It was late October, and the first snow was approaching.
The October twentieth edition of the Literary Gazette devoted extensive coverage to two matters: the course of the Three Valleys Battle and the Longxi Village incident.
The controversy, already boiling over, was reignited.
At first, everyone under heaven debated whether Fang Yun had been right or wrong, but later, they began debating whether his methods had been too harsh.
Every day, large numbers of scholars petitioned below Upside-Down Peak Mountain on behalf of the Longxi villagers, demanding that the Hall of Punishment thoroughly investigate the case and suspend Fang Yun's Palace Examination.
The Sacred Academy continued to refuse their petitions.
The two sides remained deadlocked.
But those with genuine aspirations, even those who opposed Fang Yun, stopped arguing and turned their attention to the north of the Human Race's lands.
North of Ning'an City, the Crafts Hall had completed ten new fortresses. On the map of Jing Kingdom, they formed an arc that defended the Human Race's territory.
One million new troops had finished training, a second million had begun, and reinforcements from the other kingdoms had arrived and prepared for battle.
The million new troops and six hundred thousand veterans were organized into sixteen armies, each with one hundred thousand combat soldiers.
Every five hundred thousand combat soldiers formed a guard army. Three such armies had already been established, each led by a Grand Academician.
Grand Academician Lan Xungu, the Left Prime Minister's right-hand man, had originally commanded Jade Sun Pass and would certainly have taken command of a guard army. But when a million Water Race Demon Barbarians attacked Ning'an atop the Raging Waves Battle Platform, he had sent no troops to help. The Hall of Punishment investigated him rigorously, and he killed himself out of fear of