The imperial hunting grounds had erupted into chaos.
The once solemn experimental field now looked like a noisy marketplace.
“Bullshit! This is a disgrace to refinement and learning!”
An elderly doctor with white hair held a mud-covered potato in his hand, spitting as he spoke.
“This divine object is the essence of heaven and earth! It must be cooked with pure mountain spring water, boiled over high fire eighty-one times before its depth can be revealed!”
Across from him, a younger Confucian scholar flushed red, also holding up a potato.
“Teacher! You are wrong!”
“The Book of Rites says: offerings are burned with fire at the altar! This potato’s skin is thick like the earth itself—it must be roasted over strong fire and eaten with the skin to comprehend the virtue of the earth!”
“Boiled!”
“Roasted!”
Neither side would give in, their foreheads pressed together like two fighting roosters.
The surrounding scholars had also split into two factions.
One side shouted “Boiling is orthodox!”
The other shouted “Roasting is supreme!”
Some had even started fighting—grabbing hair, scratching faces. There was no trace left of scholarly dignity.
At the center of the field ridge, Kong Fu sat cross-legged in the mud.
His once neatly arranged white hair now looked like a bird’s nest after an explosion.
The hemp garment symbolizing his status as Confucian leader was also torn in several places.
But he didn’t care at all.
With his left hand, he tightly protected a pile of large potatoes in his arms.
With his right hand, he held a featherless brush and was frantically writing something on a bamboo scroll.
Muttering nonstop:
“Divine omen… record of the divine omen…”
“Its shape is like an egg, its color like yellow earth, and its taste… its taste is fucking delicious!”
A reckless student approached him, eyes fixed on the potatoes in his arms.
“Headmaster… let me touch it just once…”
“Get lost!”
Kong Fu suddenly looked up.
His eyes were bloodshot, terrifyingly red.
He opened his mouth, revealing broken teeth, and lunged forward as if to bite.
“These are seeds for His Majesty!”
“Anyone who touches my potatoes, I’ll bite their throat out!”
The student screamed in terror and ran away on all fours.
“Too noisy!”
A childish yet authoritative voice suddenly exploded above them.
Everyone immediately fell silent, like ducks whose necks had been grabbed.
They stiffly turned their heads.
On the high platform, Ying Ziye was wearing a loose sleeping robe, rubbing his sleepy eyes.
He yawned widely and even scratched his stomach casually with his little hand.
Behind him, Qinglong was holding the large grand teacher’s chair.
“Greetings… greetings, Divine Blessing!”
Kong Fu reacted first.
He hugged his potatoes and scrambled forward, dropping to his knees at the base of the platform.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
He kowtowed three times with great force.
“We are currently studying how to eat this divine object!”
“This old minister believes it should be enshrined in the ancestral temple and burned incense daily…”
“Stop, stop, stop!”
Ying Ziye waved his hand in disgust.
He looked at this group of mud-covered scholars and curled his lips.
“Look at you people—never seen the world before.”
“Enshrine it? Burn incense?”
“This is food! For humans to eat! Not for ghosts!”
He took a leftover roasted potato from Qinglong and casually tossed it in his hand.
“You only know roasting and boiling.”
“Such a waste.”
Kong Fu froze and raised his mud-covered face, confused.
“Then… is there a better way to eat it than roasting?”
The roasted potato from yesterday already felt like the most delicious thing in the world to him.
Ying Ziye snorted.
“There are plenty.”
“Mashed potatoes, sour-and-spicy shredded potatoes, braised potato chunks, French fries, dry-pot potato slices…”
He listed a whole string of dishes in one breath.
The scholars below began to drool uncontrollably.
They didn’t even know what those were.
But just hearing the names already made them feel hungry!
“Alright, wipe your saliva.”
Ying Ziye leaned comfortably into his chair.
“Since you now know how good this thing is…”
“Then your previous punishment is over.”
“Next, I will give you a new identity.”
Kong Fu’s eyes lit up.
“Is it to return to the academy and write books praising the divine blessing?”
“Write books?”
Ying Ziye rolled his eyes.
“Useless scholars are good for nothing.”
“From today onward, you are all the ‘Imperial Great Qin Agricultural Promotion Ambassadors’!”
Promotion ambassadors?
What kind of official title was that?
Before Kong Fu could even process it—
Ying Ziye waved his small hand.
“Qinglong!”
“Give each of them a bag of potatoes!”
“Five jin per person!”
Boom!
The scholars erupted.
Five jin of potatoes!
A divine object!
Something they could barely even touch before—and now they were getting five jin each?
Their eyes turned green with greed, as if they were about to rush forward and snatch them.
Ying Ziye smiled faintly as he looked at them.
“Don’t be too happy yet.”
“You only get the potatoes if you work.”
He pointed toward Xianyang City.
“One day.”
“Go into Xianyang City—East Market, West Market, every district.”
“Perform eating potatoes in public for me!”
“And while eating, you must praise them!”
“Whoever praises the best and eats the most happily—will be heavily rewarded!”
Kong Fu was completely stunned.
Let them, scholars who had studied Confucian classics their whole lives, go into the streets and eat food like performing monkeys in public?
This… this was utterly improper!
But the potatoes in his arms felt heavy and warm, releasing an irresistible earthy aroma.
He looked around.
The younger scholars showed no resistance at all anymore.
Instead, their eyes were burning with excitement—like they couldn’t wait to rush into the city and eat their fill.
“Hmm? Scholar Kong, you don’t want to go?”
Ying Ziye raised an eyebrow.
“If you don’t want to go, then leave the potatoes behind.”
“Don’t!”
Kong Fu hugged the potatoes tightly, stiffening his neck.
“Who said I don’t want to go!”
“To establish the destiny of the common people is the duty of my Confucian school!”
“I’ll go! This old man will go eat them right now!”
……
Xianyang City.
It was not the bustling celebration one might expect.
Instead, a strange and uneasy cloud hung over the streets.
Inside a teahouse in the West Market.
Several sneaky-looking men gathered together, speaking in hushed voices.
“Have you heard?”
“In the palace, that eight-year-old kid has created some kind of ‘demonic object’!”
One of them spoke with a serious expression.
Passersby nearby couldn’t help but stop and listen.
“What demonic object? Didn’t they say it was a divine blessing?”
“Bullshit divine blessing!”
The man spat on the ground.
“You didn’t see it? Last night there were ghost fires outside the city!”
“I heard that thing was dug out from underground—it grows by eating dead human flesh!”
“What?!”
The surrounding people turned pale with fear.
Another man quickly chimed in.
“That’s not even the worst part.”
“I’ve got a distant cousin working in the palace. He saw it with his own eyes.”
“Anyone who eats that thing will lose their descendants within three days!”
“Even that descendant of Confucius went mad! Banged his head bloody at the palace gate!”
“He was corrupted by the poisonous miasma of that demon object!”
“Hiss—”
A collective gasp of fear rose.
Now that there was a severe drought and grain prices were skyrocketing, the people were already anxious.
These rumors pushed them into deeper panic.
“What are we going to do?”
“If that thing spreads, won’t we all be finished?”
“This is punishment from heaven against tyrannical Qin!”
One of the men added coldly at the right moment:
“In my opinion, all of this is because the current emperor lacks virtue, which has brought forth this demon prince!”
“If you want to live, don’t touch that thing!”
Fear spread through the crowd.
The men exchanged a glance and quietly slipped away into another direction, heading toward the next district.
They did not notice—
On a nearby rooftop, several figures in flying-fish uniforms were watching them coldly.
……
Outside the Qilin Hall.
Ying Ziye lay in a grand teacher’s chair, basking in the sun.
In his hand, he held a homemade ice popsicle, sucking on it happily.
Qinglong quickly approached and knelt on one knee.
“Your Highness.”
“Black Ice Platform urgent report.”
“Rumors are spreading in the city.”
“Remnants of the Six Kingdoms are spreading claims that the potato is… a demonic object grown by eating dead human flesh.”
“They also say that anyone who eats it will… lose their descendants.”
Qinglong’s voice carried killing intent.
“The common people are ignorant. Many already believe it.”
“Some even plan to riot and burn the so-called demon object.”
“I request permission to arrest the rumor spreaders immediately!”
“Kill without mercy!”
Ying Ziye stopped sucking on the ice popsicle.
He looked up.
His childish face showed no anger at all—none of what Qinglong expected.
Instead…
He revealed a bright, almost eerie smile.
“Arrest them?”
“Why arrest them?”
Crack.
He bit down and broke the ice popsicle.
“These rats in the gutter… are actually helping me a lot this time.”
Qinglong froze.
“Helping?”
Ying Ziye stood up and clapped his hands.
“I was just worrying about how to advertise potatoes.”
“And now the hype has come on its own.”
“The more mysterious, the more frightening—it makes people more curious, more eager to see it.”
He walked a few steps with his hands behind his back.
“Pass the order.”
“No need to arrest anyone.”
“Tell the scholars—the performance location has changed.”
“We’re not going to the marketplaces anymore.”
“We’re going directly to the large square in front of Xianyang Palace!”
Ying Ziye suddenly turned around, his eyes gleaming with excitement.
“I will host a banquet!”
“A banquet unprecedented in history…”
“A Ten-Thousand-Person Potato Banquet!”
“I will let all the people of Xianyang personally smell whether this so-called ‘demon object’ is fragrant or not!”
“And in front of those remnants of the Six Kingdoms…”
“I will slap their faces swollen!”
At that moment—
A familiar mechanical voice suddenly echoed in Ying Ziye’s mind.
【Ding!】
【Detected malicious defamation of national fortune-level divine crop by remnants of the Six Kingdoms!】
【Main storyline mission triggered: Crush rumors, win over the people’s trust!】
【Objective: Through the “Ten-Thousand-Person Potato Banquet,” completely reverse public perception and make potatoes Great Qin’s number one delicacy!】
【Reward: Beginner Culinary Encyclopedia (including lost recipes) ×1!】
【Special reward: Unlimited divine seasoning pack (cumin, chili powder, fine salt, MSG)!】
Ying Ziye froze for a moment.
Then his smile became even brighter.
Almost… a little sinister.
Cumin?
Chili powder?
And MSG?
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