Chapter 1086

This day was an overcast and rainy day; the rain was not heavy, refreshing the heart and spleen. It took away the dryness of summer and brought the coldness of autumn.

This day was also a good day, suitable for moving.

The time for moving had been set in advance, not a temporary idea. It was drizzling today, which didn't affect anything. If it were a heavy rain... then they would definitely choose another good day.

The Imperial Academy within the Imperial City started getting busy early in the morning, finding many carriages to load everything in the yamen onto the carriages. The future Imperial Academy yamen would be over at the academy outside the East City.

After a year of construction, mobilizing a large amount of manpower and material resources, the previous few academies could be considered to have been initially completed. But it was only initial construction, reaching a level that could be used. Subsequent construction still needed to continue; after all, there were many functional buildings, many active personnel, the scale of the buildings was naturally large, and Wang Yan had also added the construction of some wonders. At the construction speed of this time, it would take three to five years to be completely built...

Wang Yan stood under the eaves avoiding the rain, watching the officials in the yamen busy with the students, feeling extremely leisurely.

Just at this time, several eunuchs walked in with hurried steps.

"Minister Wang, the Emperor's oral decree, let the Minister go to the Prince of Runan's mansion to check on the Prince's body."

Wang Yan stood with his hands behind his back, asking with a smile: "What happened to the Prince?"

The eunuch said: "The Prince could not eat or drink the day before yesterday, and the imperial physician has also seen him, but there is still no way. Minister Wang's medical skills are brilliant, and even the great physicians of the Imperial Hospital are ashamed of their inferiority. Therefore, the Emperor sent us to convey the decree, asking the Minister to go to the Prince's mansion to take a look."

"This official knows; I will go over now."

"Then I will trouble the Minister to make a trip, and we will return to the palace to report." The eunuch bowed to Wang Yan very politely, and then took people away from the Imperial Academy yamen that was about to become a thing of the past.

Wang Yan gave some more instructions before setting off to the Prince's mansion.

At this moment, the Prince's mansion felt sadness as soon as one entered.

The servants in the mansion walked quickly and lightly, and their heads were all lowered. The Prince's mansion, which used to be relatively orderly, now looked chaotic, with people's hearts wavering. Even though Wang Yan had visited many times, he did not see many female family members, all of whom were walking around outside.

Being led all the way to the backyard, Wang Yan saw Zhao Zongshi and Zhao Zhongzhen sitting beside him. Both father and son were very silent, silently watching the people who cared about them.

"Seen the Great General, the Heir." Without Zhao Zongshi asking, Wang Yan said, "The Emperor's oral decree, let the subordinate come to check on the Prince's body."

Zhao Zongshi nodded: "Please."

Wang Yan bowed and turned to enter the bedroom.

Zhao Yunrang's bedroom was not very large, but there were many people inside, a bunch of women and children crying for the dead here. There were too many people gathered in the room, and the windows were not opened, resulting in the air not being too good as soon as one entered the door. It was not a strange smell that made one vomit, but the scent of rouge and powder, which could make people dizzy, and it could not be called how fragrant this smell was.

Zhao Yunrang lay on the couch, eyes open, looking straight at the ceiling, completely ignoring the buzzing in the room.

Wang Yan cleared his throat, and seeing that everyone's eyes were on him, he waved his hand: "Everyone go out."

"You..."

"All get out!" Without waiting for others to waste words with Wang Yan, Zhao Yunrang shouted angrily, still with plenty of strength.

The group of people in the room did not dare to say more, looked at Wang Yan a few times, and walked out in a swarm.

Wang Yan walked over to open the window, and then sat down on the low stool by the couch.

Zhao Yunrang laughed: "Did Zhao Shouyi send you to see if I am dead or not?"

"Let the subordinate come to see the Prince's illness."

"Heh..." Zhao Yunrang smacked his lips, and spat a mouthful of thick phlegm onto the ground, "Ziyan, do you think I am ill?"

"Life is not long; why must the Prince be stubborn?"

This was the situation the two had spoken of before; the current situation is very clear, just waiting for Zhao Yunrang to die, and Zhao Zongshi will be crowned Crown Prince. After going around in circles, it returned to the original history.

Who can this be blamed on? Blame it on Zhao Zhen for not listening and not having the ability. The palace is such a big place, he cannot control it; he only abstained from sex for half a year, nourishing his essence and storing water, in order to better reproduce the true colors of the chicken brother, and he cannot control it either. So walking to this step today, Zhao Zhen cannot blame others; he can only blame himself.

Zhao Yunrang laughed and asked: "Then do you think I can still be saved?"

Wang Yan also laughed: "Seeking benevolence and getting benevolence; why does the Prince seek death himself and say such things? It's just that starving oneself to death is too much suffering."

"There is no help for it; I cannot die too fast, and I cannot die too well... Does Ziyan have a way?"

"No. Even if I had a way, I couldn't give it to the Prince; in the future, when the Great General becomes Emperor, the subordinate still has things to do. If someone finds out and digs up this matter, saying that the subordinate poisoned the Prince, wouldn't the student have to accompany the Prince early?"

"Is this watching me about to die, and saying some heartfelt words to me?"

"The subordinate has always spoken the truth."

"Then tell me, when will my son ascend the throne?"

"Still cannot say." Wang Yan shook his head with a smile, "In the future, when the Great General reaches his twilight years, and the Heir asks the subordinate the same, what should the subordinate do?"

"Hmph, if you don't say it, then don't say it; anyway, he won't live long either, at most three to five years; I will go first and wait for him." Zhao Yunrang is naturally unconvinced by Zhao Zhen.

He waved his hand and asked instead, "Your medical path is profound; do you know how many days one can live without eating or drinking?"

"One can live for half a month without eating, but only seven days without drinking."

"How do you know?"

"When I was in the Northwest, I had the army physician use captured Western Xia officers for experiments; after death, they were skin and bones, very miserable."

"Are you scaring me? I have been trapped in this capital and enjoyed myself for a lifetime, tired of delicacies, tired of fine wine, tired of beauties. It's just that I didn't become Emperor in this life, and my thoughts are not smooth; fortunately, my son can succeed, which can be considered fulfilling my wish..."

Zhao Yunrang's words were full of unfinished meaning, but his attitude was very firm; he just wanted to die. In fact, reaching this step, he had to die.

He let out a long breath and said, "You are now a great Confucian in the world, a literary master of a generation; back then you said you wanted to write a rhapsody for me to praise me. Now I am about to die; this time you should write a funeral oration for me properly."

"I will write it when I return to the mansion in the evening, and have someone send it for the Prince to take a look."

"Where is there a living person who looks at the funeral oration written for himself? I won't look! It's the same looking at it later. You go." Zhao Yunrang waved his hand in disgust.

"Prince, go well on your way."

Wang Yan stood up, bowed solemnly to the end, then looked at Zhao Yunrang, and turned to leave.

Zhao Yunrang looked at the ceiling again, and he sighed, lingering for a long time...

Zhao Zhen sent Wang Yan over to check on Zhao Yunrang's illness, which was to find Wang Yan to endorse it. Zhao Yunrang died of illness, not because of any other reason. Although the qualified ministers in the court knew, and the unqualified officials understood, his, Wang Mou's, endorsement was not for them to see, but to be recorded in history, for later generations to see, protecting the clear names of Zhao Zhen and Zhao Zongshi.

Wang Yan kept his word and wrote the funeral oration for Zhao Yunrang that evening, and had someone send it to the Prince's mansion the next morning. Zhao Yunrang still couldn't hold back, read it himself, and replied to Wang Yan that it was well written!

Thus, half a month passed, and the Prince's mansion sent a letter that Zhao Yunrang had died.

Wang Yan attended the funeral and sent the funeral oration again on the spot, and then there was no then; people were dead, what then could there be.

One month after Zhao Yunrang died, Zhao Zongshi was established as Crown Prince and appointed as the Mayor of Kaifeng. And at this time, the huge Prince's mansion had also been dismantled, and the people had scattered. Old Zhao had many sons, and this time they all divided the family. Zhao Zongshi also took his wife and children, and the whole family moved into the palace.

One of the two major events of the current Great Song had been resolved, so the other matter that had been on the agenda early on naturally proceeded simultaneously.

Attacking Western Xia before did not make the Great Song, which had already become wealthy and had sufficient money and grain, pay any price, and it could still well support the expenditure and consumption of the war. So after the autumn harvest, the war had already started in the north.

The situation of the Khitan was not much better than Western Xia. They indeed had many people and many troops, but the interior was also very chaotic, and internal friction was very severe. After being beaten out of the frontier and losing many people, although the father and son Yelü Chongyuan, who usurped the throne, still had the strength to barely maintain their ruling position, they could not gather and concentrate their strength to exert organizational advantages. Internal infighting was equally serious, and everyone was fighting for power and grabbing profit.

And the power of Yelü Chongyuan and his son was barely enough to maintain their ruling position, so the people being ruled naturally began to listen to the proclamation but not the adjustment. They said yes to everything, but absolutely did not do the work.

After all, the Khitan that remain now are foreign tribes of the tribal system, Khitan, Mongol, etc., and their recognition of the central imperial court is not that strong. When everyone could happily win battles and share the fruits, it was naturally invincible. But now they could not win, and instead were beaten out. The originally large plate was half gone, and there were still so many people dividing the benefits.

This caused everyone from top to bottom to be for themselves, and no one was contributing to their collective interests.

Being beaten out of the frontier has been five years to date, and these five years were enough for them to collapse themselves. Not to mention that in the Northwest and the grasslands, they have been conscientiously implementing the strategy set by Wang Yan over the years, continuously weakening the Khitan. The current Khitan is not much stronger than Western Xia.

If they were to be divided further, and some people were promised some benefits, it would be even simpler.

The Great Song monarch and ministers had long been rubbing their hands, waiting for this unprecedented merit, to make the Great Song even greater!

So one year after the destruction of Western Xia, in the autumn of the fifth year of Jiayou, the Great Song assembled an army of 400,000 and launched an attack on the Khitan from the west and north.

They did not seek success in one battle; after all, the winter in the north is too cold, and the consumption of the army fighting is a bit high, and the initiative of the war is in the hands of the Great Song. Under such circumstances, risking one's life to fight the Khitan, who were destined to perish, was not worth the loss.

So they started fighting after the autumn harvest, and when winter came, the army could not bear the freezing, so they retreated and stayed put. When spring came and the ice melted, they took advantage of the time before spring plowing to continue fighting. After spring plowing was finished, they continued to fight.

In short, the war was normalized, and they fought the Khitan whenever they had the chance. In this way, it would not take a few years for the Khitan to be wiped out.

Wang Yan has always been a person who gets things done, and he has always been generous to his subordinates who lean towards him. So this time attacking the Khitan, and fighting in a normalized way, there was too much merit. So he sent Gu Tingye, who had just gotten married, to the Northwest to fight with his old subordinates and make progress together.

His own life was no different; anyway, they didn't give him any other assignments, just pinning him to the position of the Imperial Academy. He was not in a hurry, just steadily making some small changes; one or two were inconspicuous, but if he changed many, it would be subversive.

The academy outside the capital was being perfected bit by bit, and the students were increasing day by day; with the commercial street built along with the university, it also changed from being deserted to being crowded with tourists.

This is the power of time; as long as you operate with heart on the right path, time will not let down those who have expectations for it. But time is not so popular, because it makes people mature and it urges people to grow old.

In the spring of the seventh year of Jiayou, after more than a year, although the Khitan regime had not been thoroughly wiped out, the Khitan regime had been destroyed, making it completely scattered. The territory of the Great Song also expanded to the entire grassland area and also expanded to the Northeast region.

The war was fought to this point, and it was considered finished. War is a means, not an end. The remaining Khitan people could no longer form a climate. They had to rely on the Great Song for trade to survive and had already been controlled by the Great Song.

The Great Song also implemented Wang Yan's policy towards ethnic minorities; although it was indeed a bit too good for ethnic minorities, it was an effective means. In the past wars, the foreign soldiers recruited by Wang Yan all played a significant role. And after settling down to production, they also truly increased output and prospered the economy. These were all clear data, visible growth.

Zhao Zhen also achieved his wish and completed the unfinished merit of his ancestors. As for the remaining Dali and Jiaozhi, he was willing but lacked the strength. He had already given up the idea of attacking them and began to lie on the merit book waiting to die.

He had aged more and more severely in these two years, and his physical condition had plummeted. Wang Yan had checked him, and he was basically heading towards the end of his life.

Compared to Zhao Zhen, Fan Zhongyan, who had fought for the Great Song all his life, had truly reached the end of his life.

In the Fan mansion, Fan Zhongyan, lying on the bed, looked in very good spirits. There was no one else in the room, only Fan Chunren and Wang Yan.

He smiled at Wang Yan: "Sitting on the cold bench for several years, do you have any complaints?"

"Naturally not; it's not that I couldn't do things at the Imperial Academy."

"That is true; the Imperial Academy is getting better and better under your management." Fan Zhongyan said, "In fact, I also agreed to let you be at the Imperial Academy. The tree that stands out in the forest will be destroyed by the wind; your merit is too great, and you are too young; this is not good."

"Student understands Fan Gong's painstaking efforts. Teaching steadily at the Imperial Academy is much better than implicating the family."

"You are an understanding person."

Fan Zhongyan shook his head and smiled, then sighed: "In this life, I have experienced many ups and downs, but if I have to say it, the last ten years were the best. However, I also know that the results of today's reforms are all superficial and far from touching the roots. But destroying Western Xia and the Khitan, and watching my Great Song become wealthy and strong, this life is enough for me. What I haven't finished, I will have to rely on you in the future.

I see that the Emperor's health is not very good these two years; when the new monarch ascends the throne, you, Wang Ziyan, will definitely be reused. I, I have to urge you one more time: be steady in doing things, and never be eager for quick success. Although you have never failed in your actions, it is too dangerous and leaves no room for maneuver. People, how can everything be perfect? If you are not careful, you will lose your life. You are in your prime, with plenty of time; take everything slowly."

Wang Yan nodded with a smile: "Fan Gong's instruction is correct; student will definitely be careful in the future."

"Alright, I've nagged you so much. Previously, when the Prince of Runan passed away, you wrote a funeral oration for him, and I think it's very good. I heard he even saw it himself? You, Wang Ziyan, are now a great Confucian of a generation; write one for me too. I can still take a look; if I'm not satisfied, I will scold you. Alright, I've seen you, I have no regrets in this life, very good. You go, come and see me off tomorrow..."

Fan Zhongyan waved his hand with a smile; the so-called wise man knows his fate, he had already summarized his life long ago, and he also saw death very clearly. Not to mention that he lived ten more years and did many great things, he was satisfied, had no regrets in this life, and faced death very calmly. And he passed the baton for a greater Great Song to Wang Yan.

"Student pays respects and bids farewell to Fan Gong!"

Wang Yan stood up and bowed respectfully and solemnly.

Fan Zhongyan raised his hand with a smile: "Go, go, let me talk to my family properly. Chunren, see Ziyan off."

"Ziyan, let's go." Fan Chunren, with red eyes, stood up.

Wang Yan took one last deep look, turned around, and walked out of the room with Fan Chunren.

"Alright, Brother Yaofu, you can stop here." Wang Yan patted Fan Chunren on the shoulder.

"Many thanks, Brother Ziyan; if it weren't for you, my father wouldn't be where he is today."

"Fan Gong treats me very well; I treat him with the etiquette of a student, why do you need to thank me. Go back quickly."

After saying that, Wang Yan turned around and left with his hands behind his back, swaying.

Fan Zhongyan's passing was just a beginning. Those people from back then are all old now, and they will leave one after another in the next ten years or so; this is something people cannot escape. But the Great Song without these people seems a bit boring.

Wang Yan naturally did not have too much sorrow for the spring and autumn; although Old Fan left, making him inevitably have some overflow of emotions, it was not a big deal; having seen too much life and death, he had long been numb.

He was a person who had escaped birth, old age, sickness, and death to a certain extent, but he had also lost a lot...

When he returned to the mansion, the first thing he did was to write a funeral oration, thousands of words, writing about Fan Zhongyan's life and praising Fan Zhongyan's achievements. After writing it, he had someone send it to Fan Zhongyan to see, and the reply was that Fan Zhongyan was very happy, laughed out loud, and had a very high evaluation of it.

The next day, Wang Yan received news from the Fan mansion that Fan Zhongyan had passed away, and he went to see him off.

In the following half month, Fan Zhongyan's funeral arrangements were settled one after another.

Posthumously awarded Grand Preceptor, posthumously titled Duke of Chu, posthumous title Wenzheng, and honored in the Imperial Ancestral Temple.

Fan Zhongyan is gone...