Chapter 356: En, Returning to the Capital

“Counting like this, it’s been half a year since we left the capital. Once again returning to the capital, there’s both the reluctance towards letting go of that kind of carefree and unrestrained days, and also the heartfelt longing towards one’s family. However, the time we’ve been away nevertheless isn’t considered short, so the feeling of returning home soon also makes one feel exceptionally delighted inside.” Jing Wan, who was sitting by Li Hong Yuan’s side, said with a light smile.

Perhaps because in this half a year, despite the majority of the main route mostly being waterways, the total amount of time spent sitting in a horse carriage far surpassed that of, and perhaps precisely because of such, Jing Wan’s ‘carriage sickness’ symptoms surprisingly lightened quite a bit. As a matter of fact, they were already about to enter the capital, yet it was just slightly feeling unwell. Perhaps because her mood was pretty good, her spirit was also pretty good.

Li Hong Yuan held Jing Wan’s hand, lightly squeezing, “In the future, we can just find another opportunity.”

“Should be very difficult, right? This time can also be considered just happening to coincide with the occasion.” As a qinwang or junwang, under normal circumstances, without an imperial order, forbidden to leave the capital. And those that leave the capital under an imperial order, generally were all official business. For a certain someone that had no influence and no power, official business and whatnot, under normal circumstances, really won’t fall on his head.

“Opportunities are always created by people.” Just like this time, when he first started planning this matter, he was precisely going for taking his wife out to play as his number one priority.

“This time, the time spent was far more than anticipated, so there should be many people in court accusing you of misconduct, right? Moreover, there’s also that many things, the collected rare treasures considerably numerous, let alone the the large and small things bought along the way afterwards, sometimes transporting by the entire boatload. By the time they reach the capital, there should be at least several dozen carriages, so to not want to attract attention would all be difficult.”

“So what? No matter how they bounce around, in the end, still won’t be able to damage me in the slightest.”

historical

Jing Wan lightly smiled. Indeed, based on the information they received in Jiangnan, for a certain period of time, Le Cheng Emperor has been obsessed with and immersed in folk stories. Even towards the important memorandums, one has never seen him study this conscientiously before. And without a doubt, the memorandums accusing Jin Qinwang of misconduct, playing around in Jiangnan, slow to return, or perhaps having devious intentions, further wantonly accumulating wealth, destabilizing the country’s foundation, with each offense more severe than the last, unfortunately all got suppressed by Le Cheng Emperor. And if annoyed, it was just thoroughly getting chewed out.

Regardless whether it was the courtyard exam fraud case, or the corruption in the salt administration, Jin Qinwang all handled quite beautifully. The former helped the imperial court gain quite a bit of reputation, and the latter filled the state treasury. He also curbed his temper, and never once wantonly caused trouble in Jiangnan. In any case, it was just spending a bit of time to play around in Jiangnan, never once holding up the official business.

At the time, he’d already permitted him, as long as he doesn’t delay the official matter, and not stir up trouble, the rest, he can do as he pleases. But now, these memorandums accusing Jin Qinwang of misconduct, what’s the meaning of this? Did they want him, this emperor, eat his own words?

Le Cheng Emperor perhaps wasn’t that kind of dictatorial and imperious emperor, but he also wasn’t a puppet emperor grasped in someone else’s hands. At the end of the day, he still was an emperor that grasped actual power. When truly angered, the officials below also can only tuck their tails between their legs.

Especially when mentioning ‘wantonly accumulating wealth’, Le Cheng Emperor’s complexion practically just darkened into the bottom of a pot. Excluding the gold bricks and silver ingots directly shipped out from each fu’s treasury, entering the capital and entering the state treasury, the total sum exceeding twenty million taels in silver, the valuables Jing Wan acquired while in Jiangnan, converting into taels, already exceeded fifty million taels in silver. One has to know, the various taxes collected in the entire Jiangnan region every year were merely a little more than ten million taels. The ones from the fu treasury, Jin Qinwang had already given him a sum in advance, and those collected by Jing Wan, they’d already given him a report of.

In other words, his son taking a trip to Jiangnan, ‘seized’ nearly eighty million additional taels in valuables. And where did this money come from? At least ninety-nine percent were embezzled from government funds. At the time, when the amount reported exceeded ten million taels, it was already enough to make him furious, but now? He very much wanted to disregard everything and have those officials and their entire family all executed.

The regional officials had close ties with the ones in the capital, giving ‘connection making gifts’, but who didn’t know that these were for the more influential princes, and the ‘respect money’ for the various princes, how can it just be a mere ten million taels? Yet, currently, each and every on were all jumping out, saying old six and his wife raked in money?

Le Cheng Emperor hated that he can’t slap them to death!

Le Cheng Emperor, on various grounds, started sorting people out in court in all sorts of ways. Quite a few people got reduced in rank, and their salary seized. As for the fully grown princes that have been bestowed the wang title, it was catching whichever one jumped out, all getting reprimanded. And without exception, each and every one all restrained themselves more and more, just fearing that they’ll anger Le Cheng Emperor. And Le Cheng Emperor, seeing them timidly and cautiously handle affairs, just fumed in anger again, practically just a vicious cycle.

When Li Hong Yuan had these things told to Jing Wan, Jing Wan was somewhat taking pleasure at another’s misfortune.

Speaking of which, after they departed from the Pei clan, they further compressed the Pei clan even more. For the sake of survival, the Pei clan for the most part gave up more than half of their accumulated wealth, and moreover, it was even at the price of something that was low to the point of making one tower in rage. The Pei clan leader finally couldn’t hold up anymore, falling gravely ill and never rising again. However, even so, he still secretly put to death the descendants of the previous dynasty’s imperial family. At the time, for the sake of better controlling, this branch was pretty much continued down one singular bloodline^[1], so it naturally wasn’t difficult to handle. And Li Hong Yuan more or less pulled back at this time too.

Aside from this, towards the remnants of the previous dynasty, Li Hong Yuan also sent people to start purging. Without the ‘leading sheep’, in addition to failing at assassinating Li Hong Yuan in Chuanzhou Fu, instead getting intimidated by Li Hong Yuan’s bloody methods, they for the most part just became a tray of scattered sand. After killing some people in charge, the rest for the most part weren’t worth fearing.

(T/N: Small clarification, the remnants of the previous dynasty generally refers to the people still loyal to the previous dynasty’s imperial family. This is very different from people who are actual descendants of the previous imperial family.)

Once these things were more or less taken care of, they for the most part just formed relatively patterned ‘daily schedules’, and when encountering special circumstances, it was just specially taking care of.

Afterwards, it was mostly just playing around, and starting from a certain day, Jing Wan began all kinds of buying again. Jiangnan was wealthy after all, so the good things definitely weren’t in the minority.

And today, having returned to the capital, it was already the first of the tenth lunar month. At the time, when they’d left the capital, it was the beginning of the fourth month, right in the middle of spring, yet when they returned, it was already turning into winter.

When they’d left, it was naturally grand and majestic, and of these people, every single one naturally all returned along with. After all, the officials of Chuanzhou Fu have all already taken up their posts, so these officials that were temporarily substituting, not a single one stayed behind. Having been out working for that long, returning to the capital should originally be a joyous matter, but unfortunately, the majority all weren’t too well, even more dispirited than Jing Wan who was carriage-sick.

Li Hong Yuan had already changed into the qinwang formal attire beforehand, although Jing Wan didn’t put on the formal gown.

At the city gates, the of age wangyes, including the sickly fifth wangye, all came to welcome their brother’s return together.

Li Hong Yuan even gave face and climbed down from the horse carriage, exchanging a few words with them.

And they naturally just brought along Le Cheng Emperor’s verbal decree, letting him return to his manor first to clean up, and enter the palace tomorrow.

Towards Le Cheng Emperor’s words, Li Hong Yuan has never once held back, so naturally won’t fight to show off, just entering the palace now covered in dust. That’s why, he flung his sleeve and just got back on the horse carriage, leaving behind this crowd of brothers.

As for these wangyes, they could only twitch the corner of their mouth and endure. This behavior, this bad temper, really didn’t change at all, considering everyone else beneath him, not having them, these brothers, taken seriously. However, their main goal nevertheless wasn’t him, but rather the accompanying officials. Although they’ve kept in constant contact with letters, but in reality, from their letters, they couldn’t really learn much, so naturally needed to ask in detail. Of course, these officials didn’t have as good of a fate as Li Hong Yuan, needing to enter the palace right away to face his Majesty and give a report of this trip.

With this many people, and Le Cheng Emperor wanting to inquire one by one, it naturally will take quite some time, but they didn’t have the guts to divide into groups and enter the palace in order. Even if today, it didn’t get to them, they still needed to enter the palace to obediently wait their turn. This already wasn’t just being mentally exhausted, even the body all broke down along with.

And in Jin Qinwang Manor, because of having long received news, the stewards of the manor were already waiting at the entrance, a dense mass of people kneeling to greet their masters.

Naturally no one paid them any attention.

Returning to the main courtyard, Jing Wan suddenly also felt her bones going soft. After sitting down and leaning against the large pillow, she just didn’t want to move anymore.

The servant girls were busy, but it was all easy matters that they were used to. Because only Gong mama and two first rank servant girls had stayed behind to serve Jing Wan, the rest all returning to the capital ahead of them, this while, everything all cleanly fell into place, just like as if the masters of this manor had never once left.

The back of Li Hong Yuan’s hand lightly brushed over Jing Wan’s cheek, carrying a bit of tenderness, “Wan Wan should go take a hot bath, and relax some more, then let Gong mama loosen your muscles for you. Properly rest up today. Tomorrow, most likely will be busy.”

Jing Wan nodded. Indeed, at the time, her going along to Jiangnan can be considered as ‘secretly running away’. Prior to leaving, she even had her husband’s personal servant girls all married off. Each and every one of these were all offenses, and the people that wanted to look for her to ‘settle the score’ weren’t in the minority. As the ‘main mother-in-law’, on Noble Consort Su’s side, afraid, one needed to be a hundred and twenty percent prepared.

“Don’t worry, it’s nothing really. If she tries to give you trouble, we’ll just give her a bit of trouble, so as to let her be too busy to deal with you.” Li Hong Yuan was confident that if some things were to be dumped out, it would definitely let Noble Consort Su be badly burned in the head, no longer having the slightest energy to look after Jing Wan’s matters.

[1] Basically each generation would only have one son to replace the previous generation, hence not having other branches.