A family of loyal martyrs, starting with nine wives to continue the family line.

After Huo Qingluan finished speaking, none of the people on the city wall made a sound.

Nie Yinniang looked at the black flag outside the pass and pressed her finger on the hilt of her sword.

The Black Flag Army did not attack the city, but instead deployed 30,000 men 20 miles outside Yangguan Pass, awaiting Xinwu's reply.

They didn't come to steal the grain.

They came to force Xinwu to hand over people.

Huo Qingluan quickly made a decision: "Send Abudu into the pass to treat his injuries. Nie Yinniang, you personally take the messenger falcon back to the capital."

"What should I write on the letter?" Nie Yinniang asked.

"Write down the exact words."

Huo Qingluan turned her head and looked at the Western Regions merchant with the broken leg.

"Tell Your Majesty that the Black Flag Army claims to be on the Khan's orders to pursue Fang Zhaoru. Two years ago, Fang Zhaoru traveled eastward from Suyab, passing through the old roads of Kucha and Loulan, and finally entered Xinwu territory."

She paused for a moment.

"Tell His Majesty that they say Fang Zhaoru has something that can command the seventeen tribes of the Western Regions."

Nie Yinniang nodded and turned to leave.

Huo Qingluan, however, did not relax.

Fang Zhaoru is Fang Fuyao's grandfather, which is troublesome enough in itself.

What's more troublesome is that the enemy army chased the old man for two years, and even led 30,000 men all the way to Yangguan.

Thirty thousand people were mobilized just to arrest one old man?

That's a lie.

What the other party wants is definitely not just Fang Zhaoru himself.

Nie Yinniang released a carrier falcon overnight.

The urgent message, delivered by express courier, arrived in the capital the following afternoon.

Inside the Imperial Study, Wei Zhao was reviewing the construction accounts for five schools.

The Ministry of Revenue listed every brick and every piece of timber clearly, and Su Qingyun even added a note at the end.

"If we continue spending at this rate, the national treasury can only last for two years and seven months."

Wei Zhao looked at the words and couldn't help but rub his temples.

This woman is so calculating; she can even predict the end of the emperor's life.

"Your Majesty, an urgent report from the western border."

The secret agent from the Embroidered Uniform Guard handed over the letter tube with both hands.

Wei Zhao peeled off the sealing wax, his gaze falling on the few lines of text, his fingers pausing.

"Is the Black Flag Army hunting down Fang Zhaoru?"

As he read to the end, his composure crumbled.

Fang Fuyao's grandfather disappeared for three years. Suddenly, a Black Flag Army of 30,000 men appeared in the Western Regions, claiming that they would start from Yangguan and push eastward from one pass to another.

These events, taken together, cannot be explained by the mere word "border troubles."

Wei Zhao folded the letter and looked up to instruct, "Summon Fang Fuyao."

Before half an incense stick had burned, Fang Fuyao entered the imperial study.

She had just reached the imperial desk when Wei Zhao handed her the letter.

"Your grandfather."

Fang Fuyao took the letter, but after reading only a few lines, her expression changed.

Her finger hovered over the three characters "Fang Zhaoru" for a long time without moving.

Wei Zhao did not urge her.

He knew that Fang Fuyao was always calm.

The fact that this name could make her lose her composure shows that it holds a lot of weight in her heart.

After a moment, she raised her head.

"My grandfather did indeed travel to the Western Regions after he resigned from his official post and went into seclusion."

"How long have you been there?"

Three years.

Fang Fuyao placed the letter back on the table, her voice slightly tense:

"After he came back, no one said where he went or who he met during those three years. I asked him a few times, and he only said that the sunset in the Western Regions was beautiful and that he would like to see it again if he had the chance."

Wei Zhao tapped his finger on the table.

Where is he now?

"Wandering in the clouds".

"When did you leave?"

Three years ago.

Fang Fuyao bit her lip.

"He said he wanted to see the sunset in the Western Regions one last time. After that, there was no further news."

No one spoke in the imperial study.

Wei Zhao leaned back in his chair and looked at the urgent report again.

Three years ago, Fang Zhaoru went to the Western Regions.

Three years ago, the trade routes to the west were cut off.

Three years ago, the Black Flag Army began hunting down an old man who had returned from the far west.

This is no coincidence.

Fang Zhaoru must have brought back something, and this thing is important enough to warrant a Western Regions force mobilizing 30,000 people.

Wei Zhao looked at Fang Fuyao: "So, some of the content in your grandfather's half of 'The Strategy for All People' was not just theoretical."

Fang Fuyao did not answer.

Her hands were inside her sleeves, her fingertips tightening little by little.

She knew from a young age that her grandfather was extremely learned and had far more insight than ordinary people.

However, some of the content in that half of "The Strategy for All People" concerning trade routes, city-states, tax systems, and tribal governance is not something that scholars from the Central Plains could write out of thin air.

My grandfather once wrote a sentence.

"The world is vast, encompassing more than just the nine provinces. To the west lie numerous kingdoms, locked in constant warfare, all bound by a single object as their alliance."

When she asked what that thing was, her grandfather simply closed the book and said she was still too young.

Looking back now, that statement was not a guess at all.

He saw it with his own eyes.

Fang Fuyao raised her face and finally spoke: "The Fang School of Confucianism has a heirloom."

"explain."

"It is said that three hundred years ago, a sage of the Fangmen Sect traveled to the far west and brought back something with him. Later, that thing was listed as a Fangmen Sect heirloom, and only the sect leader and a few elders have seen it."

Wei Zhao asked, "What's your name?"

"Landscape Painting".

Even Fang Fuyao herself found it absurd after those three words were uttered.

She always regarded the landscape painting as a legend created by the sages of the Fangmen School.

Because no diagram has been left in the historical records of Fangmen, and no one can say for sure what it is.

But my grandfather had been to the Western Regions.

After he went missing, the Black Flag Army pursued him to Yangguan.

Legend has it that it suddenly gained weight.

Wei Zhao picked up the teacup, but did not drink it.

"Does the 'Landscape Painting' depict the mountains and rivers of the world?"

"have no idea."

Fang Fu shook his head: "The records left by the Fang Clan are very few. They only say that the map does not depict the nine provinces, nor does it record the cities of the Central Plains. It came from the far west, and it can only be effective in the far west."

"Can he command seventeen divisions?"

"That's what the Black Flag Army said."

Fang Fuyao looked at Wei Zhao, her eyes filled with worry and barely suppressed doubt.

"Grandpa never told me what he brought back from the Western Regions. If it really was the Map of Mountains and Rivers, why did he take it? And why didn't he give it to Fangmen?"

Wei Zhao did not answer immediately.

He recalled those years of the previous dynasty.

Fang Zhaoru was once a senior official in the court, but after resigning, he disappeared from public view.

Later, he left behind half of "The Policy for All People," the content of which far exceeded what the court at the time could accept.

If those three years allowed him to see a different world, then what he wrote after his return would naturally no longer be limited to the Central Plains.

But the problem remains.

How can a single image command the seventeen ministries?

Unless it's not an ordinary picture.

"What do you think that is?" Wei Zhao asked.

Fang Fuyao remained silent for a long time.

"I have no idea."

Her voice was low: "But I know one thing. If the Black Flag Army were only looking for my grandfather, they wouldn't have brought 30,000 men. They did this to force people out, and also to let everyone east of Yangguan know that they have the right to make this demand."

Wei Zhao put down the teacup.

He stood up and walked to the map on the wall.

The Western Regions remained a blank space, devoid of cities, roads, and tribal names.

For three hundred years, the Central Plains regarded that place as a desolate land, but now, 30,000 Black Flag soldiers have emerged from that blank space.

He doesn't like blank spaces.

If you can't see it, you can't judge it; if you can't judge it, you can only be led by others.

Moreover, Huo Qingluan was still waiting for his orders at Yangguan, and Fang Zhaoru's whereabouts became the most crucial secret of this war.