At that moment, Zhang Xing wavered.
He truly wavered, from the bottom of his heart, because this Intendant had shown him a path he had never imagined... bizarre, shocking, yet full of possibilities...
Zhang Xing could almost picture it: once he nodded and became this imperial kinsman and senior minister's adopted son, he could easily cross countless invisible barriers. He would be a fish in water within the Jing'an Directorate. Once he had the seniority and cultivation, he could easily put on the Vermilion Sash that marked his admission to the inner ranks. Even later transfers to the military or local government, becoming a general or a chancellor, would be like walking on level ground.
To put it plainly, being this childless Intendant's adopted son was a ticket, a ticket that would allow his abilities to receive their rightful recognition... without ability, he would merely muddle along as a doorkeeper like Xue Liang, but with ability, he could enter the inner halls and aim straight for the Southern Office.
And if that happened, even those private feelings between him and Bai Yousi would no longer face the issue everyone had avoided all along: the gulf between their family backgrounds.
But that was not even the rarest benefit.
The rarest, or rather the most immediate and most tempting benefit to Zhang Xing, was that he needed only to nod to gain immediate access to Great Wei's highest power.
Its highest power, without any doubt, because this Great Grandmaster was himself a representative of the empire's supreme authority. He was one pole among the Southern Office's ruling ministers, independently controlling the vast majority of Great Wei's secret-service forces. To some extent, his status and lack of blood descendants had even allowed him to openly carve off a portion of imperial power. By