Tiandou Empire, Tiandou City, hundreds of officials come to court.

In fact, what happened today cannot be said to be much beyond the expectations of the ministers. After all, on the night of the prince's wedding, they had anticipated the beginning of the war.

Although some officials do not want a war, because war will cause social and national instability and reduce the wealth flowing into their hands, more officials do support Xue Ye's decision.

Some of the people who supported Xue Ye's decision to declare war did so to avenge the prince Xue Qinghe and repay the favor he had given him. Xue Qinghe also promoted many talents back then.

There are still some people... who have other ghosts...

In the afternoon, at the turn of night, a man wearing a cloak that hid his appearance avoided the sight of everyone on the street and entered the mansion through the side door of Anguo Gong's mansion.

With the guidance of the servants of Anguo Gong's mansion, the man walked left and right, and finally arrived at the door of a rather secret room deep in the mansion.

The Duke is worthy of being a Duke. This mansion alone is more than two points larger than his own palace, not to mention the collection of jewels in it.

After entering the room, the person who came lifted the hat on his cloak and revealed his face. This person was none other than Wen Yuanhou and Wen Peter of the Tiandou Empire.

Looking at everyone in this room who seemed to have been waiting for a long time, Wen Yuanhou smiled and cupped his hands, and then said:

"Sorry, I'm here to play, so I'll just keep you waiting."

A bespectacled man playing with a Tai Chi ball shook his head and said casually: "No need to apologize. Everyone present knows that your residence, Marquis Wen Yuan, is close to the palace. It is normal for you to have inconvenience, but I didn't expect that today

Duke An Guo would actually invite you over."

Wen Yuanhou looked at the expression on the man's face with a smile, and sneered in his heart.

The man with eyes playing Tai Chi ball is also a marquis of the empire, Marquis Dinglin, an old rival of Marquis Wen Yuan.

"Haha, why did An Guogong invite me here? Of course it was because of the Duke's consideration. I didn't expect that your residence in Dinglin is close to the Forbidden Army station, so you were able to come here so quickly. It really surprised me."

Several other princes in the room looked on coldly at the tit-for-tat exchanges between the two marquises. They were just doing their own things, and no one had the idea of ​​​​adjustment.

The nobles of Tiandou themselves are a group of people who like to unite and betray each other because of their own interests. Although there are some family friends who have really deep friendships and long-standing alliances, most of them are just people on the same path who plot against each other.

Xue Ye was able to control the government for so many years and gradually strengthen and consolidate his imperial power because he was able to find out the interests of various nobles and use this as a breakthrough to build a multilateral system of mutual checks and balances, making the imperial power the most influential one.

And Marquis Wen Yuan and Marquis Dinglin...

They themselves should be regarded as people under Xue Ye. In order to win more trust from Xue Ye, one of them chose the residence closest to the palace, while the other chose the residence closest to the Forbidden Army station, just to show Xue Ye that

His unreserved loyalty.

But now...

Ha... maybe most of the Tiandou nobles don't have much loyalty in their bones.

After all, a royal family that has to rely on power rather than strength to control the empire, in this continent that advocates strength and respects strength, how many people can gain true loyalty is still a question worth exploring.

While Marquis Wen Yuan and Marquis Dinglin were still taunting each other, the locked door of the room was opened from the outside.

An old man wearing a big coat and holding a crutch came in from outside.

Although the old man's face was already covered with ravines, what amazed many people was that his hair was still as shiny and black as a boy's.

Everyone in the room stood up consciously after seeing the old man entering the room, just like they did when they saw Xue Ye and the former Xue Qinghe.

This old man holding a crutch was the one who invited many of their princes to come here this time. One of the only two dukes with different surnames in the Tiandou Empire, Anguo Gong Han Zhaolin.

When Duke An Guo saw everyone standing up, he nodded, then pressed his palms to signal everyone to sit down.

"Ahem..."

Sitting on the main seat in the room, Duke An Guo looked at the dozen or so imperial marquis and counts sitting on the round table in the room and coughed twice.

Several counts who were still chatting quietly at the round table immediately stopped biting their ears and sat upright, waiting for Duke An Guo to speak.

"Everyone must have heard His Majesty's speech in the main hall today, right? The war between Tiandou and Xingluo is about to begin."

After An Guogong waited until the room was quiet, he started today's topic.

Everyone at the round table nodded, but no one spoke first. They were all curious about what Duke An Guo wanted to say from this, and what they could get from it.

As for the thoughts of these nobles with different thoughts, An Guogong naturally knew what he thought. He did not explain anything first, but continued:

"As for military strength, everyone knows the gap between us and the Star Luo Empire. Even with the financial support of the Seven Treasures Glazed Sect, we cannot defeat Star Luo in terms of hard power."

"Furthermore, war is always an opportunity to reshuffle the cards. If we are not careful, maybe after this war, people who were once humble and dusty will take our place now."

Glancing over the nobles at the round table, Duke An Guo spoke calmly: "So a very important purpose of this meeting is to reach a true alliance and destroy all the rebels who try to attack our order."

"As far as I know, the forces of those principalities intend to use this war as an opportunity to intervene in Tiandou City, which is dominated by us."

Duke An Guo glanced at the nobles at the round table and spoke in a low voice:

"I know that some of you have already had contact with people from several major principalities, but I think you are just doing it to expand your family's power, rather than being squeezed out of your position in Tiandou."

"Everyone should know the difference between chaining someone else and being chained by someone else."

An Guogong tapped his finger on the round table, and the tapping sound, like the words he just said, entered the hearts of the nobles present.

Several of the nobles in gorgeous clothes even seemed to want to say something to Duke An after hearing these words, but they stopped talking after noticing many other people around them.

"What the Duke said makes sense. Even if we cannot go out, we must ensure that our share will not be taken away by others!"

A white-haired old man wearing purple and gold ceremonial clothes nodded in agreement.

The other nobles quickly expressed their agreement.

But soon, someone else raised concerns:

"Your Excellency, although we can prevent people from within the empire from entering the imperial city, you also said that we cannot defeat Xing Luo... What should we do if Xing Luo attacks directly?

"

This is indeed an issue that needs to be considered. Although they hold the power of the empire and can control Tiandou, they cannot control Xingluo next door!

If the Star Luo Empire wants to launch a war of annihilation against Tiandou...then what's the point of dividing power here now?

A cold light flashed in An Guogong's eyes. He took a deep breath and responded: "It is impossible for the Star Luo Empire to truly destroy Tiandou. Wuhun Palace will not allow such a period of destroying the balance to occur. At present, the two empires are mutually exclusive.

A pattern of checks and balances of suspicion is in the best interest of Wuhun Palace."

"So in the later stages of the war, Wuhun Palace will definitely take action to tie up the crazy Xing Luo and drag it back to the south."

"For the empire, the greatest impact of the war is only on the southern provinces and principalities. For us, the losses will not be too great."

When he said this, Duke An Guo called the waiter next to him and distributed a document to every noble present.

"I have to say that the Great Library of Wuhun City is really a good place. My people found some good things in it."

"After the war, the power of Tiandou declined, the army was disabled, and the imperial power declined, and Xue Ye, who started the war, must be responsible for this. And we can use this to get what we want and establish some systems that are beneficial to us...

…”

"For example, this one I'm showing you... I think it's very interesting..."

"It's called constitutional monarchy."
Chapter completed!