novelraw Chapter 230
Chapter 230
Chapter 230: The Stingy, Troublemaking Old Father
Before it got dark, in front of the city gate, Wei Yu and his group entered Ji County.
They rented an inn and settled there.
Although Wei Yu was quite curious about the situation on Yi Shisan’s side, when compared with Ding Facai’s situation, Wei Yu felt it wasn’t that urgent.
After all, the plague might just wipe out a large area. Since there was no result on that front, Wei Yu temporarily didn’t bother going to the prefectural capital.
After all, there was no plague over there, and what other matters were left? Couldn’t Yi Shisan handle them alone?
Wei Yu felt reassured and just wanted to have Fang Sheng contact Yi Shisan in the coming days.
While Wei Yu settled in Ji County, the Third Prince on his side was again silenced by his own scheme.
A sensible Imperial Physician who was supposed to summon reinforcements for the clinic—after going out once, simply didn’t come back?!
If Tan Lin had something happen to him and couldn’t return, that would be understandable, but the one who came back to report was claiming it was the Ninth Highness who had abducted Tan Lin… Without the clinic’s Imperial Physician and even the reinforcements taken away, the Third Prince was nearly laughing outrageously from frustration.
It was only because Wei Yu had come up with a plan to persuade many people to donate money, significantly reducing the Imperial Court’s pressure, that the Third Prince did not send someone to call Wei Yu back immediately, so Wei Yu could see how busy things were here with his own eyes!
Doctors were already scarce, and now Tan Lin was taken away—really frustrating.
Since Tan Lin was gone, the Left Court Judge could no longer lie around. Struggling to get up, he began to attend patients.
Though tiring, the good thing was the overcompetitive fellow was gone!
Without that competitive jerk, the Left Court Judge could work at his own pace. Despite some difficulties, the old man managed to persist.
While the medicine boys were busily following the Left Court Judge, the Third Prince also received letters from the capital once again.
This time, unlike before, Father Emperor sent back two letters.
One was addressed to him, and the other to Wei Yu.
The letter from Emperor Wei to the Third Prince was all about disaster relief official business. Since the Third Prince came to Huzhou, such letters were sent every two or three days.
This was a typical boss-subordinate correspondence between father and son. Aside from official matters, the letters rarely spoke of anything else, only occasionally including a few greetings.
This was the Third Prince’s relationship with Emperor Wei.
As for Wei Yu, since he left the capital, he hadn’t been thought of to send a letter to his father at all!
Not that he had no conscience, really, it was mainly that Wei Yu thought the mountain roads were far away, and there was no major matter worthy of writing a letter for. The messengers’ back-and-forth journeys were tiring, and so were the horses. Thinking of the workers at the post stations, it was better to leave out minor matters, right? Anyway, his Third Brother would surely take good care of things; not writing a letter wouldn’t be a big problem.
Which child going off on a trip would still worry about his stingy old father back at home…
Wei Yu’s thinking was understandable, and Emperor Wei also knew the character of his unfilial son.
But when the two sons went out for disaster relief, the contrast in the letters they sent back was striking!
Emperor Wei, just seeing the pile of thick letters from his Third Son, and then thinking about the other unfilial son, suddenly felt unhappy.
The old father thought: This is business travel; the Third Son writes back every few days to report. Why shouldn’t the Ninth Son, who was recently dispatched on work, also wrote back? You two aren’t even in the same place! What’s going on—do you have some little secret?
Coincidentally, someone came to report that Deng Zhengde from the Merchants' Alliance had finished business in the capital and planned to return to Ziyang County in a few days.
Emperor Wei, thinking of the current cooperation between the Merchants' Alliance and the Yizhou aristocratic families, guessed that once Deng Zhengde returned, he would arrange for people to open a route to Great Liang. When the route was ready, the Merchants' Alliance and the Yizhou aristocrats visiting Great Liang and then returning might bring back a large sum of silver…
With that in mind, the stingy Emperor immediately couldn’t sit still.
He was not as adept as his unfilial son at making money, so whether the Merchants' Alliance could get a big haul from Great Liang, Emperor Wei thought it best to notify the unfilial son in advance and have him make detailed plans.
As long as money could be earned, no matter how busy the son was, he must make time to come up with ways to get it!
Because of money, the old father was no longer angry and immediately wrote a letter to the Third Prince.
Why not send it directly to Wei Yu?
Haha, who knows where that unfilial son was now? Instead of spending time searching for him, better to send it to the Third Son and have him deliver the letter.
Wei Yu was lying in Ji County when the matter came from the sky.
He really didn’t expect that even though he was no longer in the capital, the old man could still find things for him to do!
Asking him how the Merchants' Alliance could rake in silver in Great Liang? To write down all his ideas?
Look at this—how could one get anything done?!
He was busy with disaster relief!
Did they not know how tired and busy a person doing disaster relief was?
Apparently, only he was tired.
Every day he had to inquire about the progress in Xinghua Village, keep in touch with Yi Shisan to learn about the prefectural capital of Qian City Commandery, then integrate all kinds of information to make deductions. Wei Yu was really busy. During this period in Ji County, he didn’t even have time to watch the latest comics!
Finally squeezed out a bit of free time to be a lazybones, but now his dad was squeezing him dry to write plans. Wei Yu sighed about eight hundred times a day, holding his face.
“Ministry of Revenue has so many people, and my Fourth Brother is also a business genius. Why doesn’t Father Emperor discuss this with them, but goes and sends a letter to me from thousands of miles away! Fang Sheng, do you think Father Emperor has some serious illness?”
Fang Sheng stood quietly beside him, not daring to say a word.
The Emperor was not someone ordinary people dared to curse.
Nowadays, even the ministers on the court hardly dared to speak directly to His Majesty!
No one responded, and Wei Yu felt very lonely.
He shook his head, bit a pen, and kept looking down at the paper. After a few seconds, he couldn’t help but curse again.
“Damn it, as soon as I get back, I’ll make the Ministry of Revenue guys read some business books!”
If those responsible for helping the ruler with worries didn’t take initiative one or two times and seize the opportunity to ask for promotion and pay raise, how could their reaction be so slow!
And now they even made him waste his time writing stuff here!
While Wei Yu was furiously writing here, many officials of the Ministry of Revenue far away in the capital were feeling chills.
Inside the Ministry of Revenue duty office, Qi Tishou leisurely walked by, suddenly saw a fellow colleague shiver.
He leisurely said, “Lord Sun, the weather is getting colder recently. The wind in the capital has become more ruthless these days. You should wear a few more layers to avoid catching a cold.”
Lord Sun was surprised and turned around, saluted, then smiled: “Lord Qi’s words are wise. I came out in a hurry today and forgot to ask the household servants to send me extra clothes… But for some reason just now, I suddenly felt a chill on my back.”
Lord Sun tilted his head suspiciously, thinking he might have caught a cold.
Qi Tishou passed by nonchalantly, “Probably a cold. Recently, many people in the Ministry of Works caught colds. I think you should definitely put on an extra layer tomorrow.”
Lord Sun nodded earnestly in agreement, “You’re right. Lord Qi, you sure are dressed warmly.”
“Haha, indeed I am warm. My humble wife sewed this for me. Isn’t the cuff pattern nice?”
“Hmm, looks nice indeed.”
The two walked further and further away.