"Fame Promotion Plan?"
Inside Langya Pavilion, Lu Xingshi had been drawing blueprints when Murong Xuan suddenly came up with this, saying he wanted to make him the Number One Under Heaven.
He checked his achievement missions. The Number One Under Heaven still showed no movement, but his reputation mission had changed from just starting out to well-known far and wide. Mainly because what he had done at Tiange Pass had spread, and his fame had naturally traveled with it.
The martial world now called him the Golden Crow Divine General. The Imperial Court was probably guiding things as well, deliberately tying him to it.
He must have benefited from Murong Xuan's influence, but Lu Xingshi merely listened and had no intention of truly stirring up more trouble.
"I know about becoming the Number One Under Heaven, but that isn't how you get there. If we build momentum through public opinion, the backlash will come sooner or later." Lu Xingshi knew that this truly was the perfect chance to strike while the iron was hot. His current reputation might not have been blazing like the midday sun, but he could still make the top ten trending ranks in the martial world.
So long as they put in some effort, with Murong Xuan's connections in both the martial world and the court, pushing Lu Xingshi to the top of the rankings would not be difficult.
Yet Lu Xingshi refused. The time was not right yet; his Golden Crow had not been completed.
"You aren't really planning to rise to prominence by stepping on the great sects and famous clans, are you?" Murong Xuan looked astonished.
"Unless something unexpected happens, their little bit of strength doesn't even qualify them to be stepped on by me," Lu Xingshi said bluntly.
He had now completed the full cultivation of Kun Peng Devouring the World. He had begun combining vast quantities of martial arts, using Kun Peng Devouring the World together with Eternal Youth to create his own cultivation method, though his progress remained limited for now.
And what he needed now was not ordinary martial arts inheritances, but powerful ones—such as the Imperial Awakening Palace's Imperial Zenith Heavenly Tome.
Previously, he had intended to obtain a few ordinary inheritances. But now, he wanted more.
Doing this would inevitably make him mortal enemies with those sects, so to prevent unforeseen complications, he had to make thorough preparations.
Just as Murong Xuan had said, seizing their sect-defending inheritances was, in some ways, even harder than killing them.
"I know you're strong, but you still can't look down on everyone under heaven. Personal martial prowess is limited in the end," Murong Xuan warned, hoping Lu Xingshi would keep a level head instead of being so arrogant—even if he truly had the right to be arrogant.
"Exactly. That's why I've been holed up in Langya Pavilion, forging a complete Golden Crow." Lu Xingshi had not acted precisely because of such concerns.
Hearing that, Murong Xuan could only curse inwardly even more. No wonder this brat had been so quiet lately. So he really was planning to make his name by trampling over the great sects and famous clans.
Of course Murong Xuan knew what the Golden Crow was. He had seen the design blueprints Lu Xingshi had drawn and could not understand them in the slightest, but he could understand Lu Xingshi's plans: a unique piece of equipment combining armor, weapons, cannons, and matchlock guns.
Even if Murong Xuan wore it himself, he would fear neither bows nor crossbows, and could cleave through a thousand troops with his blade.
The drawback was that he could not wear it. The Golden Crow's weight was terrifying; if he put it on, he would probably be unable to take even a single step.
Yet on Lu Xingshi, it had no weight at all.
"All right, but you need to hurry. Prince of Wu has gone north to purge the emperor's entourage," Murong Xuan said, delivering this news.
"Prince of Wu? Which one?" Lu Xingshi had no impression of him. The emperor had many sons.
"The one whose fief is in Jiangnan," Murong Xuan said.
"That isn't too surprising. Jiangnan is wealthy and prosperous, and it also has... wait, Jiangnan? I remember that the realm's scholars all come from Jiangnan, don't they?" Lu Xingshi suddenly realized something. He read books too, so he naturally knew the saying. When Great Song selected officials, roughly sixty percent were scholars from Jiangnan, while the remaining forty percent was divided among all other regions.
Thus, seventy or eighty percent of the court officials were probably Jiangnan natives.
Only sixty percent were selected, but there were simply too many of them. They formed regional cliques and excluded outsiders, so most capital officials came from the Jiangnan region.
The local officials, naturally, came from the remaining forty percent.
"Right. That's what makes it so puzzling." Murong Xuan did not understand it either.
"This is practically like rebelling against himself... no, that's not right. It really isn't right!" Lu Xingshi suddenly realized something. Why would Jiangnan rebelling be impossible?
It was true that the realm's scholars came from Jiangnan, but those were scholars. The ones rebelling did not necessarily have to be educated men.
"Land annexation!" Lu Xingshi said directly.
As soon as those words fell, Murong Xuan understood why Prince of Wu could succeed. The people he had won over were not the scholar faction at all, but those who had been driven to the end of the road by powerful interest groups.
Their lands had been annexed by powerful clans and great households, leaving them with nowhere to go. Prince of Wu would not even need to propagandize; they would willingly rise up and follow him.
After three hundred years of Great Song, land annexation had long become severe. Especially after civil officials began restraining military officials, expansion beyond the borders had largely ceased, and the contradictions had turned inward.
Back when they could still expand outward, land had continuously increased, so there had been no need to worry about such problems.
Now they no longer had that ability. It was already good enough if they could keep the frontier from being battered by foreign tribes. Especially after Prince of Liao's death, the court's lords had used every kind of method to divide the Saibei generals and further suppress military officials. There were not many capable fighters left.
If Prince of Wu succeeded, Great Song might still be able to continue for another stretch. Otherwise, what came next would be difficult to handle.
Saibei did not only have Barbarians. There were also Yi, Rong, Di, and the other foreign peoples whom Great Song had driven into the Gobi in those years. Once something went seriously wrong, they would surely head south.
"No matter how this is done, the risks are enormous." Murong Xuan, however, was worried for Prince of Wu.
Because Prince of Wu had placed himself in opposition to all the realm's literati. Even Prince of Liao could slip and fall into the water, let alone Prince of Wu.
Prince of Wu was unlike Prince of Liao, who had once been a First-Rate Expert. Prince of Wu knew martial arts too, but was not skilled in them. Instead, he was more adept at governance, which was why he had become the Prince of Wu in Jiangnan, meant to balance the Jiangnan faction.
"So long as it doesn't involve us, it doesn't matter." Lu Xingshi was not particularly concerned. There were certainly risks, but the rewards for success were immense. He would go directly from Prince of Wu to His Majesty the Emperor. If there were no risks at all, wouldn't everyone be able to do it?
"That's true." Murong Xuan agreed. The matter involved far too much, and he was powerless to do anything about it. Then he changed the subject. "So when will your Golden Crow be finished?"
"Soon, soon." Lu Xingshi answered vaguely. Once the design blueprints were completed, they still had to be tested. As long as the tests were done, there would basically be no major problems left.
At the very least, it would take another month or so.
He was crafting it all by hand, without the aid of any modern industrial equipment, so naturally it would not be easy.
But once it was complete, he would not even need to fight personally. He could simply bombard the mountain gates of those great sects and famous clans, making every last one of them squat down with their heads in their hands.