"Your Majesty is still in the Mingzheng Palace reviewing memorials. Sir Yan, please wait in the flower hall for a moment. I will go and report to you right away!"
"Please go ahead, eunuch!" Seeing the eunuch who brought him here was about to take a step, Yan Liqiang asked again, "By the way, let me ask, has your majesty been so busy these days?"
The old eunuch turned around, with a smile on his wrinkled face and an expression of admiration, "Well, of course, your Majesty is very busy, and sometimes he has to review memorials until late at night. Those of us who are around your Majesty feel that your Majesty is working too hard!"
"Your Majesty is the ruler of the world, so of course it's hard work!" Yan Liqiang's expression was serious.
"Well, who said it wasn't!" said the old eunuch, nodding his head, then left the room to report, leaving only Yan Liqiang and a young eunuch waiting in the room.
After Lin Qingtian, there was no longer a prime minister in the court. Without the threat of Lin Qingtian, the emperor naturally monopolized power. The cabinet became the emperor's secretariat, and the emperor naturally had more memorials to approve.
Yan Liqiang glanced at the young eunuch, and sat in the room with a gloomy face. However, many "dangerous" thoughts were rolling in his mind - leaving tens of millions of people in the capital to wait for death, while he was busy with other "national affairs" and "many things to do every day". He really treated these hundreds of millions of people as leeks that could be harvested at will...
His heart was different now. When Yan Liqiang came to the palace again, he no longer had the same feeling of awe as when he first came. Instead, he looked at everything in front of him with a different eye and perspective.
When he first came here, Yan Liqiang only felt that the palace of the Han Empire was magnificent and exquisite. Every blade of grass, every table and every chair here were the best in the world. Now, looking at it again, the carved beams and painted buildings, the piles of gold and jade, were all provided by the people's fat and blood and sweat of hundreds of millions of people. If the people who enjoy all this in the palace do not live up to such a huge support and cannot give back what they should, then such support will not last long and will definitely stop and collapse at some point, because the combination of yin and yang is the way of heaven! In this world, there is nothing that can be taken without giving. Perhaps this is why those powerful dynasties in history finally disappeared. It's just the way of heaven...
This realization made Yan Liqiang's mind suddenly clear!
Yan Liqiang sat for a while. The old eunuch who went to report had not come back yet, but another eunuch brought a few young eunuchs and came directly to the flower hall in a hurry.
"Oh, there's someone here!" The eunuch looked at Yan Liqiang carefully, then glanced at the young eunuch who stayed in the room, "Xiao Xizi, where is Eunuch He?"
When the young eunuch saw the eunuch coming, he was also very respectful and hurried over, "Eunuch Sheng, His Majesty wants to summon Lord Yan. Eunuch He will go to Mingzheng Hall to see His Majesty..."
"Master Yan..." The eunuch looked at Yan Liqiang again and then laughed, "This is Master Yan Liqiang from the Qiyun Guardian Office..."
Hearing someone talking about him, Yan Liqiang couldn't pretend he didn't hear it, but politely said to the eunuch, "I am Yan Liqiang, may I know what this eunuch's name is?"
"Hahaha, my last name is Sheng, and Eunuch Liu often mentions you..."
"Oh, so Eunuch Sheng and Eunuch Liu are old acquaintances. That's quite a coincidence..."
"Haha, my family and Eunuch Liu have known each other for more than 20 years. We are all family, all family..." the eunuch said, and then he called out to the eunuchs who followed him in, pointing to the two vases next to Yan Liqiang, "Put those two gilded and painted double carp vases in the box for me, and be gentle, be careful not to bump them. This pair of vases is an old item from Jiangzhou Qing Kiln, more than 200 years old, and worth a fortune. You can't make a pair as intact as this one even if you burn a thousand pairs. If there is even a little bump, you won't be able to afford the compensation even if you chop off your heads..."
"Father-in-law, what are you doing..." Yan Liqiang asked curiously.
Because he already regarded Yan Liqiang as "one of his own", the eunuch did not think much about it and said directly, "Your Majesty will be touring the south in the early spring next year. In order to avoid neglecting Your Majesty by leaving your place in a too simple place along the way, many things in the palace will be collected in the next few days and sent to the palaces along the way to prepare for receiving Your Majesty..."
"Oh, that's why!" Yan Liqiang smiled, "Thank you for your hard work, father-in-law!"
"It's not hard, it's not hard. Isn't this what we should do? As long as it can make His Majesty happy and at ease, it won't be hard at all..."
"My father-in-law is right!"
After a while, the young eunuch brought by the old eunuch carefully put away the two large vases in the house and then left the room.
Watching the old eunuch leave with a few young eunuchs, Yan Liqiang felt even colder in his heart...
After a while, the eunuch who brought Yan Liqiang here finally came back and was even more polite to Yan Liqiang. "Your Majesty asked me to bring Master Yan to the Guanglu Hall. Master Yan, please follow me...
"Isn't His Majesty in Mingzheng Hall?" Yan Liqiang said, then stood up and followed the old eunuch out of the room.
"When His Majesty heard that Lord Yan had arrived, he was very happy and ordered dinner to be prepared in the Guanglu Hall. He wanted to have dinner with Lord Yan. Lord Yan is really a promising young man. There are only a handful of people in the whole court, including the ministers, who can be invited by His Majesty to the Guanglu Hall to have dinner with His Majesty!"
"Your Majesty's grace is so great that I am truly flattered!"
After walking around the palace for about five minutes, Yan Liqiang finally saw the Emperor of the Han Empire in the Guanglu Hall.
His Majesty the Emperor was the only one in the Guanglu Hall. He was sitting behind a silver table, smiling as he watched Yan Liqiang walk into the hall.
"Protector General Qiyun Yan Liqiang greets His Majesty!" Yan Liqiang took a deep breath, buried all his emotions in his heart, and saluted to His Majesty the Emperor.
"Hahahaha..." His Majesty laughed loudly. After Yan Liqiang bowed, he walked around the silver case and came down. He personally helped Yan Liqiang up and looked at him with burning eyes. "It's been a few years since we last met. Liqiang, you really didn't disappoint me. With your own efforts, you have made the northwest prosperous. Wool cloth has been turned into treasure, which is of great benefit to the world. It is really surprising. If all the ministers in my court can be like you, why should we worry about the prosperity of my Han Empire and the people's insecurity..."
"Your Majesty, thank you for the compliment. It is all thanks to your Majesty that I can achieve something in the northwest!"
His Majesty the Emperor was delighted. "Hahaha, you are so humble at this time. But I like your attitude of not being arrogant or impatient..."
Seeing that the emperor was happy, Yan Liqiang gritted his teeth, bowed to this powerful man again, and said respectfully, "I have something to say to your majesty this time. Your majesty..."
"Li Qiang, do you want to talk about the apocalypse next year?" The smile on the emperor's face faded a lot, but he still smiled and waved his hand domineeringly, "Sun Qing has already told me. It's rare for me to have a meal with others in the Guanglu Hall. I'm really happy to see you today, Li Qiang. We won't talk about the affairs of the court..."
His Majesty's words completely blocked Yan Liqiang's words...
(End of this chapter)