Chapter 345: The Straw to Break the Camel’s Back

While the Immortal Dao's meeting continued, another meeting was taking place in a hall in Yong Province.

The main seat in the hall was occupied by a portly man. He was Zhang Xinhui, the pope of the Imperial Heavenly Dao.

Zhang Xinhui came from an impoverished background. He had never had the opportunity to pursue martial arts as a child, so he devoted himself entirely to becoming a scholar.

He had always been exceptionally bright and was renowned as a child prodigy in his hometown.

Unfortunately, countless child prodigies throughout history had failed to make much of themselves, and for the first forty years of his life, Zhang Xinhui was no exception.

He passed the low-level imperial examination when he was just twelve years old, yet made no further progress over the next three decades.

Jaded and disillusioned, he eventually joined the Imperial Heavenly Dao just to get by. Thanks to his education and eloquence, he quickly managed to convert his entire village into followers.

Before long, he began rising rapidly through the ranks of the Imperial Heavenly Dao, gaining the favor of the previous pope, who personally instructed him in Dao arts.

Ultimately, through cultivating the Book of Humans, he was able to reach the Dao Comprehension state.

At this moment, Zhang Xinhui and several other high-ranking members of the Imperial Heavenly Dao had their attention fixed on a subordinate standing before them.

"Where are Luo Binghong, Chen Qingyong, and the others?" Zhang Huixin asked. "Why did they send you back on your own?"

"The others are still in Azure Sun County, trying to find a way to recoup our losses," the subordinate replied.

Seated beside Zhang Xinhui was a heavily wrinkled old man with a head of white hair. With an urgent expression, he asked, "How much have we lost?"

The subordinate turned toward the old man with anxiety in his eyes.

The old man was the treasurer responsible for the Immortal Heavenly Dao's financial affairs, and he was notorious for his fiery temper and violent outbursts.

In fact, it was said that his personality flaws had even forced him to stop cultivating Dao arts altogether.

"Of the one hundred and forty thousand taels of silver originally reserved for buying pills, only less than fifty thousand remain, and of the forty-eight thousand taels of silver meant for the altar, less than twenty thousand remain," the subordinate reported uneasily.

These reported figures were met with deathly silence.

The pills were vital for facilitating the breakthroughs of the Imperial Heavenly Dao's high-ranking members, while the altar was required to perform a ritual that would summon the power of the Imperial High God.

In total, they had lost close to one hundred and forty thousand taels of silver, and the news felt like a punch to the gut for everyone present.

"Didn't the stock price go back up after trading resumed? Why are the losses still so severe?" the treasurer asked in a trembling voice.

"The others thought we had been scammed, so they were eager to cut their losses and sold everything as soon as trading resumed," the subordinate explained, sweat dripping down from his brow.

"What has the stock price risen to now?" the treasurer asked, barely able to contain his fury.

"It was six taels and seven qian of silver per share when I left," the subordinate replied.

"That means if we hadn't sold, not only would we have avoided any losses, we would've made over twenty thousand taels of silver by now," the treasurer murmured to himself in a distraught voice. "No... If we'd bought and held from the very beginning, we would've made even more..."

The more the treasurer thought about it, the more enraged and agitated he became. Just as he was about to erupt into a violent outburst, his eyeballs suddenly fell from their sockets and dropped to the ground.

Immediately afterward, all the flesh on his body melted into a puddle of sludge, and a harrowing roar unlike that of any beast in this world erupted from his body. 𝘧𝓇ℯℴ𝓂

Everyone else was completely dumbstruck. At the same time, a burst of demonic tainting spread from the treasurer's abrupt demonification, and a nearby general let out an agonized scream before also falling prey to demonification.

Zhang Xinhui immediately sprang into action, pulling out a yellow paper talisman that burst into flames. The paper talisman was reduced to ashes in an instant, and Zhang Xinhui cast those ashes into a cup of tea.

The tea in the cup immediately rose into the air as if it had sprung to life, taking the form of a yellow dragon before pouncing on two demons.

As soon as the talismanic water came into contact with them, the two demons began trembling violently before being reduced to nothing more than puddles of blood on the ground.

Zhang Xinhui looked down at the puddles of blood with a solemn expression.

The treasurer had been cultivating Dao arts for many years and was also privy to some of the Imperial Heavenly Dao's darkest secrets. On top of that, managing the religion's finances required extensive study, so he had already been deeply tainted by all kinds of knowledge. This terrible news had been the final straw, pushing his emotions to such an extreme that he succumbed to demonification.

"Chu Qiguang must die!" Zhang Xinhui declared coldly, regarding him as the main culprit for behind everything that had happened.

The holy maiden of the Imperial Heavenly Dao was a tall and slender woman who normally appeared as soft and gentle as water, but at this moment, murderous intent flashed in her eyes as she rose to her feet.

"Let me go to Spirit Province, Pope Zhang." she requested. "We can't just accept these losses without taking action."

"Bring Luo Binghong and the others back with you," Zhang Xinhui instructed. "Make sure they don't get away."

***

In the Palace of Eternal Life, Chen Zhong presented a report to the Yong'an Emperor, and judging from the emperor's reaction, its content had clearly piqued his interest.

The report contained financial data on Spirit Province's Cloud Sun Trade Association, as well as projections for its future profits and stock price.

Personally handwritten by Chu Qiguang, the report was very concise while still containing all of the important figures, painting a bright picture of the Cloud Sun Trade Association's future prospects.

On top of that, the report also came with eighty thousand shares in the Cloud Sun Trade Association shares for the Yong'an Emperor, with a total market value exceeding four hundred thousand taels of silver.

According to the report, these shares were projected to yield tens of thousands of taels of silver in dividends every year, and those dividends would only continue to increase as the stock price rose.

The report immediately put the Yong'an Emperor in a much better mood. However, among the other reports on his desk, a significant number had been written to impeach Chu Qiguang, Zhong Shan'e, and Yang Ling.

"I heard that Chu Qiguang also took this opportunity to screw over Wu Siqi's son. Is that right, Chen Zhong?" the Yong'an Emperor asked.

"I heard he won fifty thousand shares from Wu Wei in a bet," Chen Zhong replied with a smile.

The Yong'an Emperor was very pleased to hear that Chu Qiguang had the courage to go against the grand secretary. At the same time, he couldn't help but be stunned by the news of Chu Qiguang's victory over Jin Haitian.

Was there a mistake in my divination? Is he really not one of the Eight Han Resurgence Generals?