Liu Bian at the start, so you're called Dong Zhuo, right?

Chapter 121 The Number One Poison Master of the Three Kingdoms

On the same night, in a side room of the Yuan residence.

Yuan Shao stood with his hands behind his back by the window, his expression not good.

"Gongsun Zan has come up," he said calmly. "Is this the result you wanted?"

Behind the screen, Jia Xu remained calm; instead, a smile appeared on his face.

"My lord did not come away empty-handed."

Yuan Shao turned around, his eyes turning cold.

"You mean I deliberately let Feng Fang make a fool of himself so that Gongsun Zan could take over, and that's considered a gain?"

Jia Xu seemed oblivious to the impatience in Yuan Shao's tone and continued speaking.

"If you only consider the position of Assistant Commandant of the Left, you will naturally be at a disadvantage."

"But if we look back..."

"Today, the Crown Prince used Dong Zhuo's influence to ask His Majesty to inspect the Western Garden, and he also used Feng Fang's rebellion to elevate Gongsun Zan. On the surface, it seems that he has gained the upper hand."

"But it's precisely because this step went too smoothly that he felt..."

He's the winner tonight.

Yuan Shao's eyes darkened slightly.

"Did you let him win this move on purpose?"

"It's not 'letting go'," Jia Xu said calmly, "it's 'giving away'."

"Gongsun Zan is a man destined to be buried in the West Garden. The Crown Prince will need him sooner or later. Since that's the case, instead of stopping him, we might as well help him get promoted."

"Once it's carried up, he'll care more about the West Garden, more about the soldiers, and more about how to sharpen this knife."

"Once a person starts focusing on the knife they've just brandished, they easily overlook something even more deadly."

Upon hearing this, Yuan Shao's expression finally changed.

"His Majesty?"

"Exactly," Jia Xu continued.

"The Crown Prince is more perceptive than anyone else. He can see that His Majesty is wrong, and he will definitely try to rectify it."

"But he repaired the West Garden, repaired the Chang Le Palace, repaired the post roads, repaired Dong Zhuo, and also repaired His Majesty."

"The more supplements you take, the more easily your eyes will become blurry."

Yuan Shao remained silent for a moment before finally sitting down slowly.

"But Gongsun Zan's rise to power was ultimately due to his military strength."

Jia Xu chuckled softly again.

"Gained troops?"

"Gongsun Zan is currently only an assistant commander of the left wing. No matter how capable he is, he is still one of the eight commanders of the Western Garden."

"The person in Xiyuan who can truly set the tone with a single word is Jian Shuo."

"And it's not just the Crown Prince who can make a fuss about the personal connections, ranks, comings and goings, and interactions within the West Garden."

His voice lowered as he said this.

"Don't forget, my lord, you yourself are in the West Garden."

Yuan Shao paused slightly with his fingertips.

These words were what truly suppressed his displeasure.

Yes.

So what if Gongsun Zan got promoted?

Assistant Commandant of the Left, but still just a Commandant.

The reins of the West Garden remain in Jian Shuo's hands; and the connections, reputation, and old friends he has cultivated inside and outside the West Garden over the years have not been for nothing.

Gongsun Zan is a knife.

Even the sharpest blade needs a sheath, a place, and an opportunity to go into battle.

And none of these have truly left Xiyuan's original territory yet.

"So you deliberately let the Crown Prince take this small piece of military power," Yuan Shao said slowly.

"Not bad," said the person behind the screen. "Let him think he's won, let him sharpen his knife, let him tilt his eyes and heart further toward the West Garden, toward Gongsun Zan, and toward Dong Zhuo."

"As for what should really be seized—"

He paused, his tone almost cold and flat.

"Not at the training ground."

"In Zhangde Hall."

Yuan Shao raised his head and looked at the thin figure behind the screen, remaining silent for a long time.

The room remained quiet for a long time.

Finally, he spoke in a low voice: "The palace's inside agents have been mobilized, but His Majesty still appears to be unharmed."

Why is that?

Jia Xu shook his head and looked at Yuan Shao.

"The worst thing you can do when it comes to poisoning is to act hastily."

"If you rush, it's easy for others to spot your flaws."

Yuan Shao pressed his fingers on the table, his voice lowering slightly.

"What exactly do you want to do?"

Jia Xu waved his feather fan and slowly said, "The most potent poison lies in the medicine, not in the person."

"The most serious poisons are food, sex, desire, and overwork."

"The Supreme Poison"

—"

He paused slightly as he said this.

"In power."

Yuan Shao raised his eyes.

The voice behind the screen remained flat, without even a hint of inflection: "Isn't His Majesty about to fall ill immediately?"

"It's enough if he gets more and more tired, more and more agitated, and less and less in control of the situation each day."

The great victory in Liangzhou pleased him; the military review at the West Garden allowed him to witness it; the struggle for Dong Zhuo in the court troubled him; the aftermath on the border, the undercurrents in the capital, and the political climate among the imperial clansmen all forced him to think about them.

"Medicine can only harm the body, but the situation can gnaw at the heart."

"He didn't just die from a dose of poison."

"He will fall when he still wants to hold the world up."

Yuan Shao listened and was speechless for a moment.

"What about the Crown Prince?" Yuan Shao finally asked.

"He can make up for it," said the voice from behind the screen. "He can make up for Chang Le Palace, he can make up for west Garden, he can make up for the central government, he can make up for His Majesty."

"Then let him fix it."

"The more you try to patch things up, the more flaws you'll reveal; the more frantically you try to protect them, the easier it is to expose your weaknesses."

Yuan Shao's eyes flickered slightly, but then he suddenly seemed to think of something, and his brows furrowed slightly.

"The Crown Prince will be anxious, but Xun Wenruo will not."

"He's not someone you can mess with."

"Xun Wenruo is a defensive player, and he is most afraid of others not facing him head-on."

Jia Xu said calmly.

"And what I like most is not to face people head-on."

In the following days, things indeed became unsettled in the palace.

It's not a major upheaval.

Rather, it is an indescribable, increasingly fragmented disorder.

Two urgent reports came to the Zhangde Hall at night, both concerning the aftermath of the border situation; during the day, the Ministry of Personnel sent two contradictory grain registers, one saying that the grain route to Liangzhou was clear, while the other said that there was still a shortage in the transport; the Imperial Clan Court also sent a memorial, saying that the repairs to the Chenliu Prince's Palace were delayed and requesting that someone be sent to handle the matter.

These things, taken individually, are not considered major.

But if all of them were piled up in one place, it would be enough to keep Emperor Ling of Han awake for several days in a row.

At first, he would only cough a few more times after the court session ended.

Later, he began to experience chest tightness and insomnia at night, often calling people in the middle of the night to ask about things. After asking, he would become irritable, and after becoming irritable, he would need to take medicine, but even after taking the medicine, he might not be willing to rest early.

He initially followed Hua Tuo's prescription, but by the third day, he began to complain that it was too bitter and troublesome.

Liu Bian went to see it twice, and each time he saw it, his heart sank deeper.

Father did not collapse suddenly.

It's like a dam that already had cracks, with water seeping in inch by inch. The surface is still holding up, but the inside is already starting to loosen.

Inside the Chengde Hall, Xun Huo stood before his desk, with more than ten copies of the memorials he had received in the past few days stacked beside him.

Liu Bian sat at the head of the table, his eyes revealing an overwhelming weariness.

"Three more nighttime reports have arrived." He pushed a thin sheet of paper in front of Xun Huo. "Two are genuine, and one is fake. The fake one is cleverly mixed in with the genuine ones; if you don't look closely, you'll just think it's a matter of complicated border affairs."

Xun glanced down and stopped at one spot with his fingertip.

"It's not a matter of a fake letter."

"Someone knows what His Majesty is most afraid of, most anxious about, and most reluctant to let go of right now."

Liu Bian looked up at him.

Xun Huo slowly said, "He is not targeting His Majesty."

"They are using His Majesty's current illness to choose when he should be happy, when he should be angry, and when he has to exert himself."

Upon hearing this, the hall fell silent.

Liu Bian was silent for a moment, then suddenly asked, "Who came to mind?"

Xun did not answer directly, but instead spread out the copies one by one.

"The increased number of urgent reports from the border indicates that the communication lines outside have not been severed."

"The fact that the imperial clan's attitude is sometimes tight and sometimes loose indicates that someone is still deliberately trying to disrupt the connection between Changle Palace and the Prince of Chenliu's residence."

"The court officials are vying for Dong Zhuo's reward, which is an open struggle; but pushing these trivial matters to His Majesty layer by layer is a covert effort."

"This method is unlike Yuan Shao's."

"Yuan Benchu ​​is a person who goes with the flow, leverages the momentum, and suppresses the momentum."

"He might be able to do these things, but he wouldn't be very good at taking a knife apart into so many fine needles and sticking them into the bone one by one."

Liu Bian's gaze darkened.

"You mean, Yuan Shao has someone plotting against him?"

Xun nodded.

"This path is too unorthodox and too dangerous."

"It's not about killing with one blow."

"It means you know exactly what's wrong, but you can't grasp the right place to hold it down."

"If you submit a report at night today, the grain register will arrive tomorrow; if you supplement the grain register today, it will be forwarded to the Imperial Clan Court tomorrow; you can always supplement one place, but what the other party wants is never whether this one place is completed or not."

"What he wants is for you to keep replenishing it."

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