Chapter 522: If a person does not work for himself, he will be punished by heaven and earth
Seeing Yun Chen didn't speak, Fu Lin thought she was still listening and continued:
"Yan Shijiu was right. Gan Nian began to truly plan from that time. The siege of Guying City was so brutal, and Gan Nian did know beforehand that he would be besieged. But Yan Shijiu wouldn't tell you that at that time, Gan Nian had no choice but to walk into the trap.
Because the main force of the Nan Kingdom followed Nan Lijun to the Northern Expedition. Do you remember that in order to strengthen his own troops, Nan Lijun said that he would send 30,000 troops to General Cao Fang and General Meng Jianyun to suppress the rebellion in the central region, but in reality, there were only 5,000!
Five thousand! Yun Chen! You're a seasoned veteran, you know better than anyone what five thousand men mean! It's pitifully few! Not even enough for three battles! Not even enough for a cavalry corps! Yet, even with that, the two veteran generals managed to hold out for six months! In the final battle, there were less than two hundred men left!
To protect himself as much as possible, Nan Lijun ignored all advice and insisted on not sending troops to support the two generals, thus killing two loyal veterans of three dynasties! If Gan Nian had not volunteered to be trapped in Guying City, the next ones to be mobilized and forced to be reduced to only a few thousand men, waiting to be exhausted, would have been you and Gan Nian.
And the 300,000 Lion Power Army you borrowed with such great effort will be impossible to preserve. When the Black Scale Cavalry enters Kyoto, it will be like entering an empty city, and the Nan Kingdom will be destroyed! This was Yan Nineteen's true plan back then. So, Gan Nian had no choice but to walk into the trap.
When he told me to organize the rebels to hold the line, honestly, I thought I was doomed. After you broke through the siege of Guying City, he could have ordered us to retreat to preserve his own rebel forces, but he firmly ordered me to hold the line. He said that every inch of land defended meant ten more lives.
He had already written to Generals Huo and Yun, informing them of everything, including the incident with Yan Shijiu. It was the two veteran generals who saw the situation clearly and volunteered to fight alongside the rebels. They were not manipulated by Gan Nian; they acted for their beliefs and loyalty. Even without Gan Nian, they would still stand up to defend this country.
Later, you went north to rescue the king. Gan Nian calculated that Xiong Dun would be willing to form an alliance, but he never expected that you would risk your own life to save Luo Jiang's tribe, nor did he imagine that you would be swept away by the storm.
Can you imagine how desperate he felt at that moment? Old Master Huo and General Yun were killed in battle, the rebel army was gone, and you were ordered by Nanli Jun to marry... With the Black Scale Cavalry in front and Touman's Luojiang troops behind you. This was the end of the road.
Yan Shijiu said that he had contributed 50% to the chaos of the world, and Gan Nian's hands were also covered in blood. But why didn't Yan Shijiu mention the decisive battle of Youzhou? That was a battle that almost destroyed the country. It was a battle in which Gan Nian desperately tried to prevent the alliance between Touman and the Black Scale Cavalry, but failed, and was forced to fight head-on.
There was no calculation, no conspiracy, only loyalty and blood. Was every hero who was willing to die for his country, every hero who stood up and fought for his country, all calculated by Huo Gannian? Yun Chen, don't blame him. The fact that he was able to save the Nan Kingdom from Yan Shijiu and Nan Lijun, from a million enemy troops, is already a feat that will go down in history.
You know everything about my triumphant return to the capital. Whether it was deliberately killing King Xiyan and being stripped of his power, or forcing you to surrender your military command... we have no way of refutation. Hate me if you want.
When you handed over your military power, Lu Liang advised you to rebel. Do you remember? Actually, that was Gan Nian's last attempt to test your will. We all knew you would never rebel, but he still insisted on using Lu Liang's words to persuade you.
He knew it was best to keep it a secret from you, but he still hoped you would rebel. That way, he would have a reason not to lie to you and exploit you. Even though raising an army would be extremely difficult, the chances of success would be greatly reduced, and if he succeeded in seizing the throne, he would be accused of treason, he was willing to do it. So, he actually gave you the opportunity to choose...
Even if he hadn't lied to you, hadn't concealed anything from you, had revealed everything to you long ago, telling you that you had to surrender your military power, marry Yan Shijiu, and personally identify the bodies to exonerate him and the army, in order to achieve world peace, would you, Yun Chen, have refused? You would have agreed, willingly entering the game. But you're too innocent, too bad at lying and acting. How could you have deceived Yan Shijiu and the countless eyes in the world? How could you possibly succeed?
In fact, you're not the only one who would agree; we all would. You've definitely guessed who the corpse standing in for Gan Nian is. It's Qingxuan, the young man from Xianggu Mansion. He looks a lot like Gan Nian. If they tamper with his ear holes, they can fool you, and they can fool Yan Shijiu, too.
You probably thought we killed Qingxuan and used him as a corpse, but that's not the case. The marks on the ear holes can only be made when he's alive. So, Yunchen, I swear to God that when we found Qingxuan, he volunteered to give his life.
It sounds incredible, right? But only Qingxuan himself knows the pain of the war taking away all his family members, causing him to lose all the family property, his parents and all his brothers and sisters, and being forced to wander the streets.
He constantly yearned for revenge for this war and to exact his due from the culprit, so when we told him our plan, he agreed without hesitation. He had only one request: that we kill the culprit for him, and from now on, there would be no more war.
Yun Chen, today, Gan Nian has finally achieved the peace you desire, the peace millions of people dream of. I know you hate him most for using you as a 'reward' to lure Yan Shijiu, but this five-year-long game of life and death, a game that hinges on the fate of the Three Kingdoms, is a game he plays against the heavens. You and I are pawns, Yan Shijiu is a pawn, and so is he! He's not a god, so how can he be sure of victory? So many uncontrollable, unexpected people and events have forced him to place himself on the chessboard, scheming for life and death, nearly losing his life countless times!
In this life-or-death situation, he clearly had a hundred ways to ally with Dongyan and Luojiang, but he chose to take the risk and choose Xiong Dun and Yan Lang. The former's escape by faking his own death would be extremely difficult, while the latter's was extremely risky; the slightest mistake could betray him and lead to a complete loss. But do you know why he still insisted on choosing these two? Because they love or admire you enough, so that no matter whether he wins or loses, you can survive in the end.
After saying all this, Fu Lin felt like his throat was about to smoke, but he saw that Yun Chen didn't say a word from beginning to end and didn't express anything, so he didn't know how much he had heard.
Fu Lin understood Yun Chen's collapse and pain when she suddenly faced the truth. If she still couldn't accept it after hearing so much, he could completely understand.
There was still a lot of noise in the hall, but Yun Chen was sitting there like an old monk in meditation, not moving or saying a word.
Fu Lin couldn't help but sigh, and suddenly felt as if a mountain was pressing down on him and that he had a long way to go.
He decided to deal with Yun Chen first, so he stood up and walked to the table, ready to drink some tea to moisten his throat, and then give Yun Chen a long speech:
"Yun Chen, I know you're hurt, wronged, resentful, and angry. Blame it all on me, but don't blame him. He's already had it extremely hard, and this world and everything are forcing him. For example, Song Lan. To prevent her from informing on me, I killed her with my own hands. But I did it without consulting Gan Nian first. So, if you hate someone, just hate me. I just want us to win."
Fu Lin paused as he spoke, raised his cup and took a sip of tea. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a figure on the couch suddenly jump up like a grasshopper and rush towards him nimbly.
Before he could react, a knife had already been fiercely stabbed into his chest, and with it came the strange laughter of "Yun Chen":
"Hehe, I don't blame you. If a man doesn't care about himself, he will be punished by heaven and earth!"
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