Wei Jiansu came out full of anger and said through gritted teeth: "The eunuchs are a disaster to the country. The Tang Dynasty must be destroyed in the hands of these eunuchs!"
Fang Guan advised: "Xiangguo, don't be angry. It's true that we didn't grasp the balance in this matter. Li Fuguo caught the excuse and they wanted to make a fuss unreasonably. What's more, now they are holding on to the matter of overstepping their authority. The emperor
I would prefer Li Fuguo."
"What do you know? Even though Li Ye is young, he has mastered the cunning of his grandfather. How can these eunuchs be his opponents! He wants to control Hanzhong, but he clearly refuses to let go of Jing Xiang. He recommended Ji Guangchen and the other three to stay in Jing Xiang.
Xiang just refuses to let go. Now our Zhengshitang can no longer intervene in the negotiations. Li Ye will definitely break through them one by one, which will seriously damage the interests of the imperial court."
Fang Guan said calmly: "It seems that Wei Xiangguo has a deep prejudice against Li Ye!"
Wei Jiansu sighed and said: "As long as Li Ye is as kind as his father Li Dai, I won't care about it like this. Just watch! Once he takes Longyou and Hexi, the court will not be able to pour any water on it."
The emperor will definitely regret it!"
Wei Jiansu left in a rage.
Fang Guan looked at his back and suddenly understood, because Wei Jiansu proposed the plan to replace Longyou and Hexi with Jingxiang. Once Li Ye gained power, the emperor would definitely hold Wei Jiansu responsible. That's why Wei Jiansu was so anxious.
.
Fang Guan secretly thought, 'If I use this incident to bring down Wei Jiansu, will I be able to become the Right Prime Minister again?'
Although Li Heng said that it was just an internal conflict of interests and that the total amount of the Tang Dynasty remained unchanged, he was a little uneasy in his heart. He was also worried that giving too much to Li Ye would ultimately harm his own interests.
Li Heng took out Li Yu's report and took a closer look. He was a little worried and said to Li Fuguo: "General, Li Ye proposed that the three states of Liang, Xing, and Feng be transitioned for a period of three years. Isn't this time too long?
"
"Your Majesty, I also considered this issue carefully yesterday. I found that Cheng Yuanzhen's report was more detailed than Li Yu's report. Cheng Yuanzhen's report mentioned the reason why Li Ye wanted Hanzhong to transition in three years.
Li Ye was worried that Tubo was so powerful that he would not be able to defeat it in a short time and there would be a long-term tug-of-war, so he changed the Hanzhong transition time to three years. In fact, it is understandable that he was worried about the safety of himself and the soldiers' families in Longyou.
Not guaranteed.
Wei Chen considered that if he only used the three states of Hanzhong as a logistics place, it would not be a big problem in those three years. We can clearly write it down in the terms that the three states of Hanzhong can only provide him with logistics, but the Jiedushi Palace cannot be placed there.
Hanzhong, in addition, he is only allowed to station a maximum of 10,000 troops, and he is not given the power to appoint and remove officials from the three states."
Li Heng nodded, "This is called negotiation. It's not one-size-fits-all. It's about the details. What can be given and what can't be given. It must be written clearly in the terms. I will not give the financial rights and personnel rights of the three states in Hanzhong. I will give them to him at most.
The right to garrison troops.”
Li Fuguo struck again while the iron was hot: "The Zhengshitang did not agree with the retention of three officials under Li Ye, Ji Guangchen, Wang Xiaoru and Liu Julin. The old slave believed that the prime minister of the Zhengshitang was too pedantic."
Li Heng was actually a little hesitant. He smiled and nodded, "Why are they so pedantic? General, tell me!"
Li Fuguo sneered and said: "These three people are all officials appointed by the imperial court. They are neither Li Ye's marriage partners, nor Li Ye's former officials, nor Li Ye's family members. What should Zhengshitang be afraid of?"
Could it be that Li Ye's win-win power is greater than that of the Emperor? Your Majesty just needs to use a little trick to give them some sweetness and ensure that these three people will immediately obey your Majesty."
Li Heng nodded, "It makes sense. It is human nature for birds to choose good trees to roost in. I don't believe that I can't compare to Li Ye?"
"Your Majesty is wise, but the rotten scholars in the Political Affairs Hall do not know how to adapt. They think that being Li Ye's subordinates will be detrimental to the court. According to their pedantic thinking, Li Ye's brother-in-law Dugu Jinyang is still the general of the Longwu Army.
Wouldn’t that be more detrimental to the court?”
Li Heng suddenly realized that Li Ye's father and father-in-law were both in the court, so what did he have to worry about?
He laughed loudly and said: "I can make Cheng Yuanzhen accept all Li Ye's conditions. I only have one condition. Within a month, Li Ye must leave Jingxiang and go to Longyou."
Li Fuguo breathed a long sigh of relief, and the 80,000 taels of silver were safely put into his pocket.
Li Ye once again summoned Ji Guangchen and three others separately.
He had just received a letter from Dugu Ming that the emperor would deliberately win over the three of them, so he had to vaccinate the three of them first.
Ji Guangchen bowed and said, "I'm sorry to see you, Your Highness!"
"Ji Shijun, please sit down!" Li Ye waved his hand and asked him to sit down with a smile.
Ji Guangchen sat down with his back straight and a little embarrassed. He was worried that his lord had changed his mind again.
Li Ye pondered for a moment and said: "If the emperor asks you to be loyal, just be loyal to him. After all, he is the emperor, and it is the duty of an official to be loyal to the emperor. But one thing I want to make clear to the envoy is that your first allegiance is to the emperor."
Tang, if the emperor can safeguard the interests of the Tang Dynasty, it is natural to be loyal to it.
But if the emperor is ignorant and unruly, favoring eunuchs and causing harm to the country and the people, then you should have your own choice."
Ji Guangchen said without hesitation: "In this humble position, I am only loyal to His Highness. If Your Highness wants me to be loyal to the Emperor, then I will be loyal to the world. If Your Highness wants me to give up on the Emperor, I will give up decisively."
Ji Guangchen's attitude was greatly appreciated by Li Ye. He smiled slightly and said: "Just write a letter of allegiance to the emperor! I will revise it for you, and you will give it to Cheng Yuanzhen tomorrow."
"I humbly obey orders!"
Sure enough, before the agreement was finally signed, Cheng Yuanzhen had private conversations with Ji Guangchen, Liu Julin and Wang Xiaoru.
Soon, Cheng Yuanzhen received letters of allegiance to the emperor from Ji Guangchen, Liu Julin and Wang Xiaoru, and he immediately reported them to the emperor Li Heng with an eagle letter.
Li Heng was greatly satisfied, and immediately issued an order, conferring Ji Guangchen the title of General Yunhui, appointing him Jiedushi of Xiangyang and Governor of Xiangzhou, conferring Liu Julin the title of General Zhongwu, appointing him Defense Envoy of Jiangxia and Governor of Ezhou, and conferring the title of King Xiaoru on him.
General Yunhui appointed him as the commander-in-chief of the Jingxiang Navy, using Jiangling as the naval base to maintain water security in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River.
Cheng Yuanzhen immediately reached an agreement with Li Ye to move westward, and the court promised to protect the interests of the families of the soldiers who moved westward in Jingxiang, and to protect the commercial interests of Qi King Li Ye in Jingxiang.
At the same time, Liangzhou, Xingzhou and Fengzhou in Hanzhong were allowed to be lent to the Longxi Hexi Army for three years as a logistics base. Ten thousand troops were allowed to be stationed for protection. The army was not allowed to block normal road traffic. The three states had the right to appoint and remove officials.
The power of tax and taxation still belongs to the imperial court.
However, all official and military lands in the three states were allocated to Li Ye as resettlement land for soldiers' families.
Li Heng was even more generous in terms of the powers of the military governors of Longyou and Hexi. He not only gave all the powers that his former brother Shuhan had when he was the military governor of Longyou and Hexi, but also abolished the eunuchs to supervise the army.
Li has the right to directly appoint the governor of Yezhou and the right to recommend the governor of the state.
As for the right to tax Sogdian caravans that Li Ye wanted, Li Heng gave it to him with a stroke of his pen.
Li Heng also gave the Longyou Hexi Army 100,000 sets of armor. In response to the emperor's goodwill, Li Ye replenished the emperor's inner treasury with 300,000 gold coins.
Li Heng was so happy that he immediately gave Li Ye 1,500 sets of heavy armored infantry equipment from the old Hexi Army.
In response to Li Ye's request, the imperial court appointed Li Mi as the chief of the Longyou Jiedu Prefecture, Pei Jia as the chief of the Hexi Jiedu Prefecture, Liu Yan as the transfer envoy of the Longyou and Hexi capitals, and Wang Changling as the supervisory envoy.
After the two parties signed the agreement, Emperor Li Heng appointed Li Dai as the Minister of Rites and the Minister of Rites. It was a hypocritical appeasement!
In return for the emperor's trust, Li Ye officially resigned from the post of Shannan Dongdao observer envoy on the day of the signing of the contract, and also resigned from the post of Jianghan Jiedushi envoy.
He also promised that within a month, all the army would leave Jingxiang and move west to Longyou.
The Jianghan Army of the Tang Dynasty was officially renamed the Hexi Longyou Army of the Tang Dynasty, or Helong Army for short.
It can be said that everyone except Prime Minister Wei Jiansu was very happy. Cheng Yuanzhen left his confidant eunuch Duan Qiaofu to continue to supervise Li Ye's westward movement. He himself returned to Beijing with 30,000 gold coins satisfied.