First Minister of Ming Dynasty

"I, I dare not... Zhang Xiang's gift, the villain will engrave it in my heart, I, I will take it back and savor it slowly."

Zhang Ximeng said lightly: "No need, the tea will be cold when we go back, hurry up while it's hot!"

"I, I... drink!"

With trembling hands, You Fang dawdled the manuscript and put it on the table.His mind turned quickly, thinking of a way to survive.However, Zhang Ximeng was watching from the side, not giving him a chance at all.

With a bitter face, You Fang struggled to grab the teacup and lifted it up little by little, cold sweat dripping from his temples.

"Zhang, Zhang Xiang, I, I drank."

"Drink it!" Zhang Ximeng said with a smile: "Drinking tea is a beautiful thing! I have something to say after drinking it."

You Fang stared at this cup of tea, full of mixed flavors. He could obviously change his destiny and become a high official in the Zhu family army.

After being stunned for a long time, You Fang finally raised his neck, took a sip of tea, and then hurriedly said: "Mr. Zhang, I'm taking my leave from this humble post. Come back later."

You Fang wanted to run for his life, maybe he could save his life by inducing vomiting at this time.

But when he ran to the door, Zhang Ximeng said suddenly: "Such an adult, why are you still forgetting everything? The book is still here!"

You Fang paused, so he could only turn his head, picked up the manuscript, and ran outside again. For some reason, he felt blackness before his eyes, and his steps staggered.

This medicine is really powerful!

Just as You Fang was about to go out, several people appeared in front of him.

There were Guo Ying, Lu Qiuyun, the soldiers of the Gongwei Division, You Fang's daughter-in-law, father-in-law, and two servants.

"You, why are you here?" You Fang asked in surprise.

Guo Ying chuckled, "Mr. You, I heard people say that you are still alone. I didn't expect you to secretly marry and soon become a father. It's really surprising!"

You Fang was shocked, no matter how dull he was, he knew something was wrong.

At this moment, someone came over again, and they escorted several monks, and they also rushed over.

Guo Ying smiled and said: "You can't get married without a big matchmaker. It's the first time I heard that the temple even arranges beautiful events in the west wing. Mr. You, you are very lucky!"

Chapter 264 The First Hero

You Fang only felt his stomach churning like a knife, his heart was broken, his eyes were dark, his clothes were soaked with sweat, and his whole body was shaking.

"You, what are you going to do? Do you want to kill them all? Yes, I will take care of things, why bother women, old people. Why are women so innocent?"

He asked sadly and angrily.

Guo Ying scratched her head, "I'm talking about You Fang, you still don't understand, you are just a knife in someone's hand, you are not the mastermind, if you want to bear the blame, it will not be your turn! "

"You!" You Fang coughed violently, his body hunched, shrinking into a prawn.

At this time, Guo Yingcai said to the old man: "Tell me, who is it working for? Hurry up, don't waste time!"

The little old man was taken aback, he was naturally not as stupid as You Fang, and if he fell into someone else's hands, why bother asking for trouble, and don't wait for someone to use the big memory recovery technique.

The little old man obediently explained the matter.

"I, I am the steward of the Wang family..."

"Which royal family?" Guo Ying asked.

"That's right, it's the Wang family in Hangzhou, Wang Jue, Wang's family!" The little old man added, "Our master also sponsored You Fang to come to Jinling."

Hearing this, You Fang's body shook violently, his eyes widened, and his breathing became short of breath...

"Why do you want to subsidize Yu Fang? What's the purpose?"

"Yes, I want to see how the Zhu family's army is doing. After all, our master has a lot of property in Hangzhou, so he dare not be negligent."

Guo Yingdao: "Then how is your master investigating? But did you see it clearly?"

"Look... I see clearly, my master welcomes Zhang Taiwei into Hangzhou." The housekeeper lowered his head bitterly, no need to ask, Zhu Yuanzhang failed the interview, but Zhang Shicheng, who won the hearts of wealthy businessmen.

When Zhang Shicheng's soldiers and horses entered Hangzhou, it was Wang Jue who took the lead to welcome them.

"Since your master left with Zhang Taiwei, why did you come up with You Fang's idea? What's your plan?"

The housekeeper's heart was beating wildly, and he was obviously scared, but he dared not say nothing when faced with Guo Ying's questioning.

"I, my master only said that the Zhu family's army was too unreasonable, and worried that the Zhu family's army would invade Hangzhou. It just so happened that You Fang became a teacher in the Duke's Mansion at that time, so he set up a plan!"

"So this woman is not your daughter?"

The butler was stunned for a moment, then nodded helplessly, "She, she was bought by my master to keep in the mansion. It was originally intended to be dedicated to the nobles of the Zhu family army. Later, I heard that the prime minister of the Zhu family army was clean and honest, penniless, and his family was poor... thinking about it. It's hard to buy, so it's not a waste of money to just use her to buy Yu Fang."

puff!

Hearing this, You Fang couldn't take it anymore, he opened his mouth, spewed out black blood, and fell to the ground, feeling extremely heartbroken.

what?

My goddess, in the eyes of others, is something that I don't want to waste!

That's the person I've been dreaming about and thinking about day and night!

For her, me, I even did the assassination, and physically took out my heart and lungs. In the end, she was just a marionette in other people's hands. She was all a hypocritical performance for herself, with no real feelings at all.

I'm just the biggest fool for wasting my life.

You Fang lay on the ground, coughing up blood non-stop, extremely miserable.

"If you want to facilitate this matter, these monks also contributed their efforts?"

"Yes!"

"why?"

"Because, because our master gives some incense money to the temple every year, most of the businessmen who come from Hangzhou live in the temple. If there is anything, they will talk to our master!"

Guo Ying nodded, "Okay, that's great! Your master's hands and eyes are in the sky!"

The butler was so frightened that he quickly fell to his knees: "Return, reply to your lord's words, in fact, this is our lord's trick against Yuan court officials before, please forgive me, please forgive me!"

He knelt on the ground and kowtowed.

The woman also knelt down and begged for her life together.

Guo Ying glanced at her, and then said: "I heard that you are pregnant, and the child in your belly belongs to You Fang?"

Lying on the ground at this moment, the dying Yu Fang also pricked up his ears.

The woman was silent for a while, Guo Ying was furious, "Speak!"

The woman still hung her head, unable to speak.

Among those few monks, one dared to say: "My lord, this temptress never refuses anyone who comes... who knows who is pregnant in her belly!"

"what!"

You Fangru was struck by lightning, screaming in pain, suddenly turned his back to the sky, and fell heavily.

From his eyes, nostrils, and ears, black blood gushed out, the expression on his face twitched in pain, struggling for a moment, with endless regret, Yu Fang stared, dead!

Zhang Ximeng watched silently, only asking Guo Ying to ask questions. In his heart, he had already silently reviewed the matter... Speaking of You Fang, he was hateful and pitiful.

He studied hard and wanted to get ahead, and he didn't even have the travel expenses to Jinling.

The Wang family funded him, originally wanting You Fang to enter Zhu's army, and spy on Zhu's army by the way.As a result, You Fang came a step late and missed the exam, and Wang Jue already knew Zhu Jiajun's style, so he chose Zhang Shicheng.

Afterwards, the movement of Zhu Jiajun became more and more serious. Wang Jue was afraid and wanted to spy on Zhu Jiajun's situation.

Coincidentally, when Yu Fang was selected as Zhu Ying's teacher, he instructed his subordinates to deal with Yu Fang in the same way that they used to deal with Yuan court officials...

Poor You Fang, just a little scholar, coming to Jinling to take the exam is the farthest trip together in this life.Not to mention the limited knowledge, the mind is also pure and pitiful.

He thought that all the beautiful things in the world revolved around him, and he was tied down by a small beauty trick.

But then again, is Yu Fang innocent?

He gets confused when he sees beauty, he steals manuscripts when asked to steal, and he does it when asked to poison him... As long as he has a bottom line in life, it doesn't mean he doesn't have a bottom line at all!

Now after drinking the poisonous tea, the seven orifices bleed, and he is pissed off to death. It is his own fault, and there is no sympathy for him.

In fact, Zhang Ximeng got a glimpse of a lot from him.

The Wang family has a big business, is rich and powerful, once attached to the Yuan court, and now they are Zhang Shicheng's guests. It is really too easy for them to buy officials and support scholars.

Subsidizing studies, helping with exams, Yan Ruyu, the golden house, when they embark on official careers, they will definitely reciprocate, and they will charge for the Wang family and protect them from the wind and rain.

This kind of thing happened a long time ago. Isn't the so-called catching a son-in-law under the list just to win over the civil servants in advance!

Later, everyone felt that it was too late to catch a son-in-law under the list. To cultivate talents, they started with studying, and finally they simply set up their own schools to export talents in batches.

That's right, it is Donglin Academy.

Zhang Ximeng felt more and more that encouraging schools, expanding the scale of imperial examinations, and starting from the grassroots... must be so.

After all, only the imperial court has the power to establish a wide range of schools, aristocratic families and businessmen, who can train dozens or hundreds of talents, but cannot train hundreds of thousands or millions of scholars.

On the basis of extensive training of talents, the scale of each imperial examination is kept at a huge number, so it is impossible to buy so many people at once.

And to pass the imperial examination, one has to start from the bottom. Such people do not have much power, and it is completely worthless to buy them.

All in all, as long as the cost of buying civil servants is made infinitely high, it will naturally dispel some people's wishful thinking.

As long as we can stick to this set, it is estimated that there will be nothing wrong with the Donglin Party.

Of course, this is just a long-term plan, and the most important thing right now is this case... Someone actually reached out to Zhu Ying's side, this Wang Jue is really a character!

Together with Zhang Shicheng, although he is not a strong opponent, he should not be underestimated.We must take the opportunity to dig out all the eyeliners hidden in Jinling, and give Zhang Shicheng a head-on blow to let him know how powerful he is...

But just when Zhang Ximeng was about to do a big job, another message came from Suzhou.

This news made Zhang Ximeng unable to calm down. He looked around, thought for a long time, and decided to go to Li Shanchang.

After all, Zhu Yuanzhang is not around, and Li Shanchang has the most power in his hands. They must come to a conclusion on this matter.

After Lao Li read the news, he also had a weird face. He wanted to laugh but it wasn't funny, but he couldn't laugh and felt uncomfortable.

"I'm talking about Zhang Xiang. This Zhang Jiusi took a long time to steal your manuscript. He didn't implement the reform according to your method. Instead, he found a literati to refute your article?"

Zhang Ximeng smiled helplessly, "Maybe he can refute me with confidence!"

"What's the use of refuting you!" Li Shanchang sneered, "What can you do if you talk too much? Which Confucianist can't explain the truth? But who has the ability to work hard and flourish? Your idea is not to say What, it’s that our treasury is abundant, our armaments are complete, our food and grass are sufficient, and the people support us! It’s the food in the Changping warehouse, the armor on the soldiers, and the hundreds of thousands of civilians... that’s what’s really useful!”

Li Shanchang praised Zhang Ximeng without hesitation, which made him a little embarrassed.

However, Lao Li did bring this matter to a realistic dimension. Behind Zhang Ximeng's claim is the powerful Zhu Jiajun.On the other hand, the strength of the Zhu family's army is inseparable from Zhang Ximeng's proposition.

The two complement each other and complete each other.

Because of this, many smart scholars accepted Zhang Ximeng's proposition.

If Zhu Jiajun's achievements were not here, those people would go crazy after reading a few articles, crying to serve Zhu Jiajun, then they would be out of their minds!

"According to Brother Li, what Zhang Shicheng should do most is to learn from us?"

Li Shan laughed, "It's a pity! He can't learn it! It's just that I didn't expect him to help us spread the article... Now Wuzhong's talented scholar has his heart for Zhu Jiajun. Zhang Shicheng has dug his own grave. ah!"

Zhang Ximeng said with a smile, "I think so too, but brother Li needs to make plans early, and scholars from Wuzhong are willing to come, so they have to find a way to settle down."

Li Shanchang nodded, "It's just that, these days I have made a big move and fired many old officials of the Yuan court... Those who obeyed the law and violated the old habits, all of them were dismissed. Speaking of vacancies, I have a lot of them! As long as you can read and write, He also has the heart to accomplish his career, on our side, there is a lot to do!"

Zhang Ximeng just remembered that it was precisely because of Han Xiuniang's case that a large number of officials were cleared from top to bottom... Now that the talented scholars and scholars in Wuzhong want to join Zhu's army, it is perfectly appropriate.

Fearing that we have no talents to use, we send our best talents here. What kind of spirit is this?

"Brother Li, if the lord rules the world one day, I'm afraid neither of us can be the number one hero!"

Li Shanchang was taken aback, "Well, how do you say that?"

"The number one hero, of course, is to destroy his family and contribute, and use his own flesh and blood to strengthen our Zhang Shicheng!" Zhang Ximeng said: "We should send him a great gold talent at that time!"

Li Shanchang couldn't help laughing on his back, "Yes, I want to send a [-]-jin one!"

Chapter 265 Don't Let Me Go

Zhang Ximeng and Li Shanchang got together, and it was much smoother to do things than others. After all, Zhang Ximeng had a good vision and a sufficient structure, while Li Shanchang focused on being pragmatic.When two people get together, they are definitely a perfect match.

Of course, the premise is that their minds are in the same place. If they fight with each other or stumble each other, it will be a different situation.

On the point of winning Wuzhong talents, the two are highly consistent.

First of all, Li Shanchang used Han Xiuniang's case to clean up a large number of old officials in Jinling City.This is just the beginning, and it is foreseeable that the old officials of the Yuan Dynasty in other places will either change their minds or leave immediately... and after they left, they left countless positions that need to be filled.