coobybook Chapter 493 Joy of Life 49
Chapter 493 Joy of Life 49
In fact, when Li Chengze revealed the truth about the Niulan Street assassination to Fan Xian, he never expected that Fan Xian would kill Lin Gong directly.
If it were Chen Pingping, or even Fan Jian, who did this, he wouldn't be surprised in the slightest.
He had carefully examined Fan Xian's memories and knew that the other person was born in a society that upheld the rule of law and equality for all, unlike the people in this world who treated human life as worthless.
I thought that, influenced by that century, even if Fan Xian really wanted to deal with Lin Gong, he would be more inclined to use legal means to find solid evidence and let the law punish him.
Fan Xian currently has little influence in the court and can only ask his father Fan Jian and Chen Pingping for help.
When Chen Pingping and Fan Jian clash with the Crown Prince, Li Yunrui, and Lin Ruofu, it would be best to involve Emperor Qing as well.
The situation in Kyoto became chaotic because several forces were involved.
In this way, he can take advantage of the chaos and profit from it.
“I really didn’t expect that!”
Li Chengze glanced deeply at the dejected Fan Xian, his tone tinged with a hint of disappointment: "So you're no different from everyone else after all." With that, he turned and left.
As he turned to leave, Fan Xian seemed to sense something, slightly raising his head to look in Li Chengze's direction, but quickly closed his eyes again, immersing himself once more in his own pain.
……
When Li Chengze returned to his residence, he meticulously reviewed all the officials who had submitted to him.
After careful consideration, he selected several officials who had exploited the people, committed corruption, and whose crimes did not implicate him. He then compiled the evidence against these officials and quietly passed it on to the Crown Prince.
The wood show will be destroyed by the forest wind.
The Crown Prince's power has been greatly diminished, the Eldest Princess has lost Yan Shendu as a hidden asset, Lin Ruofu has lost his son, and even Emperor Qing has lost a trusted minister.
The fact that the forces behind him remained completely unscathed was truly eye-catching.
To avoid becoming a target of public criticism, it would be better to deliberately throw out a few minor flaws to lower the Crown Prince's guard and at the same time reassure Emperor Qing.
In short, it's always better to be safe than sorry.
With Emperor Youqing still around, he had no choice but to be cautious.
Since everyone's attention is now focused on Fan Xian, he can quietly develop his power.
In the days that followed, Li Chengze made almost no moves on the surface, simply watching the turmoil unfold in the capital, while secretly and quietly expanding his own power.
Once they realize someone is paying attention to them, they throw out a few insignificant "small fish" to divert the other party's attention and, incidentally, refine their own team.
After Ye Wan finished handling Ye Zhong's funeral, before he could observe the mourning period for his father, Emperor Qing summoned him back to the capital. After several refusals, he finally had no choice but to follow his father's example and take over the post of garrison commander of the capital.
On the surface, the Ye family remains Emperor Qing's confidant, but seeds of doubt have already taken root in Ye Wan's heart, and his loyalty to Emperor Qing has begun to waver.
He began to secretly investigate Ye Zhong's death, but finding nothing, he silently turned his attention to Fan Xian, the protagonist of that day on Niulan Street.
Si Nanbo Fan Jian finally realized that Aunt Liu had truly become estranged from him. While he was troubled by Fan Xian, he also began to turn his attention to Fan Sizhe, hoping to ease the relationship between husband and wife by showing concern for his son.
The result was the opposite, making Aunt Liu and her son even more anxious and estranged.
Meanwhile, Lin Ruofu took a half-month break from his illness and showed no sign of seeking revenge for his son, plunging the entire Prime Minister's residence into an eerie calm.
Fan Xian made several attempts to sneak into the Prime Minister's residence to visit Lin Wan'er and explain his actions, but he was always unsuccessful due to Lin Ruofu's strict guard.
Even Lin Wan'er herself was heartbroken by Fan Xian's murder of her brother and was unwilling to see him again.
Fan Xian felt helpless about this, but before he could come up with a solution, news of Qing's great victory over Northern Qi quickly spread throughout the capital, and the Northern Qi and Dongyi delegations would soon enter the capital to negotiate peace.
Emperor Qing appointed Fan Xian as the deputy envoy to receive the Northern Qi delegation, and together with Xin Qiwu of the Court of State Ceremonial, he was responsible for the negotiations with Northern Qi.
Li Chengze was slightly surprised when he heard the news.
It seems that Emperor Qing really wants to promote Fan Xian, as he has entrusted him with such an important task.
What surprised Li Chengze even more was that Lin Ruofu had recovered from his illness and had once again returned to the court.
Lin Ruofu acted as if he had never experienced the pain of losing his son, behaving exactly as before, and even showing no prejudice against Fan Jian.
But the more normal Lin Ruofu acted, the more Li Chengze felt that he was abnormal.
After a thorough investigation, nothing unusual was found, which only made him more suspicious.
"Lin Ruofu is definitely plotting something in secret. I need to be careful and not get dragged into this."
Li Chengze became secretly vigilant and instructed his subordinates to be careful and not to be used as pawns.
However, Lin Ruofu did not take any action even after the peace talks between the two countries ended.
To celebrate the successful conclusion of the peace talks, Emperor Qing specially ordered a banquet to be held in the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests.
Li Chengze thought it was just an ordinary banquet, but he never expected that Li Yunrui, this madman, would dare to cause trouble on this occasion.
He understood Li Yunrui's desire to eliminate Fan Xian, but at this moment, all the civil and military officials were present, as was the Northern Qi delegation.
The literary scene in Nanqing has been weak for a long time. Now that Zhuang Mohan has openly accused Fan Xian of plagiarism, wouldn't the Qing Kingdom lose face if this matter were to spread?
Behind closed doors, everyone can fight however they want.
But with outsiders present, how could we let them laugh at us and embarrass us?
Li Chengze turned his gaze to Emperor Qing, hoping that he would speak up and stop this farce.
To everyone's surprise, Emperor Qing seemed to be completely detached from the matter, sitting leisurely on his high seat, watching the conflict with great interest, appearing as if it were none of his business, which left everyone speechless.
Fortunately, Fan Xian is a person who has traveled from another time and has the memories of his previous life, with countless classic poems by ancient people stored in his mind.
When Zhuang Mohan accused him of plagiarism, Fan Xian was fearless and drank the wine on the table with great gusto. Under the influence of the wine, he began to recite poems incessantly.
Completely disregarding whether these poems are appropriate for today, their main approach is to memorize whatever comes to mind.
One classic poem after another left everyone present in awe, their eyes wide open, not daring to make a sound for fear of disturbing Fan Xian's poetic inspiration.
Li Chengze's pupils dilated in shock, his hand holding the wine glass froze in mid-air, and his toes practically dug a castle out of their sockets.
awkward!
An unprecedentedly embarrassing situation!
Li Chengze felt incredibly embarrassed for Fan Xian.
It would be one thing to surpass Zhuang Mohan by reciting two or three appropriate poems, but Fan Xian actually recited dozens of poems without any regard for the consequences.
The more heated the atmosphere became, the more embarrassed Li Chengze felt. In the end, he didn't even dare to look up.
Even though he has no connection with Fan Xian now, no one present knows the origin of the poems Fan Xian recited.
But as a fellow time traveler, he still felt intensely embarrassed for Fan Xian.
However, Fan Xian himself seemed completely unaware of the awkwardness and remained immersed in his poetry.
He recited poems one after another, as if he wanted to bring all the poems he knew into the world.
Let the world also experience the classic works of his world.
But... is it really completely unreasonable?
Some of the characters and places mentioned in poems don't even exist in this world. Can we just casually mention them?
While Li Chengze silently endured the awkwardness, Fan Xian had already recited the Song of Everlasting Regret.
! ! ! ! ! !
'If Fan Xian really had to recite that line, "It was when he first received the Emperor's favor," wouldn't he have any face left?'
Li Chengze was secretly alarmed and could no longer sit still.
Looking around, he saw that Guo Baokun was already completely drunk, so he immediately used his mental power to push the wine glass out of Guo Baokun's hand.
The wine glass rolled a few times on the ground and came to a stop right at Fan Xian's feet.
Although Fan Xian was pretending to be drunk, he still stepped on the wine cup and nearly fell over, breaking out in a cold sweat.
However, upon further reflection, he realized that he was going to the palace to steal the key soon anyway, so getting drunk and leaving the banquet now might not be such a bad option.
It's a pity I can't mock Zhuang Mohan a few more times; it's really letting him off easy.
Fan Xian sighed inwardly, but kept a straight face. He pretended to lose his balance and fell to the ground. Then he closed his eyes contentedly, as if he was drunk and unconscious.
Li Chengze breathed a sigh of relief and took a sip of wine with peace of mind.
Only Guo Baokun, his eyes glazed with drunkenness, looked at his right hand and wondered where the wine glass had gone.
The banquet ended unhappily, or rather, it was only Northern Qi that was unhappy.
When the Qi delegation left, everyone looked ashen-faced, as if they had just experienced a nightmare.
After all, they never imagined that this peace talk would not only fail to reclaim the lost land, but would also result in the loss of Zhuang Mohan at the banquet.
The literary scene in Nanqing has long been weak and stagnant. In comparison, although Beiqi is slightly inferior in military strength, its cultural heritage is far superior to that of Nanqing.
Zhuang Mohan was a leading figure in the literary world of Northern Qi, and to some extent, he was almost a symbol of the literary world of Northern Qi.
The Northern Qi delegation brought Zhuang Mohan with the main purpose of hoping to use his talent to turn the tide in Southern Qing and mitigate the negative impact of the defeat.
As a result, in order to save his younger brother Xiao En, Zhuang Mohan agreed to Li Yunrui's request to frame Fan Xian. At the banquet, he was thoroughly humiliated by Fan Xian, and his reputation, built up over decades, vanished in an instant.
Zhuang Mohan's disgrace meant that his prestige in the Northern Qi literary world would also plummet.
Worse still, Emperor Qing will likely not let this opportunity to damage the reputation of Northern Qi slip by. He will certainly lavish praise on Fan Xian, exaggerating the victory to its fullest extent.
If nothing unexpected happens, when Fan Xian wakes up tomorrow morning, his name will quickly spread throughout the capital, then throughout the entire Qing Kingdom, and even affect the whole world.
It would be strange if the Northern Qi delegation were happy at the thought of this possibility.
Li Chengze shook his head and chuckled, then led his entourage back to his residence.
It was already late, so he quickly dealt with the tasks at hand, then took a bath, changed his clothes, and lay down on the bed.
However, he did not fall asleep immediately. Instead, he closed his eyes and used his mental powers to search for Fan Xian's whereabouts.
At the banquet, he noticed that Fan Xian was pretending to be drunk and guessed that the man was probably going to do something shady, so he decided to go and join in the fun.
As expected, after being sent back to the Fan residence, the drunken Fan Xian dismissed the people who came to visit him, changed into a night outfit, and headed straight for the palace.
What is Fan Xian going to the palace for?
Li Chengze was somewhat puzzled, but he still used his telekinesis to follow closely.
The palace was heavily guarded. Although the commander of the Imperial Guards, Yan Xiaoyi, was confined to his residence, the deputy commander, Gong Dian, was always by Emperor Qing's side.
However, there was an old eunuch in the palace named Hong Sixiang, who was extremely skilled in martial arts. Many people speculated that he was the fourth grandmaster in the world.
However, Li Chengze did not believe it at all.
Grandmasters are beings who stand above all living beings. If Hong Sixiang were truly a Grandmaster, how could he possibly be willing to become a eunuch?
This is something so obvious that anyone with a little thought would understand, yet it's causing such a stir in the capital; clearly, someone is doing it on purpose.
It's even highly likely that the real grandmaster released the information, intending to use Hong Sixiang as a shield.
But if that's really the case, then the true identity of this grandmaster becomes quite intriguing.
This time, Fan Xian's nighttime infiltration of the palace will inevitably involve a confrontation with Hong Sixiang. He can take this opportunity to see Hong Sixiang's true strength and verify his suspicions.
Li Chengze used his telekinetic powers to closely follow Fan Xian, watching his every move.
Just as Fan Xian was about to reach the palace, he suddenly stopped, looking around as if waiting for something.
'Huh? Why did Fan Xian suddenly stop outside the palace? Could it be that he's changed his mind and doesn't plan to go to the palace anymore?'
Just as Li Chengze was surprised by Fan Xian's actions, a dark shadow flashed past Fan Xian's location and headed straight for the palace.
The man was dressed in the attire of the Dongyi delegation, and his movements were agile and nimble, making him appear to be a member of the Dongyi delegation. However, his eyes were covered by a black cloth strip.
'He's a messenger from the temple!' Li Chengze suddenly realized, but quickly recovered: 'No! He's the 'Little Bamboo' mentioned in Ye Qingmei's letter. He's going to the palace to help Fan Xian distract Hong Sixiang.'
'I've been keeping a close eye on Fan Xian lately, yet I didn't notice when he and this little Zhuzhu met up.' Li Chengze muttered to himself, racking his brains to recall any possible oversights.
'The only exception was when Fan Xian went to kill Lin Gong last time; the distance exceeded the range covered by my telekinesis, so I couldn't keep up with Fan Xian. It must have been around that time that Fan Xian met up with Xiao Zhuzhu.'
Li Chengze threw off the covers, put on his shoes, and went to the window, looking towards the direction of the palace through the window.
The night outside the window was hazy, so naturally nothing could be seen.
After a moment of contemplation, a ruthless glint flashed in Li Chengze's eyes, and he had already made up his mind.
……