The fact that Boyan was able to sit in a high position and survived many life crises safely showed that he was not a fool. He quickly heard a different feeling from the words of Liu Mengyan and Su Hetai. The current situation is no longer whether the Jiangnan can be recovered, but the question of when the Song army will fight. His reckless behavior may become the reason for the Southern Dynasty to launch a war. What made Boyan even more worried was that the Yangtze River had become the front yard of the Song court, and their warships were unobstructed on the river, but his side was not prepared to deal with the war.

Boyan participated in almost all the battles between the Jin Dynasty and the Song Dynasty. At that time, the numerous cities became obstacles to their footsteps. Therefore, they would be demolished every time they captured a city to prevent them from becoming the stronghold of the rebels again. Now, without the help of the navy and the obstacles of the city, the defense of the river was like a waste. The Song court has always regarded the Jianghuai region as the frontier to increase the strategic depth. The little emperor at the moment could not have known that the river defense of his side was weak, and no matter from any angle, it was the best time to attack.

The more I think about Boyan, the more I feel that the situation is extremely unfavorable to him. After losing Jiangnan, the tax is equivalent to losing half of his money bag. If Jianghuai loses again, it will be even worse, and the court will definitely fall into a financial crisis. From a military perspective, the Song court, which owns Jianghuai, can stabilize Jiangnan, and at the same time, it can also use this as a base to guide the Central Plains, threatening the security of Dadu at all times. If the Central Plains lose again, then the Dayuan is equivalent to being defeated back to the prototype and having to return to the grassland. In this way, peace talks are not only for the purpose of gaining time and consolidating internal affairs, but also for life and death.

As the first minister of the Yuan court at present, Boyan should be the most familiar with the reality of this dynasty. The rebellion of the king of the Yuanzhi clan in the northwest was not quelled from beginning to end. He conquered and rebelled year by year, which caused constant wars in the northwest region and had to deploy heavy troops to prevent accidents. However, the destruction of the continuous wars had caused the collapse of the northwest economy, and had previously completely used the financial resources of the Central Plains and the Northwest to support it. Once the Central Plains became more chaotic, it would be difficult to fight again without support. The kings of the outer sect would also be dissatisfied, and the division again was a foreseeable result.

Another thing is that the political situation formed after Kublai Khan's death was even more complicated. Although the real gold inherited the Khan throne, it was not based on his prestige, but was the result of exchange of interests and mutual compromise between the parties. The military power he could control was limited to the part of the Xue Chye army and the Central Plains Han army inherited from the Khan, which made it impossible for him to subdue the kings of various sects with absolute strength. The implementation of the Han law also led to dissatisfaction among the old ministers who stick to their own traditions. The direct consequence of all the contradictions was that the Khan throne was unstable.

Therefore, under the current situation, the real gold must retain most of its military strength to deal with internal disputes. Boyan also suggested stopping the conquest of overseas vassal states and focusing on integrating internal forces and quelling the rebellion of Jiangnan. But he never expected that the Song army would grow so strong in just one year, completely beyond his vision, and it would be almost unimaginable to recover Jiangnan in a short period of time. However, if you want to return to Jiangnan, it would be necessary to mobilize the whole country's strength, but it would be like drinking poison to quench thirst, and allowing it to develop was no different from raising a tiger.

Boyan thought for a long time and reached a temporary peace through peace talks with the Southern Dynasties and curbing its development through means was obviously the best choice at present. He knew that it was very laborious for a country to maintain a huge army, while the Song Dynasty implemented a recruitment system, which was a heavier burden, and required a huge amount of financial resources every year, which was even more important in wartime. Therefore, by negotiating to pay huge tributes, the purpose of weakening its military power can be achieved, while the other side can quickly recover its vitality and achieve a reversal of its strength with the help of the other side's financial resources.

However, the idea was to have it, but how to force the other party to submit has become a difficult problem faced by Bo Yan. He knew that in order to gain the right to speak in the negotiations, military victory is the best weapon, but although his side still has good combat power, he needs to face the enemy more and cannot fight with all his strength. The Song army has just won, and both morale and combat power are at the peak. Therefore, it is not a wise move to start a full war now, showing off its military power.

The domestic political turmoil and the military failure in foreign wars made Boyan not many cards available, but it inevitably led to passiveness in the negotiations. He "accidentally" offended the young emperor, causing him to flatly reject the negotiations. Restarting the negotiations became the top priority, but he knew that the young emperor was now full of complacentness and could not be done by sending people to say a few good words or apologizing, but it would have to pay some price...

…………

"Your Majesty, the Minister of Rites of the Yuan Dynasty, and the Deputy Envoy of Qihe Liu Mengyan, cross the river again to request an audience!" Ten days after the peace talks were terminated, Xu Zongren went to Yanxiang Garden to pay homage to the young emperor.

"What are he going to do?" Zhao Bing has been a little busy recently. The matter of changing the defense of the navy has begun. He not only has to review the plan, but also meet with the generals of the army to arrange tasks. It is said that the rainy season is not a good time to adjust defense, because the river water surges and the flow rate increases, which will inevitably lead to difficulties in traversing the ship. But he considers that after the rainy season, it will enter the dry season again. At that time, it will be a bit late to prepare for war on the whole line and then mobilize the army. This is a critical period, so he is naturally not very happy.

"Your Majesty, he is still coming to discuss peace!" Xu Zongren reported.

"Hmph, I've ruined my master once, and he wants to talk again as if he's fine, no way!" Zhao Bing snorted coldly, "Just send him away, just say I'm not free!"

"Your Majesty calmed down, Liu Mengyan said that Boyan regretted his reckless behavior very much. He sent him across the river to apologize and gave him some gifts, hoping to restart the peace talks!" Xu Zongren said with a smile when he saw that the little emperor's anger had not yet subsided.

"Bao, that guy Boyan is a weasel who wishes the chicken a New Year. What kind of good intentions can he do? Maybe he is holding back something bad inside!" Zhao Bing spat.

"Your Majesty, the navy has recently been deploying defenses, and warships on the river are constantly traveling. I think Boyan must have misunderstood that our dynasty was mobilizing troops to prepare for war, so I was eager to resume peace talks. It was indeed bad intentions. Liu Mengyan was also indirectly inquiring and wanted to find out the news." Xu Zongren said with a smile.

"It may not be afraid, but it is true to be alert!" Zhao Bing shook his head and said. He thought that Bo Yan, a civil and military genius, had a sharp eye and had commanded the army to fight in the east and west. He would not be scared because of this matter. Instead, he found that the situation was not good for him, so he was willing to put down his airs and apologize and recount his previous relationship. However, he was secretly adjusting the deployment and preparing for confrontation.

"Your Majesty is right, but the conditions they put forward this time are really hard to refuse!" Xu Zongren said with a wry smile. In fact, when discussing this matter, they had already expected that the Mongolian Yuan would make trouble and also decided on a response, but their response this time exceeded their expectations.

"Oh, what big gift did they give?" Zhao Bing said in a little interest.

"Your Majesty, they promised that if they could restart the peace, they would return the old empress dowager's coffin to our court!" Xu Zongren replied.

"This... it's really hard to refuse." Zhao Bing was stunned and said with only a wry smile on his face. He secretly scolded Boyan for being cunning. He put himself in a very embarrassing situation on the condition of returning Empress Dowager Xie's coffin as a condition for restarting the peace talks.

Everyone knows that the value of a dead person is insignificant compared to state affairs, but if you put this matter on the moral scale and weigh it, you will have to surrender, let alone the Empress Dowager. If Zhao Bing agrees, the signal that he can give up the weakness of national interests for family affection, which is inevitable to be taken advantage of by others. If he refuses, he will be scolded to death by the people, at least the hat of filial piety is taken off. So he knows that even though he knows it is a pit, he has to jump in, and he still has to jump in happily, but there are hundreds of dead people behind him, and living relatives are holding them in their hands, so he can sneak out to threaten and tempt him at any time.

"Your Majesty is correct?" Xu Zongren asked carefully when he saw the little emperor's face changed several times, and he couldn't figure out his attitude for a while.

"It's correct. Tell Liu Mengyan that as long as the Empress Dowager's coffin is safely returned, the peace talks can be considered!" Zhao Bing nodded heavily and said, "Is this matter not possible? Even if the knife is held on my neck, I agree!

"I obey the order, I will leave!" Xu Zongren said politely.

"Shangshu Xu stayed for a while, I still have something to ask for advice!" Zhao Bing said, "but he tried to stay."

"Your Majesty asks you to speak, I will definitely speak for you!" Xu Zongren said politely.

"It's not a public service. I just ask for advice on some unknown matters!" Zhao Bing raised his hand and asked him to avoid the courtesy. Then he moved to the back hall, changed into casual clothes, sat down again, and asked someone to send tea.

"Your Majesty, please speak!"

"Shangshu Xu, I wanted to make some changes to the imperial examination system in the past. I took the new Jinshi to become an Imperial College to practice the way of becoming an official, knowing how to handle government affairs, and then teaching officials to learn the procedures and details of doing things. This matter has been implemented in Qiongzhou, but why did some court officials write letters now and think it is inappropriate, and I can't understand it. I also ask Secretary Xu for advice!" Zhao Bing asked.

"This matter is long, and officials and officials are not the same path, but the path is different. On that day, the situation in Qiongzhou might be urgent and the scope of influence is limited, so no one expressed objections, but now it is different." Xu Zongren thought about it and explained, "From the hundreds of years since the Warring States Period, the First Emperor was appointed as the emperor to the Han Dynasty, the system of using law as the teachings and officials as the teacher was adopted, that is, the emperor governed all the people through grammatical officials, and these officials who were proficient in laws and regulations were responsible for handling state affairs."

"After the Han Dynasty, local tyrants and powerful powers became increasingly important, and officials were unable to continue to govern the country. After the Han Dynasty, Confucianism became increasingly important, and the status of the scholar-official class increased day by day, gradually replaced the powerful, began to enter the official career, and seized the power of the chief officials, that is, officials. However, the original grammatical officials gradually declined and became subordinates of officials at all levels, and were no longer the role of monopolizing power in the Qin system."

"This is the origin of the 'the Supreme Saint does not care about civil affairs but governs the hearts of the people'. Since then, the division of civil affairs and governs the hearts of the people has become a clear beginning. Since then, the high-ranking family has had the honor of the world; the poor people in the surname have no way to advance, and the bad things of elections have come to this point!" Zhao Bing thought about it.

"What Your Majesty said is exactly." Xu Zongren nodded, "Because the lord could not use it to collect matters, he had to use the cold people. People were cold and eager to be proud, and Xuanli was diligent and easy to drive, and gradually he was relied on by the emperor without realizing it. The complexity of civil affairs was disdainful, and those noble families disdained it and entrusted them to poor scholars to manage it. Because of their origins, the path of becoming a high-ranking official was basically cut off, and gradually formed a trend of becoming a higher official and a lower official."

"During the reign of Emperor Wu of Liang in the Southern Dynasties, the nine-rank official system since the Wei and Jin Dynasties was further divided into the nine-rank official system, and the sixth-rank or above was reorganized into a total of eighteen ranks, also known as the eighteen ranks; the seventh-rank or below were the seventh-rank, and almost all were subordinate officials of officials at all levels, all of which were held by poor scholars. At this point, officials and officials became two classes. In the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the imperial examinations were first selected, and the Tang officials were divided into internal and external officials, and they could be promoted from external officials to internal officials after examinations, but they still had to be assessed by the Ministry of Personnel. However, the clerks still had a low status, which led to the three provincial officials of the eighth- and ninth-rank officials, and the scholars also refused to serve, just because they had the name of officials and clerks, and all the scholars were ashamed of being of kindness."

When Zhao Bing heard this, he gradually realized that in ancient China, those who ruled people were called officials, and those who were in charge of officials were called officials, and those who were in charge of officials were called officials. To put it simply, the responsible ones were officials, and those who did practical things were about officials, which was a bit similar to the leadership positions and non-leader positions of civil servants today. Therefore, many modern people, including themselves, think that "officials" are a whole, but this is an illusion.

When discussing the salary of civil servants, most Chinese people like to mention the most is Song and Ming. The left hand is Song and Gaoshou, Bao Longtu has an annual salary of tens of millions of yuan; the right hand is Ming and has no money to survive, and even the Haibijia cannot afford to eat meat. The actual problem is that the scholars and officials in the Song Dynasty were favored by the Song Dynasty, referring to officials; and the Ming Taizu still deals with the heavy salary. What does their salary system have to do with ordinary civil servants who earn two or three thousand yuan a month today? In fact, the only ones that can be compared with them are the minor officials of the Song and Ming Dynasty.

The inversion of the identity of officials was also formed by the continuous transformation of the political system. The "Imperial Power-Civilian" relationship model system formed by the Warring States Period to the Qin Dynasty and the early Western Han Dynasty collapsed due to the rise of local forces and was replaced by aristocratic families, and at the same time produced two classes of scholars and commoners. However, this change was not confirmed by institutional regulations, but the ideological preparations of officials and officials had been completed. By the implementation of the nine-rank Zhongzheng system in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the generals and soldiers in the system were classified into two clearly divided classes.

The implementation of the imperial examination system in the Sui and Tang dynasties broke the aristocratic family system. Not only did it not eliminate the boundaries between officials and officials, but it strengthened the boundaries between the two. Most of the official positions were actually held by foreign officials, and the rights and interests they enjoyed were far from being as good as those of the vacancies. The clerks in local prefectures and counties were even more miserable, and they did not even have foreign ranks, so they could only be classified as "miscellaneous responsibilities". That is to say, the court no longer recognized you as "officials". At this point, the officials were officially completed in the division of the officials.

Zhao Bing also realized that his policy of selecting officials was not a small change, but touched on the official system formed since the Tang Dynasty and infringed on the interests of the scholars and officials...
Chapter completed!