“Why did the Star Lord lose?”
Shen Zhi said, “That’s a rather complicated question.”
“Complicated is fine. I have plenty of time to listen to you explain.” Even if she couldn’t take it all in, the System Log would faithfully record Shen Zhi’s words, so she could go back later and review them carefully, taking notes.
Shen Zhi: “…”
He really hadn’t been trying to fob Zhang Yang off.
It really was complicated to explain.
Worried Zhang Yang might not be smart enough to digest all the information, Shen Zhi thought it over and decided on a more accessible explanation.
He broke off a branch from the persimmon tree in the courtyard and sketched a rough star chart on the ground.
“In the center are the Three Enclosures: Purple Forbidden, Heavenly Market, and Supreme Palace. In the four directions are the Four Symbols: Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Vermillion Bird, and Black Tortoise.”
“Xie Shu said last night that these were the Seven Great Empires?”
“They’re empires on the ground, but stars in the sky as well.” Shen Zhi explained to Zhang Yang, “Look, the mountains, rivers, and waterways on this continent beneath our feet follow the same arrangement as the stars in the sky. In the heavens, they’re called the Three Enclosures and Four Symbols. On the ground, they’re the Seven Great Empires. Important cities, passes, commanderies, and counties within these empires are named after ‘Star Lords,’ such as Jianxing and Tianbian.”
Actually, at first there were the Seven Great Provinces.
As the fighting went on, they eventually splintered into the Seven Great Empires.
Zhang Yang understood a little more.
“So you’re saying the Star Lord’s defeat was because someone beat him?”
“…You could put it that way.” Shen Zhi didn’t expect much of Zhang Yang; grasping even a little was enough.
“Didn’t I tell you that creation myth before? The stars took Starlight as their energy and Star Earth as their bodies, then reshaped all things. All things born anew share the same origin as the Stars. In a sense, they’re the children of the Star Lords, and they inherited the conflicts between them, too.”
Or, to put it another way, all things were pieces on the board in the Star Lords’ game.
Zhang Yang asked, “What happens if you lose?”
Where there was victory, there had to be defeat.
“I don’t know what happens to the Star Lords themselves, but the ‘pieces’ belonging to their faction suffer for it. They’re driven completely off the board, with no chance of a comeback, and reduced to mediocrity.” Shen Zhi couldn’t help but sigh.
“Since you know about the Seven Great Empires, you must know about the vassal states around them, too, right?”
“They say all the minor vassal states were carved out of the Seven Great Empires.”
“Do you know why they were carved out?”
“The rulers of the great empires enfeoffed their sons, who established vassal states… Isn’t that a perfectly normal process? Could there be some other reason behind it?” Zhang Yang thought for a moment, then honestly shook her head.
After that, she ventured, “Were the ones carved out defeated?”
“Mm, you got it right.”
Zhang Yang: “…”
Shen Zhi scooped up half a ladle of water to quench his thirst and drained it in one go.
“A few decades ago, things were still all right. The Seven Great Empires kept themselves in check, and whenever conflicts arose, they used the Minor Vassal States as proxies to settle things. They didn’t dare let it get too out of hand. But the past few decades have been different. The fighting’s gotten fiercer and fiercer.”
The Minor Vassal States could only struggle to survive in the cracks.
“Why are they fighting so fiercely?”
“I’m not omniscient. How could I know everything? There are all sorts of theories. Some say the conflicts between the empires have grown deeper and become increasingly irreconcilable. Another theory only emerged in recent years. Supposedly, among the Star Lords, there’s just one missing: the Ziwei Star Lord.”
“Yeah. There are plenty of theories floating around that this is the root of the conflict. The stars are vying to see who gets to claim the Ziwei throne.”
Zhang Yang slapped her thigh and pointed at herself.
“Maybe I’m the future Ziwei Star.”
“…You? What kind of daydream are you having?”
Faced with Shen Zhi’s undisguised eye-roll, Zhang Yang pouted.
She decided not to recruit Shen Zhi after all.
What a buzzkill.
In the end, Zhang Yang asked one more question.
“Which state is that Princess from?”
“Dou State.”
Dou State had originally been part of the Xuanwu Empire.
Its territory lay between Ziwei and Xuanwu.
Two generations ago, the Xuanwu ruler granted it as a fief to his beloved youngest son, who then established Dou State there.
The youngest son and his mother had always been fond of luxury, and they didn’t change their lifestyle one bit after arriving at their fief.
They collected thirty years’ worth of taxes from the people there all at once.
After squandering it all, they went on to collect another twenty years’ worth.
By this generation, the Princess’s own brother had been on the throne for less than two years when he piled another 120 years’ worth of taxes onto the arrears he was collecting.
In recent years, natural disasters and human calamities had come thick and fast.
Uprisings and rebellions had broken out everywhere, but each had been crushed in blood.
This time, things only went so smoothly because the Princess dropped the ball and the rebels had support from powerful, established clans, giving them allies inside and out.
Otherwise, it was hard to say how things would have ended.
“Then, is Dou State still around?”
If Dou State still existed, Zhang Yang didn’t mind using the Princess’s body to pull a few strings and recruit some people under the banner of a shell company.
The old company might have a terrible reputation, but that was still better than having no reputation at all.
As long as she raised the banner and ran things well, even the worst name could be cleared little by little.
And if all else failed, she could always cut ties later.
“The capital’s been completely overrun. What do you think?”
“Isn’t the main rebel force still here?”
Tianbian Commandery shouldn’t be the capital of Dou State, should it?
Shen Zhi shot back, “You think there’s only one rebel army?”
If there were only one rebel army, it would be like a ship with a single hole in it.
Given Dou State’s circumstances, they might still be able to patch it up with some effort.
And if that didn’t work, they could pay the Xuanwu Empire to help.
A few generations back, after all, they all shared the same ancestor.
The reason it couldn’t be brought under control was obvious: there were too many holes.
No way at all.
Rebel forces of every size had carved up the entire Dou State.
Zhang Yang: “…”
She gave up completely on her little scheme of borrowing someone else’s name.
She might as well start from scratch and raise a new banner of her own.
Zhang Yang’s face was expressionless, but calculation flickered in her peach-blossom eyes.
Shen Zhi took one look and knew her mind was already churning.
“Why are you asking me all this? And in such detail?”
“Do you know where I can recruit capable people?”
This was the part Zhang Yang found most troublesome.
Recruiting players was easy: all you had to do was shout in the World Channel and post a team recruitment notice in the recruitment channel.
Interested players would apply to join on their own.
But this was a Homestead Side Quest.
Everyone here was an NPC, and the recruitment rules were different.
Zhang Yang had tried recruiting Shen Zhi and Xie Shu yesterday.
On Shen Zhi’s end, a prompt told her that his trust wasn’t high enough.
If she wanted to recruit him into her army, she’d have to earn his trust.
Xie Shu’s rejection was much more straightforward.
The System Log bluntly stated that Zhang Yang’s [Intellect] was too low, recruitment had failed, and Xie Shu refused to work with an idiot.
Zhang Yang: “…”
Even someone as composed as Zhang Yang couldn’t help cracking.
After thinking about it all night, she was still a commander with no troops.
At this rate, when would she ever reclaim her lost lands?
Shen Zhi: “???”
He suspected something was wrong with his ears.
“Recruit talent? You? What are you planning to do?”
“Reclaim my lost lands and restore my homeland.”
Shen Zhi looked at her with a mocking half-smile, his eyes full of scorn.
“You’re no Princess. Unless you admit you’re her, what lost lands are you reclaiming, and what homeland are you restoring?”
“Why do I have to be the Princess of Dou State?”
That counter-question left Shen Zhi completely at a loss.
“Huh?”