Chapter 1348: A Huge Reward for Winning a Smile
After resting for a day, Chu Mu accompanied Liu Binglan to Territory Institution.
Although the conference didn’t begin today, etiquette dictated that they should go and greet the inviting party first.
Territory Institution was situated at the center of the city. It was an extremely beautiful park and at the southern end of the park were several magnificent jade lofts.
After passing through the beautiful park, Chu Mu had the strange feeling that the scent from these flowers was familiar. Moreover, there was the remnants of a unique and alluring perfume from a woman.
“What is it?” Liu Binglan looked at Chu Mu and asked, confused.
“This park has Yu Suo’s flower demons. Their ranks are not low either.” explained Chu Mu.
“Her reach is rather wide. We come into contact with it wherever we go.” said Liu Binglan.
Chu Mu glanced at the exquisite flowerbed that looked harmless and seemed to have been nurtured by humans. Yet, these were exactly the same plants as those in Wanxiang City in the past that looked beautiful and brightly-colored, but actually left Wanxiang City in an extremely dangerous situation. He didn’t know what that woman had planned this time, but if she wanted to plot something in Zhengming Main City, a place full of hidden experts, it couldn’t be something simple.
Right after they entered the main hall, there were a few people discussing official business to the side who immediately looked at Chu Mu and Liu Binglan.
“It’s New Moon Land’s Female Supreme Liu. Why is she here?” curiously asked a middle-aged man.
“New Moon Land is but a tiny private territory. They probably don’t have the qualifications to participate in this high-level conference, right?” said an older woman.
“Why is she here? Could she have come uninvited?”
“Maybe New Moon Land is under the control of some great expert.”
These people didn’t bother covering up their voices.
With Liu Binglan’s appearance and temperament, probably nobody would forget her after seeing her. These people were all important figures from Jia Border and the border territories near Jia Border.
The news that New Moon Land was a rich land had already spread to many border territories. In fact, many experts had gone there to see it, and their evaluations of New Moon Land were very high. Adding on the fact that New Moon Land now had several dominator rank experts, their upper-level strength was no longer inferior to a few cities.
But, by the same token, in the eyes of genuine border kingdoms, New Moon Land would be no more than a small pellet of a land no matter how much it developed. It would never be able to compare to border kingdoms, which were several thousand times larger.
This notion existed in Jia Border and the border kingdoms around it. Thus, when they saw Liu Binglan appear in the highest level Territory Conference, they abruptly realized something wasn’t right. Did Territory Institution, which differentiated between ranks, permit this private territory, which wasn’t considered up to par, to participate in this conference? Indeed, being able to participate in this conference was like adding on a halo to the territory. Moreover, it was a halo that sat equally with their border territories!
“These people come from Jia Border, Guang Border, Tu Border and Yu Border. Their relations with our New Moon Land aren’t particularly good. Most of them have intentions of obstructing us. The only ones with more harmonious relations are Ze Border and Hong Border.” Liu Binglan gave a quick explanation to Chu Mu.
Chu Mu nodded his head. He roughly remembered the appearances of those people who were just discussing them.
In the main hall, people from the inviting party came to greet them, and guided Liu Binglan and Chu Mu towards a place to sit down.
During their greeting, the inviting party divulged the contents of the conference.
After learning of the contents, Chu Mu and Liu Binglan didn’t stay any longer.
Liu Binglan was a policymaker in New Moon Land, and not a diplomat. She was a person who found it very hard to speak with others, let alone establish good relations with other participants of Territory Institution.
Additionally, even though her territory was small, as a queen, she needed to have her pride. She had no need to randomly establish contact with people that didn’t look like they were genuine Border Lords. That would only degrade her status.
After leaving Territory Institution, the four people from the border territories before were using “friendly” eyes as they looked at Liu Binglan and Chu Mu leave.
The four of them seemed to know something, as their eyes involuntarily carried traces of arrogance. Especially the older woman of the four - she seemed to find it difficult to hide her contempt for Liu Binglan.
“Mom, wherever you go, you always incur the jealousy of other women.” Chu Mu noticed the eyes of the woman from Tu Border and half-jokingly spoke.
Liu Binglan carried coldness and pride in her bones. Even if she was meeting people who came from border territories, she would still have that coldness and pride. This would make people who had come from thousands of miles away feel dissatisfied when they were faced with this attitude. Adding on the fact that her appearance and temperament would always be superior, she would make others feel inferior and dislike her. This was especially the case for other women; it was only normal.
“Are you praising your mom, or calling your mom unwelcoming.” Liu Binglan felt that Chu Mu’s words were a bit uncomfortable.
“Obviously I’m praising you. You’re so outstanding that you can’t be bothered to gain knowledge from these mere peasants,” said Chu Mu with a serious face.
Liu Binglan laughed. Chu Mu’s words were rather pleasant to listen to.
Chu Mu rarely saw Liu Binglan laughed and continued to praise: “Mom is very beautiful when you laugh. You must laugh in the mirror to yourself when you have nothing to do and be bewitched by your own laugh.”
“Do you think the routine you use to trick young women will work on your mom?” Liu Binglan retracted her smile and indifferently spoke.
Chu Mu was bewildered. When did he trick young women?
But speaking of which, if Liu Binglan had laughed like this in the past whenever she came to see him in Luo City, he wouldn’t have such a negative view of her. Kids obviously didn’t care if a woman looked good or not. They only cared if the woman was warm and friendly to them. Yet, every time he saw his mom, she would have a layer of frost on her face, and would always be wearing cold-white clothing…
As they were speaking, Liu Binglan saw two people walking towards them. For some reason, the two of them had come to a sudden stop and were staring foolishly at her. For the longest while, they didn’t move their gazes.
Liu Binglan had already walked up to them before they finally reacted. Their faces went red and one of them awkwardly said: “I never expected to encounter Female Supreme Liu here. I was thinking of something just now and my mind went wandering. I’m very sorry.”
The man next to him used a cough to hide his face as he said: “Female Supreme Liu also received the invitation of Territory Institution to participate in this conference?”
Liu Binglan nodded her head and then introduced to Chu MU: “This person is Ze Border Border Lord Huang Zefeng, and this is Hong Border Border Lord Li Moyu.”
When Liu Binglan had given him a rough outline of their allies just now, she said that Ze Border and Hong Border were both trustworthy allies.
“Female Supreme Liu, who is this?” asked Ze Border’s Border Lord Huang Zefeng.
The two Border Lords were very curious about who this young man who was walking very intimately with Liu Binglan was.
New Moon Land’s potential had already been recognized by the two borders, and thus they were willing to become allies. After these two border lords had seen New Moon Land’s Female Supreme Liu, they grew curious about this woman who had an extremely high reputation in the outside world.
They had heard of this cold beauty’s reputation and after meeting her a few times, she was just like her reputation. Her face was as cold as ice and aside from a few lifts of the corners of her mouth out of etiquette, she would never smile.
The truth was that Liu Binglan didn’t enjoy diplomacy, and didn’t have the ability to talk smoothly like a diplomat. However, because of her cold and unfriendly nature to everybody, her reputation continued to grow alongside New Moon Land’s gradual growth. There were even people who issued large rewards for any person that could win the smile of New Moon Land’s Female Supreme.
Initially, this reward was just a joke that people created out of admiration. However, as more and more people learned of New Moon Land and the Female Supreme, adding on the fact that nobody had seen the ice on her face thaw, the reward continuously grew. Even now, the reward amount was still trending up.
Having a hefty reward to win the smile of a woman had happened before in the past. However, this was the first time the reward had reached such a high level. Therefore, it didn’t matter if it was intentional or unintentional, this record-breaking reward was enough to show how cold this beauty was.
Both Border Lord Huang Zefeng and Border Lord Li Moyu knew about this. But they had just seen Liu Binglan give a sweet smile when they were walking over. Thus, on the one hand, they had been stunned by her beautiful and alluring smile, while on the other, they were shocked by the fact that she had smiled. Didn’t this mean that the young man beside her had won the reward?!
With curiosity, the two Border Lords obviously wanted to know who the young man, who they hadn’t met before, next to Liu Binglan was.
As for the reward, Liu Binglan had heard a bit about it. She ultimately felt it was something senseless. If she wanted to laugh, she would laugh. If she didn’t want too, she wouldn’t laugh. Why was there a need to create a reward?
“He’s our New Moon Land’s King - Chu Mu. The owner of the territory.” said Liu Binglan.
The two Border Lords were stunned, and seemingly looked at each other in dismay.
The two of them never expected the owner of the territory to be so young. New Moon Land currently had numerous dominator rank experts, so even if their king hadn’t reached the immortal rank yet, he was probably close to it.
The man in front of them wasn’t very old, and was even part of the younger generation. Being the King of New Moon Land at such a young age was shocking. Indeed, most Realm Lords were white-haired old people!
Chu Mu wore a polite and faint smile as he nodded to them. Although Chu Mu was a cold and callous person, he wasn’t like Liu Binglan, who wouldn’t thaw over a thousand years.
“Truly a young and handsome talent. We probably can’t find even a few young people comparable to King Chu within our border territories.”
“Haha, this is truly a surprise. It seems that New Moon Land is the same as King Chu: both have unlimited prospects,” said the Border Lords half out of politeness and half sincerely.
“Do you know what this conference is about? Just now, the inviting party was a bit vague with what they told us.” Chu Mu got straight to the topic.
“Oh, we were just about to talk about this. How about this- We’ll go and see the inviting party first. The two of you just wait here for a moment and after we see the inviting party, we’ll have an in-depth discussion with the two of you.” said Li Moyu.
“Ok, that works.”