The World Online

Gaia 4th year, 1st month, 11th day, Consonance City.

Many days had passed since the Battle of Wenshan City. Yesterday, the Dragon Legion Corps had reported that they had taken down the entire Tengyue Prefecture.

Frontline intel suggested that after the fall of the Alliance Army, the sieges were exceedingly simple and effortless. Before they even reached the enemy cities, the defending troops would just open the gates and surrender.

Pretty much nothing of note happened along the way.

This was caused by their strength; they were simply unstoppable. With that, Tengyue Prefecture was untouched by war and avoided a calamity, which was a win-win for both of them.

At the same time, the Battle of Yizhou island was coming to an end.

King City gave up the moment the two squadrons sealed up Yizhou Straits. Even if Xiong Ba went back, he could not do anything. Seeing that no reinforcements were arriving, the resistance naturally became weaker and weaker.

Coordinating with the 3rd legion of the Tiger Legion Corps, the army sieged the place and occupied the cities.

With that, the entire Nanjiang battle was settled.

At the end of the month, it would be New Year’s Eve. The end of the war brought peace and prosperity to the Lunar New Year. Furthermore, during this time, soldiers would miss their families, so it was not a good time to fight.

Not only Nanjiang, but the entire China Region also started to slow down their fights to welcome yet another Lunar New Year.

......

On this day, Huo Qubing’s Guards Legion Corps reached Consonance City and camped outside of the city.

Two days ago, the Swordsman City Army left Dongchuan Prefecture. However, before they left, they performed a truly despicable act, sweeping away Dongchuan Prefecture.

A portion of the rich chambers of commerce and aristocratic families were taken by them.

Postwar calculations found that the army had taken close to 400 thousand from Dongchuan Prefecture, which was a huge hit to the prefecture that was not really rich to begin with.

Some of the chambers of commerce were even in danger of closing down because they did not have any movable funds to buy resources.

Apart from that, the 15 thousand prisoners of the Guards Legion were taken back to his territory. Feng Qingyang’s attitude was extremely clear; he was not willing to face off against them, but he was not willing to cooperate with them either.

Feng Qingyang probably thought that Shanhai City would not do anything to him if he retreated back to the Shu Lands.

Ouyang Shuo could only say that he was too naive.

That day, Ouyang Shuo used the Quick Daily News to call out Feng Qingyang; he told him to return the prisoners within a week and pay 800 thousand gold for the damages he had caused to Dongchuan Prefecture.

If not, they could only go to war.

Ouyang Shuo was not just saying such words for fun. After the Guards Legion Corps reached Consonance City, Huo Qubing had a conversation with Ouyang Shuo. The next day, they left the camp and waltzed into Dongchuan Prefecture.

Yongren City would forever be the humiliation of the Guards Legion Corps, so one would think that they were just there to stroll around now. From a distance away, everyone could smell the scent of revenge.

The clouds of battle that had stopped seemed like they were going to start once more.

Shu Lands, Swordsman City.

Different from the other main cities, Swordsman City had a thick underworld smell. All around the streets, one could see underworld people; there were hundreds of dojos, creating a truly majestic sight.

In such an atmosphere, the people’s desire to learn martial arts was truly strong.

Battle arenas, sparring competitions, and the like were played out every moment. For this, Swordsman City had modeled after the special police force in olden times and formed their own constable organization to take care of the underworld warriors.

Even the central streets of the city were designed into a giant sword.

The sword handle area was the City Lord’s Manor.

In the reading room, when Feng Qingyang saw the report, he was furious. He viciously said, ”Bastard, I’ve never seen such an arrogant person. Let’s fight, who’s afraid of who?”

When Feng Qingyue sitting opposite him saw his reaction, she sighed.

Feng Qingyue did not expect him to be so rash; he actually used the army to rob the people for just 400 thousand gold.

The moment this news was released, it made Swordsman City the laughing stock of the world.

All the Lords of the territories that managed to survive till now all knew the importance of people sentiment. Apart from the sentiment of people in your territory, the Lord’s prestige was extremely important too.

The Alliance Army was willing to surrender because of Ouyang Shuo’s fame. Honglu Temple had even set up a division to be in charge of spreading the name of the Monarch.

In comparison, Feng Qingyang’s actions would make one furious.

No wonder when the news spread out, some people said that the Feng Family was just a group of martial artists that did not know how to run a territory. Some said that they should just throw themselves into the arms of Liu Bei.

Anger swarmed at them.

Ouyang Shuo’s words in the Quick Daily News had also broken all of Feng Qingyang’s fantasies. Shanhai City definitely would not back down, and if Swordsman City did not agree, a war would be unavoidable.

Shanhai City that had just won the Battle of Yunnan was so strong that it made one shiver.

Even if the entire Yanhuang Alliance tried, they might not be able to do anything to Shanhai City. What more was a trivial Swordsman City?

Thinking about the faces of Di Chen and the others, Feng Qingyang did not think that they would fight with Shanhai City once more for him at such a time.

The only way out would be to yield.

Thinking about the humiliating terms, Feng Qingyue frowned. This time, Swordsman City had truly asked for it. However, looking at Feng Qingyang, it was not going to be easy to make him compromise.

A huge war was unavoidably going to start.

Feng Qingyue looked in the direction of Yongren City, deep in thought.

Consonance City.

Due to the actions of Swordsman City, Ouyang Shuo had to promptly arrange the appointments of the newly occupied three prefectures to allow the officials and civil servants to reach in time.

Just last night, the Nanjiang Governor-General House had announced a series of personnel appointments.

Tian Wenjing would be moved from Qiongzhou to Mengding. Hai Rui would be the new Qiongzhou Governor. These two appointments were settled long ago so they were not surprising.

The only exception would be that Mengding was worse than they thought.

Now, it was time to see how the cold-faced Governor Tian Wenjing was going to regain the people’s sentiment and the economy in a short time.

After the global auction that had recently ended, Ouyang Shuo was unexpectedly left with a million gold. Ouyang Shuo did not keep a single gold and tossed in all into improving Yunnan Province.

Apart from the 300 thousand gold in teleportation costs, the remaining 700 thousand gold was used to support the construction of the three prefectures.

Mengding Prefecture alone was given 300 thousand gold. Dongchuan Prefecture’s unexpected raid meant that they were given 200 thousand gold in financial support.

The remaining 200 thousand was naturally given to Tengyue Prefecture.

Cao Can would be moved from Kunming Prefecture Administration Director to Dongchuan Prefecture Governor.

His appointment was recommended by Kunming Governor Bai Hua. Ouyang Shuo had already promised the future position of Yunnan Provincial Governor as one of the terms of Consonance City merging with Shanhai City.

And as Bai Hua’s right-hand administrative man, Cao Can, this Zhan Dynasty minister, was going to be hugely important in the provincial office.

As such, to allow Cao Can to convince everyone, Bai Hua suggested he let Cao Can work at Dongchuan Prefecture before she established the Yunnan Provincial Governor Office.

Cao Can was both highly skilled and familiar with the situation in Yunnan. Ouyang Shuo naturally had no reason to disagree with placing him as the governor.

Leizhou Prefecture Leishan House Prefect Zhou Haichen was promoted to Tengyue Prefecture Governor. Yizhou Island was renamed as Yizhou Prefecture and would be under military control until the governor was appointed.

Originally, Ouyang Shuo wanted to ask Broken Blade House Prefect Lei Fan to be the Governor. However, this appointment was not passed during the Administration Bureau Meeting, so it was postponed till the next meeting.

Ouyang Shuo decision to promote two native Prefects to the position of Governor was extremely surprising. Prefect to Governor was a substantial rise; it was akin to jumping from city to provincial level. If it were not the game world, such an appointment would be laughed at by people.

Even with native Governors like Cui Shousi from before, their appointments were still faced with resistance. Even with Ouyang Shuo’s support, the Administration Bureau still blocked it.

Administration Bureau Director doubted these two Prefects, especially Lei Fan. Zhou Haichen was an actual juren in the wilderness and had been appointed many roles in Shanhai City and obtained a lot of credit, so Xiao He could give him a chance.

But Lei Fan? He was a mountain barbarian that had not read many books. The only education he had received was the two months in Xinan University. In their eyes, mountain barbarians were synonymous with ignorant. To be actually able to become an important official was insane.

Hence, Zhou Haichen’s appointment barely made it past but Lei Fan’s one was stopped.

Ouyang Shuo naturally could not ignore the opinions of Xiao He and the others. If he really did that, the entire system could not run, and it would even shake and affect the foundations of the territory.

If Ouyang Shuo forced through Lei Fan’s appointed, Xiao He would only resign, which was something Ouyang Shuo did not wish to see.

Hence, Ouyang Shuo had to personally write a letter to Xiao He to ask the Official Ruling Department to send an evaluation group to evaluate and test Lei Fan.

After the results were out, they would discuss the matter further.

Since the Monarch had taken a step back, Xiao He obviously did the same. Just a day ago, an evaluation group led by Zhang Tingyu had entered Broken Blade House.

Without a doubt, this appointment would become a significant matter in the territory. The Monarch’s power and the officials’ power would have moments of conflicts and cooperation, becoming normal in the future official field of the territory.

To Ouyang Shuo, the tests and training had just begun.