Inside the imperial palace, in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the lights blazed brightly.
Li An sat in the seat beside the Emperor Zhao Ling’er, his entire body practically screaming, “I don’t want to be sitting here.”
But what choice did he have?
The emperor had personally led him to that seat.
All the civil and military officials were watching.
If he dared to decline, by tomorrow the teahouses of the capital would be spreading rumors:
“Lord Li doesn’t know how to appreciate a favor—His Majesty invited him to sit, and he refused!”
And then someone would add: “They say it’s because he’s guilty.”
Guilty?
Of course I’m guilty!
Just moments ago, he had been telling Murong Xue things like “serving Northern Yan” and “using Great Qi’s chickens to lay Northern Yan’s eggs.”
And now he had to play the loyal minister in front of the Emperor of Great Qi.
This kind of inhuman undercover life was even more tormenting than the 996 overtime grind at his previous company.
“Beloved Minister Li.”
Zhao Ling’er’s voice interrupted his spiraling thoughts.
“I heard the Ninth Princess visited your residence again today?”
Li An’s heart skipped a beat.
Here it comes.
What was meant to come would always come.
He stole a glance at Prime Minister Wang Fu across the hall.
Sure enough, the old fox was watching him with a meaningful look, even deliberately smiling.
“Your Majesty,” Li An replied calmly, “The Ninth Princess did indeed visit.”
“Oh?”
Zhao Ling’er lifted her wine cup and asked casually,
“And what was her purpose?”
Before Li An could answer, Prime Minister Wang Fu spoke first.
“Your Majesty, this old minister happens to have some information.”
Wang Fu stood, bowing with clasped hands.
With a half-smile on his aged face, he said:
“As far as this old minister has learned, Lord Li not only met privately with the Ninth Princess of Northern Yan…”
“He also presented her with several items.”
“And dismissed all attendants while holding a long private discussion with her.”
The atmosphere in the hall instantly turned delicate.
The ministers began whispering among themselves.
“Dismissed attendants?”
“A private meeting with the Northern Yan princess?”
“What does that imply?”
Li An felt utterly speechless.
This old bastard Wang Fu really was everywhere.
There must be spies planted in his residence.
Otherwise, how would he know so much?
“Beloved Minister Li.”
Zhao Ling’er turned her gaze toward him.
“Is what the Prime Minister says true?”
Li An took a deep breath.
Deny it?
Impossible.
If Wang Fu dared say this before the entire court, he must have evidence.
If Li An denied it, he would only look guilty.
“Your Majesty,”
Li An stood up, appearing open and upright.
“The Prime Minister speaks the truth.”
“I did meet privately with the Ninth Princess, and I did give her some things.”
The hall erupted in an uproar.
“He admitted it!”
“He gave her things? What things?”
“Could it be… Lord Li is colluding with the enemy?”
Wang Fu pressed the advantage:
“Since Lord Li has admitted it, then this old minister will speak plainly.”
He pulled a memorial from his sleeve.
“According to my informant, what Lord Li gave the Ninth Princess was a scroll of diagrams and a bag of seeds.”
“The diagrams detail the formula for refining divine iron.”
“And the seeds… are sweet potato seeds.”
“Lord Li, am I mistaken?”
Li An looked at Wang Fu’s smug face, yet his expression remained calm.
The old man had definitely planted spies in his residence.
Since there was no avoiding it, he might as well confront it head-on.
He nodded.
“The Prime Minister is correct.”
“I did give the formula for divine iron and sweet potato seeds to the Ninth Princess.”
This time, the hall completely exploded.
“What?!”
“He really gave them?!”
“The divine iron formula? That’s a national treasure of Great Qi!”
“This is outright treason!”
Grand Commandant Sun Qian leapt to his feet and pointed at Li An.
“Li An! Do you know what you are saying?!”
“The divine iron is the painstaking work of the Ministry of Works! The sweet potatoes were painstakingly cultivated by the Directorate of Agriculture!”
“And you handed these national treasures over to Northern Yan?!”
“What are your intentions? Are you truly selling out the country in secret?!”
Li An watched the man’s righteous fury and sneered inwardly.
Sun Qian.
Even more foolish than Wang Fu.
Clearly leaning toward the Imperial Uncle’s faction, yet fanning the flames for Wang Fu at a crucial moment.
Didn’t he realize that if Li An fell, it wouldn’t benefit him at all?
But it didn’t matter.
Let them raise the tension.
The more dramatic the atmosphere, the more stunning his performance would be.
“Grand Commandant, your words are mistaken!”
Li An raised a hand, signaling Sun Qian to calm down.
“I did give those items.”
“But I would like to ask you a question.”
Sun Qian frowned. “You’ve aided the enemy like this—what more is there to say?”
Li An swept his gaze across the hall, looking at every minister present, then declared confidently:
“All of you believe that by giving divine iron and sweet potatoes to Northern Yan, I am helping them.”
“But I say—you are all wrong.”
“Completely wrong.”
His voice suddenly rose.
“What I gave Northern Yan was not aid!”
“It was… poison enough to destroy their nation!”
Silence fell over the hall once more.
Everyone was stunned.
Poison?
What did he mean?
Even Zhao Ling’er looked confused.
“Beloved Minister, explain yourself.”
Li An turned to face her, smiling faintly, confidence glinting in his eyes.
The kind of expression that said, “You mortals wouldn’t understand a genius.”
“Your Majesty, please allow me to explain.”
He stepped to the center of the hall and began his performance.
“First, let us speak of divine iron.”
“Do you know what is required to refine it?”
He answered his own question:
“Special ores. Precise ratios. Complex furnace temperature control.”
“And above all… vast sums of silver.”
“How many furnaces did the Ministry of Works explode refining this iron? How much silver was burned? How many craftsmen exhausted?”
“All of this was Great Qi testing and failing on behalf of Northern Yan!”
Sun Qian frowned. “What exactly are you trying to say?”
Li An smiled faintly.
“What I am saying is… just because I gave them the formula, does that mean Northern Yan can refine divine iron?”
He shook his head.
“No.”
“They lack the funds for repeated experimentation.”
“They lack skilled craftsmen to operate such complex equipment.”
“And they lack even the most basic concept of standardization.”
His voice grew louder, deliberately exaggerating the difficulty and cost.
“What I gave them is a massive pitfall!”
“They will follow my formula and fail.”
“They will pour in silver and manpower, only to see it wasted.”
“They will try again and again—only to fail again and again.”
“And in the end, what will happen?”
He spun around, eyes blazing.
“They will become completely dependent on Great Qi!”
“Because only Great Qi has the accumulated technology to produce divine iron!”
“Once they witness the power of weapons forged from it, if they want divine iron—they must come begging us!”
“What is this called?”
A sly smile curved his lips.
“This is called… technological colonization!”
The hall was utterly silent.
Everyone was shaken by his reasoning.
Technological colonization?
A new term.
But thinking about it carefully…
It seemed to make sense?
Northern Yan was founded by nomadic tribes—what did they know about metallurgy?
Even if the formula was handed to them openly, they might not succeed even with step-by-step instruction.
Wang Fu’s face darkened.
He hadn’t expected Li An to twist “treason” into “technological colonization.”
What a silver tongue.
“Lord Li,” he said coldly, suppressing his displeasure, “even if divine iron is as you say, what about the sweet potatoes?”
“They can simply plant those.”
“Once you give them the seeds, won’t they immediately gain high-yield crops?”
“Is that also… technological colonization?”
Li An secretly rejoiced.
That’s exactly the question I was waiting for.
“An excellent question, Prime Minister!”
He looked at Wang Fu approvingly.
“The matter of sweet potatoes is even more subtle.”
“May I ask, what is the main occupation of Northern Yan’s people?”
Wang Fu hesitated.
“Pastoralism and hunting.”
“Exactly!”
Li An clapped his hands.
“The Northern Yan people follow water and grass, skilled in horsemanship and archery.”
“That is their strength.”
“But what if… they begin farming?”
He let out a faint laugh.
“Imagine a man of the steppe.”
“He sets down his bow and picks up a hoe.”
“He no longer rides in pursuit of prey, but bends over in the fields.”
“He no longer gazes at the vast blue sky, but stares daily at whether his sweet potatoes have grown.”
“Over time—will he still be that fierce steppe warrior?”
“No.”
“He becomes a farmer content with stability.”
“His riding and archery grow rusty.”
“His bloodlust dulls.”
“His wolfish nature… disappears.”
At this point, Li An suddenly raised his voice and shouted:
“Sweet potatoes,” Li An declared loudly, “are the second dose of poison I’ve given to Northern Yan!”
“They will make the people of Northern Yan abandon what they are best at and instead do what they are worst at!”
“They will turn Northern Yan’s wolves… into sheep!”
“What is this called?”
His eyes blazed as he enunciated each word:
“This is called… cultural infiltration!”
The Hall of Supreme Harmony fell into complete silence.
Once again, everyone was stunned by Li An’s shocking rhetoric.
Cultural infiltration?
Technological colonization?
These unheard-of terms carried an eerie persuasiveness.
Sun Qian opened his mouth to argue, but found himself speechless.
Minister of Revenue Qian Tong whispered to the official beside him,
“Could it be… Lord Li is truly a heaven-sent genius?”
“I’ve lived over sixty years and never heard such astonishing ideas.”
The Vice Minister of Rites nodded repeatedly.
“Indeed! This kind of open strategy is a hundred times more terrifying than any conspiracy.”
“Even if Northern Yan realizes it, what can they do? Refuse divine iron and sweet potatoes?”
“No! They would beg for them!”
“And the moment they accept them, they step into the trap Great Qi has laid!”
Wang Fu’s face darkened.
His carefully prepared impeachment had been dismantled by just a few sentences?
Impossible!
“Lord Li certainly has a clever tongue,” Wang Fu sneered.
“But I would ask—what proof do you have?”
“How do you prove Northern Yan will abandon horsemanship because of sweet potatoes?”
“How do you prove they cannot refine divine iron?”
“And what if… what if they actually succeed?”
“Wouldn’t your argument become a joke?”
Li An smiled immediately.
“An excellent question, Prime Minister.”
“I indeed have no proof.”
“But I have a question for you.”
“Prime Minister, do you have servants in your household?”
Wang Fu blinked. “Naturally.”
“Have you ever taught them to read?”
“Absurd!” Wang Fu snorted. “Why would servants need to read?”
“Why not?” Li An pressed.
“Because…” Wang Fu faltered.
Li An smiled faintly.
“Because once servants learn to read and understand reason, they will no longer be content to remain servants.”
“They will strive to climb upward and change their fate.”
“And at that point, Prime Minister, your household might find no one left to pour tea and sweep floors.”
“This is called… the policy of keeping people ignorant.”
“Only by keeping them ignorant can they remain content.”
Wang Fu’s face turned completely black.
He understood Li An’s implication.
The boy was using the servant example to explain the feasibility of “cultural infiltration.”
And while doing so, he had also mocked him.
What a vicious tongue.
“Giving sweet potatoes to Northern Yan is the same principle as the Prime Minister not allowing servants to read,” Li An continued.
“Teaching Northern Yan to farm makes them content with stability.”
“Feeding and clothing them well makes them lose their ambition.”
“After ten or twenty years, how many of Northern Yan’s young generation will still know how to ride and shoot?”
“And at that time, when Great Qi marches north—would it not be like retrieving something from one’s own pocket?”
He turned to Zhao Ling’er and bowed deeply.
“Your Majesty, this move is called… subduing the enemy without fighting!”
The moment his words fell, the Hall of Supreme Harmony erupted in thunderous applause.
“Excellent!”
“Well said!”
“To subdue the enemy without fighting—that is true wisdom!”
Grand Commandant Sun Qian stood first, sighing in admiration.
“I have fought wars my entire life, yet never imagined such a method!”
“Lord Li, I am convinced!”
“Even if I died ten thousand times, I could not match this soft-blade killing without blood!”
Emperor Zhao Ling’er leapt to her feet, grabbing Li An’s hand excitedly.
“Beloved Minister! Cultural infiltration! Technological colonization!”
“I’ve studied for years—how did I never conceive such a strategy?”
“Your scheme shakes heaven and moves ghosts!”
“I truly did not misjudge you!”
Li An looked at the young emperor’s emotional expression, feeling complicated inside.
You believed it?
You actually believed it?
I just made all that up on the spot!
Cultural infiltration? Technological colonization?
I genuinely want Northern Yan to grow stronger to complete my system mission!
But could he say that aloud?
Obviously not.
“Your Majesty overpraises me,” he said.
“I merely… did what a minister ought to do.”
“Good!”
Zhao Ling’er raised her wine cup.
Her gaze toward Li An was full of admiration—and something else, difficult to describe.
“With a minister like you, what does Great Qi have to fear?”
“Come, all of you—drink to Beloved Minister Li!”
“To Lord Li!”
The entire court raised their cups.
Even Wang Fu had no choice but to drink, though his expression was uglier than if he had swallowed a fly.
Li An drained his cup in one gulp.
Inside, he was screaming.
These people…
Their imagination is one thing—but they’re this easy to fool?
I casually invented a few concepts and they completely bought it?
No—not only did they believe it.
They think I’m a genius?
This is ridiculous!
He glanced at his system panel.
【Current National Fortune Value: 118,456】
【Notice: Host’s “cultural infiltration” speech increased confidence among Great Qi’s court, but impact is limited. National fortune change minimal.】
Li An quietly exhaled in relief.
Good. It didn’t increase too much.
As long as Murong Xue brings the items back to Northern Yan, his mission still has hope.
The banquet continued.
Wine flowed; dishes were served.
The atmosphere grew increasingly lively.
Officials came one after another to toast him.
“Lord Li, allow this old man to toast you!”
“Lord Li, I admire you greatly!”
“Lord Li is a Zhuge Liang of our era!”
Li An had no choice but to drink cup after cup.
Could he refuse?
They approached him respectfully, praising and admiring him.
The moment he tried to decline, Zhao Ling’er would frown and say, “Beloved Minister, do not spoil the mood…”
So he drank.
He didn’t know how many cups he had swallowed.
His head began to grow foggy.
So even low-alcohol ancient wine could get someone drunk after all.
“Beloved Minister Li.”
Zhao Ling’er’s voice sounded beside him.
“You’ve had too much. Let Eunuch Liu take you to a side hall to rest.”
Li An looked up at his concerned gaze.
Within it was something else—something unclear yet unmistakable.
“Thank you for Your Majesty’s concern.”
He stood unsteadily.
“I… am indeed somewhat drunk.”
Eunuch Liu appeared at his side promptly.
“Lord Li, this way please.”
Li An followed him toward a side hall.
At the doorway, he accidentally glanced back—
And met a pair of deep, burning eyes.
It was… the Empress, Sun Ruoxi.
She was staring at him without blinking.
That gaze…
Li An’s heart trembled.
Why does it look just like that time in Cining Palace?
No… even more intense.
“Why is Her Majesty the Empress here…” he muttered unconsciously.
But in the next moment, Eunuch Liu pulled him around the corner.
“Lord Li, this way.”
He was indeed brought into a side chamber.
The room was elegantly arranged: a soft couch, a small table, and on it, a steaming bowl of soup.
“Lord Li, this is sobering soup. Drink it and you’ll feel better.”
Eunuch Liu handed him the bowl.
Without thinking much, Li An took a sip.
Hm?
The taste…
It felt familiar.
Sweet, with a faint medicinal fragrance.
Wait—
Something clicked in his mind.
Last time at Cining Palace…
The bowl the Empress gave him…
It tasted exactly like this!
His mind instantly cleared.
“Eunuch Liu, is there something in this—”
He turned, but Eunuch Liu was gone.
And the doors had somehow been shut from the outside.
“What’s going on?”
Li An quickly stood—
Only to feel a wave of heat surge from his lower abdomen. His head spun even more.
The sensation…
Exactly like last time.
“Damn it!”
He cursed inwardly.
Not this trick again?!
Soft footsteps came from behind a folding screen.
Light. Graceful. Carrying a faint, lingering fragrance.
A figure like a startled swan slowly emerged.
Li An focused his blurry vision—
And swallowed hard.
“You…”
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