Since Yuan Xiaodong arrived in Jinling, he has lost contact with the outside world. As soon as I arrived, the Jinghong Tower in Jinling had been burned down, and the people in the Jinghong Tower had gone nowhere. Secondly, Jinling Jinghong Tower and several Jinghong Towers in Jiangnan did not listen to He Ran's command. Thirdly, not all the people in the palace moved south this time. At least half of them still stayed in the capital. Most of the nails that Li Jinxiu had buried in the palace were old. The King of Qi was suspicious and did not take any of the older people with him when he went south this time, including Yuan Xiaodong's godfather, the eunuch Yuan Ying. King Qi thought this way. The older ones had been in the palace for many years and had complicated relationships. Many of them were from Minlan, and many were the informants of the clan and nobles. Therefore, King Qi put them in the palace. All stayed in the capital. The average age of the maids and chamberlains who moved the capital together this time was under twenty-five years old. None of Li Jinxiu's nails followed him south, they all stayed in the palace. Only Yuan Xiaodong had the shortest time to enter the palace, and he was the only one who came with the emperor. After learning that all the nails he had buried in the palace had been left behind, Li Jinxiu immediately sent people to mingle with the people going south and came to Jinling together.
It is a pity that although these people arrived at Jinling, they failed to sneak into the temporary palace. King Qi was very cautious. Half of the people used in the temporary palace were brought from the palace, and the other half were people from King Qi's palace. They were all people he was used to and absolutely reliable. After Yuan Xiaodong arrived in Jinling, he lived with the emperor in the back garden. Although he was lively, enthusiastic and lovable, his status as the emperor's close eunuch kept him tightly trapped. He couldn't even think of going to the palace or contacting people outside the palace. Even so, Yuan Xiaodong still made a friend with his Sheniu physique. This friend's name is Zeng Fu, a native of Qingzhou, and an old member of Prince Qi's palace. He was purified and entered the palace at the age of eight, and he is only fourteen years old this year. Yuan Xiaodong used to have a godfather Yuan Ying in the palace, and Zeng Fu had a cousin. His cousin was Eunuch Tang, the eunuch in charge of purchasing. Zeng Fu and Eunuch Tang were only distant relatives. If they were outside, the two families might not move around for a year or two, but when they arrived at the palace, they were relatives. From the royal palace to the current temporary palace, Eunuch Tang has taken Zeng Fu with him. Purchasing is a big deal, and for a veteran like Mr. Tang, it means making more money. But for a little housekeeper like Zeng Fu, the biggest advantage of this job is that he can go out often. I don’t know how Yuan Xiaodong fell in love with Zeng Fu, but in short, these two young eunuchs of similar age became friends. But all Yuan Xiaodong could ask Zeng Fu to do was to tell him the news he heard from the outside. For the time being, Yuan Xiaodong did not dare to ask Zeng Fu to help him contact the people sent by Li Jinxiu. The first is that he cannot be trusted, and the second is that Zeng Fu has not received professional training and can easily reveal his flaws. Now, Yuan Xiaodong received a mission from the emperor. He wanted to assist and accompany the emperor to escape from Jinling. For such a high-risk matter, Yuan Xiaodong had to contact outside the palace. Yuan Xiaodong believed that the people sent by Li Jinxiu must be near the temporary palace.
The Temporary Palace was formerly the Royal Palace. As you can imagine, dignitaries and dignitaries lived around the Palace. Therefore, there were no ordinary people's residences nearby, but there were shops. Zeng Fu said that there were originally two grocery stores nearby, both of which had been open for many years. However, after the emperor came here, these two grocery stores were ordered to close. The grocery store deals with the business of the wealthy families nearby. The business is very good, otherwise it would not have been open for 20 or 30 years. Yuan Xiaodong thought for a while, then found Zeng Fu and said to Zeng Fu: "All the grocery stores here are closed. The nearby neighbors have temporarily run out of oil, salt, soy sauce and vinegar. Where can I buy it?" Of course Zeng Fu didn't know, but he remembered it. When he came back from outside that day, he deliberately took a detour and went to where the two grocery stores were. The shop was locked, and there was a piece of red paper taped to the side of the shop, but half of it had been torn off. It would be fine if only one shop was like this. Both shops had red paper marks. If it were anyone else, he definitely wouldn't care. But Zeng Fu didn't want to go back to the palace, he wished to be outside every day. There happened to be a woman passing by here. She looked like the housekeeper of a wealthy family. Zeng Fu stopped the woman and asked, "Auntie, do you know where you can buy oil, salt, soy sauce and vinegar around here?" The housekeeper looked up and down and guessed Zeng Fu's identity. I don't know why the little eunuch in the palace is outside. Could it be that the palace temporarily ran out of soy sauce for cooking? There are many aristocratic families in Jinling, but the current royal family is too unbearable. There is a young emperor with unknown life experience, and an empress dowager who has been imprisoned by the late emperor for more than forty years. Moreover, after arriving in Jinling, these two people did not know how to behave and burned at least Jinghong Tower is the dream building of three generations of Jinling people. Of course, the deterioration in the reputation of the emperor and the empress dowager was also intentional by King Qi. The more unbearable these two people are, the higher the prestige of King Qi will be. Today's Jinling, not to mention the aristocratic family that always pays attention to the integrity of the family, even ordinary people do not have a good impression of the current royal family. Therefore, the woman was not surprised at all when she saw a young eunuch. She asked angrily: "Why are you asking about this? Are you going to lose your last job? How many years have you opened a shop here?" Come on, don’t let people open it when you come. Have you ever asked them if they have money to live on and if they have any food left at home?” Although Zeng Fu was playful, he had been with Eunuch Tang for a long time, and he knew as soon as he heard that the two stores must have changed places and continued to open shops, and they were still doing neighborhood business nearby. The torn red paper was probably used to guide the direction. Zeng Fu chuckled, turned around and ran away. The mother-in-law looked at his back suspiciously and quickened her pace. No, she wanted to tell the two families to be careful these days and don't let people from the palace come to their door. Seeing that the mother-in-law was gone, Zeng Fu came back again. This time he learned the lesson and got the addresses of the two shops from the mouths of two seven or eight-year-old children. Sure enough, the shop is still open, but there is no sign. Behind the houses of dignitaries, most of them would have a back alley, and the back alleys were populated by the servants of the mansion who brought their families with them. These two shops rent houses in this back alley. The two shops are not together, but quite far apart. They rented two such houses respectively. When Zeng Fu heard the news, he was very proud. He felt that he could be an official in the yamen. He was born to investigate. He proudly shared this incident with his good friend Yuan Xiaodong, but did not notice the light in Yuan Xiaodong's eyes. (End of chapter)