Chapter 497 - 275: Even Drinking Water Gets Stuck in the Teeth

Chapter 497: Chapter 275: Even Drinking Water Gets Stuck in the Teeth

Marquis Yongjia impeached Minister of Revenue Cao Dingwen and Assistant Prime Minister Wang Xuanfan for colluding with corrupt merchants to set up private gambling dens and secretly amass a vast fortune!

Song Yunzhao was stunned. She simply couldn’t recall the crime that led to Wang Xuanfan’s downfall in the book. Back when she read it, she had focused mainly on the events of the harem and hadn’t retained much about matters of the court.

The things she remembered were mostly related to the heroine. Characters like Wang Xuanfan, who weren’t particularly close to the heroine, were merely passing figures in the book, so recalling everything about him was truly difficult.

But there was one thing she could confirm: in the book, Wang Xuanfan had not been impeached and convicted alongside Cao Dingwen.

Most importantly, Marquis Yongjia had impeached the two on a single charge: setting up private gambling dens to amass a vast fortune.

Not a single word was mentioned about anything related to the government treasury case. After a moment of thought, Song Yunzhao realized what a truly clever man Marquis Yongjia was.

The government treasury case implicated numerous people. If he had used that as the basis for his impeachment, he would have made many enemies.

Marquis Yongjia was targeting Wang Xuanfan. Seeing that Cao Dingwen was on the verge of being toppled from his position as Minister of Revenue, he simply dragged him down as well.

It was a brilliant move, allowing him to avenge his daughter without making too many enemies.

Setting up private gambling dens, amassing a vast fortune.

The National Treasury was already empty, yet the Minister of Revenue—the very man in charge of the court’s finances—was engaged in such activities. How could the Emperor not be furious?

Moreover, the evidence Marquis Yongjia provided was overwhelming. The merchants colluding with the two were thoroughly investigated. The authorities started with the gambling dens, arresting the proprietors for questioning. They confessed everything without even needing to be tortured.

This proprietor was a clever man. He handed over all the letters and ledgers detailing his dealings with Wang Xuanfan and Cao Dingwen. The gambling den had been established back in the time of the late Emperor, over a decade ago, and had since generated profits of several hundred thousand taels.

And that was just the profit from the gambling den. Who knew how much had been siphoned from the National Treasury, layer by layer. Enraged, Feng Yi ordered a thorough investigation.

Previously, Cao Dingwen could claim to be a superior kept in the dark by his subordinates, but that was no longer a viable excuse. Once this veneer was stripped away, his true nature was exposed.

It wasn’t just the Emperor who was furious; the entire court was stunned. After all, Cao Dingwen’s disguise had been simply too good. Who could have ever imagined it?

As the investigation dug deeper, layer by layer, almost the entire upper echelon of the Ministry of Revenue was wiped out. The only one left standing was Song Nanzhen, who had joined the ministry only a short time ago.

What was even more shocking was that the ministry’s most critical secret ledgers had been turned in by Song Nanzhen.

Never mind the shock that rippled through the court—even Song Yunzhao was stunned speechless.

’I knew I wasn’t wrong about him,’ she thought. ’My father is a man of action. He just set off a bombshell without a single warning.’

’How long has my father even been at the Ministry of Revenue? How did he manage to find something so important?’

She didn’t know much else, but she did know that when her father first joined the Ministry of Revenue as a doctor, he was met with suspicion at every turn. Back then, she had assumed he was being ostracized because of her, his daughter the concubine.

Thinking about it now, she finally understood the real reason.

’For my father to get his hands on the secret ledgers under those circumstances... He was far more capable than I ever imagined.’

Song Nanzhen made a name for himself with this single act. From that moment on, he finally shed the label of someone who had only entered the Ministry of Revenue because of his daughter.

It also made people reconsider the fact that it was the Emperor himself who had placed him in the Ministry of Revenue. It prompted a deeper thought: could it be that the Emperor had recognized Song Nanzhen’s exceptional abilities from the very beginning?

With the evidence being overwhelming, the Emperor’s decree came swiftly. Wang Xuanfan and Cao Dingwen were imprisoned, and the Cao Family’s assets were seized. Out of consideration for Princess Consort Zhuang, the Emperor did not raid the Wang Family’s estate, but Wang Xuanfan was jailed to await his sentence, and Princess Consort Zhuang was demoted to Zhaorong.

Initially, the Emperor had no intention of demoting Princess Consort Zhuang, but she angered him by kneeling endlessly to plead for her father, and thus lost the concubine rank.

In just a few short days, a solemn atmosphere fell over the entire traveling palace.

In the face of the Emperor’s wrath, Song Yunzhao hid in the traveling palace, secretly enjoying the drama from afar. She refused to take a single step outside and even sent word to Han Jinyi and the other two concubines not to visit. At a time like this, the lower one’s profile, the better.

After all, her father was one of the main players who had picked up where Marquis Yongjia left off to take down Wang Xuanfan and Cao Dingwen. With a daughter like her in the harem, the two of them had basically become the prime targets for everyone’s resentment.

’Marquis Yongjia was the one who started it all,’ she mused, ’so why are my father and I the ones taking all the heat?’

Song Yunzhao couldn’t figure it out. In the end, she could only chalk it up to her destiny as the villainess of the story.

After Princess Consort Zhuang’s demotion, the Wang Family’s world completely collapsed. Only then did Wang Yunhua truly understand that her sister hadn’t been lying. She had always believed that as an Imperial Concubine, her sister could surely help the family; she was just making excuses and refusing to.

Now she knew the truth: her sister really couldn’t help them. The Emperor would not spare the Wang Family for her sister’s sake!

Only then did Wang Yunhua realize what she had lost. She immediately put on her makeup and finest clothes and went to request a meeting with Madam Ji. The marriage alliance with the Ji Family was now their last hope!

The atmosphere in the Ji Family wasn’t much better. The Xie couple had been planning to visit and express their gratitude, but Marquis Yongjia’s sudden impeachment, followed by Song Nanzhen’s decisive move, had thrown everything into disarray. The Left Minister was busy trying to clear his name after the fall of Wang Xuanfan, who had been his right-hand man. The Left Minister truly had not expected him to be so audacious as to secretly collude with Cao Dingwen.

Regardless, the Left Minister was still responsible for a lack of oversight, and he hadn’t returned home for several days because of the matter.

The Left Minister was busy, and so was Song Nanzhen, so there was no time for the Xie couple to pay their formal visit of thanks. Thus, both families came to a tacit agreement to postpone the matter.

This postponement dragged on until after Wang Xuanfan’s fall, the seizure of Cao Dingwen’s assets, and the implication of nearly half of all officials in the Ministry of Revenue. The ministry’s upper ranks were virtually wiped out. When the Emperor appointed Song Nanzhen as the new Minister of Revenue, a rare silence fell over the court.

The Right Minister didn’t object. His daughter had passed the evidence to Song Zhaoyi through his wife, and he was only able to clear his own name thanks to his daughter’s heaven-sent cleverness, which had saved him from the fallout.

This whole affair left a small bit of leverage in Song Zhaoyi’s hands, so he couldn’t very well trip up her father’s promotion. Although he personally felt Song Nanzhen was unequal to the heavy responsibility, he also knew that time would tell. The moment Song Nanzhen made a mistake, he would be ousted from the position of Minister of Revenue without anyone having to lift a finger.

’So, there was no need to make an enemy, was there?’

The Right Minister did not object, and for once, neither did the Left Minister.

Regarding the Wang Xuanfan affair, the Left Minister knew he had already earned the Emperor’s displeasure and suspicion. Even though he had proven his own innocence, his standing was no longer what it once was.

Song Nanzhen had undeniably rendered a great service this time, and the Left Minister hadn’t expected him to be capable of joining forces with Marquis Yongjia. With the Emperor still fuming, the Left Minister saw no reason to oppose Song Nanzhen and risk angering His Majesty further.

At this moment, the Left and Right Ministers’ thoughts were surprisingly aligned. There would be plenty of time.

’The position of Minister of Revenue,’ they both thought, ’is not an easy one to hold.’

This, however, put Madam Ji in a rather awkward position. Previously, she had looked down her nose at the Song Family. Who would have thought that in the blink of an eye, Song Nanzhen would become the Minister of Revenue? A Minister of the Six Ministries was outranked only by the Left and Right Ministers. His was no longer a station she could so easily scorn.

The whole situation was so vexing that it left a bad taste in her mouth.