Choose Liu Bei at the start, I am the only one who knows the plot of the Three Kingdoms.

Zhuge Liang's eyes flashed with a cold light when he saw the formation in front of him.

"You want to control me through divination? I'm afraid you don't have that kind of power."

After saying this, Zhuge Liang spat a mouthful of blood onto the tortoise shell.

The blood spurted out turned the entire tortoise shell and the copper coin blood red.

Zhuge Liang's face also showed a pale expression.

On Penglai Mountain in Qingzhou.

Zuo Ci was playing chess with Yu Ji.

At this moment, a cloud on the mountaintop turned blood red.

The two of them stopped what they were doing at the same time.

"Is someone performing blood divination?"

"Judging from the direction of these clouds, it should be towards Jingzhou. Currently, there is only one person in the Han Dynasty who is capable of divination by blood."

"Zhuge Liang?"

After they finished speaking, they subconsciously looked in the direction of Jingzhou.

"Let me see what he's really trying to figure out."

After speaking, Zuo Ci gently waved the feather fan in his hand.

A beam of light shot directly into the blood cloud.

Soon, the light returned to Zuo Ci's body.

"Hehe, Zhuge Liang is trying to figure out about our Penglai and our origins. This time he might be disappointed. Our origins are not something that can be figured out by a blood divination."

After saying that, Zuo Ci threw the feather fan in his hand into the blood cloud.

There was a crisp sound of "pop".

The blood cloud dispersed immediately.

At this moment, Zhuge Liang's face was deathly pale, and blood was flowing from all seven orifices.

Just then, Ma Chao walked in.

However, upon seeing Zhuge Liang's condition, his expression changed immediately, and he rushed to Zhuge Liang's side.

"Prime Minister, what's wrong? Has someone plotted against you?"

Ma Chao didn't know what had happened, but Zhuge Liang's aura was extremely unstable, and his blood energy was extremely weak.

"It's nothing, I just made this up with my own divination."

Zhuge Liang forced a smile and shook his head, then looked towards Qingzhou with a hint of fear on his face.

Seeing Zhuge Liang's response, Ma Chao didn't press the matter further, since he didn't understand divination.

Gu Rubing was completely unaware of Zhuge Liang's affairs.

At this moment, the three of them were still thinking about heading to Youzhou.

"Brother, it's just a horse farm, why do we need to go there ourselves? If you ask me, let Liu Ye lead the army and arrest everyone at that horse farm. Would they dare not give us warhorses then?"

Hearing Zhang Fei's words, Gu Rubing rolled his eyes at him helplessly.

"My third brother, promise me you won't say a word when we get there."

"what?"

Zhang Fei glanced awkwardly at Gu Rubing.

Zhao Yun could only chuckle to himself.

Half a month later, the three of them finally arrived in Youzhou.

Upon learning of Gu Rubing's arrival, Liu Ye immediately went outside the city to greet him.

"Lord."

"Well, you have worked hard during this period."

Gu Rubing wasn't just being polite. Each of these horse farm owners had their own power. In this era of war, horses were something every warlord lacked, so the last thing these horse farm owners had in abundance was money.

With money, people will naturally follow them.

With money and manpower, they naturally become fearless.

Moreover, the people working at these horse farms are often former bandits and robbers, and each of them has a lot of lives on their hands.

For Liu Ye, a civil official with no powerful allies, to be able to move around among these horse farm owners was truly remarkable.

Hearing Gu Rubing's heartfelt words, Liu Ye smiled and shook his head.

"Your Majesty is too kind. I have no great abilities. The only thing I can do is use my mouth. I am already grateful that I can help Your Majesty."

Gu Rubing smiled and patted him on the shoulder, then followed Liu Ye into the city.

Inside the government office.

Liu Ye explained the current situation to Gu Rubing.

Now that the matter of Shi Xie had occurred outside the region, during Lu Su's tenure in Youzhou, he reorganized all the horse farms that had once helped Shi Xie.

After Lu Su's suppression, seven major forces gradually emerged in the horse farms outside the territory.

It is also known as one of the seven major horse farms.

The seven major horse farms have been swallowing each other up and dislike each other. Among these seven major horse farms, four are the largest.

They were respectively called the Northern Horse Ranch, the Western Horse Ranch, the Eastern Horse Ranch, and the Southern Horse Ranch.

Liu Ye had the best relationship with the northern horse farm.

"Did you speak with the people at the Northern Horse Ranch and suggest they join the Han Dynasty's industry?"

"I did say that, but they all refused. They preferred to be their own masters. They also said that as long as they weren't allowed to join the Han Dynasty, they would sell the horses to you, my lord, at a 10% discount."

Gu Rubing frowned slightly upon hearing this.

This was clearly not the outcome he wanted.

How many horses can this northern horse farm sell in a year?

"There are probably around three thousand. The other three major horse farms are about the same. The other three smaller horse farms can supply less than two thousand horses a year. However, if our lord can bring all four major horse farms under his command, those smaller horse farms will naturally join us as well."

Liu Ye's words make a lot of sense. If all the big shots have joined, then there's no need for the small shots to persist.

"Tomorrow, I'll invite people from all four major horse farms over. I want to see what kind of people these are."

"Yes!"

After Liu Ye finished speaking, he looked at Gu Rubing, as if he had something to say.

"What else?"

"Well, my lord, there are indeed other matters, but for now it's just suspicion, and we don't have any evidence."

"Oh? What happened?"

"I recently received news from Xudu that His Majesty seems to have been in contact with outsiders, but we don't know who they are or what they said."

Upon hearing this, Gu Rubing looked at Liu Ye with a puzzled expression.

"If you know nothing, why are you suspicious?"

"It was Chen Dao who first noticed that His Majesty was always accompanied by several palace maids when he went out. At first, Chen Dao didn't pay any attention to it, but one night, Chen Dao found that these palace maids were acting suspiciously, so he arrested them. But before Chen Dao could ask them anything, they committed suicide."

"suicide?"

It is obvious that these people are assassins kept by someone.

"That's right, and we haven't been able to find out their identities either, so we don't have any evidence at the moment."

“Okay, I understand. Once the horse farm matter is resolved, I’ll need to ask Liu Xie for an imperial edict. I’ll go take a look while I’m at it.”

"Yes!"

Watching Liu Ye leave, Zhang Fei muttered discontentedly, "Brother, this emperor doesn't look like an honest man at all. Why should we care about him? If you ask me, I'll help you kill him, and then you can become emperor. Wouldn't that be much easier?"

Upon hearing this, Gu Rubing slapped Zhang Fei on the head.

"If things were as simple as you say, do you think I wouldn't have thought of that?"

"My lord, the people at this horse farm tend to act rather eccentrically. I feel that if we can't reason with them, we should just... Anyway, there are many other horse breeders in the entire outer realms. If we take their territory and horses, we can find people to raise them ourselves." After saying this, Zhao Yun placed his hand on his neck and made a throat-slitting gesture.

Gu Rubing nodded upon hearing this.

Zhao Yun's words struck a chord with Gu Rubing.

Listening to their conversation, Zhang Fei muttered something to himself, clearly dissatisfied.

"Brother, that's not fair. We're both killing people, so why do you agree with what Zilong says, but you hit me when I say it?"

Gu Rubing was both amused and exasperated upon hearing this.

Is killing the emperor the same as killing the horse farm owner?

Early the next morning.

Liu Ye then arrived at Gu Rubing's door.

At that moment, Zhao Yun was standing guard here.

"General Zhao, the people from the four major horse farms have arrived. When should we let them in to meet with you, my lord?"

"Sir, please don't worry. The lord is still sleeping. He will go to see him when he wakes up. Tell them to wait and not to rush."

"no problem."

Upon hearing this, Liu Ye turned and left immediately.

After Liu Ye left, Gu Rubing opened the door.

"Is the person gone?"

"gone."

Gu Rubing smiled, then quietly led Zhao Yun and Zhang Fei into the living room.

Liu Ye was not there at this time either.

People from the four major horse farms gathered together.

"What exactly have you southern horse farms been doing lately? You're deliberately letting your horses eat the grass from our northern horse farms. What do you mean by that?"

"What do you mean? Your horses eat our grass, isn't that enough? You even killed one of my horses. How do you plan to settle this score?"

"Hey you two, shouldn't we stop arguing now?"

"Shut up! If it weren't for your Western Horse Ranch people, would the Eastern Horse Ranch people be here causing trouble? In this three-way battle, your Western Horse Ranch has benefited quite a bit, hasn't it?"

"How dare you bite people like that?"

"..."

The four of them started arguing again.

Listening to their argument, Gu Rubing couldn't help but frown.

The internal conflicts within these four major horse farms are far too chaotic. Even if they were forcibly brought together, it would likely create significant conflicts in the future.

Gu Rubing decided to let them vent their anger first, so they wouldn't all come looking for him later.

Gu Rubing then went directly to the market and began to stroll around.

However, without realizing it, they ended up in the stables of an inn.

Just then, I saw a man who looked like a merchant carefully tending to his horse.

Gu Rubing curiously leaned closer.

The man immediately felt Gu Rubing's gaze and then looked at Gu Rubing.

"Who are you, sir? Why are you looking at me here?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean anything by it. Please don't misunderstand. I'm just curious. You seem to be a merchant, so why do you take such good care of your horses?"

Upon hearing this, the man burst out laughing.

"Sir, you may think of him as an ordinary horse, but let me tell you, this is a fine horse. It's just a pity that it's not a Akhal-Teke, otherwise it wouldn't have fallen into my hands."

Gu Rubing's eyes lit up upon hearing this.

"I wonder who you are, sir, and whether you know anything about raising horses?"

"Oh, my name is Su Shuang. I don't know anything about raising horses; I'm just a horse trader. I've seen a lot of horses, so I've naturally come to know a little bit about them."

Horse dealer?
"Since you are a horse trader, do you often visit horse farms outside the region?"

"That's true, I know them very well. Are you looking to buy horses, sir?"

“I do want to buy some, but I have my own horse farm, and I'd like to ask you to help me take care of it. As for the price, it will definitely be more than what you earn. What do you think?”

"This……"

Su Shuang hesitated for a moment.

After all, he was just a businessman and wasn't very confident in raising horses well. Besides, he had only just met Gu Rubing, so how could he trust him?

Just as Su Shuang hesitated, Gu Rubing took out ten taels of gold and placed it in front of Su Shuang.

"This is a deposit. If you agree, come with me now. Of course, if you don't agree, then this matter is over."

Upon seeing the gold, Su Shuang instinctively put it away.

That's ten taels of gold! Even as a horse trader, I couldn't earn that much in a month.

"Since you've taken the money, you have to do my job. Come with me."

"Wait a minute, I don't know your name yet."

"My surname is Liu, my given name is Bei, and my courtesy name is Xuande!"

"Liu Bei? Liu Xuande? I..."

Su Shuang finally realized that this was Liu Bei, the Imperial Uncle of the Han Dynasty, His Highness the Prince of Lie.

Su Shuang was so frightened that she almost knelt on the ground.

Fortunately, Zhao Yun stepped forward and helped the man up.

"Alright, sir, come with me."

Gu Rubing smiled, then led Su Shuang back to the government office.

When Liu Ye saw Gu Rubing return, he immediately went up to him.

"My lord, where have you been? I can hardly calm down the people in these four horse farms. What are your thoughts, my lord? Please enlighten me."

Upon hearing this, Gu Rubing smiled and led Zhao Yun and Zhang Fei directly into the hall.

At this moment, the four people had already stood up, seemingly preparing to leave.

"Are you all leaving already? Are we not going to discuss business anymore?"

Upon hearing this, the four immediately looked at the speaker. Although they did not know Gu Rubing, they had seen his portrait before.

Immediately, someone recognized him as King Lie.

The four of them immediately knelt on the ground.

"Greetings, King Lie."

"Alright, please rise, all four of you. I've gathered you here because I have some business to discuss with you."

Upon hearing this, the four looked at each other and then slowed down.

"I wonder how many warhorses King Lie is referring to? I currently have seven hundred warhorses available for sale, and they are all top-quality horses."

"King Lie, do not go to their western horse farms. Their horses are not good. Come to our northern horse farms. Our horses are the best in the world. No one can compare to us."

"You're talking nonsense. Our Oriental Horse Ranch is the best."

Listening to the three arguing, Gu Rubing frowned and then waved his hand.

"I'm really sorry, everyone. I've gathered you all here not to buy horses from you. If it were something like buying horses, would I have needed to come here in person?"

The four fell silent upon hearing this.

They knew a little about Gu Rubing's plan, but no one paid much attention to it. After all, in their eyes, how could the high and mighty Prince Lie possibly make a move against them?

However, upon hearing Gu Rubing's words, they all realized that Gu Rubing might really be going to take action against their horse farm.

The owner of the Southern Horse Ranch immediately smiled and asked, "I wonder what His Highness Prince Lie wishes to discuss with us?" (End of Chapter)