Yang Fan bypassed a few flowering trees and saw five to six Shuzhou mat embroidered with fish and lotus flowers on the soft woolen carpet among the fallen petals. Flowers were in full bloom and there was a flowing spring beside them.
Taoist Shifang, who was dressed in a Taoist robe and had white hair and beard, Old Nun Jingguang, who had a fair complexion, and Old Man Mo Lei, who was dressed in Hu clothes, accompanied Xue Huaiyi, who was bare-chested. Yu Haoran, Chen Dong, the Right Minister of the Ministry of Justice, and Yuan Jinggang, who were sitting in the lower seats, were talking and laughing loudly.
Seeing Yang Fan coming, Xue Huaiyi said, "Good disciple, the banquet has begun, why did you slip away to the side? Sit down quickly and punish yourself with three cups of wine first."
Yang Fan bowed and smiled, "Master and the three immortals, please forgive me. Yang Fan is busy with mundane affairs and is impolite!"
Old Nun Jingguang smiled and said to him kindly, "Yang Langzhong is too polite, please sit down quickly."
Yang Fan was born to be popular with women. Towards this young, handsome, refined and well-mannered young man, Old Nun Jing Guang also found him very pleasing to the eye. Therefore, although there were many high-ranking officials and nobles that the three of them interacted with, Old Nun Jing Guang was self-conscious and disdainful towards most of them, but was very kind to him.
There was an empty seat under Jingguang, Shifang, Huaiyi, and Mo Lei, which was the seat of the master. Yang Fan cupped his fists and smiled to everyone, then lifted his robe and sat down. Like the servants brought by the others, A Nu quietly stood beside the flowering tree behind them.
The banquet was very sumptuous, and all the dishes were commonly seen in the high-class banquets of the Great Zhou Empire, such as Bright Prawn Roast, Red Sea Roast, Ju Sheng Nu, Guifei Hong, Sweet Snow, Jade Dew Dumplings, Immortal Luan, etc. There were only vegetarian dishes placed beside Taoist Shifang and Old Nun Jingguang, but they were all cooked with great effort and were extremely delicious.
Yang Fan borrowed Princess Taiping's manor and invited the three immortal masters to enjoy the spring scenery. These dishes were prepared by the famous chefs of the Princess Palace. Although Taoist Si Fang and Old Nun Jingguang boasted that they could abstain from eating grains, and Old Nun Jingguang boasted that they could not feel hungry by eating only one grain of rice a day, it did not mean that they could not eat. Since it was a banquet, they did not do it to fill their stomachs, but to satisfy their appetite, so they could still eat some vegetarian dishes. As for meat, it was an indispensable part of the banquet.
In the banquet, there were not only steamed pork with rice flour made of pork shoulder, white dragon made of Chinese perch shredded, five kinds of ingredients of beef, pig, beef, bear and deer, five kinds of raw marinated five-course plate, as well as onion and vinegar chicken, civet, frog chicken, and even water refined calves simmered slowly with calves, which were fresh and delicious.
Wu Zetian's ban on slaughter had little impact on the officials' families. They only pretended to stop eating meat in the first few days after the imperial edict was issued, and then reverted to their old habits. The only impact was that it was inconvenient to eat meat in public, and because meat had become smuggled, only some unruly people who were bold enough to break the law dared to transport meat into the city. The price of meat had increased several times, but it was just a drop in the bucket compared to their wealth.
But for the lives of the common people, this order had really caused great harm. Many traders who made a living selling meat had to change professions in a hurry, and they suffered huge losses. The common people who made a living by breeding or hunting animals had completely lost their source of income. The farmers had no land, and the craftsmen did not know any skills. Some people who had no way to make a living could only sell their children and themselves, and become slaves of the rich and powerful at a low price. They were willing to become lowly slaves, just to have a meal. The common people were already full of complaints about this.
Three days ago, Chu Kuangge and Miss Xiaodong got married. On the first night, Yang Fan pulled a cart of chickens, ducks, pigs, sheep, and a net of fat fish that had just come ashore from the White Horse Temple and delivered it to them.
On the day when Aunty Hua married her daughter and looked for a son-in-law to marry into the family, there was actually fish and meat on the banquet. This became the most glamorous wedding among the families that had recently attended. When the cooks in the streets were frying and frying, and the fragrance of fish and meat filled the streets, it was unknown how many people were drooling.
Bad Luck, Huo Minglei, Bōshō, and Su Mohan smelled the aroma and rushed over.
Huo Minglei's face darkened. He pointed at the pig that the cook was pressing on the chopping board and fiercely chopping, and asked sternly, "What's the matter with this pork? Who allowed you to kill? "
Pasta's mother, who was helping in the kitchen, smiled and explained, "We didn't kill this pig, and we didn't buy it from the market. Last night, a wolf came down the mountain and killed a fat pig raised by a farmer. Erlang and his teacher, Master Huai Yi, saw this with their own eyes. "
Huo Minglei's face was stiff. He glanced at Yang Fan who was sitting at the head of the table, and asked in a deep voice, "Then this mutton …"
Pasta's mother said, "It was also killed by that wolf. Not only this pig, this sheep, but also the chickens, ducks, and geese were all killed by the wolf. "
Su Fangzheng pointed at the fat fish that had just been oiled, and asked, "Then what about this fish?"
Pasta walked over from behind his mother, and answered mischievously, "It was also killed by a wolf."
The commoners attending the banquet immediately burst into laughter, but Huo Minglei and Su Mohan didn't seem to think that this was ridiculous at all. They nodded seriously, and their anger turned into joy, and said, "Since it was killed by a wolf, then it's not a crime to kill it. It's also right to stew it and eat it."
Then the two of them took out red packets and handed them to Auntie Hua, and sat at Yang Fan's table with saliva dripping from their mouths. As they waited for the meal to start, they flattered him.
How could they not know how ridiculous the saying that the fish was killed by a wolf was? But since Pasta said it, they believed it. Pasta said this because the common people who were angry but dared not to speak out used their special way to vent their dissatisfaction. The two low-level officials were "very stupid" to be deceived, and also expressed their dissatisfaction with this unreasonable and absurd decree. Naturally, such an absurd government decree had to be treated with an absurd attitude.
But the basis of all this was because of Yang Fan sitting at the top of the table. With Yang Fan and Yang Fan's master — the famous unreasonable monk Huaiyi supporting them, they dared to end this routine interrogation in such a ridiculous way. If there was no such background, who dared to openly violate the imperial edict?
Only the privileged class.
These people sitting in the luxurious manor of Princess Taiping were the privileged class.
As the cups crossed, at the invitation of Master Huaiyi, Taoist Shifang showed a little of his skills and performed a magic to reconnect the broken cloth. He cut a bundle of white silk into pieces, and when he put his palms together, the broken cloth was restored to a bundle of intact white silk, which made Xue Huaiyi click his tongue in amazement.
Because of this magic, the topic naturally turned to the stories of the necromancers who cultivated immortality since ancient times.
Right Complement Yuan Jinggang's mouth was a little smelly. Logically speaking, an official who could reach his position should be someone who said what people said and what ghosts said. He shouldn't have said anything that was taboo. But no matter how he said it, all he said were swindlers who used illusions to deceive people, such as Xu Fu and Shinagaki Hei …
Taoist Shifang and the Pure Light Old Nun's faces became more and more ugly. The barbarian Molei did not know these ancient stories, so he blinked his big blue eyes, but did not understand anything. No one noticed that before Yuan Jinggang spouted his nonsense, Yang Fan had secretly shot him a glance.
"Haha, Yuan Buque's words are wrong!"
Seeing that Taoist Shifang's face had turned the color of pig liver and was about to explode, Yang Fan suddenly said with a smile, "It is because the magic of immortality is hard to find, and people all want to become immortals, so there are villains who take advantage of it. In fact, there are real immortals … "
Yang Fan said with fervor and assurance, "For example, Immortal Guang Chengzi, who lived during the reign of the Yellow Emperor, was 1200 years old. This is recorded in the historical records. Another example, during the reign of Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty, the father of the river once wrote the annotation for Laozi's' Tao Te Ching ', was 1700 years old, and achieved immortality on Tiantai Mountain. "
Hearing Yang Fan's words, Taoist Shifang and the Pure Light Old Nun's faces became better. They thought to themselves that they were immortals, and it was really not worthwhile to argue with a common person like Yuan Jinggang, so they smiled happily and nodded to Yang Fan with approval.
Yang Fan said again, "As for Xu Fu, Shinagaki Hei, and the others, the reason why they succeeded was not because of their clever means, but because the emperor was too greedy and blinded by greed. For example, Emperor Shi Huang, books were the same as literature, carriages were the same, and he established the foundation of the world. He had made great contributions, but he was greedy and wanted to live forever, so he was used by Xu Fu.
However, Xu Fu was also a wise man. He used the excuse that he had to go out to sea to find the elixir of immortality for Emperor Shi Huang, and finally escaped. He led 500 children and 500 virgin girls, and lived a free and happy life. Shinagaki Hei, on the other hand, was much more stupid. He found someone to carve the four words' Longevity of the Emperor 'on a jade cup, and said that it was a gift from an immortal to Emperor Wen.
Emperor Wen of Han was also a hero among the emperors of his generation, a virtuous emperor who created the rule of Wen Jing. In his later years, he also became greedy. At that time, his father-in-law on the river taught him the way to rule the country, and he used Huang Lao's knowledge to establish the foundation of the Han Dynasty. This was already a great contribution, but he also wanted to live forever. He couldn't get the celestial method from his father-in-law on the river, so he believed Shinagaki Hei. He actually trusted this nonsense that was full of loopholes.
Shinagaki Hei gained a lot of benefits. If he had left earlier, he could have had a good death like Xu Fu. However, his greed was insatiable, so Prime Minister Zhang Cang and Yanwei Zhang Shizhi monitored their actions. They found out the craftsman who carved the words on the jade cup, and in the end, he ended up with the tragic fate of the three tribes of Yi. "
When the Pure Light Old Nun and Taoist Shifang heard this, their expressions became a little unnatural.
Yang Fan raised his wine cup and smiled, "But the Emperor and the three immortal masters of our dynasty are different. Our Emperor became the Emperor with the body of a woman. This has never happened since ancient times. How can such a woman belong to the mortal world? Of course, she is an immortal who descended from heaven. And we have seen the supernatural powers of the three immortal masters with our own eyes. They are the real immortals, just like Guang Chengzi and Father on the river! "
Mo Lei was overjoyed and nodded repeatedly, "Yang Langzhong, you are a knowledgeable person."
The Pure Light Old Nun and Taoist Shifang's expressions became relaxed again, but Taoist Shifang's eyes were wandering. It seemed that because of Yang Fan's words, he had faintly thought of something.
Yang Fan saw his reaction and was secretly happy, "This Taoist is not stupid. Looking at him, he was indeed moved by my words and had the idea of imitating Xu Fu. Heh! I was afraid that you would act recklessly. Since you have the idea, then I'm not afraid that you won't work for me. That Young Master Jiang, who is hiding in the gutter and pretending to be a ghost, will never think that the person I am going to use to deal with him is actually a fraud … "
At this moment, a neigh of a horse suddenly sounded behind a cluster of flowers. The strong horse neighed and galloped, shaking off a few more petals of the flowers on the branches. Then, a Minister of Justice dressed in black appeared in a hurry against the falling petals. He turned over and got off the horse, walking quickly to Yang Fan and whispering a few words in his ear. Yang Fan's expression suddenly changed.
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