The golden words on the heavenly screen were like a final judgment, announcing the end of an era!
In Yan Province, Cao Cao read those lines, a sharp gleam flashing through his eyes!
A tyrant?
Exactly!
Wasn't that Dong Zhuo?
He narrowed his eyes, recalling the blood and fire in Luoyang back then, and a cold smile involuntarily curled his lips!
Dong Zhuo entered the capital, and the world plunged into chaos. This was precisely an age when heroes emerged in droves!
And wasn't he, Cao Mengde, the first to raise the banner of righteousness in these troubled times and campaign against that traitor to the nation?
Seen this way, who but me could be this one emperor for the ages!
In Yuzhou, Liu Bei let out a long sigh!
Dong Zhuo had thrown the government into chaos, and the House of Han had crumbled. He still remembered the devastation in Luoyang!
But then, the flame of hope rekindled in his eyes!
Troubled times bred heroes!
As a member of the Han imperial clan, he, Liu Bei, was duty-bound to restore the House of Han!
Perhaps this one emperor for the ages mentioned by the heavenly screen was Heaven's reward for his years of wandering and hardship, throughout which he had never forgotten his original aspirations!
In Ji Province, Yuan Shao stroked his beard, unable to conceal the smugness on his face!
Dong Zhuo!
Hmph!
Nothing but a warrior from the borderlands!
Had he, Yuan Benchu, not raised his arm and rallied the lords of Guandong back then, who could have kept Dong Zhuo in check?
He had been the alliance leader in the campaign against Dong Zhuo!
Who besides him, Yuan Benchu, deserved the title of one emperor for the ages!
Only Emperor Xian of Han, Liu Xie, sitting beside Cao Cao inside the imperial palace in Xu Capital, felt his heart turn to dead ashes!
It was over!
Completely over!
His ancestors' legacy!
The Great Han's four hundred years of rule!
It really would be destroyed in his hands!
Every word he read on the heavenly screen was like a knife stabbing viciously into his heart!
Whoever this one emperor for the ages turned out to be, it meant the end of his Liu dynasty!
He, the emperor, was destined to become the ruler who lost his country, nailed to history's pillar of shame!
A bone-deep chill rose from the soles of his feet and instantly spread throughout his body, leaving him so wracked with anguish that he nearly fainted!
Atop Shouchun's walls, Yang Feng silently nodded as he read the words on the heavenly screen!
Sigh!
This damned end of the Eastern Han!
The people truly had no way to live!
He recalled his days since transmigrating here. From a slave who had nearly starved to death, he had clawed his way forward through hardship. Simply surviving this long was a miracle!
No!
He couldn't stay here long!
That blockhead Yuan Shu would be finished sooner or later. He had to hurry and find a way to make a run for it!
While everyone's thoughts ran in different directions, the images on the heavenly screen began moving again, like a merciless historian coldly turning to history's bloodiest page!
[Dong Zhuo entered the capital!]
[He deposed Emperor Shao of Han and installed the young Emperor Xian of Han, Liu Xie, as a puppet, monopolizing all power!]
At this, Emperor Xian of Han's body shook violently once more!
Those humiliating memories assailed him again like a nightmare!
[After Dong Zhuo arrived in the capital, he took Lü Bu as his adopted son.]
[His adopted son Lü Bu was certainly obedient. Bought off with a single Red Hare Horse, he went straight to behead his adoptive father, Ding Yuan.]
As soon as the scene appeared, an uproar swept the world!
The military officers in particular watched, dumbstruck!
So Lü Bu had killed his adoptive father back then for a mere horse?
This Lü Bu was nothing short of a household slave with three surnames!
Utterly shameless!
The heavenly screen's account did not pause. Cold words continued to appear!
[Later, the Guandong Coalition launched a campaign against Dong Zhuo.]
[With Yuan Shao as alliance leader, Cao Cao, Yuan Shu, Sun Jian, Liu Bei, and others formed a coalition to campaign against Dong Zhuo together.]
In Ji Province, Yuan Shao saw his own name listed first as alliance leader, and his chin nearly tilted up to the heavens!
Look!
The heavenly screen had vindicated me!
I was the leader everyone had placed their hopes in!
[Later, the coalition's members each harbored their own hidden schemes, watching and waiting rather than advancing.]
[Only a handful, including Cao Cao and Sun Jian, fought in earnest.]
At those words, Yuan Shao's expression instantly soured!
Meanwhile, Cao Cao in Yan Province and Sun Jian in Jiangdong both showed faint smiles of gratification!
The heavenly screen was fair!
At least it acknowledged their achievements!
[Dong Zhuo burned Luoyang and forced Emperor Xian of Han to move the capital to Chang'an.]
[The coalition dissolved due to internal strife.]
Line after line of cold facts seemed to mercilessly mock those lords who had each harbored their own hidden schemes!
[This one emperor for the ages was also among these lords' armies.]
[However, he had yet to make much of a name for himself at this time.]
Boom!
That sentence once again set everyone's emotions ablaze!
He was among the coalition, too!
And he hadn't been famous at the time!
That narrowed the field considerably!
Cao Cao, Yuan Shao, Yuan Shu, Sun Jian, and the others immediately began frantically searching their memories, trying to find the "nameless nobody" who met those conditions!
Who could it be?
Who on earth could it be!
[But this marked the complete loss of the Han imperial family's authority, ushering in an era of warfare between warlords.]
[Later, Wang Yun, the Minister over the Masses, used the beauty Diaochan to lay a chain of stratagems, driving a wedge between Dong Zhuo and Lü Bu.]
[Dong Zhuo was killed.]
The wheels of history rolled onward. Finally, the image on the heavenly screen froze on the words "Dong Zhuo was killed"!
After a brief silence, the entire Divine Land erupted once more!
The heavenly screen had exposed this series of heart-stopping events from the past, sending everyone's hearts surging!
Cao Cao's eyes blazed in Yan Province!
They all felt that their desperate struggles back then had not been in vain!
This one emperor for the ages would surely emerge from among those of them who had truly rid the nation of traitors!
Meanwhile, far away in Xu Province, Lü Bu stood utterly frozen!
What?
A chain of stratagems?
Diaochan?
He stared at the words on the heavenly screen as though struck by lightning, his mind completely blank!
So... so that was how it was!
He had always believed Diaochan truly loved him and Wang Yun truly valued him!
After all that, he had been used as someone else's weapon all along!
From beginning to end, he, Lü Fengxian, had been nothing but a pawn on someone else's chessboard!
Immense humiliation and rage surged into his heart, and Lü Bu's face instantly flushed the color of pig liver!
He felt like the greatest joke in the world!
Was I nothing but a blade?