It was the height of summer, and although it was already about four o'clock in the afternoon, the sun was still high, releasing heat unscrupulously, and the stone slabs on Chang'an Avenue were so hot that it was estimated that the eggs could be fried. At this point, when the Beijing officials got off work, they saw the yamen of various ministries and courtyards opposite the noon gate of the imperial palace, and the officials were rushing out like a tide, either by carriage or on foot, and flowing rapidly in all directions along Chang'an Avenue.

The rush hour for officials to get off work lasted only a quarter of an hour or so before it quickly receded, and the noisy yamen of the ministries and courtyards fell silent again. At this time, I saw a group of more than a dozen officials chatting and laughing from the Hanlin Academy, and the person at the head was none other than the hot upstart in the DPRK - Zhang Xuan, a bachelor of Hanlin Academy.

To be correct, it should be a bachelor in Hanlin, and the right Shaoqing of Dali Temple, Zhang Xuan Zhang.

It is said that the "Zuo Shunmen Incident" at the beginning of this year was caused by Zhang Zhang's suggestion to enshrine the tablet of Emperor Zhu Youqi in the Taimiao, although in the end Emperor Jiajing was persuaded by Xu Jin and dispelled this idea, but Zhang Zhang, as the initiator, still received Emperor Jiajing's praise and more favor.

The month before, Wuding Marquis Guo Xun and Lu Bing and others finally welcomed the spiritual seat of Emperor Xingxian back to Beijing from Anlu Prefecture, and temporarily enshrined in the Lama Palace. Wuding Marquis Guo Xun and Lu Bing were rewarded by Emperor Jiajing for their meritorious service in welcoming the tablet of Emperor Xingxian, Lu Bing restored the position of Jinyi Wei Qianhu, and Wuding Marquis Guo Xun was promoted to the governor of the left capital of the five armies, and was in charge of the military camp.

Zhang Xuan was also promoted because of this, and concurrently served as the right Shaoqing of Dali Temple (from the fourth grade), Dali Temple is one of the three legal divisions, in charge of criminal and prison proceedings, and is generally responsible for hearing major cases. Zhang Xuan was only promoted from the criminal department to the bachelor of Hanlin in the second half of last year, and was promoted to the right Shaoqing of Dali Temple in less than a year.

As the saying goes, things gather by like, and people are grouped. At this moment, Zhang Xuan is naturally surrounded by nouveau riche officials, and of course, some of them are newly attached to Zhang Zhang.

It is said that since Yang Tinghe, Mao Cheng, and Shi Xuan left their posts at the same time last year, the Yang Party has collapsed, and the official strength of the Protector faction has been hit hard, while the upstart faction led by Zhang Xuan and Guixu has taken the opportunity to rise rapidly.

At the beginning of this year, the "Zuo Shunmen Incident", although it was skillfully resolved by Xu Jin in the end, but a large number of Protector officials such as Yang Shen and Yang Weicong were still degraded, and the strength of the Protector faction was greatly weakened again. If it weren't for Fei Hong, Mao Ji, and Jiang Mian, the three old towns, it is estimated that the DPRK and China would be the world of the upstarts!

It is worth mentioning here that during the half year that Xu Jin left Beijing, Zhang Xuan took advantage of Emperor Jiajing's favor to him, but he did not cultivate his own power in the court, of course, including the exclusion of dissidents. As the saying goes, a radish and a pit, there is a fixed number of official positions, Zhang Xuan wants to install his own people, so he naturally has to pull out the political enemies who are not dealing with him first, so in the past six months, many officials have been degraded, most of them are former Yang Dang, or stubborn Protector officials.

Emperor Jiajing is not a mediocre lord, on the contrary, he is very smart, why does Zhang Xuan dare to exclude dissidents so blatantly?

In fact, Zhang Xuan dared to do this precisely because he saw it thoroughly, and the people he rejected were all former Yang Dang, or officials of the Protector Sect, these people were all on the opposite side of Emperor Jiajing, so cleaning up these people was also what Emperor Jiajing was willing to see, therefore, it was not so much that Zhang Xuan was rejecting dissidents, it was better to say that Emperor Jiajing was using Zhang Zhang's hand to clean up the ministers who opposed him.

Getting back to the point, and said that Zhang Xuan and his party walked out of the Hanlin Courtyard with a smile, and came to the edge of Chang'an Street while chatting, at this time, their respective servants were ready to wait here.

Just as Zhang Xuan and other nouveau riche officials were saying goodbye to each other, they saw a procession of carriages coming up on the street, five exquisite carriages, with bells tied to the four corners, making a pleasant sound of bells as they marched.

"Huh...... This is the carriage of Jinghai Mansion, could it be that Xu Jin, Marquis of Jinghai, has returned to Beijing? An upstart official whispered.

Gui Cao squinted his eyes and looked at it for a moment, then nodded and said, "It is estimated that it is, calculate the time, Jinghai Hou should also return to Beijing." ”

"This one is really at ease, I only have envy, do you think so?" An upstart official sneered in a weird manner.

At the beginning of this year, the "Zuo Shunmen Incident", the upstart faction had the opportunity to completely overturn the Protector faction, but who knew that Xu Jin had ruined everyone's good deeds, and also warned Zhang Xuan and Gui Cao that they were not allowed to use the "Discussion Ceremony" to make trouble. You must know that these upstart factions are all masters who want to climb up by relying on "discussion rites", and not allowing "discussion rites" is tantamount to cutting off a shortcut for everyone to be promoted, so the upstart factions now have a lot of opinions about Xu Jin.

However, opinions are big, including Zhang Xuan and Gui Cao, they don't dare to take Xu Jin's words as a deaf ear, so in the half a year that Xu Jin left Beijing, although the upstart faction fiercely fought for territory in the court, no one dared to use the "discussion ceremony" to regenerate the incident.

Zhang Xuan watched the convoy of the Xu Mansion walk by the street, and frowned imperceptibly, recently he was planning to use the "Chen Jiuchou case" to clean up a group of Yang Ting and the rest of the party, as long as it works well, maybe he can also pull Yang Tinghe into the water, and now Xu Jin suddenly returned to Beijing, which suddenly made him feel the general invisible pressure.

Because Zhang Xuan knows very well that although he is very favored by Emperor Jiajing, he is still not the same as Xu Jin. At present, Xu Jin's influence on Emperor Jiajing is unparalleled, as can be seen from the "Zuoshunmen Incident" at the beginning of the year, this son was able to persuade Emperor Jiajing to dispel the idea of posthumously sealing his biological father as emperor, and it was not a simple persuasion, but a complete persuasion.

It was precisely because Zhang Xuan realized that Emperor Jiajing no longer had a strong desire to pursue his biological father, so he did not use the "discussion ceremony" to make trouble, not that he was really afraid of Xu Jin's so-called warning.

At this time, I only heard an upstart faction official sneer and echoed: "No, it takes half a year to go back to the hometown and province to worship the ancestors, and the Marquis of Jinghai has this kind of treatment." ”

"This official seems to have heard that the emperor only allowed him a three-month vacation."

"It seems to be, hey, but so what, does Lord Zhen still want to take advantage of this?"

"Why not, could it be that he Jinghaihou can't be impeached yet?"

"It's useless, the emperor will stay in the middle nine times out of ten, and at most he will fine some silver without pain."

Zhang Xuan glanced at a few younger brothers, got into the carriage directly, and told the coachman to drive away, he is a person who is very good at seizing the opportunity, impeaching Xu Jin for taking an extra two months of leave, this kind of thing can't move Xu Jin at all, he doesn't bother to get involved.

Let's say that Xu Jin returned to the house of Xiaofang, and just took a cool cold shower under the service of two twin beautiful maids, and changed into a set of clean household clothes, a little eunuch in the palace came to pass on the word, saying that the emperor had summoned him to the palace to meet.

Xu Jin couldn't help but be speechless, Boss Zhu really didn't let himself live in peace for a moment, and just returned home before he even sat on his ass and called himself into the palace. But there was no way, who called someone the boss, Xu Jin had no choice but to change into his official uniform and hurriedly entered the palace.

Although the palace is heavily guarded, it can't stop the infiltration of the summer cicada, and at this hour close to evening, the cicadas in the palace are also hoarsely clamoring there, making people upset. However, when I came to the vicinity of the Qianqing Palace, it was quiet, and occasionally I could see the palace people holding long bamboo poles walking under the garden trees, probably driving away those chirping cicadas.

Xu Jin entered the Heart Cultivation Hall with ease, but when he stepped into the imperial study with his front foot, he almost fell headlong. I saw that Zhu Houxi's kid was sitting on the imperial case in the T-shirt he gave him at this time, and he was still very undignified and shook Erlang's legs, drinking chilled watermelon juice while looking at a map opened on the imperial case.

"The ministers see the emperor, long live my emperor, long live long live!" Xu Jin shouted exaggeratedly, and then pushed Jin Shan to kneel down in front of the imperial case like a jade pillar.

Zhu Houxi sucked the chilled grape juice in the cup with a silver tube, glanced up at Xu Jin, and pouted: "Don't howl, I'm not deaf yet, calm down, you guy still remember to go back to Beijing?" ”

Xu Jin stood up in a chic manner, casually put a small bag of things on the imperial case, and said with a smile: "If you live in the temple, you are worried about the people, and if you are far away from the rivers and lakes, you are worried about the emperor. ”

Zhu Houxi showed a disdainful expression, picked up the bag of things on the imperial case casually, and asked curiously, "What good things did Xu Qing bring to me...... Hey, it's chili! ”

Xu Jin smiled and said: "The minister returned to the house where he used to sell haggis in Shangrao County this time, and saw that the peppers in the courtyard were just ripe, and Xiaowan picked a lot of them and brought them back to Beijing, so the minister entered the palace this time and gave the emperor some hand." ”

Zhu Houxi couldn't help but show a deep sense of nostalgia when he heard this, picked a chili pepper and put it in his mouth and took a bite, and suddenly said with a straight mouth: "It's still as spicy as it was back then, it's been six or seven years in the blink of an eye, and I really want to go back to that house to see." ”

"The house is fine now, the minister has arranged someone to take care of it, and the emperor can go back to see it whenever he wants!" Xu Jindao.

Zhu Houxi glanced at Xu Jin and said, "Cunning guy, think that if you get some chili peppers and come back to me, I won't pursue your absenteeism?" The beauty you think, you have deducted all the money you have this year. ”

Xu Jin smiled bitterly: "Buckle it, buckle it, but the minister just got home and didn't even have time to drink a sip of tea, can the emperor reward a cup of chilled watermelon juice or something, the minister is dying of thirst." ”

"You deserve to die of thirst!" Zhu Houxi said, but he still ordered the palace people to bring Xu Jin a large glass of chilled watermelon juice.

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