There are private rooms on the second and third floors of this restaurant, and each private room is equipped with brass radios, and there is more than one. In order to be able to eavesdrop on other people's conversations more effectively, this simple pickup device will be arranged in every corner of the room, so that there are no dead ends as much as possible. The intelligence officers of the Internal Affairs Bureau only had to sit in a special room and listen carefully on the other end of the brass according to the number, and they could roughly hear the conversation in the private room.

Of course, if you bite your ear, you still can't hear it, after all, the conditions are too primitive, and it is already very hard to do this. This thing is not against Imperial law, as this is an open area, and this device is mainly set up for foreigners. As for the fact that there are also residents and officials of the Empire who come here to eat, according to the laws of the Empire, if you want to spy on the officials of the Empire, you must have a special document from the Ministry of Supervision to approve it, and if you don't do so, it is illegal, at least on the surface. The imperial government has never authorized the Ministry of Supervision to do such a thing, and Hong Tao does not remember to approve such a bill anyway.

This special room was not inside the restaurant, Xiao Er took Hong Tao from the kitchen to the back of the restaurant, and entered a house in the courtyard. There were three people dressed as miscellaneous servants here, all of whom were also staff of the Internal Affairs Bureau, and they were a little confused when they saw Hong Tao, but after listening to Xiao Er's whisper, they immediately took the emperor into the inner room, and then opened a door. It turns out that this is the back wall of the first floor of the restaurant, but it is just a sandwich wall, and outsiders can't see it without careful calculation.

There was not much space in the wall, and against the wall was a very narrow table, and on the wall above each table was a copper pipe wrapped in cotton cloth, and the end was a small oval-shaped opening. A few people were putting this little mouth over their ears, listening and jotting down something on the paper on the table.

"Shh......h Tell me where the earpiece is in the private room in the southeast corner of the third floor, and I won't worry about the rest. When he entered the door, Hong Tao had already taken off his turban, and when he saw the emperor's hideous face, several monitors were shocked, and they all immediately stood up and prepared to salute. Hong Tao hurriedly raised his finger to his mouth, this kind of tube can hear the other party's conversation, and similarly, if the voice is loud here, it may be detected by that side.

"Your Majesty, there are Imperial officials in this private room, and according to the regulations, we cannot listen unless we have the authorization of the bureau chief and minister." The handyman who brought Hong Tao in pointed to a copper pipe inside, there was no one on the table in front of it, and the mouth of the pipe was plugged with a cloth.

"I'll make up the formalities for you in a while, you all go out first." Ciqi came, and as soon as he entered the door, he cleared the scene.

"Your Majesty, are you going to check the work or ......" When all the listeners were out of the wall, Ciqi closed the door and asked the same question as the shopkeeper.

"I suspect that Weng Xiaoyi hooked up with my daughter-in-law, can you listen to it? You don't need to ask who the daughter-in-law is! Hong Tao gave a very shameless answer.

"Ahh …… Ok, good, good! Listen, I don't record it, and I don't report it......" Ciqi felt that the emperor's image in his mind was much taller, and he was worthy of serious summary and study if he could be ashamed of this.

"Cixi told me when she left, I hope you don't disappoint him, and don't disappoint me. I won't listen to this kind of thing, and I'll get angry when I hear it, so you can help me listen to it, and record the important places. However, there is no backup of this item, and after I have seen it, if necessary, I will show it directly to the Prime Minister. If it's not necessary, destroy it on the spot, and it won't be difficult for you, right? Hong Tao wasn't sure what Weng Xiaoyi and the two big Song Haishang were talking about, and he didn't want to make this matter bigger, let alone decide the outcome by himself, whether he could follow the rules or follow the rules.

"Don't be embarrassed, I'll make up a copy of the listening permit and ask Minister Iraq to sign it...... Then I'll record it first! As he spoke, he sat down at the small table, pulled the plug off the brass pipe, put it on his ear, tilted his head and listened as he wrote on paper.

The meal in the private room was really not short, Ciqi wrote six pieces of paper, and the more he wrote, the darker his face became, and the tip of his nose was sweating. It's not that he's tired of writing, or he's tired of listening, but he realizes what the emperor will be when he sees this thing, and if he doesn't do it, he will have to make the first big case in the empire.

According to the strength of Hong Tao's six relatives who do not recognize him, the Weng family is probably going to be unlucky this time, and government officials, especially the units responsible for secrecy work, will have to follow suit. If Hong Tao was not by his side at this time, he would have the heart to secretly destroy this surveillance record. He didn't want the imperial political situation to have any big shocks because of this, nor did he want Hong Tao to offend too many people by killing because of this. Although Emperor Hong is a demigod in the empire, if he keeps doing this, he will block other people's financial and official roads, and soon he, a demigod, will have to become a declining god that everyone is annoyed by.

"Your Majesty...... Can you make Weng Xiaoyi disappear directly, I'll figure out a way...... I also dug out the Great Song Maritime Merchants, digging as many as I wanted, and I didn't leave any of them! Watching the emperor turn the monitoring record to the last page, Ciqi finally couldn't help but speak. When Cixi left, he told him to protect the emperor's family, and he felt that letting the emperor offend less people should also be regarded as a kind of protection.

"Oh? Do you think it's better to leave it at that? Hong Tao closed the record in his hand, there was neither anger nor embarrassment on his face, he was noncommittal to Ciqi's suggestion, and threw the problem back to Ciqi.

"The empire is very stable at the moment, and my subordinates don't feel the need to involve too many people for this. His Majesty the Weng family should also know that he is not a person who sees money and does not know the importance of it, Weng Xiaoyi may just be blinded by lard. It would be better for the empire to get rid of him and find those maritime merchants as well. Ciqi also let go, given that Hong Tao has always disliked conviction for words, he still dared to say his true thoughts.

"I don't see it, but you're a person who cares about the overall situation." Hong Tao still didn't say his opinion, I don't know if this sentence is sincere praise or sarcasm.

"I ......" The more this is the case, the more bottomless Ciqi's heart becomes, and the calm is just the appearance, maybe this emperor has already begun to act in his heart, and the involvement may be bigger than he thinks.

"Don't be nervous, I'd rather I was wrong and I'm going to believe you once. I won't pursue this matter for the time being, and I won't make it public, but you have to take a big risk to do something for me, it's against the laws of the Empire. Once someone else finds out, I can't protect you, you have to bear all the blame, you can't even go to Cape Town, are you willing? Hong Tao patted the monitoring record in his hand and handed it to Ciqi.

“…… I do! Your Majesty, I have a question, do you want to ask it now? Ciqi grinned and reached out to take the record as if he had received a death sentence. Hong Tao's reflection was really unexpected, and he probably understood what Hong Tao planned to let him do, but he couldn't figure it out.

"Just ask."

"Your Majesty and I are both for the stability of the empire and have no selfish intentions, but why are we the ones who break the law? Your ...... "Ciqi was a little aggrieved, but he still didn't dare to say the last sentence, it was the emperor's reverse scales, whoever touched it had to be careful, on this issue, the emperor was the same as a mad dog, he would bite whoever he caught, and he really bit to death.

"You want to say that the rules I made are wrong, right? You're getting bolder! Hong Tao took a step forward, his small eyes were almost invisible, and he approached Ciqi with a crooked mouth and a sinister smile.

“…… Your Majesty eats roasted unicorn meat, that thing is a lie, or I will go and pay for the meal to you and ask for it back......" Ciqi wanted to retreat, but unfortunately there was a chair behind him, so he could only stiffen his body, and watched Emperor Hong put that face close, and the tip of his nose was about to touch.

"The law is not omnipotent, and it takes wisdom to govern the country. When to obey the law and when to break the law depends on your own thoughts. Your suggestion is very good, and I hope everyone will think like you. If this matter is investigated openly, it will involve a lot of innocent people, and the old ladies of the Weng family will definitely not know about this matter, but they may work hard to save the lives of their daughters and sons-in-law, which will make the empire very unstable and have endless troubles.

"I'm not afraid that they will hate me, and I can't convince them, you see, they don't think the same way as we do, and it's hard for them to fully adapt to the laws of the Empire. But they have merit to the empire, great merit! As long as it is not a last resort, I don't want to use the law to deal with them, they are all old people, and doing so will make the people of the empire very cold. But I don't want to tolerate this matter, that will make us the builders of the empire even more chilling, we can't let our efforts for more than ten years come to naught because of someone, this kind of thing can't be tolerated once, as long as the opening is opened once, it will never be blocked again. ”

"At this time, we have to find a balance, not only to uphold the law, but also to make everyone feel comfortable, and not to affect the stability of the empire too much. It's a hard question, and I'm not God, and I can't think of a way to get the best of both worlds. At this time, there is usually a trade-off and balance problem, sacrificing a small benefit in exchange for a larger benefit. Unfortunately, this solution can only fall on you, who let you know? I don't have the right to do such a thing, and you have to carry this black cauldron. Anyway, let's find out the results first, if they really collude to betray the country, I can't stop it, I can only do things according to the law. I hope it doesn't turn out that way, but you can't lie to me, or I'll be the first to do you! Hong Tao's explanation is similar to not explaining, illegal things have to be done, and he is still the one who carries the black pot.

(To be continued.) )