Zhao Zhongyu flushed red, "In my brother’s eyes, who is the capable one? You looked down on me when I was young, and now you look down on my wife and children."
"I don’t look down on your wife. Intelligence is destined by heaven, but character is learned later. Your sister-in-law’s character is decent, but Jizhi is not. So it’s a matter of education; you didn’t teach the child well."
Zhao Changyu said, "Having neither talent nor virtue, I really can’t trust Zhao Ji to handle Zhao Family in the future. You should train Yi’er instead. I’ll live a few more years, and by then I’ll bypass Jizhi and give the title directly to Yi’er."
Zhao Zhongyu: ... It’s clear that he completely disregards Zhao Ji.
Zhao Yi is still young, almost the same age as Zhao Hezhen; he wants to raise the children together to foster their relationship. He might be better suited to inherit the family business than Zhao Ji.
Zhao Zhongyu, both angry and unconvinced, perceives it as his brother’s prejudice against him, which is extending to his descendants.
Zhao Ji indeed is not as smart as Zhao Zhi, but he’s not far off.
Zhao Ji’s performance is much inferior compared to Zhao Zhi, but among the children of noble families, the difference is not significant, whereas Zhao Yi has not yet had the opportunity to reveal many personality traits.
Zhao Changyu and Zhao Zhongyu are constantly teetering on the edge of life and death. When it comes to educating their descendants, they don’t have much time to teach personally.
They directly left them to the hired tutors, occasionally listening to the tutors’ reports.
Zhao Hezhen stood out among her siblings.
She not only excelled in academics but also did well in martial arts; her swordsmanship was on par with Zhao Yi’s, and in duels, the brother and sister were evenly matched, with her archery skills even surpassing Zhao Yi’s.
When Zhao Changyu found out, he specially called the tutor to give Zhao Hezhen extra lessons, then told her, "A tree standing out in a forest will be destroyed by the wind. To withstand the storm, you must learn to hide within the forest, focusing on developing your foundation. As long as your roots are deep enough, no storm can uproot you."
Zhao Hezhen: "What if I’m cut off at the waist?"
"As long as you’re not uprooted, you can grow again. As long as you live, you can start over."
Hezhen listened to him, began to restrain her brilliance, learned to hide her skills, and even learned to subtly target her cousins.
Zhao Changyu: ...
He felt quite exhausted, decided to let them be since they were grown and beyond his control.
Zhao Changyu decided to find a kind family for Zhao Hezhen to marry into, hoping that her schemes and tactics, once discovered, would be tolerated.
He planned well, but unforeseen changes arose.
Prince East Sea Sima Yue and Chengdu King Sima Ying fought so fiercely that their brains were almost coming out, while Sima Yong took the opportunity to seize the emperor.
The court officials were anxious, trying to mediate the conflict while attempting to rescue the emperor.
The princes fought for two years, with Zhao Changyu running around with the seized emperor. By sheer accident, Prince East Sea Sima Yue unexpectedly won, bringing the army with the emperor and court officials back to Luoyang City.
By this time, the children had grown up, but Zhao Changyu hadn’t had the chance to check on their education and life in those two years before the emperor was poisoned to death by Sima Yue.
Zhao Changyu: ...
After a series of court battles, Sima Yue chose Sima Chi from the surviving royal brothers to ascend the throne, and he monopolized state affairs.
After years of toil, Zhao Changyu’s body finally reached its limit following the new emperor’s accession, and he fell ill, bedridden at home.
And at this time, due to years of civil war, Chang’an faced a severe food shortage. Refugees from various places, hoping for a glimmer of hope with the new emperor’s accession, rushed to Luoyang seeking survival.
Though the new emperor ascended, Sima Yue monopolized state affairs, but Luoyang was still unstable. He barely controlled the soldiers, leading the army to become like bandits, looting civilians everywhere, with some scattered soldiers yet to be exterminated. So Luoyang City refused refugees entry, and the civilians inside, unless necessary for survival, didn’t venture outside.
Zhao Erlang was deceived into going out of town at this time.
When Zhao Hezhen found out, he was already at the city gate, and she could only rush to follow.
Zhao Hezhen was injured falling off a horse and was carried home, immediately known to Zhao Changyu.
He promptly sent for the imperial physician. In between, she briefly lost breath and heartbeat. So even when the physician later said it was merely a fracture, with the brain hit, but not serious, Zhao Changyu was still extremely furious.
He was willing to hand the family business over to the second branch, but that was under the premise of preserving the first branch.
Mrs. Wu and the niece’s daughter acted in a way that deeply disappointed him. Even more disheartening was Zhao Ji and Zhao Yi’s decision to conceal the truth once they understood the situation, covering up for the mother-daughter pair, while counterattacking Mrs. Wang’s mother and daughter.
Zhao Changyu felt chilled.
From that moment, he doubted his decision, and from that moment, he completely lost trust in Zhao Zhongyu and Zhao Ji father and son.
Therefore, when his hidden granddaughter showed her real character and approached him, Zhao Changyu chose her, choosing to defy worldly norms.
Since the family business couldn’t be handed to a fool, it would be difficult to end well with the second branch. Instead, why not give it directly to the granddaughter?
All that talk about women having to marry out, and outside-married women not being able to take the family’s root—all that nonsense, he discarded entirely.
The world’s rules only become rules when most people adhere to them; otherwise, they are meant to be broken.
The emperor is supreme, but look at the last emperor, what heights did he achieve in his life?
So when even the rules between monarch and ministers are broken, with the king not seeming like a king and the ministers not like ministers, what other rules in the world can’t be broken?
But he couldn’t openly say this to her; he could only split the family business in two, one part for the Zhao Family, and one part for the granddaughter.
Most of the Zhao Family’s wealth was earned by Zhao Changyu but not solely by him.
He was busy with state affairs these years, and although he oversaw the general direction of the money-making, it was mostly his subordinates who carried out the specifics.
And his subordinates mostly came from the Zhao Family.
Many enterprises were jointly managed by members of the Zhao clan.
Zhao Changyu was very wealthy, but he was low-key, difficult for outsiders to ascertain his true wealth. Yet whenever the emperor was in trouble, it was Zhao Changyu who provided funds for help.
Previously, there were battles in Chang’an. While the emperor was there, Zhao Changyu followed, and there was no food shortage in Chang’an,
Later, when the emperor was brought back to Luoyang, there were battles again, with numerous civilian casualties, fields destroyed. Zhao Changyu was in Luoyang, and there was no food shortage.
In contrast, Chang’an began experiencing a food shortage soon after Zhao Changyu left.
Privately, everyone speculated that Zhao Changyu still had a lot of money and food, certainly more than the treasury had.
Even Sima Yue couldn’t help but pay attention to this wealth.

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