By the time Li Chen and several administrators from Yongzhen Academy reached the outside, the Eastern Hedge Retreat's guards had already been knocked to the ground by the intruders. The tables, chairs, and furnishings by the entrance had been smashed and scattered, lying askew in utter disarray.
Several martial artists wearing the Demon-Quelling Bureau's brocade uniforms, with fine steel sabers at their waists, stood there arrogantly and eyed them. "You're the ones in charge here? Arrest every last one of them!"
"Wait. Which department and office do you belong to? Did your superiors not tell you what sort of place this is? How dare you come here to cause trouble?" one of Yongzhen Academy's administrators demanded.
"Well, well, you old fellow have quite an attitude. I don't care what high officials, noblemen, or heads of illustrious families you are. Today, you'll do as we say!"
"Because we're the Demon-Quelling Bureau's Embroidered Uniform Guard, the emperor's own troops, carrying out an imperial decree. Understand?"
The martial artists refused to buy the Yongzhen Academy administrator's argument.
The administrators exchanged looks, feeling rather like scholars confronted by soldiers: however sound their reasoning, there was no getting it across.
"Master Green Lotus, I see what's going on now. These men are simply ignorant louts. They don't recognize either your name or ours, and they might not even know what Yongzhen Academy is."
"These are the so-called ignorant masses!"
"With such vulgar men, I fear even announcing your name would be futile. Please go inside and rest a while. Leave us to send them away."
The Yongzhen Academy administrators communicated through secret voice transmissions.
Li Chen chuckled inwardly at their words. Seeing the situation, he too had quickly understood what was happening.
The world spoken of by the Confucian Sect was the world of scholars.