In the afternoon, a carriage slowly stopped in front of the famous Zhu Skull Teahouse in Tokyo, Zhang Xiaojie got out of the carriage and said to a dozen or so escort soldiers: "Just wait for me here!" ”

He took two close confidants into the teahouse, and a tea lady tied him to Bai Yutang, and he said to the two henchmen: "You don't have to go in, wait here, and no one else is allowed to disturb." ”

"Obey!"

Two sturdy henchmen stood in front of the door, one left and one right, with their hands crossed.

Zhang Xiaojie walked into the tea hall, this is a suite, there is a tea boy frying water outside, a beautiful tea lady is ordering tea in the back room, and the one sitting at the table is Fan Ning, the governor of the Great Song Dynasty.

"Let Xiao Fan Xianggong wait for a long time."

Fan Ning smiled slightly, waved his hand and said, "Zhang Xiangguo, please take a seat!" ”

Zhang Xiaojie sat down, and at this time the tea lady had already ordered a cup of tea, the white foam was full without overflowing, and the order was perfect.

"This is Jingting tea, the Great Song Dynasty ranks third, second only to Longfeng tea, Zhang Xiangguo should be able to drink it in Beijing!"

Zhang Xiaojie said with a wry smile: "Jingting tea is available, but Liaoguo uses boiled tea, put some salt, green onion and ginger in it, and finally drink it all to relieve the greasy beef and mutton, and there is no such elegant tea." ”

"Isn't there anything between the literati of Liao?"

"There was sencha, but no tea was ordered."

Zhang Xiaojie picked up the teacup and smelled it, the aroma was fragrant, and he praised it sincerely: "The tea is good, and the order is good." ”

Cha Ji smiled shyly and brought another cup of tea to Fanning, who smiled again: "Fry another pot of tea, and then there will be no business for you." ”

Chahime nodded and went down to sencha.

Fan Ning smiled and asked, "When is the negotiation over, when does Zhang Xianggong plan to go back?"

"According to the plan, I will probably go back tomorrow, hey! I wanted to go to Michigan this time, but I'm afraid I won't have a chance. ”

"Is Zhang Xianggong's ancestral home Mizhou?"

Zhang Xiaojie nodded, "My great-grandfather came to Youzhou sixty years ago, after he died, the family found a way to bury his bones back to his hometown in Mizhou, my grandfather and father were buried in Youzhou, they always hoped that I could go back to Mizhou to sweep the tomb of my great-grandfather, and I can only do it next time." ”

Fan Ning smiled and said: "I believe there will be opportunities, such as the next negotiation, it can be arranged in Mizhou, so that Zhang Xianggong can get his wish." ”

"If that's the case, I'm really grateful."

At this time, the tea lady sent a pot of tea, and then retreated with the tea boy.

Fan Ning personally poured tea for Zhang Xiaojie and asked lightly: "My father-in-law said that Zhang Xianggong has a personal matter with me, what will it be?"

Zhang Xiaojie pondered and said: "If I want to buy an island overseas, do you think it is possible?"

Fan Ning was stunned, they did everything possible to lure Yelu Yixin to buy an island in the open sea, but they didn't expect Zhang Xiaojie to take the initiative to bring it up, which made Fan Ning a little stunned.

"Zhang Xianggong, how do you say this?"

Zhang Xiaojie sighed, "Haven't you seen it yet, the deputy envoy Yelu Pinghui is actually in charge of monitoring me, just because I am Han, Yelu Hongji doesn't trust me in his bones, although you are the deputy minister, it's just that Yelu Hongji needs me, but my status in the court is not as good as the Khitan officials who are two levels lower than me." ”

Fan Ning understood a little, "The three holes of the cunning rabbit, Zhang Xianggong wants to buy an island overseas, but he actually wants to leave a way back for himself"

Zhang Xiaojie nodded, "I offended the prince Yelu Jun and the queen Xiao Guanyin, once the prince ascends the throne, he will not allow me, I am afraid that my family will be slaughtered, rather than being cornered, it is better to leave a way back now, the reason why I dare not talk about this matter to others is that I am afraid that people will talk too much and leak secrets, at present, only you and I know, if not, then I will leave, if it is feasible, then we will talk about it in detail." ”

Fan Ning pondered for a moment and said: "The Great Song Dynasty has tens of thousands of overseas islands, and it doesn't hurt to give Zhang Xianggong an uninhabited island with a fertile field of 100 miles, but this matter needs to be considered in the long run, and finally Zhang Xianggong can leave a token for me, and then I will send someone to Beijing to contact Ling Lang." ”

When Zhang Xiaojie heard that it was an island for himself, he was overjoyed, and hurriedly took out a jade pendant from his waist, put it on the table and pushed it to Fan Ning, "This is my family heirloom jade pendant, Xiao Fan Xianggong can send his henchmen to contact my second son Zhang Zhou, who is studying in Liaoguo Taixue, and others don't need to look for it, and please ask Xiao Fan Xianggong to keep this matter secret." ”

Fanning nodded, "I will report this matter to the Son of Heaven, and then we will contact each other through one line, and no one else will know." ”

Zhang Xiaojie got up and said: "Being outside for too long will make Yelu Pinghui suspicious, I will leave first, and please leave this matter to Xiao Fan Xianggong." ”

"Don't worry! I will arrange the island as soon as possible. ”

.........

Coming out of the teahouse, Fan Ning came directly to the palace and asked to see the Son of Heaven outside the Ziwei Palace.

After a while, a eunuch led him into the imperial study, Zhao Ji put down his pen and said with a smile: "How did you think of coming to see me today?"

"Your Majesty, there is something very unexpected today."

Fan Ning told Zhao Ji that Zhang Xiaojie wanted to buy an island overseas and arrange a way back for himself.

Zhao Ji was surprised that the Great Song Dynasty's overseas development attracted so many people's attention, and even the minister of Liao was paying attention, he thought for a while and said, "How do you think we should deal with it?"

"Your Majesty, Wechen has been thinking about Yelu Yixin these days, and he is also quite tempted by overseas islands, and he initially considered giving him Tanzhou, but Tanzhou wants to be used as a logistics base for Pingdao, so Wechen is considering taking an island from the Xiaoliuqiu Islands to him, and Zhang Xiaojie is the same, he can allocate an island from the Xiaoliuqiu Islands to him, provided that he wants to work for us."

Zhao Ji nodded, he understood Fan Ning's strategy, which needed to disintegrate the Liao State from the inside and lay a nail in the heart of the Liao State as much as possible, so he took advantage of Yelu Yixin's greed, and he wanted to use Zhang Xiaojie to find a way back for himself, if these two people can make full use of it, it will indeed bring huge losses to the Liao State, and Zhao Ji does not object to this matter.

Zhao Ji smiled and said: "I will hand over this matter to Xianggong, you can deal with it with all the powers, and you don't have to report it to me, and the same is true for Yelu Yixin." ”

"Thank you Your Majesty for your trust!"

Zhao Ji took out another draft and handed it to Fan Ning, "This is Wang Xianggong's proposal for two law changes, one is to reform official learning, and the other is to reduce redundant officials, please Fan Xianggong take a look." ”

Fan Ning took the report and sat down to take a closer look, the reform of the official school is Wang Anshi's desire to take the opportunity of the establishment of the College of Engineering to re-reform the official school system.

Basically, as in the past, the emphasis on the training of government schools, the expansion of the number of students, the establishment of outer courts, and the reduction of the number of scholars in the imperial examinations seemed to be a reform of the education system in name, but in fact there were deep political intentions.

The Great Song Dynasty imperial examination is nominally to give poor children a chance to rise, but in fact, every time the imperial examination is admitted to the Jinshi, they are basically the children of famous families, and the children of a family are admitted in a row, the imperial examination is fair, but it is unfair in terms of educational resources, the children of famous families occupy the best quality educational resources, and their children certainly have a great advantage over the children of the poor families.

Wang Anshi wanted to carry out reforms in educational resources, strengthen the expansion of official schools, and enter the officialdom after graduation, and gradually reduce the number of scholars in the imperial examination.

Historically, Wang Anshi's educational reform was relatively successful, but it was also in the educational reform that Wang Anshi encountered the biggest reputation crisis, and all the Confucian classics used by students had to adopt his commentaries, which actually seized the right to interpret Confucianism and promoted himself to a position alongside Dong Zhongshu, Zhu Xi and others.

It was this incident that caused him to be strongly criticized from all sides, just imagine how the literati of the Great Song Dynasty could allow Wang Anshi to monopolize the interpretation of Confucianism, and Wang Anshi's reputation was ruined, and he died of depression within a few years.

Wang Anshi did not mention the issue of textbooks in the draft, and Fanning was not in a hurry to express his position, but looked at the second draft of the reduction of redundant officials.

At present, there are three redundant in the Great Song Dynasty, redundant officials, redundant soldiers, and redundant expenses, and redundant soldiers are the best solution, and there are a lot of resources to resettle retired soldiers, reduce the van army, popularize the militia law, and replace the labor law.

In addition to the salt and iron being firmly controlled by the government, wine, sugar, tea, spices, and mining were gradually liberalized, but not completely, but the model of profiting from the former government and a small number of businessmen was changed to a model in which the government and most of the businessmen profited, in fact, the interests of the government did not decrease, but the interests of a small number of people were diluted.

The biggest problem is redundant officials, there are too many officials in the Great Song Dynasty, the children of the powerful have to be taken care of, the children of high-ranking officials have to be given shade, the graduates of Taixue have to be placed, and the titles of the children of the royal family, not to mention the six or seven hundred jinshi every three years.

The finance of the Great Song Dynasty, in addition to military spending, the second largest is the various benefits of officials, but the salaries of officials in the Great Song Dynasty are very high, for many years. It is only in the last ten years that with the expansion of overseas financial resources and the vigorous reduction of the army in the past two years, the imperial court's finances have begun to be more relaxed.

Fan Ning took the two drafts, pondered for a moment and asked, "Has the Queen Mother read these two drafts?"