Chapter 91: Families who are aware of current affairs
A private dinner where Cao Shuang invited his ministers to celebrate the victory of the Southern Expedition has been held in the Cao Mansion as night fell. All the ministers who came here could enjoy delicious food and wine as they pleased.
Come and eat from a wealthy family like Cao Zhaobo. After all, Cao Zhaobo has been a general for so many years and has accumulated a lot of family wealth. His father, Cao Zidan, also accumulated a lot of family property when he was alive.
Simply inviting the court officials to have a few sumptuous dinners would be no problem at all, and they would not be enough to overwhelm him.
If he were a small official in the court, and so many people came to the banquet, even if he just ate a little, just feeding everyone would destroy the family fortune he had accumulated over the years.
But tonight, the ministers can eat as much as they want, and no one will say anything. They just treat it as Cao Shuang clearing the inventory of ingredients. Of course, there is no emperor present tonight like last night.
Everyone is less constrained and can freely comment on Cao Mansion's food and wine, and enjoy the graceful dancing of the dancers.
If the emperor appears at a private banquet, the officials will feel a lot of discomfort. Although Cao Zhaobo personally invited the emperor Cao Fang who was having lunch in Xiao Zhen's palace after the court meeting early this morning.
The emperor was asked to condescend to come to the humble residence for a gathering in the evening, but Cao Fang declined Cao Zhaobo's kindness on the grounds that he drank too much last night and was not feeling well. He just asked Cao Zhaobo to entertain the court officials well.
Let them eat and have fun, and he will not disturb the officials' enjoyment of the party. After all, the emperor leaves the palace, even if it is only a few steps away from the palace, Cao Zhaobo's mansion,
It also requires many arrangements and a lot of work, which will greatly disturb the elegance of the officials during the banquet, so that the officials must maintain proper etiquette during the banquet and not show off the ugly behavior of being drunk and disrespecting the emperor.
We can only ask the ministers to restrain themselves from drinking. When watching the beautiful songs and dances, they can only sit there quietly and watch. They cannot talk and criticize casually. This will make many people unhappy.
After all, it had already been like this during the grand banquet in the palace last night, and the ministers did not want to suffer such a crime again just one day later.
But if the emperor insists on coming to the banquet, they can only greet him with a smile and abide by the etiquette of a courtier, unlike someone else.
As long as he wants, he can continue to be as unscrupulous in front of the emperor as before. After all, this master has never done such things in the past.
He separated Empress Dowager Guo from the Emperor's mother and son, disrespected the Emperor in the court hall, randomly appointed her relatives to important positions in the court, and built a new residence just a wall away from the palace.
He built tall pavilions at the four corners of the palace overlooking the imperial city, and launched an army to attack Shu just for his own convenience, regardless of the opinions of the ministers in the court, even if the emperor came to the banquet tonight,
He could also do whatever he wanted as usual, but now that Cao Zhaobo had just taken office as prime minister, he wanted to keep a low profile.
He didn't want to continue to publicly oppose the emperor in a high-profile manner like he had in the past. After all, he also wanted to win over the hearts of most of the courtiers, and he couldn't continue to push them towards his opponents.
On the surface, when we should obey the emperor, we still have to enshrine him, and we will not continue to act unscrupulously as the ministers thought.
After all, one cannot be arrogant at any time, especially when one is under one person like him and in a high position above ten thousand people. If one is not careful, others may try to pull him down like the old thief Sima did before.
Then he took the opportunity to ascend to the throne, with the euphemistic name of getting rid of the traitors and sycophants of the Wei Dynasty and cleansing the filth in the government and the public. However, the person who took the position was not another Cao Zhaobo, even worse than him. He allowed the Wei Dynasty to change the dynasty.
Once a person obtains power below one person and above ten thousand people, his inner yearning for power will inevitably change with the change of status. He will have inappropriate thoughts and yearn for the supreme power.
If Cao Zhaobo is allowed to sit in this position, no matter what happens, the legacy left by Emperor Wu will probably still be named Cao. If it were someone else, then most of the people in the Wei Dynasty would not be able to continue to be named Cao.
However, Emperor Cao Fang did not think so in his mind. Although Cao Zhaobo has restrained himself now and does not continue to act so aggressively towards him openly,
But secretly, he still held all the military and political power of the Wei Dynasty in his hands, which made him, the emperor of the Wei Dynasty who wanted to make a difference, very frustrated for a long time.
The emperors and envoys of other countries almost only recognized Cao Zhaobo and not the emperor. After all, although you, Cao Fang, are the emperor,
But Cao Zhaobo had the final say in everything in the court. If you were asking for help, wouldn't it be more effective to ask Cao Zhaobo than to ask the Emperor of Wei?
And tonight at the dinner party at Cao Zhaobo's house, there are people like Xunyu, the grandson of Xunyu of the Xun family of Yingchuan, Yang Xiao, son of Yang Xiu of the Yang family of Hongnong, Chen Tai and Chen Zuo, the descendants of Chen Qun of the Chen family of Yingchuan,
The Cui family of Qinghe, Cui Liang and other aristocratic families, regardless of whether they had official positions in the court or not, all came to support them. It was much more lively than the celebration banquet in the palace last night.
After all, this aristocratic family now has a strong idea in their hearts, and they understand who is the real master of the Wei Dynasty at this moment. Although Cao Fang said so, he did not want to disturb everyone's happy gathering.
But the real thought in my heart is that I don't want to see Cao Zhaobo's proud face. The ministers' attachment to Cao Zhaobo will be stimulated if they go to the banquet.
Maybe you can't help but want to take action in the next few years, but with your current strength, you may not be Cao Zhaobo's opponent in a few years. Instead of fighting to the death,
If Wei Jiangshan is completely defeated by Cao Zhaobo, why not continue to be patient, accumulate strength, and give Cao Zhaobo a fatal blow at the critical moment?
Furthermore, Cao Fang already hated Cao Zhaobo, a "treacherous minister", and reluctantly granted him the position of prime minister.
This was already the biggest bottom line he could make concessions to. If he was asked to flatter Cao Zhaobo again, it would be absolutely impossible. He couldn't refuse directly, so he could only evade it by claiming to be ill.
When Cao Fang learned that the Cao Mansion, which was only separated by a wall from the palace, was very lively tonight, not only the courtiers came to cheer,
Representatives of various aristocratic families who were not present at the palace dinner last night came to support him. In his heart, he felt a little more hatred and fear for Cao Shuang, the nominal elder of the same clan. The two were intertwined and welling up.
The support of these aristocratic families should have been his, but now it fell into the hands of Cao Shuang, whom he considered a "treacherous minister". How could this not make him, the emperor of Wei, jealous and resentful?
No, after rejecting Cao Shuang's invitation, he went to Hualin Garden to stay for the whole afternoon, and then returned to the palace to have dinner in the evening, and then went to Xiao Zhen's place to rest.
This afternoon, Cao Fang spent the afternoon hunting on horseback. He wanted to temporarily vent his resentment towards Cao Shuang, and he was not in the mood to enjoy the beautiful scenery of Hualin Garden...