After hearing this, Lin Shuhan's face darkened, but he immediately recovered and said, "Your Highness is a first-class figure in the world after all. You would never do such a despicable thing, would you? How could you risk eternal infamy and embarrass a poor scholar like me?"
Qiu Yizi shook his head and said, "Even if my eldest brother is careful about his reputation, there is no guarantee that he will not have any complaints about you in the future. At that time, there will be villains who want to please you and think they have figured out your intentions and come to humiliate you on their own initiative. This is also uncertain."
Uncle Lin sneered and said, "Humph! It's easy to see the King of Hell, but hard to deal with little ghosts. Is this what it means? How could you know that I am the Zhong Kui who catches ghosts!"
Qiu Yizi nodded and said, "I know your ability, sir. But will you deal with this group of idlers who harass you every day? It would be a waste of talent to waste it on these villains! What's more, there is a powerless Miss Wu beside you..."
Lin Shuhan heard Qiu Yizhi's sincere tone and knew that he was indeed thinking about himself, so he said, "Master Qiu is right. I am indeed a little too scholarly. Master Qiu knows the nature of the prince, so I wonder if there is any way he can help me."
"This is not difficult. My elder brother is not an incompetent or immoral person. If you are interested in making achievements, you might as well follow my elder brother's wishes and work in his shogunate. With your great talent, you will definitely be able to realize your ambitions." Qiu Yizi said.
Lin Shuhan smiled and said, "I never regret anything I do. I have just rejected Your Highness, so it is not reasonable for a good horse to turn back. It is better to do as Master Qiu said and be your advisor."
Qiu Yizi's eyes lit up when he heard this, and he said, "I have sincerely offered to recruit you several times before, but you didn't respond. Today, the great prince is trying to win you over, and I didn't want to mention this matter again. But I didn't expect you to bring it up on your own initiative... I just don't want to take advantage of someone's misfortune."
Lin Shuhan waved his hand and said, "Although I am not very talented, I have some backbone. If I really don't want to go, I will never get involved even if I turn into ashes. I just think that Mr. Qiu is a very affectionate person. You and I have always been in tune with each other, and I have saved Ruofei's life. Interacting with Mr. Qiu is like drinking fine wine, which makes people yearn for it."
Qiu Yizhi was overjoyed when she heard what Lin Shuhan said. She suppressed her joy and said, "So, Mr. Lin has agreed to go to Shanyin County with me?"
"Once a man has spoken, he cannot take it back." Lin Shuhan said firmly.
Qiu Yizhi was even happier after hearing this, but said, "I wonder if Miss Wu is willing to go..."
As soon as he finished speaking, he heard Wu Ruofei's cheerful and light voice coming from outside the door: "Of course I am willing, I was afraid that you would not want to go!"
Lin Shuhan was delighted to hear this, and said angrily with a smile on his face: "Great! How dare you eavesdrop on my conversation with Master Qiu!"
Since then, Qiu Yizhi has been resting and recuperating in Lin Shuhan's manor. Every day, Wu Ruofei carefully cooks chicken and duck medicinal food with precious medicinal materials. In just a few days, his body has recovered.
A few days later, someone from Qixia Temple came to say that His Highness Zheng Xin had completed the imperial mission and would leave Jinling and return to Beijing soon. Qiu Yizhi remembered Zheng Xin's instructions and immediately went out to Qixia Temple to say goodbye to Zheng Xin.
The two brothers had their own thoughts and their words did not agree with each other. After some casual greetings, Qiu Yizi left.
The next day, His Royal Highness Zheng Xin set out on his imperial mission. Instead of traveling by land, he took the Yangtze River and then the Grand Canal to return to the capital Luoyang, and inspect the city's water transport system.
Qiu Yizhi was an official appointed by the imperial court, so he had to go to the dock to see him off as usual. However, due to his low position and low qualifications, he could only stand far at the end of the line.
The already prosperous Yanziji Wharf was decorated with lights and colorful decorations, and the icing on the cake was even more prosperous. The restaurants around the wharf were all booked by the wealthy families in Jinling City. The old and young were all in the high-rise buildings, wanting to watch the rare scene of the imperial envoy and the prince's trip.
A large dragon-headed ship had long been anchored on the Yangtze River. Both sides of the ship were lined with heroic soldiers wearing brocade armor. The mast was raised high, with a five-clawed golden dragon hanging on it, floating slowly in the river breeze.
In the square in front of the dock, officials of all levels of Jiangnan Road were arranged in a row, divided into civil and military. Because Zheng Xin had swept the Jiangnan officialdom before, the total number of officials, which was originally nearly 300 people, had been reduced a lot. However, according to the rules of the officialdom, even if the official himself did not arrive, the position on duty had to be vacated for him, so the whole team seemed sparse.
Qiu Yizhi was the most relaxed among the two hundred officials. He did not chat with his colleagues and looked around from the gaps in the queue. There were many unfamiliar faces among the officials. They were newly transferred from other prefectures to fill the vacancies in the Jiangnan Prefecture. They came from bitter and cold places to serve in the fertile Jiangnan Prefecture. They all had rosy faces and looked happy.
Qiu Yizhi then scanned the ranks of officials and suddenly saw a familiar face—Zheng Tinghang, who was sent by the Ministry of Works to contact Jiangnan River Engineering. A few months ago, Zheng Tinghang contradicted the Grand Prince Zheng Xin in court. When Zheng Xin was about to punish him for the crime of being an accomplice of Yin Chengliang, Qiu Yizhi defended him, not only saving his life, but also not being demoted.
Therefore, when Qiu Yizi saw him standing in the queue seriously, he nodded to him slightly as a greeting.
Zheng Tinghang was a pedantic scholar who strictly followed the teachings of the saints that "a gentleman should not form a party". After escaping death, he did not even come to visit Qiu Yi to thank her for her mistakes. However, now that his savior took the initiative to greet him, he could not pretend to be deaf and dumb, so he smiled and slightly bowed, which was considered as an agreement.
At this moment, a cannon shot was suddenly heard from the dragon boat, followed by the sound of drums and music. Everyone knew that His Highness Zheng Xin had arrived.
Qiu Yizi looked towards the south and saw a large sedan chair carried by eight people, decorated with lights and colorful decorations, slowly approaching the dock, surrounded by countless guards and guards of honor.
The big sedan chair stopped calmly in the middle corridor cleared by the officials. The bearers in front exchanged glances with each other and lowered the sedan chair at the same time. A bearer next to him immediately reached out and gently lifted the curtain, waiting for the distinguished person inside to come out.
Not long after, a man wearing a brand new bright red Sichuan brocade robe with four claws and eight dragons walked out of the sedan chair. It was His Royal Highness Zheng Xin. As he walked, he nodded and greeted the officials he knew, with the air of a nobleman.
He slowly walked to the side of the dragon boat and bowed slightly to the crowd. Seeing this, the officials bent their knees very tactfully and performed the three-knock nine-bow ceremony towards Zheng Xin. From their movements, one could tell that they were extremely pious, as if they had completely forgotten that the great prince they were kneeling to had swept through the Jiangnan officialdom in just one month, causing countless people to lose their jobs and ruining many futures.
Qiu Yizhi, who was at the end of the line, didn't need to perform such a great ceremony because he had an imperial decree and had always been on equal footing with Zheng Xin. However, he thought that if he stood straight without kneeling, he would not only be too conspicuous, but also stand out like a crane among chickens, which would be very ugly. So he also bent his knees and bowed his head, but immediately stood up, straightened his body and looked at Zheng Xin from a distance.
Zheng Xin seemed to be looking at Qiu Yizi as well, but he was greeting and saying goodbye to several senior officials in the front row. Qiu Yizi was too far away to hear what they were saying.
Zheng Xin talked to them for a while, waved to the officials in Jiangnan, then turned around in a very casual manner and boarded the dragon boat along the carefully placed gangplank.
The dragon boat raised the iron anchor and hoisted the yellow sail, then followed the wind and the current and sailed towards the southeast.
As the dragon boat sailed farther and farther away, the catastrophe in the officialdom of Jiangnan that was caused by the case of Miaozhen lay Buddhist in "Liaochen Palace" finally calmed down. The officials who had managed to preserve their fame and positions all breathed a sigh of relief. Even the sun, with the remaining power of the dog days, seemed to have subsided a little, retracting its poisonous flames, making people feel a little more comfortable.
When the officials saw that His Highness had boarded the ship and sailed, and that the new governor of Jiangnan Province had not yet arrived, they immediately dispersed and left the dock in groups of three or five.
Qiu Yi was the newly appointed magistrate of Shanyin County. Many of his colleagues from the south of the Yangtze River had been offended by this major case, so there was no one he could talk to, so he slowly went to Lin Shuhan's manor alone.
Qiu Yizi was already very familiar with Lin Shuhan's manor. He just nodded to the gatekeeper, Old Wang, and entered the courtyard as if he were entering his own home. He was also familiar with the paths in the courtyard, and walked deeper into the manor while thinking about his own things.
After walking for a while, I saw Lin Shuhan and Wu Ruofei sorting things in front of the house, and Yuchi Jiming and Yang Ying'er were also helping to pack.
Qiu Yizi guessed that they were preparing to follow her to Shanyin County, so she walked up to them with a smile and said, "Hey, are Mr. Lin and Miss Wu moving?"
Hearing this, Lin Shuhan raised his head and said, "These are just some useless things. If you were not reluctant to throw them away, you wouldn't have taken them all to Shanyin County, right?"
Wu Ruofei also raised his head and scolded, "What do you mean by 'rubbish'? These are all the books you have read, the words you have written, and the poems you have chanted. I was thinking of collecting them and publishing a collection of poems and essays for you in a few years."
Lin Shuhan disagreed and said, "They are all pedantic writings. What's the point of collecting them together? Do you want to publish a collection of them and wait for them to be passed down to future generations? Will you make a fool of yourself?"
Qiu Yizhi heard that the two of them disagreed, and hurriedly interrupted, "This is Mr. Lin's fault. These things are certainly worthless in your eyes, but they are in great demand in Jinling City. Believe it or not, I will take a few of them and set up a stall in front of the Confucius Temple. I guarantee that those who come to grab your calligraphy and paintings will break their heads!"
"Hmph! They are just ordinary people!" said Lin Shuhan.
Qiu Yizi smiled and said, "Ordinary people have plenty of money! I am an ordinary person, so please forgive me for having some frank words to say. If you had let go of your obsession and put the paintings and calligraphy you have accumulated over the years on the market and sold some of them, you wouldn't have been so worried about Miss Wu's ransom money of more than 100,000 yuan..."
"Absolutely impossible!" Lin Shuhan interrupted Qiu Yizi rudely, "If it is as you said, then this pen in Lin's hand will be tainted with the smell of money from now on, and I will never be able to write any good poems or good calligraphy again. What's the difference between this and death!"
As soon as he finished speaking, even Wu Ruofei came over to help, saying, "Sir, what you said is indeed biased. Mr. Lin is proficient in poetry, calligraphy and painting, which is rare, but his noble character is the reason why I am attracted to him. If it really comes to the point where Mr. Lin has to rely on his writing to redeem me, then I would rather be without freedom for the rest of my life!"
Qiu Yi listened and nodded. Although she said yes, she had other thoughts in her mind. (To be continued)