Yan Province.
Inside the Chancellor's residence, the atmosphere was likewise strange to the extreme.
Seated at the head of the room, Cao Cao read the Heavenly Screen's description of Fa Zheng and Li Yan kneeling and bowing before the poetry manuscript. His face flushed crimson, his expressions a spectacle in themselves.
Wait, man, how did that work?
Writing good poetry could win people over, too?
Wasn't that a little too outrageous?
The corners of Cao Cao's mouth twitched. Unable to help himself, he was the first to speak, his mockery tinged with sourness. "Fa Zheng and Li Yan come from distinguished clans of Yizhou, after all. How could they kneel and bow before someone's poetry collection?"
"They've utterly disgraced the literati."
"Where is their dignity?"
Yet despite the mockery on his lips, towering waves surged through Cao Cao's heart.
Those lines, whether "Clouds called to mind her robes, flowers her face" or "Ten years, the living and the dead, both lost in boundless sorrow," were truly pearls in every word, shattering stone and startling the heavens.
Even he, a formidable hero of the age who prided himself on his literary brilliance, had to concede defeat before these verses.
This fellow not only enjoyed flourishing military fortunes, but possessed terrifying literary talent as well.
And it was not just him. Emperor Xian of Han, Liu Xie, beside him, and the advisers below, including Xun Yu and Guo Jia, all looked as though they had seen a ghost.
"Your Majesty, this poem... truly is a stroke of divine inspiration."
An elderly minister spoke in a trembling voice.
"More than a stroke of divine inspiration. In my humble opinion, even if Qu Zi himself returned to life, I fear he could not write a lament for the dead so heartfelt and sincere."
Guo Jia shook his head, disbelief written all over his face.
Discussion broke out among them. None could fathom how this greatest emperor of all time, whom the Heavenly Screen praised to the skies, had actually risen by "living off women."
Then again, the fellow really was handsome. It was not hard to understand why beautiful women would lose their hearts to him.
But what exactly were this so-called "draping in the yellow robe" and "Yizhou Discourse" all about?
Could it be that, just like last night, he had simply taken Liu Zhang, the Governor of Yizhou, and... offed him?
That bloody conjecture filled everyone's minds.
Compared with Cao Cao's mixture of shock and admiration, the reactions of Liu Bei and his two sworn brothers far away in Yuzhou were much more straightforward.
"Fuck his bloody ancestors!"
Zhang Fei, whose temper was the fieriest, slammed his palm onto the low table, cracking the wood outright.
His great bronze-bell eyes bulged as he unleashed a torrent of abuse. "What can this Yang Feng do besides look like a pretty boy?"
"What the hell has he written? It's all sickeningly sentimental."
"And people actually appreciate it!"
"Damn it, Fa Zheng and Li Yan must be blind, kneeling and bowing before a few lousy sheets of paper. I've really got to hand it to them."
Beside him, Guan Yu stroked his long, magnificent beard, his phoenix eyes narrowing slightly. In a rare show of agreement, he said, "Third Brother's words are not without reason."
"Such conduct truly lacks the integrity of distinguished scholars."
Only Liu Bei, though his face also showed indignation, harbored a trace of indescribably complicated feeling deep in his eyes.
First, he checked his two younger brothers' anger. "Second Brother, Third Brother, you cannot put it that way."
"In all fairness, these poems truly are masterpieces unrivaled throughout the ages."
But Liu Bei's heart was already filled with overwhelming envy and jealousy.
Good heavens.
Wasn't this Yang Feng far too lucky?
I, Liu Bei, started out weaving mats and selling sandals. After half a lifetime of running about, I finally gained a little renown, yet I still live under another man's roof, without even a place to settle down and establish myself.
And him? He casually wrote a few poems and got his hands on a land of heavenly abundance like Yizhou?
This... this really could anger a man to death.
Why him?
If I, Liu Bei, had such luck, winning the hearts of two women and the wholehearted support of two great aristocratic clans, why would I worry about failing to accomplish great things?
Alas, comparing yourself to others really could infuriate you to death.
Yet whether it was the cursing Zhang Fei or Liu Bei, whose jealousy soared to the heavens, they shared one question.
How exactly had Yang Feng, a fellow born a slave, persuaded those two Central Shu heavyweights, Fa Zheng and Li Yan, to willingly help him seize Yizhou?
While the heroes beneath heaven each weighed their own thoughts, a young man wearing a silk headcloth and holding a feather fan on Wolong Ridge in Nanyang noticed a detail everyone else had overlooked.
He paid no attention to the poems that shook the world, nor did he concern himself with the salacious romantic rumors.
His gaze locked firmly onto the final line on the Heavenly Screen.
"Draped in the yellow robe... Yizhou Discourse?"
The young man murmured to himself, his brows tightly furrowed.
"Yizhou Discourse..."
"Why does that phrase sound so familiar?"
While the people beneath heaven reacted with shock, anger, envy, or doubt, Yizhou, at the very center of the storm, had already descended into a bubbling cauldron of chaos.
Chengdu, inside the Governor's residence.
As Liu Zhang stared at the eight large, golden characters on the Heavenly Screen-"Draped in the yellow robe, Yizhou Discourse"-he felt the world spin and his vision darken.
He nearly toppled straight out of his seat.
Draped in the yellow robe?
Who was being draped in the yellow robe?
That went without saying.
Whose territory was being seized?
That was even more obvious.
He could no longer sit still.