The Affairs Bureau is a shadow son of Zhao Bu, which has developed from a small department of dozens of people to spy on political enemies and spy on the internal intelligence of the imperial court, and it is now a huge organization with 100 core personnel, 1,000 backbone personnel, thousands of backbone personnel, and tens of thousands of peripheral personnel. Not only did they spread throughout the ruling areas of the Great Song Dynasty, but they also spread their tentacles to the surrounding enemy countries or the range of hostile forces.

The functions of the bureau have also changed from monitoring political opponents, collecting domestic political and economic intelligence, and eliminating rebels to engaging in external subversion of the enemy's regime, sabotaging the enemy's economy, inciting and creating unrest, and plotting rebellion and assassinating high-ranking officials of the enemy's country. Internally, it is to eliminate enemy spies, collect domestic political, economic, and public opinion intelligence, monitor those with different political views, and secretly investigate the behavior of officials and defectors to the enemy, the movement of the army, and the ideological dynamics of senior officers. In addition, the secretariat also has a function of secretly protecting the safety of the emperor and his family, monitoring the royal family, and removing potential safety hazards.

Therefore, the Secretariat played an immeasurable role in Zhao Neng's success in stabilizing power, repeatedly defeating coups against himself and victories in foreign wars. And this is also a double-edged sword, their terrifying strength is enough to influence the political situation, and if it is not used well, it will threaten their own rule, so that Zhao has firmly controlled the bureau in his own hands from the beginning, and the appointment of officials and the plan of action must be personally investigated.

In addition, Zhao also restricted their powers, never delegated decision-making power and execution power, only gave them the power to investigate and supervise, but did not have the power to arrest and try, even if they secretly dealt with an ordinary official, they had to get his authorization before they could carry it out. He knows that this will affect efficiency and execution, but he also understands that once this shackle is released, then there will inevitably be a problem of abuse of power, which will not only threaten the stability of the regime and put everyone in danger, but also produce new **, and even participate in the struggle for power.

Of course, Zhao also knows that the implementation of 'spy politics' is intolerable even for modern governments, and he is very disgusted with them. Because no one knows whether the people around them can be trusted, and their every move is exposed in front of others, and they don't know which words or actions they will be guilty of. Therefore, if they feel threatened, they will spare no effort to strike them until they are cleared or locked in the cage of power.

Therefore, in order to avoid trouble, everything in the bureau was covered up, even important ministers such as Ying Jieyan, Lu Xiufu, and Wen Tianxiang only knew that the emperor personally controlled a secret force, but they were not clear about the department, organization, personnel situation and how to operate, and others had no way of knowing. And the people in the palace only know that there is such a department under the Imperial City Department that is responsible for purchasing and collecting goods for His Majesty, and they have also seen them send some messy things, but they rarely see the deputy envoy of the Imperial City Department who is also the head of the Bureau.

With such a huge organization operating, Zhao can't do everything himself, and he also needs some people to upload and distribute the work, so naturally he can't hide it from everyone. However, knowing the situation is limited to a few cronies, Ni Liang, Chen Dun and Lin Zhiwu have all served as the liaison of the Bureau, and Tan Fei is currently in this role. In the palace, except for Wang De, only Su Lan knows some inside information, but she understands that this is His Majesty's absolute secret, and she never asks about it, and she will not take the initiative to contact the affairs bureau.

Now that someone in the palace contacted him through the channels of the bureau, Zhao Xin became vigilant at the moment. But when he unfolded the letterhead, the familiar fly-headed Xiaokai immediately came into view, and sure enough, it was Su Lan's letter, and the content was not much, and he quickly read it in ten lines. In addition to the routine greetings, the main reason is that after the Empress Dowager heard that the Mengyuan army had invaded the hinterland of Jiangdong, she was worried that the tragedy of the enemy army besieging the city and being forced to surrender would recur, so she arranged the back road of the concubines in advance, and evacuated Lin'an when necessary to avoid the annihilation of the whole army.

In order to ensure that nothing went wrong, the Queen Mother secretly ordered Su Lan to contact Zheng Huchen, the director of the Affairs Bureau, and sent a team of men and horses to escort everyone to secretly evacuate Lin'an, and was responsible for protecting their safety on the way. She knew that it was not in accordance with the rules for her to come forward to contact her, but she was forced by the Queen Mother and felt that the situation was urgent, so she took it upon herself to contact Zheng Huchen to secretly meet with the Queen Mother. Subsequently, Zheng Huchen was instructed to formulate an evacuation plan, arrange manpower, arrange transportation, plan the route, and immediately start the evacuation plan once the situation is critical.

The other is Zheng Huchen's request for guilt, and he also understands that he was ordered by the Queen Mother, which is tantamount to cutting first and then playing, which has violated the iron law formulated by the emperor, and has touched His Majesty's scales. At the same time, he repeatedly explained that what he did was not to cling to the Queen Mother and find another backer, he was still loyal to His Majesty as before, and he had no second thoughts, but this time there was an accident, and he didn't know the inside story at the time, so he could only take the decree head-on.

Zhao looked at it, it can be said that he had mixed tastes, and he didn't know how to deal with it for a while, so he found a more comfortable posture again, and his fingers unconsciously knocked on the table. He didn't understand how the Queen Mother knew that she would have a secret power in her hands, but thinking about how she had lived with her for many years, she might have inadvertently revealed clues; In addition, he often has a huge amount of income and expenses for unknown reasons, and although he does it secretly, it is not easy to hide it from the Queen Mother who is in charge of Ouchi.

In addition, the little yellow door and the palace maid who entered the palace in the past were all decided by the queen mother, so it is not surprising to put an eyeliner next to him, that is, Wang De was also the steward of the queen mother back then, monitoring his words and deeds. But Zhao believed that Wang De would not betray him, after all, he had already sat at the top of an inner servant, and no one could give him more. What made him strange was that the Queen Mother had never mentioned the matter of the affairs bureau to herself, and he thought that he had successfully concealed it. But at the moment, it seems that the inner part is not as strict as imagined, and the Queen Mother is not as simple as it seems, but it is just deeply hidden.

However, Zhao believes that the Queen Mother has no malicious intentions, otherwise she would not have been silent for so many years, and let herself run the affairs bureau so big. And he used the power of the bureau to not directly issue an order himself, but pretended to contact Zheng Huchen with Su Lan. If it is excluded that the Queen Mother does not know the specific functions and operating procedures of the Bureau, or does not want to cause suspicion between mother and son, so as to cause disharmony in the inner palace.

But the Queen Mother's calculations made Su Lan and Zheng Huchen very frightened. Su Lan is not an ordinary palace maid now, but the emperor's concubine, according to the rules, she cannot interfere in the government affairs, and it is a matter of the little emperor's secrets, she is tantamount to exposing His Majesty's secret to the queen mother's eyes, at least from the tacit in the past, it has become a matter on the table. And this will also attract the jealousy of other concubines, after all, her status is the lowest among all concubines, but she has enough power to influence the political situation, and she will inevitably be excluded and secretly suppressed.

Zheng Huchen's position is even more embarrassing, he swears allegiance to the little emperor, and he can't offend the queen mother, after all, they are mother and son, and the relationship is very harmonious, but it makes him caught in the middle of a dilemma. In addition, what the Queen Mother asked for at this time was not a private matter, but a major matter related to the life and death of the royal family, but he couldn't refuse.

Zheng Huchen knew in his heart that he had done it, violating the rules set by the emperor, and betraying his trust, and he was only afraid of losing His Majesty's favor in the future; If you disobey the order and are worried that the queen mother will be dissatisfied, you will be blamed by the emperor if there is really an accident in the future. Anyway, it's not appropriate to do it yourself or not, even if the two turn their faces, but no matter how the emperor and the queen mother make trouble, they are mother and son after all, and His Majesty will not openly break with him, and he is the only one who is unlucky.

Zhao estimated that Zheng Huchen ostensibly obeyed the Queen Mother's decree out of this psychology, turned around and sold the Queen Mother, told himself in detail about the meeting between the two, and repeatedly asked for punishment for the crime of 'not suing without permission'. This shows his helplessness and fear, and also expresses his loyalty to himself from the side. And in order to confirm that what he said was true, he also sent his recital and Su Lan's letter to his case in order to corroborate each other.

The three of them tried to prove that they did a good job, but they let Zhao Nan do it, and no matter who they did, they couldn't attack it. But he also figured it out, since everyone is right, then he should be a good person. He took a piece of letterhead and wrote on it, 'The Queen Mother is righteous, cares about the society, and I am very comforted'; and on another letterhead, he wrote, 'The law is not forgivable, and the circumstances are forgivable.'" After writing it, let Wang De seal it separately and hand it over to the messenger to distribute it to the palace and the bureau.

After dealing with urgent official business, Zhao's eyes were on the war in front of him again. Xuyi City has always been an important military town during the period of the separation of the north and the south, guarding the confluence of the Huai River and the Bianhe River, especially the southward migration of the Song Dynasty, and it has become a frontier town, with heavy troops. The Song and Jin sides fought over Sizhou on the other side of the river, and many wars broke out.

However, after Mengyuan captured Jiangnan, the north and south were unified, Xuyi became an inland city, and the military status declined, but after all, it was an important hub on the canal, Mengyuan changed its name to Linhuai Mansion, and also stationed troops here, with about 1,000 soldiers. After learning that the Song army had conquered Yangzhou and marched north, Xuyi's military status was highlighted again, and the township soldiers from the surrounding counties were mobilized, and the neighboring Sizhou garrison was asked for help, and the number of troops in the city increased to 4,000. At the same time, I sent an urgent message to the province and asked for reinforcements.

For the defenders who are not strong in combat with only 4,000 soldiers, Zhao really doesn't care about it in normal times, but today he can't. He led his troops in a hurry, did not carry heavy weapons, and lacked siege equipment. Most of the newly formed Mengyuan troops were cavalry, and they were even more amateurs in attacking the city, but the Xuyi city they faced was stronger than Yangzhou, and it was not easy to take...... Fupin Chinese