Translator – Xiao He Lian
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Chapter 52.1
After Lu Yan left, Zhou Shuan pondered for a long time. Who would have thought that the Heir Apparent of the Zhenguo Duke Mansion would also hide a delicate woman, it was no other than the third young lady of the Shen Family whose whereabouts had been a mystery.
There are so many people looking for the third girl of the Shen family in the capital right now, but there are only a few people in Chang’an who can protect her.
He couldn’t confirm that there was anything going on between the two of them, but when he mentioned the third girl of the Shen family, the unabashed possessiveness in the eyes of the eldest son of the Lu family proved his suspicion.
After a while, he chuckled.
Although Jingzhao Prefecture does not belong under to the Three Divisions1 (The three-division trial is a trial system in ancient China . The ” Three Divisions ” are the three main central judicial organs in ancient China.In the Tang Dynasty, the Minister of Justice, the Imperial Censor, and the Grand Councilor of the Dali Temple were appointed as the Three Officials (referred to as the “Three Officials” in the Tang Dynasty); During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the Ministry of Justice, Dali Temple, and the Imperial Censorate were the three legal departments. in the event of particularly serious cases, the Three Law Departments would conduct a “round trial” together with ministers ), it is in charge of the public security and governmental affairs of the 22 counties in Chang’an. Although the rank of a Magistrate is only of fourth rank, his power is not small.
Since Lu Yan was transferred to Jingzhao Prefecture, many wealthy businessmen in Chang’an began to think of bribing him in order to make some profits and use the yamen as a convenience.
It’s easy to bribe other officials but how could the eldest son of the Duke of Zhenguo and the son of the eldest princess care about that little money? So those people invariably focused on his women.
There are many clean and self-sufficient men in this world, but obviously there are more who cannot resist the temptation.
The most famous case of them all, was the incident when the youngest son of the Sun family in the capital committed a crime, and the case fell into the hands of Lu Yan. In order to save the life of his youngest son, the Sun family went through a lot of trouble and offered Persian beauties and other countless beauties to Lu Yan.
To ensure that Lu Yan would fall for at least one of them, there was also a Taoist nun among the beauties.
But what was the result?
Not only was the youngest son of the Sun family sentenced to exile, but even the Persian beauties were sent off.
Many people in the court knew about this matter. And everyone knew that Lu Yan was not attracted by beauty and his reputation for being impartial and righteous was also gained during that time.
When he heard a while ago that Lord Lu had a confidante in the Pingkang brothel and he felt that it was strange that such an arrogant person would go to a brothel to have fun.
But today his doubts were cleared up.
The person in the brothel was a shield and the one he wants to hide, even at the expense of his reputation, was another person.
As for Shen Shu…
It turns out that Lord Lu, who is righteous and impartial also has a selfish side.
——
Lu Yan left Zhou Mansion and the carriage was heading towards Chengyuan when someone suddenly stopped the carriage.
Yang Zong stepped forward to inquire. After a moment, he turned around and opened the curtain of the carriage. “Master, the person who stopped the carriage was someone from the Duke’s Mansion. He said that the East Palace sent a painting to the Duke’s Mansion.”
Lu Yan frowned, “What painting?”
“Wang Yunzhi’s masterpiece. The visitor also said, “His Royal Highness personally said that he owes you a favor.”
After a long moment of silence, Lu Yan nodded and said, “Let’s go back to the Duke’s Mansion.”
Recently, the entire imperial court has focused its attention on the East Palace.
The ban on the East Palace was withdrawn and the crown prince “politely” sent all the previous medical officers back to the Imperial Hospital, leaving only Bai Daonian. In just a few days, the coughing sound that shook the East Palace every night has been alleviated.
What this means was thought-provoking.
Lu Yan nodded and turned the ring on his hand and whispered: “You go and inform her later that I have a lot of things to do tonight and won’t come back.”
Yang Zong said: “I understand.”
——
Back at Suning Hall, Lu Yan thoughtfully looked at the painting in his hand and couldn’t help but tap the table with his index finger, saying, “Call Fu Qi over.”
Yang Zong bowed and said, “Yes.”
An hour later, Fu Qi opened the study door and said: “Heir Apparent.”
“What’s going on in the East Palace?”
Fu Qi said: “Heir Apparent’s prediction was right. After the Emperor appeased the East Palace, His Royal Highness re-investigated the case of the Chengxi Canal. He said he wanted to find the first draft of the construction plan of the Chengxi Canal. During this time, he also went to the Imperial Censorate.”
Lu Yan raised the corners of his lips…. sure enough.
The Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of War, and the Imperial Censorate are all the territories of the Crown Prince. Once the Crown prince regained power, the first person he would save would be his right-hand man, Yunyang Marquis Shen Wenqi.
He will not let go of the Ministry of Industry.
Although Yunyang Maquis was a bit pedantic and rigid, he had to admit that he was a rare practical person in the officialdom. Without him, the agriculture and water conservancy of Jin Dynasty would not have flourished to this extent.
Since Marquis Yunyang was promoted to Minister of Industry three years ago, the Jin Dynasty’s hydraulic control, flood control and land drainage capabilities have far exceeded those of other countries.
Every early summer, the water level of the Yellow River will be low. But there will be heavy rains during the seventh and eighth months during which it was impossible for the embankments of the Yellow River to control the floods while irrigating crops at the same time.
Looking back to those previous years, it is unknown how many times floods have occurred, but in the past few years when Yunyang Maquis was in charge, floods have indeed never occurred.
The Emperor praised the work plans drawn by Marquis Yunyang more than once and these contributions were all recorded under the name of the Crown Prince.
Usually, for a senior official like Yunyang Marquis, a project with his approval should never have such a big accident…
Upon careful consideration, the possibility of problems with the blueprints was extremely high.
Otherwise, the Crown Prince would not have knelt at the door of Tingzheng2(The hall where the emperor listens to administrative affairs) Hall to ask for justice for Yunyang Marquis. Who wouldn’t understand the principle of being wise and protecting oneself?
However, the collapse of the Chunxi canal not only hindered the transportation of goods, but also the war ahead was also affected. When the Emperor was so angry, there was really no room for maneuver.
T/N – Hiii Everyone. The drama for the this chinese novel was released recently.(Low key excited but I won’t be watching it for now😋😄 Cuz me don’t wanna spoil the novel). I genuinely didn’t know there was a drama in the making for this when I first decided to translate this novel. I really loved this story and I want other avid readers like me to enjoy it as much as I did hence why i decided to translate. But later I realized there was a drama in the making and I was excited (hopefully it will carry the original essence of the novel)😅😅😅. kekeke Have a nice day!
Next update is on Wednesday next week. Sorry for the slow updates😓🙏.