At the end of the Han Dynasty: a stingy husband from his hometown

Chapter 401 Grace
The carriage moved forward on the official road of Zhonglu County. Due to the dense forests here, the speed of the carriage was not very fast.

Zhonglu belongs to Nanjun, located south of Xiangyang, which is the north of Nanzhang County in Xiangyang City in later generations.

This place is south of the Han River and at the eastern foot of the Jingshan Mountains. Compared with the vast Jianghan Plain, the terrain is quite steep, and it can also be regarded as a natural barrier to the south of Xiangyang City.

"Your Majesty, after passing the hill in front, we entered the territory of Xiangyang."

Today's Xiangyang, even though it has become the capital of the Chu Kingdom, is still far less vast than in later generations. Entering Xiangyang means that it is not far from Xiangyang City.

Tian Feng opened the car curtain and looked at the rolling hills on both sides of the official road, feeling a little complicated.

Time is the most terrifying weapon. Tian Feng has not seen Zhou Qi for several years, and he does not know how much weight he still has in the heart of His Highness the King of Chu. He understood that when he was sent to Jiaozhou, in addition to the fact that Jiaozhou really needed a talented person, there was also the reason why the King of Chu wanted his ears to be clean.

Now that we are approaching Xiangyang, Tian Feng can't help but feel a little uneasy with this thought in his mind.

"Crench!"

"Crench!"

"Crench!"

"What happened?"

The horses driving the carriage kept neighing, obviously a little uneasy.

The Shu Zuo next to him couldn't help but be shocked when he heard this.

Tian Feng couldn't help but feel shocked at this time. He hurriedly opened the curtain and got out of the carriage.

As soon as Tian Feng got off the carriage, he heard the rapid sound of horse hooves from far to near.

"Shut up!"

Shu Zuo smiled bitterly and said: "You will see if you look at it, the flag of this army and horse is the dragon flag with the word "Zhou". Throughout the Chu Kingdom, this flag can only be used by the lord!"

The carriage was still moving forward unhurriedly. Even though the mountain road had been repaired, it was still somewhat bumpy.

Tian Feng frowned when he heard this and said: "This place is only twenty miles away from Xiangyang. Even if there are soldiers and horses blocking the road, they must be soldiers of the Chu State. Why are you panicking?"

"Lulu!"

Not long after he closed his eyes to recuperate, he suddenly heard the slightly panicked voice of the groom. The moving carriage suddenly braked. Tian Feng felt his body suddenly lean forward. If he hadn't reacted quickly and grabbed the handle, he might have fallen into the carriage.

"Tian Shangshu, my lord has personally gone out of the city twenty miles to meet you, sir. I have been waiting here many times, but your lord has not gone with me to meet my lord!"

However, when Shu Zuo saw the battle in front, he couldn't help but be shocked. Then he hurriedly turned to Tian Feng and said, "The way ahead was blocked by a group of soldiers and horses."

After Tian Feng stabilized his figure, he couldn't help but frown slightly, and immediately asked the groom outside through the curtain in a deep voice.

He hurriedly looked up and saw Chen Wenzheng, a trusted general under King Chu's command, approaching on horseback.

Tian Feng, who was either timid about being close to home or had something on his mind, had no intention of admiring the scenery on both sides of the official road. Instead, he closed the curtains and closed his eyes in the carriage to meditate.

Before the groom could answer, Shu Zuo had already opened the curtain and stretched out his upper body, wanting to see why the groom was so anxious and reining in the reins.

"Tap Tap!"

What an honor it is to be led twenty miles out of the city by the lord himself to greet him? I'm afraid I couldn't find another person in the entire Chu State who would be treated like this.

Shu Zuo turned to look at Tian Feng, feeling secretly happy in his heart.

As Tian Feng's subordinate officer, the more Tian Feng is valued by the King of Chu, the higher his future achievements as a subordinate officer will be. At this time, Tian Feng was not only moved, but also keenly caught Chen Wen's name for him, and immediately asked: "General Chen calls me "Shang Shu"?"

Chen Wen smiled slightly and said: "Sir, he has made great achievements in governing Jiaozhou. Now that he has returned to Xiangyang, he will naturally reinstate his position and take charge of the Shangshutai again. Not only that, the lord also wants to add a thousand households to his settlement!"

Even though Chen Wen was Zhou Qi's old friend and confidant, he did not dare to neglect him when facing Tian Feng.

Although many people would be jealous of the increase of one thousand households in the food town, Chen Wen didn't care much about it.

He believed that as long as he was loyal to his lord, when the Chu Kingdom conquered the world in the future, with his lord's character of caring and righteousness, the rewards from his old ministers would definitely be great.

The reason why everyone's official positions and titles are suppressed now is for future considerations, to avoid giving too many rewards now, so that there will be no titles and no rewards in the future.

On the contrary, Tian Feng returned to the official position of Shangshu Ling, which made Chen Wen understand Tian Feng's position in Zhou Qi's heart.

If we say that in the entire Chu State, apart from the King of Chu, the person with the highest official position is Bian Cang, who is the Taifu of Chu State.

However, the position of Taifu held by Bian Rang obviously meant that he was regarded as a mascot. He belonged to the kind of person who had a high position but did not have much real power.

Shangshu Ling is different.

Since the time of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Shangshu Ling has been responsible for helping the monarch to oversee all political orders.

At that time, eunuchs were responsible for the official position, but during the period of Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty, it was changed to scholars, which led to the increasing power of this official position.

During this period, the famous "three independent sittings" were the three official positions of Yushi Zhongcheng, Sili Xiaowei and Shangshuling.

The reason why it is called "three independent sittings" is because these three official positions can sit on separate seats during court meetings.

Needless to say, the Sili Xiaowei has great supervisory power. He is said to "rectify everything except the three ministers." When participating in discussions about government affairs, he is above the nine ministers, and when congratulating, he is below the ministers.

Anyone who is familiar with official positions in the Han Dynasty will know how powerful the official position of Sili Xiaowei is.

Censor Zhongcheng is known as "the Governor of the Ministry of External Affairs, the Censor of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Minister of Public Affairs, and the Supervisor of Hundreds of Officials." Although his rank is not high, he has high power.

As for the Shangshu Ling, there is not much else to say. Just one "overarching all political orders" shows how powerful it is. Even the censor Zhongcheng pales in comparison in front of him.

Historically, when Cao Cao coerced the emperor to order the princes, Xun Yu, who was in charge of internal affairs, was appointed as Shangshu Ling; Fa Zheng was also appointed as Shangshu Ling after helping Liu Bei win the Battle of Hanzhong.

When Liu Bei died, in addition to Zhuge Liang, another important minister, Li Yan, was also appointed as Shangshu Ling.

Fei Yi, known as the Prime Minister of Jihan Zhongxing, was also appointed Shangshu Ling after Zhuge Liang's death.

Zhou Qi's reappointment of Tian Feng as Shangshu Ling was not only a great favor and trust for Tian Feng, but also a disguised way of telling Tian Feng that if nothing unexpected happens in the future, Tian Feng may become the first prime minister of Chu. .

Although the Chu State is rich in talents, Jia Xu, Zhuge Liang, Zhou Yu, Zhang Zhao, Du Ji and others all have talents in managing the world.

However, apart from Xi Zhicai, it was Tian Feng, a top strategist, who was the first to join Zhou Qi and made great contributions to Zhou Qi's current foundation.

Although Zhuge Liang is more suitable to be the prime minister, he is much inferior to Tian Feng in terms of age, qualifications and merit.

The most important thing is that Tian Feng is also loyal to Zhou Qi and has outstanding talents. Even if he sometimes speaks poorly, he is still the best candidate to be the first prime minister of Chu State.

In addition, Zhou Qi also had an unknown idea, which was to rely on Tian Feng's favor to win over Zhang He, gain a high view of the surrendered Hebei soldiers, and lay a solid foundation for the Chu State to pacify Hebei in the future.

As long as Yuan Shao's civil servants and generals from Hebei know that Tian Feng holds a high position in Chu State, they will definitely become more alert.

In this way, as long as the Chu State is strong enough, it can defeat others without fighting.

(End of this chapter)