Chapter 1146: Anomalies

Latest website: "Hmph, Angsa, the blood debt you owe the Great Song, I will reclaim it bit by bit." Zhao Xu held his pen and drew another heavy circle over the location of Aiji.

When one empire rises, another must inevitably head to its grave.

Moreover, the British intervention in the internal chaos of the Great Song increased the difficulty of him eliminating the powerful clans, leading to more Great Song commoners dying in the flames of war.

This account, he has always remembered.

Furthermore, the British also transported the wealth plundered by the powerful clans back to Britain and sheltered numerous remnants of the powerful clans who had fled from the Great Song.

He was very clear about the purpose of the British in taking these people in.

Without a doubt, in the future, these sheltered powerful clan rebels would inevitably serve as the vanguard for subverting the Great Song.

Perhaps, even now, there are already descendants of powerful clans lurking in the Great Song, secretly waiting for an opportunity.

Therefore, for such a sinister foreign empire that would use any base and shameless means, the only thing he needed to do was to beat it down completely.

To achieve this goal, he already had two plans.

The first is the reason he is winning over the Ross nation.

The purpose of this plan is to let the Ross nation disrupt the order of the Western Lands, forcing Britain and the Xitu Guo to divert their energy to confront the Ross nation.

In this way, Britain and other Xitu Guo would be unable to deal with the Great Song with all their might.

The second plan contains two aspects: one is the global trade system he is currently establishing, and the other is mining the overseas colonies of Britain.

Although they are two aspects, the purpose of the overall plan is the same, which is to exclude Britain from the global market established by the Great Song and curb its industrial development.

After the Battle of Tianzhu, he had once thought about temporarily easing the contradictions with Britain and other Xitu Guo, establishing trade relations with them, and securing another market for the industrial products of the Great Song.

But after weighing it during this period, he believed this was completely unnecessary.

The Great Song must firmly continue to confront the Xitu Guo directly.

Because the benefits of confrontation with the Xitu Guo are greater than easing relations.

After all, under confrontation, he can continuously obtain new markets and sources of raw materials by depriving the Xitu Guo of their colonies.

Whereas under eased relations and expanded trade, since the steam industry in the West itself is already very developed, he feared that the industrial products of the Great Song would not be welcomed in the Xitu Guo, the profit situation would not be ideal, and it would instead give them a chance to catch their breath.

Of course, he did not close all doors to cooperation.

Unless Britain is willing to pay war reparations to the Great Song as a defeated nation and simultaneously sign a series of unequal treaties.

However, he believed that the British would definitely not agree.

These conditions are exactly what the British did when they bullied indigenous nations.

Now that the roles are reversed, they would certainly be unable to accept it.

Having firmed up the strategy of "winning over one and striking the other," Zhao Xu's brows relaxed.

For the many years to come, he only needs to continuously execute this strategy until an international order belonging to the Great Song is completely established.

Leaving the study, Zhao Xu, having finished his day's state affairs, returned to the Hougong.

At this moment in Yanxi Palace, Yang Susu, Feng'er, and Luan'er were chatting and laughing together, all three holding a jade-carved, powder-sculpted infant in their arms.

After his eldest son was born, Feng'er and Luan'er had successively given birth to a boy and a girl for him.

Among them, Feng'er gave birth to a girl, and Luan'er gave birth to a boy.

"Tai'er, look quickly, your Imperial Father has returned." Seeing Zhao Xu, Yang Susu held the little Imperial Prince and said to Zhao Xu with a smile.

Feng'er and Luan'er also carried the little Princess and little Imperial Prince in their arms and came up to meet him.

"Come, Imperial Father will kiss each of you." In the imperial court, Zhao Xu is the supreme ruler, but once he returns to the Hougong, he immediately becomes a father, and the family becomes harmonious and happy.

Not long after his eldest son was born, he gave him a name, Zhao Tai, signifying a peaceful and prosperous country.

The little Princess he had with Feng'er was named Zhao Wan'er; this was proposed by Feng'er, and he agreed.

According to Feng'er, as long as it sounds good, it is fine.

Luan'er and his Second Prince were named Zhao Fan.

This name was chosen by Luan'er, and it was done intentionally.

In private, Luan'er told him that she only wished for her son to be ordinary.

Regarding this, Zhao Xu also understood in his heart.

Now that Feng'er and Luan'er are already Noble Consorts, even if they wanted to escape, they could not avoid the political vortex of the Great Song.

Ever since he ascended the throne and the Newspaper published the news of Feng'er and Luan'er being Noble Consorts, Feng'er and Luan'er inexplicably had many relatives pop up.

All sorts of distant aunts and uncles came, all wanting to claim kinship with Feng'er and Luan'er.

Luan'er and Feng'er were bought by the Mi Family; at that time, Luan'er and Feng'er were still young, so how could they possibly know these people?

But these people still had ways, even bringing family genealogies from home.

They found the names of Feng'er and Luan'er's fathers on them.

There were even some officials who, in order to fawn and curry favor, took the initiative to mingle with these newly emerged relatives of the Noble Consorts, hoping to gain wealth and status.

Seeing that the matter was causing a huge stir, after Feng'er and Luan'er discussed it, they only said one sentence to these relatives: "When you watched me being sold to the Agency over a decade ago, from that moment on, I had no relatives!"

It was precisely this sentence that quelled this farce, and Zhao Xu also took the opportunity to have Liu Fu punish those officials who had fanned the flames in this incident.

But after this matter, Feng'er and Luan'er both became somewhat vigilant.

Because in this whole incident, they were both used by some officials.

If they had selfish motives, perhaps a faction would be born behind the Princess and Imperial Prince they gave birth to.

This faction would inevitably be drawn into the struggle with the eldest Imperial Prince, Zhao Tai, in the future.

However, Feng'er was fine; after all, she gave birth to a Princess, while Luan'er was more sensitive.

Therefore, she later stubbornly named her son Zhao Fan.

"The Emperor must have encountered a happy event today to be so happy." Zhao Xu was full of smiles when he entered the courtyard; as husband and wife are of one heart, Yang Susu naturally could guess it.

Zhao Xu nodded; the matter of Persia could indeed be called a happy event.

However, he did not say exactly what the matter was, and Yang Susu did not ask; this was also the tacit understanding between the two: the Hougong does not ask about state affairs.

Zhao Xu took Zhao Tai from Yang Susu's arms and played with him for a while, then chatted with the three of them, before playing with Zhao Wan'er and Zhao Fan for a bit, enjoying a period of laughter and play.

Just as they were chatting, a young eunuch suddenly hurried over and said something to Xiao Guizi.

Xiao Guizi nodded, signaled for the young eunuch to return, and then came to Zhao Xu's side and said, "Your Majesty, the Prince of Chun is on his deathbed. The Empress Dowager has sent someone to invite Your Majesty, the Empress, and the two Noble Consorts to go to the Chun Wang Mansion together to visit him."

"Is that so?" Zhao Xu and Xiao Guizi exchanged a look, a strange glint flashing in both their eyes.

A year ago, there were rumors that the Prince of Chun was unwell, and his condition had grown increasingly severe over this past year.

In Yancheng, this was no longer a secret.

Previously, Zhao Heng had even gone to visit him.

Yet to others, this was merely the normal cycle of birth, aging, sickness, and death for the Prince of Chun.

But to him, there were some other things hidden within it.

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