Thousand-year-old family: its rise began with Shang Yang’s reforms

Chapter 337: Kind Heart and Kind Deeds, but Bad Consequences
The origin of the name Liu Xiu is very strange. It was the name that the emperor dreamed of on the second day after he prayed for blessings during a sacrifice.

After waking up from the dream, he named the prince "Xiu".

Liu Xiu, who is no longer the crown prince, is riding on horseback, heading to his fiefdom of Hongnong.

He didn't know that the gears of fate were turning slowly.

Wang Mang entered politics in the seventeenth year of Huanglong.

He is a person that others cannot describe. When others talk about Wang Mang, they always feel it is very strange.

This person seems to have no aspirations. He acts crazy and says weird things all day long.

Wang Mang was not like this since he was a child.

It is said that when he was nine years old, Wang Mang had a nightmare at night and was in a coma for three whole days. After he woke up, the young Wang Mang clamored that he had dreamed of gods and the place where gods lived, and said there was this and that there.

No one knows what Wang Mang dreamed about, but since then, Wang Mang always has some new ideas.

He was very kind to the maids, servants and even servants around him, as if he treated them as "people" like himself. His reputation spread throughout the entire Chang'an City. Therefore, in the 17th year of Huanglong, he was summoned to "select filial and honest people" and was recommended to become a minor official.

It was also in this year that his sister "Wang Mowan" entered the palace for only three months and was favored by the emperor and eventually became the queen.

He also became the veritable "uncle of the king".

The power of external relatives during the Han Dynasty was extremely terrifying, especially when the emperor did not control government affairs.

Wang Mang seemed to be unaware of how much power he had. He remained as polite, gentle, and benevolent as usual. He never put on airs whether facing the common people or his colleagues.

This also made his reputation even better.

The speed of his promotion broke the convention and can be described as "rising rapidly".

"Being a farmer in the morning, ascending to the Emperor's Hall in the evening"

After Wang Mang was recommended as a filial and incorruptible official because of his sister and his own reputation, he was appointed as a minor official with a salary of 500 stones and worked in the Honglu Temple.

Only half a year later, he was promoted to Shaoqing of the Honglu Temple, a position with a rank of 1,000 stones.

Half a year later, Wang Mang was promoted to the position of "Honglu Temple Minister".

This position is worth two thousand stones.

In just over a year, Wang Mang was promoted from a minor official to an official with a salary of two thousand stones. This speed of promotion was unimaginable to others.

Of course, even though Wang Mang himself was very humble, there would definitely be many people talking about the speed of his promotion.

There was even one time when Wang Mang had already arrived at the yamen, but no one heard his footsteps and did not know of his existence, so they were still talking about the matter. To say it was talking was already a nice thing to say, as there was no shortage of dirty words.

This kind of thing happened not just once, Wang Mang encountered it almost every day.

But he never cared about or even dealt with those people.

This is still the case even though he is now an official with a rank of 2,000 stones.

Winter comes and summer goes, spring goes and autumn comes,

In the blink of an eye, it was already the nineteenth year of Huanglong. The emperor was becoming increasingly sleepy, which was a very normal thing.

Not all emperors could live as long as the previous two emperors.

In the 19th year of Huanglong, the emperor issued an edict appointing Wang Mang as prime minister.

This seems to be the first prime minister who is a relative of the emperor other than the Chen family in the Han Dynasty, and also the most perfect official in the Han Dynasty other than the Chen family.

People even compared him with Chen Ju, the Anju Gong of the Chen family, saying that Wang Mang was quite like an ancient sage.

Such rumors spread throughout the world and naturally reached Guandu City.

In Guandu City.

Chen Jin sat in the Zhushen Building, looking at the letters of his ancestors, as if he had no idea what was going on outside.

In fact, no one in the world, not even the current emperor himself, knows the current situation in the world better than he does. The world is still stable, even though Wang Mang became the prime minister.

He put down the book in his hand and looked towards Chang'an with a look of confusion and curiosity on his face.

Chen Jin wanted to know whether this Wang Mang was a fellow traveler of the Chen family?

If they were on the same path, the Chen family would not mind giving up the position of the so-called "first foreign relative family". This position was not a very good thing for the Chen family.

It can only be considered a burden.

Outside my building, a man with an ordinary face walked in, but there was something strange in his eyes.

"Master, the King of Hongnong is here to visit."

"He said he had something important to discuss and wanted to see you."

King of Hongnong?
Hearing this title, Chen Jin was stunned for a moment, then he realized that this was the former crown prince.

Not long after the queen was deposed, the prince became "King of Hongnong" because he offended the emperor.

But what is King Hongnong doing here at this time?

Is there something urgent?

With this thought in mind, he stood up and walked out of the building.

forecourt
Liu Xiu sat in the courtyard with a somewhat panicked look on his face. He looked outside from time to time, wanting to know when the current King An would appear.

But in just a moment, Chen Jin appeared in the room.

Liu Xiu looked at Chen Jin who was sitting in front of him, sighed softly, then lifted his clothes and knelt on the ground: "Please save me, King An!"

Chen Jin, who had just sat on the chair, was instantly confused by Liu Xiu's move. He quickly helped Liu Xiu up and said with confusion on his face: "What is the King of Hongnong saying?"

"Why is it like this?"

He even tried to comfort Liu Xiu by saying, "You are the King of Hongnong of the Han Dynasty. Has the Han Dynasty ever killed anyone with the surname Liu and made him a king?"

This is indeed not the case.

Even at the beginning of the founding of the Han Dynasty, the kings occasionally rebelled, but most of them did not end up dead, but were imprisoned at most.

Except for the period of "Emperor Xiaoren" in Kaihua Temple, when several kings were killed for treason, it was really because those kings had gone too far.

That's why I had to do it.

Liu Xiu listened to Chen Jin's comfort, but he did not calm down at all. Instead, he became even more panicked.

"The one who wants to kill me is Wang Mang!"

Wang Mang?

Chen Jin was even more confused: "Why did Wang Mang kill you?" Liu Xiu was even more confused than him: "I don't know!"

Peach Blossom Spring
Chen Ye, who had been sleeping, regained some of his consciousness. He looked at the long river of history that had changed due to the turbulence of time. Then he turned his gaze to the mundane world, looking at Liu Xiu who was asking for help in the Chen Mansion and Chen Jin who was bewildered opposite him.

A hint of curiosity flashed in Chen Ye's dark and deep eyes. Even though he was now in a state of constant battle with fate in the long river, he still had a curious heart.

People are curious.

This is proof that one is alive.

Chen Ye closed his eyes and then cast his gaze towards Chang'an City in the distance. He really wanted to know what the situation was with Wang Mang in Chang'an City.

He could naturally see the truth of history from Liu Xiu's words. Wang Mang did indeed secretly order people to kill Liu Xiu, and he did so at all costs.

But. Why?

This is an eternal problem that no one can answer.

In the original history, there were many rumors in later generations, such as Wang Mang hunted down Liu Xiu many times after he became emperor, and actually killed two people named Liu Xiu, but in the end he was overthrown by a person named Liu Xiu.

But in fact, would Wang Mang really kill several Liu Xiu who were not relatives of the Han royal family?
This is impossible.

The reason is very simple and can be divided into two situations.

First, Wang Mang was a time traveler. If Wang Mang was really a time traveler, even if he didn't know that Liu Xiu was really a relative of the Han Dynasty, even a fool like a pig could guess that "Liu Xiu" was most likely born in the royal family, right? After all, Liu Xiu's slogan was "Restore the Han Dynasty" and his surname was Liu, so it was the most correct to consider it in the direction of a relative.

It would be even more ridiculous if we say that history was not like this at the beginning, but became like this after Wang Mang killed several Liu Xius.

In this era, with so many relatives of the Han Dynasty, how could it be possible for a "Liu" who was not surnamed Liu and not a relative of the Han Dynasty to replace those relatives of the Han Dynasty and become emperor?

Is the Golden Sword Alliance just a decoration?
Second, Wang Mang was not a time traveler. If Wang Mang was not a time traveler, then it would be even more impossible for him to inexplicably kill several people named "Liu Xiu". What good would this do him?
For these superiors, killing a few people for no reason is certainly a small matter, but specifically targeting someone named Liu Xiu to kill him?

How small is the probability of this happening?

The probability that Wang Mang is a time traveler is even smaller than the first one.

So what exactly is going on with Wang Mang?
Chen Ye was also curious about this, and now that he had finally arrived at this time and space, he could catch a glimpse of some traces of Wang Mang.

He wanted to satisfy his curiosity.

When his eyes fell on Wang Mang, Chen Ye's expression, which had remained unchanged for thousands of years, finally underwent some strange changes.

He raised his head and looked at the turbulent river of time with a strange expression.

like
He understood what was happening.

Wang Mang was not a time traveler, at least in the long history of the Chen family, he was not a time traveler.

But he is no different from a time traveler.

Because in the battle between fate and the Chen family, the long river was turbulent, and some things in the long river of later generations were reflected in some places.

Most of the time, these things were destroyed by Chen Ye and fate, but a very small part of them remained. These things remained somewhere in time and space, and the biggest possibility was that they would gradually disappear with the passage of time.

A small minority will survive.

These remaining "waves" actually have no effect, but when there are enough of them, they will condense into some "starlight", allowing people to see some of the "brilliant" starlight of future generations.

Of course, it doesn’t necessarily mean later generations.

You may also see the "present" or even the "past".

Chen Ye's expression became even weirder.

And at this moment, among the mortal world.

Wang Mang returned home.

He has become the prime minister, second only to the emperor. The current emperor is incompetent and spends all day drinking and having fun in the palace. The queen is his sister, so naturally she listens to him in everything.

Now he eliminates dissidents and can be said to have the final say in the court.

He held power in the court.

Then, he took out a bronze mirror that he had obtained when he was a child, then he exhaled and looked at the picture in the bronze mirror.

This bronze mirror was obtained by him when he was a child, and it can be said that it was something that changed his life.

When he got this thing, he had an inexplicable feeling that he could only use it three times.

The first time I used it was when I was young.

At that time, he was despised by his family and not loved by his parents, so his greatest wish was to know what kind of person he would become.

As the bronze mirror flickered, he saw himself becoming the prime minister who was second only to the emperor and above everyone else. Later, he even established a country called "Xin", truly standing at the pinnacle of the mortal world.

The second time was when he had become the prime minister.

At that time, he was in control of power, so he wanted to see more closely whether he would have any enemies after he became emperor.

As the bronze mirror flickered, he saw that he was overthrown and replaced by a man named "Liu Xiu".

At that time he knew that the crown prince's name was Liu Xiu, but how could Liu Xiu, who had been demoted to King of Hongnong, have any hope of overthrowing him?
Wang Mang licked the corners of his dry mouth.

This time, he wanted to see why he was overthrown by Liu Xiu.

But the flashing bronze mirror did not let him see why he was overthrown as he wished, but instead made him see a more distant future.

This time the picture was exceptionally clear, and he even had a feeling that this should be the world a thousand years later.

His eyes could not help but be attracted by everything in it. Is this the real "leaving doors unlocked at night"? This is the real Datong society!

There was determination in Wang Mang's eyes.

He was determined to become such an emperor and rule such a world!
No one can stop him!
Peach Blossom Spring
Chen Ye slowly raised his head and looked at the place in the sky that looked like dust. He sighed faintly: "So, your goal is to get history back on track?"

In fact, the moment Chen Ye saw Wang Mang, he discovered something was wrong.

Was it just a coincidence that the “waves” stirred up by the fight between the two of them were not wiped out? Was it just a coincidence that they fell into the hands of the young Wang Mang? Was it just a coincidence that the first two times pushed Wang Mang to complete his historical mission, and the latter time allowed Wang Mang to see “socialism”?
Is it possible for such a coincidence to happen in the world?
At least in Chen Ye's opinion, this is almost impossible.

All coincidences are intentional and "man-made".

Chen Ye had a smile on his face: "It's just another fight, why should I be afraid?"

What we should fear is fate.

In the 20th year of Huanglong, Prime Minister Wang Mang started his own reforms.

This is a reform that is difficult to evaluate, but the author of the Book of Han who wrote a separate biography for Wang Mang made a comment that later generations believed was the most accurate evaluation of this reform.

"Having a benevolent heart and doing benevolent deeds may bring about bad consequences."

(End of this chapter)