Most of the ingredients were easy to obtain, but there were two types of herbs which were rare. They were only able to obtain six sets of these two types of herbs even after combing high and low in Lan City. Thereafter, they needed to head to the southwest to purchase the rarer herbs. In particular, they had to send some people to the Sixty Thousand Mountains. The headquarters of the aboriginals was located there.
In any case, Ren Baqian could finally continue with his training.
Seven sets of the medicinal herbs could last him for more than a month and could solve his emergency situation for the time being.
That very night, Ren Baqian entered the [Visualization of Wood], which he hadn't done for a very long time. He felt exhausted after he woke up from it. Previously, he was already accustomed to this sort of feeling, but after stopping for two months, he was somewhat unable to adapt to this kind of fatigue.
The next morning, Ren Baqian clenched his fists and finally felt that his strength had increased.
This feeling was pretty good.
However, when he saw Tong Lan in the palace in the afternoon, he immediately felt that this increment in strength was his own illusion. As usual, Ren Baqian was walloped by Tong Lan. He then spoke in a stern voice and declared, "Your grandfather will always be a grandfather!"
Boom!He suffered a solid punch.
With a black eye, Ren Baqian continued to say, "Your teacher will always be your teacher. Remember to respect your teacher.""Hmph!" The little lolita looked at the sky and snorted. She looked at him with disgust.
Today's training was finally over. Ren Baqian earnestly said to the empress, "Your Majesty, I feel that I need to change opponents.""To an eight year old?" The empress laughed at him.
Ren Baqian was at a loss. Wouldn't he lose face if he couldn't even defeat an eight year old?
He absolutely believed that the empress could an eight year old "genius" that could hang him up and beat him. "How about getting an imperial bodyguard to be my opponent…?" Ren Baqian gnashed his teeth and asked.
In any case, the imperial bodyguards were gentler than Tong Lan as they were of a lower status.
Furthermore, the strength of the imperial guards wasn't necessarily comparable to Tong Lan.
Even though the imperial guards and Tong Lan were at the Earth Wheel level, what Tong Lan learned wasn't something that the imperial guards could achieve. After all, that old bastard Tong Zhenye was a Spirit Wheel expert and definitely had some tricks up his sleeves. He knew just from seeing Tong Zhenye defeating Qin Chuan with his [Black Tiger Steals Heart] in 13 consecutive strikes.
From a sensible point of view, Ren Baqian always felt that the Minister of War should be able to fight better than the Minister of Works. In fact, Qin Chuan won more battles than he lost.
The empress looked at Ren Baqian as his expression changed. Her almond-shaped eyes were now bent, as if she was laughing in her heart. She finally said something after a long time, "I'll change the opponent for you only if you defeat Tong Lan!"
"Your Majesty…" Ren Baqian was full of grievance.
"Work hard to defeat her. It isn't pleasant to hear that you can't even defeat a ten year old," the empress added.
Ren Baqian felt that the empress was rubbing salt onto his wound.
This wasn't only unpleasant to the ears, but it would also embarrassing if spread to the others.
Forget it—it was just Tong Lan. At the very least, he would somehow benefit from battling Tong Lan.
Every time he stood beside her, he was much taller than her. Thus, he nonetheless still had a psychological advantage.If his opponent was changed to one of the imperial guards that had thick and muscular limbs, he would lose this bit of advantage. During the rainy season, rain fell as and when it liked even though the sky was still clear just a while ago. Ren Baqian was sitting in a chair beside the empress and basking under the sun when the sky suddenly became overcast.
After Ren Baqian and the empress returned to the main hall, it began to rain heavily. The bean-sized raindrops slammed onto the tiles and the ground, producing pitter-patter sounds.
"Your Majesty, do you want to have hot pot for dinner tonight?" Ren Baqian looked at the rain outside and then turned to look at the empress.
"Sure!" The empress nodded her head.
One could never have too much hot pot.
Before the sun started to set, guards were already streaming in despite the rain with their hands filled with food that would become hot pot ingredients. The empress and Ren Baqian felt pretty good as they listened to the sound of the rain while having piping hot food.
Ren Baqian filled each of their cups with wine, raised a toast, and then drank it in one shot.
"The people in the south are always dishonest, and we have just killed a group of them. Recently, we also noticed that they are connected in private," the empress said unenthusiastically as she took a sip of wine.It was unknown when she acquired this habit of talking about the nation's affairs during meals.
"Oh!" Ren Baqian nodded.
This was an ongoing issue. However, it became even more serious after the war with Great Xia.
"Do you have any thoughts on this issue?" the empress asked faintly.
"Let me make trip there!" Ren Baqian decided after thinking for a while. "After all, it takes some time to deal with this issue. I will treat it as making preparations to attack the Yun Nation. However, I would not be able to accompany Your Majesty anymore and that would be a little regretful." "In this case, you don't have to regret. I'll go with you," the empress said cooly. "Your Majesty wants to tag along too?" Ren Baqian was slightly surprised as he hadn't expected that the empress would be interested in heading to the south.
"I want to see why they are still not content even though the imperial court has given them more than ten years of peaceful living," the empress replied. She had already grown sick of their dirty tricks long ago. If she hadn't made that promise to them back then, she would have gotten rid of them.
Now that she was going to resolve this issue, she also wanted to see what those people were like, what kind of life they lived, and whether the imperial court had treated them poorly or not.
"What about the nation's affairs?" Ren Baqian asked. Previously, they headed to the north because of the urgent situation during the war. Now that things had stabilized, it wasn't appropriate for the empress to leave behind the nation's affair and head to the south.
"With the Elders and the radio stations, everything will proceed smoothly." The empress didn't mind at all.
"I have to take my students along too, so I'm afraid that this trip will take up some time," Ren Baqian continued.
"Oh, by the way, do you want to get your palm read? I learned it from an elder when I was a child." Ren Baqian's eyeballs rolled.
"Palmistry?"
"Everyone's palms are different. You can see the fate of a person from their palm. This is a skill that has been passed down for thousands of years," Ren Baqian explained. "How do you read it?" It piqued the empress's curiosity.
"Your Majesty, give me your hand," Ren Baqian said as he held the empress's hand and flipped it over. After that, he used another hand to touch her palm and squinted his eyes.
He touched it once, then again and again…
The empress was so full of expectations that her eyebrows rose, and a cold glint flashed across her eyes…
Ren Baqian then coughed once. "Your Majesty was born into riches and honor, a descendant of the imperial family, and ranked the best in the entire world. A ruler's life…. From your marriage line, it seems that you have found your fated one and that things will turn out smoothly. You and your partner will live to a ripe old age in conjugal bliss…" The empress continued to look at him with an icy-cold gaze. She somehow felt that she was being lied to by the guy in front of her…
"From your wealth line, no one can compare to Your Majesty's wealth in this world. Although your wealth isn't the best at present, this year will be your turning point. From this year onward, Your Majesty's wealth will increase gradually, and you'll be the richest in the world… Your Majesty will also have 12 children…"
Smack!The empress's ears turned red, and she shot a cold stare at Ren Baqian. "12 children?"
Giving birth to 12 children? The thought of it made people shiver.
Moreover, giving birth was a difficult task for the aboriginals.
An average family had about three to five children, and that was already considered pretty good. Otherwise, there wouldn't be so few aboriginals.
For someone who was so strong, like the empress, it was even more difficult for her to produce an heir.
This scoundrel was definitely lying to her.
Ren Baqian exerted all his strength into swinging his hand. He was almost close to tears.
"I'm the one who's going to have 12 children…" Ren Baqian inhaled.
Smack!" The empress's almond-shaped eyes widened. If they weren't her children, whose children would they be?
"Your Majesty, it's really swollen…" Ren Baqian looked very miserable.