Distant Mountain Battle Song

Chapter 303 Destruction and Rebirth

It took Yun Ce more than a year to understand "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River" at first, and each time he read it again, he gained a new understanding.

Wu Tong was a remarkable man. After hearing Yun Ce recite "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River" once, he was able to repeat it haltingly. After the carriage had traveled ten miles, he could recite "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River" backwards.

However, there is still a long way to go before we can truly understand "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River".

I don't know if Cao Zhi was having a wet dream when he wrote "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River," but after he wrote it, a hundred people could interpret it in a hundred different ways.

On the rest of the journey, Wu Tong didn't mention the poems and prose of the Han Dynasty, nor did he continue to tell Yun Ce that Liang Zhizhi's claim that Han prose was the best in the world.

Instead, they kept savoring the beauty of the imagery in "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River".

Originally, Yun Ce had prepared a parallel prose version of "Preface to the Pavilion of Prince Teng" in case Wu Tong disagreed. Now it seems unnecessary. He couldn't even pass the test of "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River," so there was no need to ask the ancient sages of the Tang Dynasty for help.

Honestly, in a world like the Han Dynasty where people relied on gathering and animal husbandry for survival, Yun Ce would believe it if someone wrote a simple folk song like "The sky is vast, the fields are boundless, the wind blows the grass low to reveal cattle and sheep." But as for grand and majestic prose, frankly, that doesn't belong to the people of the Han Dynasty in this world.

Therefore, for a long time, Yun Ce had little interest in the culture of the Han Dynasty, except for its history.

They don't identify much with Han culture, so they don't feel a strong sense of belonging to Han society, and therefore can't feel close to the people of Han.

This sentiment aligns with the thinking of the Han aristocracy, who felt that they and the poor were not the same species and could not empathize with each other, so naturally they did not care much about the life or death of the poor.

Lei Ming eventually established a tribe of less than five thousand people.

With the establishment of tribes came power and class. Although Yun Ce felt he didn't need anyone to serve him, at some point, eight maids always stood around the carriage. They didn't ride in the carriage but walked alongside it.

“If you don’t, these five thousand people will be very uneasy.”

Wu Tong copied the "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River" onto a long scroll, and then he never put it down. Only occasionally would he take his mind away from the "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River" and casually give Yun Ce some advice.

"You mean, I can sleep with them?"

Hearing Yun Ce's vulgar words, Wu Tong worried that they would pollute the "Ode to the Goddess of the Luo River," so she rolled up the long scroll and said, "If you do this, they will be even more loyal to you."

"That's not necessary."

After Yun Ce finished speaking, he instructed Lei Ming to find two carriages for the eight women to follow his carriage.

Once the group crossed the Qingshui River, they had entered the territory of the Eastern vassal states. Since there was a tribe of five thousand people, Cao Kun naturally knew that Yun Ce had arrived.

It had only been three months since they last met, but Cao Kun looked noticeably older. Yun Ce mentally calculated that the guy had probably aged ten years in those three months.

In fact, his face was still the same, with little change. The main signs of aging were his eyes and the mature aura emanating from his young body.

Cao Kun didn't want to ride a horse or take a carriage, so Yun Ce had no choice but to walk with him. With Cao Kun's personal guards blocking the way, there was no one for the first hundred meters and no one for the next hundred meters. As for the left and right sides, not even a single bird could be seen.

“My father is dead. I killed him.”

Cao Kun's every word was earth-shattering.

Yun Ce sighed and said, "My adoptive father wanted to kill my adoptive grandfather, but he didn't. Did you know that?"

Cao Kun paused for a moment and said, "I've heard a little about it."

"So, you're better than my cheapskate father, what more could you want?"

Cao Kun frowned and said, "Can this really be compared like this?"

Yun Ce said, "If we don't compare like this, how else can we compare? My adoptive father died, and I became the heir apparent of the Prince of Changsha. Your father died, and you became the governor of Qiuhe Prefecture?"

Cao Kun nodded and said, "Who else but me?"

Yun Ce then laughed loudly, "Do you feel much better now? Now you can tell me your reasons for having to kill your father."

Cao Kun was silent for a moment, then suddenly laughed and patted Yun Ce on the shoulder, saying, "Suddenly I feel there's no need for that. A true man doesn't need to explain his actions to others."

Yun Ce sighed and said, "I am happy to see this happen. Hurry up and reorganize the troops in the five states under your command. This time, we severely damaged the first priest of the Gui Fang, Da Xue Beng, in Chang'an. I also used a radioactive source to ambush him. Now, I don't know if that old guy is dead or not. When he fled, he said that he was going to lead the Gui Fang army south."

Cao Kun looked around cautiously, then whispered, "I also killed more than six hundred members of the Cao clan."

Yun Ce gasped and said, "Why are you still worrying about such a trivial matter? Didn't you hear me say that the Guifang people are about to head south?"

Cao Kun asked, puzzled, "Do you think it's a small matter that I killed more than six hundred members of the Cao clan?"

Yun Ce, equally puzzled, asked, "Is there anything wrong with the principle of 'pacifying the interior before resisting external aggression'? You killed a group of people; have the remaining people completely submitted to you?" Cao Kun replied, "Even those who were two-faced were killed by me."

Yun Ce gave a thumbs-up and said, "He is indeed a man destined for great things."

Cao Kun said somewhat awkwardly, "You really don't mind what I've done?"

"Don't worry, if my father gets in my way, I'll kill him too. Don't get hung up on such trivial matters, and focus all your energy on the approaching Ghost Fang army."

"You really would kill your father?"

"How could that be? He's my own father!"

Cao Kun stared at Yun Ce for a long time before saying, "That's right, only I could do something like killing my own father. Tell me, what did you do to the Great Avalanche?"

Yun Ce sighed and said, "Old priest, I, along with half of the strongest combat force of the Star Climbing Tower, only have one leg, one arm, and one eye left from the Great Avalanche. Oh, and the radiation source has caused damage of unknown extent."

Cao Kun thought for a moment and said, "Three months. Even if it's only three months, we still have three months."

Yun Ce said, "It should be more than three months. We have been preparing for a long time, but the Tiger Legion Plan of the Great Avalanche has become more complete. With more time, their high-level combat power will increase exponentially."

Cao Kun said, "I heard you have something that allows even commoners to fight against martial artists."

Yun Ce sighed, knowing that this thing couldn't be kept secret. Cao Kun had just killed his own father and his clan brothers, and now he suddenly brought up the bomb, which was tantamount to telling Yun Ce that he was no ordinary person when he went crazy, and that he had better share any good things he had, otherwise, he was a ruthless person who wouldn't even spare his own father...

This is why Cao Kun told Yun Ce as soon as they met that he had killed his own father and six hundred clan brothers.

Yun Ce took out two pieces of paper from his pocket and handed them to Cao Kun. One was a gunpowder formula, and the other was a bomb manufacturing blueprint.

After Cao Kun took it and examined it carefully, he said to Yun Ce, "Zheng Tianshou has not returned yet."

Yun Ce said, "They may have already perished."

Cao Kun shook his head and said, "No, Zheng Tianshou's name has not disappeared from the Dragon God Temple in Qiuhe Prefecture."

Yun Ce shook his head and said, "The last time I saw Zheng Tianshou was before I killed Da Xuebeng. I haven't seen Zheng Tianshou since then."

Cao Kun nodded and said, "I'm leaving."

Cao Kun arrived suddenly and left even more decisively. He was becoming more and more like a ruthless and ambitious man. He disdained to do anything tentative. He came to find Yun Ce with the aim of obtaining the gunpowder formula and bomb manufacturing technology. Once he got it, he left immediately. Even though Yun Ce was one of the few people he could talk to, he was unwilling to waste any more time on Yun Ce.

Watching Cao Kun depart on his Xintianyou cruise ship, Wu Tong leaned over and asked, "The new overlord of the East?"

Yun Ce nodded and said, "How about it? Impressive, isn't it?"

Wu Tong nodded fiercely and said, "A person who can cut off his own father's head with one stroke at the clan assembly cannot possibly be dissatisfied. His stroke will foreshadow the collapse of the human order of the Han Dynasty."

"There are many things that have collapsed in the Han Dynasty. The Han Confucian scholars emphasized the relationship between the emperor and his subjects, and the relationship between father and son. The fierce battle between the Grand Marshal and the emperor in Chang'an destroyed the relationship between the emperor and his subjects. Now Cao Kun has destroyed the relationship between father and son. This is not only the collapse of the false human relations, but also the fact that the Han Dynasty will enter an era of chaotic relationships from now on."

With people like them stirring things up, every relationship you encounter in your life will collapse.

Wu Tong sighed and said, "What will people talk about in the future?"

Yun Ce sneered and said, "Just put the word 'profit' in the middle."

"Did you also provide Cao Kun with the gunpowder formula and bomb manufacturing technology for profit?"

“That’s right. If the Guifang people want to move south, they first need to break through the Iron Enclosure Pass. After taking the Iron Enclosure Pass, they will move south along the coastline of the sea. The first place to suffer will be Haizhou. Now, Haizhou is Cao Kun’s territory. I want him to hold out a little longer.”

Wu Tong shook his head fiercely and said, "That's good too. In the future, we won't consider interpersonal relationships and will only focus on interests, which will make many things much easier to handle."

When chaos arrives, the environment changes drastically, and people's living conditions become harsh. Many things that cannot be seen in prosperous or peaceful times will appear one by one.

Sometimes, chaotic times are like a giant meat grinder, shredding people and then reshaping them. But those reshaped by chaos are no longer the same people they were before.

This became even more apparent after Yun Ce returned to Yun Clan Manor.

While the social order and social order were collapsing elsewhere, the relationships between people at Yun Family Manor were developing in a positive direction.

Although a harsh winter has passed, as tender grass sprouts, the new society of Yun Family Manor is also constantly sprouting new buds. People are slowly accepting the reality that a fair and oppressive society does exist.

Eji, who had returned home long ago, had been waiting at the door for Yun Ce's return these past few days. All she knew was that her husband was injured, seriously injured, and she wanted to know as soon as possible. No matter how badly Yun Ce was injured, she wanted to tell him as soon as possible. As long as he came back, it would be the greatest good thing.

(End of this chapter)