Chu Xiujie realized during his conversation with Chu Junyuan and Chu Maoshi how complicated it was to be a good court official. There were many officials under him who, although loyal to His Majesty, had not done anything that would obviously harm the State of Wei.

However, everyone has selfish motives. Many times, when the decision made by the city lord is beneficial to them, they will actively support it. Even if such a decision has some hidden dangers, they will not take the initiative to point them out, but will choose to ignore it.

And another very uncomfortable thing about doing this is that when there are problems after the decision they made, they can still put the blame on themselves. After all, it was they who proposed the decision, and they were just executing it.

When you try to hold the other party accountable, you'll find that they're not clearly at fault in any way. If you're not careful when making decisions, it's very likely that your decision won't achieve the desired outcome, and you'll even become the target of public criticism when problems arise, while those officials not only reap the benefits but also escape unscathed.

Thinking of this, Chu Xiujie admired Chu Fan, who became the emperor, even more. Before he became the city lord, he would also make various comments on the current emperor of Shengwu Continent or those emperors in history, and believed that if he became the emperor, he would definitely be able to do better than them.

Even in the current Wei State, there are many people who think that Your Majesty is not doing well enough. They think that Your Majesty has let the royal family, the six ministries, and families with which Your Majesty has marriage ties control all the resources, and does not give these small families these opportunities to make money.

Only after I became the city lord did I realize how difficult it is to be a qualified ruler.

Chu Xiujie whispered, "Governing a city is so complex, it's hard to imagine how difficult it is for Your Majesty to govern a country. Furthermore, as a city lord, we only have a few officials to deal with, and we can't even guess their intentions. A country has tens of thousands of officials, and even the court has hundreds of ministers. When these people conceal information from Your Majesty for their own benefit, or even deceive Your Majesty, it's difficult for Your Majesty to see the truth one by one."

Therefore, we often see that the decrees issued by the emperors of many countries in the Shengwu Continent are extremely outrageous."

Chu Junyuan smiled calmly and said, "Indeed, as a ruler, no matter how wise you are, when your subordinates harbor selfish motives, they are likely to be blinded and make decisions that they assume will benefit the people, but in the end, they will only achieve the opposite of what they intended and become a joke."

Chu Maoshi also spoke up, "So as a ruler, we must have a clear understanding and not be fooled by the sweet talk of our subordinates. Sometimes we need to think more carefully before we can know whether a decision is truly beneficial to the people."

Chu Xiujie sighed and said, "This reminds me of something that happened in history. When a country was hit by a drought and local officials requested disaster relief from the imperial court, the emperor at the time actually said: The people have no food to eat, so why don't they eat meat?

It is obvious that as the ruler of a country, he has never tried to understand the real living conditions of the people. He is flattered by court officials every day, who say that the country is very rich every day, so that the emperor is completely unaware of the suffering of the people.

When he heard that the people had no food, he thought that since there was no grain, eating meat would be enough to fill their stomachs. However, he did not consider that if the people could hardly get even basic food, how could they possibly get meat?

This is a simple truth. As an emperor, he spends most of his time in the palace, so all matters are reported to him by the court ministers. When all the court ministers praise the emperor for their own interests and do not report the true situation of the country to the emperor, then of course the emperor cannot make correct decisions.

Chu Junyuan was pleased that Chu Xiujie had figured this out. He then spoke, "That's why I admire our Majesty so much. His Majesty established the Royal Government Affairs Office, which basically handles all government affairs. His Majesty doesn't have to spend too much time dealing with irrelevant government affairs and waste his energy."

Another benefit of the Royal Affairs Office is that, with eleven members, they can often analyze issues from different perspectives, reducing the risk of being misled by individual ministers. After all, seeing the world from multiple perspectives is always wiser than having one person make the final decision.

Even if the princes of the Royal Government Affairs Office were deceived by the ministers and made unwise decisions, the elders of the royal family could stop their behavior. After all, the members of the Royal Government Affairs Office were nominated by the elders of the royal family, and they naturally had the power to dismiss them.

Finally, with His Majesty controlling everything behind the scenes, it's practically impossible for a wrong decision to occur."

Chu Xiujie said, "Yes, I don't know how His Majesty could come up with such a comprehensive and wise policy. His ideas are often difficult to understand without reaching a certain level of status and experience. Your Majesty always manages to think outside the box and examine problems from a fresh perspective. This ability is truly admirable."

Chu Maoshi said, "There are many ministers in the courts of many countries on the Shengwu Continent who believe that the country is only for the royal family, not for them. When they are in office, they deceive their superiors and seek personal gain, but ignore the long-term development of the country and the well-being of the people. Ultimately, this leads to instability in the country.

Although such cases were much less common in Wei, they were definitely not absent. Before the establishment of the Imperial Government Affairs Office, when His Majesty was in court, most of the court ministers were eager to gain greater power and benefits. They dared to exaggerate or conceal the true situation in court in order to confuse His Majesty and cause him to make wrong decisions.

However, after His Majesty executed several ministers and nobles, and the Royal Affairs Office was established, such situations largely disappeared, as His Majesty no longer attended court. The Royal Affairs Office, however, consisted of eleven princes and numerous other staff, who possessed ample energy to investigate the truth behind the incident. This prevented these court ministers from using the "Spring and Autumn" style of writing in their memorials.

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