Southern Frontier of the Empire. Sand Gull Star Field.

Marshal Xue Chunfeng, the current commander-in-chief of the Imperial Counterinsurgency Corps, locked himself in a secret room and instructed his adjutant not to disturb anyone who asked to see him!

There was no light in the room, and it was pitch black, but for a marshal with the strength of the Holy Rank, this bit of darkness was nothing! What he really cares about is the shadow in his heart!

In front of him, there were two edicts. One was sent by the empress, asking him to immediately take the newly appointed governor of the twelve provinces of southern Xinjiang to the Xinghui Kingdom to meet Yun Haoyu, who had been crowned regent of the prison country, and obey all his orders!

The other copy was sent by the imperial capital, from the hand of the Queen Mother Zhu Zhaoyuan, but in the name of the new emperor! Let him immediately swear allegiance to the new emperor, and prepare to conquer the Starlight Kingdom and avenge the empress!

In order to win the hearts of the people, Zhu Zhaoyuan crowned him as a first-class marquis in the edict, rewarded him with a lot of property, and even his family in the imperial capital also gained a lot of benefits!

There was a difference of several hours between the arrival of the two edicts, and he was originally going to meet the empress, but he was only halfway there, and the edict from the imperial capital was urgently sent to his flagship by his cronies! Only then did he vaguely understand the current situation in the empire!

The empress's accident was definitely premeditated! Moreover, there must be very hidden spies in the fleet of the Praetorian Guard! Otherwise, that woman in the imperial capital would not have gotten the news so quickly!

The palace has been destroyed, and there is no hyperspace communication equipment in the fleet of the Praetorian Legion that can directly reach the country, and it is only possible to transit through a secret stronghold in the southern part of the empire and send it back to the imperial capital! This means that even under his hands, he has eyes and ears from the imperial capital, and the energy is quite strong! I can even hide it from him!

Now, he is faced with a dilemma: to obey the empress's edict and surrender the command of more than 2 million warships and more than 100 anomalous legions; Or accept the edict of the imperial capital and become the hero of the de facto army support side!

In all fairness, he was a little resistant to subserviencing the young man! Although the other party is a genius who has not been born in the empire for a hundred years, he has made outstanding achievements, and he has worked with him for a period of time before, and he gets along well! But it is another matter to make yourself a vassal to him!

If the empress was still there, he would naturally have nothing to say. But now the empress's life and death are uncertain, and I don't know if she will be able to recover in the future! Judging from the current situation, even if the empress can wake up again one day in the future, she will lose control of the domestic political situation!

Zhu Zhaoyuan in the imperial capital will never give her a chance to turn around, and now she must step up her actions to eliminate all the forces loyal to her in the country!

So, obey the orders of the imperial capital and pay allegiance to that child who is only a teenager? Seems like an even worse option! The child is far from being an adult, and there is no way to know what kind of heart he is! As for the woman...... It's obviously not a good thing, so don't mention it!

The other party is trying his best to entrap him now, but it is just because of the military power in his hands!

Since neither path is feasible, there is only a third option - self-reliance!

In all fairness, he was loyal to the Empire, loyal to the Empress, and in the absence of accidents, he would not have seriously considered some undeserved ideas as he did now! But now that the empire is in fact ownerless, he has to think about the future of himself and his cronies!

If you stand on your own, your previous problems will be solved! He actually controls a quarter of the empire's military strength, and he has the twelve provinces of southern Xinjiang that have just been cleared, and the vast territory of more than 300 star fields as the foundation! As long as the flag is changed, it will immediately become a powerful power!

The idea is tempting! All he had to do was make up his mind to become the founding master! Speaking of which, the Starlight Kingdom only has more than 200 star fields so far! And most of them are backward star fields, and they can't be compared with him at all, why should he bow to the other party?

Human ambition is a wonderful thing, once it is born, it will rise up like a raging flame, driving the people who were originally in peace to do some unreasonable crazy actions! And don't care about what will happen to you in the end!

Of course, he is not completely carried away by ambition now, and the remaining glimmer of reason in his heart tells him: now is not the time to do this! After all, not all of these legions were his descendants, most of them were drawn from various major theaters of the empire and temporarily under his command. If you want to take that dangerous step, you must pacify these legions!

Another problem is this: if you stand on your own now, you will immediately become the focus of enmity between the two forces! The woman in the imperial capital wouldn't let him go, and the young man in the Starlight Kingdom wouldn't let him go! When the time comes, he will be attacked from both sides, and the internal will be unstable, no matter how powerful he is, he will not be able to cope with such a crisis!

Therefore, it is now necessary to make a false commitment with a certain force, swear allegiance on the surface, but in fact wait for the situation to change! Think about this step when the time is right!

That Yun Haoyu is not a fuel-efficient lamp, once he is loyal, his military power will not be able to be kept! So I can only talk to that woman, take advantage of the other party's unstable foundation and the disadvantage of urgent need of support, to bargain and get more benefits!

It seems that his previous act of ordering the withholding of all edicts sent by His Majesty to the country is undoubtedly very correct! It is necessary to convince the forces in the country that something has happened to your Majesty! In this way, the domestic situation will develop in the direction of their own hopes! Your own interests can be maximized!

After figuring out this layer, his heart suddenly became much more steady! ——

Tianhua Star Field, the main hall of the Imperial Palace.

Zhu Zhaoyuan took the prince Fang Yuan to sit on the tall imperial throne, with a proud and arrogant face!

In the spacious hall, thousands of courtiers have arrived, looking at the mother and son on the throne, silent!

The news of the empress's accident is too sudden, and there are too many doubts that are difficult to explain! In the message forwarded back through southern Xinjiang, many key details are vague! According to the scrutiny does not stand up to scrutiny!

How can such a big thing be confirmed because it is difficult to distinguish between true and false news? Or even about to gather all the ministers and support the new king?

Reasonable, this is simply unreasonable! It is impossible to give an account to the government and the opposition, the trillion citizens of the empire!

Moreover, this matter has always been carried out by people from the faction of former Prime Minister Chen Yinjie, and the others are only spectators! Naturally, this made them extremely dissatisfied!

Therefore, when they were summoned to the imperial palace and heard that Chen Yinjie announced that he would support the crown prince Fang Yuan as the new monarch of the empire as the new prime minister of the empire and auxiliary minister, the dissatisfaction in the hearts of the ministers finally broke out!

Yu Gang, the minister of the Imperial Supervision Yuan, was the first to attack: "Queen Mother, and Your Excellency Earl Chen Yinjie, what happened to Her Majesty the Empress during her visit to the Starlight Kingdom?" Just by virtue of a piece of news that is difficult to distinguish between truth and falsehood, it is not at all in accordance with the imperial decree to conclude that His Majesty has met with an accident and that he will also support a new king! We hope you can give a convincing statement! ”

Zhu Zhaoyuan's face changed slightly, straightened his expression slightly, and encouraged him to pretend to be sad and said:

"Yu Qing, Her Majesty the Empress was ambushed and killed by the Xinghui Kingdom in collusion with foreign forces! This has been confirmed! The country cannot be left without an owner for a day, and the ministers are elected by the ministers to support the prince to inherit the throne! It's a reasonable thing to do, but do you have any different opinions? ”

"How can the news of His Majesty's death be confirmed? How can such a big matter be rushed to a conclusion without detailed investigation? is so hasty, how to explain to the government and the opposition? Yu Gang rebuked angrily, "There is also the matter of supporting the new monarch, which must be appointed by the emperor to ascend the throne, if not, it must be elected by the royal clan council, and the entire members of the imperial cabinet, the imperial court of nobles and the high-level members of the parliament can be decided after joint consultation!" ”

"And now, just by virtue of a former prime minister who has long since left office, and a group of officials who can't get on the stage, want to decide such a major matter on your own, who gave you such power?"

With his reprimand, Zhu Zhaoyuan's face became more and more ugly, and finally patted the bookcase in front of him and said, "...... That's enough! ”

"Are you still finished? Do you really think that this palace will not dare to deal with you? ”

Chen Yinjie said with a smile: "Your Excellency Yu Gang, Your Majesty is dead, and the new monarch is up, this matter is a foregone conclusion, don't you come out to stir up again, right?" The prince is the bloodline of the first emperor, and it is natural to inherit the throne, don't everyone think so? ”

"Everyone? Who are you? Another old man with a solemn and old-fashioned expression stood up and reprimanded, "Is it the Manchu Dynasty Minister, or your Chen Yinjie's group of friends?" What right do you, an idle earl who has left his job, meddle in the affairs of state? ”

Chen Yinjie's face turned a little blue: "Mr. Sorag, do you also have any objections?" As the prince of the prince, he originally enjoyed the right of priority inheritance, and this practice does not violate the tradition of the House of Nobles! ”

The speaker of the Imperial House of Nobles, Sorag, sneered: "Originally, it was not a violation! However, it is not your turn to speak in this matter at all, and even the Queen Mother should not meddle in such a big matter! None of your practices are in accordance with the laws of the Empire! ”

"And!" Sorag changed his words, "I have received a new edict here, which was forwarded by someone from the Imperial Ministry of Security, which says: The Empress is not dead, but she is injured and cannot be could!" Therefore, the imperial husband Yun Haoyu was crowned as the regent of the prison country, and he exercised the highest power on his behalf! The authenticity of the edict has been confirmed! ”

"So, what you're doing is simply rebellion!"

As soon as these words came out, the ministers were in an uproar!

"Your Excellency Speaker Sorag, can you take responsibility for your words?" Gurlons immediately asked solemnly.

"Of course, I have Her Majesty's edict here!" He took out the edict and handed it to the Minister of War to read carefully, and then passed it on to everyone to look at one by one!

Suddenly, the people in the temple were discussing:

"Yes, it is indeed His Majesty's edict......"

"The seal and all kinds of anti-counterfeiting secret marks are complete, and it cannot be a fake ......"

"Your Majesty is still alive and has not encountered unforeseen ......"

"So what now......

"Of course it's an edict, how can it be messed up by that Chen Yinjie......

The discussion of the ministers became louder and louder, and the eyes that looked at Zhu Zhaoyuan became more and more indifferent!

Seeing that the situation was faintly out of control, the fat man snorted coldly and pressed a signal transmitter hidden in his hand.

The gate of the palace suddenly opened, and countless elite abilities dressed in sealed light armor swarmed in! Sensen's sharp blade pointed at the ministers in the palace!

"You are...... The private army of the six great families? Yu Gang's face was stunned, and he immediately said angrily:

"Chen Yinjie, you dare to lure a wolf into the room! Collusion with the forces of the family to plot the artifact, you ...... You rebellion of this empire! ”

The heads of several major families who had never spoken before showed disdain at the same time, and Yun Hongchang sneered and said, "Your Excellency Yu Gang, what you said is wrong!" Aren't the six great families also courtiers of the empire? We don't mean anything else, it's just that now that the empire has suddenly changed dramatically, we have come out to support a new monarch and help the royal family stabilize the situation! ”

Gurlons reached into a signal controller in his pocket, but found nothing to happen.

"Your Excellency, Honorable Minister of War!" Yun Hongchang sneered, "The legions near the imperial capital will not be able to catch up at all for a while, and as for the guards in the imperial palace, they have all been taken down because of dereliction of duty!" So...... You don't have to worry about it! ”

"Dog thief ......" Yu Gang was furious and smashed him in the face with a hard punch!

"You...... Chop this old thing up for me! The head of the Yun family was annoyed and angry, and roared with a blue face.

A Blood Cloud Guardian rushed over and stabbed him through the heart! This upright old minister was killed in the main hall like this! The crimson blood stained the jade steps red!

"Bastard! What are you doing! How dare you ......" Sorag scolded, and was immediately stabbed to death with a sword!

Zhu Zhaoyuan sneered and asked, "Who else dares to disagree?" ”