Chapter 239: Assassination (1)

Recruitment. Xu Yuan had indeed entertained the idea.

Ever since they had met, Young Master Wang’s manner of speech and way of doing things had impressed him. The methods he used to handle the merchant guilds they encountered along the road were especially tempting, as was his assessment of the Great Flame Empire’s commercial market as a whole.

He was a man with vision. Even Xu Yuan, who had received a modern, systematic education in management, found himself outmatched by the man’s insight in certain areas.

However, as the two of them traveled north, the thought gradually faded.

The merchant guilds under Young Master Wang’s management were all quite large. They might not have rivaled the Calm Sky Merchant Association’s presence in those commanderies, but each one still ranked among the local top ten.

Young Master Wang had once mentioned that his father served as an official at court. Since his family was part of the bureaucracy, a household of that caliber had almost certainly chosen a side long ago.

If they supported the Chancellor's Manor, there was no need to recruit him. If they supported the imperial clan, then someone of his standing could not be recruited in the first place.

And so, Xu Yuan had abandoned the idea of recruitment and settled for befriending him while waiting for an opportunity. His current identity was fake, after all. If the man ever found himself unable to continue down his present road and needed another ship to board, their friendship would give Xu Yuan the chance to offer him one.

Yet Xu Yuan had never expected this brat to be waiting here to recruit him instead. The jade token landed soundlessly on the table.

Looking at it, a muscle on Xu Yuan’s face twitched almost imperceptibly. There was a similar token inside his Sumeru Ring. His was not made of jade, but violet iron crystal. It also bore the image of a dragon, with the character Three engraved upon it.

The Third Prince, Li Junqing.

The courtesan onstage continued her graceful dance, while ethereal music drifted out from behind the platform.

Li Junqing watched him with a smile and said softly, “Brother Zhou, I hope you will assist me in compiling a Grand Compendium of Industry and Commerce.”

Xu Yuan froze for a moment. Then a peculiar look entered his eyes. “A merchant’s handbook?”

The Third Prince let out a long sigh. “Brother Zhou, although Father now places great importance on industry and commerce, their methods of administration still rely almost entirely on convention and unwritten custom. There are precious few books or ancient records on the subject. I wish to ease Father’s burdens, but I lack capable people. Over the past month, I have observed your speech and choice of words. It is clear that you possess great knowledge and hidden depths.”

After hearing him out, Xu Yuan remained expressionless and gave no answer. Commerce across the realm was flourishing. Over time, all manner of marketing and management methods had quietly emerged, many of them almost modern in nature.

However, information traveled poorly, and every family guarded its secrets like a miser clutching his last coin. The experience a shopkeeper accumulated over an entire lifetime would either follow him into the grave or be passed down only to his own son. If that son proved useless, the knowledge vanished with him. In other words, no one had yet organized this knowledge into a proper system.

From the Third Prince’s words, however, it seemed he had already begun doing precisely that.

The problem was that Xu Yuan had deliberately discussed those subjects with the Third Prince to establish his own authority, demonstrate his abilities, and make it easier to recruit the man later.

And now… Xu Yuan coughed lightly and shook his head. “I am not worthy of such a great responsibility.”

The Third Prince sighed. His casual air vanished, and his expression turned solemn. “Commerce is one of the great roads to enriching a nation. Yet books on the subject are scarce, while every school and merchant clan hoards its knowledge as a private treasure. Talented people have nothing they can study from.

“Brother Zhou, if you were willing to compile your knowledge into books, then one day your works might even be tested in the imperial examinations alongside the Four Books and Five Classics. It would be a great undertaking whose merit would endure for a thousand generations, a sage’s achievement!”

A sage’s achievement… Xu Yuan felt rather strange as he listened.

The Third Prince certainly knew how to sell a dream. Xu Yuan had not even agreed yet, and the man was already promising him eternal glory and sagehood.

Had Xu Yuan not studied the fine art of dangling carrots himself, he might actually have believed it. Still, what the Third Prince was trying to accomplish came as something of a surprise.

Only when there were books could people learn.

The Third Prince wanted to establish a complete training system for commercial talent under the imperial clan, one capable of steadily producing all kinds of skilled merchants and administrators.

When Xu Yuan remained silent, the Third Prince sighed again. “Brother Zhou, you need not concern yourself with my status. You may accept or refuse as you please.”

He lightly tapped the imperial jade token on the table with his slender fingers.

Xu Yuan composed himself and carefully controlled his expression. “Your Highness, the Third Prin—”

Li Junqing waved a hand and said with breezy ease, “Brother Zhou and I took to each other the moment we met. You are a year older than me, so you may call me little brother or simply Junqing.”

“Junqing, then…”

The Third Prince maintained his elegant smile and nodded.

Xu Yuan ran a finger around the rim of his porcelain teacup. With his eyes lowered, he asked, “Junqing, before trying to recruit me like this, did you ever consider my family background?”

The Third Prince narrowed his eyes at those words, then laughed and leaned back against his chair. “Since Brother Zhou is willing to speak so plainly, I will not beat around the bush either. You possess exceptional talent in the ways of commerce, but I suspect your family is not particularly powerful.”

“Oh?” Xu Yuan continued tracing the rim of his cup. “And what makes you say that?”

The Third Prince first raised a shield against any possible offense. “Brother Zhou, I mean no disrespect by what I am about to say.”

“Go on.” Xu Yuan nodded.

The Third Prince raised three fingers. “There are three reasons. First, Brother Zhou, you are already around 30, yet you are only sixth rank. That cultivation is rather low. Unless you were born with a useless constitution like Third Young Master Xu, the core scions of great aristocratic clans can always have their cultivation propped up with pills and resources. At the very least, they should reach the fifth rank.”

The Third Prince glanced at Xu Yuan and lowered one finger.

Xu Yuan listened without saying a word.

Seeing this, the Third Prince continued, “Second, I wield some authority within the Imperial Shadow Guard, yet I have never heard of anyone like Brother Zhou in the capital. Given your age and talent, if you came from one of the great clans, there is no reason I would not know of you. And if you truly do belong to such a clan, then you must be from a sidelined branch that has been deliberately suppressed.”

“Third, if Brother Zhou’s family were truly so powerful that even I could not recruit you, you would hardly be traveling without a single attendant. Even the son of a third level court official would have at least a third rank Grandmaster accompanying him.”

With that, the Third Prince folded down his final finger.

At that moment, the effeminate man returned carrying a tray of breakfast dishes, including something resembling meat congee, and quietly set them on the table.

Xu Yuan took a bowl of demonic-beast meat congee and blew on it. Then he raised his eyes and looked straight into the Third Prince’s. “So you had already thought everything through, Junqing.”

In the Great Flame Empire Empire, most first and second level positions were honorary titles. Third level was effectively the summit of real political power. After all, even the Chancellor was technically only a second level official.

Officials at the level of vice ministers and ministers were generally die-hard loyalists. Below that, however, loyalties became far more fluid.

There was no shortage of men who switched sides simply because their current patrons failed to value them.

The Third Prince neither confirmed nor denied it. He took a bottle of fine wine from his Sumeru Ring and poured them each a cup. “If Imperial Brother learned about someone like Brother Zhou, I imagine he would be very pleased.”