The disgraced official I took care of was actually Zhu Houcong's childhood friend.

Chapter 545

"I am but a woman, and many things I do will not attract much attention. Moreover, I do things for you not for any personal gain, but simply because I cannot stand Zhou Chu's actions. If things ever come to light, I will never try to shift the blame onto you."

Wang Mingyue looked at Xia Yan and said.

Xia Yan was somewhat tempted by these words. It would be convenient to use a woman who was completely unrelated to him. As for whether she would involve him, Xia Yan didn't have any expectations. Xia Yan knew very well that there was very little in the capital that could be kept from the eyes and ears of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

There might be spies from the Embroidered Uniform Guard in one's own residence.

However, for safety reasons, Xia Yan did not meet Wang Mingyue at his own home, but instead specially chose a Xia family estate outside the capital. There were not many people on the estate, and Xia Yan planned to deal with everyone on the estate afterward.

Those who were sent to the manor to do rough work were usually unpopular servants in the Xia household, or servants who had made mistakes. Even if these people were beaten to death, no one would ask them a question.

Xia Yan didn't expect to completely hide his every move from the Embroidered Uniform Guard; he knew very well that would be difficult. He would be satisfied as long as he could conceal the connection between himself and this woman.

"Besides, before Li Xian was arrested, he gave me all the money he had hidden away, and even left me some of the families of the officials he had previously contacted who had been investigated and exiled by Zhou Chu. He probably hoped that I would avenge him, so by doing this, I was indirectly avenging him."

Wang Mingyue said self-deprecatingly.

Those who had previously assassinated Zhou Chu under Li Xian's command were all executed by the Embroidered Uniform Guard. However, the crime of assassinating Zhou Chu, the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, was at most punishable by immediate execution. No law of the Ming Dynasty allowed these people to have their entire families exterminated.

Moreover, these people are involved with far too many families, and Zhou Chu has always been busy with other matters, so he hasn't had the energy to investigate them.

"Compared to Li Xian, do you hate those farmers more?"

Xia Yan looked at Wang Mingyue and asked.

“I used to hate Li Xian more because I still had illusions about those country people. But now that Li Xian is dead, whether I hate him or not doesn’t matter much anymore. What I need to do now is to make sure that those rural farmers never have any hope of looking up again. They don’t deserve it!”

Wang Mingyue answered truthfully.

Xia Yan was very satisfied with Wang Mingyue's attitude.

"It's fine if you work for me, just do what you want. If you need any help, you can ask Xu Zisheng, but his father passed away after he finished the imperial examination and is currently in mourning."

Xia Yan looked at Wang Mingyue and said.

When Xu Jie achieved the third-highest rank in the imperial examination, Xia Yan publicly praised him, saying that Xu Jie was a candidate for prime minister and had the talent to enter the cabinet. Xu Jie, from the very beginning, was labeled as a member of the Jiangnan faction.

Xu Jie had always had a feeling that Zhou Chu, the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, did not like him.

Furthermore, Xu Jie had close ties with Xia Yan and Yang Tinghe before entering officialdom. If Yang Tinghe had not retired, it would have been Yang Tinghe, not Xia Yan, who praised Xu Jie.

Back then, Xu Jie's classmates all sought connections with Yang Lian, but he remained unmoved not because he was particularly insightful, but because Xia Yan had someone deliver a letter to him, revealing the key points.

Xu Jie had no choice but to accept this favor, since he had chosen a side from the very beginning.

Xu Jie's choice of sides was very subtle, and even Zhou Chu didn't notice much. Zhou Chu thought that the historical Xu Jie had joined the Jiangnan Group later, but in fact, Xu Jie had joined the Jiangnan Group from the beginning. Historically, Yang Tinghe had praised Xu Jie. Later, Zhang Cong advocated changing the statue of Confucius in the Confucian Temple to a wooden ancestral tablet and changing "Great Sage and Scholar King" to "Sage and Confucian Scholar".