Chapter 820 All Thirty-Six Stratagems are Knowledge
Several people were talking in the inner room.
A palace maid's anxious voice came from outside: "Madam Prince, please allow me to inform her before you go in..."
"Smack!"
A crisp slap rang out from the outer room.
Immediately afterwards, the beaded curtain rolled, and a woman dressed in gold and silver entered.
"The newly promoted palace maid by the Queen's side has no manners whatsoever. Such a servant should be beaten to death and thrown out." After entering, the Princess Consort not only did not bow, but also seemed rather arrogant. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Yesterday we had distinguished guests, so there were some things that were inconvenient to ask. Today I have come specifically to ask the Queen about Tinggu."
Tinggu was the old woman who was ordered to be drowned by the Queen on the way.
When she ordered Tinggu's execution, the Queen anticipated that Prince Alexander would send someone to confront her.
She had already prepared her words and began, "I remember at the beginning of the year, several servants in Prince Alex's mansion committed insubordination and were sentenced to death by the Madam. Similarly, since Aunt Ting has offended my dignity, it is not an exaggeration to say that she deserves to die."
Lady Dowager had not expected the Queen to be so assertive. She said coldly, "Tinggu is the cousin of the Prince's wet nurse. The Queen is doing this without any regard for the Prince's reputation."
"Did I hear that right?" Cheng Wanwan suddenly asked. "Does the Empress Dowager have to consider the whims of a prince when dealing with a mere servant?"
Lady Junwang then noticed that there were other people in the inner room. She recognized the woman as Lady Sui from the Great Yu Kingdom. She was fluent in the Asab language, which was why she had come on a diplomatic mission with the court officials of the Great Yu Kingdom.
Discussing such trivial matters in front of the people of Daewoo seems to affect relations between the two countries.
Lady Alex smiled and said, "Lady Sui must have misheard. What I meant was that the Queen should hand over such a trivial matter to Prince Alex to handle, so that no one would dare to offend the Queen's dignity in the future."
She stepped forward, leaned close to the Queen's ear, and lowered her voice, "I'll assume for now that those four palace maids outside killed Tinggu. I urge Your Majesty to deal with those four maids as soon as possible. Otherwise, once the people from Dayu Kingdom leave, things won't be so simple."
After saying that, she turned and left the inner room.
The queen's face turned ashen, and she barely managed to suppress her emotions to avoid losing her composure.
"Mother, please don't be angry," the prince said gently. "These days will soon be over, please bear with it a little longer."
Cheng Wanwan sighed, unsure of what to say.
The Queen's actions were indeed frustrating; even an outsider like herself felt extremely annoyed.
She handed him a cup of tea: "Your Majesty, have some tea to cool down. I'll take the prince to see the strategist of the Great Yu Kingdom first."
The Queen, holding her teacup, forced a smile and said, "Alright, thank you for your hard work, Wanwan."
The people of the Great Yu Kingdom were housed in the palace, in a side hall on the far west side. The ministers lived in the main hall, while the attendants lived in the side rooms.
The servants in the courtyard were all maids and attendants brought by the ministers, but the guards at the entrance of the side hall were Asab's palace servants.
These gatekeepers are clearly Prince Alexander's spies.
"Greetings, Your Highness." Shen Dongming greeted him respectfully at the entrance of the side hall. "I drank Asab's fine wine yesterday, and I still savor the taste. This wine is extremely strong, and my Great Yu Kingdom cannot brew it. May I discuss with Your Highness the method of brewing this strong wine?"
Cheng Wanwan translated these words, speaking in a voice that was neither too loud nor too soft, enough for the palace guards at the gate to hear.
The prince nodded: "The royal family has a brewery. I spent several months there and happen to know a little about it. I'll have someone send over some different spirits so that I can drink and chat with Lord Shen."
Shen Dongming laughed loudly: "Excellent, excellent."
The prince turned and gave instructions to the servants at the palace gate.
The palace servants didn't sense anything unusual and obediently went to fetch the wine.
More than a dozen jars of strong liquor were moved into the main hall, where several ministers and princes of the Great Yu Kingdom sat down and drank together.
Fifteen minutes later, the people inside had drunk too much and were behaving somewhat uncontrollably, so the servants of the Great Yu Kingdom quickly closed the doors of the main hall.
Although the door was closed, the sounds of drinking and merrymaking could still be heard.
The palace servants guarding the door shook their heads. His Highness the Prince never drank alcohol, but he was going all out to win over the people of the Great Yu Kingdom.
However, with Prince Alex around, the prince's tricks were no match for him.
Inside the main hall, there were indeed people drinking, but they were now guards from the Great Yu Kingdom.
A group of ministers went into the inner room.
The group sat around a low table on the ground. On the table was the list that the prince had written earlier, which Cheng Wanwan had translated into the language of the Great Yu Kingdom.
The two advisors sent by the Emperor are Lord Yang and Lord Bi. Many years ago, they were just the Emperor's staff. Because they made excellent suggestions during the struggle for the throne, the Emperor directly appointed them to official positions after he ascended the throne. Now they are officials of the second rank and important ministers in the court.
Lord Yang held the list, his expression grave: "Prince Ali's men are mostly high-ranking officials of the first or second rank. Prince Ali controls all the important official positions in the court. It will be difficult to reverse the situation."
Shen Dongming said, "The king's seven confidants, although they are also second or third-rank officials, are in charge of farmland and water conservancy. They have no real power, which means they can't help at all."
"Not so, not so." Lord Bi stroked his beard. "On the surface, Prince Alexander's men do seem numerous, but in reality, their connection with Prince Alexander is not close. Prince Alexander and the King are from the same clan, and to be on the safe side, he has not promoted any of his blood relatives. Moreover, the members of the Prince's wife's family are all incompetent and useless, so Prince Alexander has not promoted them either... Without blood ties, these people are only bound by interests. Those who can be bought with interests can naturally be divided with interests as well."
Lord Yang nodded: "In that case, this matter isn't actually that difficult... These officials practically have greed written all over their faces, so winning them over should be relatively easy. Also, these three officials are fond of beautiful women, so using a honey trap should be able to turn them against their masters. There are also counter-espionage schemes, empty city stratagems, and chain schemes. We can also try using someone else to do the dirty work, trapping the thief behind closed doors, and taking advantage of someone's misfortune..."
The ministers of the Great Yu Kingdom were discussing the matter with great interest.
The prince, listening to the translator beside him, grew increasingly dumbfounded.
He thought he had read a lot of books, but after seeing this today, he realized that he hadn't read enough, and that he had never heard of so many strategies before.
He quickly took out paper and pen and carefully wrote it down.
"Our purpose in coming here is to regain military power. Even if we can win over all the civil officials, we still won't be able to wrest military power from Prince Alexander." Lord Bi pondered for a moment before speaking. "We have ways to defeat the ministers in court, but how do we divide and conquer these military personnel who have followed Prince Alexander for more than ten years?"
Everyone began to think seriously.
They were all civil officials and not very familiar with the military system, so they couldn't come up with any good solutions in a short time.
Seeing that no one spoke, Prince Victor finally spoke up: "Among the military, the person most trusted by Prince Alex is Military Advisor Milia."
Lord Bi immediately circled the name, and the paper also contained some basic information about Strategist Milia.
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