Chapter 54 – The Mission to the Palace

“Adopted orphans?” The crowd was astonished.

Fan Xian calmly responded, “It’s just that the era is a bit long ago, after Sean was captured, the Northern Wei Dynasty was overthrown, the world was in chaos, and the Uesugi Tiger happened to be the one who popped up at that time.” Naturally, the Procuratorate had some other evidence, or else they wouldn’t have come to this conclusion, but among Fan Xian’s tasks for this trip north, there was another one to confirm Uesugi Tiger’s division.

“No wonder Uesugi Tiger is in a hurry to get Sean out.”

“This is a big problem for the Northern Qi court.” Fan Xian just said this and then stopped abruptly, frowning slightly. Haitang wanted Xiao En to die, the Emperor wanted to imprison Xiao En to force out the location of the temple, and Uesugi Tiger purely wanted to let the old man have a happy old age, the three most powerful parties in Beiqi, because of Xiao En alone, had turned into three forces with completely different directions, so there was a lot of hilarity to watch.

Fan Xian of course also wanted to know the secrets of the temple, so he couldn’t just be a spectator.

It was getting late, and the crowd had traveled a long way, so they began to make arrangements for rest. As for tomorrow’s arrangements, there were naturally relevant officials who had drawn up the rules, so Lin Wen only picked out a few important matters and reported them to Fan Xian. The most important thing tomorrow is to go to the palace to see the saint, and then to negotiate the prisoner exchange at the Honglu Temple.

Fan Xian thought about it and then said, “Entering the palace is in the morning, as for the afternoon at the Honglu Temple.” He turned to Lin Jing and said, “I will have to trouble Lord Deputy Envoy.”

“You, my lord?” Lin Jing looked at Zheng Envoy Fan in confusion, thinking how could it be possible for the Zheng Envoy not to be there for the important occasion of exchanging prisoners and paying tribute.

Fan Xian slightly lowered his eyes and said quietly, “This official has more important things to do.” There were two pieces of paper for the prisoner exchange agreement, a white one and a black one, and Fan Xian valued the black one more. He had already handed over Sean and Si Li Li, so naturally, he had to immediately confirm where Yan Bingyun was.

Fan Xian sat in the carriage to the Beiqi palace, yawning, he was not a bed of delicate characters, but last night really did not sleep well, and then look at his side of the Gouda and Wang Qinian also seems to be a face of tiredness, it is not difficult to imagine, last night’s mission of the collective insomnia of the personnel.

That said, last night was about to go to bed. That Honglu Temple young secretary Wei Hua came again, although he did not enter the backyard, but there are several kabuki beauty with a fragrant wind, ran into the room of all the South Qing Lords, for a time shocked the crowd exclaimed.

Fan Xian where to know, this Northern Qi actually have this kind of bedtime rules, bluffed, although looking at the foot of the bed half kneeling girl looks pretty, a pair of big eyes watery is extremely tempting, but the first came to the first day of the capital, this kind of ridiculous, Fan Xian still can not do, so he had to ask her to go out.

By this disturbance, naturally not many people sleep well. On the contrary, a kabuki entered Lin Jing’s room and never came out.

While eating breakfast, Fan Xian looked at Lin Jing’s face and saw that she didn’t look very good. Lin Jing was a bit surprised and explained with a smile that even when the Northern Qi delegation went to Kyoto, the Honglu Temple made the same arrangements.

Fan Xian wiped the corners of his eyes and realized that there was a bit too much eye booger, then he glanced at Wei Hua who was in high spirits at the front of the group, and couldn’t help but curse in his heart, guessing that the other party was probably tossing and turning on purpose.

Going on a mission, in fact, is …… almost the same as going on a business trip in the previous life. Fan Xian made such thoughts. The carriage was moving smoothly, and he greedily lifted the window to look at the scenery on the street. It’s not easy to come to the capital of Northern Qi, even the street scene has not been glanced over, have to enter the palace to kowtow, is really some big upset ah big upset.

Get off the carriage, into the palace, pile up a smile, caress hands, step into the deep doorway, suddenly see a bright, bright place is heavy eaves, ten thousand halls, the palace building is mostly black, solemn and incomparable, there is still a hint of fresh ancient style.

Fan Xian was slightly stunned, stopped in place, looking at the palace in front of him, just as when he first arrived outside the capital city, and some slightly lost in thought. Beiqi palace and Qing’s palace is really very different, not to vast win, but layers upon layers, looks beautiful quiet, seems every black beams and pillars are in the story of the palace once happened, every long wooden corridor is to tell visitors, how many ancient great people, once gently stepped through.

The delegation fell silent, and the seven tiger guards stayed in the outer room because they were carrying long swords and naturally could not follow them into the palace. Following Fan Xian around, in addition to Lin Wen Lin Jing Wang Qinian, were some of the necessary officials of the Ministry of Rites in the mission.

Don’t know how long to walk, walk through the corridor, past the corridor water, gradually up, finally came to the main hall of the palace of north qi.

In front of the hall, the great inner guards guards stood sternly, with a resolute look, at a glance, it is known that at least the seventh grade of the master.

Outside the thick wooden door, there was the head eunuch who was waiting with a half stooped body.

The crowd lightened their footsteps and came to the front of the hall, the head eunuch opened his eyes, gave these southern barbarians a breathless glance, shook the duster in his hand, and shouted in a duck’s voice: “The Southern Qing envoys have arrived!”

The eunuch’s voice was not loud, but the two wooden doors behind him slowly opened in response to the sound, revealing to the guests the true face of the northern power center of the continent.

Daqi palace main hall is extremely broad, the internal space is very large, above the hanging eaves between all are very expensive glass, so the sky light without cover into the temple, the palace often gloomy flavor all blowing away, a clear and cool.

The two sides of the palace is not know what material made of columns, to support. Columns painted black above, with gold decoration, each column has coiled dragons into the clouds of the figure, looks exquisite peerless.

After the columns are layers of gauze, the back of the hidden silhouettes swaying, I do not know is a palace maid or eunuchs.

Entering the hall, the first thing that caught Fan Xian’s eyes and made him memorize it was the long straight road in front of the door, which was flanked by two pools of clear water!

The delegation, led by the eunuch, slowly walked along the straight path. The Qing officials who entered this palace for the first time were as shocked as Fan Xian – the straight path under their feet was made of green jade! It was covered with a gorgeous blanket, and the feeling of the palms of the feet landing on it was exceptionally gentle.

And the straight road on both sides of the water is to let the crowd unexpected, such a large palace, but also repair two pools! The pool water please Zhan incomparable, the water is still golden fish swimming, if the eyesight is sharp enough, like Fan Xian, can also see the deepest pool of water, there is a black and a white two big fish, is elegantly light swinging double tail, crouch in the white sand above.

Deputy ambassador Lin Jing looked at the scene in front of him, couldn’t help but sigh in his heart: “such a luxurious palace, enough to see the northern qi inherited the first big country of northern wei’s family property in the past year, exactly what kind of national financial strength, it’s a pity that it is also due to the royal family’s luxury, only to raise the northern qi’s extravagant winds, the weakness of the gas, only to be defeated by the hands of their own country for many years.”

After the long road, is the Northern Qi ministers where the class, behind the water wave light flood, the hall no by the wind gradually, when the ground is sandalwood boards paved, a solemn and dignified.

Right in front of the high above, is the dragon chair, north qi son of heaven at this time is very interested in looking at the gradual approach of foreign envoys.

The envoy knelt on top of the ground wrench, worshiping the enemy emperor in the manner of a courtier and saying long live.

“Flatten yourself.” Emperor Bei Di smiled faintly, as if it was indeed a comfortable thing to be able to have a vassal of Southern Qing bow at his feet.

Fan Xian secretly exhaled and stood up, only to realize that a pair of gazes were cast on his face. He was a bit surprised and looked back, only to find that the young emperor above the dragon chair was looking at himself with a somewhat ambiguous gaze.

The young emperor of the Northern Qi pro-government but two years, this year should be only seventeen years old, and their own age, the teacher of literature is Zhuang Mo Han’s second son, martial arts teacher is the bitter lotus master’s great disciple, as a result of getting to the present text is not, martial arts is not good. This person is not good at women’s color, and the emperor of the Qing country is somewhat similar, some playful, for the empress dowager is respect and fear and anger, for the group of ministers more reward and less punishment.

Well, the young emperor seemed to believe in such things as love.

This was the first piece of information that surfaced in Fan Xian’s mind when he saw the face of the slightly boyish emperor. But he immediately knew that he had been rude; when the lord of a country looked at him, he, as a subject, would never have the right to look at each other.

So he hurriedly bowed his head slightly and stood to the side in silence, but in his heart, he was puzzled by the pair of ambiguous glances he had seen earlier.

Lin Jing’s powerful voice rang out beside him, and as the deputy envoy, he reluctantly took up all the complicated etiquette and official duties on his own, in spite of Fan Zheng’s extreme laziness – what he was reading at this time was the state letter that His Majesty, the Emperor of the Kingdom of Qing, had personally drafted.

Fan Xian listened casually from the side, knowing that it was nothing more than some grandiose words, that the two countries were in eternal friendship and had been brothers for generations, and that even the tofu seller Dong’er in Tanyuzhou couldn’t be fooled by these lies, but he still had to read it out solemnly.

Sure enough, that young Emperor of Qi, His Majesty, was nodding slightly over and over again, expressing his approval of his counterpart in the south.

Fan Xian scoffed in his heart, but smiled respectfully on his face, seemingly intoxicated by the friendly atmosphere between the two countries. Immediately afterward, Beiqi’s Ministry of Ceremonies official came out again, and according to the usual babble of beautiful words, this matter is considered to have a preliminary result.

However, Fan Xian still felt very uncomfortable, because at this time he realized that, in addition to the young emperor, there were many more pairs of eyes looking at him, and even though he was no matter how stable his mind was, he began to wonder.

In fact, the one who is puzzled is the Northern Qi ministers, we all know that this time the South Dynasty came to visit the ambassador, the main ambassador is that generation of poetry fairy Fan Xian, so everyone is very interested in, can make the generation of the country’s great ZhuangMoHan depressed return to the country of the young man in the end what is the appearance of the young man, today on the temple, this Fan Xian has always been the golden mouth does not open, and even read the state of the book of the important things, also all the vice envoys to do.

The ministers couldn’t help but be more interested in this handsome young celebrity.