Soon enough they heard a high-pitched voice from the other room."What kind of bad luck is this? I don"t understand how that pleb of a monarch returned safely from his northern barbarians and is now the top dog in the entire kingdom."
"Shh. Lower your volume, if someone hears your cra.s.s words, you will create more troubles for your father and everybody else as well."
Another boy seemed to be coaxing the first one.
"Pah! Do you think I am afraid of him? All he knows is to give idiotic edicts left, right and centre. What was that about sending in our genealogy records and the other one about the slaves? Is he that free to mind all these matters?"
At this point, another voice piped up, "We all know that you are just grumbling because that edict about the slaves made you lose your chance to have some fun with that daughter of one of your servants."
The crisp sound of flesh hitting a wooden surface was heard, "Ptui! As if those words could stop this master from having anyone that this master wants."
The second person cleared his throat and continued, "Okay. Let"s not talk about these trivialities. What my father is more worried about is the grasp that person seems to have of politics and court."
Another voice concluded, "It looks more like he was sent to some great scholar and has an advisor all these years instead of spending them while being held hostage against the late emperor."
"What"s even more frustrating is that he hasn"t allowed anyone to dip hands into any of the lucrative deals that go on behind the scenes. I heard that he will send one of the three army Unit Commanders to look into the salt mine cases and the unrest at the borders."
The high-pitched voice gave in his own two-cents.
"More importantly, he seems to want to do all the important things by himself and doesn"t ask any of the Imperial Clan members to help in any way. At least, if he gave them the chance, it could help them to win some of his and the commoner"s goodwill."
P"If only we could know and exploit his weakness. Sadly, our side doesn"t have comprehensive information about him."
Those words seemed to get murmurs of agreement.
"Well, we do know his one weakness. That runty boy he keeps close to him."
Those words seemed to ignite a fire in Su Li because she loudly placed her won"t cup on the table and she clenched her hand so tightly that the blue veins could be seen straining under the pale white skin.
That loud noise seemed to jolt the four of them in the room and Zhou Sheng simply held her first in his own hand and patted it while smiling.
He made a shus.h.i.+ng motion and everyone knew that since they had gotten this good given opportunity, they couldn"t allow anger to cloud their minds and miss anything important that was being so carelessly and freely talked about by these youngsters.
"Humph! What weakness? I think he is just using that person as a meat s.h.i.+eld. After all, if everyone knows that both of them are close, people will direct their spears at that boy and the family he has entered and the Ning Clan would have to fight to save that noy and themselves or they might just find themselves eradicated in such a storm."
With a significant pause, he continued, "In such a situation, he himself doesn"t have to so anything and can simply enjoy himself while sitting on his throne and watching others spill blood in his name."
The third voice hummed.
"What I am more interested in is if he has an advisor by his side and if so, who is that person? He himself is so slippery that he doesn"t allow anyone to catch onto any of his weak points and there are no cracks in his facade that we can exploit."
The first voice seemed disgruntled because it had undertones of satisfaction, "Why are you so concerned about this no-name advisor? How are you even sure that there is an advisor so to speak?"
"Why don"t you use your brains? If its an advisor who is guiding him behind the scenes, then in such a situation, we can poach the said person to our side. If not, then isn"t he too powerful an opponent when he didn"t grow up in court intrigue?"
Before Su Li and her companions could hear any further, Baozhai and Changying had returned with a group of girls who were scantily dressed.
During the next half an hour they spend watching the girls dancing and giggling, Ning Fu realises that he hates entertainment houses and its girls fervently.
They either keep making cow-eyes at the monarch or keep going into fits of giggles at any given moment. Find authorized novels in Webnovel，faster updates, better experience，Please click for visiting.
He wants to berate them for their lapse in decorum but than belatedly realises that this is a place where decorum is not practised.
Meanwhile, Su Li acts as a chatty drunk - smiling goofily at any girls who come her way and making inconsequential remarks about their beauty.
Though she also makes sure to not let the conversation go beyond a few words.
After all, since this is Prince Xi"s place and he seems to think himself as the overlord of this place, it would be remiss of her if she didn"t cultivate a reputation here and then come here a few times to wreak havoc.