A cool-headed analysis

As he listened to the waves of thunderous cheers, Zi Shou felt miserable.

His incompetence points were gone, and so were his immortal pills.

Stay calm. Analyze this. Think it through.

There had to be something wrong here.

Zi Shou recalled the contents of the bamboo slips. There it was-the problem lay with Kong Xuan.

Of course he knew who Kong Xuan was: a quasi-sage, invincible beneath the sages. With him taking action, how long could the North Sea rebels possibly keep jumping around?

The question was, how had that bastard Fei Lian thought to bring Kong Xuan along to suppress the rebellion?

I've read Investiture of the Gods. Have you read Investiture of the Gods too?

That shouldn't be possible!

It could only be chalked up to coincidence-and Huang Feihu, who had helped Fei Lian transfer Kong Xuan without reporting it.

If Huang Feihu had reported to him promptly, he could have kept Kong Xuan behind, and this victory could certainly have been avoided.

Still, this works too. Now I have a reason to punish Huang Feihu. So the King of Wucheng Who Guards the Nation has a towering reputation? I'll demote you first.

Then there were those hundred Royal Guards.

As Zi Shou saw it, with a formidable enemy before them, it would have been good enough if these men hadn't deserted. How could every last one of them have charged to the front, using their lives to shield their commander from blades?

Yet that was exactly what they had done. They had protected Fei Lian amid the chaotic fighting, earning the admiration of the entire army sent to quell the rebellion. Even Kong Xuan had willingly conceded the foremost credit to them.

The sovereign's Royal Guards earned the greatest merit in suppressing the rebellion?

Naturally, that meant their king had trained them well!

With every Royal Guard so loyal and courageous, how wise and mighty must their sovereign be?

Zi Shou could already picture the army's return to court. He must have already established the image of an enlightened ruler in the soldiers' minds.

He had trained the Royal Guards and replaced the commander. He couldn't explain his way out of it even if he wanted to.

Their education was still incomplete; he hadn't properly instilled an overbearing mindset in them. Until their training reached perfection, he couldn't send the Royal Guards away again.

Wen Zhong stopped trying to dissuade him.

There was absolutely nothing wrong with the way His Majesty trained his soldiers.

Wen Zhong looked at the few Royal Guards beside Zi Shou, finding them more pleasing to the eye the longer he looked.

So what if they had fat heads and big ears? Without broad, thick bodies, how could they shield His Majesty from blades?

So what if they looked bad and acted arrogant and overbearing? They could draw assassins' hatred.

Huang Feihu stopped trying to dissuade him too.

He couldn't very well say, "Your Majesty, stop training soldiers and hurry up and favor my younger sister!"

Besides, the way Zi Shou was staring at him made his skin crawl.

I haven't done anything wrong lately, have I?

Soon, the assembled ministers grew lively.

Most of what they said was praise, lauding the Royal Guards and Zi Shou until flowers seemed to rain from the heavens. Even Fei Lian had become a valiant general of the age along with them.

When Minister Fei returned to court with his army, he would surely receive a promotion and a higher title. His soaring rise was all but assured.

Shang Rong stood at the head of the civil officials, his eyes darting about.

With the North Sea rebellion suppressed, King Zhou's prestige in the army was unrivaled. With Wen Zhong returning to court as well, the military officials would inevitably swing entirely to King Zhou's side. That would leave only the royal relatives, including Zi Qi, and the veteran ministers controlling court affairs, including Shang Rong himself, among the forces at odds with King Zhou.

They were plainly weak and isolated. More importantly, King Zhou now controlled the army.

Switch sides.

He had to switch sides.

Shang Rong shuddered. He had to pledge his allegiance.

Hadn't King Zhou used the consort selection to test them before?

Back then, he had used the North Sea war as grounds to oppose the selection. Now that the war was settled, if he brought it up again...

This could work!

Shang Rong prostrated himself. "Your old minister Shang Rong petitions Your Majesty! With our great victory in the North Sea, our nation enjoys Heaven's favor and the flourishing blessings of sun and moon. Grain fills our stores and silk stands in heaps, a sign of abundant prosperity."

"Heaven ordains Yin-Yang, and its decree must not be defied. Your Majesty is in the prime of life, at the proper age to take consorts. Upholding the teachings of Yanhuang and honoring filial duty, you should command the lords of the Four Garrisons to select one hundred beauties from respectable families in each of their domains, regardless of wealth, rank, poverty, or low birth. Let them be chosen solely for dignified looks, gentle temperaments, and graceful, virtuous conduct, to fill the Imperial Harem, bring Yin-Yang into flourishing harmony, and perpetuate the ancestral line!"

Zi Shou liked what he heard.

Whatever else happened, he first had to ruin his reputation. Selecting consorts on a grand scale was the best way to do that.

He vaguely remembered that Su Hu, the Marquis of Jizhou, had refused to send his daughter and declared, "Su Hu of Jizhou will never pay homage to Shang."

But the voice sounded a little familiar to Zi Shou. Looking closely, he realized the man making the suggestion was Shang Rong.

This wasn't right!

Wasn't Shang Rong a loyal minister? He even had a reputation for virtue, and had presided over rites and music under the previous king. Why would he propose selecting consorts?

Could it be...

Zi Shou thought it over. There did seem to be a reason.

Because he had been training the Royal Guards to walk with a tyrant's swagger, he hadn't favored anyone in the Imperial Harem. He knew it was because he had only just transmigrated and felt too unfamiliar with them to make a move, but nobody else knew that!

He currently had only two sons, and none of his other consorts had borne children. Compared with previous monarchs, he did indeed have rather few offspring.

After repeated consideration, Zi Shou agreed.

Selecting consorts might not earn him infamy or make people regard him as an incompetent ruler, but surely it couldn't leave them with yet another impression of an enlightened king.

Besides, once the new consorts arrived, if a few were beautiful and caught his fancy, he would have a perfectly legitimate reason to become a king who never attended morning court again.

The new consorts would be different from the old ones too. They would only just have met, so they could get acquainted slowly, and he could even enjoy the feeling of falling in love with a beauty.

Having thought it through, Zi Shou instructed the official attending him, "Transmit my decree at once to the lords of the Four Garrisons."

At that moment, another flash of inspiration struck Zi Shou.

This era had castrated men, but no palace eunuchs.

Castrated men served in positions such as palace attendants, inner servants, and gatekeepers, but they were few in number and low in status. They merely handled chores and delivered messages, forming one type of household retainer.

The messenger just now, for instance, was a castrated man and a retainer of Fei Lian. Having a fine tomb built for them was the greatest favor they could receive.

After the consort selection, there would be many more women in the Imperial Harem, and the consorts of the three palaces would need people to attend them.

Most of the previous consorts had come from wealthy, noble families and brought their own maids into the palace. But this selection disregarded wealth and status, so there would certainly be beauties of common birth.

Palace eunuchs could emerge naturally from that.

How many treacherous, power-grabbing ministers had this outstanding profession produced?

Those were exactly what Zi Shou urgently needed!

Besides, proposing the profession of palace eunuch was vicious enough in itself. If some monarch wanted to send your son into the palace to be castrated, you would certainly curse him.

Zi Shou felt that if palace eunuchs came into being at his hands, he would be saddled with infamy for all eternity. The North Sea victory would count for nothing.

Moreover, he could imitate the Ming Dynasty and establish the Eastern Depot. Answering only to the emperor, it could freely monitor and arrest officials and commoners without judicial approval-a most notorious institution of violence.

At that thought, Zi Shou finally felt at ease.

Consort selection plus eunuchs surely couldn't produce any more unexpected mishaps. He could smoothly become an incompetent ruler.

Zi Shou understood it all.

In this world of Investiture of the Gods, filled with gods and Buddhas, a human monarch's power truly amounted to little. In all likelihood, events would follow the story of Investiture of the Gods, with Great Shang marching steadily toward destruction.

The system was his greatest source of support. If he didn't earn more incompetence points to exchange for rare treasures and wondrous cultivation techniques, death would truly mean death. He could only follow the course of the investiture calamity like a puppet on strings.

Zi Shou didn't want to burn himself alive on the Deer Terrace. Just imagining being burned hurt! He would also choke to death on the smoke. How awful!

A few more months passed. The North Sea rebellion was completely quelled, and Fei Lian led the army back to court.

Zi Shou began considering how to deal with these generals who had earned merit.

As a monarch determined to become an incompetent ruler, he certainly couldn't reward meritorious service.

But if he didn't reward them, someone would surely question it. How should he respond then?

In the end, Fei Lian simply didn't know how to behave as a subject. Wouldn't it have been better to obediently return in crushing defeat? Instead, he just had to win.

Especially that meddlesome Kong Xuan. His appearance in the early stages of Investiture of the Gods was practically a bug. Unless a sage intervened, losing was impossible. He was far too much of an obstacle.

Zi Shou had to find a pretext to exile him to the frontier.

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