Taking advantage of the opportunity when Liu Zongmin went out to instruct the servants to prepare the meal, Zhao Peng attached himself to Zhu Cilang's ear and whispered: "Your Highness, we are here to save you! As long as we know that you are here, it will be easy. We will definitely find an opportunity to rescue you. But the time is not yet ripe. Please wait patiently, we will definitely save you! Escort Your Highness to Nanjing to ascend the throne 1."

Zhu Cilang was happy and said with an uncontrollable smile on his face: "Thank you for the wine of the two generals! If I could escape by chance and arrive in Nanjing, if I could ascend the throne to the emperor, I would definitely not treat the two ministers who followed the dragon unfairly!"

Gao Wencai saw the smile on the prince's face and quickly advised: "Your Highness, we are still in the thief's nest now. I hope Your Highness can keep this matter in my heart. Don't be happy. Otherwise, if the thief asks, he will probably be exposed."

Zhu Cilang put away his smile and looked sad. After all, he was the crown prince. He had learned the emperor's mind skills since childhood. His ability to disguise, and his face was much better than his Chongzhen father. The earliest Chongzhen was just a trusted king and was trained as a vassal king. Therefore, he had never learned the emperor's mind skills since childhood, so he was fooled by a group of civil servants. As the crown prince trained by the crown prince since childhood, there were always people who taught him the emperor's mind skills. Even the civil servant teachers such as Jiang Fengyuan, Wang Duo, Qu Kesan, Fang Fengnian, Liu Lishun, Yang Tinglin, and Lin Zengzhi refused to teach the crown prince's mind skills, and the eunuchs in the palace could teach them. So in terms of acting skills, Zhu Cilang was actually much better than his father.

Seeing that the prince had a talent for acting, Zhao Peng felt much more relieved. It would be much better to have such a prince than the King of Fu. Originally, Zhao Peng had thought that if the prince was not good, he would have to go to King of Tang Zhu Youjian himself, but how could Zhu Youjian be orthodox? Zhu Youjian's orthodox nature was even worse than King of Fu Zhu Yousong. Although Zhu Yousong was a rich man, he was Wanli's grandson after all, and his orthodox nature was far before other vassal kings. Therefore, Nanjing chose Zhu Yousong instead of the stronger Lu King Zhu Changqing.

If Zhu Ciyang could arrive in Nanjing and ascend the throne, wouldn’t he be far more orthodox than Zhu Yousong? How could the prince of Emperor Chongzhen not be as good as a blessing king?

But in fact, Zhao Peng, as a novice in history, did not know that the next thing was not that simple. First of all, how he would rescue Zhu Cixuan. After saving people, how to safely send him to Nanjing is a big problem. As the "dragon ministers" who supported Zhu Yousong ascended the throne and Zhu Yousong's confidants would definitely not let Zhu Cixuan arrive in Nanjing safely, and would inevitably intercept the prince halfway.

That's all a story later. The biggest problem I am facing now is how to rescue Zhu Cixuan? Zhao Peng has been considering this issue for the past few days. He tried hard to recall the pitiful historical knowledge in his mind: After Li Zicheng's defeat, the crown prince Zhu Cixuan disappeared. Where did he go? It is said that he was harmed by the Qing court. So the problem is, did Zhu Cixuan fall into Li Zicheng's hands? Why did it fall into the Qing court again? Zhao Peng couldn't remember why this was the reason, but one thing is certain is that after Li Zicheng's defeat, he did not take Zhu Cixuan away, but something happened.

Zhao Peng remembers that the so-called third prince Zhu was actually Zhu Cixu, the fourth prince of Chongzhen. After the defeat of the Shun Army, a Shun Army general was originally led by Zhu Cixu. Later, he was separated from the chaos and lived in the people until he was over 70 years old before being killed by Kangxi.

In this way, Zhao Peng, who had only half a bucket of water, actually outlined the general scene after Li Zicheng's defeat in his mind: the Dashun army was defeated in Shanhaiguan, and the defeat was like a mountain. Li Zicheng retreated to the capital. The first thing he had to do was to put the 70 million taels of silver he had copied away. The three princes who became burdens were discarded by Li Zicheng.

Thinking of this, Zhao Peng had an idea: Since that's the case, things are simple. Wait for a while. After Li Zicheng was defeated, he took the prince out and escorted him south.

But the question arises again. How should I escort His Highness the Crown Prince south? According to Zhao Peng's plan, when escort His Highness the Crown Prince south, I also have to take all the craftsmen from the capital and bring them to the south together. To escort the prince and the craftsmen south, this requires an armed force to escort, so the most urgent task is to recruit soldiers.

"The wine and food are coming!" Liu Zongmin's rough voice sounded outside.

The servants and maids walked into the lobby like butterflies, and soon they filled the Eight Immortals table.

Zhu Cilang pointed to the table full of dishes and said to Gao Wencai and Zhao Peng: "Don't worry, the two generals. In fact, General Liu did not treat this prince badly. It's just that I was sad about my father's affairs, so I couldn't sleep or eat."

Liu Zongmin laughed: "After all, he is the Prince of the Ming Dynasty. He is a rough man. How dare he treat His Highness the Prince unfairly!"

After saying that, Liu Zongmin turned to Zhu Cilang again and said, "Your Highness, the king will make arrangements for your father's affairs. The tomb of the former emperor has been arranged. Three days later, you can let your father be buried in the land and the king can ascend the throne to the emperor. At that time, the king will bury your father with the emperor's courtesy and order all officials of the court to pay tribute to the former emperor!"

After leaving the son-in-law's mansion under house arrest, and walking to a place where no one was around, Zhao Peng said to Gao Wencai: "Brother, since the thief wants to rebuild the Jinyiwei, it is better for us to take this opportunity to recruit soldiers. If there are no soldiers, how can we escort His Highness the Crown Prince south?"

Gao Wencai nodded: "Since we know where the prince is, it is not difficult to rescue His Highness the Prince. What's more difficult is to escort the prince south. What's even more difficult is that we are afraid that the south has already established a new king! If the south has established a new king, and His Highness the Prince goes south, someone will definitely interfere heavily! Compared with Li Chuang, those people are the real enemy of His Highness the Prince!"

After all, Gao Wencai is an old Jinyiwei who has been ups and downs in the officialdom for nearly twenty years. His experience in political struggles is naturally something that a historical novices like Zhao Peng cannot compare with.

Who was not a good person in the officialdom back then? If Zhao Peng had not saved Gao Wencai's life-saving kindness, Gao Wencai also saw that Zhao Peng and Princess Kunxing were in love and were willing to help him with all their strength. With Zhao Peng's own ability, they might be killed by civil servants when they went to Nanjing. Don't think that time travelers are awesome, especially time travelers like Zhao Peng who have half a bucket of water knowledge. If Gao Wencai had not helped him with it, wouldn't it be easy for those civil servants to play with him?

Helping Zhao Peng is not only Gao Wencai's loyalty to Chongzhen, but more importantly, the two are now on the same front. As long as things succeed, they are both ministers who assisted Zhu Cixuan in ascending the throne; if they fail, neither of them will survive.

Gao Wencai's sense of political scent is much sharper than that of Zhao Peng. He knew clearly that those who supported the new king in the south would definitely not let the prince live to Nanjing. There was a precedent in this kind of thing in the Ming Dynasty. In the Tumu Incident, after Emperor Yingzong of Ming was captured, the capital established Zhu Qiyu as emperor. Later, Emperor Yingzong of Ming was released by the Oirats and returned to the Ming Dynasty, and Zhu Qiyu imprisoned Zhu Qizhen. Soon after, Zhu Qizhen took advantage of Zhu Qiyu's serious illness and launched the Sect's Snatching the Gate and deposed Zhu Qiyu. After Zhu Qizhen ascended the throne again, those who supported Zhu Qiyu were naturally liquidated, Yu Qian and Wang Wen were killed and their property was confiscated.
Chapter completed!