A murmur of discussion immediately rose through the great hall.
The Seventeenth Imperial Prince had actually volunteered to leave the Divine Capital and take up a fief in the northwest!
This move was almost tantamount to publicly withdrawing from the struggle for the throne.
Once an imperial prince left the Capital Region and established his princely residence, unless the Divine Capital underwent an earth-shattering upheaval, he would find it difficult to compete for the future sovereign's seat with the princes who remained in the capital.
Emperor Jingtai was clearly very satisfied with the Seventeenth Imperial Prince's choice, and seemed rather gratified.
He had actually conferred the title of Pacify-the-West Commandery Prince on him outright, along with the high office of Deputy Protector of the Western Regions.
The fellow was only at peak Golden Core.
An ordinary imperial prince would merely receive an imperial noble rank such as commandery duke, county duke, commandery marquis, or county marquis, with a stipend roughly equivalent to that of a third-, fourth-, or fifth-rank immortal official.
Still, the imperial edict spelled things out clearly.
Ji Chengjing was not permitted to mobilize troops without authorization or interfere in local taxation. He was only responsible for following Qing Chen to learn frontier affairs and participating in legislation and warfare concerning the Golden Tent Khanate and the various nations of the Western Regions.
Though called the Deputy Protector of the Western Regions, this newly appointed commandery prince was actually being entrusted to Qing Chen for guidance and experience.
It was a clever choice, too. After all, he had no powerful support, and securing a commandery prince's title without trouble was already a very good outcome.
Yet even at this point, the imperial edict was still not finished.
Wei Jin took another breath and unfurled a supplementary golden edict