Nine Star Hegemon Body Art

When the feast ended, Long Chen bid farewell to Yu Qingxuan and returned to the mansion with Yu Qianxue. However, Yu Qianxue remained oddly silent as they traveled.

Long Chen smiled at her. “Why aren’t you talking? It’s not like you.”

“How isn’t it like me?” asked Yu Qianxue.

“Is your will crushed after a tiny setback?”

“I wouldn’t say that it is crushed, but it is definitely a serious blow to me. Even if I didn’t consider myself an unrivaled expert before, I thought that it would be hard for me to find a match in the same realm. But now? I feel like I’m a frog at the bottom of a well. I’m still too naive.” Yu Qianxue bitterly smiled.

This battle had truly been a blow to her. All the experts of their royal family had been utterly defeated.

Previously, she had had the utmost confidence in herself, and she had even challenged Long Chen. Now, she realized just how naive that challenge was.

Moreover, she hadn’t just wanted Long Chen but also his entire Dragonblood Legion. Thinking of how confident she had been in herself back then, she was so ashamed that she could barely look at him.

“Long Chen, are we very naive? Are we laughable?”

“You…! Even if the answer’s yes, you don’t need to be so direct!” rebuked Yu Qianxue.

“Oh? You want me to comfort you? In truth, with your character, this little blow is nothing,” said Long Chen with a smile.

“How do you know? We’ve lost the face of the royal family and our royal father. Considering how prideful he is, the more he doesn’t punish us, the worse we will feel inside,” sighed Yu Qianxue.

“I call you naive and you still don’t understand? Your defeat was entirely within expectations. It was also a part of the imperial family’s plans. Thus, you don’t need to feel any guilt. It’s true that all of you are very powerful. There is not one useless coward amongst you, and that’s something worthy of praise. When His Majesty praised you, he meant it. He was truly satisfied by your display today,” said Long Chen.

“Really?”

“Of course. If my guess is right, the next step will be a hellish training session for you all. The emperor wanted you to lose, and everything was a show for the other side to see.” Long Chen thought back to the various clues he had spotted during the banquet. He felt that this was very likely.

“They wanted us to intentionally lose? Why? Why are you looking at me like that?” asked Yu Qianxue.

Long Chen sighed. “If you still can’t even figure this out, you should really give up on being the empress. Obviously, the royal family was intentionally presenting a weak front in order to either deceive their opponents or lure them into a trap. If they presented a weak front, then it was to buy more breathing room. If it was a trap, then it might be to catch all the enemies at once. In my opinion, the latter is more likely. When the eight empires attack, the Vermilion Bird Empire will stand on the right of reason when they strike back. In the Vermilion Bird Empire’s history, the royal family has had some conflicts with the seven empires, and now even the Heavenly Ruler Seal Empire is being a disloyal dog. As a result, the Vermilion Bird Empire can be said to be surrounded by enemies right now, but this is also a large opportunity for them. As for whether it is actually danger or opportunity, it depends on the empire’s true power. If they have power, they’ll be consuming a big meat bun. But if they don’t have power, they’ll be crushed to death by that meat bun.”

“Are you saying that this was all arranged? No, there’s no way. There’s no way to fake our true power, is there?”

“Fool, you lost to the other side because you lack combat experience. But at the same time, all of you have a seal in your bodies,” said Long Chen.

“Impossible. If there was a seal, we would know!” Yu Qianxue’s eyes widened.

“It’s up to you whether you want to believe it or not.” Long Chen shrugged indifferently.

Just how immense was Long Chen’s combat experience? His vision had been trained from the mortal world to the immortal world. Although he hadn’t sensed anything at first, but when the seventh prince fought, he finally noticed something wrong.

Back then, no matter how these princes and princesses fought with their lives on the line, they were unable to trigger the energy deep within their bodies, which made zero sense. When facing death, people would instinctively trigger their latent potential. But afterward, they would enter an extremely weak state. That was also called overdrafting oneself.

However, they were unable to fight back or trigger that potential. This seal might be able to trick others, but it couldn’t hide from Long Chen.

“If what you’re saying is true, that would be great. We’d show the eight empires that our Vermilion Bird Empire’s royal family isn’t full of fools!” Yu Qianxue was excited at the thought.

The eight empires had started calling Yu Xiaoyun the fool lately due to how explosive his temper was and his inability to deal with problems. They were intentionally slandering him to lower the morale of the people of the Vermilion Bird Empire.

“No, you’re wrong. The emperor really is a fool. The smart ones are his two empresses.”

Long Chen waved his hand dismissively. He refused to acknowledge that this plan had anything to do with Yu Xiaoyun. Yu Xiaoyun was a prime model of someone who acted without thinking, only able to be direct and straightforward. Thus, this kind of scheme was not his style.

Yu Qianxue was speechless. Perhaps the only person in the Vermilion Bird Empire who dared to speak about the emperor like this was this fellow.

However, after witnessing Long Chen blowing up an expert of the Heavenly Ruler Seal Empire with a punch and capturing the peak heavenly genius Weng Tianyao in front of the Earth Venerates, she now felt such admiration for Long Chen that it was bordering on worship.

The two of them then returned to the princess mansion. The next morning, someone came to give Long Chen a status plate, and he knew it was time to report to the Philosopher Institute.

“Tch, they want me to play the bad guy? Fine, for my wife, I’ll accept it.” Long Chen took the status plate and went to the Philosopher Institute alone.

The Philosopher Institute was the highest institute of learning in the Vermilion Bird Empire. In it, there were only a total of three Philosophers, the ones with the greatest learning in the entire empire. Philosopher Sun, also known as Sun Gongzhi, was one of them.

When Long Chen arrived at the gate, he saw the board with the name of this place written on it. When he saw it, he couldn’t help being moved.

The words were written squarely, and although Long Chen was not skilled in calligraphy, just from seeing the writing of the characters, Long Chen could sense the overflowing righteousness from the person who had written it.

“This place is said to be the highest institute of learning in the empire, but it is actually a dirty swamp for the corrupt. How vile. The only question is whether you will still be standing here tomorrow.”

“Perhaps the answer to that question depends entirely on a single word from senior!” Just then, an ancient voice rang out from the other side of the gate.

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