This was Zhuang Kingdom.
In the fourth year of Fengtian, Zhuang Kingdom had not welcomed the glory people had imagined. Even in terms of ordinary folk's lives, things had not improved.
From "Yongtai" to "Dading," from "Dawn" to "Fengtian," it seemed only the reign title had changed.
National wars, assassinations of kings, political reforms, coups... heads were severed one after another, banners changed batch after batch, territory expanded and shrank, yet people went on living as they always had.
Those who stood atop the city walls, gesturing grandly as they surveyed the scenery, changed and changed again, round after round.
Perhaps the common people who faced yellow earth with their backs to the sky were the only eternal constant.
When the Fengtian reign title had first begun, Zhuang Kingdom had actually cut quite a fine figure.
The Council of Elders had formally taken control of the nation, fully throwing in with the Daoist Sect. No longer did it harbor private ambitions and offer outward obedience while inwardly defying, as it had under the Zhuang Emperor. Led by State Daoist Academy Libationer Zhang Ren, the Council of Elders was utterly loyal to the Daoist Sect.
At the behest of its then Chief Instructor, Zong Dezhen, Yujing Mountain gave the Zhuang Kingdom Council of Elders remarkably direct support, greatly bolstering the nation's fortunes. Indeed, in the "Twelve Dao Palaces" strategy Zong Dezhen had mapped out at the time, he had personally marked off Zhuang Kingdom's three thousand li of mountains and rivers with his Vermilion Brush.
As a crucial link in Zong Dezhen's grand plan to make the Daoist Sect preeminent, the "Twelve Dao Palaces" strategy had been backed by an ocean of resources.
Unfortunately, Heaven Does Not Grant Wishes... Zhang Ren was still here, exhausting himself in service, when the Chief