At dusk, Guo Jincheng walked quickly from the newspaper office. A guard followed him leisurely. A bullock cart stopped in front of him. Just as Guo Jincheng was about to get on the cart, someone from behind called him, "Jiulang!"
Jiulang is Guo Jincheng's pen name in newspapers. The deacons at the newspaper office all call him Jiulang, but few people call him by his official name.
When Guo Jincheng turned around, it was his good friend Xue Qing. Xue Qing was Xue Tao's younger brother. He was now eighteen years old. He studied tea science at Taixue and studied under the eminent monk Jiao Ran. He was in charge of the tea column in "Chang'an Express"
.
Although he and Guo Jincheng are nephews, they are actually best friends.
"Aren't you going to eat?"
Guo Jincheng smiled and said: "Then go quickly, I'll go back to school first."
"Let's go together! I will introduce you to some young heroes. They are all officials in various places. Listen to their insights."
Guo Jincheng didn't want to go, but when he thought about his father's request for him to make more friends with young heroes, he hesitated and nodded, "Then I'll accompany you once!"
The place where they ate was in the Mingyue Restaurant opened by Guo Ping. Guo Jincheng walked up the stairs. He suddenly grabbed Xue Qing and told him: "Don't forget, my name is Xue Cheng!"
"Don't worry! Your identity will not be revealed."
Xue Qing took Guo Jincheng to the second floor. After looking around, someone called him, "Xiao Xue, this way!"
Four young officials were sitting at a table by the window, one of whom was waving to Xue Qing.
These four people are Xie Changming, Han Yu, Xiao Zhenye and Lu Nan. The reason for their gathering today is that Xie Changming was transferred from Baiquan County to Xiaoguan County to serve as county magistrate. Xiao Zhenye was also promoted to the position of Chief Registrar of Yushitai, and Lu Nan was promoted to Chief Registrar of Yushitai.
Zuozang Ling is a seventh-rank official.
Han Yu was promoted to the seventh rank, Hekou Port City Shipping Order, and was affiliated with Taifu Temple. They returned to Beijing this time to go through the promotion procedures, and all four of them were promoted.
But none of the same batch of Jinshi who were with them encountered such a good thing. The main reason was that the Jin army captured Jiangnan and the court wanted to win over the Jiangnan nobles, so the children of the Jiangnan nobles were reused.
Xie Changming, Xiao Zhenye and Lu Nan were all descendants of famous families in the south of the Yangtze River. Han Yu was highly praised and recommended by the Salt and Iron Transfer Administration because he handled the conflicts in Lucheng County well and straightened out the production capacity of the salt field. He was promoted again.
Half a grade, he was appointed as the shipping commander of Hekou Port City.
The person waving to Xue Qing was Lu Nan. Lu Nan was also a disciple of the eminent monk Jiao Ran and was proficient in tea art. He went to Taixue two days ago to visit his master Jiao Ran and met his junior brother Xue Qing. He invited him to come and have a gathering together tonight.
.
Lu Nan introduced his junior brother to everyone. He was born in the Xue family of Taiyuan. He is currently studying at Taixue. He is also the writer of "Chang'an Express" and is responsible for the tea art column.
Everyone in the Xue family in Taiyuan was not very interested, but everyone in the "Chang'an Express" deacon suddenly became interested and stood up one after another to greet him.
Xue Qing greeted everyone and introduced Guo Jincheng behind him, "This is my younger brother, called Xuecheng. Like me, he studied at Taixue. Despite his young age, he is also the author of "Chang'an Express"
, is responsible for the people's livelihood column, and many of the court's decisions depend on his column.
Everyone really didn't expect that this young man, who looked a little immature, would actually write the people's livelihood column, which made everyone marvel and awe at the same time.
"Little brother, this is impressive!"
Xue Cheng cupped his hands and said with a smile: "I hope you can give me some advice, brothers!"
Everyone invited the two of them to sit down, three people in a row, two rows facing each other. Next to Guo Jincheng was Han Yu. Han Yu filled a glass of wine for him and asked with a smile: "In the people's livelihood column of "Chang'an Express", there is often an article written by Jiulang.
, do you know me, my dear brother?"
Guo Jincheng smiled slightly and said: "Jiulang is my pen name!"
"No way!"
Xiao Zhenye exclaimed: "Jiulang's writing skills are old and sophisticated, and his insights are unique and profound. We all thought he was an old man, but we didn't expect him to be so young?"
Guo Jincheng quickly explained: "My writing skills are still relatively immature, and I usually have to be revised and polished by the main writer. The articles you see are actually revised."
Xie Changming happened to have a copy of "Chang'an Express" next to him. He turned to the People's Livelihood column, pointed to an article and said: "This article "Winter is coming, will cotton be popular?" was written by my dear brother!"
Guo Jincheng nodded, "I hope Brother Xie will give me more opinions!"
"I do have to make a comment. This article mentions Chang'an all the time and doesn't mention anything outside Chang'an. This is not fair. In all my years in Baiquan County, I have never seen what cotton looks like."
Guo Jincheng was a little embarrassed. When he wrote this article, he really did not consider the prefectures and counties outside Chang'an. After all, their newspaper is called "Chang'an Express" and it mainly focuses on the situation in Chang'an.
Xiao Zhenye said with a smile: "Young Master Xue, these guys are all local officials despite their young age. That old Xie just now was the Baiquan County Lieutenant, and now he has been promoted to the County Magistrate of Xiaoguan County in Yuanzhou. The one next to you
Old Han is the best, he used to be the county magistrate of Lucheng County, Cangzhou, and now he is promoted to the shipping magistrate of Hekou Port City. This old Lu is the Zuozang Ling and controls the imperial treasury. As for the subordinates, he is the worst, and now he is just
The chief register of the Yushitai."
Guo Jincheng was surprised. He did not expect that these officials were so young and were already seventh-rank officials. He quickly stood up and said: "You are all young heroes and pillars of the imperial court. Your future is limitless. Please accept this courtesy from me.
"
Xiao Zhenye laughed, patted Guo Jincheng on the shoulder and said, "Young brother, if you hang out with us in the future, you will definitely have a bright future."
As soon as he finished speaking, someone next to him snorted. Although the sound was not high, it made everyone's ears explode. Everyone was startled and looked together. They saw a man in gray standing behind Mr. Xue.
The man, with his hair down and half covering his face, no one noticed his presence just now.
"Brother Xue Xian, this is..." Lu Nan asked.
"This is my servant. My father is afraid that I will not learn well, so he asks him to follow me."
Guo Jincheng explained vaguely, and then said to the man in gray: "Go downstairs and wait for me!"
The man in gray clothes was not because of Xiao Zhenye's arrogant words, but because Xiao Zhenye slapped the little master's shoulder casually, which was not allowed, so the man in gray clothes gave him a slight warning.
The man in gray turned around and walked away like a float. Everyone was talking about it, but they didn't notice that there was another petite woman standing behind Guo Jincheng, filling the vacancy of the man in gray.
Guo Jincheng nodded, "I will write another article in two days, calling for the expansion of cotton production so that all poor families in the world can benefit."
.........
Everyone had eaten for more than an hour and was full. Lu Nan went down to pay the bill. Not long after, he ran back and said in surprise: "It's strange. The shopkeeper said that we will be free of charge for today's drinks. What's the reason for this?"
Guo Jincheng knew it well and secretly complained that his aunt was doing ridiculous things and embarrassing himself. Xue Qing reacted quickly and said with a smile: "We in the newspaper office often come here to eat, and the checkout is once a month. I guess the shopkeeper put our drink money on
The newspaper office is in, let me go and talk about it, I’ll treat you tonight!”
Xue Qing got up and ran downstairs. Han Yu said to Guo Jincheng: "I came back from Hebei all the way, and I feel that the people at the bottom are still relatively poor. Although the court has many good regulations, such as stipulating that three coarse items should be sold at low prices, many places are not enforcing them.
At that time, it was just in name. The government itself did not have coarse cloth, coarse grain, and coarse salt, and they could not sell it. In some cases, local officials and merchants colluded to sell the three coarse items to merchants, and the merchants resold them at higher prices."
Guo Jincheng solemnly said: "Brother Han, please write an article about the people's livelihood in Hebei! I will publish it in the newspaper so that the court can pay attention to these situations in time."
Han Yu nodded, "I'll write an article if I have time in the next two days!"
Just as he was talking, Xue Qing ran back and said with a smile: "Okay, I had a lot of fun drinking tonight. I hope we have a chance to get together again!"
Everyone stood up to say goodbye. Xue Qing and Guo Jincheng got into a carriage, waved goodbye to everyone, and the carriage quickly drove away.
Xie Changming looked at the carriageway going away: "This Xue Qing should be a son of an official, but this Xue Cheng is hard to see through."
Everyone was puzzled and asked: "Brother Xie, what do you mean?"
Xie Changming said lightly: "Didn't you notice that he has four guards? The three female guards, and the man in gray, are very skilled. He snorted softly, and my ears were like thunder. This is definitely not what ordinary people can do."
The top guard I have.”
"Could it be that he is a son of a powerful person?"
Xiao Zhenye said to himself: "But there don't seem to be many powerful people now!"
Xie Changming smiled slightly and said: "Don't forget, Princess Jin's surname is also Xue!"
Everyone laughed, "Brother Xie's associations are too rich."
Xie Changming also felt that he was overthinking. How could this be possible? It is normal for a wealthy family to protect their legitimate son and send a few more guards.
But Xiao Zhenye was thoughtful. He vaguely felt that the identity of this person named Xuecheng should not be that simple.