Saving the Star of Literature After Faking My Death

You faked your death. The good news: You escaped the tyrant's imprisonment in the imperial palace. The bad news: You transmigrated into the body of a "criminal Confucian scholar" who had just been beheaded. ◆ 300 million star coins in debt ◆ E-rank physique, a total weakling ◆ Only Confucian classics remain in your skill library ◆ Your teammates are all ancient people with combat strength of five ◆ Your opponents are all top-tier, corrupted power brokers [But you've unlocked a hidden achievement: MAX-level trash talker · wholesale dealer of white moons · master of winning hearts without lifting a finger] - Su Zhaogui: The greatest power comes from the human heart. There will be a way. [Thirty years on the road, yet I have not reached the summit of success.] [Don't envy Penglai, far beyond the horizon. Become the greatest person in this world.] - [System: Take Zi Qiu, for example. He was denounced as a "vile Confucian" and expelled from the "Wentong School"...] The Chief Imperial Tutor: He is my most accomplished disciple! (Volume One: King Wen's Zither) - [System: Take Liu Shuangzhou, for example. He trusted prophecies, lost his integrity, and was condemned to have his tongue cut out and his corpse mutilated...] Wang Cang, Grand Marshal of the New Government: I deeply regret having failed you in the past, sir. I offer you the position of Grand Imperial Astrologer! (Volume Two: Cloud-Piercing Brush) - [System: Take Yun Jiucheng, for example. He challenged the powerful like a mantis trying to stop a chariot, and died in poverty and illness...] Special Forces Soldier of the Red Heart Battalion: This is the bearing of a top scholar of the Southern Dynasty! He is a hundred thousand times better than Luo Hui! (Volume Three: Gentleman’s Sword) - [System: Take Xu Ren, for example. He died young and accomplished nothing...] The Eight Great Schools of the Wang Sect: This is cause for celebration! We get to see our beloved senior brother again! (Volume Four: Bamboo Staff for Investigating Principles) - Outwit an old miser: Spirit +5; help the people resist taxes: Words of Power +5; suppress bandits and open the courier route: Physique +5; offer counsel to the duke's residence: Intelligence +5... - System prompt: The "Save the Star of Literature" mission has been completed successfully. Please select your reward. [King Wen's Zither] awakens good intentions; [Cloud-Piercing Brush] confuses the mind and bewilders the spirit; [Gentleman's Sword] slays ten thousand foes; [Bamboo Staff for Investigating Principles] dispels delusions and calms the mind... Physique +100; Spirit +100; Words of Power +100; Intelligence +100... The Confucian blade stirs the seas, the waves of the written word surge through ten thousand ages. A brush becomes a sword, strategies become blades, a scholar in white holding a book shakes the gates of heaven! - Nangong Zhuo once broke Su Zhaogui's proud spirit, crushed his reputation for talent, and imprisoned him as a captive in the inner palace. Su Zhaogui had been a ray of light to Nangong Zhuo in his years of hardship. After Nangong Zhuo ascended the throne, Su became his most secret shame, his deepest obsession, and the prisoner he could never speak of. Nangong Zhuo once thought that breaking Su's wings would let him keep the moon forever. He never knew that Su Zhaogui would rather shatter like jade than be stained by dust. After Su Zhaogui faked his death, the tyrant found a line of ink on the imperial desk: [Muddy water and dust cannot stain the moon's light. The pine and cypress stand alone in purity, their branches unbroken by frost.] - A secluded palace hall, high walls without windows. Wearing a black dragon robe, Nangong Zhuo tapped his knuckles against a cold golden pillar as he looked down at Su Zhaogui, dressed in white and stained with blood inside his cage. "Your pride? Your reputation? ... I'll break all ten of your fingers, silence your jade-like voice, and tear away the wings you use to soar... I want to watch the light in your eyes go out, little by little! You will be my prisoner for all eternity!" Su Zhaogui coughed up blood, yet only gave a silent, cold laugh. His eyes blazed with even greater defiance, and his lips moved: "...I'd... rather... shatter!" - A humble shack in the countryside, lit by a dim oil lamp. Sixteen-year-old Zhang Junyou (Nangong Zhuo) curled up on his sickbed. The hand gripping Su Zhaogui's sleeve had prominent knuckles, his face was as pale as glass, and his voice was as fragile as a fledgling's. "Su... big... brother... I'm cold..." Su Zhaogui handed him hot medicine and carefully blew on it to cool it. Leaning against the earthen wall, the boy gazed through the window at the farmhouse beneath the moonlight, his eyes bewildered yet full of hope. "A life of chickens, dogs, mulberry trees, and hemp fields... Will the peaceful world Brother Su spoke of really come one day?" The candlelight flickered, illuminating the boy's tired yet clear-cut profile. Su Zhaogui stroked his head and answered in a gentle, resolute voice, "It will. Don't let the lamp... in your heart go out." - The imperial city was under strict guard, its streets filled with white funeral banners. Nangong Zhuo stood in a shadowy hall before the spirit tablet honoring "Empress Su, the Most Benevolent, Cultured, and Compliant Sage of the Imperial Realm." The strange old wound across his heart suddenly throbbed with pain! Nangong Zhuo clutched the iron tablet, his face twisted into a savage grimace, yet he let out a crazed, sick laugh. "My dear Su..." His fingertips brushed the cold tablet as though caressing his beloved's skin. "Alive, you are my beloved captive! Dead... you are my empress!" He pressed the tablet hard against his heart, feeling the sharp pain that followed him like a shadow, as if a string were twisting inside him. "My dear Su... Do you want to watch me... clutch your name and suffer until I go mad?" - ◆ Gentle, jade-like, clear-eyed strategist on the receiving end × corrupted, unhinged emperor and god of war on the pursuing end ◆ Romance: It looks like a tyrant chasing his wife after losing her, convinced he's following a tragic romance between men, but it's actually a sweet-and-sour tug-of-war from a pure-love story. ◆ A long, plot-focused progression fantasy with a lightly ensemble cast. Scheming √ Missions √ Debates √ Magical artifacts √ ◆ Entirely fictional setting, entirely fictional setting, entirely fictional setting. A made-up story, just for fun. Theme: The highest virtue is like water; guarding softness is called strength.