The entire palace was controlled by the people brought by Song Wan. Li Shi remained in a coma. The Empress Dowager woke up in the past two days after being struck by lightning, but she became crazy and kept shouting that she wanted to poison the Queen and that the position of Queen must be hers. Her voice was so loud that the eunuchs and palace maids passing by could hear it.
Before long, the Empress Dowager's crazy talk spread quickly, and even the storytellers in the capital began to process it artistically and tell it as a story.
The first one to do this was a restaurant that was about to go bankrupt. Due to serious operating losses, it owed a lot of foreign debts that it could not repay. So it decided to give up and became a storyteller. It even changed the names of the rumors that had been circulating in the capital recently and embellished them, telling them as a book.
The restaurant owner thought at the time that if he couldn't pay the money, he would die, and if he offended the royal family, he would also die. Since he was going to die anyway, he might as well give it a try. As a result, the restaurant was saved by his chance, and the debt was slowly paid off. The most important thing was that he didn't lose his head.
This made the owners of other teahouses and restaurants eager to try their luck, and within a few days they began to secretly follow suit.
In the past, every time a new emperor came to power, a large number of so-called traitors would be demoted or executed, and the lives of ordinary people would often be affected. This time was very different. The capital was very peaceful. Except for those dignitaries who were trembling with fear every day, the common people found that their lives were still the same as before. They didn't see any storytellers in the teahouses, and they were fine.
As long as it doesn't affect their lives, few people are willing to care who sits at the top.
For ordinary people, the most important thing is to have a stable life and fill their stomachs.
Now, some officials who had served under Li Shi when he was still the Prince of Xiang were trembling with fear. They saw with their own eyes that the people around the future new emperor stuffed Lord Wu Liao's mouth with a smelly sock and hung him at Changle Gate for three whole days. It was a complete disgrace.
It was Song Wan who asked Song Qi to hang someone. She originally wanted to hang Li Shi on the city gate, but Wei Xuezhi and Xu Ziwei once again agreed that no matter how serious Li Shi's guilt was, he was still the son of the late emperor and had sat on the throne. They couldn't do it too openly, otherwise it would affect the young prince's future.
So Song Wan had no choice but to settle for the second best and kill Li Shi's lackey Wu Liao.
Gu Yan said anxiously that this was called killing the chicken to scare the monkey. With Wu Liao's previous experience as a warning, other officials should carefully consider whether they can accept such an outcome before doing anything.
As for Li Shi, he stayed behind. Gu Yan hurriedly told Song Wan that she could do whatever she wanted in private.
Song Wan did nothing about the crazy queen mother. She just locked her and the mentally normal mother of Prince Yu in the same yard and did not allow them to come out.
As the saying goes, three women make a play, but Song Wan felt that two women might be enough. She heard that the palace maids and eunuchs guarding the courtyard could watch the play for free every day.
The new emperor's coronation ceremony will be held in October, so not only will the Ministry of Rites have time to make arrangements, but Song Wan and Gu Yanji will also be able to send letters to Xinzhou and Qiandi in time.
The family of Linyuan Marquis Xu Shen and the family of Ping'en Duke Yao Guangyuan were all arrested and imprisoned.
The people who arrested them were part of the 5,000 people that Song Wan brought back from Guizhou. As for the Royal Guards and Defense Battalion that had been beaten and surrendered, Song Wan disliked them because they were too weak and not skilled enough. She planned to wait until Song Yi and the others arrived before planning how to train these 100,000 people.
With Gu Yu's ascension to the throne, the seal on the door of the former Weiyuan Marquisate had been torn off, and a plaque of the Marquisate was hung again.
Song Wan went to see it. The mansion was quite large. She also found the courtyard where the original owner lived. There was a huge pond there. No one had taken care of it for two years and it had dried up. Only several thick layers of silt remained at the bottom.
After gesturing the approximate area of the pond, Song Wan called Song Qi and asked him to find a group of people to clean up the silt underneath.
Song Qi thought she wanted to repair the pond, so he said, "I'm not familiar with the craftsmen in the capital. How about I go to the Wei Mansion and ask?"
"What kind of craftsmen are you looking for?" Song Wan was puzzled. "Why don't you just go and call Niu Tiedan and a few other strong men over?"
"All they do is eat and fight, how could they possibly build a pond?" Song Qi thought, the eldest lady's yard must be rebuilt by a famous craftsman, otherwise it would not be worthy for the eldest lady to live in it.
"Who said I was going to build a pond?" Song Wan wanted to knock him on the head. "I asked you to find someone to dig out the silt. Why would you build such a good place? Of course it's for storing gold and silver!"
Song Qi: “…”
He was careless.
He actually forgot that in the eyes of the eldest lady, money is more important than anything else, and only the second son of the Gu family might be able to compete with her occasionally.
Song Wan continued to talk about her plan, "When the time comes, we'll surround the area with iron walls all around and at the bottom, leaving only one exit. We'll also build a pavilion or something on top to keep them out of the rain."
Song Qi wrote them down one by one and promised to complete them.
"Or we should find another craftsman like you mentioned." Song Wan thought for a moment and said.
"Miss, have you changed your mind?" Song Qi breathed a sigh of relief. He had just said that it would be great to plant lotus flowers and raise goldfish in a nice pond. But using it to hide silver sounded weird.
"Of course not!" Song Wan didn't expect Song Qi to still be determined. Could he be thinking about growing flowers and raising fish? "The sheds you build are all ugly. Find a professional to build a beautiful one that will be worthy of protecting the silver in the pond."
Song Qi: “…”
It has been two years since Song Wan came here, and this is the first time that he has openly searched a house. Gu Yan is anxious to accompany Baozi to the palace to deal with all matters, and Gu Wu temporarily replaces the leader of the Imperial Guards to protect them closely.
So the hard work of confiscating the property fell on Song Wan. She said that she didn't mind doing more of this hard work.
However, since Song Qi was the only one left by his side, the speed of confiscating the property had to be slowed down a lot, so Song Wan also dragged the former imperial guard Wei Lin over.
Among all the Royal Guards, he was the only one who could barely stand up and should be able to carry two boxes at a time.
Wei Lin hadn't expected to be alive. After all, he was once the emperor, err, the secret guard and commander of the imperial guards of the King of Xiang. Shouldn't he be tortured and questioned by all means to see if the King of Xiang had any other hidden forces? At least, they should have treated him like they did Wu Liao.
So now they just dragged him over to help search the house?
As Song Qi untied Wei Lin, he asked, "How many bags can you carry at a time?"
Wei Lin didn't understand. "How many bags?"
Song Qi motioned him to look ahead and boasted, "My eldest daughter can carry ten bags at a time!"
Wei Lin looked in the direction he pointed, and saw the eldest lady Song Wan he mentioned, dressed in red, with a relaxed look on her face and walking towards them briskly. She had a long golden whip on her shoulder, and tied to the whip were at least six or seven bulging numb bags. Her free hand was holding two or three bags.
Song Qi continued, "I'm telling you, if you can't even carry two bags at a time, my eldest daughter might not want you anymore. Then I'll really have to send you to clean the toilet."
When Wei Lin heard the words "clean the toilet", the corners of his mouth twitched.
He thought of Wu Liao, who was now cleaning chamber pots in Yuzhou and was hung on the city wall for three days before being taken to the palace to clean toilets.
"We can carry it!" Wei Lin said immediately, "Three bags will do!"
Song Wan walked closer, took off the sack on his body, and dropped it at Wei Lin's feet with a bang, as if even the ground was shaking.
"Miss!" Song Qi shouted.
"What are you standing here for?" Song Wan glanced at Wei Lin, "Hurry up and get to work! If you don't empty the mansion before sunset, you won't have dinner tonight!"
"We'll give you food after we move?" Wei Lin's scalp tingled from being stared at, but he still mustered up the courage to ask, "The kind that's filling?"
To be honest, before he was arrested, he never thought that one day he would be starving. He was only given a bowl of porridge with salty and slightly smelly pickles bought from somewhere. He had had enough.
"That depends on how much you've moved. I don't want to keep useless people here!" Song Wan said sternly, "Remember, put the gold in one bag, the silver in another, and the remaining jewelry in last."
After getting the answer he wanted, Wei Lin's enthusiasm was immediately raised. He carried four bags on the first trip and surpassed Song Qi.
Song Wan expressed her satisfaction. She said to Song Qi, "This Wei Lin is okay. Don't lock him up in the dungeon and waste food. You can take care of him from now on."
"Okay!" Song Qi was quite excited. He now had younger brothers.
The group, including Song Wan, went back and forth for several hours and finally emptied the Linyuan Marquis Mansion before the sun was about to set.
Wei Lin was so tired that he was sweating profusely and couldn't even straighten his back. Song Qi was very satisfied with this younger brother. He worked hard and his martial arts skills were decent, not worse than his previous self.
Song Wan looked at the endless carts and said, "I didn't expect the salary of a marquis to be so high!"
After hearing this, Wei Lin quickly explained, "Miss Song, the salaries of court officials are not that high. They are usually private properties of the marquis' mansion, such as banks, fields, shops, etc., which will generate a considerable profit every year, but..."
Song Wan tilted her head, "But what?"
Wei Lin hesitated for a moment, but finally replied, "But for a mansion like the Linyuan Marquisate, which has only been prosperous for over a decade, to have such a large fortune, I believe there must be corruption involved."
"So he's a corrupt official!" Song Wan suddenly realized, "It seems that corrupt officials in the capital are much richer than those in the local areas!"
Song Qi agreed, "After all, the capital is under the emperor's feet. If you want to smooth the relationship, you need to be more covert, and the money you ask for will naturally be more than other places."
"I originally thought we could finish moving both mansions today, but it turns out we only have enough space for one." Song Wan looked regretful. "We'll have to continue with the Yao family tomorrow."
Dozens of carts were lined up from the gate of the marquis's mansion to the entrance of the alley, which was quite spectacular.
The cart was surrounded by layers of enemies. Hearing that a high-ranking official's house was searched today, many people nearby took a break from their busy schedules and tried to look into the alley.
To get from Linyuan Marquis Mansion to where Song Wan lived, one had to pass through the main street. When the people of the capital saw so many carts full of gold, silver and jewelry, they gasped. How much had been embezzled?
Song Wan only took the existing gold and silver as labor fees. She did not want other jewelry, jade and real estate, which were the money houses, fields and shops that Wei Lin mentioned. She would leave them all to Baozi to enrich the national treasury.
Song Wan is not stupid. If he wants to live a peaceful and happy life, he must ensure that the salaries and food supplies of the soldiers at the border are not reduced at all.
Along the way, Song Wan sat on a cart at the head and received a lot of stares. At the same time, she also saw what the real capital was like.
The noodle stall owner with patches all over his body but still smiling, the patient who was kicked out of the clinic because he had no money to treat his illness, and the beggar in the corner who was about the same age as A Yu but dark and thin.
Song Wan sat on the silver and looked at them, and suddenly wondered if they were like herself before, not having enough to eat every day.
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