A heretical cultivator in Bureau 749, I'm the fiercest at pulling out tendons and skinning peop

It's not like the aristocratic families have been going against the Han Dynasty for just a year or two.

On the surface, they treat you with utmost courtesy, sending you gifts during holidays and expressing their loyalty without fail.

But what about behind the scenes?

They're constantly making petty moves: today they're forming small cliques locally, tomorrow they're flirting with foreign forces, and the day after tomorrow they're sabotaging some project for the big guy.

You could say they're rebelling, but they don't have the guts.

You might call them obedient citizens, but they don't really have that kind of sincerity.

It's just hanging there, stuck in the middle like a piece of chewing gum, impossible to shake off or chew, it's really annoying.

The big man had always wanted to deal with them, but he hadn't been able to find a suitable excuse.

After all, aristocratic families have existed for far too long in the history of the Han Dynasty. They are deeply rooted, intertwined, and their influence is far-reaching.

If you act rashly without a legitimate reason, the combined counterattack of those powerful families is no joke.

So the Great Han was waiting, waiting for an opportunity.

Then Ji Zuodao appeared.

A child abandoned by a powerful family cultivated to the Divine Realm, returned to the Wang family, and wiped out the entire clan.

There's a very interesting point here—

No one spoke up for the Wang family.

not a single one.

Because what the Wang family did was so despicable—abandoning children, extracting their essence, and altering memories—any one of these actions would be enough to make people criticize them behind their backs.

When Ji Zuodao destroyed the Wang family, people in the circle might say, "That kid is ruthless," but no one would say, "He shouldn't have done that."

Even other powerful families wouldn't say much; they would just watch the spectacle.

This is the effect that the Great Han wanted.

A reasonable, legitimate, and impeccable excuse.

In fact, those geniuses who came to our door were real, but the people were fake. They were all people from 749 who took over, changed their identities, and changed their aliases.

Today you are the true young master of the Li family, tomorrow you will be the illegitimate son of the Zhao family. Anyway, those powerful families will be wiped out before they can investigate.

Aside from the disobedience of the powerful clans, there was another reason why the Han Dynasty wanted to take action against them.

Making a baby.

Yes, you heard right, having a baby.

Those powerful and influential families were desperately trying to have more children, as if they had been given quotas to meet.

They have sons, then daughters, then daughters, then sons again, wishing they could turn the whole family into a reinforced company.

Why did you have so many children? Can you even afford to raise them? Hey, they really can.

The most powerful and influential families have nothing but money, land, and resources.

Let alone having ten or eight children, even if they had a hundred, their family could afford to raise them.

The problem isn't whether they can afford to raise them, but why they're so desperate to have more children.

There's a reason behind this.

A Qi cultivator's talent is 70% determined by fate, basically something they are born with.

If one of your parents is a Qi cultivator, the probability of you inheriting the talent of a Qi cultivator will greatly increase.

Are both your parents Qi practitioners?

The probability is even higher, ridiculously high.

Therefore, it is obvious what those powerful families are planning.

Have many children, have as many as you can, have dozens or even hundreds of offspring, surely some of them will inherit the talent of a Qi cultivator?

One or two is not too few, ten or eight is not too many.

As long as the number of Qi cultivators in the family increases, the family's power will naturally rise accordingly.

What's this called? This is called a talent strategy.

Of course, the big man wasn't stupid; he wouldn't let them do that.

Years ago, the Han Dynasty introduced a policy specifically targeting the issue of childbirth.

I won't go into the specifics, but there's one crucial point.

There are fines for having more children than allowed, and they are heavy fines.

This rule applies not only to ordinary people, but also to families of Qi cultivators. If a family of Qi cultivators dares to break the rule, they will be punished to death.

But the result?

People are allowed to have children as they please, and they're punished as they should. They pay the fines and continue having children without even blinking an eye.

He paid the fines, which amounted to several small targets, without batting an eye, just like paying parking fees.

Why?

Because they know perfectly well what's going on.

This fine is nothing compared to the value of a Qi cultivator.

If a Qi cultivator is properly trained, the value they can bring to the family in the future will far exceed that small fine.

This is a sure-fire way to make money; only a fool wouldn't do it.

Therefore, over the years, the number of Qi cultivators in the Han Dynasty has increased dramatically, like a rocket.

The vast majority of these are descendants of families that practice Qi cultivation.

There are certainly independent cultivators, but their proportion is pitifully small, just a drop in the ocean compared to the scions of aristocratic families.

At first glance, this seems like a good thing. A large number of Qi cultivators indicates the strength of the Han Dynasty and the prosperity of our cultivation civilization.

But everything should be done in moderation.

Crossing the line will cause trouble.

Why has 749 been frantically recycling elixirs all these years?

Do you think they're hoarding goods for speculation? Or reselling them for profit?

Bullshit. 749 isn't short of that little bit of money.

They recycle elixirs to limit the number of Qi cultivators.

In a sense, elixirs are a machine for producing Qi cultivators.

Some people are not born with the talent to become Qi cultivators, but if they are lucky enough to take spiritual medicine for a certain number of years, they may be able to open their acupoints and gain the talent to become Qi cultivators.

Therefore, elixirs are a double-edged sword.

If used properly, it can save lives and help people cultivate themselves; if misused, it will lead to an out-of-control number of Qi practitioners and trigger a series of chain reactions.

The reason why 749 has gone to great lengths to collect spiritual herbs over the years, even at the cost of breaking ties with those powerful families and sects, is to keep this thing under his control.

We cannot allow elixirs to proliferate, nor can we allow the number of Qi cultivators to grow indefinitely.

Too many Qi cultivators are really not a good thing.

Think about it, if there are too many Qi cultivators, how will resources be allocated?

There's only so much spiritual energy, so many spiritual herbs, and so many spirit stones. With too many monks and too little porridge, trouble is bound to happen sooner or later.

When the time comes, in order to seize resources, powerful families will fight each other, and independent cultivators will fight each other. The whole circle will be in complete chaos. The scene is too beautiful to bear.

Besides, what will happen to ordinary people if there are too many Qi cultivators?

The difference between a Qi cultivator and an ordinary person is like heaven and earth.

Once a Qi cultivator reaches the Spirit Sea realm, they can easily crush dozens of ordinary people.

If the number of Qi cultivators becomes too large, the living space for ordinary people will be squeezed smaller and smaller.

If the social structure becomes unbalanced, classes solidify, and conflicts intensify, it won't just be a problem for the Qi cultivators' circle; the whole society will suffer.

Therefore, limiting the number of Qi cultivators is not something 749 did out of boredom, but rather something he had to do.

It's like a river, where the flow of water is limited.

If you open a sluice gate here to divert water for irrigation, and another sluice gate there to divert water for power generation, and each sluice gate is opened very large, eventually the downstream flow will be cut off.

What happens if the river runs dry? Crops die of drought, fish and shrimp die of thirst, riverbeds crack, and the ecosystem collapses.

The same principle applies to the number of Qi cultivators.

There is a theory that Liu Bowen severed the dragon veins and cut off the connection between heaven and earth in order to limit the development of Qi cultivators.

Whether this is true or false, no one can say for sure now.

After all, it's been so long, the historical records are very vague, and various legends and versions have emerged one after another. No one can provide conclusive evidence.

But one thing is certain: there must have been quite a few Qi practitioners around Liu Bowen's time, and there must have been some problems that forced him to take drastic measures.