Chastity Layman

  Chapter 1050 Ritual funeral

  The summer of the eleventh year of Zhenguan came quietly.

  The troops of Fanshang Suwei in Luoyang also changed into summer clothes, and the heavy winter robes and spring jackets were also replaced one after another. The whole city seemed bright and colorful.

The emperor left without saying goodbye and returned to Chang'an. It is said that he had already lived in Zhaoling, so as to be closer to Empress Wende. .

  The emperor threw the imperial court to Chengqian to supervise the country and Linchao, and reduced the prime minister's team to four, with the eldest grandson Wuji, Qin Lang, Ma Zhou and Li Daliang as four ministers to assist the government.

  Although the situation in the court is stable, the Tang Dynasty has been invincible all over the world since Zhenguan, and the four barbarians have proclaimed their vassals, but it does not mean that the Tang Dynasty will sit back and relax.

  Thousands of miles of land, hundreds of millions of people, all of a sudden were handed over to Cheng Qian. Although Cheng Qian was very excited, he also felt that there were so many clues that he had no way to start.

   Fortunately, Changsun Wuji has been the prime minister for more than ten years. He has been in the central government for many years and has a lot of experience. Ma Zhou is also an expert in this area.

   Qin Lang, the prime minister who has been worshiped for many times, is actually relatively unfamiliar with the affairs of the central government. He is also a shopkeeper who likes to be hands-off, and he can't stand his temper. Fortunately, Qin Lang is not bad at employing people. He doesn't want to do it himself, but he has a good plan and assignment.

  Thus, although the emperor left the Luoyang court for a long time, there was no chaos here, but a peaceful one. Although there were occasional minor mistakes, in general, it went smoothly.

  For the current Luoyang court, after all, there are no wars outside and no disasters inside. In the past few years, the court has sufficient storage, rich taxes, the court has money and food, and the country’s politics is clear. It can be said to be the best era.

  Perhaps it was precisely because of this that the emperor dared to abandon the stall of the court and directly hand it over to Chengqian, and went to Chang'an to accompany his deceased wife and raise his children and grandchildren.

  As long as Cao Sui follows the rules of Qian and Xiao, and manages the court according to the existing track, then there will be no major troubles.

   It's just that the young prince suddenly took over the court. This is different from the previous prisons. This time, the prison is almost in control of the real power.

   There are not so many constraints.

  After spending the first period of time in excitement, Cheng Qian gradually got used to it, and began to feel a little restless.

  Just listen to the suggestions of the four ministers, and everything is done step by step, which is a bit dissatisfied for him. It is rare for him to be a regent. Chengqian still wants to do some practical things, especially if he has made some political achievements.

   Right now, Chengqian feels that the court can do a lot, and there are many places where it can make meritorious service. For example, Siyi did not really surrender completely. Taking Xue Yantuo in the north as an example, he not only wanted to succeed the Turks to dominate Mobei, but also kept trying to occupy Monan as well.

After the Tang Dynasty destroyed the Eastern Turks, they first restrained the Turkic tribes and then directly subordinated them. They refused to give up Monan, especially the land of Hetao and Daibei. In addition, the imperial court was actually worried about letting Xue Yantuo dominate Mobei. , intending to support the Huihe Alliance led by Bodhisattva to fight in Mobei, which made Xue Yantuo more dissatisfied.

  Datang also passed the canonization of Khitan, Xi and other former Turkic subordinates to make them dissatisfied with Xue Yantuo. This made Xue Yantuo, who was determined to be the new overlord of the grassland, very dissatisfied.

   It was Xue Yantuo's tentative intrusions several times, but after being beaten back by Li Ji and others, the stalemate came to an end. Afterwards, Xue Yantuo was tricked by Li Shimin, who pretended to agree to marry the princess, but demanded exorbitant gifts from them. Xue Yantuo finally collected a large number of livestock from various ministries and sent them all the way. Thinness and other reasons, said that Xue Yantuo was rude and did not marry.

   This made Xue Yantuo very popular. After a lot of tossing, they not only offended all the tribes under Tie Le, but also accompanied hundreds of thousands of cattle and horses. In the end, the princess of the Tang Dynasty has not yet married?

  Yi Nan slashed his face with a knife angrily, and vowed to settle accounts with Li Shimin.

It’s just that before he raised an army, the Bodhisattva of Huihe first troubled him, and the Eastern Turkic Khan Qin Guozhong in Monan, and Li Simo and others led the Turkic tribes to prepare for the war, and from time to time they held a group exercise or something. Yi Nan was very uncomfortable.

The border is heavily guarded, and there is no chance of invasion. The Bodhisattva has the support of the Tang Dynasty, and there are Khitan, Xibu and other alliances behind. The concubine was a bit alienated and often had conflicts with the concubine Bazhuobu.

   This made Yi Nan very anxious. He has been busy dealing with these messes for the past few years. Although there are constant frictions on the northern border, they have never been able to fight.

  Now the imperial court received the news from Mobei that it is said that the brothers Ba Zhuo were severely dealt with by Yi Nan. Now that they are honest, Ba Zhuo and his brother Jie Libi also temporarily shook hands and made peace.

  Then the Yinan father and son gathered tribesmen and horses, raided the Bodhisattva, defeated the Bodhisattva, and defeated the four tribes of the Huihe Alliance in a row.

  Now the Bodhisattva asks the Luoyang court for help.

"Huihe Bodhisattva is the governor of Yanran, who was enshrined by the Tang Dynasty. The four divisions of Pugu, Bayegu, Sijie, and Tongluo are also the four governors of Jinwei, Youling, Lushan, and Guilin set up by the imperial court. Xue Yantuo himself It is also the vassals attached to us who professed their vassals to the Great Tang, and now dare to openly violate the oath they made at the beginning, brazenly sending troops to attack the various tribes, this is an act of conspiracy and rebellion, and must be severely punished!"

   Your Majesty.

  Prince Chengqian set the tone as soon as he came up, there is no need to discuss, he must send troops, fight!

  Changsun Wuji is the order of Zhongshu, the inspector Zuo Pushe, and also holds the Shangshu to save trouble, and is the uncle of the prince, so he is the head of the four auxiliary governments.

   He frowned slightly at the prince's attitude of beating and killing.

"During the national mourning period, it is not advisable to raise troops. Xue Yantuo is unruly and difficult to tame. This is a long-standing thing, but dealing with Xue Yantuo does not necessarily require large-scale crusade. You can order Huihe and Khitan tribes to join forces to crusade, and let Monan's Yang Guozhong, Li Simo and the other Turkic soldiers can cooperate to restrain them."

   Chengqian was obviously dissatisfied with Changsun Wuji's concept.

   "If you don't die by beating a snake, you will suffer endless troubles. Xue Yantuo is not always rebellious, and he is ambitious. You must send troops to fight against them, so that you will never suffer future troubles!"

   "Your Highness, it is not appropriate to send troops during the national mourning period." Changsun Wuji insisted.

   Ke Chengqian believes that since the Han Dynasty, the moon has been used instead of the day, and the three-year national mourning period has been shortened to 27 days.

"Although it is said that the ceremony does not attack the mourning, it means not taking advantage of the mourning of the enemy's country to attack the enemy in order to show benevolence and righteousness, but now the other party is plotting rebellion, and our Tang Dynasty is raising troops to attack the chaos. Why not? The thieves have already attacked the city and looted the land , How can I ignore it in the Tang Dynasty? Is the Yanran Dudu Mansion not the king of the Tang Dynasty? Is Huihe not my Tang clan?"

   "If I can't maintain the vassals in the Tang Dynasty, how can I maintain the vassal system? How can the name of my father, Emperor Khan, be respected by all the vassals?"

   "Must send troops!" Cheng Qian said resolutely.

  Qin Lang sat there very quietly. Ever since the emperor left Luoyang and returned to Chang'an, and kicked Fang Xuanling, Wei Zheng and other people out of the court, leaving only the four of them to assist Chengqian, Qin Lang has actually been relatively quiet.

   He seldom speaks in the court, unlike Changsun Wuji who takes the opportunity to monopolize the power, wishing to have one person in charge of the government. Ask him about everything, ask him for instructions and report on everything big and small, and if you don't like it, you have to reprimand and scold others. Changsun Wuji also quickly recruited a large number of people, such as Chu Suiliang, the servant of Huangmen, Han Zhongliang, Shangshu of the Ministry of punishment, and Liu Shi, a member of Zhongshushe.

Qin Lang saw these things in his eyes, but he didn't take them seriously. After all, no matter how hard he tried, he was still Li Shimin today. Don't let the emperor run back to Chang'an without saying a word. He didn't care about the Luoyang court, but who One cannot ignore the control ability of the emperor who immediately invaded the country and seized the throne in a mutiny.

   In the final analysis, the current crown prince inherits Qianqian and supervises the country. No matter how much power Changsun Wuji holds, the emperor is still above him.

  If the emperor dies, now that Chengqian is the new emperor, Qin Lang has to be careful. After all, the highest power is not there. If the eldest grandson controls the government, it may be a real dictatorship. At that time, Qin Lang is also in danger.

   But there is no danger now, so he can tolerate Changsun Wuji's seizure of power. In other words, in fact, Changsun Wuji's current behavior of arbitrarily authorizing power and even forming a party may not be without Li Shimin's tacit support behind it.

After all, Li Shimin prefers to balance when employing people. This is very similar to Li Yuan. It can be seen from the appointment of prime ministers by the emperor in the past ten years. Among the prime ministers used by the emperor, Changsun Wuji, Gao Shilian, Yang Gongren , Li Jing, Yu Wenshiji, Yang Shidao, Wei Ting, Du Ruhui, Du Yan, and even Hou Junji were all from the Guanlong Group.

  Xiao Yu, Chen Shuda, and Cen Wenwen belonged to the representatives of the gentry in the south of the Yangtze River.

  Wang Gui and Xu Jingzong are representatives of the Shandong gentry.

  Wei Zheng, Ma Zhou, Dai Zhou, and Sun Fujia are representatives of poor families and petty gentry.

  As for Fang Xuanling, Qin Qiong, Qin Lang, Li Ji, etc., they are all representatives of powerful Shandong.

  The emperor kept adjusting the team of prime ministers, but no matter how they changed, the prime ministers in the Zhengshitang were always in a relatively balanced state, and no one was dominant.

   This is also the key to the emperor's control of power. If the courtiers belong to the same faction, the imperial power is in danger of being emptied.

In the past, Li Shimin was very guarded against the Guanlong Group. This was also because the Guanlong Group created four dynasties, and they also overthrew several dynasties. Therefore, Li Shimin, like his father, even Yang Jian and Yang Guang, although they are also Guanlong Group Long was born, but has been guarding against the Guanlong Group.

  Using Fang Xuanling as prime minister, appointing Wei Zheng to disrupt the situation, and then exceptionally reusing the poor family Ma Zhou, including the appointment of Qin Qiong and Li Ji as prime ministers from Shandong upstarts.

In the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it is even more important for the Shandong gentry who were even higher and superior. Li Shimin has always had the attitude of hitting two poles before giving a date. They can't even enter the center. Brother Zheng Shanguo and Zheng Yuanxuan, since they were killed in Jiancheng, have never been able to enter the core central level.

  (end of this chapter)