Above Blue Lake, great mist billowed.
The treasure ship lay hidden within.
Golden Haired Tiger licked at his fur. Seeing that no one was paying attention, he secretly raised a leg to scratch himself, casually brushing past his nose as he basked in the rich fragrance.
"Bai Mingzhe, Bai Chenfeng, current holder, former holder, Eighth Branch descendants..."
Liang Qu flipped through the pages, circling and marking notes.
Cha Qing and the other two had not spent the past half year idly. They mined every day and chatted nonsense with the miners, practically becoming half Hantai natives.
The greatest internal conflict within the Bai Clan had naturally arisen from the chieftain replacement incident, brought about by the Da Shun Imperial Court's intervention in the external environment.
Bai Mingzhe had gone to live in Southern Zhili at eight and studied martial arts in the Imperial Capital at fourteen. During the formative years of his childhood worldview, he had received the most orthodox Da Shun education. Southern Zhili, as its private reserve, was incomparably prosperous—not some wild, grass-roots stage of carving out a livelihood. It was said that even Bai Mingzhe's white moonlight, the woman who had taken his virginity, was in Southern Zhili.
Crossed out.
Street gossip, insufficient as evidence.
Given Liang Qu's life experience, especially that of his previous life—
It was perfectly normal to see prosperity and develop admiration and devotion for it. This was also the foundation of Appease Distant People, its righteousness lying in binding them with loose reins. After several generations, local resistance would weaken, and after a few hot wars at little cost, they would naturally be absorbed into the territory.
But clearly, the Imperial Court had been in a hurry to replace the former clan head, Bai Chenfeng, for no other reason.
The over-two-hundred-year-old Bai