Chapter 1: The Miserable Transmigration

  There are only three days left before the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show at Quanfang Pavilion starts, and during this time, Shuntianfu has been continuously fermenting topics related to Quanfang Pavilion's T-stage show. More and more people in Shuntianfu know what Quanfang Pavilion's T-stage show means, and more and more people know what the content of the previous Quanfang Pavilion's fairy landing T-stage show was.

  Finally, the news reached the ears of Grand Secretary Li Dongyang.

  Li Dongyang, what kind of person is he? To be precise, his official position should be Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, Gentleman of the Studious and Diligent Hall, Grand Tutor to the Crown Prince and Concurrently a Grand Secretary.

  The Ministry of Revenue is one of the six ministries, in charge of national land, taxation, household registration and other financial powers. The Minister of the Ministry of Revenue is even more the chief officer of the Ministry of Revenue. As for the title of Gentleman of the Hanlin Academy, it is just an honorary title. The title of Grand Tutor to the Crown Prince belongs to the first rank of the three dukes, meaning the teacher of the crown prince.

  As for the title of the last cabinet minister, what kind of weight it is, first we have to make clear what kind of organization the cabinet is. In the Ming Dynasty, the cabinet was the emperor's secretarial institution, only serving as a consultant and assisting in handling memorials, not participating in decision-making. That means a group of people helping the emperor make decisions.

  This title doesn't sound like much at first, but in reality, it's actually quite intimidating. Influencing major decisions that affect the world, emperors usually convene a meeting with cabinet members to discuss and often listen to their opinions. That is to say, cabinet members often influence the direction of the country's trend and decide on many major events.

  Li Dongyang holds both the great powers of finance and cabinet, and is also one of the three dukes with great power. Moreover, he was the trusted minister who took care of the emperor's last will before his death. The current Emperor Zhu Houzhao has no children, and Li Dongyang's position as the Grand Preceptor of the Heir Apparent represents that he used to be Zhu Houzhao's teacher when Zhu Houzhao was still a prince, responsible for teaching him the way of being an emperor. Therefore, Zhu Houzhao both respects and fears Li Dongyang.

  In the imperial court, eight eunuchs including Liu Jin, Zhang Yong, Ma Yongcheng and Gao Feng who were deeply favored by Zhu Houzhao were called "Eight Tigers". Although they were mutually at odds with each other, once they encountered attacks from civil officials, they would unite as one to resist together, led by Liu Jin and Zhang Yong. After several rounds of struggle, the Eight Tigers emerged victorious every time, so few high-ranking officials in the imperial court dared to be enemies with them again, except for Li Dongyang who was different.

  There were 17 members of the Grand Secretariat during Zhengde's reign, with Li Dongyang as their leader. If other officials caused trouble for the Eight Tigers, Zhu Houzhao might have protected them and even punished those who caused trouble. However, if the Eight Tigers provoked Li Dongyang, he would go directly to Zhu Houzhao's imperial study and loudly accuse them while holding the late emperor's will in his hand, with tears streaming down his face.

  He not only impeached the Eight Tigers, but also dragged Zhu Houzhao into it. Since Zhu Houzhao ascended to the throne, this has become a routine. Whenever Li Dongyang impeaches the Eight Tigers, he must first find fault with Zhu Houzhao, lecturing him on the way of the ruler and spitting stars at his face. Then, facing east, he kneels down and asks for the late emperor's will, finally crying out loud that he is ashamed of the trust placed in him by the late emperor, and then asking Zhu Houzhao to persuade him to live or die, until Zhu Houzhao agrees to punish the Eight Tigers.

  Among the Eight Tigers, four people, including Qiu Ju, Gu Dajun, Wei Bin and Luo Xiang, were beaten with a board. Liu Jin was also fined five years' salary and was forced to reflect at home for a month without being allowed to go out. Such a person, none of the Eight Tigers dared to provoke, even Zhu Houzhao gave him three points of deference.

  At present, in the study of Li's mansion, Cao Yuan and Liang Chu, who are also members of the cabinet, are also here. The two were originally students under Li Dongyang, and they were promoted by Li Dongyang himself. During the reign of Emperor Xiaozong, the two had already served as Taizi Taibao and Libu Shilang. Now, one is the Minister of Personnel, and the other is the Vice Minister of Personnel. Such high-ranking officials owe their positions to Li Dongyang's support, so they are considered iron-clad members of Li Dongyang's faction.

  Li Dongyang's mansion was not very large, of course, as the chief minister of the cabinet, his mansion could not be too small. However, Li Dongyang had a habit, that is, no matter what, the study must be big enough. As a famous calligrapher and writer in the Ming Dynasty, Li Dongyang's study did not say it had a collection of 10,000 volumes, but there were about 7,000 or 8,000. Moreover, most of those books were old and looked like they had been read frequently.

  In the study, three people sat in a chair each, with a small wooden table beside them holding ordinary pastries and tea. After finishing a cup of tea, Li Dongyang had already discussed many state affairs with Cao Yuan and Liang Chu. As this small-scale meeting was about to come to an end, Li Dongyang sighed: "Liu Gong and Xie Gong were dismissed from office due to their harsh words, which displeased the Emperor. Of the four assistant ministers back then, only I am still in court."

  "Since the Emperor ascended to the throne, he has been expanding his imperial estate, building new palaces, and using inspections as an excuse to extort money from the people and abduct women. The whole country is filled with complaints, and the people are suffering. He also favors eunuchs, allowing them to arrest and frame innocent civilians and humiliate court officials at will. This kind of indulgence and neglect of governance is truly unbearable. As the former Emperor's trusted advisor, I, Dongyang, was appointed as the chief grand councilor, but now my words carry no weight against the eight tigers' single sentence, which makes me feel ashamed of the trust the former Emperor placed in me."

  Li Dongyang said that in fact, the original four assistant ministers are now only him left in office, and the other four, such as Xie Qian and Liu Jian, were disliked by Zhu Houzhao for scolding him too severely and eventually left the officialdom. Since Zhu Houzhao ascended to the throne, he has done many bad things, feeling guilty of the trust placed on him by his predecessor.

  Li Dongyang's words came out, and Cao Yuan and Liang Chu immediately advised: "Teacher, you are a pillar of the court and a minister of the state. The prosperity of the Ming dynasty depends on you, teacher. I hope you won't lose your spirit."

  Li Dongyang nodded, and with a sigh said: "The Emperor was intelligent and clever in his youth, and he was good at self-control and etiquette. It's just that because of the influence of others, it has come to this point. We eat the salary of the monarch, and we should share the worries for the monarch. Not only do we need to bring peace to the country and govern with reason, but also to eliminate the treacherous officials around the Emperor, and not let the Emperor continue to sink down."

  "What the teacher said is absolutely right." Cao Yuan and Liang Chu said.

  Li Dongyang said, "Recently, there have been rumors circulating within the Shuntian Prefecture that a brothel called Qunfang Pavilion has been engaging in lewd and shameless performances, violating moral principles. Originally, this matter should be handled by the Shuntian Prefecture itself, but I received information that the Leopard House had once received an invitation from Qunfang Pavilion. Could it be that someone within Qunfang Pavilion is acquainted with His Majesty and plans to invite him to watch such lewd and shameless performances?"

  "Is this really happening?" Cao Yuan nodded and said: "Don't worry, teacher. I will definitely send someone to investigate thoroughly. If I find out that the Fang Pavilion is using such a lowly and shameless performance to charm the Emperor, I will not let them get away with it."

  "Hmm." Li Dongyang nodded.

  Jiang Xia still didn't know that he had been targeted by a huge creature, Victoria's secret was being prepared in full swing. Three days passed in the blink of an eye, and today was the day of Victoria's Secret T-stage show.

  At the last Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, many people already knew what kind of show it would be. For men in the Ming Dynasty, they had never tried openly and publicly watching young girls wearing three-pointed suits walking on the runway.

  For Jiang Xia, this is fashion; for men of the Great Ming Dynasty, this is boundless stimulation.

  Just as the play was about to start, Zhu Houzhao finally arrived at the entrance of Qunfang Pavilion with Zhang Yong and Liu Jin. Jiang Xia smiled and said, "Second brother, I thought you weren't coming."

  Zhu Houzhao shook his head with a hint of annoyance on his face: "You don't know, there's an old man in my family who's been dragging me to talk about the Tao of the Saints all day today. If Zhang Yong hadn't set fire to our family's woodshed, I almost wouldn't have made it out. Fortunately, I finally arrived, and that thing with Ya hasn't started yet, has it?"

  "No, I've saved you the best seat, come with me."

  This time Victoria's Secret T-stage show really made Jiang Xia a fortune, just that invitation letter, Jiang Xia initially only sent out a small amount, and then continuously raised the price in the black market, finally the invitation letter was even raised to three hundred taels per sheet.

  It's just a lingerie show, didn't expect to get pursued by the Da Ming men like this, truly beyond Jiang Xia's expectation.

  As they entered the Fragrant Pavilion, Jiang Xia led Zhu Houzhao to his pre-arranged seat. After the turtle official announced the start of the show on stage, the first Victoria's Secret T-stage show in the Ming Dynasty officially began.

  The Xiaoyou Fangge couldn't possibly host a show as big as the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, but when the girls walked out wearing sexy lingerie, all the men inside got excited. They all stretched their necks and stared with wide eyes as the girls walked across the stage.

  To be honest, such a performance is also very embarrassing for the girls, but Jiang Xia paid a lot of money to reward them, so the girls also opened their hearts.

  The small amount of cloth covering her beautiful body was exposed in front of everyone, such stimulation for the men of the Great Ming Dynasty was truly unprecedented and unexpected.

  Although I had mentally prepared myself beforehand, now that I really see it, these men almost have the impulse to rush onto the stage and grab one down to take home and have a good time.

  This time, the Huafang Pavilion had made special preparations. Each girl had a numbered tag on her body. If a guest fancied one of them, he would give silver to the turtle spirit in the main hall and make an appointment, then they could meet in private after a while.

  One by one, the girls walked out, and the guests in the hall kept making their choices. This made Zhu Houzhao nervous, and he kept saying to Jiang Xia: "Brother, this...this one is for me, and that one, uh, and this one too."

  Jiang Xia looked at Zhu Houzhao and smiled, jokingly saying: "Although you've practiced the 'Heart Sutra of Women', you still need to be moderate, excessive indulgence can harm your body."

  "Don't worry, big brother, I know."

  Jiang Xia nodded and didn't say anything else, completely unaware that someone in the crowd had been paying attention to him and Zhu Houzhao all along. After the fashion show ended, he also quietly left.