Chapter 97: 97. Duel And The Race For Crown Prince Began
He Jin's statement immediately surprised everyone both nobles and common people they didn't react at first but when they saw Lie Fan standing up, The people immediately cheered when they heard that Lie Fan would participate in the duel. the nobles exclaimed to one another as they knew that Lie Fan hadn't participated before and this meant that they finally could see if the rumors were true about Lie Fan's prowess in the previous war.
Lie Fan salutes Emperor Ling and Empress He network leaving the terrace, accompanied by his bodyguard walks down towards the arena. Xun You and Jia Xu were left on the terrace, both of them were better in there with protection from Imperial Guards.
Everyone can't wait to see Lie Fan in action, both nobles and common people have heard tales of his prowess before.
Lie Fan arrives at the outer ring of the arena where a weapon rack full of all kinds of weapons and a stable boy with a horse waiting for him. Lie Fan without wasting any time takes a Halberd from the rack and gets up on the horse that rides toward the center of the arena under the applause of many people to meet face to face with Zou Jing.
Arriving at the center of the arena, Lie Fan and Zhou Jing salute each other. Lie Fan uses the eye of Erlang Shen to see Zou Jing's attributes.
•Zou Jing
STR: 285 VIT: 83 AGI: 75 INT:71
Zou Jing's stats are some of the best he has seen so far in the Imperial Army, but his attributes are only on par with Liu Pi when he recruited the Zhang Brothers before.
Lie Fan: "General Of The Left of the Han Army Lie Fan!"
Zou Jing: "General of the Han Army Zhou Jing!"
He Jin: "Both generals have greeted each other! Please turn back and position yourselves! Under my order, the duel between General Lie Fan and General Zou Jing will begin!"
Lie Fan and Zou Jing both turned back to ride their horse toward the edge of the arena, Momentum also plays a big factor in a general duel that's why they were positioned like this. shouts of support for Lie Fan can be heard anywhere, making Zou Jing a 30-year-old veteran general a bit jealous.
He Jin seeing that both of them have reached their position, shouts for them to prepare themselves, and the countdown from 3 to 1 is heard He Jin and a loud start makes Lie Fan and Zou Jin both ride fast toward each other.
Zou Jin using a guandao yelled a battle cry and swung it toward Lie Fan which looked somewhat dangerous due to the momentum of his horse. Lie Fan seeing this immediately raised his halberd and using the momentum from his horse, received Zou Jing's attack.
When both of their weapons hit each other, a resounding metal sound can be heard across the arena. Zou Jing's hand feels a bit sore after his attack parried by Lie Fan attributing it to the momentum that Lie Fan got from his horse.
After the first clash, Lie Fan and Zou Jing began to swing their weapons heavily toward each other. The sound of a Halberd and a Guandao hitting each other can be heard by many people and everyone was watching the duel with bated breath so focused that no one was speaking.
Lie Fan actually feels that he can end this duel in a short time but he doesn't want everyone to know his true strength, so he prolongs the duel between him and Zou Jing.
Zou Jing who is receiving a slash attack from Lie Fan parried it and can feel that Lie Fan didn't use all of his strength, infuriating him as he thinks that Lie Fan is looking down on him. So with a shout, he suddenly made a stabbing movement toward Lie Fan's head, seeing Everyone was shocked but Zhang Rang and He Jin secretly hoped that Lie Fan was hit by this move.
Lie Fan evades the attack easily and seeing that Zou Jing dares to try to harm him intentionally makes him furious, so he uses all of his strength to swing his halberd so hard that Zou Jing who is still surprised that Lie Fan evades his sneak attack gets hit on the left abdomen.
Zou Jing was knocked down from his horse and felt pain in his left abdomen when he touched it he could see some blood, fearing that the wound was fatal he opened his armor and saw that it was only a small cut but the blunt damage was so heavy that his left abdomen turned a bit blue.
The Arena was still very silent, everyone was still shocked by the turn that happened. Emperor Ling was the first who wake up from his shock and stood up from his silence clapping his hand loudly while praising Lie Fan for his prowess and truly worthy of the title of Strongest General In The Han Army waking everyone up from the trance and began to cheer Lie Fan.
Lie Fan replied to Emperor Ling's praises saying that there are still many strong warriors out there and he can't bear to receive this title. Emperor Ling was very happy as he had such a strong and loyal general who was still very young, he awarded Lie Fan with 100,000 taels and appointed him the honorary title of Bodyguard Of The Heir Apparent (Crown Prince).
When the common people heard this, they cheered Lie Fan louder as they thought that Lie Fan protecting the future Crown Prince would be very safe and maybe influence Lie Fan to become a better Emperor in the future.
He Jin and Zhang Rang who heard this instantly heard a bell ringing in their thoughts, Lie Fan becoming the honorary protector of the Crown Prince is a very influential position. He can influence the crown prince and persecute anyone who he thinks is a threat to the crown prince, but fortunately, it was still an honorary appointment not full-time.
While the 2 of them feel alerted by this, they also think of putting their respective prince to become the crown prince faster because it means they at least have a momentary alliance with Lie Fan.
Lie Fan who heard Emperor Ling's appointment stepped down from his horse and kneeled receiving the mandate from Emperor Long, saying loudly that he was honored by Emperor Ling to trust in him. All of the nobles saw this and began to feel that Lie Fan could threaten the position of the old noble's household that was rooted in Luoyang with his arrival because of how fast he was rising through the ranks.
Lie Fan stands up saying how grateful he is for Emperor Ling's trust, and walks toward Zou Jing and extends his hand towards him to help Zou Jing stand up. Zou Jing who saw this was confused but still took Lie Fan's hands and when he managed to stand up he heard Lie Fan's voice.
Lie Fan: "You're lucky that our weapon has been blunted and can't penetrate the armor deeply so I forgive your transgression from before but if you ever show your face in front of me you will be dead."
Zou Jin: "Y-Yes I-I'm sorry Governor Lie Fan, I was affected by the situation before."
Lie Fan after hearing Zou Jing doesn't say anything just salutes him and gets up on his horse ride back towards the weapon rack to put the halberd back. The duel between Lie Fan and Zou Jing was the end of the Military Festivals, everyone went back home still talking about how strong Lie Fan was.
After the Military Festival ended, He Jin and Zhang Rang began to maneuver their movement again in the court to pull in support for their prince. For a while, the names of Liu Bian and Liu Xie kept being said in the court when Emperor Ling hadn't arrived.
Some support Liu Bian due to him being older and being 1st in line for the throne, while others support Liu Xie even though he is too young but he can't be reached and molded as a good crown prince easier to teach than Liu Bian who have inherited some of his Father manners.
Lie Fan and his Baohuzhe inner circle don't participate in this race to put a crown prince, Lie Fan himself personally knows from the future that Emperor Ling won't appoint a VrCrownrince because he is afraid that if it's Liu Xie his brother-in-law will be offended and with his influence cause some trouble. He also never considered Liu Bian as Crown Prince material so his chance of becoming a crown prince was very low.
So every time a court meeting ensued, He Jin and Zhang Rang took this chance to keep persuading Emperor Ling to appoint a Crown Prince as now that one of the honorary titles surrounding the Crown Prince had been appointed.
When this happened, Emperor Ling kept changing his face while in deep thought. He also feels angry because he can be considered to be Young and his subjects were hurrying him to appoint a crown prince like he would be dead shortly.
Emperor Ling knows that he is sick, but how bad his sickness isn't told by the Imperial Doctor as he is afraid that he will be beheaded as there is no cure for his sickness, only medicine to support his body but with the lifestyle Emperor Ling have it's only matter of time before he dies.
Lie Fan and Baohuzhe also convened to have a meeting, to discuss which prince they think is better to become the Crown Prince. All members except for the inner circle were arguing trying to point out that it was Liu Bian or Liu Xie who was a better Crown Prince than the other. Lie Fan who heard the arguing keeps going was slightly irritated and slammed his hand on the table beside him.
Lie Fan: "What are you all arguing about?! Liu Bian and Liu Xie are still kids who haven't even reached 10 years old yet! None of them truthfully qualify for the position of Crown Prince as they are still too young. Liu Bian's personality can still be changed and Liu Xie can be taught but his young brain will not receive knowledge much because he hasn't understood life!"
__________________
Name: Lie Fan
Title: Yellow Heaven Subjugator
Age: 18 Years Old (185 AD)
Level: 13
Next Level: 12.000
Renown: 175 -> 185.
Cultivation: Art Of War (level 8)
SP: 376.700
ATTRIBUTE POINTS
STR: 508
VIT: 219
AGI: 228
INT: 247
CHR: 90
WIS: 209
WILL: 165
ATR Points: 0
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