In the Prime Minister's Mansion, two men in their forties were sitting by the rockery in the back garden and chatting with great interest.

One of them is thin and small, and he is the owner of the Prime Minister's Mansion, Hu Weiyong, and the Prime Minister of Zuo. The other person is Li Chengyi, the younger brother of the founding hero Li Shanchang, who served in the court as the Taifu Temple.

The relationship between Hu Weiyong and Li Chengyi is extraordinary, not only that, but the Hu family and the Li family have a very close relationship both inside and outside the court.

The Hu family and the Li family are fellow villagers, and Hu Weiyong and Li Chengyi are still married. Li Chengyi's son married Hu Weiyong's daughter.

They also stood on one side in political positions, and were both members of the Huaixi clique, and secretly were at odds with the Zhedong clique headed by Liu Ji.

Hu Weiyong can do the position of Prime Minister Zuo today, not only relying on his natural intelligence and sensitive political sense, but also has an inseparable relationship with Li Shanchang.

In the sixth year of Hongwu, Li Shanchang, as the leader of the Huaixi Peng Party Group, recommended his fellow countryman Hu Weiyong to serve as the right prime minister.

Since then, Hu Weiyong has maximized his political talents, defeated a large number of competitors, won the favor of Zhu Yuanzhang, and rose to the position of the left prime minister of the government and the opposition.

Hu Weiyong took out a brown-black unicorn amulet from his arms.

At first glance, this amulet appears to be carved from a gemstone, smooth as a mirror and sparkling with translucent light. But on closer inspection, it has the texture of wood, delicate and smooth, like a picture that people can't put down.

"Amazing! Is this wood or gemstones? Is there such a beautiful thing in this world? It must be a godsend! Li Chengyi was dumbfounded.

"Hahaha!" Hu Weiyong laughed proudly. Praise for his taste, no matter how unreasonable, he will take it in his pocket without modesty.

"This is called ebony, it has been buried in the ground for 5,000 years, it can be described as an oriental sacred tree, spiritual! You see, it has both the quaintness of wood and the charm of stone, and it will never fade or decay. Hehe, it is the only one in this world who can live as long as heaven and earth. ”

"Tut-tut! I said so! The texture looked like wood, but it was brighter than precious stones, and all the treasures of the palace were eclipsed before it. ”

"I've never seen anything like this in the palace, have you?"

"I haven't seen it, I haven't seen it." Li Chengyi's head is like pounding garlic.

"The treasure ...... of the city of Zhancheng" Hu Weiyong suddenly approached Li Chengyi's ear and lowered his voice, and at the same time used the gurgling water pouring down from the rockery to cover it up.

In fact, there was no one beside them, not even the servants who were waiting, but Hu Weiyong still preferred to express the rarity of the treasures in this mysterious way, "Our emperor doesn't have it!" ”

The Champa state is in the southwest of China, south of Chenla, west of Cochin, is the first docking station and must pass through the sea route from China to Southeast Asia.

Founded by the Cham people, the Champa country has close ties with China, and every year it pays tribute to China with rare and exotic objects such as ivory, rhino horn, ebony, garan incense, Guanyin bamboo, and Zhenzhen incense.

In recent years, Hu Weiyong has no one in his eyes and has seized many tributes without permission. This amulet made of ebony is one of them.

Its formation has gone through vicissitudes of life, and things have changed from the stars to the ancient times, and it originated from the animals and plants of ancient times.

When the mountains and the earth cracked and the torrent rolled, the creatures of the earth were buried in the ground, silently cultivated in an environment completely different from the surface of the earth, and sincerely assisted with allies to defeat the lawless who took advantage of the situation, and finally achieved a hard, shiny, and uncorrupted holy product.

The powerful people of all dynasties have used ebony as a thing to ward off evil spirits, and made all kinds of exquisite objects, its gold is precious and rare, and everyone flocks to it.

Hu Weiyong gently put the amulet into a glass of water that was about to overflow. A circle of water droplets dripped down the wall of the cup, and the unicorn in the center of the water resembled a black rose in full bloom.

He stretched out two thin and white fingers, took out the unicorn, put it in his mouth, and held it tightly like tasting a fresh date.

Li Chengyi was dumbfounded, although he had a close relationship with Hu Weiyong and had witnessed his countless incomprehensible habits, he had never expected Hu Weiyong to have such a strange behavior.

Hu Weiyong closed his eyes and enjoyed the pleasure brought to him by ebony.

Ebony slowly injected all his essence and aura into Hu Weiyong's body without hesitation. Hu Weiyong's face was full of light, and his clean face seemed to have been sprinkled with nectar purification water in the jade bottle of Guanyin Bodhisattva.

It took a long time for him to open his eyes, and they glowed with the brilliance of rebirth. When Ebony escaped from his mouth, it seemed to be thin, exhausted, and dying.

Seeing that the ebony body that had been sucked away from the aura was dull, Hu Weiyong was satisfied and put it back into a delicate wooden box to recuperate.

"Look at this again." Hu Weiyong was full of interest, got up and walked around the display case, and lifted a gold wine jug.

Li Chengyi hadn't woken up from his trance yet, his eyes were always following the wooden box where the Qilin amulet was placed, I don't know if he was grieving for Ebony or if he also wanted to take a few breaths of aura.

"Master Li......" Hu Weiyong coughed, he didn't want his audience to be unable to keep up with his rhythm and not be able to fully appreciate his commentary.

"Wow!" Li Chengyi hurriedly got up to greet Hu Weiyong and his treasures, and added leaves and branches to send his admiration.

Hu Weiyong put a wine jug and a wine glass on the table. He tilted the bottom of the pot, and at some point the wine that was filled slowly flowed out of the spout and flowed into a finely crafted, splendid three-color agate cup with a strange shape.

Compared to this agate cup, the golden flask immediately pales.

"Beast Head Agate Cup!" Li Chengyi exclaimed, he was not completely uninformed.

"Hehehe, has Master Li seen it?"

"No, it's just admiration. How can a lower official see such a high grade. ”

"This beast head agate cup was paid tribute to Tang Gaozong by the Western Regions. When he heard that Tang Gaozong got this wine glass, he was overjoyed and pardoned a minister's capital crime. You see," Hu Weiyong pointed to the lower half of the wine glass, which was a peculiar face, "is this a cow or a sheep?" ”

"Hehe, I don't think this is a cow, it's not a sheep, it's a mythical beast! The prime minister has this divine beast, like heaven's help! ”

"Oh, how do you say?"

"You see the two long horns on its head are in contention," Li Chengyi's eyebrows were raised high, as high as his fighting spirit, "and they stretched out to the inside of the cup, indicating that everything was like a bag." Gold in the mouth...... Hehe, this wealth is all the prime minister's. ”

Li Chengyi's nostrils were bigger than the mouth of the divine beast, and he exhaled a thick air of flattery.

"Wonderful!" Hu Weiyong slapped his thigh, and hurriedly poured the wine in the beast head agate cup into his stomach, just like the magistrate had to knock on the shocking wood to make a final decision after the county trial.

After drinking, Hu Weiyong crossed his hands on the back of his head, leaned back, and leaned comfortably on the back of the chair.

"Congratulations to the prime minister, the blessings are immeasurable!"

"Whether you are blessed or not, it depends on its owner."

"The prime minister is not only a blessed person, but also a blessed person. Now it is under one man and above ten thousand. Someday......"

"Huh! Brother Xian, you can't talk nonsense. Hu Weiyong showed rare caution in front of Li Chengyi.

"I heard that Lord Liu is seriously ill, and the emperor asked the prime minister to take the imperial doctor to visit?" Li Chengyi held up a silver wine glass that had transformed into broken copper and iron next to the radiant beast head agate cup, and tentatively mentioned Liu Ji to Hu Weiyong.

"Poor Lord Liu!" Hu Weiyong wanted to show a sad face, but it looked ridiculous.

"Although Lord Liu has offended the emperor many times, the emperor's affection for him is still very deep." Hu Weiyong sat up straight, approached Li Chengyi again and whispered: "The emperor's mind is difficult to fathom. ”

Li Chengyi poured wine into the beast head agate cup, and when Hu Weiyong was intoxicated by the aroma of wine and the flying beast brought by the divine beast, he said casually: "Prime Minister, I think this is a great opportunity. ”

"Oh?" Hu Weiyong closed his eyes and inhaled into his nose one by one. In the most wonderful moments, wine is not only a way for him to drink, but also to smell.

"Our Huaixi Group and Zhedong Group have been fighting for many years, although on the surface it seems that our Huaixi Group has the upper hand, but the Prime Minister and our Li family and other ministers of the Huaixi Group are worried about dealing with Liu Ji, they can't eat well, and they can't sleep well, what kind of day is this? If Zhedong Group has no Liu Ji and the dragons have no leader, then they will definitely not be able to turn over, and we can sit back and relax! ”

In the passion of looking forward to a better future, Li Chengyi's fat head is brilliant.

He is not groundless, wantonly sowing discord in front of Hu Weiyong. He clearly understood from Hu Weiyong's high-sounding rhetoric that Hu Weiyong was not only jealous but also hateful to Liu Ji.

The jealousy is because Liu Ji is talented. Hu Weiyong felt that Liu Ji was not worthy of Zhu Yuanzhang's praise for him - he was a man of heaven and a man, and he was both civil and military; Its spirit is upright, and its talent is magnificent.

Zhu Yuanzhang did not correctly recognize his Hu Weiyong's shining point while elevating Liu Ji, which caused great unfairness. One is overestimated, the other is underestimated, and the originally small gap between the two has become a chasm.

However, the ambitious Hu Weiyong knows that those who achieve great things must be good at employing people. If he had kept his jealousy in check, if Liu Ji could be used by him, everything would have been very different.

He repeatedly showed favor to Liu Ji and gave him gold, silver, jewelry, and a beautiful mansion. Liu Ji repaid him by repeatedly suing him in front of Zhu Yuanzhang.

What chilled him the most was that Liu Ji compared him to an inferior horse, and told Zhu Yuanzhang that if Hu Weiyong was allowed to serve as the prime minister of the Ming Dynasty, the carriage of the Ming Dynasty would overturn under the control of his inferior horse, and the car would be destroyed and killed.

Since then, Hu Weiyong no longer restrains his jealousy, but also turns it into a flame that burns Liu Ji. It was a strong hatred, a hatred that would not stop if it did not achieve its goal.

He deliberately instructed others to falsely accuse Liu Ji, saying that he wanted to occupy a piece of royal land as his burial ground, and his ill-intentioned intentions were clearly exposed.

Zhu Yuanzhang, who had long been at ease with Liu Ji, heard the false accusation and deprived Liu Ji of his seal. In order to eliminate Zhu Yuanzhang's concerns, Liu Ji, who had already returned to his hometown, had to return to Yingtianfu, and only then escaped death.

Since Hu Weiyong took over the leadership of the Huaixi Group from Li Shanchang, the Huaixi Group has defeated the Zhedong Group with an overwhelming victory under his leadership.

Liu Ji, the leader of the Zhedong Group, was seriously ill and had no intention of ruling the government. As soon as Liu Ji dies, the Zhedong Group will completely collapse, and the Huaixi Group will be able to dominate the government and the opposition.