It doesn't matter what the lord is.

"The world's number one territory, Xiqin? Why would Xiqin write a letter to the king? No, why did the letter fall into his hands? What's going on..."

Kaia said slowly:

"Some time ago, Lord Lingwu defeated the invasion of the giants and returned triumphantly. This news spread throughout Yongtian Kingdom."

Kai nodded, he knew the news.

Kaia continued:

"The Lord of Lingwu wants to march south with his 80,000 cavalrymen. This idea has been in his mind for a long time. Their ancestors had a grudge against the previous king, and the family lived in the extremely cold north and accumulated great strength. On the contrary, the royal family's strength has been greatly reduced with the invasion of the dragon tribe some time ago, and they can no longer withstand Lingwu's march south."

Kai thought for a while and asked tentatively:

"The royal family is planning to seek external assistance?"

Kaia nodded:

"Not only is the royal family planning to seek external aid, there are also territories willing to help them. The Western Qin and Southern Chu families also have hatred and don't want the Lingwu lord to go south too early. When I received the news of the Lingwu lord's triumphant return, I guessed that one of the two families would definitely support the royal family. This is the general trend of the world, and no one can change it."

Kai frowned, lost in thought.

Kaia glanced at his brother and sighed again:

"The only problem is that the royal family cares about their reputation. Now, the royal family still governs all the territories on the surface. They cannot slap themselves in the face and openly form an alliance with a certain territory. In this case, both parties need to keep it a secret, and at the same time, they need to use a small matter to implicitly announce the fact of the alliance to the world - do you understand?"

Kai nodded.

Kaia sighed again and said:

"The Jipingtian family is courting death, and it has brought disaster upon itself. Some time ago, they sold a batch of weapons to Xiqin, but it was found that they were inferior and passed off as good ones. It happened that the buyer was somewhat related to the lord of Xiqin, and the matter was reported to the lord of Xiqin. The lord of Xiqin intended to use the Jipingtian family as a sacrifice, but the fact that he was cheated when buying something was not suitable for publicizing. So he dug deeper and found out the Liushi incident that was causing a stir in the forging world at that time. Under the banner of justice, he commissioned the royal family to help him investigate the case."

Kai said softly:

"The royal family has never accepted such a commission before."

Kaia said calmly:

"The royal family is arrogant. If you just follow the orders of other lords to investigate a case, wouldn't you just be a servant doing odd jobs? So this time, we made an exception to help the Lord of Western Qin investigate this case. In the eyes of those who are interested, this is enough to prove the fact that the two families have joined forces. The royal family will definitely suffer from this alliance. It won't be long before some decrees favorable to Western Qin are promulgated. There is still a tigress lying in the north, and the south is planning to use the emperor to control the princes. This is also something the royal family can't do. A good cook can't cook without rice. If the Lord of Western Qin doesn't help, the white-robed minister can't hold on for too long. Moreover, this commission is of the nature of upholding justice, so it's not too shameful for the royal family to accept it. The Lord of Western Qin has saved some face for the royal family. Generally speaking, one is willing to fight and the other is willing to be beaten, and the one who hits didn't use too much force."

Kai shuddered and asked with a trembling voice:

"If we forcibly sentence Liu Shi today, wouldn't that be..."

Kaia turned his head and glanced at his brother, then opened his squinting eyes slightly and said seriously:

"If I can't become the Prince of Yunyang, you will most likely lose your head! You know what kind of person father is. If he can use the two of us to appease the anger of the Lord of Western Qin, he will do it without hesitation. Last time, I only offended the Lord of Lingwu over a small matter, and I was locked up for a long time, and all my horses were lost. If the two of us go against the trend of the world this time and ruin the alliance between Western Qin and the royal family, the consequences... you can think about it yourself."

Kai felt his back was soaked with cold sweat. He swallowed a mouthful of saliva with a gulp, and the resentment towards his brother in his heart disappeared instantly.

However, the resentment and anger in his heart could not be dissipated quickly. Since he could not afford to offend Xi Qin and the royal family, Kai decided to change his target.

Kai thought for a while, then moved closer to Kaia and said in a low voice:

"That Lord of Yuxi City, Lid...why is it him?"

Kaia frowned:

"This is also a question I can't figure out. There are two possibilities. The first is that when the Lord of Xiqin gave the order, Liushi happened to be in Yuxi City. He thought Liushi was Lide's man, so he simply asked Lide to investigate. The second possibility is that when the Lord of Xiqin and the royal family had not found a suitable thing to do, Lide facilitated this matter."

He thought for a moment, his brows slowly relaxed, and he said:

"No...it should be the first one. We have checked Lid's background. He grew up in Yunyang since he was a child. He is not powerful enough to have a say with the Lord of Xiqin."

Kai breathed a sigh of relief, then said angrily:

"Consider him lucky."

Kaiya glanced at his brother, his smile returned to his face, and he said:

"Don't worry, even if today's incident hadn't happened, I wouldn't have planned to let him continue to develop in peace. Next month, I will call Yunyang Prince Li Yi and Qiming Prince Noren. If necessary, I will also notify Zhaochen's city lord Fang Yuan. Although the Huaiwang territory and Qiming territory are not adjacent to Yunyang, it is not a problem to privately support Li Yi with some military supplies and transfer some experts from the guards to him. The demons to the west of Yuxi City are ready to make a move. If the north and the east put pressure on him at the same time, he will have to accept his death even if he is a god."

Kaiya narrowed his eyes, looked at the ceiling, sneered and said:

"And don't forget, some are happy while others are sad. If Li De helps the royal family and Xi Qin, he should be prepared to bear the wrath of Ling Wu."

58. The only way to grow

Yuxi City·City Lord's Mansion

Hidetsu, the son of the blacksmith Yoshihirata family, never imagined that there would come a day when he would be tied up and thrown into the grocery store.

His mouth was blocked and the room was dark. He didn't know how long he hadn't eaten. He was even a little dizzy from hunger.

In a trance, he seemed to hear a woman muttering something in his ear. The longer he listened, the more he felt that the voice was like Carissa, who had been dead for three years. Once this thought came to him, he always felt that there was a cold air floating around him, and it seemed that there was a pair of red eyes blinking in the darkness.

Every minute and every second was like torture.

……

The next day after returning to Yuxi Castle, Lid brought Alaya and Liu Shi to the door of the grocery room.

Lid turned around and said to Alayya:

"Lend me the sword forged from Flowstone."

Alayya drew the long sword [Scarlet Fire] from her waist and handed it to Lid with both hands.

Lid took the sword, threw it in front of Liu Shi, and said lightly:

"Pick it up. Go in. Kill him."

Liu Shi stared blankly at the sword in front of him, his chest heaving violently.

Lid didn't say anything, just looked at him silently. Alaiya stood behind her young master, also without saying a word.

When Liushi was a child, his father was betrayed by Lord Huai and died in the battlefield wearing a torn armor. His mother also committed suicide. Liushi did not set his heart on killing Lord Huai, but wanted to become a forger who was stronger than anyone else, so that the tragedy would not happen again. When he was an apprentice, Liushi was humiliated by his master. He did not challenge his master, but quietly left his master and endured the infamy alone. Later, Carissa, the only person who supported and trusted him, was killed. Liushi had no doubts at all and kept blaming himself.

Even if he was immersed in forging and entered a state of insanity and frenzy, he would rather hurt himself than hurt others.

This can be called kindness, or it can be called cowardice. In other words, excessive kindness itself is a kind of cowardice.

The sword tinkled on the ground a few times before returning to silence.

After Liushi took a breath, a fierce light flashed in his eyes, and he suddenly pounced on the sword like a hungry wolf, holding it firmly in his hand. He was like a child who had just seen a sword, with one hand on the hilt and the other hand hastily grasped the blade, which was cut and covered with blood. Liushi didn't care at all, he had fallen into a state of being obsessed with forging and couldn't extricate himself. He didn't feel the pain, but was concentrating on doing something big.

He clenched the sword with his bloody hands and stumbled towards the grocery room.

Reed calmly opened the door for him, then stood aside with Alayya, not looking inside, just looking at the distant sky.

A low growl, almost like that of a wild beast, came from the room.

Liu Shi held the sword in his backhand and stabbed Xiu Zi's body again and again.

There was no pattern at all, and every sword was struck with all his strength.

Blood kept pouring out of Xiuzi's body, and every time the sword swung, blood splashed on his body and face, and soon the whole room was filled with the unpleasant smell of blood. [Hurting others] This incident seemed to bring great pain to Liushi. The expression on his face did not show the excitement of revenge, nor the joy of relief. It was twisted and hideous to the extreme.

But even so, his hands did not stop.

At first, Xiuzi would twist his body and struggle, his blocked mouth still whimpering, his eyes showing a begging look. But soon, he stopped whimpering and struggling, his body was like a sack full of rice, which was stabbed more and more, and the rice slowly flowed out, and the sack shrank.

Outside the house, Alayya asked softly:

"Master, what is love?"

Lid put his hands in his sleeves and did not give an answer. Instead, he repeated Alayya's words and fell into deep thought:

"Yeah, what is love?"

Alayya said softly:

"Does Ryuishi love Carissa?"

Lid thought for a moment and said:

"Liushi once told me that if one day you become jealous of someone you care about, that's when you realize you've fallen in love with her. It's easy to go from frugality to luxury, but it's hard to go the other way. Lonely people get used to loneliness, and it's the saddest thing to receive a favor from someone and then suddenly lose it. Liushi knew this very well, so when he first got together with Carissa, he probably didn't dare to give his true heart to her, fearing that one day he wouldn't be able to bear the fall from the clouds to hell. But later, when Carissa was with other blacksmiths, Liushi would get jealous and go crazy, which means he was hopelessly in love with Carissa."

Alayya thought for a moment and nodded.

However, she still said with some doubt:

"But love did not make him strong. On the contrary, it brought him countless pains. The same goes for Qingyun and the queen. In my opinion, it would be better for them not to fall in love with each other and to be alone forever."

This time, Lid didn't speak for a long time.

After a long time, he laughed, stretched out his hand to ruffle Alayya's hair, and said:

"It makes people lose their minds, makes people dizzy, makes people fly into the fire, and makes people desperate. From a rational point of view, there are indeed more negative effects. But no one can control this kind of emotion, and only by experiencing it personally can you understand whether it is worth it. We are not qualified to judge anything."

Alayya thought for a while and realized that whether it was Qingyun and the Queen at that time, or Liushi and Carissa now, they all had many regrets, but they never regretted it.

Alayya nodded, not quite understanding.

Inside the house, Xiuzi was already lifeless, his body covered in blood.

Liu Shi wanted to let go of the sword, but found that because he was holding it too tightly, his hands were no longer under his control and he couldn't let go no matter what he did.

He knelt on the ground, holding the sword, and tears kept pouring out like a flood.

The next day, Reed slept until noon. When he got up to find something to eat, he heard the sound of iron hammering.

He made a cup of hot coffee and drank it as he walked towards the forge.

The door of the forging room was not closed, so Reed saw the man hammering with a hammer at a glance.

Almost didn't recognize it.

Liushi's hair, which was as wet and greasy as wakame, was neatly combed. His black hair was combed behind his back, and his long bangs that had covered his eyes were twisted together and tied into a bun. Although he still looked a little weird, he was obviously much cleaner and tidier. In addition, he took a good bath, and he seemed to be three or four years younger, returning to the appearance of a skinny handsome man with fair skin.

There were still some dead fish eyes, and the dark bags under his eyes from lack of sleep were still there, which made Lid feel a little familiar. Otherwise, if the change was too big, he would have thought that Liushi had been replaced by someone.

However, this alone is enough to be shocking.

"morning."

Lid greeted him, Liu Shi nodded at him and said the same thing:

"morning."

Lid pointed to his hair and said:

"It looks much cleaner. Has it been properly tidied up?"

Liu Shi replied:

"Amo helped me with it."

"It's rare that you agree. Before, I felt that taking a bath was a waste of time."

"Yes."

Liu Shi said this with a faint smile on his face, and said in a steady tone:

"Now that I don't want to die so badly, I naturally start to pay attention to these things. Even for my daughter, I can't be sad like before... A-Mo has suffered for me for three years, and I, as a father, must protect her in the future."

"That's it."

Reed took a sip of coffee and nodded.

Liu Shi was silent for a moment, then suddenly said:

"Did you say anything to Amo?"

Reed shook his head.

Liushi said:

"If Amo plans to repay the favor in some strange way, I hope you can stand it... She's just a child."

Reed didn't understand at first, but when he figured it out, he spat out a mouthful of coffee on the ground.

He raised his hands in front of his chest, waved them to both sides, and said righteously:

"I've never touched a loli. I have no interest in loli."

59. Revenge

Sea of ​​Clouds, City That Never Sleeps

Bai Feng's core advisers were spontaneously discussing a question: Should Master Bai Feng still support Lid as he did before?

One side supports, the other side opposes.

The news that Li De entered the territory of King Huai alone and brought Liu Shi and A Mo back to Yuxi City in a swagger had already spread to Yunhai.