Chapter 108

While the Crown Prince was chatting with Master Mingde, Yinzuo went to find the young monk in the temple and asked him to recommend some Buddhist scriptures for calming the mind.

When the prince came over, Yinzuo couldn't help but say with regret: "Did we finish the conversation so soon?"

Yinzuo looked at the crown prince and then at the abbot Mingde, trying to read something from their faces, but the abbot's face was as kind as ever, and Yinzuo had no way of judging anything from the expression on his brother the crown prince's face.

While sitting in the carriage, Yinzuo couldn't help but ask, "How did the conversation between the Crown Prince and Master Mingde go?"

"Did you gain anything?"

Yinzuo's eyes were clear and bright. He looked towards him and asked him with concern.

The prince pointed at the scriptures and asked Yinzuo, "What do you want to ask?"

The prince's power has been growing in recent years, and his eyes are more and more like Kangxi's, giving people a sense of unfathomable depth. However, in front of Yinzuo, he is still the close and good brother most of the time.

But now with this question, with a penetrating gaze that seemed to see through everything, Yinzuo did not dare to act rashly and felt guilty, as if he was being interrogated.

Yinzuo sat down and confessed honestly: "Well, I just feel that the prince has too many things on his mind. I think the prince is impatient and confused, and it will hurt his health over time."

Yinzuo picked up the scriptures and said to the prince, "I think there are some things we can learn from fourth brother's copying of scriptures and his calmness."

"Look at how bored Fourth Brother is, but he hasn't gotten sick after being bored for so many years. Isn't this all thanks to the effort he made from copying the sutras?"

"Brother Prince, do you think it is relaxing to chat with Master Mingde? If you think it is okay, we can come again later. The environment inside the temple is also good." The temple, it seems, can make people calm down a bit when they arrive at this place.

The prince's heart was in turmoil as he listened to Yinzuo's words. Yinzuo was indeed not wrong, he was impatient and confused. He had been taught self-discipline and self-control since he was a child, but after suppressing self-control for so long, he sometimes even developed a violent rage that wanted to destroy.

He is under pressure from the Emperor above, watched by his brothers beside him, and has a group of vassals but also the so-called prince's faction who are under his control. There will never be a day in the year when he can let go of all these and truly relax.

Ever since his brothers were granted titles, they have been more and more involved in the affairs of the court. Yinreng sometimes wonders that in the former Ming Dynasty, the princes had no real power, but in their dynasty, the emperor also followed suit and established a crown prince, but his brothers were all trained in the upper study. Each of his brothers has real power, and their influence is growing. How can he feel at ease?

Naturally, he also developed his own power. The feeling of having power in his own hands made him feel at ease, but it also made the Emperor father wary.

In the past, he felt that the Emperor was dissatisfied with him and promoted his brothers to temper him, but now he increasingly feels that the Emperor may have wavered in his heart. After all, except for him, the other brothers are not that bad.

The prince did not think that chatting with a monk or copying Buddhist scriptures could cure all this anxiety and restlessness.

However, the prince only raised his eyebrows and said to Yinzuo: "It is enough to have your fourth brother who loves to copy Buddhist scriptures. I am the prince, and it is not good to have another prince who studies Buddhism."

Yinzuo opened his mouth and said, "Alas, the position of Crown Prince requires a lot of consideration."

Yinzuo whispered, "We kept it a secret from others."

"If that doesn't work, we can go and look at Taoism, which is actually not bad. We can also look at our Shamanism, or Lamaism is also OK."

“They should all have similar content.”

It doesn't matter which religion it is, as long as it is useful, he can donate silver to build a golden statue.

The prince couldn't help but laugh at Yinzuo's words and said, "What nonsense! People will never know what we are doing."

Yinzuo said confidently: "It is just that my brother the Crown Prince is concerned about the various religious doctrines of our Qing Dynasty."

Yinzuo decided to go back and started to take action.

The prince helplessly flipped through the Buddhist scriptures and said to Yinzuo, "Master Mingde does have some Zen principles, and it would be helpful to listen to them." But in the end, he could not save him.

"I will also take a look at these scriptures when I return."

Yinzuo was very happy to hear this: "As long as it's useful." He went back and arranged for the golden statue to be placed in the temple.

When the prince saw Yinzuo’s happy look, a warm feeling flowed through his heart.

The Emperor's father also gradually drifted away from him. The prince knew how rare and precious it was for one person in the royal family to remain pure and innocent.

The prince also didn't want to add more troubles to Yinzuo because of his own affairs. Why drag both of them into the vortex of bitterness and troubles when one of them can live a simple and happy life?

But even if the prince wanted to hide it, how could he hide it?

A few days after returning, Yinzuo collected Taoist scriptures as he said, and excerpted some teachings of Shamanism and Lamaism and sent them to the Eastern Palace.

Yinzuo felt that the prince looked a little better, and he was very happy. He also gave the prince many suggestions, such as he could pick up polo after not playing it for a long time, and exercise is good. He also asked the prince to spend more time with his niece and nephew, and bring them to the amusement park in his brother's house to play, and the adults could also have fun...

Yinzuo looked at the children playing in the garden and pushed the prince over, "Go play with them. They all want to play with you, too."

"I have put my official duties aside, so don't think about anything else now."

"There is no one else in the garden, so you won't lose face."

There was indeed no one else, it was just Yinzuo who secretly drew the picture of the prince playing with the child. After reading it in the study, he did have some talent.

Two days later, the painting was given to the prince. In the painting, the prince was playing on a seesaw with a child. Well, it must have looked a little inappropriate.

Before the prince's expression changed, Yin Zuo hurriedly said, "I'm not trying to make fun of you, brother. There is only one copy of this painting. Here it is. I haven't shown it to anyone else before you, brother."

The prince was not at ease with Yinzuo's virtue. Although this younger brother made people feel soft and warm most of the time, he was also naughty and liked to tease people, and sometimes he would make people want to beat him up.

So the prince asked suspiciously: "Then why did you draw it?"

Yinzuo did not mind the prince's distrust of him. He pointed at the painting and said, "I just wanted my brother the prince to see me smile. I wanted to preserve the scene for my brother the prince."

"I hope that when the prince sees this painting again, he will be able to recall the happy mood he had at that time."

The prince no longer had any speculation about Yinzuo. He was so touched that he reached out and touched Yinzuo's head.

Yinzuo returned from the prince's visit, thinking that the prince seemed to have relaxed when playing with his nieces and nephews, so he should be fine.

If a person does a little bit better, it will become better and better! Sometimes it is also good to learn from the Buddhist and Taoist teachings of detachment and letting go.

Anyway, Yinzuo took many approaches and tried every possible way to make the prince less worried and less depressed.

The effort that Yinzuo put into the crown prince was also noticed by others. When the Seventh Prince came to Yinzuo's place for dinner, he wanted to persuade Yinzuo a few words.

He himself had a foot disease and was even very inferior when he was young. Now that he has grown up and is living a good life, all his ambitions are to earn a higher position for his mother and to leave better titles for his children and grandchildren. As for bigger ambitions, he has never had any.

It was also because of this bystander mentality that he could see things more clearly than others. The current political situation was very chaotic. Yinzuo could have stayed out of it like him, clean and invincible. Why bother getting involved too much?

Yinzuo didn't know what the Seventh Prince was thinking, but he felt that he seemed to be hesitant to speak, as if he had something to say.

"What's wrong with Seventh Brother? Is there anything you can't say to me?" Yinzuo asked.

The Seventh Prince stroked his teacup and said, "I'm thinking about how Xi'er will go to school when he grows up. If I hire a teacher in the mansion to teach him, it won't be good for him to learn alone."

"Besides, now that he can speak, he should see more people and not be kept in the mansion all the time."

"He actually likes to come and play with Sixth Brother."

"As for the children of my fourth sister and eldest sister, as well as the children of my third and fourth brothers, if they can play together, and receive their enlightenment and formal education in the future, I think it will be much better than keeping them alone in their own homes."

Yinzuo listened to what the Seventh Prince said. At first he didn't understand what his seventh brother meant, and just nodded along with what the Seventh Prince said.

But then I heard the Seventh Prince say: "The technical college run by the Sixth Brother is very good. It also conducts some small experiments, which are also very interesting. And the Sixth Brother's amusement park is also very attractive to children."

So, what does it mean?

"Sixth brother, can you see if we can gather our children together and set up an academy as well?"

The Seventh Prince did not say what he was going to say. He thought that considering the Sixth Prince's concern and affection for the Crown Prince, the Emperor and his brothers, and the Sixth Prince's inability to stay out of it, it would not be of much use to say it, so he might as well use other things to distract the Sixth Prince's attention.

Yinzuo had no idea of the Seventh Prince's ulterior motives. He almost jumped up when he heard the Seventh Prince's proposal.

"Seventh brother, are you kidding me? When I was in the study room, the emperor repeatedly criticized me for being lazy. After I left the study room, I was severely impeached. My academy is now said to be heretical and cannot be accepted in the upper halls of society."

"If I come, won't all our seedlings be destroyed?"

"If it were the Emperor, I wouldn't be able to do this."

The Seventh Prince found it funny and asked, "Why?"

The Seventh Prince looked at his Sixth Brother Yinzuo with a filter. He felt that there were many people who could read the Four Books and Five Classics, but it was rare to find someone like his Sixth Brother who could always bring something different to the Qing Dynasty. Why did he have to learn the same old thing? If his son Xier could be like his Sixth Uncle when he grew up, what would be wrong with that? Very good!

The Seventh Prince said this to Yinzuo. He had known for a long time that his seventh brother always liked to glorify himself, but Yinzuo still blushed when he heard it. Alas, there was nothing he could do. His younger brother just thought that he was the best.

Yinzuo felt that his seventh brother was much better at flattering people than he was, and now he was being flattered by his seventh brother to the point of being dizzy.

(End of this chapter)