New year, new atmosphere. In 1041 AD, the first year of the Qingli period arrived.
Historically, the Song and Xia dynasties were still in a standoff. Years of war had made the Song Dynasty suffer, and the price of grain in Bianliang had skyrocketed.
But since the Kangding peace talks last year, the domestic situation has stabilized and food prices have returned to normal.
Zhao Jun has been very busy recently. First of all, as the head of the Political System Council and the second-in-command of the Song Dynasty, he has to attend various occasions.
For example, morning court meetings, year-end sacrifices, New Year banquets, etc., and they also have to go to Kaifeng Prefecture and various departments to inspect and give instructions, review their work in the past year, and investigate the current efficiency of the officialdom.
Then Zhao Zhen chose a marriage for him. She was Cao Wei's youngest daughter, Cao Miaoxin, the cousin of Empress Cao.
It is worth mentioning that Empress Cao’s name was Cao Miaolian.
Cao Miaoxin was born in Cao Wei's later years, in the first year of Tiansheng, that is, in 1023 AD. She is seventeen years old this year and will probably be eighteen in a few months. She barely meets Zhao Jun's requirements.
no way.
Zhao Jun inherited the Zhao family's fine tradition - liking beautiful women.
Secondly, he really cannot accept underage marriage. It has to do with principles and also with his desire for his wife to be an adult and give birth to healthy children.
However, in ancient times when girls came of age at the age of fifteen, or even eleven or twelve, or even seven or eight, it was very difficult to find a beautiful woman over eighteen years old who was not a widow or a divorcee, and who was of equal social status.
As for Cao Miaoxin, she was born into a military family and liked swords, guns, sticks and clubs since she was a child. It is said that she once had a lover, but she beat away anyone who came to propose marriage with a stick. This is why she was still unmarried at the age of seventeen.
After hearing about it, Zhao Zhen told Cao Cong about it. Cao Cong was naturally overjoyed and went to tell his niece. However, Cao Miaoxin was not happy about it. She said that she had been waiting for her lover and did not want to go on a blind date with Zhao Jun at all. As a result, the matter was delayed for several days and it took a long time before she agreed to meet.
It just so happened that Zhao Jun had other things to deal with. Although Zhao Zhen mentioned to him that there was a suitable woman he could go meet, he was delayed by other things halfway and stood up the woman, which was quite unexpected.
In fact, Zhao Jun cannot be blamed for this matter, because he happened to be arrested by Bao Zheng that day. Bao Zheng returned to Bianliang in the fourth year of Jingyou and was appointed as the magistrate of Kaifeng Prefecture by Zhao Jun. He was very diligent and responsible in his tenure. After two years, he was promoted to the position of Palace Minister.
Although he was an eighth-rank censor, he did not underestimate his power. In less than a year, he impeached many colleagues and made himself disliked by everyone.
Originally, this situation would certainly have been suppressed, but he was appreciated by a big boss and was promoted to Censor last year. A year later, he was transferred to be the co-magistrate of Kaifeng Prefecture. His promotion was like riding a rocket, and in four years he went from the seventh rank to the fifth rank.
On the way to a blind date, Zhao Jun's carriage slipped due to snow, and the horse collided with some civilians. He was caught by Bao Zheng who was patrolling the streets at the time.
Bao Zheng didn't care that the boss behind him was Zhao Jun himself. He scolded his boss in the street and asked him to compensate the people for all the losses.
This was very frustrating and delayed the blind date, so Zhao Jun had no choice but to send someone to tell Cao's house to make an appointment next time. Then he went to Lao Fan's house to discuss this year's new policy reforms.
It was the beginning of the new year, the sixth day of the first lunar month, and most officials, except those on duty, were on leave.
Old Fan has been very successful recently. He has just been promoted from deputy prime minister to prime minister. His prestige among the people has skyrocketed because of his two great victories. Now he has become an idol in the hearts of the people of Song Dynasty.
Zhao Jun entered the Fan Mansion and saw Old Fan leisurely drinking tea in the study. In previous years, Zhao Zhen would hold several more banquets and invite civil and military officials to daily banquets, poetry gatherings, etc.
But this year it snowed in Bianliang and it was a bit cold. The Constitutional Court was composed of a group of old men in their sixties and seventies, and people were afraid of causing trouble for them, so they only held one annual meeting and cancelled the subsequent banquets. Everyone just rested at home, which was quite comfortable.
Seeing Old Fan so leisurely, Zhao Jun walked over unhappily and sat on the chair opposite him, with his feet on the edge of the charcoal basin. While warming himself by the fire, he complained, "You seem to be feeling quite comfortable."
"What? Are you feeling unwell?"
Old Fan was not sitting behind the desk in the study. Instead, he had a wooden couch inside with a thick quilt on it. He lay on it diagonally with the quilt covering his chest and below, leaning on the couch to read a book while drinking tea.
He turned sideways, picked up the teacup from the coffee table beside him, took a sip, then put it down, looked at Zhao Jun and said with a smile: "I heard that the emperor chose a woman for you, and she is from the Cao family. Don't you like her?"
“I didn’t even look at it.”
Zhao Jun took the hot tea handed to him by the servant of the Fan Mansion and said, "I'm so unlucky. My carriage slipped and knocked over the people's stalls. I ran into Bao Zheng and he scolded me. It's not my fault, and it's not like I didn't compensate the people."
"Isn't this great? The Kaifeng Prefecture's Vice Magistrate is impartial and fair, and the Director of the Constitutional Council doesn't act like an official, and even though he holds high positions of power, he humbly accepts criticism. You're like Qin Shi Huang playing clones—a win-win situation."
Lao Fan laughed and joked.
Zhao Jun was shocked and asked, "Where did you learn this nonsense?"
"Yesterday, the officials watched the popular science video you downloaded with us. It also included information about a strange little country in Africa. I learned this from that video."
Old Fan said.
Zhao Jun rolled his eyes and said, "Don't read that rat's stuff anymore. He updates too slowly. Before I traveled through time, I waited for several months to get more episodes, but now I see there are less than ten episodes, only two or three episodes a month."
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