Chapter 19: Confrontation in front of the palace

Emperor Qing was actually waiting for Fan Xian’s self-defense report, he had intended to casually fool around a few times, just to muddle through, any emperor in the heyday, in fact, are very good at this kind of “mud” skills.

But it did not occur to me that Fan Xian has not cared about it, put on a look of guiltlessness to roam around, this question thrown back, he thought in his heart is very underhanded – not want to let themselves bite? You, as the emperor, always have to escort me before, if now only this kind of small matter, to be their own gray head and face, in the future really move up Xinyang, clean up the Princess, you must not throw me to the Empress Dowager to go as a small dish to eat?

If it is a general favorite minister, ministers, there is no Fan Xian such a severe gas and gambling. As the saying goes, “The heart of the saint is unpredictable, and the might of heaven is unpredictable.” If you are a courtier who is proud of your favor, who knows that one day His Majesty will remember that you rode in his carriage, and chop you up with a knife, and you will have no place to go to reason.

But Fan Xian knew that he wasn’t an ordinary courtier, and the Emperor didn’t know that he knew that, so this was a bit of fun, and he was testing to see how far His Majesty could go for himself.

On the seventh day after the Imperial Historian’s collective petition, Fan Xian arrived outside the palace gates in a carriage, and as soon as he got off the carriage, the few officials from the Qinian group all arched him into the center of the room, their black and gray clothes, cold faces, and upright bodies all signaled his identity.

The officials gathered at the palace gate watched this scene, and naturally knew that this was the character that all the officials often discussed after tea, not to mention the other things, just on the topic of putting secret agents in the open to protect themselves, Fan Xian was the first person in the Supervisory Yuan.

Today is the period of the court meeting, his majesty specially called Fan Xian into the palace to listen to the meeting, all the officials know what things are going to be talked about today, and their hearts can’t help but get excited. Some of the civil officials who had befriended Fan came over to exchange pleasantries with Fan Xian, and on the pretext that the weather had turned cold, they hid beside the palace doorway again.

At this time, on both sides of the imperial road, there were only five or six officials wearing reddish-red official uniforms and Fan Xian’s line of officials from the Supervisory Yuan wearing black official uniforms, standing face to face, but their eyes looked like they had penetrated each other’s lines and shot towards the distant city silhouettes, oblivious to each other.

Those officials wearing reddish-red official uniforms were the very same imperial historians who had submitted a petition to impeach Fan Xian at the Duzha Academy. Fan Xian looked at them coldly and lowered his voice, “Each one of them is as long as a pig, but they are actually still clean officials?”

Deng Ziyue whispered beside him, “One place investigated for a few days and really didn’t find out anything. My lord, most of these imperial inspectors come from humble backgrounds, and they value their reputation the most. This is the only thing they can rely on, and even the concierge has to be careful when receiving a gift cake, so it is indeed extremely difficult to find out anything.”

Fan Xian frowned and sighed, “If officials are not greedy, the world is in trouble.”

Deng Ziyue laughed bitterly, thinking that the “wonderful words” of Lord Tisi were really a bit absurd.

The imperial inspectors looked at Fan Xian coldly, without a trace of fear in their eyes. Fan Xian knew that the other party was really not afraid of him, and thought with a bitter smile that if all the officials were not greedy, what use would he be as the supervisory authority’s chief of staff? The other party was an official, so he couldn’t possibly send a few of his subordinates to assassinate him, in which case, even if the emperor’s father was no better, he would only be driven back to Tanyuzhou.

Fan Xian understands that the rarest thing in the world is a clean official, and he also believes in the investigative ability of a place, and these people in front of him must be real clean officials. But he understood even more that the most frightening thing in this world was when the clean officials swarmed to be your enemy! –Thinking of this, he could not help but admire his young and beautiful mother-in-law for actually being able to move these non-corrupt and non-corrupt Qing officials, she really did have a pair of brushes.

When Fan Xian sighed, he didn’t know that the several imperial historians of the opposite side of the court were also sighing in their hearts when they looked at the Lord of the Imperial Household.

It was clear that Fan Xian’s behavior in the past month had shown that he was a corrupt official and a powerful official with a long sleeve, and that he had enough evidence, but why had His Majesty not said anything? They don’t worry that His Majesty will punish them more severely because he is in favor of Fan Xian. On one hand, they are convinced that His Majesty is a wise lord, and on the other hand, what does a royal historian do? It is to bear the righteousness with an iron shoulder, and to give advice with an iron bone, even if he dies? Even if they die, what’s the point? They just want their bones to smell good!

But the imperial censor’s office of the imperial historians in the past few days is not very good, first of all, in the dynasty of the string without any effect, no matter which ministry officials, once they heard their intention, face is still polite, but refused to join with them to write a letter. Secondly, the public opinion of the civil scholars was also not launched, those in the past years in the marketplace criticized the government of the talent, once they heard that they want to impeach is Fan Xian, even shook his head, simply do not believe.

And what made the royal historians most furious was the attitude of those young people in the Imperial College. The royal historian who went to the Imperial College to mobilize the students a while ago was finally blown out – no one believed that the Poetry Immortal, the designated successor of Zhuang Mo and Han, the son of the family of the Minister of the Household, the idol of a generation of young scholars, and the dream lover of countless young girls, would be so bad-mannered as to go and impeach Fan Xian, and that he would be so bad as to go to the Imperial College to impeach him. would be so impecunious as to covet such a small amount of silver!

“Thirteen thousand four hundred taels, just a little bit of silver?”

Perhaps the imperial inspectors were really used to being poor, so this was the one thing they couldn’t figure out the most.

At this time, suddenly a morning breeze brushed by, making the spirit of the officials guarding outside the palace, followed by a change of color, looking at the sky driving the morning light drifting over the rain clouds, hiding into the palace gate hole. Those forbidden guards and small yellow door also dare not let these powerful and important bosses suffered rain, so did not block.

Autumn Kyoto often change face, after the wind is rain, an autumn rain solemnly floated down, from subtle to drenching, but only a few breaths of time, the palace between the large area of green stone ping was suddenly wet, showing a thick black to.

At this time, outside the palace gate, only Fan Xian and his party stood there with the Imperial Inspectorate’s party, and the rain poured onto their bodies, but there was no reaction at all. Fan Xian squinted his eyes and looked at the other party, and suddenly opened his mouth and said, “Imperial Inspector Lai, go hide from the rain.”

The person he greeted was Lai Mingcheng, the left imperial inspector of the Duzha Academy, a high official of the third rank, and Imperial Inspector Lai gave him a cold look and said, “Lord Fan is drenched in this rain, does he think that he will be able to wash away the sins on his body?”

With an arch of his hand, Imperial Secretary Lai said, “Today’s face to the saint, this official will impeach Lord Fan to the end!”

Fan Xian raised an eyebrow, thinking that this imperial historian was also shady in the clear, smiled, and returned with an arch of his hand, “Is that so? I just don’t know if Lord Lai would have the same bravery today if there were really a clan relative who had broken the law.”

The left imperial historian angry don’t want to speak, will sleeve a brush, will go to the palace door, and behind him that several imperial historian is actually straight kneeling in the rain!

“Playing the trick of kneeling at the palace gate?” Fan Xian pitied and laughed at these people, and sighed, “Life is nothing but an invitation to fame, I really don’t know what the court is doing raising you people.”

A few of the royal historians kneeling in the rain glared back angrily!

Fan Xian, however, turned a blind eye, lifted up the rain hat behind him to cover his head, and said with a slight smile, “This official is black, no matter how it is washed, it is black, and although all of you adults are red, they are black when they are washed by the rain.”

The rain slipped off the official uniform of the Inspectorate on his body, the Lotus Clothes were smooth and did not seep, and the black color was still the same gloomy black color.

And after the official uniforms of the several Imperial Historians were wetted by the heavy rain, their colors gradually became heavier and gradually came closer to black.

The imperial historians glanced down at the clothes they were wearing, letting the rain wash over their faces, but were stubbornly silent and refused to speak.

After all the important matters of the court had been discussed, His Majesty the Emperor seemed to have seen the two people, Left Capital Imperial Historian Lai Mingcheng and Supervisory Court Tisan Fan Xian, and his brows furrowed in some annoyance as he had the eunuchs summon the two of them to him, saying coldly, “In front of all the ministers of the court, say something.”

The left imperial historian, once he straightened his official uniform, said aloud, “What I have said is already contained in the sangha, I ask your majesty to quickly investigate and arrest this case, in order to purify the courtroom, in order to clear the people’s grievances!”

The emperor turned his head to look at Fan Xian, “Why has your self-defense submission never been handed over to the Zhongshu?”

Fan Xian bowed respectfully and said, “I didn’t write the folders.”

The emperor angrily rebuked, “What arrogance! The imperial inspectorate impeaches all the officials, and you are the first one to be so arrogant! Don’t think that because your family has been loyal for generations, and you’ve been a credit to the country and famous in the world for the past year, I won’t be able to punish you!”

Fan Xian knows that the emperor is angry because he has been silent, because he threw the topic to him and angry, pleaded guilty: “I really do not know to write a plea for the crime …… I know the crime.”

His Majesty’s face a little clear, said: “I read in your first into the official world, Fan Jian and busy, Chen Pingping that old thing will not teach you these, will spare you this time. Today, I declare you to enter the palace, then listen to how you self-defense, how to this full of civil and military account.”

Fan Xian looked embarrassed, and only after a long time did he speak hesitantly, “I …… really don’t know how to defend myself.”

His majesty’s face instantly darkened, and he said word for word, “So you’re admitting your guilt?”

Fan Xian raised his head in a huff, his face showing bitterness, and said, “Long live, I don’t plead guilty! The reason why I don’t plead guilty is because the facts cited by the Censorate are ridiculous, and I don’t know anything about them, and I don’t know who is involved in the so-called bribery and perversion of the law, so I don’t know where to start.”