Jiang Chen hadn't expected that a few casual remarks of his would have such a dramatic clearing effect. The banquet, where guests had been chatting in small clusters just moments ago, fell silent almost instantly.
Countless pairs of eyes turned in unison toward Jiang Chen.
Everyone present was a power player of the Eastern Kingdom, and they all knew that Marquis Longteng had been trying for years to get his hands on that plot of semi-spiritual land in Marquis Jianghan's possession, scheming every way he could to seize it.
From the looks of things, was Jiang Chen about to burn bridges? Openly defying Marquis Longteng to his face?
The man at the center of it all, Jiang Chen, looked like he didn't have a care in the world. He pulled out a chair, sat down with a broad, easy sprawl, glanced at Dongfang Zhiruo, and muttered, "Looks like you haven't been slacking off these past few days. At this rate, making it past your sixteenth birthday should be no problem at all."
Clang—crash!
Three or four people in the audience fumbled their wine cups and dropped them straight to the floor, so stunned were they by Jiang Chen's words.
This finally prompted the handful of people who hadn't recognized Jiang Chen to lean over and whisper to their neighbors: Who on earth was this little marquis, and how was he so outrageably brazen?
That was the King's most beloved princess he was talking about!
And sitting right beside the princess was the eldest princess herself, Gouyu, whose expression was already darkening by the second.
Looking at Gouyu's face—which had grown so grim it seemed ready to drip—most of the onlookers didn't dare cast their gazes this way too boldly.
Everyone knew that Princess Gouyu was a cultivation prodigy of the Eastern Kingdom and one of the most powerful figures in the kingdom's power structure.
Setting everything else aside, she was the person in charge of the Hidden Dragon examination. Which marquis present would dare offend her?
Jiang Chen, however, seemed blissfully unaware—oblivious that he had seated himself in the most prominent section of the hall, and oblivious that he had become the center of everyone's attention.
Once seated, Jiang Chen had already used the periphery of his vision to survey virtually everyone at the banquet. To his surprise, he spotted a few familiar faces.
For instance, the Third Hall Master of the Apothecary Hall. And the Tianshui Marquis, who had slapped himself in the face that day.
It was clear that the Tianshui Marquis was on his best behavior today, keeping an extremely low profile. In the past, the Tianshui family would always have been the first to jump out and target the Jiang father and son.
But today, neither the Tianshui Marquis himself nor his heir made any move. What had happened at the Jiang Han Marquis's estate that day still clearly lingered in his mind. Though he wouldn't make a move himself, watching others target the Jiang father and son still gave him a measure of satisfaction.
These people had no idea about the agreement between Jiang Chen and Dongfang Lu. They felt no qualms whatsoever about pressing the Jiang father and son.
Sure enough, just as Jiang Chen was about to ask Dongfang Zhiruo a few questions about how she had been, several young heirs approached their table with practiced coordination.
The first to arrive was none other than the heir of the White Tiger Marquis—Bai Zhanyun.
"Jiang Chen, do you know what day it is?" Bai Zhanyun looked righteously indignant. "Today is Miss Long Juxue's sixteenth birthday. And you dare call this a sordid affair? I demand you apologize!"
"And me as well! Hong Tiantong, speaking in the name of the heir of the Vermilion Bird Marquis, order you to apologize to our host and to every guest present!" Hong Tiantong had also changed his usual style of egging others on from the sidelines, taking the initiative to strike out today.
Clearly, in a setting like this where ingratiation with Long Juxue was paramount, Hong Tiantong wasn't about to let Bai Zhanyun steal all the glory.
Both of these two came from formidable backgrounds.
The Eastern Kingdom had one hundred and eight marquises, each with varying levels of strength. But four great marquises had always held the top four positions, unchanged regardless of whatever upheavals the kingdom experienced.
Marquis Longteng held first place, the White Tiger Marquis held second, the Vermilion Bird Marquis third, and the Black Tortoise Marquis fourth!
Two of the heirs of these four great marquises had suddenly stepped forward, bringing along several heirs from other high-ranking marquis families, forming an aggressive encirclement around Jiang Chen.
Jiang Chen remained perfectly composed. He cast a lazy glance at Hong Tiantong and asked coolly, "Are you giving me orders?"
"You can take it that way," Hong Tiantong replied with arrogance.
"Oh…" Jiang Chen lightly tapped his forehead and turned to Princess Gouyu with a half-smile. "Princess Gouyu, is this man part of your royal family? Or is my memory failing me? Do marquises have the authority to order one another around? I seem to recall that only the royal family holds the right to command marquises!"
He then glanced over at Hong Tiantong with a languid air and grinned. "The heir of the Vermilion Bird Marquis, right? When did you change your surname to Dongfang? Something this momentous happened, and you didn't think to give the world advance notice? That way we could have prepared ourselves!"
Hong Tiantong, who had been striding forward with aggressive momentum, was instantly rendered speechless by that casually delivered counter- question. He stood there frozen like a statue, dumbstruck.
"And you—Bai Zhanyun, was it? If I'm not mistaken, this is already the third time you've provoked me. I didn't want to bother with you before. But today, you say this isn't a sordid affair—what's all this jumping around about? Are you blind? Can you not see the princess sitting right here? Do you have any concept of marquis etiquette? Shouting and screaming in front of a princess—have you even the faintest notion of rank and propriety?"
"And the rest of you—what do you think you're doing? Following these two fools out here to make a spectacle of yourselves? Are you trying to tell everyone present that your disloyalty no longer needs to be concealed?"
Jiang Chen's barrage of words left every last one of these young men gaping and flushed, their minds completely blank. They wanted desperately to fire back, but not a single coherent response came to mind.
Bai Zhanyun trembled with fury. "You… Jiang Chen… you lying son of a—"
"If your mother didn't lie, where did you come from? Was your mother not spewing filth? If she wasn't, then where exactly did you crawl out of—were you some stray brat your father picked up off the road?" When it came to verbal sparring, Jiang Chen had spent a million years in his previous life trading barbs with the heavens themselves. His sharp tongue had cursed its way across every realm.
These few? They weren't even worth his time.