Chapter 654 --654

Chapter 654: Chapter-654

An hour later, the atmosphere at the Imperial Youth Academy was extremely tense.

The wealthy teenage nobles were huddled in the corners of the classroom, whispering frantically and casting terrified glances at the back of the room.

Chijen was sitting at his tiny desk. He wasn’t reciting poetry. He was aggressively unfurling a five-foot-long legal scroll, a brush in his hand as he rapidly calculated compound interest.

Suddenly, the sliding doors slammed open.

The Headmaster of the Academy—a highly respected, incredibly arrogant elderly scholar who had tutored princes—marched into the room. He had heard about the incident with Lord Lin yesterday, and he was absolutely furious.

"Vanguard Saura Chijen!" the Headmaster barked, stroking his long white beard. "This Academy is a place of refined learning and aristocratic grace! We do not tolerate military thugs terrorizing our noble students! Stand up and apologize immediately, or I will expel you!"

The teenagers gasped. Finally, an adult was putting this terrifying thirty-year-old in his place!

Chijen did not stand up. He calmly finished writing a legal footnote, carefully set his brush down, and looked up at the Headmaster.

"Headmaster," Chijen said, his voice a deep, resonant rumble of absolute legal authority. "Are you currently speaking to me in your capacity as the administrator of this facility?"

"Of course I am!" the Headmaster sneered. "I am the absolute authority on these grounds!"

"Excellent," Chijen nodded. He reached into his bunny satchel and pulled out a heavy, red-stamped imperial document. He slid it across the floor toward the Headmaster’s feet. "Then I am formally serving you with a Notice of Eviction."

The entire classroom froze. The Headmaster stared at the paper as if it were a venomous snake.

"What... what absolute nonsense is this?!" the Headmaster sputtered.

"Under the Imperial Land Acts of the Third Dynasty, applied via the cross-reference of the Military Reclamation Clause of year forty-two," Chijen recited flawlessly, his tone perfectly mirroring a seasoned examiner dismantling a flawed logical argument. "This land defaulted to the state ten years ago due to a lapse in the Duke’s lease. This morning at dawn, my mother, General Heena Vanguard, formally claimed it as a strategic military outpost."

"A military outpost?!" the Headmaster shrieked, his face turning purple. "This is a poetry academy!"

"Not anymore," Chijen deadpanned, tapping the scroll. "Legally, this is now Vanguard Outpost Number Seven. Which means you and your staff are currently trespassing on active military grounds. That carries a mandatory sentence of three years hard labor."

The teenage nobles began to hyperventilate. They were going to be drafted into a chain gang?!

"You cannot do this!" the Headmaster roared, his aristocratic dignity completely shattering. "The Emperor himself funded this pavilion!"

"The Emperor funded the building, Headmaster. Not the dirt underneath it. Basic legal logic dictates that property improvements do not negate underlying land ownership," Chijen countered smoothly, taking a bite of his red apple. "However, as the newly appointed Vanguard heir and acting landlord, I am willing to offer you a settlement."

Chijen unrolled his massive calculation scroll.

"If you wish to keep operating this school," Chijen announced to the utterly paralyzed room, "you owe the Vanguard estate eighty years of back-rent. Factoring in compound interest, adjusted for inflation, and adding the late fees... you owe us exactly two hundred and fifty thousand gold taels. Payable by noon tomorrow."

The Headmaster’s eyes rolled into the back of his head, and he collapsed onto the floor in a dead faint.

Chijen sighed, looking at the unconscious Headmaster and the crying teenagers. He neatly rolled up his scrolls, placed them back into his yellow bunny satchel, and stepped over the old man’s body.

’Father is going to be so thrilled,’ Chijen thought exhaustedly as he walked out of the classroom to collect the rent.

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.

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On other side....

the Grand Hall of Supreme Harmony did not look like the seat of global power. It looked like the waiting room of a heavily underfunded military hospital.

The Prime Minister, Gu Chen, was notably completely absent. Word had spread that the immaculate scholar was currently bedridden with mysterious, agonizing, and entirely unbruised internal injuries. Naturally, the civil faction was absolutely furious.

"You military thugs brutalized our Prime Minister so badly he could not even attend court today!" a heavily bandaged Minister of Revenue shouted across the aisle, pointing an accusing, trembling finger at Kael.

"Oh, cry me a river!" Kael yelled back, proudly sporting a black eye. "Isn’t it your treacherous team who threw a wooden plank at our Madam first? You started it!"

Immediately, the Imperial Court devolved into a rapid-fire, highly petty screaming match.

Civil Official: "You vicious animals used heavy leather belts to whip us!"

Military General: "You hypocrites used solid iron planks painted to look like wood!"

Civil Official: "You used your bare fists to beat the elderly!"

Military General: "You pulled out cast-iron frying pans, silver tea pots, and wooden clubs from your robes! You came armed to a morning assembly, and you’re crying about fists?!"

Sitting on the golden throne above the chaos, the Emperor rested his head heavily on his hand. He looked down at the bickering, bruised officials with completely dead eyes.

"Gentlemen," the Emperor groaned, his voice laced with profound existential despair. "This is the Imperial Court of the Great Dynasty. It is not a trauma center. Could you please at least pretend to have some respect for the throne?"

Nobody heard him over the shouting.

Off to the side, standing entirely apart from the chaotic screaming match, Heena Vanguard was casually inspecting her fingernails. She looked perfectly rested, completely unbothered, and thoroughly bored.

Without even looking up from her nails, Heena took a breath.

"ENOUGH!" she roared.

The single, terrifying, battle-hardened command echoed off the marble pillars. The entire court instantly snapped their mouths shut. The screaming died in a fraction of a second, leaving the Grand Hall in absolute, deathly silence.

The Emperor slowly sat up, a look of deep, profound offense crossing his royal face. ’Come on,’ the Emperor thought bitterly. ’I am the Emperor! I am the Son of Heaven! Why do they immediately shut up for her and completely ignore me?! At least give me some face!’

Heena finally looked up from her nails. She turned toward the throne, smoothed out the front of her dark military robes, and offered a perfectly elegant, flawless bow.

"Your Majesty," Heena greeted smoothly. She pulled a thick, heavy parchment scroll from her sleeve and held it out toward the Head Eunuch. "Please pass this to the Emperor for his immediate review."

The Head Eunuch approached her like a man walking to his own execution. His hands were literally trembling as he reached out to take the document.

Whenever this terrifying woman handed him something, it was always a world-shattering catastrophe. Yesterday it was a bulletproof steel umbrella and a chest of treasonous exams. Today, the Eunuch was genuinely terrified the scroll might explode.

He carefully carried it up the golden steps and placed it on the Emperor’s desk.

The Emperor let out a weary sigh, unrolled the parchment, and began to read.

His eyes slowly widened. He read it again. He looked at the official red stamps, the citing of the eighty-year-old Imperial Land Registry, and the meticulously calculated compound interest.