Thief Emperor

Chapter 1011: Happy and Unwilling to Return
"East Palace."

The Duke of England lowered his head and drank a sip of tea without saying anything.

It is an indisputable fact that the Eastern Palace is becoming increasingly powerful, but this expansion of power is within the emperor's permission.

This time, the emperor even left the capital for more than half a year and left the crown prince to govern the country. One of the reasons was to expand the Eastern Palace.

And now, perhaps His Royal Highness the Crown Prince realized the Emperor's intention, or perhaps the officials of the Eastern Palace realized this intention, but over the past six months, the Eastern Palace has recommended more than 30 officials to the court, and the Ministry of Personnel has approved them all with almost no objection.

And now, the Eastern Palace actively participated in the fraud case in the seventh year of Zhangwu, and its intentions were not difficult to guess.

Those who could be involved in the imperial examinations were basically high-ranking officials. If a few of them were pulled together, people from the East Palace would naturally fill in the gap when the emperor was not at home.

Furthermore, His Majesty the Emperor is obviously very concerned about this scandal, so of course the Eastern Palace must follow suit and perform well in front of the Emperor.

You must know that in the Zhangwu Dynasty, no matter how powerful one was, it was nothing in front of the Emperor. As officials of the Eastern Palace, each of them knew very well that in the Zhangwu Dynasty, to secure the position of the Crown Prince was by no means to expand one's power and dominate the court.

Instead, they have to perform well in front of His Majesty the Emperor. Otherwise, even if all the civil servants in the court are from the Eastern Palace, once they are surrounded by the Imperial Guards, the worst that can happen is that a group of officials will be replaced.

And the Eastern Palace is absolutely not allowed to have any contact with military officers.

Duke Ying thought about it seriously, then looked at Meng Hai and asked, "How has the Xue family been doing with the Eastern Palace recently?"

Meng Hai thought for a moment and said, "Your Highness has visited the Xue family several times to see Prince Xue, but I haven't heard of any close contact between the Xue family and the Eastern Palace."

Liu Bo hummed, lowered his head to drink tea, and continued to ask: "It has been half a year since the investigation. How many people have been investigated by the three judicial departments?"

"There are a total of 23 Jinshi candidates from the 7th year of Zhangwu involved, as well as 27 court officials and clerks from the Ministry of Rites. The officials from the Ministry of Rites have all been detained in the Dali Temple Prison, waiting for Your Majesty to come back and make a decision."

"The officials involved were detained in the Jingzhao Prefecture Prison."

Meng Hai was silent for a while, then continued, "If it were the laws of the previous dynasty, this would have definitely implicated many people, and in the end, I'm afraid there would be a major case against more than a thousand people. However, Your Majesty is benevolent and kind, and this dynasty cannot implicate many people. In the end, I'm afraid only these fifty or sixty people will be convicted."

"If we investigate further, we will have no way to find out."

Meng Hai stood up, poured tea for Liu Bo, and continued, "Si Zheng, when will His Majesty return to the capital?"

"It's probably another month or two."

Liu Bo took the tea, took a big sip, and said with a smile: "You are getting more and more efficient now. This case seems to have been sorted out. His Majesty is worried that you can't handle it well, so he asked me to come back early to take a look."

Meng Hai scratched his head and said, "I'll just stay in Luoyang. This matter isn't complicated. I'll keep an eye on it day and night, and of course I'll be able to see most of it."

Liu Bo put down his teacup, thought for a moment, and continued to ask: "How many of the officials involved in this case are former officials of Wu Zhou?"

Meng Hai was startled, and scratched his head. After thinking for a while, he shook his head and said, "I really haven't paid attention to these things, but most of the officials in the Ministry of Rites are officials from the previous dynasty, and there are few Jinshi from this dynasty."

Liu Bo knocked lightly on the table and said, "The origins of these people must be thoroughly investigated. Your Majesty is very concerned about this imperial examination fraud case. Although this dynasty will not implicate others, this time, it will not stop at these fifty-odd people."

Meng Hai lowered his head quickly: "Yes, I understand."

"I will sort out the detailed backgrounds of these people in the next few days."

At this point, he paused, somewhat curiously: "Si Zheng, if we cannot implicate others, how can we investigate this matter further?"

Liu Bo looked at him and shook his head slightly: "I don't know either, but your majesty naturally has his own ideas."

"You and I, just do our job carefully."

"Yes."

…………

February, Jinling Prefecture, inside the imperial city.

His Majesty the Emperor was enjoying a rare moment of free time, and was sitting on a recliner reading a book. To his left, a woman in a tight Hu dress was playing the zither with her bare hands.

Not far ahead, there was a girl in palace dress dancing gracefully. When the song was about to end, the girl spun around and bowed to the Emperor, revealing her deep cleavage.

Emperor Li clapped his hands and said with a smile, "Not bad, not bad."

After complimenting him, he looked at the woman playing the piano and said with a smile, "The beauty's piano is also good, it makes me feel relaxed and happy."

A few months ago, after arriving in Jinling, the local nobles of Jinling wrote to the emperor together, wanting to offer their daughters to enrich the harem. At that time, Emperor Li did not agree to select concubines in Jinling, after all, selecting concubines was a very troublesome matter and required a lot of manpower.

But at that time, he held a banquet in the imperial city and invited the gentry to bring their daughters to the banquet. During the banquet, His Majesty the Emperor took three people into the palace to serve, and the two before him were two of them.

One of them was born in Jinling and the other in Wujun, both were Han women.

The reason why the woman playing the zither wears Hu clothing is because it was a trend among the noble ladies of that era to wear Hu clothing, which was considered a new trend.

After all, Hu clothing is not as loose as clothes with big sleeves, and can better show off one's figure.

The woman who was playing the zither stood up immediately after being praised by the emperor, and came to the emperor, pulling the emperor's sleeve, and said angrily: "Your Majesty, do you still not remember my last name? Why do you still call me beauty?"

Emperor Li touched his nose.

He had so many things to do that he actually forgot some of them.

The woman sat closer and said in a tender voice, "My surname is Su, and my nickname is Zhao'er. Your Majesty, please don't forget it again."

These two women had both entered the palace and were conferred the title of fourth-rank beauties by the Emperor. Naturally, they had both served the Emperor.

The present emperor is very different from the ruler of the southeast more than a decade ago.

When he was the King of Wu in the southeast, although some people sent him women, and even the Lu family of Fanyang sent him Lu Yuzhen as a concubine, but at that time, everyone was just placing bets.

Not only was he betting on himself, he was also betting on other princes.

But now, the world is unified. Not long ago, the news that the court recovered Youyan has spread throughout the world. A unified dynasty has been clearly formed.

Now, if someone sends a woman into the palace, it is no longer a gamble, but a clear desire to create a step for advancement for their family.

Therefore, these women were much more gentle and charming than those in the past. After entering the palace, they had no other thoughts and only wanted to serve the emperor and please him.

The emperor smiled and said, "I have too many things to do, so it's inevitable that I forget things."

"I'll remember it later."

At this time, the dancing Concubine Wang also walked up to the emperor and sat down near his left.

The two women were both seventeen years old and youthful and attractive. Even the emperor could not help but be moved. When he was about to take the two beauties with him to expand the Li Tang dynasty, the eunuch Gu Chang approached cautiously and whispered to the emperor, "Your Majesty, Concubine Shu and Concubine Lu are here."

Li Tang imitated the Xiao Zhou system, with a harem consisting of four concubines and nine imperial concubines. After that, there were nine imperial concubines, nine beauties, and nine talented women. After that, there were Baolin, imperial concubines, etc.

Excluding the queen and four concubines, there were a total of 108 "organizations".

Lu Lang was the Zhaoyi, the head of the nine concubines.

Upon hearing this, the Emperor coughed, stood up, and smiled at the two beauties beside him, saying, "You can go back now. I will come to look for you later."

The two beauties smiled, bowed, and retreated respectfully.

As soon as the two of them left, the Lu sisters arrived. His Majesty the Emperor stood up to greet them and said with a smile, "Lang'er is pregnant, it's not good for her to rest, why is she walking around?"

Concubine Lu did not speak, but just looked at her sister. Concubine Lu looked at His Majesty and sighed, "Your Majesty, didn't you say that we would return to Luoyang in the spring? How long do we have to stay here?"

Li Yun stepped forward, took Lu Huan's hand, and said with a smile: "Why, Huan'er, are you not used to staying in Jinling?"

"We are used to it."

Concubine Lu looked at Li Yun and said angrily, "I'm afraid that Your Majesty will be so happy here with the beauty that he won't want to go home."

The emperor smiled and said, "That's pure nonsense."

He looked at the two sisters and said seriously, "I have made preparations. We will set off to return to Luoyang in five days."

Emperor Li looked at Lu Zhaoyi and said softly, "Lang'er, you should stay in Jinling for a while. When you give birth to an heir at the end of the year, you can return to Luoyang."

Lu Zhaoyi nodded slightly and sighed.

"I have no choice but to stay here by myself."

(End of this chapter)