“It’s difficult.”

Facing his best friend Liu Ziyu who had returned from Xiangyang, Zhang Deyuan, who was sitting on the ground under a green tree by a small river in the west of Nanyang City, opened his heart to the wine in the cool river, just like he did to Zhao Ding and Hu Yin when they were displaced. "Ziyu, you don't know that in the eyes of outsiders, I, Zhang Junxu, am the Chief Censor, the so-called position of half a prime minister, and the most trusted person in the government. I should have been satisfied long ago, but in my position, I am neither up nor down, neither forward nor backward, and it is difficult to do anything..."

Liu Ziyu grabbed a pear, took a bite, but said nothing.

"Yan Xiu, please don't disbelieve me." Zhang Deyuan probably understood the other party's mentality, but explained seriously. "I just want to ask you one thing. You said that the sun is shining here, the flowers are red and the trees are green, it is the peak of early summer scenery, it should be the time for scholars and officials to drink wine and write elegantly, why are there only two serious officials sitting here? You just came back from your meritorious service, and the government granted you a special leave, what about me?"

Liu Ziyu then put down the pear and thought for a moment: "Is Deyuan saying that the rest of us have work to do and can't rest?"

"Of course." Zhang Jun sneered, raised his cup and drank, then raised his hand to list them. "I will imitate our emperor's manner and list them from beginning to end... Needless to say, the four ministers at the top, the emperor passes notes every day, assigning tasks to the ministers one by one. If the task is completed, they will tick the note and hang it in the hall. If the task is not completed, they will make an exception and still hang it in the hall. If it is delayed, the emperor will go to the hall every day and slap the table, asking in public whether a certain minister has a few notes that have not been handed in today... The secondary capital is in a hurry, the main hall, the meeting hall, the capital hall, and the Privy Council are all integrated, and everyone is watching, which minister can not go all out?"

"I knew about this in Xiangyang." Liu Ziyu also shook his head and smiled when he heard this. "The three-line minister Lu Haowen, it is said that Lu Xianggong is busy with the work of opening, dividing and reporting the notes every day, almost stealing the work of Lan Daban; the pile-of-notes minister Xu Jingheng, Lu Xianggong handed all the difficult and important government affairs to him, so that he had a pile of notes in his arms, and there were not many that could be handed in; the Guanxi minister is Yuwen, Yuwen is in charge of the major affairs of the Western Army, but the situation in Guanxi has not been completely settled, so the Guanxi notes are often interrupted, and then the hall is full of them; the proud minister Wang Boyan, who is in charge of the rest of the military affairs, is often efficient, so all his notes are ticked, and the hall is full of them, and he is very proud recently."

Zhang Jun shook his head more and more: "Even so, who wouldn't want to hang a note themselves?"

"Indeed." Liu Ziyu also became serious. "You and I were just joking in private. If we really talk about it, who wouldn't want to do things like you gentlemen? Just like what I said just now, except for Xianggong Lu's slight ridicule, the other gentlemen, no matter if they are more involved or more distracted, or if they fail to complete their tasks, everyone in the world seems to know that you gentlemen are doing things one by one, not just sitting there doing nothing. But Deyuan... you must be only 31 years old!"

Zhang Jun nodded slowly, but then shook his head slowly: "Yan Xiu, if that's all, then of course I'm greedy, but now among the close ministers, I'm the only one who's idle..."