke into her room through the window and attempted to "a.s.sa.s.sinate" her. She would also not forget the terrified face that Xiaozhuang had when she and her master had gone to "a.s.sa.s.sinate" him.

Su Emei rushed a few steps back and raised her long sword fiercely.

The light reflected from her sword and connected into a curve and lit up in front of her, which then shattered one of the incoming streaks of Sword Qi.

At the same time, she leaned backward and dodged another streak of Sword Qi very easily with her slim body.

However, since her body was still in continuous motion, she could not dodge the last streak of Sword Qi that was coming toward her waist from the left!

Su Emei looked petrified all of a sudden, and felt her hands and feet turning cold. Just as she leaned back, she also noticed someone jumping out from the forest behind her.

From her perspective, the person happened to be aligned with the moon and was covered up the moonlight. He unleashed one streak of strong Knife Qi, which then dashed in front of her with the speed of a comet.

"Mid-level Qi-refining!" Su Emei was taken aback at the thought.

She never expected the opponent to be at the mid-level of Qi-refining, which was not much weaker than her. If that was really the case, she could neither dodge nor block this incoming streak of Knife Qi!

Never would Su Emei expect someone to attempt to murder her on their journey, especially with extremely skilled teamwork and techniques.

Before they had gone down the mountain, their master never mentioned any enemies they had. Although she was already reacting and responding rather fast, she was still too inexperienced to confront professional a.s.sa.s.sins!

Just as a hint of despair flashed in her eyes, she felt herself kicking something, or she was kicked by something. That abrupt feeling made her lose control over her body and fall straight down!

The Sword Qi on her left scratched over her chest and ripped her navy-blue robe a little. The freezing Sword Qi made her feel the chill in her bones as well!

However, the Sword Qi never hurt her in any way.

But Su Emei did not feel lucky at all because the Knife Qi was already in front of her eyes. It grew bigger and brighter, and her pale cheeks were lit up!

She felt a little tickle as if her cheek were being caressed by a strand of hair, then saw a sleeve being raised up in front of her. It seemed like someone had positioned his palm toward the sky and lifted something up.

In a flash, the sleeve retracted. When Su Emei regained her clear vision, all she saw was a sky full of stars more splendid than all the pearls in the world!

"Where is the Knife Qi?"

Only then did she realize out of surprise that the Knife Qi had disappeared.

She also realized that her back was not touching the ground, but had instead fallen onto someplace warm. It felt like she was leaning on someone"s legs while the person sat cross-legged, it was not cold or hard at all.

Su Emei"s vision was blocked by sparrows before she could figure out what was going on.

In fact, she just realized that there were no sparrows, but it was the silhouettes of people who jumped into the sky as swift as sparrows!

They all raised their swords up high and slashed toward Su Emei. Their hair was swinging through the air with their movements, and their Sword Qi was as unstoppable as a waterfall, covering up the stars in the sky!

The a.s.sa.s.sins" attacks came one after another, there was no s.p.a.ce in between at all.

The dark figures moved at a speed that Su Emei"s eyes could not keep up with, and four streaks of Sword Qi were already approaching her before she realized it. She did not even have the time to jump or dodge!

At this time of crisis, she felt a warm hand holding onto her waist. Just as she opened her eyes wide in shock and was about to scream, she felt a sudden thrust, and all the streaks of Sword Qi fell beside her.

There were mud and water spilled all over the place due to the big explosion by the Sword Qi. Su Emei heard the crisp sound of impact and felt the chilly wind caressing her face, yet she did not feel any pain at all because none of the Sword Qi had managed to hit her!

She felt her body becoming light all of a sudden, and as she looked up, she discovered that she was flying toward the stars.

She could hear the wind blowing past her face.

Not even one bit of the mud was spilled onto her!

She felt one arm adjusting the position of her shoulder and followed to her waist, then gradually held her belly from behind. That delicate and warm touch made Su Emei unable to keep from shaking a little, as if she was struck by lightning. At that moment, she finally realized she was already in midair, and the official road and the forest were all under her feet!