The next day, the Emperor of Great Wei once again summoned his nine sons to the Wende Palace.

Except for the Seventh Emperor Hongyin and the Ninth Emperor Hongxuan, the rest of the princes had roughly guessed the purpose of their father's summoning them to the Wende Hall this time.

That is the unprecedented "prince's companion" in this year's examination.

Although it is said that the prince of the eunuch does not have much authority, it is nothing more than supervising the entire process of the scientific examination, but it is undeniable that the imperial examination is a national event related to the Great Wei official system after all, and it is an excellent opportunity to reasonably contact the officials of the ministry.

Therefore, all the princes who are enthusiastic about the throne are looking at this opportunity with great care, and want to try to see if they can take this opportunity to attract some officials, such as the emperor's eldest son "Prince" Hongli, the second son "Yongwang" Hongyu, the third son "Xiangwang" Hongjing, the fourth son "Yanwang" Hongjiang, and the fifth son "Qingwang" Hongxin.

These princes originally thought that their father would decide the prince who would accompany the eunuch after consulting with the ministers, so in the past few days, he has a lot of relations with the courtiers who have the right to speak, after all, these are all princes who have left the cabinet, as long as they are not blatant friends and private interests, and generally win over the ministers of the court, the emperor of Great Wei has always turned a blind eye.

After all, this is the "rule of the game" for the princes of the Great Wei Dynasty to compete for the throne: within the scope of the rules, the rules are unscrupulous.

But what no one expected was that the emperor of Great Wei finally decided to use the method of "drawing lots" to choose the prince who accompanied the prisoner, which made the five princes who had been running around these days feel very depressed.

However, they can also accept this situation, except for the crown prince Hongli, who is temporarily the prince.

After all, as usual, the crown prince Hongli is the most likely to be appointed as the prince of the accompanying prince, if there are no special circumstances, the remaining four princes who have been crowned kings will hardly be able to get this opportunity, unless the emperor of Great Wei intends to set up another prince, he will pick one of the latter four.

The only thing that can't be understood is that the princes obviously heard that the princes who accompanied the prison did not include the seventh prince Hongyin, the eighth prince Hongrun and the ninth prince Hongxuan, why did they suddenly change their minds?

At this time, the Emperor of Great Wei revealed the reason, and they learned that it was the Eighth Emperor Zhao Hongrun who was a scoundrel and entangled with their father, which made the annoying Emperor of Great Wei change his mind.

"Hachi?"

It can be seen that all the princes are surprised, especially the sixth prince Zhao Hongzhao.

Because in their impression, their eighth brother is purely a fun-loving person who never does anything serious, why did he suddenly change at this time?

"It is said that Xiaoba was imprisoned in the sect for some reason a few days ago, and it took seven days to release him...... Could it be that it has something to do with it?'

The second prince, King Yong, glanced at Zhao Hongrun suspiciously, thoughtfully.

A few days ago, Zhao Hongrun was framed by Luo Wenzhong of the Ministry of Officials, and stayed overnight in the incense pavilion of Miss Su in a water pavilion, and was finally taken away by the people of the Zongfu, and the people of the Zongfu did not disclose this matter, nor did the Emperor of Dawei disclose it, therefore, the princes only knew that their eighth brother was imprisoned in the Zongfu for some reason, but they had no way of knowing this reason.

"Looking at Hachi's meaning, it seems that he is determined to win this time?"

The third son, "King Xiang", Hongjing, also glanced at his eighth brother thoughtfully, and secretly calculated in his heart.

As one of the princes competing for the throne with the crown prince Hongli, Yongwang Hongyu and Xiangwang Hongjing are the most likely to replace the crown prince at present, which is a well-known thing in the government and the opposition.

They didn't care much about their eighth brother's involvement in this incident, after all, Zhao Hongrun's chaotic fu in the Vertical Arch Hall that day was a fool who could hear that he had no intention of taking the throne, and he didn't care much about the sixth prince Zhao Hongzhao, so he couldn't be called the enemy of the four princes who had been crowned kings at all.

In comparison, Prince Hongli's complexion was a little unsightly.

It's no wonder, after all, if Zhao Hongrun didn't intervene, he would have the greatest chance of becoming a candidate for the prisoner, but now, his chances are only more than one percent, which makes the prince of the East Palace a little unhappy, staring at Zhao Hongrun unhappily.

At this time, Zhao Hongrun's attention was focused on the matter of drawing lots, and he didn't care that his actions made the prince of the East Palace a little unhappy, but King Yongwang Hongyu and King Xiangwang Hongjing saw it clearly.

『……』

The two princes exchanged glances in tacit understanding.

At this time, the emperor of Great Wei had written the names of the nine emperors on nine pieces of paper, and at the same time, the great eunuch Tong Xian folded the nine pieces of paper separately and spread them on the dragon case.

Seeing that the Great Wei Tianzi was about to reach out and grab one of the papers, the princes who were quite enthusiastic about the position of the prisoner suddenly tensed their nerves and secretly prayed that they could be selected.

But at this moment, Zhao Hongrun suddenly interrupted the Son of Heaven: "Father, this is unfair. ”

The princes looked at Zhao Hongrun in surprise, surprised that this brother would say such a thing, but when they thought about it, this brother did not hesitate to start two rounds of struggle with their father in order to go out of the palace to play, and they were also relieved.

Under the surprised gaze of the princes, the emperor of Great Wei did not feel the slightest anger when he heard this, but only showed an impatient expression.

"How is it unfair again? Didn't you say you were going to cast lots? ”

I saw Zhao Hongrun take a few steps towards the dragon case, and explained: "The emperor is not saying that it is unfair to draw lots, what the emperor means is that it is unfair to draw lots like this...... How did the emperor know if his father secretly wrote down the emperor's piece of paper and deliberately didn't choose it? ”

"It's ...... Questioning the Father?'

The princes' faces changed slightly, and they said in their hearts that this brother was so bold and reckless that he dared to question their father like this.

However, to their surprise, the Great Wei Tianzi was still not angry, he frowned and asked, "Then what do you mean?" ”

"I beg my father to put these nine pieces of paper in a box that cannot be seen, muddy them, and then extract them. …… That's fair, right? ”

"......" The Son of Heaven frowned and glanced at Zhao Hongrun, and said impatiently: "Okay, in order to make you die, I will do what you say." ”

After that, the Son of Heaven glanced at Tong Xian, the great eunuch beside him.

Tong Xian understood, bowed, and retreated from the dragon case.

He glanced at the wooden shelves in the Wende Palace, and saw that there was a black and purple box on one of the shelves, so he carefully held it over and placed it on the dragon case.

Seeing this scene, Zhao Hongrun breathed a sigh of relief in his heart, because this box was exactly what he ordered the Ministry of Industry to make yesterday.

He knew that the place where the Emperor of Great Wei summoned these princes should not be in the Vertical Arch Hall where the three Zhongshu ministers handled government affairs, but in the Wende Palace, the place where the Son of Heaven rested.

Therefore, he asked Zongwei Mu Qing last night to sneak into the Wende Hall and secretly place this box here while people were not paying attention.

For this reason, Zhao Hongrun did not hesitate to spend hundreds of taels of silver to coerce and induce a cadre of guards on duty outside the Wende Palace, and ordered them not to disclose the matter.

Don't think it's an ordinary box, in fact, it's a wooden box with a mechanism.

It may not be remarkable at first glance, but in fact, this wooden box is exquisitely made, and it has a dark grid in it, which contains the paper that Zhao Hongrun has prepared in advance, which is also nine sheets, and it is also neatly folded, the only difference is that his name is written on these nine pieces of paper, Hongrun.

The reason why the word Zhao Hongrun was not written is because according to custom, the surname is not added when calling members of the royal family.

At this time, Tong Xian had already put the nine pieces of paper into the wooden box, covered the lid, and then held the wooden box and shook it gently a few times.

"Satisfied?" The Son of Heaven asked.

Zhao Hongrun smiled slightly, and then arched his hand and said, "Can you let the emperor draw it?" ”

The Son of Heaven glanced at Zhao Hongrun with unpredictable eyes, raised his hand and made a gesture of please.

Seeing this, Zhao Hongrun stepped forward.

To be honest, he was really a little worried that his father would not allow him to smoke it, after all, at this moment, the sawdust actually contained eighteen pieces of paper, nine of which were written by the Son of Heaven, and the remaining nine were written by Zhao Hongrun in imitation of the notes of the Son of Heaven.

In front of everyone's eyes, Zhao Hongrun pretended to hold the wooden box and shook it again, seemingly messing up the paper inside, but in fact, he was just pressing the mechanism to replace the nine pieces of paper from the Son of Heaven.

After the preparations were completed, Zhao Hongrun put the wooden box on the table, opened the lid, reached into the box, and took out one casually.

"Huh? It seems that the will of heaven is on the side of the emperor, tsk, what a blessing. ”

Spread out the paper, and the word "Hongrun" was clearly written on the paper.

"That's too much of a coincidence, isn't it?"

The princes looked at each other, and said in their hearts that I would go up and smoke if I knew this.

But a few of them who were more careful had already begun to doubt the authenticity of this lot, but because this wooden box was taken casually in the Wende Palace, they didn't want to question anything rashly.

However, although they didn't say anything, a strange smile appeared on the face of the Son of Heaven: "Draw another one." ”

Suddenly, Zhao Hongrun's smile became a little unnatural.

"What's the matter, draw another one." Looking at Zhao Hongrun, the Son of Heaven said lightly: "Are you afraid of pulling out another piece of paper with your name written on it?" ”

"......" Zhao Hongrun said in a sneer: "Where did the father speak, this paper was written by the father, how could it be all the names of the emperor?" ”

"Huh! Not necessarily. The Son of Heaven smiled faintly and reached into the wooden box: "Since you don't smoke, I should draw another one for you." ”

As he spoke, the Son of Heaven took out another piece of paper from the wooden box, spread it out and took a look, and sure enough, the word "Hongrun" was written on it.

Only then did the princes suddenly realize: it turned out that this kid was cheating!

After glancing at Zhao Hongrun, who was speechless with a straight face, the Son of Heaven simply took out all the papers in the wooden box and spread them out one by one, and sure enough, Zhao Hongrun's name was written on all of them.

"I can't see that you are really accomplished in imitating my handwriting...... How long have you been studying? The Son of Heaven sneered.

Seeing that the trick was exposed, Zhao Hongrun was simply relieved, shrugged his shoulders and said, "This still needs to be learned?" The father's handwriting is not very good, just look at it twice. ”

"This bad son will be angry when the matter comes!"

The Son of Heaven exhaled viciously.

"Redraw the lot!"

"PS: This book has been signed A, and it was first published by the starting point Chinese website. I hope that readers of this book will take a minute to go to the starting point and vote for this book, and I would be grateful for it."