The swansong of the swansong

Chapter 122 I Really Want to Die
After Kangxi arrived in Yangzhou, he moved directly into Zhenyuan.

The salt merchants in Yangzhou were so extravagant that it was appalling.

The Zhenyuan Garden where Kangxi lived truly achieved the goal of "a new scene at every step", and each scene is a different world.

The fourth prince and Yinyou were called into the garden.

Kangxi carefully inquired about the details of the disaster relief in Henan, and finally, adopted the fourth brother's suggestion and exempted Guide Prefecture from taxes and grain for five years.

From beginning to end, Kangxi never asked about the situation of the Jiangning Lin family.

For Kangxi, it was obviously beneficial to the rule of the Qing Dynasty to crack down on the scholar families in Jiangnan from time to time.

Neither he nor Yinyou dared to tell anyone about the fourth brother falling into the water.

As long as Kangxi knew about it, the fourth prince and the guards around Yinyou would be severely punished.

This time, the princes who followed Kangxi on his southern tour were the Crown Prince, the fifth prince, the eldest prince, the thirteenth prince, the fourteenth prince, and the eighteenth prince.

Including the fourth prince and Yinyou who met up halfway, there were a total of eight princes accompanying the emperor.

The eighth brother was supervising the country in the capital, and the third brother was squatting in the capital watching him.

After Kangxi arrived in Yangzhou, he didn't want to leave. Every day, apart from sightseeing, he would summon ministers from all over the country.

Because Yinyou was in charge of the Imperial Household Department, all supplies from local officials needed to be coordinated with him, and he was very busy every day.

At dusk, after Yinyou came out of Zhenyuan, he heard Wulin say, "Master, Li Xu went to pay a visit to the prince today."

Yinyou's eyes flashed slightly. This guy Li Xu actually went to see the prince under the nose of Kangxi. He really wanted to die!

As the saying goes, Buddha saves those who are destined to be saved.

Some people are born to play both sides, and Yinyou has no choice but to watch coldly.

As soon as Yinyou returned to his residence, he heard that the Thirteenth and Fourth Princes had come together.

After meeting the emperor and receiving his decree, the status of the fourth prince and Yinyou as imperial envoys was lifted.

The fourth son still had to deal with the affairs of the Ministry of Revenue, and Yinyou also had to deal with the affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of War. Only the thirteenth son was like a lonely ghost, doing nothing all day long.

When the three brothers sat together, chess was naturally a must.

"Fourth brother, Eighth brother is the regent again!" Thirteenth brother's words left a lasting aftertaste.

The fourth brother couldn't help but look at Yinyu, who just smiled but said nothing.

Even though the Fourth Brother always taught the Thirteenth Brother mathematics before, it is an indisputable fact that the Thirteenth Brother is a popular figure in the Eastern Palace.

The Eighth Prince is the regent again. The Thirteenth Prince's implication is that the Eighth Prince is posing an increasing threat to the Crown Prince, and he hopes that the Fourth Prince and Yinyou will help the Crown Prince.

No matter what time, the butt determines the head, and that is the truth!
No matter how appealing the slogans you shout are, interests cannot deceive people.

Seeing that Yinyou didn't say anything, the fourth brother was too lazy to speak either.

What is there to say?
Yinreng was still the crown prince, yet he dared to kick the fourth prince unconscious. In the future, when Yinreng became the emperor, wouldn't he have to kill the fourth prince?
Yinyou didn't have the slightest favorable impression towards the prince!

If Kangxi hadn't arranged a matchmaking, he wouldn't have wanted to marry Cuiqing at all.

The prince's brother-in-law has not benefited from the prince's actions, but has instead suffered from them. He is definitely a burden!

However, after Yinyu rescued the fourth prince from the water, as long as he did not have obvious ulterior motives, given the fourth prince's personality, he would generally tolerate him.

When the Thirteenth Prince saw that the Fourth Prince and Yinyou were silent, he also knew their difficulties and said no more.

As long as they don't talk about the prince, the atmosphere is very good when the three brothers sit together.

The three brothers take turns playing chess. The loser treats the winner and the winner eats for free.

As a result, the fourth brother lost the most in the end. He sent Su Peisheng to order a table of fine food. The three brothers sat together and feasted.

This time, the fourth brother made a great harvest during his trip to the south of the Yangtze River. With several million taels of silver in his pocket, he felt very confident.

As for Yinyou, he mainly got Lin Qianqian and 300,000 taels of silver.

The Lin and Fang families' land properties seem to be large, but in fact, many of them are lands that local people voluntarily invested in order to avoid taxes.

In those days, the gentry enjoyed great privileges, the most important of which was that they did not have to work or pay taxes.

To be honest, Yinyou supported the fourth brother's idea of serving as a minister and paying taxes at the same time from the bottom of his heart.

In the era of small peasant economy, bureaucrats and gentry were all vampires who made no contribution to the country or society.

According to Yinyu's understanding, industrial capitalists and bureaucratic gentry are fundamentally different.

At the beginning of the reform and opening up, the investment promotion introduced was the processing and manufacturing industry of "three-in-one" and "one-in-one" and sweatshops.

However, without the manpower advantage of sweatshops, the country at that time had no export products to earn foreign exchange.

It is an indisputable fact that industrial capitalists, such as Huawei, BYD, CATL, etc., have progressive significance for society.

"Fifteenth brother, come on, let's have a drink!" The Thirteenth Brother was so happy after drinking that he simply took off his smock and drank with Yinyou with his bare chest.

Yinyou's heart moved slightly, and he simply took off his clothes and drank with the Thirteenth Master without caring about the tiger claw marks exposed.

When the fourth brother saw the hideous tiger claw marks, he immediately remembered Yinwei’s heroic act of risking his life to save him.

Alas, where can I find such a good brother?
Finally, the Thirteenth Prince was once again drunk by Yinyu and passed out. Apart from anything else, just in terms of his drinking capacity, the Thirteenth Prince was definitely defeated by Yinyu.

After Yinyu arranged for someone to send the Thirteenth Prince to the guest room to rest, the Fourth Prince was not sleepy at all. He forced Yinyu to continue playing chess and chatting.

"Thirteenth brother, you are a little obsessed with supporting the prince." The fourth brother's words are quite interesting.

However, Yinyou's attitude towards the Thirteenth Prince was neither to speak for him nor to add insult to injury.

Moreover, Yinyou always suspected that the relationship between the Fourth Brother and the Thirteenth Brother was much better than it seemed!
Otherwise, the Thirteenth Prince’s experience during the more than ten years from the time the Crown Prince was deposed to the time the Fourth Prince ascended the throne could not have been a blank.

Nowadays, how could anyone who secretly wanted to do something big not have a hidden agenda?
Anyway, as long as the fourth brother doesn’t say anything, Yinyou won’t bother to ask.

"Fourth brother, Thirteenth brother is a good drinking buddy." Yinyou said it vaguely, but the fourth brother understood that he didn't want to say anything bad about Thirteenth brother.

After playing a few more games of chess, the fourth brother went to the guest room to rest.

Kangxi stayed in Yangzhou for ten days before setting off for Jiangning.

After the imperial carriage arrived in Jiangning, just as Yinyu had expected, Kangxi moved into Cao Yin's weaving office again.

At this time, Cao Yin's stepmother Sun had passed away and was buried in the ancestral tomb in her hometown.

However, Kangxi insisted on taking his sons with him to pay homage to Sun's spirit tablet.

After this incident, Cao Yin's reputation in Jiangning became even more popular and he became very popular.

The fourth child said bitterly: "Khan Ama dotes on Cao Yin too much."

Yinyou couldn't help but smile. At that time, Kangxi asked the princes to kneel down and pay respect to Sun's spirit tablet, but the fourth prince was the last one to do so.

To be honest, Kangxi was crazy again by doing this.

No matter how favored Sun was, she was only a bondservant of the royal family after all.

It is totally unacceptable to let the Crown Prince and his brothers kneel down and worship the royal bannermen!

"Fourth brother, Khan Ama is particularly nostalgic, there is nothing we can do about it." Yinyou deliberately said it with a double entendre.

With the fourth brother's cleverness, he must have understood Yinyou's subtext: the world belongs to Kangxi, he can do whatever he wants, so why stop him?
The fourth brother suddenly stood up, stamped his feet and said, "How unruly!" After saying this, he went out to find the fifth brother.

The next day, Yinyou took the memorial and came to the weaving office to ask to see Kangxi.

When Yinyou entered the room, Cao Yin and Li Xu were both there.

Kangxi, who was in his fifties, was quite talkative. In front of Cao Yin and Li Xu, he deeply recalled the good times when they captured Oboi together.

Kangxi was in a good mood, so Yinyou would not be stupid enough to interrupt him.

When Kangxi finished talking and was drinking tea, Yinyu reported: "Replying to Khan Ama, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince has instructed the Ministry of Internal Affairs to import more pearls from the sea. I have written a petition and would like Khan Ama to review it."

After reading Yinyou's petition, Kangxi pondered for a moment, then picked up the red pen and wrote the word "approved" on the petition.

To be honest, despite the love-hate relationship between him and the prince, Kangxi tried his best to meet the prince's living requirements.

Among the expenses of the Imperial Household Department, the prince's expenses were more than 50% more than those of Kangxi.

After Kangxi approved it, he finally remembered to ask Yinyu: "Why did you bring in pearls?"

Yinyu whispered, "I am not sure either."

In fact, Yinyu knew it very well. However, if Yinyu said that the prince planned to grind the expensive pearls into powder and apply it on the faces of the beauties around him for beauty treatment, Kangxi would definitely be furious.

Yinyou didn't want to disturb Kangxi's nostalgia, so he wanted to say goodbye and leave.

However, Kangxi was so excited that he didn't even give Yinyou a chance to leave.

After Kangxi had his fill, he waved his hand and asked Li Xu and Cao Yin to leave first.

When no one was in the room, Kangxi said coldly: "The prince is used to spending money lavishly, and you don't care about him?"

Yinyu blinked, knowing that Kangxi was being naughty again, and he fought back without hesitation, saying, "My dear Khan, Your Highness the Crown Prince is the ruler, and I am the subject. How can a subject govern the ruler?"

Among all the sons of Kangxi, only Yinyu dared to present facts and reason, and even confronted Kangxi.

In fact, Kangxi was also very clear that a lot of the money spent by the prince was wasted.

However, Kangxi himself did not care. Was he going to let Yinyou kneel at the gate of the East Palace and beg the prince not to be extravagant?
How can this be true in this world?

"Did you know that Li Xu went to see the prince?" Kangxi pretended to be uninterested and asked Yinyou casually.

"My Lord Khan, I have vaguely heard of this matter. However, I have a lot of things to do and did not ask in depth." Yinyu tried to fool him by pretending to be careless.

However, Kangxi said: "Some people should not be spoiled too much. Once spoiled too much, they will become arrogant."

If he were an ordinary person, he would have followed Kangxi's wishes and started criticizing Li Xu.

However, Yinyu knew better than anyone that even if Kangxi had some minor dissatisfaction with Li Xu, it would not be a big deal.

Until the death of Kangxi, he always doted on Li Xu and Cao Yin.

"Khan Father is holy and wise!" Yinyu took out the magic weapon for praising the emperor and pressed it so hard that Kangxi's lungs and trachea hurt.

PS: I updated the chapter even though I had a bad cold. I’m the hardworking Xiaoshiwu, so please give me a few monthly tickets. It’s not too much, right?

(End of this chapter)