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Chapter 284
Chapter 284 - Cao Cao's Briefing
Hua Shi took a deep breath, calming her emotion. As a person who walked the path of a saint, she had to be patient.
The matter about jealousy, envy, or selfish thought had to be cleansed from her mind.
'I'll have to talk with Friday and Tong after this. '
...
8 PM.
Tong collapsed on the bed in his room, lying exhausted, while Friday and Hua Shi were sitting on the side of the bed and were massaging his body.
Friday was humming while her hands were slowly stripping Tong's clothes as usual. On the other side, Hua Shi stopped massaging Tong's shoulders and began combing Tong's hair.
As for the baby, she was sleeping on the baby bed, smiling.
Hua Shi looked at Tong and Friday. She opened her mouth and wanted to speak something, but she bit her lower lips and stopped trying to speak.
Noticed the hesitation and the suspicious action of Hua Shi, Friday glanced at the girl.
"Is it about He Xing?"
"Eh?"
"I saw her dazing at Tong today. You probably noticed it too, right?"
"Uh, yeah."
"Then, is it about her? Do you want me to kill her and hide her dead body?"
Tong snapped open his eyes in shock. Friday was leading the conversation to hell.
"Stop, stop, STOP!! What the hell, Friday!? Why do you want to kill someone because she is staring at me?"
Friday shrugged, "She fancies you. That's enough reason for a wife to kill a bug that wants to pester her beloved husband."
"That's totally wrong! You can't just kill her because she looked at me! Think about it. If there is a man you know gazed at you and I want to kill him because of it, how will you feel?"
"Delightful, of course!"
Tong scratched his head with both hands to the point that he messed his hair, "No! Urggg... Dammit, Friday. You need help..."
Because of the bickering, Zhang Min, who had been sleeping soundly, cried from fright. Hua Shi rushed to the baby while she glared at the two.
"AH! SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU! Minmin, mama is here. It's okay."
"..."
.
It took Hua Shi and hour to put her baby back to sleep again. She gestured Friday and Tong to follow her to the other room.
Once the three left the sleeping baby in the room, Hua Shi began explaining her troubles about the angelic power and its characteristic in a hushed voice.
Tong nodded and embraced Hua Shi to console her, "It's alright. You can do it. We might not be able to enjoy our night. But once you awaken the few troublesome virtues, we can do whatever we want again."
Tong kissed Hua Shi's forehead, which made her smile.
On the other hand, Friday giggled, "You just got conned, zombie mama. The angelic path doesn't have a backlash, but once your virtue drops down to zero, that virtue is gone for good. A mental cannibal like you can't cultivate it."
Hua Shi glared at Friday, "Slut! Once I get my wings, I'll beat the fOOk outta you!"
"Bitch please, you need at least 4 wings to beat me. Heck, I doubt you can even get two wings with your immoral hobbies. There's that [Chastity], you know? You have to abstain from sex and desire for years to complete it! Can you do it?"
Hua Shi was on the verge of tears, but Tong patted her forehead and tightened his embrace.
"Don't listen to that. I know you can do it."
Hua Shi nodded and snuggled her head on Tong's chest.
Friday rolled her eyes in an annoyance, "Whatever. Tong, since you can't make another baby with Sunday anytime soon. Give me a baby!"
Tong rolled his eyes this time, "Friday, you will also have to learn how to control your lust. Eventually, you will have to reawaken your [Sins] as well. So, if you practice now, you will cleanse it faster."
"I already knew self-control!"
"No, you're not. Actually, I have a lot of work to do tomorrow, and I also need to save my stamina to practice controlling my power. So... no sex."
"NUUU!! What about my baby? I want a baby, too."
Hua Shi laughed at Friday, "Karma, bitch!"
"You!"
...
The bickering of the three could be heard inside He Xing's room. Although she could not understand what they were talking about because the voices were muffled, she was jealous of their relationship.
He Xing looked at Liu Xie, who was sleeping while sucking his thumb like a little monkey.
"I wish you have a warm father like young master Zhang, too."
Her heart beat faster when she recalled the face of Tong. He Xing shook her head to get rid of the image in a panic.
'No, I can't get my hope up. If I were to get close to him, those two girls would kill me... '
.
.
Because of the ruckus that day, He Xing kept her distance from Tong, which saddened her and made Tong felt terrible.
Thinking about the complication that He Xing and Liu Xie had, Tong also wanted to treasure them since they were under his wings.
However, Tong did not want Liu Xie to grow up with a bad habit and a misunderstanding about him, who was considered as Liu Xie's foster father. Sometimes, he secretly visited He Xing to play with Liu Xie without the knowledge of his two wives.
One day, Tong was teaching Liu Xie about his speech, which he suddenly called him, "Papa!"
Tong sweated while He Xing panicked. They were afraid that calamity might befall them if Liu Xie spoke the word in front of Hua Shi or Friday.
"Little Xie, when we're outside, call me dàgē (elder-brother) instead. Okay?"
Out of desperation, Tong tried to convince the little guy.
"Fudge-Da-Ge!"
He Xing and Tong smiled while they wiped away their sweat. It was fortunate that he was smart, but they still feel restless.
"Young master Zhang, please avoid visiting us in secret for a while. It's dangerous for us, too."
"I know. I'm sorry."
Friday and Hua Shi never knew about these secret visits incident.
Unfortunately for Tong and He Xing, Liu Xie called Tong "Papa" the day after in front of Friday and Hua Shi.
...
...
June 15th.
Xuchang.
Cao Cao, Wang Yun, twenty noble representatives, and ten officers were sitting around a round table, looking at the map on the table.
Xun You took the role of the strategist. He took a brush and painted the map with different colors. He highlighted their territories in blue, while the other forces were painted with red, green, yellow, grey, and other colors.
Once Xun You was done, he hung the map on the wall, and the landscape of the dozens of military forces revealed to everybody in the meeting.
"So many forces."
"I've never expected that our country has this many clans."
"T-The Yellow Turbans have so many counties! The entire Bing Province is theirs!?"
"Half of the Ji Province too."
"No, you should pay attention to Dong Zhuo in the west!"
"Right! Dong Zhuo has... 3... 4... Dammit, his territory is larger than the Yellow Turban!"
All officers under Cao Cao exclaimed and murmured upon seeing the whole picture of the country.
Cao Cao coughed to get everyone's attention, "As all of you can see, our country's noble system breeds this many forces, but we actually aren't unite as one. Each of the forces governs different county, city, or even a whole province. However, none of them can see the real problem at hand."
Cao Cao picked a blush and circled three locations with black paint. Three circles covered Luo Yang, Nanpi, and Julu.
"Three major forces are causing chaos and killing among the people! Dong Zhuo's tyranny should be known to all of you since most of you have fled from the Capital. As for Yuan Shao, the recent news about his coronation should speak for itself. This disgrace of all aristocrats wants to make his son Emperor! As for the Yellow Turban..."
Cao Cao paused. Hesitation revealed in his eyes as he did not want to fight against this force. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before he continued.
"The Yellow Turban consisted of a group of righteous people that fought against the tyranny of the previous Emperor, Liu Ping. They eradicated all corrupted nobles and officials that tarnished our reputation and replaced the noble system with the knowledge of many immortals. You can say that this is a force created by immortals!"
All officers in the room stopped talking and gazed at Cao Cao in solemn. They had been briefed about the immortal beings around the land, and they knew about Tong, Hua Shi, Xiao Wu, Li Feihong, Sun Fang, and Li Jing's identity.
These teenagers were the threat that they had to face.
Cao Cao continued, "However, because of the lack of communication, several opportunists pretended to be a part of the Yellow Turban Army and used its name for plundering or recruiting followers. From our latest intel, the real Yellow Turban actually changed their uniform to blue, and they quit wearing a yellow bandana or other yellow clothing. On the other hand, the imposters are still wearing bandanas and yellow clothes."
"The problem about this force is not the real Yellow Turban Army but the bandits that have claimed to be them! These bandits are like a plague. Out of all provinces, only Liang Province of Ma Clan was untouched because they didn't know about the Yellow Turban. As for the rest of the country, peasants that have been suffered from the drought are taking up arms and follow the trends of the bandits!"
"Another factor that contributes to this abnormal decision of the peasants is Dong Zhuo's false decrees. He demands heavy taxes from all counties and threatens to kill every civilian if they didn't pay him tributes or taxes. The weak prefects of many counties have already abandoned their posts, but some of them actually followed Dong Zhuo's order. They levied from their people and caused the peasants to rebel!"
"All officials are vile in the eyes of ordinary people! We have to correct them by destroying the sources of corruption first while we suppress all the bandits around the land. This meeting is held to recruit all of you, good nobles that have escaped from Dong Zhuo's clutch. I want to borrow all of your soldiers, a part of your supplies, and gold so that I can raise more troops to eradicate the traitor Dong Zhuo and the bandits!"
One of the noble representatives stood up, "I understand your purpose from gathering us, but why are you targeting the bandits and Dong Zhuo? We can see that many evil forces try to steal our beloved country like Yuan Shao! Why are we fighting small time bandits and the strongest force of Dong Zhuo at the same time? If we want to finish off the bandits, why aren't we going after the Yellow Turban? As long as the main forces exist, the imposters will continue to expand. But if the main force is gone, no one will want to follow after the destroyed army anymore."
Many nobles nodded upon hearing the suggestion. Even Cao Cao's officers also agreed.
"For that, I have my reasons. First, as I said before, the Yellow Turban is a righteous force under the direct control of the immortals. From my investigation, they are trying to help the people, but the people itself misunderstood their intention. And secondly..."
Cao Cao took out a scroll from his cloth, "In this scroll, it contains a proposal that Zhang Jiao sent us. Zhang Jiao and Zhang Tong sent a tribute of 100, 000 stones of food to Xuchang a few days ago. In this treaty, they want the official titles of Governor for the following cities... Julu, Ye, Zhongshan, Jinyang, and Shangdang."
"In exchange, they will form an alliance with us, and they will disband the name of Yellow Turban to help us stopping the civilians from joining the bandits."
| ← Ch. 283 | Ch. 285 → |