Chapter 383

"Liu Jinyi, Liu Jin... is it this blatant?"

An Ziyang flicked his fingers twice on the document.

"With such obvious clues, they might have been waiting for you to find them, and yet I still had to wait for Battalion Commander Mei to communicate with me... Are you all eating too well lately, or have I been too easy to talk to?"

The Company Commanders stood with their heads bowed, silent as cicadas in winter.

One of them mumbled: "Battalion Commander, it's not that we aren't putting in the effort... Battalion Commander Zhu is the only son of the Commander. We are your people, and you are the person of the Chief of the Guard. If we investigate and cause any friction, we are afraid it will make it difficult for the Chief of the Guard in front of the Commander..."

An Ziyang sighed.

That's true.

The root of this matter is that he usually brainwashes his subordinates too much, causing the entire Battalion Command to be like a cult.

Things like being startled, clutching their chests and shouting "Oh my Chief of the Guard," or sneaking to Li Miao's door to steal bricks to grind into pendants to wear on their chests for protection, are no longer fresh news in his Battalion Command.

The advantage is absolute loyalty to Li Miao, but the disadvantage is that whenever they encounter something related to Li Miao himself, these people get a bit dizzy.

Take the current matter, for example.

Everyone in the Embroidered Uniform Guard knows the relationship between Li Miao and Zhu Zai; it's closer than a real father and son.

Don't look at how they tease each other or throw tables on a daily basis, neither having a good face for the other. But if someone really stands in front of this pair... there is no one in the Great Ming that Lord Li dares not kill, and no mess that Lord Zhu dares not clean up.

How could these Company Commanders dare to get involved between these two?

An adopted son investigating a biological son—it's hard to say and hard to hear.

"Forget it."

An Ziyang stood up.

"You go and investigate the background of this Liu Jinyi thoroughly. Dig up the ancestral graves within eight generations, and even do a blood test on the dogs raised at home. If there is even a slight mistake... you know that the Tang Men sent a batch of good things recently, right?"

Several Company Commanders were pale and nodded repeatedly in agreement.

An Ziyang took the stack of documents, left the Embroidered Uniform Guard Yamen, and took a carriage to the Forbidden City. After getting off at the palace gate, verifying his identity, and receiving his tooth plate, An Ziyang walked quickly toward the southeast of the Forbidden City.

After walking for a while, passing through the Donghua Gate, a two-story small building came into view in the distance, three bays wide, with a double-eaved hip roof, covered with black glazed tiles and green edges. On the plaque on the door were written the three large characters "Wenyuan Pavilion."

Wenyuan Pavilion, which is the Cabinet.

This is the center of power in the Great Ming.

If it were before last year, An Ziyang, a small Regular Grade Five Battalion Commander, would not have been qualified to come here. Even Zhu Zai had to be careful and respectful when coming here.

But now it is already very different.

An Ziyang walked to the outside of the Wenyuan Pavilion, glanced at the side, and saw several eunuchs standing outside the door with their heads bowed and eyebrows lowered, as if they hadn't heard his arrival.

Ceremonial Supervision.

The supreme power of the Great Ming can be divided into three parts.

The Emperor, the Cabinet, and the Ceremonial Supervision.

World affairs, when put on paper, are nothing more than a small memorial. Countless memorials are summarized by the Six Ministries to the Wenyuan Pavilion, and the Cabinet gives processing opinions, which is the so-called "ticket drafting." Once the "ticket drafting" is formed, it is sent by the Ceremonial Supervision to the Emperor to form the final decision, called "red approval."

The key lies in this "red approval."

In theory, "red approval" is spoken by the Emperor himself, and the Ceremonial Supervision's writing eunuch uses a vermilion brush to put the Emperor's will on paper, forming the supreme resolution of the Great Ming.

But in execution, not every "red approval" comes from the Emperor's own will. For some "not very important" small matters, it is the same if the Ceremonial Supervision approves them directly.

As for which matters are important and which are not... if the Emperor himself does not ask, it is actually decided by the Ceremonial Supervision.

The phenomenon of "eunuchs holding power" in the Great Ming was born because of this. The Senior Grand Secretary and the Head Eunuch of the Ceremonial Supervision, these two roles lay on top of imperial power, swallowing every bit of power the Emperor himself abandoned, and eventually grew into two behemoths in the Great Ming court.

If the matter of the Imperial Mausoleum hadn't happened, the Embroidered Uniform Guard would not have been able to hold their heads up in front of these two roles.

But now... An Ziyang looked at those eunuchs, and the corners of his mouth slowly curled up.

These eunuchs were each gray-haired and chicken-skinned, standing at the door like puppets, only reacting when An Ziyang got close, raising their dim old eyes to look at him.

Seeing the Embroidered Uniform Guard official uniform on him, these eunuchs suddenly became respectful, bowing to salute.

An Ziyang waved his hand.

"No need. If you are tired, go and rest. As long as there is someone at the door... just go through the motions."

"Yes, yes."

The old eunuch nodded like a garlic masher.

"Is the Commander in?"

"Yes, yes. Just now the Cabinet drafted some regulations, and the slave just sent them down to Lord Zhu."

"Hmm."

An Ziyang nodded and walked into the Wenyuan Pavilion.

The first floor is divided into two rooms. The outer room is for some clerks responsible for summarizing and classifying the memorials sent by the Six Ministries. The inner room is where the Cabinet Grand Secretaries and the Senior Grand Secretary discuss matters.

Seeing An Ziyang enter, the reactions of these clerks in the outer room were different.

Some showed fawning smiles, some suddenly changed color and bowed their heads without speaking, and some showed indignation.

An Ziyang stopped, tilted his head, and scanned those who showed indignation.

One of them suddenly flushed, his lips moving as if to speak. But his colleague behind him reached out and pulled his sleeve, pulling him behind, and smiled at An Ziyang.

An Ziyang didn't care at all and walked up to the second floor.

The second floor is also divided into two rooms, but there was no one in the outer room. An Ziyang walked to the inner room and knocked on the door.

"Come in."

A weary greeting came from inside.

An Ziyang pushed the door and walked in.

"Commander."

Inside the inner room, the floor was covered with documents filled with words, and even some of them were "red approved" memorials that could be used as imperial edicts if placed outside, all thrown randomly on the ground.

And in the middle of these papers was a long table a zhang wide, also stuffed full of documents and memorials, the highest stack being two feet high, swaying and precarious.

In the center of the long table, Zhu Zai was frowning, lost in thought while looking at a memorial in his hand. The ink on the brush in his right hand had already dried, obviously having been suspended in mid-air for a long time.

An Ziyang glanced at the brush in Zhu Zai's hand.

This brush was seven inches and three fen long, with a red jade shaft, transparent as chicken blood, with a gold chimera knob embedded at the top. The brush tip was made of white wolf hair, and the four characters "Feng Tian Cheng Yun" (By the Order of Heaven, the Mandate is Fulfilled) were engraved on the brush body.

This is the "Zhu Bi."

The foundation of the Ceremonial Supervision, the embodiment of imperial power that decides world affairs with one stroke, and also the sharpest and heaviest weapon in the world.

Zhu Zai held this brush, but only felt exhausted.

(End of chapter)