Shouting from a Small Room
Taishu Hall’s guards found themselves waking up from awkward lying postures; however, they didn’t notice anything amiss due to the dizziness and nausea that hit them the same way before they pa.s.sed out, forcing them to open their eyes in a rush and get to their feet. They had to bear with lack of sensations for a while before they felt they were in their own bodies again. One other common denominator was that they were all scared since they fell asleep on the job. After all, regardless of what your family background was, all imperial guards had to abide by the same set of strict rules and suffered the same penance. In the best-case scenario, they’d be whipped thirty times. In the worst-case scenario, they’d lose their heads. Upon finding even the superiors snoring, though, they started to question what happened and realised everyone else shared the same experience and feelings. It was illogically possible for the entire squad to have dozed off on the job. Hence, the commander led a team to inspect the exam venue.
They didn’t see any flames from the outside and nothing upon entering the exam venue. A tile slipped and nearly cracked the commander’s head open, however. Considering the fact that the tile shouldn’t have shattered into dust from the height that it fell, it suggested that the tile was completely mashed to begin with. After he inwardly remarked that the exam venue needed to be renovated badly, he continued further in. While he found some examinees sleeping, the majority of them were writing as if their lives depended on it.
Flipping scholars get to sit on their arms and write while I have to walk stand on guard. Waste of my time worrying.
“Continue the patrols. Do not drop your guards,” the commander instructed.
The moon’s position had changed.
Ming Feizhen slapped He s.h.i.+ on the face. “Wake up! He s.h.i.+, wake up!”
Still groggy but regaining awareness of his surroundings, He s.h.i.+ stuttered, “St-stop!” grabbed Ming Feizhen’s hand and yelled, “You’re going to knock me out if you don’t stop!”
As he lubricated his neck with some neck movements, He s.h.i.+ asked, “Why did I fall asleep? Why are you here? Why… is the room different?”
“How is it different?”
“I’ve spent two days here. I know how many tiles there are and how many cracks there are on the wall. The tiles look like they were haphazardly stuffed together a moment ago, and it looks hideous. Wait, what are you doing here? What have you done?”
“This is not time to be worrying about minor issues. Long-story short, I’ve sorted out the old fart. I need what I requested from you now.”
It can be hard to make great work when its stolen from ????????.???.
“You sorted him out?”
A short while later, Ming Feizhen sat on the ground to start copying the response He s.h.i.+ provided him. As per their agreement, He s.h.i.+ wrote two excellent responses and one shoddy response. Feng Shanshan was obviously no longer going to need his copy.
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“You subdued all those corrupt officials? Now I understand why His Majesty wanted you to sit the exam. He must’ve entrusted the case to you since he knows you’re a detective. Else, he’d have been feeding to the wolves.”
“The internal strife is, needless to say, the Seven Champion White Princes. You can tell from the recent turmoil that His Majesty is insistent on tackling them. If the White Princes of them can recognise what they should do in these times, they’d follow Luo Sword Manor as soon as possible. If they wise up, they might enjoy prosperity for a few more years. Otherwise, trouble will be on their doorstep before they know it.”
Ming Feizhen raised his head. “Do you think they recognise the times?”
He s.h.i.+ scoffed, “Would they be struggling if they did?”
“Good point.”
“The matter of succession is self-explanatory. n.o.body knows what to expect until a Crown Prince is named. That’s why all the Princes are forming factions. Until one is named, none of them will settle down.”
Continuing to copy, Ming Feizhen queried, “Tsk, tsk, everything is a big problem. You’ve noticed it all?”
“Big problem?” He s.h.i.+ snorted. “How are they big problems?! The drought in Hedong, the locust infestation in Shanxi, Beijiang’s military activity, the homeless citizens, the struggling citizens… these are what you call big problems. A group of selfish civil servants trying to climb the hierarchy, n.o.bles trying to fight for authority, a bunch of officials struggling to choose a faction, and forcing His Majesty to make a choice are big problems? A natural disaster takes tens of thousands of lives. A locust infestation means a famine in the subsequent year is inevitable, which means keeping the death toll to less than thirty thousand would be amazing. Beijiang has been looking to form an alliance, which means we need to ease tensions between us and the Western Regions, or we’ll be hit from both sides. These are big problems.”
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