DLWAV CH97

Meanwhile, while Lu Dang and the middle-aged man and the others were working with great enthusiasm, on the other side in the capital, the Song family was also living quite prosperously.

The Song family arrived in the capital on the fifteenth day of the sixth month.

The next day, Song Jiyang couldn’t wait to enter the palace.

After meeting Emperor Zhangwu and going to the Ministry of Personnel to exchange his documents, he officially assumed his position as Right Vice Censor-in-Chief of the Censorate.

And Song Qingying, as the freshly minted legitimate second daughter of the Right Vice Censor-in-Chief, consequently received a supplementary invitation to the garden party from Princess Fukang’s residence—an event that only invited female relatives of officials ranked third grade or above in the capital.

At this garden party, Song Qingying saw the legendary former Crown Prince, now the Eldest Prince Zhou Hongyi.

With just one glance, she took a fancy to Eldest Prince Zhou Hongyi.

Not only because Eldest Prince Zhou Hongyi had outstanding looks and excellent bearing—her favorite type.

But more because she suddenly felt that in this ancient world filled with ignorance and benightedness, only an emperor was worthy of her, the favored child of heaven.

Except for Emperor Zhangwu, of course.

After all, he was already over fifty years old, and she had heard that when he was captured by the Western Rong, he had drunk the Western Rong chieftain’s urine just to survive.

So she could only set her sights on those princes who weren’t much older than her.

With her abilities, was she afraid she couldn’t put her chosen prince on the throne?

Most importantly, with the status of empress, perhaps in the future she could even learn from Wu Zetian and become an emperor herself for fun.

The only pity was that Eldest Prince Zhou Hongyi already had a fiancée.

And no matter how she tried to entice him, he wasn’t willing to break his engagement with his fiancée for her.

So she had to settle for second best and chose Third Prince Zhou Hongyue, whose looks and background were far inferior to Eldest Prince Zhou Hongyi’s, but who was willing to humble himself to gain the Song family’s support.

There was only one problem: if she had enough silver in hand, she could completely use money to bribe court officials and then pave a road to heaven for Third Prince Zhou Hongyue.

But unfortunately, her hands were now completely empty, and the essential oil extraction method and cake baking techniques she had racked her brains to recall couldn’t possibly earn her large amounts of silver in a short time like the glass formula had.

But fortunately, she had other methods.

So one month later, Third Prince, by presenting Emperor Zhangwu with a formula for preventing smallpox, was enfeoffed as Prince Changxian by the overjoyed Emperor Zhangwu, and was permitted to observe governance in the Ministry of Revenue.

Two months later, Third Prince led his subordinates to open lottery stations in the capital and nearby prefectures, issuing lottery tickets every two days at two wen per ticket, with the first prize being one hundred taels of gold. Within one month, he collected one hundred fifty thousand taels for the national treasury. Emperor Zhangwu, additionally delighted by the one hundred thousand taels of silver in dividends privately sent by Third Prince, waved his hand grandly and changed Third Prince’s title to Prince Xian.

But soon, news spread through streets and alleys about someone who had become obsessed with buying lottery tickets, even selling their children to raise money for bets.

After hearing this news, the entire court and country immediately swept away their praise for Third Prince. A crowd of upright officials submitted memorials one after another angrily denouncing Third Prince’s establishment of lottery stations as harmful to human relations, a heinous crime. They demanded that the lottery stations be abolished and Third Prince be punished.

Who knew that the next day, Third Prince would again present Emperor Zhangwu with a method for preparing chemical fertilizer, and submit to Emperor Zhangwu rice grown with chemical fertilizer. Upon learning that after applying chemical fertilizer, the rice yield per mu had actually risen from the original two hundred jin to two hundred sixty-five jin, Emperor Zhangwu was overjoyed and added another prefecture to Third Prince’s fief.

Third Prince then proposed using the tax silver obtained from the lottery stations to repair the Imperial Academy and the Shuntian Prefecture examination hall. Emperor Zhangwu readily agreed.

When the news spread, the entire court and country was in an uproar.

The next day, the entire civil and military officialdom uniformly changed their tune, declaring that Third Prince’s establishment of lottery stations was truly beneficial to the country and people, with merit in the present and benefit for ages to come.

As for that person who had ruined his family fortune buying lottery tickets and even sold his children—clearly that was because of his own lack of virtue and extreme ignorance. It had nothing to do with the lottery stations themselves. Otherwise, with so many people buying lottery tickets, how was it that only he committed such utterly heartless acts?

Because of this, Third Prince’s reputation throughout the court and country immediately reached a new peak.

Naturally, more and more people were willing to join his cause.

“Hahahahaha.”

After the morning court session, as soon as he returned to Prince Xian’s residence, Third Prince Zhou Hongyue couldn’t help laughing loudly.

His confidants were also all glowing with pride: “The Second Prince thought he could defeat us with those few rumors—he truly underestimates us too much.”

“At this moment, the Second Prince probably can’t laugh anymore.”

They assumed the rumors had been spread by the Second Prince.

Because before this, since the Second Prince was born of Chen Noble Consort, Emperor Zhangwu’s most favored consort, he was Emperor Zhangwu’s favorite son.

This could be seen from the fact that while other princes all shared the generation character “Hong,” only Second Prince Zhou Hongzhen alone had the generation character “Hong” [different character, same pronunciation].

But now, from the fact that Emperor Zhangwu greatly praised Third Prince, even directly bypassing the Eldest Prince and Second Prince to enfeoff Third Prince with a single-character princely title, it could be seen that Third Prince’s position in the emperor’s heart, if not higher than the Second Prince’s, was at least not lower.

So how could the Second Prince not be anxious?

But Third Prince quickly calmed down again.

“The Second Prince and his people have probably already become suspicious of me.”

“If they knew those techniques weren’t discovered by me, but were presented by Song Qingying, they would definitely try every possible means to win Song Qingying over.”

His confidants immediately said: “We request that Your Highness enter the palace tomorrow and petition the Empress Dowager to issue an edict bestowing marriage between you and Song Qingying.”

In this world, there was no relationship closer than that of father and son, or husband and wife.

Only by marrying Song Qingying would she wholeheartedly help them.

After all, hadn’t Song Qingying always been planning to marry Third Prince?

Hearing this, Third Prince’s face immediately darkened.

“Have me marry that poisonous woman…”

In fact, as early as when he discovered that Song Qingying seemed to be deliberately seducing him, he had thoroughly investigated Song Qingying’s background.

Thus he was all too clear about how cruelly Song Qingying had pushed her legitimate elder sister into the fire pit.

So how could he possibly take a liking to Song Qingying?

His confidants immediately said: “Your Highness, your subordinates also know you don’t like Song Qingying, but for now we still need to rely on Song Qingying to establish prestige and accumulate strength, so for now you can only endure this grievance.”

“We request that Your Highness prioritize the overall situation.”

With things having been said to this point, Third Prince could only say: “Very well.”

Early the next morning, Third Prince entered the palace and requested that the Empress Dowager issue an edict bestowing marriage between him and Song Qingying.

When the news spread, the court and country was naturally in another uproar.

Because in their view, Third Prince was currently riding high—even the Duke of Zhenguo had begun considering marrying his legitimate eldest granddaughter to Third Prince.

Third Prince could completely take this opportunity to find himself a powerful father-in-law to fill the gap of not having a strong maternal family to support him from above.

But they never expected that Third Prince would actually end up preparing to marry a legitimate second daughter of a minor official of the third grade from the lower ranks.

—After all, in the capital, if you threw a brick down, the worst you’d hit would be a fifth-grade official.

So Song Jiyang, this Right Vice Censor-in-Chief with absolutely no foundation, was in many people’s eyes truly nothing. His legitimate second daughter wasn’t even qualified to be Third Prince’s side consort.

But soon, they understood why Third Prince had gone against convention and insisted on marrying a minor official’s legitimate second daughter as his princess.

Because they discovered that when Song Qingying was in Yangzhou, she had produced one novel technique after another, wildly earning several million taels of silver.

Then thinking again about how Third Prince had previously been mediocre and unaccomplished, but now had suddenly succeeded in so many major matters one after another—how could they not guess that those formulas were most likely given to him by Song Qingying?

Third Prince instantly transformed from being the target of everyone’s doubts into the object of everyone’s envy.

They didn’t think Third Prince was eating soft rice [living off a woman]. Instead, they felt this was a display of Third Prince’s methods and cunning.

Because without such methods and cunning, would Song Qingying be so devoted to him?

And the Song family also rose to fame accordingly.

“Hahahaha.”

The one who became overjoyed was naturally Song Jiyang.

He had originally thought that if Song Qingying could marry into Prince Huai’an’s residence, it would already be the Song ancestors’ graves smoking with blue smoke [great fortune].

But he never expected that his daughter, Song Jiyang’s daughter, could actually become a prince’s consort, and even in the future become the Empress of Great Qian, second only to one, above ten thousand.

“Good, good, good—as expected of my daughter, Song Jiyang.”

Hearing this, Song Qingying’s face also couldn’t help showing a trace of pride.

It was at this moment that a servant came to report, saying that Prince Huai’an had arrived with his princess consort, Concubine Xu, and the eldest son Zhou Ruiming.

Hearing this, Song Jiyang and Song Qingying couldn’t help being stunned.

Then they directly laughed: “Invite them in.”

If this were still in Yangzhou, upon learning of Prince Huai’an’s visit, Song Jiyang would have to at least lead his entire family out to greet him.

Even though at the time Prince Huai’an had visited the Song family to thank Song Qingying for saving his eldest son Zhou Ruiming.

But now, a mere Prince Huai’an clearly no longer deserved such great courtesy from them.

After all, Prince Huai’an was only a commandery prince, and had long been outside the three degrees of mourning kinship with Emperor Zhangwu. When he visited Yangzhou for pleasure he could throw his weight around, but in the capital, he was just like the Song family—nothing.

No, he was even worse than the Song family.

Because once Song Qingying became Princess Xian, when he saw her in the future, he would probably have to perform kneeling rituals.

Most importantly, they all still remembered how Prince Huai’an had forced them to hand over their entire family fortune to him that day, and how Concubine Xu had forced Song Qingying, wanting to marry her to that good-for-nothing son of hers.

The Prince Huai’an family naturally also noticed the Song family’s disdain for them.

But they didn’t dare show even a trace of dissatisfaction.

Because that very morning, Third Prince had found some faults and impeached eight officials close to him in one breath, including some high-ranking frontier officials.

And Emperor Zhangwu had actually followed Third Prince’s suggestions, dismissing some officials from their posts and suspending others from duty.

This showed how much Third Prince was currently in the emperor’s favor.

要知道淮安王府和三皇子一向無冤無仇。

要知道Prince Huai’an’s residence and Third Prince had never had any grievances.

So Third Prince’s sudden attack on him was most likely to help the Song family vent their anger.

How could Prince Huai’an’s residence possibly be a match for Third Prince?

Prince Huai’an knew that if they couldn’t satisfy the Song family today, then this matter was probably only the beginning.

Thinking this far, if not for the Song family’s steward already coming out to greet them, Prince Huai’an would have wanted to kick Concubine Xu and Zhou Ruiming one more time each.

If not for Zhou Ruiming whoring himself into a stroke and being saved by the Song family, if not for Concubine Xu setting her sights on Song Qingying, how would things have become what they were now?

And Concubine Xu’s complexion was no better. She never expected that one day, Song Qingying would transform and sit in the position of a prince’s consort.

If she had known things would become what they were now, she would never have provoked Song Qingying back then.

But now it was too late for anything.

So they could only smile apologetically, take Song Qingying’s hand, and affectionately say: “…Such a great happy event, and you didn’t even tell us.”

“Don’t forget, Qingying is our Ruiming’s savior.”

“So now that Qingying is getting married, we should definitely show something.”

“We’ve prepared a dowry gift for Qingying—not much, just two million four hundred thousand taels of silver. You must accept it.”

Two million four hundred thousand taels of silver?

Equivalent to Prince Huai’an’s residence not only returning all the silver they had previously extorted from them, but also giving them an extra one hundred thousand taels—

Song Jiyang and Song Qingying and the others immediately burst into hearty laughter again.

Who would have thought that the previously so arrogant Prince Huai’an family would have such a day—

And while Third Prince and the Song family were riding high, in Yangzhou.

Ao Ruize was just preparing to take off his outer robe and let Third Master Liu draw something on him when the middle-aged man’s voice suddenly came: “Mr. Zhou, good news—the Commander-in-Chief of the Jiangnan military camp accidentally fell from his horse and died while out hunting. Little Li’s sworn brother Battalion Commander Li has been promoted to acting Commander-in-Chief of the Jiangnan military camp.”

“We can prepare to raise troops.”

The result was, before Ao Ruize could put on his clothes, the middle-aged man rushed in.

So the next second, his voice abruptly stopped—

Fortunately, Ao Ruize’s face had already been tempered. He calmly closed his clothes: “Then raise troops!”

Support me on Ko-fi