A Dish Best Served Cold (The Man In Rage)
Chapter 1145 Ye Fan's Worth

"For as long as the rivers flow and the mountains stand, may he remain unrivalled in his strength and prowess. For as long as the moon rises and the sun falls, may he find no match for his power and abilities. Such is he, Mr Chu, the one and only!"

Silence descended upon them all.

It enveloped the world. Each blade and leaf stilled. The distant clouds paused in the sky while the surface of the lakes seemed to have frozen over. Time appeared to have come to a standstill. Nothing stirred in the still air. The winds had died.

Li Hong-Ze's strong voice boomed loudly in the stillness and reverberated like thunder between the heaven and earth.

Everyone was stunned speechless.

Wu Wei-Tao stood frozen to his spot while He Lan-Shan's jaw dropped.

Li Er, Chen Ao and the others widened their eyes. The utter shock on their faces made them look like fools.

Li Hong-Ze's words echoed endlessly inside their heads.

Had they just heard someone declare Ye Fan as a pillar of the nation and the pride of the country? Had he just been conferred a title by the government?

Dear heavens, what the hell was even going on?

Wu Wei-Tao and the rest nearly peed themselves.

Any one of those praises would have had the power to transform a person's life.

None of them, not Wu Wei-Tao or He Lan-Shan, not Long Bai-Chuan, not even the well-respected Lu Cang-Qiong, was worthy of such praise.

Yet Ye Fan had been accorded all of them.

He had been hailed as a pillar of their nation, someone who kept the country going and held the world up.

Men like Li Er, Chen Ao and He Lan-Shan might seem like influential figures in Yunzhou, Jianghai or Jiangdong, but their contributions to their country were limited to these small regions. To China, they were but a few of countless bricks that went to the construction of the mighty empire that was the country.

Old generals and lords like Xur Jun-Lin and Lu Cang-Qiong were slightly better off than the former group. Nevertheless, they were but a few metal rods in the grand construction of China.

You needed millions of bricks and tens of thousands of metal rods yet there were only seven pillars that held the country up.

The upper echelons of the Chinese government must accord Ye Fan with the highest regard to have conferred him the title of the seventh pillar of the nation, a prestige that few could enjoy. They had hailed him as the one and only, the Unrivalled. What high praise indeed!

There were only two persons that had been accorded that title in history.

The first was the man who had created the Mongolian Empire, a great man of East Asian origins whom none could rival. He was Genghis Khan!

The next was a general who had commanded the three armies and hundreds of thousands of soldiers and who had been praised as the only and one by the great emperor of the Han dynasty. He was the Military God, Han Xin!

One had created a great empire that had spanned the European and Asian continents. The other had built the founder and the first emperor of the Han dynasty his empire and paved the way for a glorious age in Chinese history.

Every word in the government's decree was worth diamonds. Each praise would have given Ye Fan limitless prestige and glory.

In fact, neither Lu Cang-Qiong nor Xur Jun-Lin was worthy of such praise.

That had been why they had been utterly dumbstruck when they had heard Li Hong-Ze's words.

They couldn't understand why a nameless nobody like Ye Fan had earned such high praise from their country.

The country had regarded him so highly that they had sent Li Hong-Ze to make a personal trip to Yunzhou and confer his titles upon him.

"This is just...but why?" Lu Cang-Qiong's voice shook with disbelief as his face paled with horror. He couldn't believe his eyes.

Wu Wei-Tao and He Lan-Shan were even more shocked than he was.

"Ye Fan? A pillar of our nation? How is that possible?" gasped Wu Wei-Tao out loud as his eyelids twitched with horror.

He couldn't believe what was happening before his eyes.

Everything seemed so surreal and like a scene out of a dream.

This was a hooligan who had come from the countryside. Prior to his reign in Jiangdong, he had been a useless man who had married into his wife's family and was disdained and insulted by everyone around him.

Wu Wei-Tao couldn't believe that such a man would warrant their nation's leader to issue a document personally and have the second most powerful man in their country confer a title upon him.

It was akin to witnessing a beggar receiving the royal decree and being made a prince of the state.

The sudden upheaval in Ye Fan's fortunes turned Wu Wei-Tao's world upside down.

He Lan-Shan's face was pale as he murmured. "Could they have mistaken him for someone else?"

He couldn't believe that the man whom he had called a ruffian had suddenly transformed into an unrivalled hero of the state whom the upper echelons of the government had to address respectfully as Mr Chu. "A mistake? Is there another Ye Fan in Jiangdong? Another Ye Fan who's also called Mr Chu and who leads the people in Jiangdong?" Li Hong-Ze glared at He Lan-Shan.

Shivers coursed through He Lan-Shan's blood and his face paled further. He immediately shut up.

Li Hong-Ze pretended that he had not heard Lu Cang-Qiong's question and ignored him completely.

He walked up to Ye Fan and smiled at him with approval and admiration. 'Tm heartened to see such a young man with such accomplishments. I couldn't believe it at first when someone told me that the Mr Chu who rules over Jiangdong is only a young man. It seems that you are very young. You have a long and bright future ahead of you." "China is honored and proud to have such a young hero amongst our midst. I was worried that no one would be able to assume the God of War's place when he retires in the future. It seems that we do have someone. With Mr Chu around, China can be assured of a hundred years of peace and stability!"

Li Hong-Ze's words struck hard like a bolt of lightning.

Wu Wei-Tao and the others shook more violently when they heard him.

Their country believed that a single man was going to guarantee the peace and future of the nation for a century.

Oh my!

What high praise! What impossibly high praise!

None of them could imagine the extent of power and strength a person must possess in order to earn such praise. How powerful must one be in order to protect and guard a nation for a hundred years? This seemed too surreal. Wu Wei-Tao and the others couldn't help but believe that some exaggeration was at play.

Ye Fan might be able to beat a thousand men, but so what?

Wars were fought in the tens of thousands of men and with warships and missiles.

Ye Fan was but a man of flesh and blood who could only relied on his fists and legs. How many men could he take down with punches and kicks? How long could he keep fighting?

But Wu Wei-Tao and the others were but ignorant fools who had not seen much of this world.

They had no idea how powerful martial artists could be and had not heard of supreme grandmasters and their prowess in battle.

They had no idea that a supreme grandmaster had no fear of tens of thousands of men or of warships and missiles.

None of those could withstand a single punch from Ye Fan.

There had not been a hint of exaggeration in their country's praise for Ye Fan. In fact, those praises might have been too modest.

The God of War, Ye Qing-Tian, had the power to protect China from harm for a hundred years too. Ye Fan was a greater prodigy than Ye Qing-Tian.

He was going to become the most powerful man in the martial arts circle in the future and he was going to level the Chu family.

His name would linger in history and become a talisman that protected China from threats for two hundred, even three hundred years. It would continue to protect China for a hundred years after his death!