Chapter 369
369 Centralized authority
After the Imperial Army became stronger, it would obviously help the Imperial court strengthen its centralized authority.
He would take back the local powers in Pingzhou and Jizhou and grant them various privileges. He would also strengthen the authority of the local authorities and let them manage the local affairs. For example, he would reduce the number of private revenge and private trials within the local powers. This would effectively reduce the control that small sects, families, and powers had over their members. Strengthen the investigation of local resources and industries to ensure tax revenue; All major forces had to hand in a list of personnel in preparation for recruitment.
These rights corresponded to law, finance, and human rights.
Of course, these changes were not carried out in one go. They were done bit by bit.
For example, the first thing he did was to check the industry. This matter was because the Imperial court was facing financial difficulties at the time.
In the past, the Imperial court of Great Yan had tried to do this, but they had faced great resistance. How could the various local powers so easily accept the Imperial court having control over their Mingmen?
Of course, the Imperial court had a deep control over them. In some sense, the Imperial court was them. Most of the officials in the Imperial Court System came from these local forces. It was quite like the Emperor and the scholars ruled the world together.
On one hand, these local forces would resist. On the other hand, he also had the intention of letting the Imperial court change its own life.
This was the internal resistance of the Imperial court.
The Lu clan dynasty did not have much of a problem in this aspect. Their Foundation was not like the Li Dynasty’s, which was built on the Imperial court. Instead, it came from the North. Moreover, after the previous great catastrophe, the Imperial court had been cleansed from top to bottom. There was some internal resistance, but it was not that great.
After the internal resistance had decreased, those local forces were unlikely to rebel openly. The faceless society’s destruction had also reduced his underhanded methods to insignificant ones.
However, there was another problem on this matter, and that was the external resistance. Yunxiao sect.
Of course, these small clans and sects were more inclined to maintain their independence in Great Yan’s system. Yunxiao sect supported this to a certain extent.
There weren’t too many considerations in terms of interests, but the most important thing was human relationships. All the factions liked to send their talented juniors into Yunxiao sect. They also worked together and often provided benefits to some of the high-level cultivators in Yunxiao sect. Just looking at the relationship of a single sect in Yunxiao sect, it might not be that strong. However, when their numbers reached a certain level, they would gather together to speak up, and it would always cause many high-level cultivators in Yunxiao sect to have some reaction.
In the past, every time the central court had the idea of centralized power and harmed the interests of the local forces, they would always look for people from the same sect or some familiar faces in Yunxiao sect to help speak for them. In the end, Yunxiao sect formed pressure on the Imperial court and obstructed the advancement of centralization.
Objectively speaking, this was also weakening the Imperial court, which was also beneficial to Yunxiao sect.
However, in the past ten years, Lu chaoxi had already resolved a large portion of the financial power. This was taken advantage of the financial difficulties of the Imperial court after the war, and they could not even maintain the tribute to Yunxiao sect.
The Lu family had just taken over and maintained a honeymoon period with Yunxiao sect. Even now, they were still in the honeymoon period. After all, no matter what, the Lu family had helped Yunxiao sect a great deal back then. At the same time, they had been rather obedient ever since they became the Emperor.
During that period of time, to solve the financial problems of the Imperial court, the businesses of the various local powers were investigated and the tax limit was set. This also revealed a lot of industries that had been hidden and avoided taxes in the past.
And since these things were already in his hands, even if the court’s financial situation eased later on, he would not have any thoughts of returning them.
The local powers did not have Yunxiao sect to speak up for them anymore, so there was much less room for resistance.
However, it was impossible for the Imperial court to not raise any objections if they wanted to go further and take back the law-enforcement and human affairs powers, disintegrate the local forces ‘control over the cultivators under them, and make it easier for the Imperial court to mobilize more manpower.
Furthermore, the Lu clan also lacked a reason that could convince Yunxiao sect on this point, like when they took back their assets.
At that time, he took back the financial power to solve the financial difficulties of the court and to better provide for the sect. Then what was the point of taking back the law-enforcement power and making those local forces hand in the list of people?
To put it bluntly, it was indeed quite difficult for the Lu dynasty to push forward this matter.
However, one thing to note was that Yunxiao sect’s opposition was not in the name of the sect to oppose the Imperial court’s direct implementation of this series of policies. Their form of objection was to send a letter to the Imperial court in the name of a certain high-level cultivator from Yunxiao sect to plead for mercy or to inquire about the matter. The Imperial court couldn’t force it, so they could only let it go for now.
Lu chaoxi was actually very unhappy about this.
Not to mention the identity of the Emperor, even if it was an ordinary person who was doing things normally, it was impossible for them to feel much satisfaction in their hearts when they were being pointed at and ordered around like this.
But what could he do? He couldn’t fall out with her, and he couldn’t resist her either. He had to continue doing things.
He could only pinch his nose, let some go first, and then speed up the processing of some. As for those who were let off, it wasn’t as simple as just letting them go. They could exert pressure on them from other directions. For example, making their business difficult, or the government finding fault with them from other angles.
To Lu Qing, he was only paying attention to this matter through listening to reports and other similar methods. His consciousness did not go there.
His son had handled the matter well. He just had to take it one step at a time. Lu Qing thought about it. Even if he were to interfere personally, it would be difficult for him to have any significant impact on the overall situation.
Moreover, he had his own matters to attend to.
In the past, the creation book and the rising stars technique were only four-star cultivation techniques. However, after he had merged them with the immemorial cultivation techniques, they were two shortcomings. He had broken through to the nascent soul realm only after obtaining the five-star White Saint Sword manual. These two cultivation techniques were originally weak points. After they were upgraded to five-star, Lu Qing’s cultivation speed was much faster than before.
Only a few years had passed, and his nascent soul state level three cultivation showed signs of improving.
Next time, when he could cultivate outside the starry sky or enter the spirit gathering temple, he might not just break through to nascent soul state level four. Perhaps, at that time, it would not be impossible for him to rush to a higher level in one go.
As for the few juniors from the other families, they had also made further progress in their cultivation.
Ming Chao and chaoxi had both reached the mid-stage golden core realm and became fourth-level golden core cultivators. Yan Ling was at the fifth-stage golden core realm. Chaohe was slightly worse off. He was still at the second-stage golden core realm.
Although Ming Chao, chaoxi, and Yan Ling stayed in the capital of Yan for a long time, they would return to Yuyan mountain at certain times. He couldn’t give up the experience of exchanging one year for ten years of cultivation in spirit gathering temple.
However, compared to the four who had already entered the Golden core stage, the ones who grew the fastest in the family were the two little guys of the Wen generation.
Wenen was still lacking a little, but Weiwen had already reached the ninth level of the initial enlightenment stage and was ready to break through to the Golden core stage.
She did not have an external elixir to use. Even so, Lu Qing was still very confident in her.
The materials she needed to break through to the Golden core stage had been luxuriously prepared by her family. Just the cost of the materials alone had reached more than 150000. If the various levels of alchemists, blacksmiths, and array Masters were included in the arrangement, the cost would probably be even higher.
Of course, for an ordinary cultivator, it would be very difficult to complete the breakthrough without the help of an external elixir. But to her, this was not a big problem.
He had the Golden heaven spirit root, the gold virtue spirit body, and the indestructible sword body that had been upgraded once, which was more compatible with the metal attribute. The talent bonus that she could have obtained before entering the solo queue had been fully pulled. Under normal circumstances, it was hard to imagine what other Ways and Means could be used to obtain a more powerful talent than Weiwen’s current one before reaching the Golden core stage.
By relying on these, she did not need an external elixir. She could obtain a very high probability of breaking through by directly relying on those relatively more conventional preparations.
Moreover, Lu Qing had prepared a rare four-star item for her to break through the bottleneck.
In reality, Lu Qing had been planning to do one thing recently: The exploration of the underground Spirit River in the spirit Lake vein.
The underground Spirit River had been discovered a long time ago. In the beginning, there was a Lake where water ghosts occupied. Lu Qing found a Yin-essence water Jade and an underground Spirit River that was full of spirit Qi. He connected the river to the surface and led water out, forming a Spirit Lake vein.
It was a land of treasure.
Without the yin-essence water Jade, it would not have been so smooth for mingchao to achieve Qiming. As a level-three water spirit vein, the spirit Lake vein had been of great help to the Lu family when they had just started to rise. Although this place was not the key to the Lu family’s rise, it was a place that provided a lot of help.
Furthermore, when Lu Qing first explored the underground Spirit River, he could clearly sense that the end of the spirit River would not be as simple as it seemed. At that time, due to the time constraints when he left his body, and the speed of his flight was not fast enough, he did not explore the end of the spirit River. However, the concentration of spiritual Qi in the part she explored had already reached the level of the fourth tier.
However, it was also because of this that Lu Qing did not continue to explore.
On one hand, the Family Matters that would come one after another were all very important. Even when he was free, Lu Qing’s attention would be placed on his own cultivation.
In addition, there was another very important point. This was his first time exploring the underground Spirit River. He had only walked halfway, but he could already feel the concentration of spirit Qi. It had already reached the level of a level four spirit vein. One could only imagine that at the end, the strength would increase even more.
There might be some important secrets hidden there, and there might be great benefits, but at the same time, opportunities were accompanied by risks. The level of danger there would probably not be too low.
In the past, the Lu family was not as powerful as it was now. Even if he explored in his consciousness form and found something, it would not be easy for the Lu family to develop it and turn it into something that he could use.
However, the time was now very ripe.
Lu Weiwen was about to break through to the Golden core stage. However, she needed some preparation time before that. Lu Qing planned to take advantage of this time to explore the area. And later on, if Weiwen could reach Jindan, perhaps she could help with this matter.
Since he had decided, he would do it.
The spirit Lake vein was no longer of any special help to the Lu family. However, the spiritual Qi there was special, and it was very suitable for cultivators with water spiritual roots to cultivate in. At the same time, it was also suitable for some water element spirit herbs to be planted there. Therefore, the Lu family had some businesses there, and some of their clansmen cultivated there.
This made things much more convenient for Lu Qing.
He immediately activated the experiential learning mode and locked onto a family cultivator in the spirit Lake vein. He directly teleported over and quickly found the entrance to the underground Spirit River and entered it.
The spirit River flowed from low to high. Lu Qing followed the direction of the spirit river’s flow and went against it.
His current flying speed in his consciousness form was much faster than before. It didn’t take long for him to surpass the position he had given up on exploring back then.
Lu Qing did not stop. He continued to fly into the distance.
But soon, he felt that the time he had left his body had come to an end.
He was not in a hurry to spend karma to replenish the time he had left his body. He first opened the map function in the system interface and took a look. He found the location of the nearest family member, which was not far away, so he teleported there directly in the experiential learning mode. After replenishing the time he had left his body for nothing, he continued to burrow underground, found the location of the underground river, and continued to go against the current.
He could save a lot of karma by doing so.
Although Lu Qing had a lot of karma now, the price of replenishing the time he spent outside his body would become very expensive in the future after it was doubled many times.
Who knew how long this underground river was? This time, since Lu Qing had made up his mind to explore, he did not want to give up halfway.
Of course, there were times when he could not find his family members nearby. In that case, there was nothing he could do. He could only spend karma to replenish the time he had left his body before continuing to fly.
Just like that, after spending quite some time, Lu Qing headed east. He actually arrived at Dong Hai County, which was located near the sea.
This underground river was actually from the sea?
“I didn’t expect this.”
Lu Qing’s curiosity grew.
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