Tao and Heaven

Chapter 14: Dao Jun comes to power, great disasters happen in the world (two in one)

After everyone was seated, Zhao Feng wanted to exchange a few pleasantries and introduce those children from noble families, who would be his greatest help in his future fight for the throne.

But Yu Hua was obviously not interested and interrupted, "I just need to know about the water vein."

The young man from aristocratic family who had stood up to introduce himself suddenly stood there awkwardly, with an embarrassed look on his face, and the atmosphere became silent.

Gu Wen was drinking tea, and a ton of ton of ton was only half a pot of water. He hoped that Tiansui could move and save his precarious "assets".

It’s a pity that the finest tea in the palace is of little use. It seems that the Zhao family is not so extravagant that they have magical medicines to provide daily necessities.

Zhao Feng coughed lightly and said, "Gu Wen, come up and answer the fairy's questions."

Gu Wen stood up and walked to the center of the hall and bowed to Zhao Feng and Yu Hua who were sitting in the main seats. For some reason, he felt that the latter's eyes hidden behind the veil brightened a little.

Maybe it hasn't been exposed yet, but she must have noticed something.

Otherwise, it would be difficult for Gu Wen to explain why a goddess who transcended imperial power would be interested in him. He had been avoiding her intentionally or unintentionally.

Yu Hua asked, "Gu Wen, how many wells are there in the city?"

"There are a total of 1,631 wells. If we count the dry wells, there are more than 2,000 wells. Some wells have been sealed and filled, so we can't know the total number."

Gu Wen replied that he had not forgotten about the water veins and had taken time to investigate it in the past few days.

“Is the well water different?”

"Most of the water is bitter, turbid and bitter. It needs to settle overnight before it can be drunk. There are more than 200 clear water wells, which are clear and tasteless and can be drunk directly. There are less than 80 sweet water wells, which are sweet and loved by princes and nobles."

"Take me to the sweet water well, the best in the city."

Before Yu Hua could stand up, Gu Wen continued, "I have asked someone to bring the best well water in Bianjing to the palace. It was just scooped up this morning."

"It's been more than an hour, and there's no sign of the spiritual energy dissipating."

Yu Hua shook his head and told Gu Wen a piece of information that he was very interested in: the sweet water well in Bianjing City was a spiritual spring?
Suppressing his doubts, he replied, "There are also deliveries within an hour. I was afraid that the fairy would need something special, so I asked the waiter in the water room to deliver one every half hour. I don't know if the half-hour one would suit the fairy's taste."

"Besides, it's noon now, the busiest time in Bianjing. The ox-horse and horse carts are jammed, and the distance is very long. It will probably take more than an hour to go back and forth."

Yu Hua was completely speechless. Is this how ordinary people work? She had done everything she could think of, and even things she couldn't think of.

Looking at the young man below who was neither humble nor arrogant, a little bit of depression also dissipated.

The descendants of the Gu family are trustworthy in doing things, which is much better than Zhao Feng, whose brain looks like he was kicked by the guardian beast of the Sanqing Sect.

"Then it's all up to you to arrange."

She nodded slightly in response and said no more.

Seeing this, Zhao Feng, the master, also felt very proud and said with a smile: "Marquis Wen has done a great job, and I will reward you with 500 taels."

Five hundred taels of silver could feed an ordinary person for a lifetime, but for Zhao Feng it was just a casual reward, and the children of the noble families around him did not think it was a problem.

It is worth spending a fortune to win a smile from a beautiful woman.

In essence, troubled times are caused by the rich getting richer. The source of all intensified social contradictions is probably annexation and exploitation. Money never appears out of thin air.

So for Gu Wen, staying here is a form of plunder at the highest level.

The deposit is 8,000 taels, an increase of 500 taels, totaling 8,500 taels.

"Thank you, Your Highness."

Gu Wen took the treasure note from eunuch Feng Xiang, and calculated that five hundred taels could buy twenty medicinal fruits, which was roughly half a year's worth of Tiansui.

Assuming that perfection of each of the five internal organs requires two times of Heavenly Marrow, a total of ten times of Heavenly Marrow will be required to break through the third level.

Eight thousand five hundred taels are equal to eight and a half heavenly marrows, and one and a half heavenly marrows are still needed to break through to the third level.

The first level can make his breath last longer, and his physical strength recover faster than it consumes. The second level can make his weak body fully recover, and his ears and eyes are so sensitive that he can hear the sound and identify the position. But these are not enough to make him invincible when being chased by Daqian. I hope that the third level can give him some self-protection ability.

If not, then go to the fourth level and stay dormant until you reach the ninth level!
Practicing is difficult, but not particularly difficult. There are too many opportunities in Bian Jing.

Gu Wen exhaled slightly to let out his excitement, bowed his hands and said, "I'll go see if the well water has been delivered."

"Go ahead." Zhao Feng waved his hand, and then said to show his appreciation: "Don't call yourself Xiao in the future. This is the name of a servant. You are already the Marquis of Daqian Wen."

After these words were spoken, the looks of the people around him changed slightly, and even the children of aristocratic families began to look at Gu Wen.

They are not stupid, they are all representatives of some big family and the future head of the family.

Zhao Feng was intending to promote Gu Wenqi's position in the mansion.

Gu Wen showed an extremely surprised expression, bowed his head and bowed to thank him again, then turned and left.

When he stepped out of the lobby and no one could see his face, all the emotions on his face completely disappeared. The breeze lifted his hair, and his deep black eyes revealed a hint of disdain.

The extravagance and laughter behind him were nothing but an illusion. When the frontier troops' food and wages were completely swallowed up by the big and small officials along the way, when the county soldiers guarding the city had to rely on trading the city opening looting fees with the bandits to pay their salaries, when the rural militias completely became bandits and lived a life of banditry.

When all the military machinery that originally maintained order in Daqian was completely paralyzed, that would be the time of its demise.

As far as Gu Wen knows, the above has basically been achieved, so it will be very quick.

This is not something that can be resolved by supernatural powers. The conflict has never been an open rebellion, unless the Zhao family can kill everyone.

Only Yu Hua watched all this quietly. From the dark back in her mind, she saw wars and cavalry, the coming of troubled times, and the certainty of an ordinary person in the face of troubled times.

But now Daqian has a Daojun Emperor, a powerful person at the level of Zhenjun.

She felt more and more that Gu Wen was special.
-
The entrance to the palace.

Gu Wen scooped a spoonful of well water and put it into his mouth. It tasted cool and sweet, but his fate did not react.

But the true energy in the body unexpectedly became active. This might be the so-called spiritual energy. No wonder so many big households are flocking to the "sweet water well".

If Zhao Feng had not been a prince, I would not have been able to hold such a good thing in my hands. It seems that there are many things in this Bianjing that I don’t know about. Those sparse and ordinary things may have some magical properties.

These aristocratic families are like monopolizing knowledge. Even Gu Wen, who has been guarding the well for three years, has only become a head of the wellmen. Without the method of cultivation, it is useless to rack your brains.

But Tiansui is not spiritual energy and is of little use to me.

"Carry it in."

He led two water room workers to carry a wooden barrel about half a person's height into the palace. During the process, when passing a relatively high staircase, one of them missed the opportunity and the entire barrel tilted. Gu Wen quickly reached out to help, and the huge barrel was straightened. Although he did not lift it up, but just helped to hold it up, a bucket of water weighs 100 kilograms. Gu Wen just lifted it lightly, and it felt like lifting a heavy weight with ease.

The two sailors were sweating profusely because of their mistakes and kept apologizing, but they didn't notice that there was some superhuman power.

"Just keep walking."

Gu Wen didn't care too much and let the sailor continue to walk in. He clenched his fists and recalled the feeling just now.

The training did not allow him to fly, but the benefits did have a real effect on his body. It was just that this natural strengthening was somewhat difficult to detect and caught people off guard.

I have to pay attention to this in the future.

In the lobby, the lively conversation suddenly quieted down as two watermen brought in buckets of water.

As the waterman left, everyone's eyes were focused on Gu Wen, and these eyes were also diverted when he presented the water in a porcelain bowl.

Yu Hua touched the water with her fingertips, and a slight wave of spiritual energy stirred the water surface in the bowl. She pondered for a while. Because of the bamboo hat, outsiders could not see the changes in her expression. Gu Wen, who had just started practicing, could not judge what she was doing through the subtle fluctuations.

Not showing one's emotions on one's face is a high level of accomplishment; covering one's face is even more effective than this quality; outsiders won't even have the chance to read your expression. But not everyone can do this.

It is easy to be caught when walking on the street, and those in higher positions are afraid of being impersonated. I guess only immortals can play like this.

Yu Hua asked, "Gu Wen, where is this well?"

"Longqiao Water Room, Longquan Well." Gu Wen replied.

The best wells would naturally be directly controlled by the palace.

Zhao Feng, who was standing by, did not miss any opportunity to strike up a conversation and also said, "Longqiao was originally famous for the water from this well. The food made with Longquan water has a unique flavor. It was because I discovered that Longquan was extraordinary that I set up a water room and created this paradise on earth in Bianjing."

However, this was the first successful marketing case in Daqian that Gu Wen had invented. Moreover, Longqiao itself was a very prosperous commercial street, but it became the first with his help.

Of course it doesn't have the unique flavor for cooking. Longquanjing tea is indeed delicious, but if you mix it with oil and salt, who knows what it tastes like.

Gu Wen curled the corner of his mouth, but did not expose Zhao Feng. He could understand a bootlicker who was eager to show off.

"This idiot doesn't even know what his subordinates wrote. It turns out that lickers have brains connected to their rectums, and they are used to shit."

Yu Hua heard the vulgar words, but she didn't get angry. Instead, she couldn't help but smile.

The way the descendants of the Gu family cursed others was quite interesting. There were a few words she had never heard of, but that did not hinder her understanding.

She said to Zhao Feng: "Lingquan is wise, you should drink more."

hiss!
Fairy, are you caring about me?
Zhao Feng's eyes widened in disbelief, and then his cheeks quickly turned red. He could not hide his joy in his tone and said, "I dare not disobey the fairy's words. From now on, I must cook meals with Longquan water and only drink Longquan water."

"Gu Wen, I'll leave this matter to you. This king needs to be able to drink a full hour of Dragon Spring water at all times."

"Yes."

Gu Wen nodded, and couldn't help but sigh in his heart: He is really wasteful and extravagant. If your Zhao family doesn't perish, who will?
It takes half an hour to walk from the water room to the palace, and it takes a stick of incense to travel there unimpeded by horse-drawn carriage. If Zhao Feng only needs one horse-drawn carriage per day, it will be very simple.

But if he wanted to drink Longquan water within an hour every moment, he had to arrange twelve groups of people to deliver it continuously.

Meals and lodging, overtime pay, and bribes to officials at all levels along the way. In this month, three thousand taels would be more than enough.

Yu Hua frowned slightly. She only heard the word "extravagance" and the three thousand taels of spending in Gu Wen's mind, and she wanted to speak out to stop him.

It didn't matter how much money the Zhao family spent, and she was even less interested in how much money Zhao Feng wasted. She just didn't want to add to the cause and effect.

We enter the world not to save people, but we cannot harm people either.

Suddenly, Gu Wen's mind came again, and it was actually a feeling of joy.

"But the more extravagant he is, the more kickbacks I get, and I can provide more jobs for the people. If all the business in the world is done by me, there will be tens of millions fewer people starving."

The funniest thing Gu Wen found was that he used the capital means from his previous life and actually felt like a good man in Daqian.

No matter how cunning a businessman is, he is still more humane than a scholar-official.

He was just making fun of himself, but when Yu Hua heard it, it was shocking, and there was a hint of surprise in her starry eyes.

'Even the Zhao family's extravagant spending can be turned into a good thing?'

She didn't understand the laws governing the operation of the mundane world, and it was hard for her to imagine how Zhao Feng's extravagance could benefit the people, so she was somewhat curious.

From then on, Yu Hua could only think about it. Gu Wen was extremely wary of her, and she was afraid that if she got too close, he would be scared away.

I had a hunch that the descendant of the Gu family might really run away. This guy is a bit like a loach, and I have to find a way to catch him.

Yu Hua spoke again, "Longquan should be the head of the water veins in Bianjing. It contains mysteries. You should take good care of it and report anything to me."

"Yes."

Gu Wen responded, then returned to his seat and became an unknown person. However, this time people around him started talking to him, and even before he was made a marquis, people were already trying to please him.

An illusory title brings endless power.
-
After Grain Rain, it was the spring plowing season in Daqian. The imperial court began to issue decrees to urge the counties to sow, as the foundation of a country lies in agriculture.

The huge machine called Daqian began to operate. One decree after another caused countless rotten parts to break. Some could still function, while others had completely collapsed due to another harsh rule. Amid the huge explosions, there were uprisings one after another.

The situation on the frontier is tense, and the officials in the rear are suffering.

One of the eleven counties of Daqian, Zezhou County is famous for its abundant lakes and fertile land, and is the largest grain producing area in Daqian.

The setting sun on the long river stretches for thousands of miles, creating a fertile plain nurtured by three rivers and one river.

Countless Hu cavalry were galloping in the distance, and the distant river reflected their reflections and a dim setting sun. At the end of the horse's hoof prints, a city behind them was burning, and the smoke connected the dusk and the earth.

The old man hunched over and bent over, using his last bit of strength to plant the seedlings, and then poured them into the farmland. His nasal cavity was contaminated by the fertile soil, his breathing gradually stopped, and without any struggle, he stood upright in the field and planted them.

That seedling was the only green thing in the thousand-acre land, the rest were just white bones.

The rice seedlings for spring plowing had not been planted in the most fertile farmland of Daqian.

When the news reached Bian Jing, entered the palace, and fell to the emperor in Taoist robes, he only responded with one sentence.

"I want to make an elixir and become an immortal."

(End of this chapter)