In late September, the autumn wind howled on this particular day. Zhao Jiu was in the rear hall of Mingdao Palace, where he had a dream. He dreamt that he could travel back and forth between this era and nine hundred years later through a well. So, he began to moonlight as a two-way merchant-official. In the modern era, he enjoyed a life of technology and boundless historical resources. In the Great Song Dynasty, he savored the desire for power and the reputation of a holy emperor.

However, one day, Jin Wushu led an army of 100,000 iron cavalry south. The terrain was flat, and they approached Bozhou in just a few days. This Zhao, the Emperor, couldn't leave the well, so he refused to move south under the guise of resisting the Jin in the Central Plains. As a result, the Imperial Guard of over ten thousand men was surrounded on the vast plain by the Jin army's hundred thousand cavalry.

Subsequently, these civil and military officials of the Great Song surrendered one after another, handing over the supplies that this Zhao Emperor had painstakingly brought to Jin Wushu. Left with no choice, he could only jump into the well and escape. Returning to the modern era, he opened a history book and only saw that the Song Dynasty fell because of Zhao Jiu. This person was ambitious but lacked talent, and in the end, he jumped into a well and died. The Jin people gave him the title of "Well Emperor," making him a laughingstock for thousands of years.

Awakening from his dream in the early morning, Zhao Jiu was covered in sweat. He merely sighed softly, then cautiously lifted the covers to get out of bed, careful not to wake Consort Pan Xian beside him.

Several eunuchs stepped forward and, at Zhao Jiu's signal, skillfully dressed the Emperor and fastened a leather belt suitable for archery and riding. When the Emperor came out of the door and saw Liu Yan on duty outside, he didn't say much but just nodded slightly, and the latter understood.

Soon, dozens of Liaodong cavalrymen escorted the Emperor on his journey, joining Yang Yizhong and several other riders who had caught up. In the faint light of the east, they headed north together.

Now, recently, with Yang Yizhong's defection and Zhang Jun's rise, Huang Qianshan and Kang Lü's small group, which had no foundation or whose foundation was originally this Zhao Emperor, collapsed overnight:

Kang Lü was executed on the spot for making resentful remarks in the palace;

Huang Qianshan was dismissed as Chancellor and sent to the Scholar's Hall, appointed as Chief of the Dongxiao Palace in Hangzhou, and sent to live in Lizhou.

However, outside of the two core members, Chancellor Wang Boyan was raised high and gently put down, changed from Administrator of the Privy Council to Deputy Administrator of the Privy Council, out of concern that the simultaneous dismissal of the two Chancellors of the East and West would cause unrest; in addition, Royal Camp Commander Wang Yuan was also pardoned after seeking Zhao Jiu and crying.

In short, Zhao Jiu dared not completely empty the court.

After this, the current situation in the court is that, before Li Gang had time to return, the Right Vice Minister of the Ministry of Personnel (Deputy Chancellor) Lü Haowen actually controlled the duties of the Chancellor of the East;

Wang Boyan still controlled the Privy Council of the West;

The Royal Camp Commander was still Wang Yuan;

Zhang Jun was promoted beyond the norm to Imperial Censor, in charge of remonstrance;

Another Great Eunuch of the Inner Palace, Lan Gui, hurriedly returned from Bozhou City, but half of the duties of the Inner Palace were given by Zhao Jiu, almost absurdly, to Yang Yizhong, and Liu Yan of the Red Heart Team basically replaced the guard duties;

In addition, Zhao Jiu, on the recommendation of Lü Haowen, Zhang Jun, Yang Yizhong and others, massively promoted a group of courtiers such as Hanlin scholars, drafters of the Secretariat, and gatekeepers, and issued a document summoning a group of retired old ministers to the line, calling them to the line under the name of official duties, to act as executive consultants... this complex group is actually the so-called traditional secretary team of the Zhao Song Emperor.

And all of this, plus the six ministries that had some real power after the Yuanfeng Reform, constituted the actual core power department of the current line.

However, these alone are not enough, otherwise Zhao Jiu would not have fallen into the current dilemma of being unable to advance or retreat, and would not be so anxious that he would have nightmares at night and have to ride his horse every morning to relax.

There are three problems, and these three problems are very clear just by looking at the personnel above.

The first is finance.

Although the Yuanfeng Reform returned financial power to the Ministry of Revenue, and then the Ministry of Revenue was directly under the control of the Chancellor, the current situation is that the Ministry of Revenue is simply a clever woman who cannot cook without rice. The real source of wealth, to put it bluntly, still relies on the transfer from the Yangtze River basin, specifically, it requires Liang Yangzu, a Compiler of the Jiying Hall, Academician of the Huiyou Pavilion, Prefect of Yangzhou, Commissioner for Pacification and Transport of Jianghuai and other routes, and head of Southeast tea and salt affairs, to send the Southeast wealth.

This important official, who took in the remnants of the Western Army such as Zhang Jun, Yang Yizhong, Miao Fu, and Tian Shizhong, which was almost equivalent to saving the Zhao Emperor's life, is actually the financier of the entire exiled small court, but at this time he is probably just arriving in Jiangnan...

In a word, there is still no real money to do things here!

In addition to this, there are the troops.

After fully contacting the imperial government, Zhao Jiu basically confirmed that, with the Western Army road cut off, what he has in his hand right now is just the Royal Camp plus the troops at Zong Ze's place in Tokyo. At this time, all the commanders of the Royal Camp are basically suppressing bandits in the Jingdong and Huainan regions (Shandong and Lianghuai regions), and even at this time, less than half of the bandits have been suppressed. When the time comes, they will probably need to rotate and rest before they can clean up the bandits everywhere.

In other words, there are currently no large-scale troops that can really fight here!

In fact, this is the fundamental reason why Zhao Jiu did not deal with Wang Yuan and Wang Boyan. In the current situation, they cannot hold military power at all. The troops are all in the hands of various warlords, and Zhao Jiu can completely communicate directly with these warlords, large and small.

And in addition to having no soldiers and no money, what makes Zhao Jiu feel the most collapsed, or rather, what really makes Zhao Jiu so worried these days, is precisely the Grandfather Zong Ze, whom he had most expected!

For no other reason than that Grandfather Zong really doesn't take him seriously, and really treats him like a naughty child to fool.

First of all, when Zhao Jiu issued an edict to Tokyo to find Zong Ze to be the Privy Councilor, Grandfather Zong accepted the position of Privy Councilor, but was unwilling to come to Bozhou to see Zhao Jiu at all. The reason, of course, was that the battle in Tokyo was critical, because Jin soldiers had already appeared at the Sishui Pass, and the battle was very anxious.

Then, Zhao Jiu continued to send envoys to tell Zong Ze that Huang Qianshan had been dismissed as Chancellor and that he had reactivated Li Gang. So Grandfather Zong immediately replied, explaining the difficulties of the situation around Tokyo, and directly saying that there was a famine in Tokyo, and then he wanted soldiers, money, and food... Of course, Zhao Jiu could understand this, and he naturally didn't have any soldiers, but he still had a little bit of money and food in stock, so he almost tightened his belt and tried to support Grandfather Zong, even the gold powder on the body of the Daoist Ancestor was scraped off, melted down, and sent over!

Then, about seven or eight days later, Li Gang had just returned to the Huaixi area, but he encountered a rebel Ding Jin who had just emerged in the Huaixi area blocking the road. So Prime Minister Li sent a document from afar, first stating his political program, roughly saying that he still wanted to prepare everything here, and when he arrived, he would go to Nanyang with him, etc... Unexpectedly, this document was sent around and attracted the attention of Grandfather Zong, who immediately sent a document to the line, saying that the food prices in Tokyo had calmed down a lot, and he now had a million troops, enough to resist the enemy, so he asked the Emperor not to go to Nanyang and just return to the old capital!

This is simply too absurd. Not to mention that he was still asking for soldiers and food, and said that there was a famine in Tokyo, but in the next breath, it became that the food prices in Tokyo had calmed down. The key is that million troops... there must be a million Tokyo refugees, but a million troops is too childish!

At this time, Zhao Jiu really felt the helplessness of being treated like a child, and this helplessness was probably even more serious than the previous Zhao Gou's feelings. After all, if he was like the previous Zhao Gou, wholeheartedly thinking about fleeing south, ignoring these words and running to Yangzhou with his head buried, that would be fine. The key is that Zhao Jiu vaguely understands Zong Ze's thoughts in his heart!

The reason why Zong Ze is telling lies with his eyes open to deceive Zhao Jiu, the reason why he is fooling Zhao Jiu like this, is essentially because he is afraid that Zhao Jiu will run away again! And once Zhao Jiu starts running away again, as long as he runs to Yangzhou on the edge of the Yangtze River, even if he doesn't cross the river, one sentence in Grandfather Zong's memorial will become a reality - the land of the Central Plains and the hearts of the people in Hebei are there. Once abandoned, it will take more than ten years and hundreds of thousands of troops to take them back!

And it is precisely because he understands Zong Ze's good intentions that Zhao Jiu cannot ignore the other party's intentions. But the problem is, if he really goes to Tokyo according to Zong Ze's intentions, it must be a dead end, right?

Although Zhao Jiu doesn't understand historical details, historically, Jin Wushu chased Zhao Gou all the way, searching the mountains and seas, and only ran out of strength after attacking Jiangnan. He still broke through Han Shizhong's main force on the way back to the north and successfully returned. This shows that the main direction of the next wave of Jin army attacks is Zhao Jiu's line, and Jin Wushu's main force is staring at Zhao, the Emperor!

In this case, even if Grandfather Zong historically held Tokyo for several years like a pillar in the middle of the stream, which can be called a miracle, but once he goes there and attracts Jin Wushu's 100,000 main force to Tokyo, he is afraid that he will be wiped out with those million troops, right?

However, what is even more collapsing is that when Zhao Jiu told Zong Ze about his concerns about the Jin army's third full-scale southward attack, Zong Ze didn't believe it at all. According to Grandfather Zong's statement, the Jin Kingdom's Grand Marshal and Second Prince Wanyan Wolibu are both dead, and the three of the Jin army, Nianhan, Talan, and Wushu, will inevitably fight for power. In the short term, no one can be the commander and lead the main force south. Please rest assured, Emperor... By the way, Grandfather Zong also updated the data. Now there are two million troops in Tokyo!

This is the most helpless thing for Emperor Zhao - it's okay to not have power for the time being, but after driving away the traitors, the loyal ministers don't believe him!

Especially since Li Gang has been proven to be suitable as a Prime Minister but not as a commander, and Zong Ze, although not good at leading troops into battle, is one of the most outstanding commanders of this era, and was his greatest reliance before!

The sun rose in the east. Zhao Jiu stood on the bank of the Wo River, looking northwest. If it weren't for the fact that once he entered a place like Tokyo, it would be difficult to withdraw, he would really want to ride his horse to Tokyo and show his heart to Zong Ze... By the way, see if Yue Pengju, who he is so concerned about, is there.

Of course, with Grandfather Zong's attitude, what can the twenty-four-year-old Yue Pengju do? Zhao Jiu became more and more unconfident.

"It's getting bright, Emperor. Let's go back as soon as possible, otherwise the hearts of the people here will be uneasy." Seeing Zhao Jiu gazing at the old capital again and again, Liu Yan was moved but didn't forget his duties, so he took the initiative to step forward to persuade him.

"Let's go." Zhao Jiu glanced at the northwest direction again, finally sighed faintly, and then turned to go down the embankment.

He knew that Zong Ze's documents would probably stop in the next few days, because Li Gang was about to bypass the Huaixi and rush to Bozhou. Then this Prime Minister Li would preside over the transfer of the line to Nanyang, and may even further move from Nanyang into Guanzhong... In this environment, Zong Ze can't compete with Li Gang, the banner of the pro-war faction, otherwise he would not have repeatedly submitted memorials before Li Gang returned.

And once he ignores Zong Ze and listens to the arrangements of the other ministers, retreat a few steps to a strategically advantageous place, whether it's Guanzhong, Jingxiang, or Yangzhou, and quietly accumulate strength, farm the land, and train troops. As long as he doesn't make mistakes, it seems that it's the situation where you can lie down and win even if you change a dog. The only thing is that you have to wait more than ten years and more than hundreds of thousands of soldiers will die!

As the saying goes, "Thirty years of fame is like dust and dirt..." Historically, when Yue Pengju received the twelve gold tablets, he must have been at least thirty-five years old, right? That is, at least twelve years later.

Just as the group of knights were about to go down the embankment and mount their horses, a goshawk suddenly flew across the sky, gliding from the southeast directly towards the northwest, attracting the knights to look.

Zhao Jiu also turned his head in astonishment, feeling surprised and suspicious, but ultimately at a loss.