Empress Cao happily held the little prince in her arms, feeling the admiration and intimacy of the little man in her arms. Her heart was filled with joy.
Looking at this little prince, the more I look at him, the more I like him, and the more I look at him, the more he dotes on me.
So, he ordered someone to get the longevity lock that he had prayed for at the Daxiangguo Temple, put it on Zhao Xin, and murmured: "Bless the Bodhisattva, be merciful to the Buddha, and bless my son with longevity, good fortune, and health!"
When Zhao Xin saw this, he immediately grabbed the longevity lock and held it tightly in his hands as if he were grabbing some treasure.
Everyone was surprised when they saw it. One of Queen Cao's personal maids was more courageous and asked softly: "My lord, why do you need this longevity lock so much?"
Zhao Xin opened a pair of pure, innocent and lovely eyes and replied with great seriousness: "Your body, hair and skin are given to you by your parents, so you should not take them lightly! Not to mention the gift given by the empress?"
When everyone heard this, they were shocked and shocked. They all knelt down and congratulated Empress Cao: "Congratulations to the empress, congratulations to the empress..."
Queen Cao was so happy that she almost lost her temper. She hugged Zhao Xin and kissed her again and again, wishing she could keep this little sweetheart with her at all times.
However, the palace has its own rules. Before the officials say anything, she, the queen, can only visit regularly every day.
This is a bit unsightly!
After thinking about it, Queen Cao suddenly laughed.
She put Zhao Xin on the bed, and then called over the inner palace Dutou Wang Shurui, who was sent by the government to take care of the little Duke. She whispered: "The king, Dutou, the Duke is here, you must take good care of him, and you must not do it."
If you make the slightest mistake, I won't let you go!"
"Don't worry, Madam!" Wang Shougui is a eunuch in his fifties. He looks thin and his skin is tanned by the sun. He doesn't look like the pampered eunuch in the palace at all. Instead, he looks like an old farmer in the countryside.
He bowed in front of Empress Cao very respectfully: "Earlier, Zhang Cairen had already sent someone to give instructions to the old minister..."
After hearing this, Queen Cao's face changed slightly, and then she laughed quickly: "Sister Zhang, please be careful! I will definitely go to Ninghua Palace in person to express my gratitude!"
Wang Shougui then stretched out his body and bowed again, with his forehead touching the ground.
Empress Cao stood up, looked back at her sweetheart, and walked away surrounded by many maids and eunuchs.
Zhao Xin took all this in his eyes.
He naturally understood that what had just happened was a classic scene comparable to the palace fight novels of later generations.
The intrigue between the queen and the emperor's favorite concubine.
only……
Zhao Xin took a deep look at Wang Dutou, who was still kneeling in front of his bed, with his forehead on the ground and not daring to raise his head.
He smiled slightly.
This eunuch is no ordinary person!
This king of the inner palace abides by the rules and is the absolute confidant of his father Zhao Zhen!
Although the official title is only the head of the chamberlain, among the high-ranking eunuchs of the Song Dynasty, it is just a middle-level official title, with six levels above it.
However, like the civil servants, the status and rank of eunuchs in the Song Dynasty were not determined by their official titles, but by what they were responsible for.
As for Wang Shougui, in addition to the eunuch rank of head of chamberlain, he also had additional eunuchs with royal equipment.
This official position is not simple.
In later generations, the so-called imperial guards with swords in front of the emperor were actually eunuchs with imperial weapons in the Song Dynasty.
They are the absolute confidants and confidants of the king. They serve as guards in the palace and serve as the king's last line of defense. When outside the palace, they serve as supervisors, supervising and exercising authority on behalf of the king. They are the kind of people who are specially used to give the emperor a small job in later movies and TV dramas.
Report, the guy who framed Zhongliang.
Moreover, Wang Shougui is not just one person.
He has a brother named Wang Shouzhong, and this man is even more incredible!
The eunuch organization of the Great Song Dynasty is called the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The most expensive part of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is that all the eunuchs are known to all the eunuchs. This can be understood as the chief eunuch in charge of later generations.
And Wang Shouzhong is now known to all the internal chamberlains, and he is known to all the internal chamberlains to do official business in the imperial city.
What's the meaning?
To put it simply, Wang Shouzhong is now the governor of the Edong Factory and the commander of the Jinyi Guards.
In the Song Dynasty, all eunuchs who could achieve this position were the emperor's most trusted and trusted eunuchs.
Among the Wang brothers, the elder brother is a factory official and the younger brother is a royal guard.
In today's Song Dynasty, it can be said to be extremely powerful.
To put it bluntly, even the current rulers and prime ministers had to bow their hands to their brothers and address them as "Prince".
At least he can be honored by his official title!
But now Wang Shougui has made it clear that only Zhang Cai, who now lives in Ninghua Hall, is following his lead.
This is so interesting!
"I didn't know this in my previous life!" Zhao Xin laughed in his heart: "Interesting! Interesting!"
The struggle between the concubines in the palace had nothing to do with Zhao Xin, and he didn't want to care about it.
However, he had to take care of brothers Wang Shougui and Wang Shouzhong even if he didn't want to.
Otherwise, I might not be able to sleep well at night!
"Wang Qing..." Zhao Xin looked at Wang Shougui and suddenly asked, "Aye, do you intend to marry Empress Zhang as a Xiuyuan in the near future?"
Since the Tang Dynasty, the hierarchy of concubines in the emperor's harem has been clearly defined.
The queen is the most noble, the mother of the world, she can be called your majesty, and she can even be called a lonely person!
When the late Empress Dowager Zhang Xianmingsu was listening to the government behind the curtain, she used to call herself "Zhen", which was only used by the emperor. Later, she changed her name to "I" after receiving advice from Taiwanese admonishers.
Under the Queen are the Five Concubines, under the Five Concubines are the Nine Concubines, and under the Nine Concubines are all kinds of beauties, beauties, and talented people.
Below the talented people are various unofficial titles such as wives, county wives, and county princes. Their status is equivalent to temporary workers or public institutions in later generations, and they have no establishment (status).
Only those with talents and above can be regarded as the emperor's official concubines and have status.
But Cai Ren is only the lowest concubine, she is the gatekeeper of the harem concubines, and her status is only the fifth rank.
And Xiuyuan is one of the nine concubines, the second rank!
It just so happens that in the current harem, except for Queen Cao, all the five concubines and nine concubines are vacant.
This is because in the second year of Jingyou's reign, the Queen Guo died suddenly, which directly caused Zhao Xin's father to become furious and expel all the concubines he had previously granted.
Therefore, under the current circumstances, as long as someone takes the throne as the ninth concubine, they can actually become the concubine second only to the queen!
And Zhao Xin happened to remember that in his previous life, in two months, his father Zhao Zhen would consecrate Zhang Cairen as Xiuyuan.
This suddenly broke the structure of the entire imperial city, triggering a series of chain reactions and even leading to a mutiny.
In his previous life, Zhao Xin was too busy pretending to be stupid, so he was only an afterthought to these things and knew very little about them.
But now, when he heard the conversation between Wang Shougui and Empress Cao with his own ears, he saw with his own eyes that the head of the inner palace, armed with his royal equipment, was sarcastic and contradictory in front of Empress Cao.
When he connected it with what he knew and heard in his previous life, his heart immediately became as bright as a mirror.
Regardless of the history books of later generations, the eunuchs in the early and middle stages of the Song Dynasty seemed to be invisible.
However, Zhao Xin, who had ruled the world for more than thirty years in his previous life, knew it very well.
The eunuchs of the Great Song Dynasty never missed the games and battles in this world.
However, the civil servants of the Song Dynasty were too powerful.
The light of the civil servants was so strong that it obscured everything, making the world mistakenly believe that it was the civil servants and bureaucrats who had the final say in the Song Dynasty!
But how can it be so easy?
The emperors of the Song Dynasty desperately tried every means to separate and divide the powerful group of civil servants and bureaucrats, using the strategy of "controlling each other by the big and small" to weaken their power, and stumbling upon them with the theory of "confused by different opinions".
How could one let go of the eunuch, a useful weapon?
The existence of the Imperial City Division is an example of the Song emperor’s unwillingness to give up the eunuch as a weapon!
In his previous life, Zhao Xin often used eunuchs to contain and even monitor civil servants and generals.
The thoughts and ideas of these guys are too clear.
Most of the eunuchs in this palace are opportunists.
loyalty?
That's a quality you only have when it's advantageous.
It is the nature of others to follow the trend and act according to the wind!
Wang Shougui was shocked. He looked at the Duke sitting on the bed, and cold sweat broke out on his forehead.
"My lord...what did you say?" he asked cautiously.
"I would like to ask my beloved, does Aye have any plans to marry Empress Zhang as a bride in the near future?" Zhao Xin looked at the eunuch with a half-smile but not a smile. His small body looked frail, but what he said fell into Wang Shougui's ears.
, but it was like the dark wind blowing from the underworld, making his liver and gallbladder tremble, and he almost lost his soul.
Then, the way Wang Shougui looked at Zhao Xin completely changed.
He worshiped tremblingly: "My lord, I am no more than a servant of an official. How can I have the courage to inquire about the palace arrangements of an official?"
"You have disgraced my old minister!"
After saying this, the eunuch, who was so majestic outside, kowtowed desperately.
The head was broken and bloody from kowtowing.
Just at this moment, a figure flashed outside the screen in the hall, and a pair of eyes peered over.
Zhao Xin looked up and smiled without saying a word.
He knew that the person behind the screen must be the newly promoted Hanlin medical officer who was currently ordered to serve him in his daily life and take care of his body. Xu Xi was promoted to the Imperial Medical Bureau.
Xu Xi is a scholar and a civil servant.
This is where Zhao Xin's confidence lies, and why he dares to test and even question Wang Shougui.
The big and small are in harmony with each other, and the different opinions are in conflict with each other.
The ancestral system of the Song Dynasty was not only reflected in the court, the military, and local areas, but also in the palace and among the concubines.
There must be one link after another, there must be mutual supervision, intersecting, and threatening each other, and balance is everywhere!
Just like Zhao Xin's daily life now.
He was raised by three concubines: Queen Cao, talented person Zhang, and biological mother Miao.
The person responsible for arranging and serving him was the head of the inner palace in front of him, who was responsible for the imperial equipment, but it was the Imperial Medical Officer behind the screen who took all kinds of medicines and supervised the people.
Even when reporting, the two of them were separated.
Among them, Wang Shougui is mainly responsible for reporting, filing and archiving to the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Xu Xi, on the other hand, had to send the relevant documents, files, and records to the Zhongshu Province and hand them over to the living room clerk who was in charge of the royal archives for filing.
In other words, what is happening now involves Zhao Xin, the prince, Guoben.
Therefore, the report will be reported to the prime ministers and governors in Beijing at the latest this evening.
Therefore, Zhao Xin has nothing to fear and is not worried at all about the story of Liang Ji in the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Under the current system of the Song Dynasty, unless there is a mutiny and the rebels come to Zhao Xin, no one can touch him.
The ancestral system that gave him a lot of headaches in his previous life is now Zhao Xin's biggest talisman.
To put it bluntly, even if a confidant of the government like Wang Shougui says something wrong now, or if Zhao Xin says even half of a word that denies him, the Taiwanese admonishers will go crazy early tomorrow morning.
How crazy were the Taiwanese admonishers of the Song Dynasty?
Zhao Xin has seen it countless times in his previous life!
"Okay..." Zhao Xin looked at Wang Shougui until the latter's forehead was bruised and blood flowed all over his cheek before waving his hands and saying: "Why do you have to be so sensitive? I just asked casually!"
"Since Aiqing doesn't know, then I'd better ask other people..." He smiled: "For example... Zhang Douzhi..."
When Wang Shougui heard this, his neck suddenly felt cold and his hands and feet trembled with fear.
Just like the court, the eunuchs and eunuchs in the Imperial City of the Song Dynasty were also divided into several different hills.
And the ‘Zhang Douzhi’ mentioned by Duke Shou happened to be his and Brother Nai’s mortal enemy!
Moreover, in terms of status, rank and authority, he was far above him. Even his status in front of the officials was far higher than that of his 'mere' head of the inner palace.
Like his elder brother, he was not only known to all the ministers within the palace, but he also led the governor of Enzhou from afar and promoted all the treasurers in Beijing with his own official position. He was a great eunuch with real power and could serve as a minister in the palace!
To put it bluntly, if that Zhang Douzhi was really summoned by Duke Shou.
Then there are only two endings waiting for him: either get out of the imperial city in despair and go to a remote state in Lingnan to stay in the army and pray not to die on the road; or he may be given a glass of poisonous wine and three feet of white silk.
It would also implicate Brother Nai, who was demoted to the state and county, and even had to go to the temple of the late emperor to perform sacrifices and eat cold pork.
So Wang Shougui lay on the ground, not daring to move. Even though it was still February, his underwear was already soaked through.
"Qing is too nervous..." Zhao Xin looked at him and said leisurely: "It's better to go down and rest!"
Wang Shougui felt as if he had been granted amnesty, and hurriedly kowtowed to express his gratitude: "The Lord is benevolent and holy, and I am deeply grateful to you!" As he said that, regardless of his bloody forehead, he kowtowed a few more times, then stood up and bowed again.
, and exited respectfully.
Until I walked out of the palace door and came into the corridor.
Looking at the green flowers, plants and trees gradually appearing in the courtyard, Wang Shougui sighed heavily: "Today I realize the power of the saint!"