Xu Jingzong has been so busy lately that his hair has turned a lot gray.
The errand assigned to him by Li Zhi was both a huge risk and an opportunity to show off his merits. For this big boss who had been in the court all his life, he was certainly very aware of the risks and opportunities behind this errand.
As one of the eighteen scholars of Zhenguan, Xu Jingzong was the political legacy left by Li Shimin to Li Zhi. Xu Jingzong also knew his position very well. From the day Li Zhi ascended the throne, he firmly hugged Li Zhi's thigh.
, as long as this thigh is held tightly, his political career will never be bad.
Sure enough, Xu Jingzong has achieved the position he is today as the Right Prime Minister, a position inferior to one person and superior to tens of millions of people.
This time Li Zhi made it very clear that he wanted to cut off the queen's wings. Xu Jingzong was really embarrassed, but he still gritted his teeth and agreed.
He weighed the pros and cons very clearly.
Only by being determined to follow the emperor can he be rich and prosperous for generations to come. If he rejects the emperor, his status in the emperor's heart will be compromised. Xu Jingzong is old, but what will happen to the future of the descendants of the Xu family for generations to come?
The queen, no matter how noble her status is, is just a woman, and her power cannot be extended out of the harem. After her wings are cut off this time, she will only become more honest from now on. Can the right prime minister not be able to offend her?
Therefore, in this operation against Li Yifu, Xu Jingzong made every effort to bring Li Yifu down completely so that he would never be able to stand up again.
The reason why Xu Jingzong came to Ganjingzhuang today was because he received a letter from Li Qinzai when he was working with the Sanfa Division to collect evidence of Li Yifu's crimes.
After Xu Jingzong read the letter, he hurriedly set off before dawn and went straight to Ganjingzhuang.
Although there is a lot of evidence against Li Yifu collected in the past few days, what worries Xu Jingzong is that all the evidence is trivial and trivial.
The evidence that should be annihilated had long been secretly eliminated by Li Yifu, and it was not as fatal as the incriminating evidence Li Qinzai had in hand. If what Li Qinzai said was true, then Li Yifu would be dead this time.
Xu Jingzong came to Ganjing Village for the first time. Although he was the prime minister, he politely handed over his name card and waited outside the door in a polite manner.
Xu Jingzong knew very well that Li Qinzai's weight in the emperor's heart was much higher than that of his prime minister, and he did not dare to act like a prime minister in front of Li Qinzai.
If he can't even do this little bit of human sophistication, his years of experience fighting in official circles will be considered as feeding the dog.
Li Qinzai was also very considerate and went out to greet him personally. The two of them saluted each other outside the door and smiled with their arms stretched out. If there was a burner of incense, the two of them would kneel down without hesitation to pay their respects.
After a few words of greeting, Li Qinzai invited Xu Jingzong in and ordered a banquet to be held in the front hall.
An old fox and a young fox, of course, they couldn't talk about anything too deep when they got together. They exchanged a few useless greetings and exchanged some insignificant gossip about the capital, and then they exchanged glasses.
After half-drinking, Xu Jingzong did not forget about business, so he asked about the warlock Du Yuanji who was kidnapped by Wu Minzhi.
Li Qinzai clapped his hands and escorted a tied-up middle-aged man in.
Xu Jingzong looked around and slowly narrowed his eyes: "Is he Du Yuanji?"
"Yes, it's a very important matter. I don't dare to ask any more questions, so I'm not in a hurry to interrogate him. He should know everything Grandpa Xu wants to know. This man may not be a hero. Just go back and use some torture on him."
, I guess he will do it."
Excitement flashed in Xu Jingzong's eyes. If Du Yuanji really had the handle to kill Li Yifu, the mission entrusted to him by the emperor would have been fulfilled.
As for some other members of the party behind the court, haha, the biggest fish has been caught, are you still worried that others will not fall into the trap? Even if there is no evidence of guilt, Xu Jingzong has a way to involve them in the case of Li Yifu
, catch a bunch of them, no one can escape.
"Marquis Li County, you have accomplished a great thing," Xu Jingzong said with joy, stroking his palms: "If the crime of the evil thief Li Yifu can be proven from Du Yuanji, the emperor will be happy, and both you and I will be praised by the emperor.
…”
Li Qinzai smiled.
Seeing his strange smile, Xu Jingzong immediately slapped his forehead and said with a bitter smile: "I am so naive. With the personal relationship between the Emperor and Marquis Li, you really don't need to care about any praise, haha."
Li Qinzai ignored the topic and said: "Xu Xiang plans to kill all the followers of the rear party this time?"
Xu Jingzong was stunned and said: "Since you have taken action, of course you don't have to show mercy, otherwise you will leave trouble for yourself."
Li Qinzai sighed: "Xu Xiang still thinks wrong..."
Xu Jingzong said hurriedly: "I would like to hear from Li County Marquis Gao."
"The emperor's decree for you is to cut off the wings of the queen's party, but he did not say that he would catch them all in one fell swoop. And if you really wipe out the queen's party, the queen will definitely hate you to the bone..."
"Young man, let me say something harsh. Mr. Xu, you are already old, but the Queen is not yet forty. If the Queen survives the crisis this time, it is hard to say that she will not find opportunities to take revenge on the children of the Xu family..."
Xu Jingzong's face suddenly turned ugly. The reason why he was so cruel to the queen's followers was because he judged that the emperor might depose the queen this time. If the queen was deposed, what would he have to fear from the queen?
Especially the scumbag decree given by the Emperor to the Taiyuan Wang family yesterday, to restore the Taiyuan Wang family's surname, sent a signal to the outside world that the queen was abolished.
But Li Qinzai said that the queen could survive the crisis this time, which was completely contrary to Xu Jingzong's judgment.
As an old fox in the court, every step he takes must be clearly calculated. If Xu Jingzong really makes such a major error in judgment, he is simply making fun of the lives of the entire clan.
"Why did the Marquis of Li County say this? Didn't the Emperor say this to the Queen..." Xu Jingzong's expression became solemn.
Li Qinzai smiled and said: "One night and a hundred days of kindness between husband and wife, no matter how angry the emperor is with the queen, he will not be too unkind to the queen. There may be lessons, there may be beatings. In order to balance the court, there may be ways to cut off the queen's wings.
,But, after being abolished...it is almost impossible."
"The emperor is a kind-hearted and wise king. He will not be cruel to anyone unless he has to. Of course, the reason for deposing the king and queen is because the powerful minister Chang Sun Wuji and the Guanlong gentry have posed a serious threat to the monarchy. For the sake of the Li and Tang royal family
, the emperor had to depose the queen and bring down the powerful ministers."
"But this time, although the queen made mistakes, her mistakes will not lead to her being deposed. First of all, the queen has a clean background. She does not belong to any aristocratic family. She even stands on the same front as the emperor. The husband and wife work together to suppress the family. Such a good wife is not easy to find.
.”
"Secondly, the mistake the queen made this time was just poisoning Mrs. Wei. It can be said to be a personal grudge in the harem. To put it bluntly, it was just jealousy among women. The emperor will not rise to the level of deposing the queen for such a trivial matter.
.”
"More importantly, the Hou Party is also a force in the court. The art of the emperor lies in balance. If Xu Xiangruo really wipes out the Hou Party, it will leave more trouble for the emperor, because if the Hou Party is eliminated, the forces in the court will inevitably be unbalanced, and the emperor will
We still need to be busy cleaning up the aftermath and returning the situation to a balanced situation..."
"So, Mr. Xu, if you really kill all the queen's followers, I'm afraid the emperor will praise you on the surface, but in his heart he would like to dismiss you and exile you to relieve his anger. You have done a bad thing with good intentions, which is laborious and thankless. You also sent the queen to
I have been offended by death, why do you think this is necessary..."
After listening to Li Qinzai's big words, Xu Jingzong's body trembled violently, and he rubbed his beard with an ugly expression and remained silent.