Unable to Control One's Own Fate

Unable to control one's own fate

While lying in the hospital room, Wei Keng confirmed how the consciousness-link system was working after his arrival in this plane, and learned about his teammates.

As for the teammates who had come with him this time, they had been sent to four different planes, with two Transmigrators assigned to each one.

His current partner was Ke Feijia, who had arrived in Jiankang, the southern economic center.

From this plane's perspective, a few months earlier he had been a group executive who volunteered to take part in the C-Meson Energy Project. The project could also be called the "Seclusion Qi Cultivation" project, and he had been asleep in this plane for two years. Now, the version of him in this world had just woken up.

The actual situation was that while his body slept in this plane, his primary consciousness had returned to the Main World to confirm whether the newcomer was suitable for the mission here.

Ke Feijia was now in charge of this cutting-edge technology project. Before that, he had been secretary to a member of the cabinet, and had connections in Shenzhou beyond the ordinary. He had now abandoned politics for research. On one hand, the Main World was paying close attention to the "C-Meson" project; on the other, Shenzhou's leaders had also realized how important "C-Mesons" were, so Ke Feijia had been sent here as a trusted operative. That meant Wei Keng would have little trouble in this plane. The technical work and the difficult tasks were all being handled by a veteran Transmigrator.

Ten hours later, Wei Keng left the private medical center in good health.

A boxy sedan from Shenzhou was parked outside the center. Rows of armored guards stood on either side, none of them carrying firearms. The reception made Wei Keng unsure which foot to put forward. A poised, attractive woman bowed to him. "Young Master Wei, I'm Qin Hongyue. I'm delighted to welcome you."

Wei Keng hesitated. "How am I supposed to return the greeting? Uh, when bowing, does a man put his left palm against his right fist?" Only then did he realize he had grown up in a cultural wasteland.

Wei Keng had not yet had a chance to return to the Xijing headquarters that day.

Clearly, the itinerary had been deliberately delayed. Wei Keng could imagine the people back at the group working around the clock to clean up the loose ends from this period.

That evening, Wei Keng stayed temporarily at an inn run by the Xianyangzi branch.

After washing up, he looked at the enormous bed and drew a deep breath.

The bed here wasn't like the thick, mattress-topped steel-wire beds back in Wei Keng's world. It was a nanmu Chuihua Pillar Step Bed.

The wedding-night scenes in period dramas often showed a bed surrounded by wooden pillars and topped with a carved wooden canopy, making the whole thing look like a little wooden house. The edge where the bride and groom sat was set within a circular opening that ran from top to bottom.

A Step Bed was even more elaborate, standing three meters tall. Since you had to climb eight steps to get into it, it was also called an Eight-Step Bed. Since the Song dynasty, this sort of thing had been the exclusive preserve of the wealthy. Jin Ping Mei had a passage about it: when Ximen Qing married his third wife, Meng Yulou, the matchmaker explained that Meng Yulou was a widow with some money to her name—and two Nanjing Step Beds.

Although Shenzhou's productivity had advanced at a breakneck pace in the twentieth century, and merchants had turned things like watches and cars into luxury goods, the Step Bed had lost none of its prestige. It had also kept up with the times, going high-tech. It was no longer just a bed: it came with built-in home automation, air conditioning, desk lamps, a refrigerator, and massage equipment, as well as automatic dust removal and fragrance spraying.

Of course, the bed wasn't the only thing that made Wei Keng draw a deep breath. Behind the bed's curtains sat a beautiful woman.

When Qin Hongyue saw Wei Keng, she smiled faintly and removed her hairpin. Her long black hair fell like a waterfall. Then the youthful, mature beauty said, "Young Master, I'm here to attend to you tonight."

Wei Keng was momentarily dazed.

A gentle beauty in your arms could sap a hero's resolve. Most men in the twenty-first century claimed to be straight and said they could resist, but the truth was they'd never had the chance.

When a young woman turned gentle and flowed toward you like water, all talk of masculine resolve, morality, and integrity went out the window.

Wei Keng immediately backed away. He returned to the changing room, looked at himself in the mirror, turned on the gold-plated faucet, and splashed water onto his face. Then he dried it.

If he couldn't keep his composure in this room, he needed to reset himself.

He went back into the room and faced the "skeleton beneath the rouge" again.

After a long pause, Wei Keng managed to ask, "Um, are you a virgin?"—a stupid question that could only have come after the twenty-first century. He thought, When I'm offered something I can hardly refuse but have to turn down, I need to find a flaw and convince myself.

Qin Hongyue smiled. "Young Master, you can rest assured. Everything has been arranged exclusively for someone of your standing. I'm naturally pure and untouched."

Wei Keng raised a hand and covered his stiff, twitching cheek.

After several rounds of inner struggle, Wei Keng gritted his teeth and said, "All right. You can leave."

The woman's body stiffened slightly. Then she turned and asked, "Young Master, won't you remember this night?"

Wei Keng took a deep breath. In the end, he suppressed his desire and said, "I'm tired today. Go. If you don't leave, I'll have to sleep somewhere else."

Qin Hongyue studied Wei Keng's conflicted expression, then watched as he finally steeled himself. A teasing smile touched her lips. "You're an interesting man, Young Master. Good night." She rose gracefully and left the room.

As the door closed, Wei Keng turned around, feeling both relieved and regretful. He wasn't paying attention and bumped his head on the bed's doorway, raising a lump.

With a long sigh, he took out Paper and Pen and stared at the densely written plans he had made for himself. After a long while, he set them aside and went to sleep wrapped in the quilt.

In a room three floors away, Qin Hongyue opened a screen and reported what had happened to the person on the other end.

The person on the screen asked, "What? He turned you down?"

"Yes. But he wavered a little. We could try Plan B."

Qin Hongyue was speaking with the person in charge of the Wei Family's third branch at Luoshui Group. Wei Keng's father had fathered many children in this plane. Still, Wei Keng and Wei Qiang's status as legitimate sons couldn't be shaken within the clan system.

The third-branch representative said, "There's no need to try anything. Just stay with him."

Nine hours later, dawn broke.

Wei Keng woke up. His body had been frozen in this world for more than thirty years, but he was still in a young man's body.

After yawning, he looked at the sunlight outside the window and complained, though he was really regretful. "Couldn't you have climbed into my bed at night? If you're going to make things exciting, you should see it through."

A few dozen seconds later, he muttered, "Bah, bah. Calm down. Calm down."

With his thoughts in the gutter, Wei Keng rinsed his mouth and washed his face, waiting for his ardor to die down.

Once they set off again, Wei Keng found the person in charge of the itinerary and issued an uncompromising order. "Yesterday's delay was unacceptable. No matter what, I'm returning to my destination today."

After stressing it so firmly, Wei Keng found that the journey went much more smoothly. The accompanying motorcycles and the road closures were both scaled back.

Through the real-world view outside the Domestic Water-Repelling Golden-Eye Van, he could see more of the local people.

Xijing's streets were full of idle young men, and they were constantly seen gathering around the Speech Platform.

At the Speech Platform, councilors were passionately expounding on the Gongyang School—the grand theory in the Gongyang Commentary about xxx!

Buddhists often said, "Put down the butcher's knife and become a Buddha," and, "Turn back from the boundless sea of suffering, and you'll find the shore." Daoism also advocated balance and harmony. But the Gongyang School cried, "National enmity! Even if it takes nine generations—or a hundred—you must avenge it!"

In Wei Keng's era in the Main World, Confucianism was considered relatively moderate. Hearing this doctrine so suddenly left him unsettled.

Perhaps noticing that Wei Keng kept looking out at the Speech Gatherers, Qin Hongyue said, "Young Master, don't listen to the words of those riffraff. They only gather like this for a day's food."

As she spoke, she pointed out the organizers handing out food vouchers after the speeches.

These speaking events were actually arranged by people in the city's Political Affairs Council.

Shenzhou now had a high rate of displaced people. Large numbers of strong, energetic men were roaming in groups, so the authorities sent people to provide relief. They also arranged for lecturers to give speeches while food was distributed. These "lecturers" were modeled on the "political instructors" in the military, and were common in Shenzhou's official relief organizations.

An old saying went, "Trying to stop the people's mouths is harder than trying to stop a river." If you couldn't block the flow, you had to divert it. Since ancient times, Zhuxia had been expert at controlling floods.

Who were Shenzhou's enemies these days? There were plenty abroad.

For the moment, the Rising Sun and Shenzhou were still allies. Luoshui Group's main industry was aviation, and the Rising Sun's West Armored Mech Research Center had already developed the Sky Dog Mech. This fighter would eventually be widely deployed in the Empire's air force. But in Shenzhou, major mech media outlets such as the Nanyang Morning Post had already started stirring things up, insisting that military aid to the Rising Sun had to end. Was there any truth to that? Well, it wasn't baseless. The Rising Sun was a dutiful son—the kind like Arthas and Jaina. It had built a number of wartime bases on the Korean Peninsula.

Meanwhile, in northern Shuoyuan, the Krasna Aerospace Agency had applied its gravity-isolation system to military use, and had finished developing the Kirov Heavy Airship. It lacked maneuverability, but its heavy armor and the bombardment capabilities of its heavy cruise missiles posed a huge threat to Shenzhou's northern frontier.

Europa and New Rome were Shenzhou's biggest trading partners, but after occupying the mineral-rich Yanzhou Continent, those blond foreigners had also set their sights on Shenzhou's interests in the Persian Gulf, which was under its protection.

So, judged by the harshest standards, they were all enemies. But constantly emphasizing these external enemies was really just a way to cover up internal problems.

The sudden popularity of the Gongyang School in Shenzhou had drawn different interpretations from every social class.

The first group was made up of small-time merchants who traveled throughout the country. They thought the Pure stream was rallying public opinion—in other words, political nobodies were using these street events to get themselves more exposure.

The second group consisted of the few Xiucai who had gotten their hands on banned works like Commerce Theory. They recognized this as Cao Gong's ploy to "borrow a head" and turn public opinion around.

The third group was Shenzhou's establishment. They knew the people's suffering had reached a critical point. Food relief could keep most people from charging a Dao Prefecture in despair, but it couldn't stop the Wuxia, with nothing to do, from growing restless. Newspapers and radio had long been widespread, and there were even flip phones. Men who had reached adulthood had more ways to access information. Traditional methods of appeasement no longer worked. They had to give the people the fantasy that they might become great, soaring swans. So, to the high officials of the Imperial Court, provoking them and sending them hustling through the streets was a way to channel their Blood Courage and prevent a major upheaval.

The fourth group consisted of people who wielded real power over the realm. To these great families who truly ruled the world, population was a resource—but if it couldn't be put to use, it became a hot potato. In the imperial era, population explosions had caused agricultural production to collapse, and the resulting mass of displaced people could shake a dynasty to its foundations.

But during the Little Ice Age three hundred years earlier, Shenzhou had successfully used its far greater population than Europa's to launch a second great expansion. Immigrants from Min Yue and Zhongyuan came to the Nanyang region and formed the Xiangzu Model, which was far more advanced than that of the local natives. They seized land, water, and Mountain Forest, grew crops, built forts, and laid roads and bridges. In one stroke, that era opened up eight prefectures in the Nanyang region for Shenzhou and supplied the initial resources for its Industrial Revolution.

In Qin Tong Calendar year 2201, when Shenzhou faced another economic crisis, it once again resorted to this model. It invaded southern India from Myanmar, sending six million settlers there over thirty years and crushing European rule in South Asia. It built a railway from Shudi through Southeast Asia and onward into South Asia, moved twenty million people there, and completely assimilated the locals, turning the entire South Asian Subcontinent into a new land of plenty.

Of course, Shenzhou had swallowed all of Tianzhu without leaving so much as a scrap. Its advance, like a civilizational steamroller, had terrified all of Europa. The farsighted people of Europa believed that unless they formed a Holy Alliance, in a few centuries the East would crush the countries of the Western Continent one by one. That was how global competition began, with the European countries uniting to fight Shenzhou.

You might succeed in expanding abroad the first few times by relying on your size, but eventually the others would definitely guard against you.

King of Qin's unification of the Six Harmonies had been built on the efforts of several generations of wise kings, culminating in a single sweeping victory in the reign of Qin Shi Huang. If Qin had waited another century or two after conquering Han, the other states would have had plenty of time to learn from their defeats and reform their systems. Qin would no longer have been able to push forward.

Now Shenzhou had reached another point in the historical cycle, with too many people again. Most of the population had only received Elementary Education and couldn't keep up with the manufacturing demands of the new High-Tech Workshops. If these uneducated people couldn't find a sense of purpose in social production, they could only find some semblance of it in Triad Gangs. That was why the street-corner political influencers who boasted, "We, Zhuxia, value martial prowess," always attracted a crowd.

Wei Keng said, "Emotionally, I agree with the first group's analysis, because I hate moral blackmail, using the greater good to manipulate people, and the shamelessness of making an example of a few insignificant people.

"What I've learned makes me understand the second group's concerns. This vast realm really does need to change.

"But my actions can only belong to the third group. The people's unrest is like a tangled mess. There are factional struggles, and everyone has their own agenda. The only way to unite them is to fight enemies abroad. And as for where I stand—"

Wei Keng glanced at the limited-edition van worth twenty million under him, then sighed. "I'm sitting on the fourth level."

Wei Keng placed his hand on Qin Hongyue's jade-smooth thigh, feeling its softness and firm muscles, and grumbled inwardly, If I stay in this position too long, I'll only ever see things from the fourth level.

Wei Keng suddenly remembered the system's monitoring protocols. He withdrew his hand and coughed at the maid beside him, whose face had reddened all the way to her collarbones. Putting on an air of righteousness, he said, "Just now, uh, I didn't mean to put my hand there."