Li Xia said he was going back to Chang'an, but in fact he just walked to Mengjin Ferry and stopped at Longma Yingtu Temple.

That day, he was waiting at the ferry for Guo Shoujing, who had just been moved from the pacification envoy of Hebei to the minister of the Ministry of Industry, and planned to walk together to the Yellow River Gorge to the west.

In the two months after bringing peace to the world, he had roughly completed the review and transfer of officials in various states and counties. Now that the treasury silver and the first batch of salt taxes from the south had arrived, he could finally begin his planning and governance.

In front of us is the broad and mighty Yellow River, which under his governance will end its harm to the world a hundred or even hundreds of years in advance.

He couldn't help but feel a sense of pride that the great country was written by him.

In Li Xia's eyes, this is the happiness of an emperor.

However, before Guo Shoujing arrived, news came from Kaifeng that Zhao Yu suddenly died.

As long as it did not affect the stability of Jiangnan, Li Xia didn't care about the matter. But after Cao Xi came back to express his condolences, he just asked a casual question, which scared Cao Xi to the ground.

"Bless your majesty, my slave is back."

"Have you seen Zhao Yu? Did he die of illness or was he killed by Quan Jiu?"

"Ah! Your Majesty, please forgive me. When I went to the Yingguo Palace this time, I didn't... I didn't want to investigate this matter. The coffin has been sealed, and I didn't see it..."

"Get up." Li Xia asked again: "I didn't see the body, but no one told you?"

Cao Xi wiped his forehead and responded cautiously: "Your Majesty, I only found out one thing. When Mrs. Yingguo went north, she bribed Liu Mengyan and asked him to say something good on her behalf."

"I didn't ask you to say anything nice."

"At that time, she did not expect that slaves could also receive His Majesty's mercy, so she asked Liu Mengyan to ask Your Majesty if he still remembered the past events of his youth in Qiantang."

After Cao Xi said this, he glanced at Li Xia furtively.

The queen of a country was reduced to a prisoner, and then she said some ambiguous words, which was somewhat unusual and rare.

really.

"good."

Just when Cao Xi thought that Li Xia wanted to summon Quanjiu for a meeting, he heard him say: "Since she doesn't want to be the wife of Yingguo, then she will pass the decree and be demoted to the wife of Tianchuan County."

"Your Majesty, this servant is guilty!"

Cao Xi was so frightened that he stood up and fell to his knees again.

He realized that his conversation with Quan Jiu had been overheard... Looking back at the time, it was only Wang Qinghui who overheard and took the initiative to report it to the Public Opinion Department.

"I know my sin! I know that it's not that Your Majesty has no one to use. It's because I see that I'm disabled and has nowhere to go. Your Majesty keeps you by your side because of your kindness. Even if I die, I will never be able to repay Your Majesty's great kindness. I should know that."

Nothing to say..."

"You did nothing wrong. Stop making noise here and go and summon Liu Mengyan."

"yes."

Cao Xi stood up in a hurry and suddenly thought, Mrs. Yingguo and Mrs. Tianchuan County are all false claims, but where is this Tianchuan County?

Li Xia had already seen Zhang Wenwan running towards this side from the Yellow River, and then he waved her hand to come forward.

"Brother-in-law."

"Huh? You can't play anymore. Do you want to cross the river from here and go back to Baozhou?"

"No." Zhang Wenwan said: "I originally asked Sister An An to paint for me by the river. I had a good time, but the eldest sister insisted on saying bad things about me."

"What bad words?"

Zhang Wenwan was so anxious that she raised her hand and pointed to the river, but her words were incoherent.

"My brother-in-law is waiting for me. The younger brother of Guo Shoujing, the new minister of the Ministry of Industry, is Guo Hongjing, the young eunuch of Dushui. When Guo Hongjing first arrived in Chang'an, he met Jiang Di. He felt that Jiang Di was gentle, elegant and talented, unlike the people told him at home in the north.

, doesn’t study, and behaves rudely... Ah, brother-in-law, you know what makes me angry, right? My eldest sister is really annoying."

"I don't know, I think Wen Jing is right."

"Huh, anyway, I have to marry better than Jiang Di..."

"I know, let's go play."

"By the way, the eunuch who just passed by was the former Queen of the Song Dynasty. Yan Rongke was angry when Zhao Jin refused to let Yan Rong kill her." Zhang Wenwan put her hands on her hips, raised her eyebrows, and hummed like Yan Rong: "

Let me tell you, I came to Kaifeng just to kill her!"

"How do you know?"

"Zhao Jin and I had a good time." Zhang Wenwan said matter-of-factly.

"Aren't you angry with her?"

"I'm not angry with her a long time ago, doesn't my brother-in-law know?"

Li Xia only remembered that Zhang Wenwan was very dissatisfied when she accepted Zhao Jin, but she didn't know when they reconciled.

He couldn't understand what was going on with these women, so he said, "Go, the courtiers are here."

"Oh, by the way, brother-in-law, I'm going to fork the Yellow River fish and grill it for dinner tonight?"

"Ah."

Li Xia felt that she was the only one making noise in the entire harem, but she did not act like an emperor and just waved her away.

~~

Liu Mengyan was summoned and hurried from Longma Negatu Temple to the Yellow River.

This was the first time Li Xia summoned him alone after he surrendered.

He had made great achievements many times, but in the end he was not reused. He was actually very puzzled.

Today I finally met the saint, and I saw Li Xia standing by the Yellow River. His figure was still tall and burly, and his eyes were still heroic. Compared with more than ten years ago, he was more majestic, but other changes were not major.

Liu Mengyan immediately had a feeling - the emperor in front of him had not slacked off at all because of his pampering, and his ambition had not yet been satisfied.

"I leave Mengyan to pay my respects to Your Majesty."

"Follow me for a walk."

"I obey the decree."

As Li Xia walked away, he asked, "How do you feel about Zhao Yu's death?"

Liu Mengyan, who was following behind, was slightly embarrassed and said: "The Duke of Ying has always been weak, I am not surprised."

"You are quite magnanimous."

"Reporting to your majesty, when I was in Lin'an, I was often worried and angry because of the ignorance and debauchery of the Duke of Ying. Fortunately, your majesty came from heaven to unify the four seas, which is a great blessing for the family and the country. The fire of the emperor of Song Dynasty cannot compare with the glory of the sun and the moon by your majesty.

On a par... Even Madam Ying Guo said so."

Liu Mengyan was too lazy to say good things for Quanjiu, so as not to offend Concubine Ning and Concubine Kang.

But in fact, Concubine Ning did not have the same power in the Tang Dynasty as the "Yam Martin Party" before. He finally found the cat, but failed to find a backer to join the Yan Party or the Zhao Party.

Quan Jiu said that since he has a history with His Majesty, he would not mind being a broker for a time.

Seeing that Li Xia didn't answer at this time, Liu Mengyan paused briefly and then said: "Your Majesty's style, in Lin'an back then, which woman was not attracted by it."

Li Xia suddenly said: "Cao Xi has just sold you."

Liu Mengyan was startled and felt a chill on her back.

"I...I'm not...I'm guilty..."

"It's not a serious crime to be interested in seducing people." Li Xia said, "But if I want a woman, I will find it myself. I don't need my subordinates to search for me. Cai Jing, Qin Hui and others are officials who can satisfy my selfish desires. I don't need them. Don't even think about leaving."

This way."

There was a lot of room for defense in these words, but Liu Mengyan did not dare to defend himself. He only dared to lean over and respond: "I know the crime, and I accept the decree."

"You performed two great feats when you surrendered, but I have never reused you. Do you know why?"

"It's my fault that I can't bear the heavy responsibility."

"You sneaked into Mongolia and committed treason, didn't you?"

Liu Mengyan was really startled this time. He quickly knelt down and touched his forehead to the ground, saying: "I don't dare. Although I have some correspondence with the Zhang family, I actually received favors from the Zhang family in my early years, so I did this."

He handled some private matters, but never disclosed the important military matters to the foreigners. At that time, the minister was a member of the Zhang family of the world, not a minister of the Meng Yuan..."

His reasoning was very clear, meaning that if Li Xia wanted to deal with him, he needed to deal with Shen Kai, Zhang Yanxiong, Jing Jie and other members of the Zhang family first.

It is true that Li Xia would not use such an old incident from more than ten years ago to punish Mengyan. There is no evidence, and if it were really counted, too many people in the whole court would be guilty.

But Liu Mengyan did make him feel untrustworthy.

If you think about it carefully, maybe it was because when Liu Mengyan was the right minister of the Song Dynasty, he did not take the initiative to get the Song Dynasty to surrender, but only focused on finding a backer in the new dynasty.

Everyone surrendered, but he surrendered disgracefully.

From these things, he seems to be a traitor and a sycophant. However, when Li Xia recently reviewed the Song officials, he was somewhat surprised to find that since Liu Mengyan became an official, he neither took bribes, perverted the law nor treated the people harshly.

Everything was done properly.

Apart from personal moral deficiencies, there is no other fault that can be found.

"His Majesty."
To be continued...