Benevolent Sovereign Ji Long, seated high upon the imperial throne, slowly swept his gaze across Qiankun Hall.
Among the vast black mass of kneeling officials, some were relatives and close friends of Duke Yu Shi Mingpo—the very close kind.
In court, matters involving taking sides could not be swayed by ordinary connections.
Yet the majority of officials kneeling to request a sacred judgment belonged to the Heaven Temple faction.
Led by Prince Zhen, these officials knelt in a vast black mass and requested a sacred judgment!
What was a sacred judgment?
On the surface, it meant the sovereign's sole decision!
But in truth, it was a request for him, the emperor, to issue the final ruling according to the result reached under political conventions.
This so-called sacred judgment was merely a way of saving face for him, the emperor.
If he truly tried to dispose of the matter as he pleased, the Heaven Temple faction led by Prince Zhen would absolutely leap up and slap his face until it rang.
The problem was that the result reached just now was not one the Ancestral God Hall or he, the emperor, wished to see.
They even knew full well that this was a tactic Heaven Temple had deployed to investigate the matter of Blood River Fortress.
But political conventions were political conventions.
Even an emperor had to follow the rules in court.
Benevolent Sovereign Ji Long's gaze passed over Chief Great Sun Priest Chancellor Bai, Minister of Justice Feng Tingji, Minister of War Ban Di, and Grand Celestial Master Wu Yu one by one, hoping they would step forward and speak.
Yet none of them had any solution.
How could they dare disregard political conventions that even the emperor had to obey?
With a helpless sigh in his heart, Benevolent Sovereign