Ming Dynasty: I, Yan Maoqing, am truly radiating auspicious energy!

Chapter 29 Luck
"You all stand down first."

Seeing how cooperative Yan Maoqing was, Guo Xun found the young man increasingly pleasing to the eye and decided to stop trying to fool him. He gave a light shout to his trusted servants and Manager Liu.

"Yes."

Manager Liu agreed and retreated out of the courtyard with the other servants.

"You go out too."

Guo Xun glanced at his trusted servants who were uninvolved, and then spoke up.

"Yes?"

The trusted servant was taken aback, and while he readily agreed, he was somewhat surprised.

Upon hearing this, Manager Liu raised his head in confusion, a look of doubt appearing in his eyes.

It should be noted that although their noble master "enjoyed collecting books and writing poetry, and loved associating with scholars and literati," he held those civil officials in utter contempt and disdain.

In his mind, scholars and civil officials were two completely different groups of people.

Once a scholar enters officialdom and becomes a civil servant, he becomes nothing more than a piece of silk used to wipe one's bottom.

He once commented on the silk used to wipe one's bottom as follows:

"This stuff not only gets dirtier faster after being thrown into the dry toilet, but it also smells even worse. Even farmers have to pick it out and throw it away when they use the manure from the dry toilet to fertilize it, otherwise it will ruin the crops. It's better to use the straw paper that dissolves in the manure."

Although this statement is somewhat absolute, Manager Liu and his trusted servants had seen many civil officials on a daily basis, and upon reflection, they often found it to be quite reasonable.

Yan Maoqing, who has not only passed the imperial examination but has also been selected as a probationary official, is now in the position of Jinshi.

It should fall into the category of silk that has been used to wipe one's bottom, or silk that is about to be used to wipe one's bottom.

Normally, even if their noble master wanted to win this person over, he would at most give a gift and exchange a few pleasantries with him. After leaving the house, he might spit on him and immediately wash the hands that had just touched him.

But today, this master even dismissed his trusted servants who were always by his side...

It is not difficult to see from this that Guo Xun's attitude towards Yan Maoqing, this "silk used for wiping his bottom," seems to be different from that of previous civil officials.

Although Manager Liu did not know what kind of predicament Guo Xun was facing, he still had reason to suspect that Guo Xun's attitude was related to Yan Maoqing's novel "Xuan Po Cang Qiong" which was being serialized at Luming Pavilion.

This is because when this master first saw "Xuan Po Cang Qiong," he had considered presenting the book to the palace in exchange for merit.

For Yan Maoqing, this was an incredibly auspicious event, like his ancestors' graves emitting auspicious smoke!
After all, their master was the famous Duke of Yi.

Since the time of Guo Ying, the ancestor of the Guo family, who followed the Ming Taizu in his campaigns and was enfeoffed as the Marquis of Wuding for his military achievements, three generations of Guo family members have married into the royal family and become powerful and influential officials and relatives of the emperor.

Now, in their master's generation, under his painstaking management, the Guo family has been promoted to Duke and Grand Tutor, bringing their status and power to the peak since the founding of the Ming Dynasty. Few people in the court can rival them!

Right now, the master is clearly treating Yan Maoqing differently.

If Yan Maoqing is also capable enough, his future will be limitless, something that his fellow graduates can only envy!

With these thoughts in mind, Manager Liu's mind became increasingly active...

……

First, he dismissed everyone around him, then pulled Yan Maoqing into the room, carefully closing the door behind him.

Guo Xun finally turned around, found a chair, and sat down, continuing his previous remarks with a beaming smile:

"Young friend Jingqing, you must be pondering what my win-win strategy is right now, right?"

"Nothing can be hidden from the Duke of Yi. Please enlighten me, Duke of Yi." Yan Maoqing took a teacup, rinsed it briefly with tea from the pot, poured a cup of tea for Guo Xun, and then stood aside, speaking quite cooperatively.

"I intend to present the Emperor with your book, 'The Profound Breaker of the Azure Sky,' which you are currently printing at the Deer Cry Pavilion. What do you think?"

Guo Xun glanced at the teacup, then stared into Yan Maoqing's eyes and asked directly.

"what?"

Yan Maoqing was taken aback; this was a completely new version he had never imagined!
What is "Xuan Po Cang Qiong"?
That was a web novel produced in later times, in which most of the content was made up based on imagination and was only for entertainment.

In terms of entertainment value, Yan Maoqing still holds a sliver of hope.

After all, the book had already been tested by the market in later generations. Now, it was being serialized in the Ming Dynasty as a periodical, and it didn't seem to have any serious problems adapting to the local conditions. At least it had some sales that were satisfactory to him.

It is about literary value.

Even if Yan Maoqing were out of his mind, he would never dare to compare it with the widely circulated "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Water Margin" of this era, as the two are not the same thing at all.

But Guo Xun is now presenting "Xuan Po Cang Qiong" to the Jiajing Emperor, clearly not because he values ​​its entertainment or literary value.

Rather... it's the value of metaphysical cultivation!
What kind of mystical value could this thing possibly have?
Even if Guo Xun dared to say it, Yan Maoqing wouldn't dare to admit it.

Otherwise, if the Jiajing Emperor had truly believed it...

Where could he find a magic stone tablet for Emperor Jiajing that could display "the power of mystical cultivation, three levels"?
Where can we find the old alchemist hidden in the ring?
And those rare and precious materials, top-level medicinal prescriptions, cultivation techniques, and strange fires on the Strange Fire Ranking that are obviously generated using online name generators.
Furthermore, was the Jiajing Emperor so easily fooled?
Although he was obsessed with metaphysics and was deceived by sorcerers throughout his life, there were also quite a few sorcerers who died without a burial place after he exposed them.

If Yan Maoqing remembers correctly, among the alchemists who were well-known around the Jiajing Emperor, it seems that only Shao Yuanjie and Tao Zhongwen had a peaceful death.

The reason these two men were able to gain the trust of the Jiajing Emperor and die peacefully was actually due to their practice of fasting and praying for blessings and warding off illness, as well as so-called sexual techniques, some old tricks that had been exhausted by their predecessors, and some inexplicable luck.

Shao Yuanjie has since passed away, so there's no need to mention him further.

Take Tao Zhongwen, a favorite of the Jiajing Emperor, as an example.

Emperor Jiajing was frail and sickly. He held many religious ceremonies to pray for his health and cure his illnesses, and also prepared some talisman water for him to drink. If he recovered, he would naturally take credit for it; if he didn't recover, he would say that the patient was not sincere.

Isn't this just the same old, versatile tactic that Zhang Jiao, the great sage and wise teacher of the Han Dynasty, had already mastered?
However, Tao Zhongwen was indeed lucky, because Emperor Jiajing was quite robust and always managed to pull through, with all the credit going to Tao Zhongwen.

There's also the phrase "two dragons never meet," which was fabricated by Tao Zhongwen.

The eldest son of the Jiajing Emperor, Zhu Zaiji, died two months after birth. His second son, Zhu Zairi, was made crown prince shortly after birth. This saying arose after Zhu Zairi contracted smallpox.

From then on, the Jiajing Emperor avoided seeing any of his princes.

It wasn't until the day Zhu Zai Rui turned fourteen and underwent his coming-of-age ceremony that the Jiajing Emperor, on a whim, met with him at the ceremony.

The day after his coming-of-age ceremony, Zhu Zaiyi suddenly fell seriously ill and died.

From then on, Emperor Jiajing placed even greater trust in Tao Zhongwen.

This was Tao Zhongwen's luck, a kind of luck that is hard to explain.

There are many other similar examples.

For example, when Emperor Jiajing was on his southern tour, his palace caught fire two years ago. During the trip, he asked Tao Zhongwen about it, and Tao Zhongwen replied, "It's a fire." That very night, the palace was indeed engulfed in flames, killing many palace staff and even Emperor Jiajing himself.

Whether it was luck or not, who can say for sure?
In any case, it was only through this luck that Tao Zhongwen's favor with the emperor steadily increased...

Yan Maoqing knew he didn't have Tao Zhongwen's luck, and since the day he transmigrated, he had avoided the crazy Jiajing Emperor like the plague. So why would he take the initiative to go to him now?

(End of this chapter)