Yang Lun let go of Deng Ying and walked back to the shadow by the window.
The memorial he had thrown down was still lying under the table, and at first glance, it seemed a bit of an obstruction.
It was the first time that he got so angry in the cabinet duty room, and there were many fire needles.
A stubborn censor.
An emperor who didn't care about political clarity and only cared about checks and balances of power.
There is also the all-pervasive Northern Pacification Office.
But in the end, Deng Ying was the only one who bore the brunt of the anger.
He actually regarded Deng Ying as a person who had no support from any power and was inferior to him. He was subconsciously convinced that even if this evil fire burned on him, he would humbly endure it and would not bring any bad influence to the current situation.
After several years of friendship, all connections were severed by that knife, but his trust in Deng Ying was still there, but it just became the basis for him to humiliate Deng Ying wantonly. Yang Lun was secretly frightened, his internal organs were in turmoil, but he could not express a single word to this man in palace clothes.
He held his forehead, wiped away the hot sweat forced out of him during the first month of the year, and whispered:
"I'm going to find Huang Ran."
He picked up the memorial on the ground and wanted to say nothing more to him. But when he reached the door, he couldn't help but turn around and said, "Why don't you sever your ties with me and be a good servant of the inner court?"
Deng Ying lowered her head and pressed the swelling on her face. "If you want to cut it off, just do it. I don't want to cut it off."
Yang Lun shook his head and laughed bitterly, "You are a man of integrity. You have become what you are now. No one will accept you. The more you do, the more suspicious the court will be of you. For example, today, in order to delay the Northern Pacification Office, you used the East Factory to extort money from the Huang family. The officials in the capital only criticized you verbally and in writing, and they didn't know that you were trying to save him!"
Deng Ying let go of his hand, "Do you think I'm still dreaming of a reputation as a clean official?"
"What else are you asking for?"
Yang Lun pointed at the calligraphy of Bai Huan hanging behind him with his backhand, holding the memorial in his hand, and said, "Take a look for yourself. This is the duty room of the cabinet, a place where the world's literary minds are transformed into the righteousness of the country..."
"."
Deng Ying interrupted him and continued calmly: "I have disgraced this place. If you rashly set foot here, you will be cursed."
Yang Lun's throat trembled, and his throat suddenly felt as painful as a needle.
"I understand."
Deng Ying took a step closer to him. "I even know what the conflict in your heart is, but I don't know how to make you see it more openly."
"Let it go? Why can't I let it go?"
Deng Ying raised her head. "In your opinion, the two men who were tortured with me in Nanhaizi last year and died of starvation later are the honor of our fellow disciples, while I, who survived, am the shame of our fellow disciples. Since I am surviving, I should let it go completely and be a good slave. Then you won't be so conflicted when you see me."
Yang Lun did not say anything. His inner struggle, when expressed by Deng Ying, felt as chilling as a cold spring flowing over stone.
“I didn’t do it.”
Deng Ying's voice was calm and gentle. "I have indeed insulted you by having a personal relationship with you in my current capacity. You can rebuke me, but don't cut off my path. I know what my fate will be from now on. Before that day, I want to live with my guilt intact."
Yang Lun exhaled a hot breath, looked down at Deng Ying, and said in a stagnant voice, "Can you survive like this?"
Deng Ying looked up at Yang Lun, lifted her robe, bent her knees, and kowtowed to Yang Lun.
Yang Lun lowered his head and clenched his hands behind his back. He almost guessed why Deng Ying did this, but he still lowered his voice and asked him, "What do you want to say?"
Deng Ying stood up, "Zi Xi, compared to humiliating you, I can't forgive myself more... I hurt Yang Wan's heart..."
He lowered his head and looked into the unknown place. "After the teacher died, my soul was broken. I wanted her to have mercy on me, even if it was just a little bit, so that I could save me at that time. Later, I had other desires from her. I hated myself for tarnishing her reputation, but she didn't scold me like you did."
As he spoke, he looked up at Yang Lun, "Zi Xi, whether I can survive depends on how long you can tolerate me, and how long Yang Wan is willing to forgive me."
Yang Lun turned his back and asked, "Have you forgotten the oath you swore to me in the Ministry of Justice?"
"Yes."
Yang Lun punched the wooden table, and a layer of fine dust rose from the documents on the table. He turned around and grabbed Deng Ying.
"Who the hell told you to post..."
He cursed, but he was so emotional that he couldn't say what he wanted to say. He held his tongue and spoke again with less arrogance, "Who the hell told you to call me by my given name?"
After saying this, he put Huang Ran's memorial into his arms and left the cabinet duty room without looking back.
The dust in the light looks like gold flakes.
The vast cabinet duty room, carrying the greatest student aspirations and patriotism of the world's students, did indeed frighten Deng Ying. He stood under the empty window light, feeling a chill down his spine, but he did not dare to stay for long.
He lowered his head and straightened his torn collar, walked out of Donghua Gate, walked along the Guanglu Temple Yamen towards the Inner East Factory, and met the East Factory guard Tan Wende halfway.
"Master."
Tan Wende clasped his fists and saluted.
Deng Ying looked at him for a while and asked, "Just came back?"
Tan Wende cupped his hands and said, "Huang Ran is going to the palace to attend the banquet today. The lieutenant of the Northern Pacification Office dare not stop him. I have left two men to check the outer house and will come back to report to the governor."
Deng Ying asked: "Have you checked those drunken words?"
"I have checked and it is true. The rest of the words are not important. The most important thing is the drunken poem, which was written by Huang Ran himself. There is a line in it: 'I pray that spring will come today, and the ground will be three feet thick by now.' It is now in the hands of the Northern Pacification Office. Let's see how the Northern Pacification Office interprets it. If they don't interpret it well, it will be a counter-poem."
Deng Ying nodded, "Did you get the money?"
Qin Wende laughed and said, "Hey, those are just empty titles. They can't scare him. Only his concubines were scared and threw some of their headgear to me. The rest are with his wife. I guess they have almost been snatched away by the people in the Pacification Office."
"You are not hurt, are you?"
"I dare not."
Qin Wenyi said repeatedly: "Master, you taught me to make a small fortune quietly, and let the Pacification Office take the blame when there is trouble. I think that although the money is not much, it is much better than killing people, and it will accumulate more good karma. How can I be rash? I will follow the Master in the future and do things well.
"good."
Deng Ying smiled and nodded, "Today is New Year's Eve, go back early."
Tan Wende bowed politely and left.
Deng Ying looked up at the sun which was approaching noon.
There were no clouds in the sky and the sun shone directly down, falling on his skin, but there was no warmth at all.
Controlling the East Factory was different from commanding the craftsmen who built the imperial city. Although his heart had not changed, what he did was two extremes in the world.
Deng Ying gathered his cloak together, lowered his head and walked towards the Inner East Factory Yamen, reciting Huang Ran's poem silently all the way.
"I pray that spring will come today, and that the ground will be three feet thick with ice."
At first glance, there is nothing wrong with it, but when combined with Huang Ran's identity and the recent debate in the court on the establishment of a crown prince, this poem has the terrifying meaning of killing the emperor and establishing another emperor.
Deng Ying pressed his palms, then turned around and looked in the direction of Donghua Gate.
Today, the three gates of the imperial city were wide open, and the officials from the capital who had come to the palace for the banquet had gathered in the Hall of Supreme Harmony one after another. The opened gates were like three huge hopeless mouths. When Deng Ying was designing and building them, he knew every brick and stone like the back of his hand. But once they were delivered, they became connected with the breathing of the current emperor, losing their original simplicity.
Deng Ying turned around and continued walking towards the window, wanting to praise Huang Ran from the bottom of her heart.
"I pray that spring will come today, and that the ground will be three feet thick with ice."
He wrote this sentence like a knife cutting out a wound, very good.
**
The ministers in the Zhonghe Hall were waiting for the banquet. In the Qianqing Palace, the empress dowager and the concubines were also receiving the worship from the ladies outside the court under the guidance of the Shangyi Bureau Sibin and Zhangbin. At the end of this year, the old princess of Prince Ping came back to Beijing to visit the empress dowager. She was the sister of the empress dowager's mother's family. She had not returned to the capital since she followed Prince Ping to the northern fiefdom. Seeing her elder sister again after many years, they talked about family matters and later talked about the northern border. The Wala had been harassing people for years, and the people were suffering. They talked a lot.
The rest of the concubines and ladies of state were not very interested in these border affairs. Only Concubine Ning sat beside the Queen Mother and the old princess, listening attentively and occasionally responding.
The old princess saw that she was wearing a half-length Luo jacket and skirt. Although her makeup was solemn during the New Year, it was still not too heavy. Her whole temperament was light and elegant, and her conversation was gentle and gentle. She liked her very much and couldn't help but say to the Queen Mother, "This must be Yi Lang's mother."
The Queen Mother nodded, "Yes."
The old princess said, "I think only a queen like you can raise your grandson to be so sensible."
After saying this, an idea came to his mind, "I wonder if the queen has other sisters."
Concubine Ning looked at the Queen Mother and did not speak rashly. The Queen Mother took over and said, "She has a younger sister who is now in the Shangyi Bureau."
The old princess hurriedly said, "Then I must meet him."
The Queen Mother smiled and said, "Do you want to be seen by your grandson?"
“Yeah.”
The old princess looked at Concubine Ning and said, "If I hadn't come back, I wouldn't have had the chance to say this. But now that I'm here with the Queen Mother, I'm going to have the nerve to ask you. My grandson hasn't married yet."
"The queen can't do that."
The Queen Mother directly countered this statement.
The old princess didn't understand what was going on, but Concubine Ning quickly stood up and knelt down.
The Queen Mother lowered her head and said, "What are you doing?"
"Your Majesty, please forgive me, Yang Wan..."
"Don't be rude in front of a distant guest. Go and bring her over. We can talk about the rest later."
The palace maid beside the old princess took advantage of the time when the queen mother and Concubine Ning were talking to bend down and whispered a few words to the old princess. The old princess then understood that Yang Wan was the female official of the Shangyi Bureau who had been engaged to the Zhang family and later damaged her reputation. She hurriedly stood up and said to the queen mother: "You are old and confused. My grandson is still a little young. There is no need to panic."
After hearing what she said, Concubine Ning finally breathed a sigh of relief. However, when she looked up, she clearly noticed that the Empress Dowager was unhappy.
She knew that if she stood there, it would make the Queen Mother even more embarrassed, so she left under the pretext of going back to the palace to change her clothes.
Yang Wan was originally standing under the moon platform of the Qianqing Palace, following the two eunuchs, observing the affairs of the prime minister.
Suddenly, a warm little hand grabbed my fingers.
"Aunt..."
Yang Wan turned around and saw Yi Lang looking at her intently. He looked like he was running towards her in the cold wind, with the strings of his cloak untied.
She quickly squatted down and pulled Yi Lang's cloak tightly around him. "Your father is about to take the throne in the Zhonghe Hall. Why are you still here?"
After saying this, he looked up and asked the eunuch who followed him, "What's going on?"
The eunuch replied, "When he woke up this morning, His Highness felt uncomfortable and vomited something, but His Highness held it in and didn't let anyone know. The general was originally going to the Zhonghe Hall, but His Highness suddenly said that he wanted to come back to look for Empress Ning, so we had no choice but to follow him, but we didn't know that the Empress Ning had gone to change her clothes."
Yang Wan touched Yi Lang's forehead and found that he didn't have a fever, so she asked him to stand in a leeward place and she shielded him from the snow and wind.
"What's wrong? Did you eat something that made you sick?"
Yi Lang shook his head, "I don't want to go to Zhonghe Hall."
"Why."
Yi Lang lowered his head and pursed his lips for a while, then suddenly said something that seemed to have nothing to do with the banquet.
"That day, my father personally came to the Wencheng Hall, reprimanded my lecturer, and made him stand in the cangue outside the Meridian Gate."
After he finished speaking, he frowned, tugged at the leather belt around his waist, and his eyes turned red. "I pleaded for him, but my father accused me of being 'young and arrogant.'"
Yang Wan comforted him and said, "Your Highness is not afraid."
"I'm not afraid, but I feel sorry for him."
When he said this, he clenched his fists and his body was shaking a little.
Yang Wan looked at his little hands and sensed his uneasiness.
They were emperor and subject, father and son, and he was just a life under the murderous power of the emperor. He tried his best to hide his fear in his words, but it still showed in his body.
Yang Wan hugged him and held his gradually cooling hands in her arms.
But he trembled even more violently.
Yang Wan calculated the time and knew that it would be bad to continue the stalemate, so she lowered her head and whispered to him, "I will accompany Your Highness there."
Yi Lang raised his head and said, "Aunt, you are a female official, you cannot enter the Zhonghe Hall."
Yang Wan nodded and said, "I will not go in. I will take Your Highness there and then wait for Your Highness under the platform."