According to Chinese tradition and imperial customs, on the seventh day after the death of the old emperor (that is, the first seven), the new emperor must succeed to the throne before the coffin of the first emperor.

But it was also in these seven days, with the death of Li Zhi, that there was a brief vacuum period of the supreme power of the Tang Dynasty, which attracted the attention of many people, and also caused some open and secret contention.

In this competition, the fastest, most accurate and most ruthless shot is, of course, Wu Zetian.

Since the beginning of the "Two Saints in the Same Dynasty", Wu Zetian has continuously exercised the "supreme power" of the Tang Dynasty under the authorization of Li Zhi. Over the years, Wu Zetiantong Guò has accumulated considerable experience in governing for many years, and has won a lot of people's hearts, and even has a certain popularity and support rate among the masses and civilians - for example, the twelve suggestions she put forward have been implemented for so many years. Many of them are programs for the welfare of the lower classes.

Her current actions prove that she has no desire to delegate power and retire.

Xue Shao often recalled Li Zhi's last words - "The queen of heaven is the ruler, the servant takes care of her life, the horse is in charge of the soldiers, and the new monarch is assisted!" The Mandate of Heaven artifact is not blasphemous! ”

The first half of the last sentence is the personnel arrangement made by Li Zhi on his deathbed. At that time, no one could force Li Zhi to do anything he didn't want to do, and there was no doubt that it was the embodiment of his self-will after careful consideration. In his last words, Li Zhi appointed Pei Yan as the minister to take charge of the government, and there is no suspense about this. Looking at the current Tang Dynasty, only Pei Yan has the ability and prestige to be this minister who cares for his life.

But Xue Shao has always known that Li Zhi has a knot, that is, he has suffered from the ministers of Gu Ming, and he does not completely trust the ministers. He certainly didn't want his son Li Xian to become a puppet emperor after he succeeded to the throne - not to mention that Li Xian was still such an incompetent wretch, and Li Zhi didn't believe that he could fight like his father did in the past.

So Li Zhi made another important personnel arrangement - Tianhou Zuozheng.

The word "Zuo" can be used quite thoughtfully. If it is said to be "ruling on behalf of the government" or "weighing the system in the dynasty", then Wu Zetian can justifiably throw the emperor into the side hall and sit down, and he still exercises the supreme power on behalf of him as he did in the last years of Gaozong. But Li Zhi only said "Zuo Zheng", which means that Wu Zetian can only "assist" from the side, just like a senior staff member or think tank to give advice to the emperor, instead of going directly to the court to decide right and wrong and give orders.

As for the "horseshoe soldiers", Xue Shao thought to himself that Li Zhi had no way to do it. If the new emperor wants to sit firmly on the throne, the first thing to bear the brunt of is the strong support of the army. Li Zhi looked around in the army, and Cheng Wuting of the Northern Ya were all generals promoted by the queen of heaven; Xue Rengui may be trustworthy, but he is too old, who knows how many days he will live? Wang Fangyi is thousands of miles away, and he has no foundation and influence in the court, and he is also a little old...... So pick and choose, only your son-in-law is trustworthy.

In this way, Li Zhi made the personnel arrangement of "separation of powers" in his last words that Pei Yan would take care of the government, the queen of heaven would be a senior staff officer, and the horse would be in charge of the military power.

Xue Shao felt that Li Zhi's "positioning" of the queen of heaven was the most strange. He neither kicked the queen away from allowing her to interfere in politics anymore, nor did he clarify the scope of her power. It can be seen that Li Zhi still relied on Wu Zetian very much when he was dying, but he did not completely trust him.

The two saints have gone through nearly 30 years of ups and downs together, and they are in danger to overthrow the eldest grandson Wuji and Chu Suiliang, the ministers who care for their lives, and truly regain the imperial power. They supported each other, Li Zhi was in poor health, Wu Zetian stepped forward to take care of the government for him, the Tang Dynasty has been governed well over the years, and Wu Zetian's credit is still great. At the same time, the two saints have been fighting openly and secretly, and they are still fighting until the moment when Li Zhi died.

The two saints have never really trusted each other completely, and at the same time they are very inseparable from each other.

Now that Li Zhi has finally passed away, this is both a great crisis and a great opportunity for Wu Zetian. Because, the person who gave Wu Zetian the power is gone, and at the same time, the only person who can "suppress" Wu Zetian is gone!

Power is like a drug, it's hard to quit once you get it. The government and the opposition are now very clear about one thing, the queen of heaven will not be willing to give up her authority like this and withdraw from the court stage of the Tang Dynasty.

In the seven days when the old and new emperors handed over the king, Wu Zetian could be regarded as busy. While carefully taking care of Li Zhi's funeral, she united with Pei Yan and others to seize power, arranged henchmen in various confidential departments of the imperial court, and went to Bingzhou, Yizhou, Yangzhou, Jingzhou and Youzhou, etc., which were important economic centers and military towns, and installed people to take over the real power. At the same time, Wu Zetian also made great efforts to stabilize the hearts of the people.

Old royal families such as King Huo and Li Yuanliang were all ordered by Wu Zetian to be named "Tai Lieutenant" or "Prince Young Master". This is a high-ranking official at the level of the Third Duke or the Third Division, who is extremely glorious but has no real power. But people like Li Yuanliang have nothing to lack, what they want is some false fame, and what they love is a face, Wu Zetian is definitely on their pulse and then does what he likes.

Sure enough, as soon as the illustrious position of the three dukes arrived, Li Yuanliang and the others happily accepted it, and immediately turned a blind eye to Wu Zetian's jumping up and down above the court.

Even people like Li Yuanliang don't point fingers, and of course other ministers can't talk too much. In this way, the political situation in the Eastern Capital Dynasty is generally stable!

Right now, what Wu Zetian wants most is the peace of the eastern capital, the stability of the court, and the protection and consolidation of his authority and status. Then, it is not enough for her to appease a group of civil officials who play with pen and rod. "Politics comes out of a gun", of course Wu Zetian didn't know this original sentence, but she definitely understood this truth. If he provokes a general with troops, a hundred civil officials with a pen and a pole will not be able to stop him.

Therefore, what made Wu Zetian pay the most thought and effort was the generals who stabilized the army and won over the army.

Among them, there are three generals in charge of different military powers, which are particularly prominent.

The first is the Thousand Cavalry General Wu Yougui, who is now leading troops to protect Wu Zetian himself. Wu Zetian's appointment of him to be such a senior official is already a great honor and preferential treatment. Now the government and the opposition all know that every day after the trip, there is a good dog in front of the road, and the name of this dog is Wu Yougui.

The second important general that Wu Zetian focused on wooing was the general of the forbidden army who now controls the entire Luoyang City and the Purple Hui Imperial City, Cheng Wuting.

Cheng Wuting is already the general of Yulin Wei, and his military career has basically come to an end, and there is no room for further promotion, but his loose official quality is still not high. So Wu Zetian promoted him to two orders in one go, which is equivalent to eight years of less struggle. In addition, Wu Zetian also heard out from nowhere that Cheng Wuting wanted his son to go to the right guard and go to Xue Shao's subordinates. Without waiting for Cheng Wuting to take the initiative, Wu Zetian waved his pen, go kid - Cheng Qizhi was named the general of the Right Guard Mansion.

However, this is the official position that Xue Chuyu is holding now.

So in order to "move the position" for Cheng Qizhi, Xue Chuyu, who was only in his twenties, completed a major leap in his life, and was promoted from the fourth rank Zhonglang to the general of the third rank of the right guard, and officially became Xue Shao's right-hand man together with another right guard general, Li Duozuo. At the same time, Guo Yuanzhen, who was also transferred to the right guard, was slightly lower than Cheng Qizhi, and the right guard was the general of the Zuo Lang.

These two personnel appointments for Xue Shao's best brother and best partner were all made by Wu Zetian on his own initiative. Her intentions are very clear, in order to win over Xue Shao, a good son-in-law, and the right guard general who is in charge of the 200,000 army, she spares no expense!

Although Xue Shao has only been in office for a few days, his strength lies in the fact that he is the "Tuogu General" who was entrusted to the military power by the first emperor on his deathbed. This is too powerful, even after the new emperor takes office, he has to pay tribute to Xue Shao as a guest, because his own throne and land have to count on Xue Shao to protect him.

Therefore, Wu Zetian is really coaxing and paying tribute to Xue Shao as a baby bump like a cash cow now. Xue Shao was injured and had difficulty moving, so she made an exception to let Xue Shao live in the Zhenguan Palace, and asked Xue Chuyu to lead two hundred elites into the palace to protect him.

In fact, these two behaviors are strict zhòng violating the palace system - only one man is allowed to live in the harem, which is an iron law; Field armies are generally not allowed to enter the city, let alone such a forbidden place in the imperial city.

But because Xue Shao was assassinated and injured, Wu Zetian made an exception for him!

Not only made an exception for him alone, Wu Zetian also took Xue Shao's brother and younger brother to live in the palace, in the name of avoiding assassins for safety; In addition, even the Kudi family, who lived in Xue Shao's house, moved to live in the Zhenguan Palace.

In addition, Wu Zetian not only agreed to Xue Shao's arbitrary selection of eighteen martial arts shooters to be his personal slaves in the court, but also sent more than 100 eunuchs and palace maids to serve Xue Shao and his family - this is where the emperor lived during his lifetime, not to mention the prime minister, even the prince has never enjoyed this kind of treatment.

Many people say that the queen of heaven's courtesy to Xue Shao is "out of line", which must contain the meaning of wooing and buying. But after all, Princess Taiping is also Wu Zetian's beloved daughter, and now she is pregnant with Liujia and Xue Shao is injured, so Wu Zetian's excessive preferential treatment of Xue Shao in private is barely reasonable. Although the courtiers had some discussions, they were not particularly obsessed.

But in official affairs, Wu Zetian also attaches special importance to Xue Shao and has special wooing.

Xue Shao's elder brother Xue Yizhi has been scattered in Chang'an for a long time since he stepped down as the assassin of Jeju. But on the fifth day of the emperor's death, a letter of appointment was handed over to Xue Yi - appointing him as Sinong Shaoqing.

Si Nong Shaoqing is an official position from Sipin, and it is a very important official position that holds real power.

In the central system of the Tang Dynasty, the three provinces and six ministries are the institutions that make decisions and issue orders, and the "nine temples" (or Jiuqing) below are the yamen that actually do things. Sinong Temple is an important institution in charge of national agriculture, and Sinong Shaoqing is equivalent to the current "Vice Minister of Agriculture".

Datang is a big agricultural country based on farming, and the importance of "Sinong Temple" is self-evident. Xue Yi had previously done a history of Sanpin Thorn in other places, and he did have rich experience in persuading farmers to teach agriculture. However, the three grades of foreign officials are not as good as the five grades of Beijing officials, which is the consensus in the Tang Dynasty officialdom. Now, Xue Yi, the "former assassin history" who has been idle, has been promoted overnight to the fourth grade of Jingguan and is also in charge of the agricultural confidential department of Datang, the significance of which is clear at a glance.

Not only Xue Xu, who has political experience, is on the rise, but Xue Shao's younger brother, Xue Xu, who is still studying in Guozijian, was also named a baron (baron) in Fuping County - he sat at home and did nothing, and was stunned by a reward. Everyone knows that this is certainly not because Xue Xu's books are read very well, and they have moved the court, the queen of heaven and the prime minister.

Xue Shao was lying on the sickbed, quietly watching Wu Zetian spread clouds and rain above the court, watching some people around him rise or recover, he also saw many people dancing thousands of miles away, and many people were sad and dazed.

Xue Shao thought to himself, right now, the times have reached an important turning point.

I am very fortunate that I have formulated the right strategy before, and I let my father-in-law, the old emperor, give full play to his residual heat, so that I have today's status and strength.

I am also unfortunate, now that Wu Zetian has been revealed, her political alliance with Pei Yan is in full swing, and no one can control them or suppress them anymore. But when my father-in-law, the old emperor, was dying, he entrusted his precious son, Adou Li Xian, who was difficult to pick up, to me, and asked me to escort him.

In the midst of such a great wave of the times, where should I go?