FIMA Ch86: Ruthless

Gu Siyuan never thought in his entire life that a descriptive term like “little goblin” would one day be associated with him.

He looked up at the sky, glanced at Xie Xuan, and said coldly: “It’s getting late. Instead of talking nonsense here, Your Highness might as well hurry back and drink your medicine.”

Hehe, you’re really original.

Never seen anyone urge someone to leave by telling them to go back and drink medicine.

Xie Xuan’s fine white fingers grabbed his arm, tapping lightly, while intentionally glaring at him with slight resentment: “Just a moment ago we were male and female mandarin ducks, and now with one wrong word, General Gu directly turns hostile and refuses to acknowledge me.”

Gu Siyuan had thoroughly understood his character. Naturally ignoring his posturing, he grabbed his mischievous fingers and said sternly: “If Your Highness doesn’t want to leave, you can accompany this official to stand guard at the Huangji Hall. I’m sure you’ll have a good reason to explain it to His Majesty then.”

Xie Xuan scratched his palm, curled his lip, and blamed the victim: “This Prince was just making a joke, why is General Gu so serious.”

Gu Siyuan ignored him, directly grabbed the person’s arm backhanded, lifted him, and jumped down from the large tree: “I’m leaving first!”

“Hey, wait a minute,” Xie Xuan hurriedly tugged at his sleeve.

Gu Siyuan turned his head indifferently, his eyes clearly saying: You better have some actual business.

Xie Xuan pouted and made a face.

However, he really did have actual business this time.

He leaned forward slightly and said in a low voice: “That scholar you sent to the mansion last time woke up and gave some information. I’ve already sent people to verify it. If what he said is true, the royal court will probably face another upheaval.”

Gu Siyuan nodded faintly: “As long as Your Highness has made a decision.”

Regarding what happened in Ling County, he couldn’t be clearer.

Xie Xuan waved his hand, saying hatefully: “Fine, go then, you ruthless fellow who doesn’t acknowledge anyone once you put your pants on.”

Gu Siyuan immediately stopped his departing footsteps, narrowed his eyes, and his deep gaze slowly swept from Xie Xuan’s face to his neck, then slowly down to his chest, and even further down.

This gaze was too sharp, as if it could penetrate. Xie Xuan couldn’t help but feel the back of his neck flush slightly, as if he had been seen through completely clean.

Staring at him, Gu Siyuan curled the corners of his mouth in a faint arc, exuding an unrestrained and arrogant temperament different from usual: “Since Your Highness is so looking forward to this official taking off my pants, next time there’s a chance, I will definitely let you experience it personally, and won’t disappoint you again.”

“…” Xie Xuan.

He’s acting like a hooligan, right?

This ice-face Gu Siyuan is acting like a hooligan to the dignified Sixth Prince of Great Liang.

Sure enough, usually just pretending to be serious. In this terrifying world, how can human hearts be so false.

…

During morning court that day.

Emperor Jianzhao announced the candidate for the Superintendent of the Capital Garrison, which was Gu Xun, General of the Household of the Imperial Guards.

This final result dropped the jaws of quite a few people.

Although the current Emperor had taken back the Tiger Tally of the Capital Garrison into his own hands, and the Superintendent position was nominally just a messenger, not possessing the power to command and dispatch troops like the former Commander, the saying goes “the local magistrate is not as good as the current manager.” Seeing each other every day, as time passed, there would always be opportunities to infiltrate and plant trusted followers.

How could they find such a young upstart who had never led troops for a force of tens of thousands of men in the Capital Garrison?

And among them, the reaction of the Sixth Prince Xie Xuan’s faction was the most intense.

They brought up all sorts of reasons for opposition, wishing they could directly smash their heads on the ground, expressing that if he was there, they wouldn’t be.

After their initial shock, the factions of the Eldest Prince and Second Prince quickly recovered their calm.

Previously, when the results of the sacrificial assassination case came out, both their sides suffered considerable losses in power due to Emperor Jianzhao’s severe punishment by implication, while Xie Xuan remained completely unharmed.

Both factions were originally very worried that since Emperor Jianzhao doted on Xie Xuan so much, he might find a way to hand over the position of Superintendent of the Capital Garrison to Xie Xuan’s people as well.

But now, it was given to Gu Xun.

Everyone knew that the ones Gu Xun disliked the most were Noble Consort Lu and the Lu family.

Then in the future, no matter whose hands this Capital Garrison fell into, anyway, it wouldn’t fall into Xie Xuan’s hands.

Looking at the intensely reacting Sixth Prince’s faction in the royal court, the Eldest Prince and Second Prince’s factions unexpectedly had the thought of watching a good show.

Since we don’t have a chance anyway, watching others suffer is also a kind of enjoyment.

By the end of the argument, the Eldest Prince’s faction hypocritically submitted a memorial, stating His Majesty was wise, and that Gu Xun was a person of outstanding ability and absolute loyalty, truly a good candidate for the position of Superintendent of the Capital Garrison.

After all, the former Commander of the Capital Garrison was the Eldest Prince’s father-in-law. Speaking of which, he was the one who suffered the most damage. Being able to support His Majesty’s decision like this now truly showed what a good son he was.

Emperor Jianzhao was indeed very satisfied, and even rarely praised him a few sentences.

The Eldest Prince immediately shot a gloating glance at Xie Xuan.

“…” Xie Xuan took a deep look at his good royal brother.

Hehe, you better not regret it.

Meanwhile, the Fourth Prince Xie Huan had known this result long ago. Plus, he never expressed opinions on these partisan struggles, and in the hearts of the courtiers, he was very neutral and uncontested, so his reaction was extremely calm.

Sitting high on the Dragon Throne, Emperor Jianzhao looked at the expressions of his sons, expressionless on the outside but feeling quite good inside.

After a long while, with some secret smugness in his heart, he kept a solemn face and said: “This matter is settled.”

Acting out his play until the end, Xie Xuan dragged out his voice and cried out: “Imperial Father!”

Emperor Jianzhao also sighed: “Xuan’er, don’t be willful. The matters of the Capital Garrison are of grave importance.”

However, to maintain the illusion that he still valued Xie Xuan, he ultimately placed a few people recommended by Xie Xuan in some less crucial positions.

After court ended, the Eldest Prince Xie Hong remained in a state of high spirits, specially walking up to mock: “Previously, for Sixth Brother’s sake, Imperial Father handled the assassination case severely and stripped General Wang of his position as Commander of the Capital Garrison. As your older brother, I thought it would be handed over to Sixth Brother’s people. I didn’t expect… ah haha…”

“Eldest Royal Brother shouldn’t rejoice too early,” Xie Xuan smoothed his robes and smiled coldly.

Xie Hong just thought he was overly angry and exasperated. He loudly mocked a few more sentences before turning and swaggering away.

“…” Xie Xuan.

During court, that was all acting, and everyone believed it so deeply.

Tsk, now that I finally spoke a word of truth with great difficulty, nobody actually believes it.

The loneliness of an actor!

On the other side, while Gu Siyuan was still handing over duty shifts at the Imperial Guards, he also received the imperial edict appointing him as Superintendent of the Capital Garrison.

After being slightly stunned for a moment, he immediately thanked for the Emperor’s grace and accepted the edict.

Standing nearby, Wang Chengying smiled: “General Gu actually has a moment of losing composure? A young man after all.”

The Commander and Vice-Commander of the Imperial Guards also specially came over to congratulate him.

Previously, Gu Siyuan was merely their subordinate.

But now, Gu Siyuan concurrently held a post in the Capital Garrison. Although currently it could only be considered a nominal secondary third-rank position, in terms of rank, he was parallel to them, so they could now address each other as colleagues.

The key was that Gu Siyuan was still so young, only in his twenties.

Gu Siyuan casually chatted a few sentences with these people, went to the Huangji Hall to thank Emperor Jianzhao for his grace, and then headed directly toward the large camp on the outskirts of the capital with the imperial edict.

Although he held a nominal position and wouldn’t work at the Capital Garrison normally, he was still His Majesty’s representative there. For the convenience of transmitting orders and supervision in the future, he had to at least get familiar with the current Commanders and mid-level military officers of the Capital Garrison.

The Capital Garrison had a total of 30,000 troops, generally divided into three major camps: the Infantry Camp, the Cavalry Camp, and the Divine Engine Camp.

Among them, the Infantry Camp had the most people, over 20,000, and was subdivided into three regiment camps, each led by a Commander responsible for dispatching. Normally, they mainly practiced combined camp formation combat, with weapons including broadswords, long spears, shields, and so on.

The Cavalry Camp had a total of only 1,000 men, each equipped with a warhorse. They were responsible for patrolling and scouting, as well as vanguard rapid attacks, and was also the most envied camp.

The Divine Engine Camp mainly consisted of archers, also numbering only over a thousand. However, they didn’t use ordinary bows and arrows; they were all equipped with powerful crossbows. Not only were they less strenuous to use, but they also had a higher hit rate, longer range (reaching a thousand meters), and stronger lethality, capable of penetrating armor. They were also an important weapon for countering cavalry.

Previously, after the Commander of the Capital Garrison was stripped of his position, the three major camps conducted daily drill training under the leadership of their respective Commanders.

Bringing a few Imperial Guards, Gu Siyuan arrived outside the large camp on the outskirts. He directly spurred his horse forward, leaped over the fenced gate surrounding the camp, jumped high into the camp, and said loudly: “The Imperial Edict has arrived!”

Gu Siyuan purposely infused some internal energy into his voice, ensuring everyone in the entire camp could hear it.

The soldiers who originally saw someone riding a horse breaking in and were just about to step forward to block him immediately changed their expressions and knelt on the spot to listen to the edict.

The several Commanders sitting together in the central military tent heard the voice and coincidentally looked at each other.

Having climbed to their current positions, they naturally had their own networks and had long heard about the fierce arguments in the royal court over the new Superintendent of the Capital Garrison.

If they were to speak their true thoughts, of course they completely didn’t want another person pressing down on their heads. But thinking about such things, they knew it was impossible. The position of the Capital Garrison was too special; His Majesty couldn’t possibly just let it be.

Therefore, before the Superintendent arrived, they gathered together to analyze which of the several highly experienced generals in the court had the highest probability, and what attitude they should adopt to face them later.

But they didn’t expect the imperial edict to come directly today.

Looking at it this way, His Majesty and the factions of the several princes had argued out a result.

“Let’s go out and see!”

“Mm.”

The three regiment Commanders of the Infantry Camp, plus the two Commanders of the Cavalry Camp and Divine Engine Camp, a total of five people, successively walked out of the main tent.

Looking at Gu Siyuan leading at the front, their gazes were uncertain. No mistake, right? The person who came is actually this young?

However, seeing the soldiers already kneeling all over the ground, the five of them no longer hesitated and knelt down directly in front of them toward the direction of the palace city.

Gu Siyuan looked around. Seeing no one else coming out, his expression turned solemn, and he proclaimed loudly: “By the grace of Heaven, the Emperor issues this edict: To praise the virtuous, the Imperial Guard General of the Household Gu Xun, serving the guard with loyalty and uprightness, proclaiming virtue and illustrating grace, maintaining integrity and acting righteously. I greatly commend him. Therefore, Gu Xun is promoted to Superintendent of the Capital Garrison. Respect this.” (Note 1)

The several Commanders looked at each other.

Indeed, the candidate for the Superintendent of the Capital Garrison has been confirmed.

Gu Siyuan jumped down from his horse, glanced at everyone, and said indifferently: “I wonder where the Commander Lords are. After today, we are colleagues. I hope we can pool our wisdom and efforts, and lead the Capital Garrison together to serve His Majesty with utmost loyalty.”

Hearing this, everyone present slowly stood up, and then unanimously made way for a wide open path.

The five Commanders then slowly walked out from the middle of this open path until they stopped in front of Gu Siyuan.

The person in the middle had a cold expression between his brows. He looked at Gu Siyuan: “You mean to say, you are Gu Xun?”

Gu Siyuan’s expression remained unchanged: “Exactly.”

As soon as these words were spoken.

“Hahaha… hahaha… Has your hair fully grown yet?” Several loud laughs rang out one after another.

“You say you’re the newly arrived Superintendent of the Capital Garrison?”

These guys in the Capital Garrison were not only cunning old soldiers but mostly came from wealthy and noble backgrounds, making them extremely insubordinate.

Gu Siyuan held the imperial edict high with one hand, saying indifferently: “It’s not what I say, it is His Majesty’s sacred edict.”

Those people’s expressions changed, and they said in a deep voice: “We naturally obey His Majesty’s sacred edict, but whether Lord Superintendent can convince the masses will depend on your own abilities.”

Gu Siyuan raised an eyebrow at them, his expression unchanged: “So, you want to test my depth?”

That Commander raised an eyebrow: “Since Lord Superintendent puts it that way, it’s not impossible.”

“Fine,” Gu Siyuan sneered, handed the imperial edict backhandedly to the Imperial Guards behind him, and looked at the soldiers present: “Horsemanship, archery, broadsword, spear, marching and deploying formations, what do you want to test?”

Half a day later, as the setting sun fell in the west, Gu Siyuan, bringing those few Imperial Guards, walked out of the Capital Garrison gate again, with quite a few people standing behind seeing them off.

After riding a certain distance, Gu Siyuan finally instructed those few people: “Not half a word about today’s events is allowed to be spread out.”

The expressions of those few people turned solemn, and they replied in unison: “Yes.”

…

This day happened to be the Empress Dowager’s Thousand Autumns.

The drizzle that had fallen for a few days stopped just like that.

The sky cleared after the rain, looking clear and azure as if washed, and the high-hanging sun shed tens of thousands of rays of light.

In the small garden of the Ningshou Palace, various species of fresh flowers bloomed gorgeously. Corresponding with the young girls passing through the flowers and laughing playfully, it presented a scenery of infinite splendor.

Empress Dowager Jiang had always been frugal. Just like in previous years, the Thousand Autumns ceremony wasn’t held grandly, merely setting up a simple banquet in the small garden of the Ningshou Palace.

However, this time was somewhat different from usual, as quite a few noblewomen and daughters of ministers were invited into the palace, and they were specifically asked to bring their daughters along.

Everyone instantly understood; this was to select principal consorts for the several princes.

His Majesty had four adult princes. The Eldest Prince and Second Prince had already married a few years ago. Now, the ones needing principal consorts selected were naturally the Fourth Prince and the Sixth Prince.

The Fourth Prince had always been transparent, not in the Emperor’s eyes.

Only the Sixth Prince, Xie Xuan, was highly doted upon by His Majesty, and even substituted for the Emperor to sacrifice to Heaven last month. If nothing unexpected happened, he might be the future Crown Prince, so everyone’s eyes naturally focused on him.

“Eldest Sister, look, this peony is so beautiful, I’ve never seen it before?” Jiang Ruirui, the legitimate daughter of the second branch of Duke Cheng’en’s mansion, walked over holding a flower.

Jiang Yuanyuan swept a casual glance and said lazily: “This is a new tribute from the White Horse Garden of Luoyang this year.”

Jiang Ruirui smiled playfully to please her: “As expected of Eldest Sister, who frequently enters the inner palace, you’ve long been accustomed to seeing good things.”

Jiang Yuanyuan leaned against the corridor pillar, wearing a light red dress, covered in pearls and jade, incredibly gorgeous, as if she herself was a blooming peony.

Regarding Jiang Ruirui’s praise, she said expressionlessly: “What does this count for.”

As if she was extremely dismissive of this treatment that everyone envied, not taking it seriously at all.

Jiang Ruirui didn’t feel her tone was wrong, but instead became even more elated: “Hehe, that’s right. Today is the Empress Dowager’s Thousand Autumns, inviting so many people is just to select a principal consort for the Sixth Prince. After Eldest Sister becomes the Sixth Prince’s Consort in the future, seeing these every day naturally won’t be a novelty anymore.”

The force in Jiang Yuanyuan’s hand tightened, and the abundant juice of the peony splashed out. The meticulously painted nail polish was instantly stained.

She frowned her willow eyebrows slightly, looking at Jiang Ruirui with a somewhat severe expression: “The ones selecting consorts this time aren’t just the Sixth Prince, but also the Fourth Highness.”

Why did everyone only have Xie Xuan in their eyes? Xie Huan was clearly much more outstanding than Xie Xuan.

This ignorant fool in front of her actually dared to ignore Xie Huan too.

Jiang Ruirui was stunned by her suddenly sinking tone, but quickly reacted again.

She hurriedly patted her own mouth and added: “Yes, yes, there’s also the Fourth Prince. The Fourth Prince and the Sixth Highness are blood brothers, and the Fourth Prince is the older brother. Only talking about the Sixth Highness makes it seem like we don’t respect the order of seniority. Eldest Sister is still the most thoughtful. As expected of someone who will be a Prince’s Consort in the future.”

“Hmph,” Jiang Yuanyuan narrowed her eyes, too lazy to look at this fool anymore.

Right at this moment, movements rang out from outside.

The palace servants loudly announced the arrival of the several princes.

The ladies and girls who were originally admiring flowers in the garden hurriedly retreated shyly behind the curtain seats on the side.

Sitting at the very top were the Empress Dowager and the Emperor.

Regardless of their past relationships, the several princes now all put on sincere smiles and stepped forward one by one to present their birthday gifts.

The Eldest Prince Xie Hong presented a birthday screen embroidered entirely with auspicious patterns. It was unknown what kind of technique and needlework were used, but under different lighting, the displayed patterns actually changed. The Empress Dowager was very pleasantly surprised.

The Second Prince Xie Kuan’s mother consort came from a Marquis mansion and was naturally affluent. He presented a Bodhisattva carved from white jade. The white jade was flawless, and the Bodhisattva shone brilliantly all over. What was even rarer was finding such a large piece of solid jade.

Although the Empress Dowager never liked luxury, she could only sigh in admiration at this thought and effort.

Next, it was the Fourth Prince Xie Huan’s turn.

Xie Huan had always been a transparent prince in everyone’s eyes, not favored by the Emperor, so the expectations for him weren’t high either.

But his birthday gift this time made everyone marvel. The gift itself wasn’t exceedingly rare, just a Buddhist sutra.

But this Buddhist sutra was written by Master Liaochen. Master Liaochen was the sacred monk of the Huangjue Temple, also praised as the number one eminent monk in the world. However, he hadn’t seen outsiders for many years; even the current Emperor couldn’t see him if he wanted to.

It was said that the Fourth Prince sought this Buddhist sutra by kowtowing every three steps from the foot of the mountain to the top before Master Liaochen finally relented.

The filial piety contained in this gift was extremely commendable.

In this era, filial piety was already the greatest praise.

Jiang Yuanyuan cast a secret glance toward Xie Huan.

These people will definitely discover your brilliance and know that you are much stronger than some Xie Xuan.

Xie Xuan narrowed his eyes.

This fourth brother of mine truly planned for a long time, picking a good occasion, wanting to step onto the front stage.

At this time, the Empress Dowager looked lovingly at Xie Xuan again: “Xuan’er, what did you prepare?”

Xie Xuan stood up: “Several royal brothers have been so generous, your grandson feels somewhat ashamed. I merely made a simple portrait.”

As he spoke, he handed the portrait in his hand to the palace servant in front of him.

“Magu Offers Longevity?”

Looking at the slowly unfolding portrait, the Eldest Prince sneered disdainfully: “Truly ordinary.”

Magu symbolizes longevity, and her image is mostly that of a young girl holding an immortal peach, a Buddha’s hand (citron), or a wine jug, accompanied by cranes and deer, with a background of green pines and the Sea of Fortune. It is mostly a birthday gift given by people of that time to female elders. (Note 2)

But members of the royal family grew up in fine clothes and rich food, having seen many good things. This gift indeed couldn’t be presented on the table.

Although Xie Kuan and Xie Huan didn’t speak, the contempt in their eyes was also hard to conceal.

“Ah… this picture?”

Right at this moment, the palace servant holding the painting suddenly let out a small gasp of surprise.

“What’s wrong?” Someone nearby asked.

Empress Dowager Jiang immediately waved her hand: “Bring it closer, let me take a look.”

A moment later, Empress Dowager Jiang looked at Xie Xuan pleasantly surprised: “Xuan’er, what a clever thought. How was this done?”

The expressions of the Eldest Prince and the others changed.

Could this one painting still produce some tricks?

“This painting is both the Picture of Magu Offering Longevity and a Picture of Ten Thousand Longevities,” Xie Xuan said softly.

Everyone present came forward to take a look, and after a good while, their eyes widened slightly.

The Magu in this painting, including the green pines and so on, were actually not outlined with a brush, but pieced together by individual ‘Longevity’ characters of different shapes, fonts, and colors. One entire painting used exactly ten thousand ‘Longevity’ characters.

It could be described as magnificent and exceptionally profound in meaning.

“The Sixth Highness has such a clever mind!”

“To actually come up with such a painting method, it’s truly unprecedented!”

“As expected of the Sixth Highness, utmost filial piety!”

“…”

The Eldest Prince Xie Hong and the others glared at Xie Xuan hatefully. They spent so much effort, only to have their thunder stolen by this single broken painting.

This was especially true for Xie Huan.

He had remained transparent all these years. Although being transparent avoided many storms, it also avoided many opportunities.

He originally wanted to use this opportunity to show his abilities in front of the courtiers, making people realize Emperor Jianzhao still had such a son who was both loyal and filial. But as a result…

Xie Xuan ignored these chaotic gazes and instead looked toward the Imperial Guard standing duty nearby.

The cleverness of this painting was actually taught to him by this annoying fellow, Gu Siyuan.

The Imperial Guard Vice General nearby also happened to be looking at the painting, and even nudged Gu Siyuan: “General, the Sixth Prince’s painting is truly somewhat interesting.”

“Just bizarre tricks and wicked craft, merely playing to the gallery,” Gu Siyuan immediately snorted coldly with disdain.

He didn’t even purposefully lower his tone; many people nearby heard it.

That Vice General looked embarrassed.

Just as everyone thought in their hearts, General Gu truly hated Noble Consort Lu and the Sixth Prince.

“…” Xie Xuan hatefully turned his head away.

Truly dedicated to his work, this guy.

To think there’s an acting enthusiast in this world more dedicated than himself.

When he gets ruthless, he even scolds his own drawing!

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