Chapter 96: Battle for a Capital City (Part 2)
“Senior, why bother with these children?”
Xue Xingchuan looked at Jin Yulu with an expressionless face as he spoke.
These words took everyone by surprise, and the area around the National Teaching Academy’s gate fell into a dead silence.
Everyone could see that although Xue Xingchuan was expressionless and seemed cold, that “senior” was spoken calmly and without any hesitation—those who knew Jin Yulu’s background wouldn’t find it strange. Even Fei Dian, the most senior of the current thirty-eight divine generals on the continent, couldn’t claim seniority over him. Xue Xingchuan, no matter how famous a general of the Great Zhou Dynasty, calling him “senior” was only natural—but the young people at the National Teaching Academy’s gate didn’t know this, so they were greatly shocked.
Jin Yulu smiled and said, “Someone wanted to charge in, so I had to stop them.”
Xue Xingchuan turned around, looked at those blood-soaked young men from the capital, frowned slightly, and said, “You were a bit too harsh.”
Jin Yulu shook his head and said, “I was a soldier before, with a duty to defend the land. If the demon race dared to cross the border by even one step, I would drive them back, using any means necessary. Now I’m the gatekeeper of the National Teaching Academy, so I have the responsibility to guard the gate. If someone wants to break into the academy, I will also drive them back, regardless of the consequences.”
Xue Xingchuan was silent. He knew the weight of those words.
Just then, a young deputy general walked up to him and whispered a few words.
Xue Xingchuan raised an eyebrow slightly and said, “This matter has blown up too much. It doesn’t look good.”
Jin Yulu pointed at the crowd, which was beginning to stir again with occasional obscenities, and said, “What do you expect us to do? They’ve been making a racket outside the academy for a long time. If the court won’t come to maintain order, that’s one thing, but are they going to stop us from maintaining order?”
Xue Xingchuan’s frown deepened. Today, one incident after another had occurred at the National Teaching Academy, especially this one—it was all just petty nonsense. If the palace hadn’t sent word for him to control the situation and prevent too bad an influence, he wouldn’t have come at all.
The young deputy general said, “Sir, perhaps we should just observe for now. If anyone violates the laws of the Zhou Dynasty again, we can punish them then.”
Xue Xingchuan felt relieved at this, thinking that this was indeed worthy of his regard—this suggestion was very appropriate.
Without hesitation, he walked toward a tavern near Baihua Lane, truly preparing to just watch. Hongyun Lin looked around somewhat dazedly and then followed. The imperial guards lined up in front of the National Teaching Academy’s gate, making it clear they would side with neither party, but that no one should go too far.
Xue Xingchuan was satisfied with this situation, but the two groups inside and outside the National Teaching Academy were very dissatisfied.
The troublemakers felt that several of their people had been severely injured, yet Xue Xingchuan and the imperial guards hadn’t arrested the culprit and were ignoring the matter—this was utterly unreasonable. Tang Thirty-Six, on the other hand, felt that since those people were still making noise outside the academy, the guards should step in and stop them—also unreasonable.
Either way, nothing was reasonable.
Xue Xingchuan felt that being forced to deal with this matter was even more unreasonable, so he decided to stop arguing. Since the imperial guards were here, surely no one would dare to charge the National Teaching Academy again, and the people inside wouldn’t be so disrespectful as to continue injuring others. He could give an account that way.
The only places where a figure like him needed to give an account were two palaces: the Imperial Palace and the Detached Palace.
But he hadn’t considered that the three young men in the National Teaching Academy might give him face, but they cared more about giving themselves an account.
Seeing that the imperial guards were merely standing solemnly in front of the National Teaching Academy, the troublemakers guessed that as long as they didn’t try to charge into the academy, the court wouldn’t interfere. Some bold ones soon resumed their cursing.
Standing at the gate, the words were much clearer than in the library. Hearing terms like “country bumpkin” and “toad,” and those people stubbornly insisting the marriage contract was fake, Chen Changsheng’s mood grew heavy. Tang Thirty-Six’s face turned even frostier, and his grip on his sword hilt tightened.
“Are you deaf? Can’t you hear such loud noise?”
Tang Thirty-Six shouted at the young deputy general of the imperial guards.
The young deputy general turned around, looked at him expressionlessly, and said, “I hear it clearly. So what?”
Tang Thirty-Six said, “Since you hear them cursing, aren’t you going to stop them?”
The young deputy general was silent for a moment, as if seriously considering it, then said, “Why should I stop them?”
Tang Thirty-Six’s expression grew colder as he looked at him and said, “Then if I say I’ll sleep with your sister, is that okay?”
Hearing this, the imperial guards were furious and all glared at him. The divine general was resting in the tavern for now; if their leader gave the order, they would charge up and knock this foul-mouthed youth to the ground and teach him a lesson.
Strangely, the young deputy general didn’t get angry. Instead, he said seriously, “Are you sure you want to do that?”
Tang Thirty-Six recalled the girl’s rough childhood demeanor, shuddered, and forced himself to stay calm, saying, “I was just talking. Why so serious?”
“You don’t dare to do it, you don’t dare to say it, and now when a thousand people curse you to your face, you don’t dare to talk back. Pathetic.”
The young deputy general mocked him. “Better hurry back to Wenshui and cry to the old master.”
Tang Thirty-Six flew into a rage, pointing at the dense crowd outside the gate and said, “One person cursing a thousand? Do you think I’m stupid?”
The young deputy general said seriously, “Then I have no other solution. Their mouths are theirs, and the sound just reaches the academy. Who can control that?”
Chen Changsheng felt there was something off about their conversation. He stepped forward and asked quietly, “Do you two know each other?”
“I’ll tell you after we deal with these people,” Tang Thirty-Six said.
Someone looked at Chen Changsheng and thought he matched the rumors—indeed very ordinary—while Tang Thirty-Six, with his flashy clothes and handsome features, probably wasn’t that person. Murmurs gradually rose, and soon they confirmed he was Chen Changsheng. Like oil poured on a fire, the shouts of abuse surged, as if they would tear open the sky over the capital.
Tang Thirty-Six’s face grew uglier and uglier. He secretly made a hand gesture with his left hand.
The broken gate panels from the morning were now stacked behind them. Xuan Yuan Po had left at some point. Following Tang Thirty-Six’s instructions, he had walked a long way west along the academy wall, climbed over using a ladder, and squeezed into the crowd from the other end of Baihua Lane.
Although the crowd was dense, who could match the strength of this demon youth? In the time they had been talking, he had already reached a spot about twenty zhang from the gate, surrounded by agitated young people. No one noticed anything unusual about him.
He was holding a stone in his hand.
When he saw Tang Thirty-Six’s hand signal, he knew it was time, but he still hesitated. Only when he saw Tang Thirty-Six’s extremely cold gaze and thought about what he would face in the National Teaching Academy if he didn’t comply did he finally grit his teeth and make up his mind.
He raised the stone and hurled it toward the National Teaching Academy’s gate, shouting loudly, “Smash this bastard to death!”
The crowd, full of obscenities, fell silent for a very brief moment. Everyone heard the words clearly and saw the stone flying toward the academy gate, even saw its trajectory. Some prepared to cheer, while others turned pale.
Was this really going to blow up?
*Smack!*
With a dull thud, the stone landed heavily on the stone steps in front of the National Teaching Academy’s gate, breaking into several pieces, bouncing up, and then falling again.
At that moment, the stone was only a few inches from Chen Changsheng’s foot. The fragments that flew up didn’t hit his leg—he was just lucky.
Tang Thirty-Six thought admiringly, as expected of a demon race—their control over strength was indeed superior. He could throw it so accurately.
Xuan Yuan Po, in the crowd, thought fearfully, how did I use too much strength?
Regardless, a stone had landed.
The incident at the National Teaching Academy’s gate instantly escalated from a war of words to a physical battle.
“How dare you use ranged weapons!”
Tang Thirty-Six cursed furiously, picked up a stone from the ground, and hurled it at the crowd opposite.
With a sharp *whoosh* through the air, followed by an *ouch* of pain.
A man in scholar’s robes clutched his forehead and fell backward, blood gushing between his fingers.
Then Tang Thirty-Six’s second stone arrived. *Smack!* A capital youth lost several teeth, his mouth full of blood.
The crowd outside the gate finally snapped out of it. Some shouted in panic for a doctor, some angrily called for retaliation, and others rushed to the imperial guards, pointing at their two blood-soaked companions and accusing them, demanding the guards arrest the culprit. The scene was utter chaos.
Finally, someone began to fight back. They picked up whatever they could from the ground and threw it at the National Teaching Academy’s gate.
The scene turned into a melee. The imperial guards, standing in formation along the academy wall, naturally couldn’t step in to stop anything anymore.
Long before the crowd started picking up stones, Tang Thirty-Six had already led Chen Changsheng away from the gate. They climbed up a ladder to the top of the wall, and Tang Thirty-Six signaled Chen Changsheng to hand him stones from below. Beneath this section of the wall, plum trees were planted, and a shallow layer of stones covered the ground—plenty to go around.
The situation outside the National Teaching Academy was completely different. Baihua Lane was always kept very clean. How easy was it to find stones on the bluestone pavement? Pry up the bluestone slabs? Might as well go home and get a kitchen knife.
Someone looked at the broken gate of the National Teaching Academy and saw plenty of rubble and some wooden planks that could serve as substitutes. They wanted to get ammunition for their companions, but Jin Yulu was still sitting properly in his chair—how could anyone get past him?
With the prepared against the unprepared, the outcome of this melee was all too clear.
Tang Thirty-Six held the wall. Every stone he threw took down one person.
Groans rang out continuously. Dozens of people were hit by stones in succession.
From early morning, when the Tianhai family’s carriage smashed through the academy gate, to now, when the whole city was cursing the National Teaching Academy, he had been holding back for a long time. Now that he finally found an outlet, there was no mercy. Stones whistled through the wind, and beneath the wall, there was nothing but cries of pain.
Some stood farther away, thinking he couldn’t hit them, and glared as they cursed with all their might. But the next moment, a stone flew through the air from the academy wall, smashing hard into their foreheads and knocking them flat.
…When Tang Thirty-Six used his true essence to empower the stones as he threw them, what was he thinking?
“So satisfying!”
He stood on the wall, shouting with glee, swinging his arm freely. With every stone that whistled away, someone fell. Truly, he was in his element.
A genius youth from the Azure Cloud Ranking, using true essence against ordinary troublemakers—what else could it be called but bullying?
Now that he had reached the upper level of Meditation, he could be considered a peak powerhouse among the younger generation. The stones flying from his hand, even if he deliberately didn’t use true essence, were still as strong as arrows. How could the people in the alley withstand that?
The obscenities in front of the National Teaching Academy had long been replaced by cries of pain. Every shout of abuse had turned into wails.
Before the wall, the crowd scattered in all directions, dodging everywhere. Blood flowed, and dust rose thickly.
Truly, in the midst of laughter, the strong enemy was annihilated.
“That’s enough! That’s enough!”
The young deputy general of the imperial guards, seeing the miserable state of the people, finally felt some pity and turned to shout at Tang Thirty-Six on the wall.
To be honest, Tang Thirty-Six was really careless about where he stood. He didn’t stand anywhere else but right on the wall above the imperial guards’ formation. Earlier, the crowd had managed to pick up some stones from around them, but when they retaliated, at least half of their throws missed because they were afraid of hitting the guards.
Tang Thirty-Six didn’t stop, asking, “What’s enough?”
The young deputy general said helplessly, “You’ve already smashed people like this, and you still say it’s not enough?”
“You said before that their mouths are theirs, and the sound just reaches the academy, so you couldn’t do anything… Now these stones are mine, and my hands are mine. It just so happens they flew outside the academy. What’s the difference? Besides, they threw the first stone!”
As he said this, Tang Thirty-Six scanned the crowd, confirmed that Xuan Yuan Po had already slipped away in the chaos, and completely relaxed. He continued throwing stones at people.
Dust continued to rise in the alley. Cries shook the sky. People supported each other as they retreated. The scene was utterly miserable, truly like a defeated army.
The crowd had scattered like birds and beasts, but Tang Thirty-Six still hadn’t fully satisfied himself. He squinted, picked up a stone shard, and aimed at the last person lagging behind—he remembered clearly that this man had been the first to call Chen Changsheng a freeloader. He had only been hit on the head by one stone—how could that be enough?
Because of that marriage contract, this capital city had shown collective hostility toward the National Teaching Academy and Chen Changsheng.
Tang Thirty-Six used these stones to smash all that hostility and frustration away.
Chen Changsheng didn’t do much, just kept handing stones from below the wall. In normal times, he might have thought this was nonsense, a waste of time and life. But today, he was happy. He didn’t even notice his clothes being torn by the plum branches.
So life could be lived in many ways, or played in many ways.
Maybe it had no meaning, but it was really interesting.
And this way, it was really easy to be happy.
(When I wrote those last two sentences, everyone knows what I must have been thinking about. After I finished writing, I considered deleting them or changing them, because that’s the story of the Nightfall, the creed of the academy. I didn’t want to influence things too much. But then I thought, since I love the academy, I agree with its principles. Since I believe it’s right, what harm is there in writing more? In fact, some readers said this chapter title gave them the feeling of “I fight a city alone” from the Nightfall. Yes, I like that kind of vibe. I bow my hands. Thank you to the girls for the photos in the group chat. Thank you to the readers who donated because of those photos. Please continue to support and vote. I’ll go look at the photos now…)