The Holy Academy's Sky-walking Tower Ship can go directly into the capital city, but the Miscellaneous Family's Sky-walking Tower Ship only stops outside the south gate of the capital city.
According to normal etiquette, even if the monarch does not come out to meet him, the left prime minister should go out of the city to welcome him.
However, the officials of Jing State who went out of the city to welcome the envoys from the Miscellaneous Sect were headed by the Right Prime Minister Cao De'an.
When they walked from the sky-walking ship to the ground, the group of people did not see Fang Yun. Some of them felt disappointed, while others looked angry.
Hong Maoshan, who was in charge of the negotiations, had a smile on his face from beginning to end. He treated the officials of Jing State as old friends and chatted and laughed all the way. Finally, they stayed in the residence of foreign envoys in the Jing State Academy.
Since this was a rare visit from a great scholar from the Holy Academy, the reception standards were extremely high.
Fang Yun dared not to give them face, and the other officials did not dare to do so.
After arriving at the residence and taking a short rest, Hong Maoshan went straight to the point and said that there was no time to lose and both sides should negotiate as soon as possible.
Soon, Hong Maoshan and others received a reply.
Fang Yun was not feeling well and the negotiations were postponed.
The officials who responded felt that they had spit on Hong Maoshan and others, saying that they had tried every means to ask Fang Yun to come forward, but Fang Yun refused. If Fang Yun did not speak, not to mention the Peace Negotiation Department, even the Queen Mother of Jingguo would not be able to negotiate directly, so they could only wait until Fang Yun recovered.
The family asked Fang Yun when he would recover, but no one could give an answer.
In desperation, Hong Maoshan and other eclectic officials had to rest in the imperial academy. Hong Maoshan also met with some eclectic scholars in the capital and said that the eclectic school and the Kingdom of Jing would definitely put aside their past grudges and would not affect any eclectic scholar.
The next day, the officials from the Zajia Kingdom again asked the officials from the Jing Kingdom when the peace talks would begin.
The answer is unclear.
On the third day, many officials from various schools could no longer contain their anger and used strong words to demand that Jingguo set a time for peace talks.
Still no official response from Jingguo.
On the third night, the anger of many officials of Zajia subsided because they received news that the vast majority of Jingguo officials actually wanted to negotiate with Zajia, and only Fang Yun was unwilling to negotiate and had been obstructing the matter.
On the morning of the fourth day, officials of the Zajia School, led by Hong Maoshan, walked out of the academy and began to travel around the capital. At the same time, they kept hinting to the people of the capital that the Zajia School had been in the capital for several days and all the officials of the Jing State were willing to negotiate, except Fang Yun. This showed that it was not the Zajia School who was obstructing the Jing State, but Fang Yun who was using the Jing State to fight against the Zajia School.
Various rumors began to spread in Jing State. Some even said that Fang Yun had joined forces with other schools and were preparing to drive out all the eclectic scholars in Jing State. The reason why the eclectic scholars had made threats before was that they were forced into a desperate situation by Fang Yun.
On the fifth day, Hong Maoshan went outside the palace and took the initiative to request peace talks, but in the end he had to return empty-handed because Fang Yun did not show up.
Soon, all the scholars in the ten countries knew that the respected old Confucian scholar Hong Maoshan endured humiliation for the sake of human peace, but was teased by Fang Yun and was turned away.
As a result, voices denouncing Fang Yun emerged in various places, especially the people of Qing, who raised the moral stick, accused Fang Yun of violating etiquette, and asked the Holy Court to make a ruling.
Although the Holy Court had not made a ruling, someone on the discussion board had clearly pointed out that Fang Yun was ill and injured, and it would not be considered a violation of etiquette if he did not meet with Hong Maoshan at this time.
On the sixth day, a piece of news suddenly broke out that although Fang Yun was recuperating in Duo Garden, he was still handling government affairs. This was obviously a trick to trick the envoy.
The people of Qing and Gu were completely enraged, and many scholars in Qing even wanted to declare war on Jing.
Relations between the two countries reached a freezing point.
Some officials of Jing State also thought that Fang Yun had gone too far, so they began to impeach Fang Yun. Some officials even thought that since Fang Yun was ill, they should simply entrust the power of peace talks to the right prime minister.
Officials like Hong Maoshan were restless at first, but finally their tempers were completely smoothed over. They simply stayed in the academy, meeting with scholars from various schools of thought and communicating with them when they had nothing to do. It gave people the feeling that Hong Maoshan and others had become the permanent envoys of the various schools of thought to the State of Jing.
On the tenth day after Hong Maoshan arrived in Jingguo, Fang Yun finally decided to start negotiations in Zuo Xiangge tomorrow.
The officials of Jing State and all the miscellaneous officials breathed a sigh of relief.
In any case, since we are negotiating, it is a good sign.
It was an autumn morning with a clear sky.
The new cabinet headquarters had just been built, and many places were designed and named by Fang Yun himself, such as a conference hall that could accommodate tens of thousands of people, a lounge for officials to rest, and meeting rooms of different sizes.
In a medium-sized conference room, various people and officials from the Peace Negotiation Department arrived early.
The layout of this conference room has never appeared anywhere else in Shengyuan Continent. There is a long table in the middle, with officials from both sides sitting on both sides.
Hong Maoshan sat in the middle of the right side of the conference room, while the middle chair on the left side of the conference room was empty.
The officials were a little confused. Didn’t they agree to have peace talks today? Why didn’t Fang Yun come
As if aware of the thoughts of the officials, the Minister of Rites Sheng Boyuan coughed lightly and said, "Fang Xusheng is on his way. Don't worry, he is still a patient. Come on, bring the fruits."
Afterwards, the cabinet's servants brought a large platter of fruits and vegetables.
Those miscellaneous officials were all worldly-wise people, but when they saw the fruit platter they had never seen before, they showed curiosity. Then they discovered that more than half of the fruits and vegetables were ones they had never seen before.
There was a fruit plate in front of each official, but no one started eating immediately, waiting for Hong Maoshan to eat first.
Hong Maoshan was a little embarrassed because he couldn't recognize all the fruits and vegetables and didn't know how to eat them. If he ate them incorrectly, he would be laughed at.
The officials of Jing State laughed in their hearts but appeared serious on the surface.
Sheng Boyuan said sympathetically, "My Jing Kingdom and the Blood Mang Realm jointly cultivated a batch of new fruits a long time ago. They have been put on the market this year. Fang Xusheng invited officials from the capital to taste them and specially invented this fruit plate to entertain the guests."
Hong Maoshan smiled and said, "Some of these fruits and vegetables are unprecedented. Even a great scholar like me finds them strange. I'm afraid others would not dare to buy them if they see them."
Sheng Boyuan said: "An official once asked about this, and said that his family might not buy it. But Fang Xusheng said that satisfying people's needs is just an ordinary businessman, but creating demand is a pioneer. As long as the product is good, people will gradually eat it."
Hong Maoshan nodded and said, "There are some fruits and vegetables that I don't recognize. I wonder if you can introduce them one by one? If they taste great, I will promote them in Qing Country myself."
Therefore, the officials of Jing State who were familiar with these fruits and melons introduced them one by one and took the initiative to teach how to eat them. Only then did Hong Maoshan lead the officials to learn about the new fruits and melons.
Some officials of Jing State secretly cursed Hong Maoshan as an old fox in their hearts. If he didn't know how to eat it, he could just ask directly, but he took several detours.
After all the fruits and vegetables were introduced, the officials also ate their fill.
An official of Jing State said with great regret that the Blood Mang Realm had also cultivated a kind of stinky thorn melon, which was covered with sharp thorns on the surface and smelled strange, but tasted sweet and soft. It has now become the new favorite fruit in the capital, but it has also caused controversy. Some people like it very much and love it, while others feel sick when they smell it. If it were not so controversial, and the quantity was rare and only sold in a few places, the officials of the Miscellaneous Family could have tasted it.
Some officials were very curious and said that they would taste the stinky prickly melon in the capital after the peace talks were over.