Raiding the Great Gan Imperial Treasury, One Hundred Thousand Iron Cavalry at the City Gates

After Lin Hanzhou suppressed the rebellion, Li Yuechan immediately dispatched men to seize all the princes involved in the coup, along with their accomplices.

Inside the imperial palace, Li Yuechan sat upright upon the dragon throne, the last traces of her youthful timidity having vanished from her face.

In their place was a cold, imperial majesty.

"Transmit my decree."

Her crimson lips parted slightly; her voice was not loud, yet it echoed clearly in everyone's ears.

"The First Prince Li Xun, the Third Prince Li Tai, and the others have rebelled and incited chaos. Their crimes are unforgivable; they shall be beheaded to serve as a warning to all!"

"As for their accomplices, they are equally guilty and shall be beheaded on the spot as well."

A single icy decree instantly sealed the fates of dozens of imperial relatives and high-ranking court officials.

This was the first fire Li Yuechan lit after ascending the throne.

She used the blood of her own brothers to cleanse the majesty of imperial power and to declare to all under heaven:

She, Li Yuechan, was no longer the Ninth Princess who could be bullied by anyone, but the absolute Empress of the Great Gan Dynasty!

Following the issuance of the decree, those princes and court officials were executed on the spot.

Since the court floor was already stained with blood due to Lin Hanzhou's intervention, no one minded adding a little more.

After dealing with the rebels, Li Yuechan issued a second, and most important, decree.

"I hereby appoint Lin Hanzhou as the Grand Protector State Preceptor of our Great Gan. Henceforth, to see the State Preceptor is to see me!"

This decree formally established Lin Hanzhou's transcendent status in the entire Great Gan Dynasty—one person above all, and ten thousand below.

The situation in the Capital City was, for the moment, finally stabilized.

Li Yuechan knew clearly that all of this was owed to that one man.

That night, deep within the palace.

Li Yuechan secretly summoned Lin Hanzhou.

"Master State Preceptor."

She bowed deeply to Lin Hanzhou, completely shedding the airs of an empress.

"Without the State Preceptor, there would be no Yue Chan today, nor would there be a Great Gan."

"Yue Chan has nothing to repay you with, so I can only offer the treasures of the Great Gan imperial family. I hope the State Preceptor will accept them."

As she spoke, she took the Imperial Seal of State, which represented the legitimacy of imperial power, from her bosom.

"Does the State Preceptor know that besides symbolizing imperial power, this Imperial Seal of State has another very important function?"

At this point, a hint of pride flashed in Li Yuechan's eyes.

"It is the only key to opening the greatest treasury of our Great Gan imperial family!"

"This seal was carved from an extraterrestrial meteorite by the Founding Emperor of our Great Gan."

Hearing this, Lin Hanzhou nodded slightly; he clearly had not expected the seal to have such a function.

At the same time, he began to look forward to the Great Gan Dynasty's imperial treasury.

A treasury passed down for hundreds of years must surely contain many fine things, right?

Soon, Li Yuechan led Lin Hanzhou to a hidden location in the deepest part of the imperial palace.

Before a seemingly ordinary stone wall, Li Yuechan slowly pressed the Imperial Seal of State into a groove on the wall.

"Rumble--!"

Accompanied by a dull, thunderous sound, the entire stone wall slowly shifted to the sides.

A massive cavern entrance, radiating a rich aura of spiritual energy, appeared before the two of them.

"Master State Preceptor, please, this way."

Li Yuechan carried a palace lantern and walked in first, with Lin Hanzhou following behind.

When he saw the scene inside the treasury, even though he had once been the emperor of the Great Sui, he could not help but gasp.

This... this was far too luxurious!

It was a massive underground space, the size of several football fields.

On one side of the space stood rows of giant bookshelves crafted from thousand-year-old nanmu wood.

The shelves were densely packed with all manner of cultivation techniques and classics.

From the most basic third-rate martial arts to master-level techniques that would drive the martial world into a frenzy, everything was there.

A rough estimate suggested there were at least several thousand volumes.

On the other side, there were mountains of rare treasures and materials.

There were century-old ginseng, fleeceflower roots, and all kinds of rare ores and medicinal herbs...

This was the entire foundation of the Great Gan Dynasty, accumulated over hundreds of years.

"Master State Preceptor, this place is the treasury of our Great Gan."

"From this day forth, you possess the highest authority to enter and exit this place freely."

"You may peruse all the cultivation techniques here, and you may take and use any resources as you please."

The voice of Yue Chan carried an incomparable sincerity.

Listening to her words and looking at the dazzling array of treasures surrounding him, a heartfelt smile appeared on the face of Lin Hanzhou.

He had truly not misjudged her; the Ninth Princess had been clever since she was a child, and it was worth all the help he had given her.

Thus, in the time that followed, Lin Hanzhou became completely immersed in this massive treasury.

He was like a parched sponge, frantically absorbing the knowledge and resources found here.

He read through various cultivation manuals and classic texts, forgetting to eat or sleep, drawing parallels to perfect his own martial arts theories.

At the same time, he did not stand on ceremony, swallowing century-old spiritual herbs as if they were sugar beans.

He refined the medicinal power within them to elevate and consolidate his own cultivation.

Meanwhile, in the outside world, with the loyal commander of the Imperial Guard and supreme grandmaster Wang Jian holding the fort, the situation in the Capital City would not fall into chaos.

Everything seemed to be moving in a positive direction.

However, the good times did not last long.

On the fifteenth day of Lin Hanzhou's seclusion, an urgent military report, delivered at eight hundred li a day, struck the Capital City like a bolt from the blue.

The Great Qing Dynasty in the north had assembled an elite army of one hundred thousand, known as the "Snow Wolf Iron Cavalry," and marched south.

For reasons unknown, these one hundred thousand iron cavalry had bypassed the front lines where they were currently locked in a standoff, driving straight into the heartland of the Great Gan Dynasty.

Now, those one hundred thousand iron cavalry had arrived at the gates of the Capital City.

This news caused the Capital City, which had only been stable for half a month, to instantly fall into a state of immense panic.

One hundred thousand Snow Wolf Iron Cavalry!

The terror of this army had long since spread throughout the Great Gan Dynasty along with the wars on the border.

Every single soldier among them was a second-rate martial artist capable of taking on ten, an elite force forged from mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

Although the defending Imperial Guard of the Capital City also numbered over one hundred thousand, in terms of combat power, they could not compare to the enemy's ace division.

But this was not the most desperate part.

The most desperate part was that the enemy's one hundred thousand iron cavalry were led by two grandmasters.

One must know that a grandmaster is known as a "match for ten thousand," capable of piercing through a massive army formation with their own strength!

And a grandmaster is, even more so, a legendary existence where one person is comparable to a million troops!

In front of them, the numbers of ordinary soldiers had lost all meaning.

The only ones who could deal with a grandmaster were other grandmasters.

Yet, in the entire Great Gan Dynasty, the grandmasters known to the public could be counted on one hand.

Those loyal to the imperial court numbered only two.

One was the General of the State, who was currently on the northern front lines, pinning down another grandmaster of the Great Qing Dynasty.

The other was an imperial retainer who was stationed year-round near the three major sects to monitor their movements.

Both of these grandmasters were incredibly far from the Capital City; distant water could not quench a nearby fire.

When the dark, looming silhouette of the Qing Army iron cavalry appeared on the horizon, the entire Capital City fell into a deathly silence.

The black Snow Wolf banners snapped and fluttered in the cold wind.

The iron-blooded Sha Qi gathered from one hundred thousand elite soldiers shrouded the entire Capital City.

On the city walls, the young empress who had ascended the throne only half a month ago, Yue Chan, now had a face as pale as paper.

The civil and military officials beside her were in a state of panic, displaying all manner of unsightly behavior.

Some were even secretly plotting in their hearts how to open the city gates and surrender to the enemy outside.

The Great Gan Dynasty was facing the most dangerous and desperate moment since its founding hundreds of years ago.