As the hour of Chou passed, the night was at its darkest. The fiery aura around the Wenhan Garden had been suppressed, but teams of lanterns and torches were still gathered there, layer upon layer, creating an atmosphere of grim tension.

The palace guards had already established a tight defense line along the courtyard walls. Cheng Zhouhai and his deputy dismounted from their carriages and made contact with Tie Tianying, who had arrived earlier.

"...Now that the fire is almost out, order all personnel from the yamen to stand by on the spot. No one is allowed to move without orders... Your imperial guards secure the inner circle, and I'll have people watch the perimeter. Anyone acting suspiciously or making inquiries will be noted down, and after today, we'll pay them a visit, one by one..."

"...His Majesty will be arriving shortly."

"...Understood." Cheng Zhouhai nodded. "What about casualties?"

Tie Tianying glanced at the deputy beside him. "Very heavy."

"Understood." Cheng Zhouhai nodded again, then waved his hand to his deputy. "Go now, watch the outside. Report back with any news."

"Yes, sir." The deputy obeyed and left.

Before long, a convoy of carriages escorted by imperial guards arrived from the north, entering through the side gate of the Wenhan Garden. Emperor Jun Wu, with a long sword at his waist, stepped down from the carriage, followed by Zhou Pei. They sniffed the air, and under the escort of Tie Tianying and Cheng Zhouhai, headed toward the courtyard.

Within the Wenhan Garden, a three-story complex, a fire had consumed one building entirely, and the main building had been largely burned. Due to the massive arrival of water wagons, the air was thick with the unpleasant odor of half-burnt wood, mingled with the faint scent of blood. Li Pin, who lived not far away and had to discuss matters with Zuo Wenhuai and others every day, had already arrived. He greeted them and bowed to Jun Wu and Zhou Pei.

"How are Left Minister Zuo and the others? What are the casualties?" Jun Wu asked first.

"Your Majesty, Your Highness, please follow me."

As Li Pin spoke, he led them towards the third building, which remained mostly intact. Along the way, they saw figures of young men. Some seemed to be moving around in the already burned-out rooms of the main building, doing who knows what.

"Are Zuo Wenhuai and Xiao Jingyi alright?" Jun Wu suppressed his curiosity, not running over to inspect the charred building, and asked. Li Pin nodded and said in a low voice, "They are fine. The fighting was fierce, but Zuo and Xiao were prepared. Several were injured, but fortunately, nothing major happened. Two are seriously injured, and their condition is uncertain."

Hearing this, Jun Wu breathed a sigh of relief. Looking at the one and a half buildings that had been destroyed, he turned to the side and asked, "What are they doing in there?"

"During the fighting, several bandits broke into the rooms inside, intending to resist to the death. These men surrounded the rooms, trying to persuade them to surrender, but their resistance was too fierce, so... they threw in a few bombs from the southwest. The corpses inside are now mangled. They... went in to look for clues. But the scene is too gruesome, Your Majesty shouldn't go in."

"I won't look." Jun Wu gazed at the ruined rooms, his brow relaxing. He replied softly, then said, "True patriots."

Using bombs to blow people to pieces was clearly not the standard for judging a patriot, but seeing the emperor's delighted expression at the violent atmosphere, no one dared to question it. After all, since his ascension to the throne, the emperor had struggled through a difficult journey of being chased and constantly fighting. This scene of being assassinated by bandits and then luring them into a house to be blown to bits was right up his alley.

--That's how good people should be!

"Were the books and materials transported from the southwest damaged?" He asked about this as he looked at the traces of the fire.

"Since arriving in Fuzhou, the first thing we did was to organize and copy these books and materials for backup. Even if something happened today, the information would not be lost. Oh, the fire scene that Your Majesty sees now was deliberately set by us later..."

"Why?"

"For Your Majesty to act, first suffer a loss, it's an excuse. Whether it's used or not, it's just these two buildings. Moreover, as soon as Lord Tie arrived, he tightly sealed off the inner circle, and the courtyard was even more sealed off. We are saying to the outside world that we suffered heavy losses tonight and many people died, so the situation outside is a bit chaotic..."

"Well done."

Jun Wu couldn't help but praise.

The group had now arrived in front of the intact wooden building. Along the way, Jun Wu had observed some things. Although the outer and inner defenses of the courtyard were the responsibility of the imperial guards, the cleanup and investigation of each battle site were clearly under the control of this China Army team.

This was unusual. Theoretically, Tie Tianying would have been responsible for this first-hand information. The fact that he was excluded meant that there must have been some disagreement or even conflict between the two sides. But facing Zuo Wenhuai and others who had just completed a round of killing, Tie Tianying ultimately did not force the issue.

What was revealed here was the true strength of this team of forty-odd people from the southwest, which was very different from the respect and even shyness that Zuo Wenhuai had shown in the past. For those in power, this was of course a bad sign, but for Jun Wu, who had always been puzzled and fantasized about what the powerful combat power of the southwest was all about, it clarified many things.

That's right, if they didn't have such an attitude, how could Teacher have defeated Zongwang and Xiyin, who were more difficult to deal with than the Jurchen Eastern Route Army, in the southwest.

As a young and vigorous emperor in his early thirties, he had struggled for a long time under the shadow of failure and death, and he had fantasized countless times about what kind of iron-blooded atmosphere there should be in the China Army camp in the southwest. When the China Army finally defeated Zongwang and Xiyin, he was filled with guilt because of his long-term failures and the slaughter of the Wu dynasty's people. He even said things like "a real man should be like this."

Zuo Wenhuai was a talent planted by the Zuo family in the southwest for training. After coming to Fuzhou, he was frank in his court appearances, but he also seemed too shy and bookish, which was still somewhat different from the China Army that Jun Wu had imagined. He had once felt regret for this: perhaps the southwest considered that there were too many scholars in Fuzhou, so they sent some smooth and worldly civil servants. Of course, it was good to have people to use, and he would naturally not complain about it.

At this moment, the revealed and ruthless aspect was displayed before him.

That's how it should be!

Walking to the front of the two-story building, the young China Army members from the southwest saluted him. He reached out his hands to help up their blood-stained bodies and asked where Zuo Wenhuai was. When he learned that Zuo Wenhuai was examining the bandits' corpses and wanted to call him out, Jun Wu waved his hand and said, "It doesn't matter, let's take a look together. What kind of things are they!"

The place where the bandits' corpses were concentrated was on the left side of the first floor. Before they had even arrived, Zuo Wenhuai and the others, who had learned that the emperor was coming, opened the door and came out to greet Jun Wu. Jun Wu greeted them a few words, then smiled and walked into the room.

"Your Majesty, in there..."

Zuo Wenhuai also wanted to persuade him, but Jun Wu said, "It doesn't matter, I've seen corpses before." He especially liked the feeling of being decisive.

This room was quite large, but the smell of blood inside was strong. The corpses were arranged in three rows, front and back, about twenty or so, some placed on the ground, some placed on tables. Perhaps they had heard that the emperor was coming, so the corpses on the tables were hastily covered with a layer of cloth. Jun Wu pulled open the cloth on the table and saw that the corpses below had all been stripped of their clothes, lying there naked, with some wounds looking even more bloody and狰狞 (zhengning - hideous).

"...We've checked them, and these corpses have mostly dark and rough skin, with calluses on their hands and feet. Judging from their positions, they seem to be people who have been at sea for many years. During the fighting, we also noticed that some of them had agile steps, but the movements of their lower body were very strange, also like the skill of being on a ship... We dissected the stomachs of several of them, but we haven't found any obvious clues yet. Of course, we're new here, and there are some traces that we can't find. The specifics will have to wait for the coroner to examine..."

Dissecting stomachs... Jun Wu pretended to look at the disgusting corpses, nodding repeatedly. "Has the coroner arrived?"

"...Because we don't know who did it yet, we discussed it with Lord Li and think that we shouldn't let any idlers in yet, so..."

"You're right. What was the bandits' martial arts like?"

"Their skills are all good. If they were to fight privately, the outcome would be uncertain."

"Then why were our casualties so few?... Of course, this is a good thing, I'm just a little curious."

"Your Majesty, battlefield formation fighting is different from Jianghu disputes. The Wenhan Garden is guarded by troops on the outside, but we had carefully planned how we would attack this place if we wanted to, and we had some contingency plans. When the bandits came, the sentries we arranged first discovered them, and then we temporarily organized a few people to patrol with lanterns, deliberately leading them to a place. After they came in, it was too late to resist... But these people were determined and fearless, and we only captured two seriously injured people. We bandaged them up and will hand them over to Lord Tie later..."

"Mmm-hmm..." Jun Wu nodded, listening with great interest, then said solemnly, "Those with such determination may be the privately raised retainers of some great clans. Search carefully, and you should be able to find out."

"Judging from the steps these people took to sneak in, they knew the troops guarding the perimeter quite well, and they happened to choose the time of the shift change, so they quietly came in without alarming them. This shows that the people who came here really have deep connections in Fuzhou. Also, it hasn't been a month since we arrived here, and we haven't really started doing anything yet. I don't know who did it, so mobilized the masses to try to get rid of us... These things are not clear for the time being..."

Jun Wu smiled. "These things can be investigated slowly. The decision you and Lord Li made temporarily was very good. First seal off the news, deliberately burn the building and show weakness. When the news of your losses is released, in my opinion, those with ulterior motives will eventually show their faces. Rest assured, I will definitely get revenge for you for today's events. By the way, where are the injured? Take me to see them first. Also, the imperial physicians can be let in first. After they finish treating the injuries, keep a close watch on them and never allow them to reveal even a sliver of information about this to the outside world."

The group then went to see several injured men in the rooms of another building. Jun Wu reflected, "Actually, since entering Fuzhou, there have been some people who assassinated me before, but because the army is stationed nearby and Lord Tie is doing his best to protect me, there are ultimately fewer people in the city who dare to assassinate me at the risk of offending the public. You only just arrived in Fuzhou, and you encountered such a thing. It's my negligence. These local bullies are so concerned about the righteous cause of my Wu dynasty, but they didn't put in so much effort during the resistance against the Jin--"

He cursed fiercely.

This team from the southwest had not yet begun to participate in large-scale reforms. In the first round of speculation in everyone's mind, the greatest possibility was that those old Confucian scholars who had always been thinking about the crime of弑君 (shijun - regicide) had taken action. To be able to mobilize dozens of people to launch an assassination in this way was a truly grand gesture. If Zuo Wenhuai and the others had been a little careless after arriving in Fuzhou, the people on the first floor might have died tonight.

But looking at the blood stains on these people, and the steel wire armor worn under their outer clothes, Jun Wu understood that these young men were much more vigilant about this battle than the others in Fuzhou.

Such a thing might mean that they didn't trust him in normal times, but at the moment, it also proved their correctness.

"I want to apologize to you," Jun Wu said. "But I also assure you that such a thing will not happen again in the future."

"Your Majesty doesn't need to do that." Zuo Wenhuai lowered his head and bowed, pausing slightly. "Actually... to say something treasonous, before we came, Mr. Ning in the southwest had instructed us that wherever there are interests involved, the internal struggle is more dangerous than the external struggle, because many times we don't know where the enemy is coming from. Since Your Majesty is carrying out reforms, we are Your Majesty's pawns. Pawns don't avoid knives and guns. Your Majesty doesn't need to see us as too delicate."

Jun Wu looked at him, remaining silent for a long time, then took a long, long breath. In that moment, he suddenly remembered the meeting he had with the China Army members before he ascended the throne in Jiangning. That was the first time he had seen a China Army spy face to face. The city was in danger, supplies were tight, and he asked the other person if they had enough to eat. The other person replied: we have enough to eat, because there are not many people anymore...

At this time, Zuo Wenhuai vaguely overlapped with that figure...

This is the China Army.

This is the China Army!

If I had such soldiers by my side in those days, how could the mere Jurchens have ravaged and slaughtered Jiangnan...

He nodded.

Next, the group discussed the matter in the room for a while, about how to confuse the outside world and how to find out the mastermind behind this incident... When they left the room, the China Army members had already made a handover with some of the imperial guards under Tie Tianying's command--their bodies were covered in blood, and even those who could still move appeared to be seriously injured, quite miserable. But under this miserable appearance, the people who survived the battlefield fighting against the Jurchens had begun to accept the challenges of the strangers who were the local bullies in this unfamiliar place...

The sky was not yet bright, the stars were twinkling in the night sky, and the smell of the fire was still permeating the air. The night still seemed restless and uneasy. One force after another was about to show its posture...