She had left the palace less than seven o 'clock, a full two hours before nine o' clock. Yu Shu did not return home but went to Wangji Tower to find Xue Rui.
A few days ago, Xue Rui had said that he would come to the Aquatic Conclave, yet she didn't see him in the palace today, causing her to feel bewildered. She wondered if something had happened to him at the last minute, which was why he couldn't come.
She went to Wangji Tower, but Xue Rui was not there. She could only eat dinner first and then go to the Celestial Commissioner's office for a meeting.
.....
The meeting hall was located in the middle of the Nine Palaces pattern. You just had to walk straight past the bell tower in front of the door.
Yu Shu arrived early. The spacious hall was brightly lit. There was a long carpet at the door and more than twenty chairs lined up on both sides. There were only three to five people who had arrived before her. Two attendants were walking back and forth in the hall, lighting the lamps and serving tea.
"Official Yu." Xin Ya was sitting at the front. When he saw Yu Shu come in, he greeted her.
"Official Xin," Yu Shu walked over, looked to the sides, and asked, "Where should I sit?"
Xin Ya put down his teacup and pointed to the seat next to him. "Sit here. It's not a formal meeting, so there's no need to be so formal."
Yu Shu thought that she was only one rank or two lower than Xin Ya, so it was not a bad position to sit next to him, so she sat down.
"The matter I asked you to do last time, did you have any results?" Xin Ya leaned over and asked quietly. It was not convenient to talk in the palace in the afternoon, so he did not ask about the death that Yu Shu had divined for him.
Yu Shu glanced at him without batting an eyelid. She had divined Sir Xin You's horoscope that day, but the result was that the person was not dead at all.
Xin Ya had told her with certainty that the person had died twenty years ago, so she suspected that Xin Ya was deliberately testing her and had some crooked idea.
"It's only been a few days. Why are you in such a hurry?" Yu Shu joked with him. "Didn't I tell you? You don't know the date of that person's death, and you don't know the cause of death. It's not easy for you to ask me to do a divination."
Hearing this, Xin Ya did not look disappointed. Instead, she smiled and said, "I was just casually mentioning it. I'm not in a hurry to force you. Take your time and help me calculate in detail."
Yu Shu nodded, thinking that she would have to wait until she ran out of Tihu Incense Pills before telling Xin Ya everything.
"Say, what do you think the Junior Supervisor wants us to wait here for?" Yu Shu changed the topic and asked Xin Ya about it.
After the Water and Land Conference, Emperor Zhao Qing had gone to the Imperial Ancestral Temple to offer sacrifices. The Great Tipping Point and Ren Qiming had accompanied him and had not returned to the Celestial Commissioner yet.
"I think we need to discuss a countermeasure." Xin Ya snorted coldly and said, "Those arrogant Wei Nation people think that because they know some sorcery, they can look down on us, the Great An Yi Division. They even want to confuse the Emperor. If we let them get what they want, we, the Celestial Commissioner, will have no face left."
In the afternoon at Fengqing Palace, Xin Ya had been stepped on by the Japanese envoy, Yamada Jiro, which caused him to be glared at by Emperor Zhao Qing. He was still angry.
"Is it sorcery?" Yu Shu rubbed her chin. It seemed that Xin Ya, like the others, did not know what was going on.
"There's rain on a sunny day and blood talismans. If it's not sorcery, what is it?" Xin Ya snorted disdainfully on the surface, but in fact, he was shocked when he saw the rain during the day.
Yu Shu chuckled and did not continue the discussion. The Xin family was a family that relied on creation and was proficient in the art of geomancy. As for their attainments in astronomy and calendar, they were probably not as good as Jing Chen, a Daoist disciple who had learned the "Chaotic Sky Divination Log".
It was not that Xin Ya, as the head of an aristocratic family, was useless. Everyone had their own specialties.
As the two of them chatted for a while, more and more people arrived. When Jing Chen entered, he saw Yu Shu and Xin Ya sitting on the left side of the table. He did not go up to them to make things difficult for himself and just sat opposite them.
.....
After the hour, Junior Supervisor Ren appeared on time but did not see the Great Tipping Point.
"Sir."
He stepped in and everyone in the meeting hall stood up.
"Take a seat." Ren Qiming pressed his hand against the air, pursed his lips and walked to the seat of honor. He turned and scanned the crowd.
Yu Shu did not know if it was an illusion, but his gaze seemed to linger on her for a moment longer.
"Today is the Water and Land Conference. After meeting the Yin-Yang Masters from Japan, tell me what you think."
As soon as Ren Qiming finished speaking, everyone looked at each other in silence. No one made a sound.
Ren Qiming sneered, his expression darkening. "Since no one wants to say anything, then let me say it — His Majesty asked us, the Celestial Commissioner, to preside over and preach the Yi Xue. His original intention was to enlighten those foreign envoys and show the majesty of the Great An nation. But two mere Japanese warlocks with unorthodox methods dared to look down on the Yi Xue in front of us, the Celestial Commissioner. Even if you don't feel ashamed, I feel deeply ashamed!"
His words made everyone blush. Even Yu Shu was a little embarrassed.
"Sir, please calm down." Someone could not help but say, "When tomorrow is the Water and Land Conference, we will definitely not tolerate those Japanese who mislead the public with their lies."
Ren Qiming looked at the official who spoke, his face still cold. "What countermeasures do you have?"
That person was instantly speechless.
"Cough." Cao Yan, the Left Commander, who was sitting in the first seat on the left, covered his mouth and coughed.
"Sir Ren, please calm down. I don't think it was difficult for me to understand what happened during the day. Now that I think about it, the so-called Yin-Yang Master who can summon the wind and rain probably knows some strange divination of the weather and predicted that there would be a rain in the afternoon. Therefore, he borrowed the east wind. He does not really have the ability to manipulate the weather, nor is it some sorcery."
As soon as he said this, the minds of many of the muddle-headed people present changed, and they all came to a sudden realization.
Yu Shu sized up Cao Zuoling, who was speaking. She was not surprised that other than herself and Jing Chen, there was someone else who could think of this point.
The Celestial Commissioner, the Left Commander, was a third-rank official. His authority was below that of Ren Qiming, but he was the head of one of the three families with the longest history among the 12 aristocratic families, the Cao family.
Cao Youling, who had been strangled to death in the Taishi Library and pretended to have committed suicide by hanging on the observatory, was his granddaughter.
In addition, the Cao family had another in-law that was worth mentioning. It was Consort Yin Shufei's maiden family, the residence of Prime Minister Yin.
The 12 aristocratic families in the capital city were intertwined, and there were only a few families who were truly in power. However, they were never far from the imperial court because they were filled with in-laws and had many branches and leaves.
Ren Qiming's expression softened a little, and he nodded in agreement with Cao Zuoling's words. He then said to the crowd,
"The so-called summoning of the wind and rain, and bringing the dead back to life, is only known to the immortals in the legends. We, who learn Yi, should know that Yin and Yang and the five elements should be able to counter fortune and misfortune. There are things that can be controlled, and there are things that cannot be controlled. What can be controlled is controlled by us, and what cannot be controlled is controlled by the heavens. It is absurd to think that I can control the will of the heavens, but you all believe in it. You should be ashamed."
Everyone felt ashamed, and they all said that they had learned a lot.
Seeing this, Ren Qiming said again, "Today's incident happened suddenly, and no one expected the Dong Ying envoy to launch an attack at the last minute. I was at fault for not being able to deal with it in time. I have already received three months of salary penalty from the Imperial Secretary, so each of you will have one month reduced."
No one had any objections. It was just a small salary penalty, and they did not expect to live with that amount of money every month.
Only Yu Shu had a strange expression on her face, and she was angry in her heart. She had only been an official for two days, and she did not even get a copper coin, but she was already punished for a month. Didn't that mean that she would be working for nothing for the next month?
Originally, she did not like the Dong Ying people who came to cheat her territory, so Yu Shu vented her anger on them.
Back to the topic, Ren Qiming looked around again, and finally his eyes fell on Jing Chen, who was wearing a silver robe with the Big Dipper embroidered on his shoulder, and said,
"I heard that in Taoism, you have learned astronomy, calendar, and sorcery. I wonder if you have any insights that can solve the current situation."
Jing Chen's face was calm, and he said, "Sun rain is rare and unpredictable, but it is not impossible to predict. Among the Dong Ying envoys, there must be someone who is proficient in this method. It is not difficult to solve it. As long as we, the Celestial Commissioner, also predict a rain, and imitate their skill, their deception will be broken. The difficult thing is, we need the weather to be favorable, and there will be a rain tomorrow. "
Ren Qiming frowned.
After a while, Xin Ya, who pretended to be deaf and mute, suddenly said, "This … tomorrow is the 16th of July, the day of the full moon, how can we know that there will be rain?"
What was as unpredictable as the sun rain was the special day of the 15th and the 56th of every month, when the full moon would lead to the tide, and the water mist would be forbidden to predict.
At least among the Celestial Commissioner, no one knew this kind of strange magic, which could ignore the astronomical calendar and predict the weather of these two days.
Yu Shu clasped her hands on her knees, and looked up at Jing Chen, with a sneer at the corner of her mouth. What, did he want her to come out to help him again?
At this time, Ren Qiming asked everyone,
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
