Chapter 282: Inside and Outside the Palace (Thirty-four) 'Deal!'
"Since it is Rushengwan, I wonder if Yuma can make the emperor's son take it?"
As soon as Xu Lingjiu said these words, Li Wenjin's expression immediately changed. His hand holding Rusheng Pill shook and he almost dropped the pill.
Then he calmed down, held the pill and showed it to Xu Lingjiu, and said, "Do you want our family to feed this pill to the emperor's son? Okay, but... you eat it first and let us eat it."
How about taking a look at home?" Then he handed the pill in his hand to Xu Lingjiu.
"Hahahaha." Xu Lingjiu laughed, then took the pill under Li Wenjin's stern gaze, threw it into his mouth, his throat rolled, and it seemed that he had actually taken it.
But Li Wenjin obviously didn't believe it. He was also a man who had seen the world, so he deliberately asked: "How does Mr. Xu's medicine taste?"
Xu Lingjiu smiled and said, "Medicine is medicine, and it naturally tastes like a holy pill."
Li Wenjin snorted softly and said: "If this pill is like that pill, the emperor's son would have to take it for several days. It is enough to get it from the imperial hospital. Why should Mr. Xu be so eager?"
At this moment, Li Wenjin could tell from Xu Lingjiu's words that he had indeed swallowed the "Rusheng Pill" alive. It can be seen that this medicine should be non-toxic. However, from the perspective of purpose, there must be something wrong with this medicine.
Otherwise, why would you, Xu, change the medicine?
"People don't tell secrets, Mr. Xu, since you and the people behind the scenes want to cooperate with our family, you naturally know that our family is almost always open to money, but our family must also say it first... No matter it is
This kind of transaction, our family must know the details, and we can't be sold to help others count the money." Li Wenjin stared at Xu Lingjiu and said coldly.
Xu Lingjiu still looked harmless, raised the porcelain bottle in his hand, and said: "Yu Ma should have noticed that this medicine is exactly the same as Rusheng Pill. No matter the shape, color, smell, or taste, they are all the same."
No difference and no toxicity.
Of course, Yu Ma has doubts in his mind, which I can understand. Today I might as well explain it more clearly: Even if this medicine is handed over to the Imperial Hospital for testing, or if any ordinary person is allowed to try the medicine, it will never cause discomfort, let alone
Said he was poisoned."
Li Wenjin's mind was racing, and at the same time, he subconsciously reached out for the porcelain bottle, poured out the Rusheng Pills inside, and observed it carefully in his hand.
He looked and smelled it, not only pinched it, but even cut one in half with his fingernails and looked at the cut surfaces carefully, but he still couldn't see anything wrong.
Then he thought about it again and finally realized that Xu Lingjiu's words just now were very suspicious - "Or let any ordinary person try the medicine."
Why did Xu Lingjiu insist on specifying "ordinary people" to take it? Is it not toxic for ordinary people to take it, but children with jaundice should not take it?
If this is the case, then other pharmaceutical ingredients must have been added to this pill. Otherwise, how could it change the properties of the medicine and turn Rusheng Pills, originally used to treat jaundice, into a medicine that cannot be taken if jaundice occurs? However,
Obviously, the added ingredients do not require a large dose, and are probably colorless and odorless, so that the fake ones can be mistaken for the real ones.
Li Wenjin suddenly felt that the power behind this matter was so great that even a man who often prided himself on being brave felt a chill on his back. The chance of newborns getting jaundice is indeed very high, but if he thought about it in advance, he would
It would be too deliberate to prepare a drug that looks common but is actually different to harm him.
It can only be said that the person who promoted this conspiracy must have been preparing for this matter for a long time. The plan is not only interconnected, but also difficult to distinguish between true and false.
They had previously used themselves to obtain Kunning Palace's garrison defense plans and time rotation schedules, thus dragging themselves onto the pirate ship. After they were already involved in it and it was impossible to distance themselves from the relationship, they would throw out another plan.
They "cooperated" and gave the specially-made "Rusheng Pill" to the emperor's son to take to achieve their goal.
Since this bottle of "Rusheng Pills" is of great importance, they also know that they will definitely have concerns, so they have already planned to make the pills so fake that even the hospital may not be able to detect any problems, so everyone
All suspicions were eliminated.
Under this situation, even if the incident comes to light in the future, since the cause cannot be found out in the end, even if the emperor's legitimate son dies, it will probably be regarded as an accident and God's will, and no one will be responsible for it.
The only problem is...
"Mr. Xu, we don't care what happens to this bottle of medicine for now, but we must remind you: you must know that the emperor's legitimate son will call us uncle no matter what."
"Two hundred thousand taels." Xu Lingjiu didn't hesitate at all, and actually made a quotation directly.
Li Wenjin's heart skipped a beat, but he grunted, turned his head, and said indifferently: "As far as our family knows, the palace has already prepared everything for the crown prince's canonization ceremony."
"Two hundred and fifty thousand taels." Xu Lingjiu said.
"Our family also heard that the emperor was very satisfied after asking Gao Rixin to help build the three main palaces. Now he is planning to ask Gao Rixin to help rebuild the Zhongcui Palace so that the crown prince can have a separate life in a few years.
You don’t have to stay in Kunning Palace all the time.”
"Three hundred thousand taels." Xu Lingjiu said again.
Li Wenjin smiled and calmly said: "I remember, the imperial concubine went to bed yesterday..."
"Three hundred and fifty thousand taels."
"By the way, does Mr. Xu know that Queen Mother Rensheng has been in disharmony recently? Although she has not improved in the past few days, she goes to Kunning Palace to see the emperor's legitimate son every day. As soon as she comes out of Kunning Palace, she is in high spirits.
It will be very good..."
Xu Lingjiu said without blinking: "Four hundred thousand taels."
Li Wenjin's breathing was obviously a lot heavier. He thought about it for a while and finally said: "We remembered something again..."
"Li Yuma." Xu Lingjiu shook his head and waved his hand to stop him: "Let's do this. The price is five hundred thousand taels. Can't we say more?"
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! "Deal!" Li Wenjin slapped his thigh: "Our family will accept this matter - are you sure this medicine really can't be found?"
Xu Lingjiu showed a confident smile: "If it can be found out, Li Yuma, you are in a bad situation, but I and the princes behind me, aren't they even more doomed?"
"Well, that's the truth." Li Wenjin nodded and agreed with this statement.
He really thought so, because the medicine was so similar to Rusheng Pills. Even if the incident really came to light, he could pretend that he had taken Rusheng Pills for the emperor's son. With his special status, he could say so.
Maybe he can really get rid of the suspicion, but in the end, the worst thing is that "although he can avoid the death penalty, he cannot escape the living crime."
For Li Wenjin, as long as the death penalty can be avoided, "living crime" is not a big deal. As long as his sister, Queen Mother Li, is still in Cining Palace, this living crime can at most have some symbolic meaning and will not make him suffer at all.
How much pain.
Five hundred thousand taels! What is this concept? A cow in the capital costs only eight taels of silver, and the monthly salary of a first-grade official in the imperial court is only more than sixty taels. [Note: But the more officials you get, the more you get, take Gao Pragmatic as an example
, he is the Taifu, the Grand Scholar of Wenhua Palace, the Minister of Household Affairs and other positions can each receive a salary. Of course, among them, the Grand Scholar is only of the fifth rank, and although his status is high, his salary is very low.]
If this kind of "small money" comparison is not interesting, then it may be more obvious when you look at the warships of the Beijing-China Liangyang Fleet: a single armed transport ship costs 55,000 taels, a single second-class cruiser costs 120,000 taels, and a single first-class cruiser costs 16
Ten thousand taels, a single third-level battleship costs 240,000 taels... Even Jinghua's current most expensive battleship, a second-level battleship, costs only 350,000 taels.
Five hundred thousand taels can already be used to build nine armed transport ships, which can be directly formed into a sea trade fleet. The firepower is even so powerful that it does not need escort in 99% of the sea areas in the East and Southeast Asia - unless the two ocean fleets want to beat it.
If we add the previous two hundred thousand taels, we can build almost thirteen armed transport ships. How can we say this scale... If we were to go to Japan now, the Japanese navy, which was crippled in Korea, would probably not dare to fight.
In order to bribe Li Wenjin, the Jiangnan plutocrats actually spent 700,000 taels, which shows their huge investment this time. Such a huge investment also shows that they really will not give up until they achieve their goals this time.
At this time, Gao Pragmatic didn't know that the emperor's legitimate son was already in danger. He had a lot of things to do now. Leaving aside the public and private aspects of the three strategic directions, the accounts of the Ministry of Accounts, which was about to close this year, had to be settled again, and there were still many things to do.
Next year's fiscal budget includes both revenue and expenditure, and the workload is huge.
Although clearing accounts and making budgets do not require a highly pragmatic and hands-on approach, in terms of income, he always has to explain a lot of changes that may occur next year, which requires summing up with the officials below. As for the expenditure budget, it is even more troublesome, and he has to communicate with various ministries.
The courtyard yamen are arguing one by one.
Any yamen hopes that its budget will be bigger and bigger, but the Ministry of Accounts will do the opposite, giving as little as possible, lest the revenue will not be as large as the expenditure and create a deficit.
Although the financial system of the Ming Dynasty has gone through several rounds of highly pragmatic reforms, it is obviously still far from the level of later generations. In essence, it is still based on the principle of "living within your means". Therefore, for things like deficit, it is the same as
It's almost like seeing the god of plague. You can avoid it as far as you can.
Being pragmatic in managing finances also has something in common with war. I like to keep a "reserve team", that is, try to leave enough flexible funds to prepare for emergencies. This makes the household department always have to do it at the end of each year.
Many officials in the Ministry of Revenue have made rapid progress in the skill of eloquence when engaging in verbal battles with other bureaucracies. They are all able to quarrel with other scholars, and they also have the aura of "even if there are thousands of people, I will go".
That day, he had just led some of his subordinates to argue with the Ministry of Works for two hours. It was already lunch time, and he was about to take a temporary "truce" to fill his stomach, when he suddenly received a secret report from his servant.
When he opened it and took a look, Gao Pragmatic couldn't help but frown.
I saw only one line written on the secret report: The royal horse came to Guangjinfang again this morning, for a total of one hour and two quarters, and his face looked happy when he came out.
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ps: This chapter was a bit difficult to write. At first, I looked up the prescription for a long time... then I thought that if I made a mistake, it would be better not to write it, so I scrapped the 1k draft. Finally, I thought that it would be less.
