Heirs of the Seven Swords of the Qin Dynasty

Chapter 1914: Setting Sail (Twenty-Five)

When is the right time?
What kind of choices will you face?
What is the right choice?

All these questions suddenly flooded into Zhang Han's mind, but he couldn't think of the answer to any of them.

Zhang Han was very clear that he lacked a lot of important key information compared to Gu Xun.

But what he didn't understand was why he was missing so much key information that he had no clue about?
The intelligence network of Shadow Secret Guard is indeed not as good as Luowang and Liusha, but it is still one of the best in the world.

It is normal that he knows less than Gu Xun, but it is abnormal if he knows much less.

And now, he felt like a fool who knew nothing, while Gu Xun knew everything.

He really couldn't figure this out - of course, it was right that he couldn't figure it out, after all, the gap between the two sides was not the intelligence network, but whether or not they used cheats.

Gu Xun knew that Zhang Han must be full of doubts in his heart, but he couldn't answer these questions, and didn't want to answer them.

"Go ahead, go ahead." Gu Xun waved his hands, and while sending the guest away, he also gave a final reminder, "From now on, try to avoid Zhao Gao. You can't beat him with the power of the Shadow Secret Guard alone."

"I'll take my leave..." Zhang Han wanted to ask something but didn't know where to start. After hesitating for a while, he had to take his leave obediently.

After Zhang Han left, Gu Xun packed up simply and left his courtyard.

This time he was not going out, but leaving Sanghai.

At this point in time, he shouldn't have left Sanghai.

There are still many things he can do and manage, such as he cannot sit idly by and watch the trouble in Xiaoshengxianzhuang.

But Gu Xun still chose to leave now, leaving Sanghai, the biggest whirlpool of the empire.

As for the reason...it's actually very simple, he was just fed up with it.

He felt that he had been meddling in too many other people's affairs over the years.

He had to take care of things, both what he should and shouldn't take care of, and for no apparent reason, a lot of troubles were thrown upon him, making him work hard every day.

So Gu Xun has now decided to just give up and leave it alone.

Apart from his own personal affairs, he is now only concerned with one thing - the matter of the Seven Stars of the Blue Dragon.

This matter is not only of great importance, but also involves Yan Fei and Qian Long.

With his wife and children involved, Gu Xun couldn't just leave it alone no matter what.

But other than that, he was really annoyed.

He didn't want to care about the life and death of the various schools of thought. He just wanted to let everything take its course. Let them do whatever they wanted. Anyway, it was impossible for them to really disappear.

Gu Xun was too lazy to worry about Fusu's throne, leaving Han Fei and the others to take care of it. He even returned the Quicksand to Han Fei.

As for other miscellaneous trivial matters, there is no need to mention them.

Once the idea of ​​giving up came into his mind, the world became wider for him. Having made up his mind, Gu Xun felt a lot more relaxed in an instant.

But then again, the Mirage is about to set sail, and since Gu Xun still intends to take care of the affairs of the Blue Dragon Seven Stars, he should not leave Sanghai.

But Gu Xun knew some secret information that others didn't know, and knew that the Mirage's voyage would not be so smooth, so he was not in a hurry at the moment, but decided to go back to Xianyang first.

Go back to Xianyang to deal with some trivial matters.

So, without anyone knowing, Gu Xun left.

His departure also marked the complete disappearance of the Liusha force from Songhai.

………………

It was almost noon when Ying Zheng's carriage set off from the general's mansion.

Although the streets were cleared early, the emperor certainly would not set out so early.

This time, Ying Zheng strictly controlled the regulations when visiting Xiaoshengxianzhuang and did not bring too many entourage.

The only people who accompanied Ying Zheng were his close attendant Zhao Gao, Prime Minister Li Si who came from Xiaoshengxianzhuang, and Chunyu Yue, an imperial doctoral official who came from a Confucian background.

There were fewer people than the last time Fusu visited Xiaoshengxianzhuang, and there were only two carriages.

Ying Zheng and Zhao Gao had one carriage, and Li Si and Chunyu Yue had one carriage.

The carriages of Li Sichun and Yu Yue were driven by professional coachmen from the Chariot Bureau under the Imperial Household Department, while Ying Zheng's carriage was driven by Zhao Gao himself.

Although he was the emperor's close attendant, Zhao Gao rarely drove the emperor himself - because there was no need, as the Chariot Office had professionals, and eunuchs like Zhao Gao might not be able to do a better job than them.

Zhao Gao's situation was more special.

He used to be the Minister of the Imperial Chariots, a subordinate of the Imperial Coachman, and was considered a middle-level bureaucrat in terms of rank alone.

With this kind of status, one cannot be a coachman, even the emperor’s coachman.

But things are different now. Zhao Gaozhong's official position as the Minister of Chariots has been stripped, and he only has the identity of the emperor's eunuch - the identity of the leader of Luowang is very special and can be ignored.

It was fine for a simple eunuch to drive for the emperor. Although it was rare, it did not violate the rules or exceed etiquette.

Zhao Gao must have been unhappy about becoming a coachman, even if he was driving for Ying Zheng.

However, no matter how dissatisfied he was, he didn't dare to show it openly.

The reason why it was his turn to drive was because Ying Zheng said he wanted to meditate alone and did not arrange any extra carriages - Zhao Gao was no longer the Minister of the Imperial Chariots, so it was not easy for him to arrange the carriages and horses.

In this case, Zhao Gao had to either drive the car himself, or squeeze with Li Si and others, or squeeze with the driver originally arranged.

So he decisively dismissed the coachman and drove the car himself.

Apart from not daring to do so, Zhao Gao actually didn't particularly mind this matter.

Driving might be another warning from the emperor to him, but it was ultimately just a trivial matter, just a loss of face, and it was meaningless to him.

The key point is that Xiao Shengxianzhuang is going to be in trouble, and he is very happy.

He had originally planned to use the Mohist Qinglong Plan to deal with Xiaoshengxianzhuang, but before he could make a move, the emperor took the initiative to approach the Confucianists.

This saved him a lot of trouble and even reduced the risk to almost zero.

Now he just had to figure out how to do it.

After all, Xiao Shengxian Manor has a close relationship with Gu Xun. Even with the emperor's support, Zhao Gao has to make more calculations to avoid getting no benefits and getting into trouble.

When Zhao Gao was driving to Xiaoshengxianzhuang in a good mood, Tianming and the other two had already returned to Sanghai.

The three of them have been busy these past two days, and now they all look exhausted.

They sneaked into the city skillfully, hid in a remote corner, and began to discuss the specific plan.

"How do we do it?" Tianming was the first to speak, "Still the old way?"

The old way he was talking about was naturally the route to sneak into the porter's team and get on the ship.

Shao Yu raised his eyebrows, "Last time, Young Master Siming came to our house. That route is not safe, right?"

Tianming spread his hands and replied, "Anywhere may be unsafe, there is no need to think so much."

"I'm here to protect you. If anything goes wrong, just run away and I'll cover you. I guarantee everything will be fine."

Shao Yu frowned and reminded, "Tianming, you can't trust the Yin Yang family too much. It's easy to get into trouble."

He did not doubt the authenticity of this matter, but even if it was true, how tolerant would the Yin-Yang family be of him?

How long will this tolerance last?
If any of these two issues go wrong, Tianming may suffer serious consequences.

The best way to deal with it is to pretend that it doesn't exist and be as careful as possible. Of course, in a critical moment, it's okay to try your luck, it's the solution.

"Don't worry, I know what I'm doing." Tianming waved his hand and responded with a smile, "I can joke about my own life, but how can I joke about the lives of both of you?"

"It's not a matter of life or death." Shi Lan also advised, "If you're not careful, something bad will happen."

Both of his friends advised him, and Tianming could only raise his hands in surrender, "Okay, I'll listen to you."

"But I can't miss this ready-made benefit. The Yin-Yang family must be plotting against me in secret. I'll be at a loss if I don't take it."

"Let's just be careful."

When they heard it, they both thought it was right.

If you don't take advantage of the benefits, you will definitely lose out. After all, the Yin-Yang family must be up to something behind the scenes.

"Try to be careful and don't be careless." Shao Yu could only remind him again.

Tianming waved his hand casually and brought the topic back to the right track:

"So what do we do?"

"How about taking the trouble and walking through the water?" Shao Yu chose a relatively safer method to be on the safe side.

If it were in the past, he might not have been so careful, but it had only been two days since Yun Zhongjun had gotten into trouble, and the people from the Yin-Yang family might be angry now, so he had to be on guard.

"All is fine." Although Tianming felt it was troublesome, he did not refuse.

Shi Lan had even less objection.

………………

Outside Sanghai City, the Mohist seaside stronghold.

Now that martial law in Sanghai has been lifted, the Mohists no longer need to hide in Xuanwu.

Of course, I still don’t dare to make any big moves, I just breathe a sigh of relief.

"The city is bustling now." Dao Zhi slumped in a chair, holding an apple in his hand, and said with a smile, "I wonder how many people's hearts were touched by Ying Zheng's going out."

He went into Sanghai City early in the morning to investigate the situation and had just returned.

Gao Jianli at the side asked in a deep voice, "Does anyone want to take action?"

Dao Zhi shook his head. "It's hard to say. I don't think so."

"It's a mess. It doesn't look like there's any big organization involved. It doesn't look like they're ready to start a fight."

The commotion caused by Ying Zheng's visit this time was not too big, and the defense was relatively conservative. To be honest, it was actually a good opportunity.

But precisely because it looks like it's suitable for action, people are afraid to take action.

Having just suffered a great loss in an assassination attempt, no one thought that the empire would really let down its guard.

It was common for court officials to remember food but not beatings. After all, most of the time they had no obligation to remember beatings unless they were ordered to do so by their superiors.

But for an organization like the Shadow Secret Guard Luo Network, it is a very dangerous thing to only remember the food and not the punishment.

If the emperor were put in danger twice in less than half a month, Zhao Gao and Zhang Han would have no choice but to die.

Whether judging from logic or based on his own observations, Dao Zhi did not think that there would be any trouble today.

"Are there any other discoveries?" This judgment was also consistent with Gao Jianli's opinion. He did not dwell on it and asked other questions instead.

Dao Zhi thought for a moment and then replied, "Overall, there's nothing special about it. It's just like that."

Given the current situation in Sanghai, any major event would surely attract a large number of people to join in the fun, either openly or secretly. Everyone knows this situation and there is nothing to say.

"Is there anything abnormal?" Gao Jianli asked.

Dao Zhi stroked his chin and pondered for a while, "Abnormal... yes, there seems to be a bit too active near Xiaoshengxianzhuang."

"I just don't know what kind of people they are... I don't think they are good people."

"Didn't you catch your tongue?" the Snow Girl interrupted.

"I didn't dare." Dao Zhi replied with a smile, "The city is in chaos, it's easy to hide, but it's inconvenient to take action."

"I'm afraid of alerting the enemy and causing trouble."

Although the martial law in Sanghai City was lifted, it was still loose on the outside but tight on the inside.

There are a large number of troops stationed inside and outside the city, and the men of Luowang and Shadow Secret Guards are also hiding in the dark, ready to take action at any time.

In this situation, no matter how arrogant Dao Zhi was, he would not dare to act rashly. If he got into trouble, it might not just be him who would be in trouble.

Gao Jianli had no doubts about this, and said with a slightly worried tone, "From this point of view, Xiao Shengxian Manor might really be in big trouble."

Dao Zhi really didn't care about the life and death of Confucianism, and replied nonchalantly, "That's their business, we can't interfere."

Dao Zhi acted so "ruthlessly" partly because Zhang Liang had already told them in advance that no one else could do anything about it.

On the other hand, it is because he himself is rather disgusted with Confucianism.

Dao Zhi disagreed with many aspects of Confucius's teachings.

When it comes to resisting the empire, Dao Zhi was also very clear that Confucianism would never be their ally.

The Confucianism at this time was not like the Confucianism of later generations, which had no bottom line and no integrity.

Today's Confucians and Confucian scholars still have their own thoughts and persistence, and they have not distorted Confucius' teachings to the outrageous extent that has been achieved in later generations.

But there is one thing that is exactly the same between the two - Confucianism cannot rebel.

Confucian disciples can be dissatisfied with the emperor, can give advice to the emperor, and can even give advice and curse the emperor - of course, whether the emperor will kill you or not is another matter.

If one is really disappointed with the emperor and the government, one can just wash one's hat with clear water and one's feet with turbid water. At most, one can ignore the affairs of the court, just like the Xiaoshengxianzhuang who only focused on reading the books of sages before.

But you cannot openly and violently resist the court.

What Confucius pursued throughout his life was self-discipline and restoration of propriety.

Restoring rituals was essentially about helping the Zhou Dynasty win the resurrection match.

However, now that the Zhou Dynasty has been completely destroyed, even the most stubborn people within Confucianism are not obsessed with it, but have flexibly adjusted the content of "restoring rituals".

From helping the Zhou Dynasty to revive, it changed to guiding the empire onto the right path - the right path that conforms to Confucian ideals.

At present, Confucianism has made little progress in the aspect of "restoring rituals".

However, no matter how difficult the "restoration of rituals" process is, Confucian disciples can only turn around and think about "self-discipline" and cannot think about other things.

And "self-control" certainly means that one cannot rebel or use any explicit means to resist imperial rule.

Therefore, the most that Confucianism can do is to provide some indirect assistance to other anti-Qin forces, hoping that they will really oppose the empire... unless the empire is destroyed and a new dynasty is established.

"But after all, we have owed Zifang a lot of favors, so we can't just ignore it." Xue Nu reminded her.

Dao Zhi shrugged and said nothing.

Zhang Liang’s favor must be recognized. He does not support helping Xiao Shengxianzhuang, but he will not oppose it either.

Anyway, he has no other choice. If you have any idea, he will do it.

Gao Jianli pondered for a moment and made a decision, "The Mohist School must repay a favor, and we absolutely cannot allow Luowang to attack the various schools of thought."

"Let's... make preparations in advance and contact some helpers."