"Great Lord, this... is not an excuse for me to shirk responsibility, but the national treasury is currently empty. To deal with the tyrannical Qin, the State of Chu has already exhausted all its resources."
The King of Chu cried poverty with great pomp and circumstance, covering his face with his sleeve as if in shame, while explaining himself clearly.
So, in the end, you just don't have any money?
"I am ashamed to say that I truly cannot afford such a large sum of money," the King of Chu said tentatively, feigning distress.
"Why don't we wait until we destroy the Qin state, and I promise to build an even better palace for the goddess Nüba?"
"Host, he's just making empty promises!"
He scoffed, saying that it was always the system and Ling Xiao who made empty promises to others.
The King of Chu has lost his mind and dares to make empty promises to them; it's like showing off his skills in front of Guan Yu—utterly shameful.
"You have no money, yet you want the Nine Cauldrons?" Ling Xiao asked with a hint of doubt.
"Well, didn't the goddess Nüba say she would help Chu fight against Qin? I and my court officials truly cannot afford that much money. The Nine Cauldrons are far too important, so..."
The King of Chu hesitated, glancing furtively at Nüba, hoping to get the answer he wanted.
In his view, since Nüba had promised to help the State of Chu, she shouldn't have made so many demands.
The national treasury is indeed running low on funds; it's impossible to expect the dignified King of Chu to use his own private coffers to pay for it.
"Hiss!" Nüba's undisguised sneer made the King of Chu's face flush red, and a trace of resentment arose in his heart towards her. She was too disrespectful to him.
"I don't care how you get the money to build the palace. My hard work in gathering information about the Nine Tripods and bringing good fortune to the Chu Kingdom is not going to be in vain!"
Nuba's face was cold as she stared at the King of Chu and declared, word by word:
"Apart from my father, the Yellow Emperor, no one has ever dared to take advantage of me. You must take the Nine Tripods, and you must build the palace!"
Overbearing and unreasonable! The King of Chu trembled under the pressure of Nüba's imposing aura, the two words echoing in his mind, feeling extremely frustrated.
But seeing that Nüba looked like she was about to tear him to pieces at any moment, the King of Chu still chickened out.
After the King of Chu was forced to sign the "blood oath" presented by Nüba, he stumbled out with a face full of sorrow.
"Whew," Ling Xiao blew on the card in his hand, his eyebrows dancing with excitement, "I've already decided! The location for the Nüba Palace will be at the border of the three kingdoms of Chu, Yan, and Qi."
Why?
Ling Xiao rolled her eyes at the system, saying with exasperation, "Have you forgotten? Less than two years after the Chu Kingdom fought against Wang Jian, its capital was captured and the kingdom was destroyed."
She sighed, somewhat regretfully, "I thought with me here, there would be some surprises in the Qin-Chu battle. Who knew that even with your godlike performance, you couldn't carry your incompetent teammates?"
Faced with the self-praising host, he remained calm and said abruptly:
"So, after Chu is finished, you're going to let Yan take over, and then Qi?"
"You understand me!" Ling Xiao said, feigning surprise as she looked at the system.
Haha, this guy is even raising money to build houses. It's not enough to just take over the Chu Kingdom, he's got his eyes on the other two. He's really going to squeeze every last drop of blood from the bone.
It seems the host's lower limit has been overestimated, he thought to himself.
After playing around for a while, Ling Xiao lay half-reclined on the couch, twirling her hair with her fingers, murmuring to herself:
"The Moon Goddess's presence has diminished. The carrots have been planted for almost two months, and the land in Xianyang is almost ready for harvest. Let's take this opportunity to finish the mission of reaching six or seven million followers."
……………………
The news that Nüba had led the people of Chu to dig up the "fresh" Nine Tripods spread to various states, eliciting varying reactions.
The State of Qi had already given up; in reality, they were the last state to be destroyed.
The reason is simple: being the furthest away, they were misled by Qin's strategy of befriending distant states while attacking nearby ones, and kept pretending to be deaf and dumb, unwilling to believe that Qin would break the alliance—mainly because they couldn't defeat them, so they hypnotized themselves.
Therefore, Qi would try to trip up Qin and spread jokes, but it dared not actually engage in a real battle.
However, Yan was different. Crown Prince Dan of Yan considered himself a man of great talent and ambition, and he felt both resentful and unwilling to accept that Ying Zheng, who was also a hostage in Zhao, was in the same state.
Among the few remaining states, the Yan state was the weakest and had the smallest territory.
Therefore, Prince Dan believed that confronting the Qin state head-on was too difficult, so he was always looking for shortcuts to save and strengthen the country.
Prince Dan sent people with a large amount of gold, silver and precious treasures to pay homage to Nüba, indicating that the Yan state was looking forward to Nüba's arrival.
They also made further preparations, recruiting warriors and skilled swordsmiths from among the common people.
As for Ying Zheng...
"Have you taken care of the ministers of Chu?"
The officers below the stage nodded and stroked their beards.
"The spies bribed them with large sums of money, and those ministers, who were also looking for a way out, worked very hard. The King of Chu and the great nobles were at odds over a celestial book belonging to Nüba."
The Chu army has diverse origins, and the aristocratic power is too great. The struggle between the King of Chu and the powerful nobles has spread to the army itself. I've heard that Xiang Yan is in a terrible predicament.
Spy.
Ying Zheng's sharp eyes were filled with mockery, his sarcasm unforgiving:
"Even with the help of a goddess, such worthless creatures are still of little use."
After speaking, Ying Zheng lightly tapped the table with his knuckles:
"However, Nüba's weapon-forging method is truly excellent. Wang Jian also wrote that the Chu army's new weapons on the battlefield are extremely sharp, each one a treasure."
"Does Your Majesty intend to use this method?" the officer asked.
"Let a spy see if they can get it; this method is truly a waste of talent in the hands of the Chu people."
Ying Zheng did not deny that the heavenly book passed down by the gods should rightfully belong to him.
“The King of Chu is very wary of this, and I fear I may not be able to do enough,” Wei Liao said, somewhat embarrassed.
"Why worry if we can't get it? When Qin unifies the world, everything in Chu will belong to Qin!"
Ying Zheng relaxed his brows and chuckled softly.
Just then, a sound came from the doorway, and Zhao Gao tactfully and cautiously announced that the carrots planted in Xianyang were almost ripe and ready to be harvested.
The carrots are ripe!
The officer was overjoyed. He pulled so hard that he tore off a few strands of his beard, but he didn't care about the pain. He bowed down and loudly congratulated the officer.
"Congratulations, Your Majesty! From now on, the people's worries about famine can be largely alleviated."
Ying Zheng was also pleased; his hands, which were tucked into his sleeves, were already clenched tightly, but he did not show excessive excitement.
"Summon Li Si and others to accompany me to the carrot field, and allow the people to approach and watch."
Zhao Gao understood that the king wanted those commoners to watch in order to prepare for the large-scale carrot planting in the second half of the year.
Seeing bags and bags of grain being harvested, even the most stubborn old farmer would choose to plant carrots.
At this moment, Fusu also ran in to join in the fun, "Father, I also want to see carrots," with a fat, chubby white rabbit chasing after him, stumbling along.
"Go quickly, let's see if the carrots grown in the mortal world taste good!"
Ying Zheng naturally agreed.
……………………
The ridges between the fields were densely packed with farmers from all over the country, their hands and feet dark and chapped, their faces weathered and their clothes tattered.
But as they looked at the bountiful harvest in the fields, their eyes grew brighter and brighter, and they were almost moved to tears.
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