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

Chapter 436

As Zhou Chu had predicted, Yun Jin not only escaped punishment, but the Lu family also received numerous rewards because of her.

"I was just on my way to the palace to see His Majesty when I saw Eunuch Huang. It's been a long time, so I came to say hello."

Zhou Chu was followed by a maid carrying a plate filled with washed peaches.

"These are peaches I brought from Jiangnan. The peaches there are especially sweet. These are all fresh peaches that just came off the harvest this year. Please have a taste, Grandpa Huang."

As Zhou Chu spoke, he picked up a peach and handed it to Huang Jin.

Huang Jin didn't refuse, took the peach, and took a bite.

"Is this a Yangshan peach? It's really delicious, a rare delicacy."

Huang Jin praised it highly.

After Huang Jin finished eating a peach, a lot of juice had dripped out. The eunuch next to him hurriedly and respectfully handed him a handkerchief, which Huang Jin took and wiped himself.

“Lord Zhou, why don’t you come with me to the palace to see His Majesty? His Majesty has been talking about you these past few days.”

Huang Jin looked at Zhou Chu and said.

"That's exactly what I meant."

Zhou Chu smiled.

Zhou Chu and Huang Jin arrived at the palace and entered the Imperial Study with ease.

"I see your Majesty."

Zhou Chu bowed and said.

Zhou Chu entered the Imperial Study with Huang Jin, so no one announced his arrival. Jiajing was engrossed in processing memorials when he heard Zhou Chu's voice, looked up, and immediately perked up.

"Hengqi, I was just talking about you. You've already returned to the capital, yet you didn't come to see me immediately."

Jiajing pretended to be displeased.

"I have just returned to the capital. There are many trivial matters at home that need to be dealt with. I came to see Your Majesty as soon as I finished them."

Zhou Chu made up a story off the top of his head.

"How is your health recovering?"

Jiajing came up to Zhou Chu, patted him on the shoulder, and asked.

"I've almost fully recovered. There were no serious injuries, so the recovery was quite quick."

Zhou Chu smiled.

"That's good. By the way, I specially had some good things collected for you. I'll get some for you too."

After saying this, Jiajing looked at Huang Jin.

Huang Jin immediately understood, went to the bookshelf next to him, and carefully took down a box.

Huang Jin's attitude piqued Zhou Chu's curiosity, since Jiajing's private treasury was overflowing with all sorts of treasures, and countless paintings and calligraphy by famous figures.

Under such circumstances, what could be something that Jiajing would call a good thing and that Huang Jin would treat with such care?

Huang Jin brought the box to Jiajing. After Jiajing opened the box, Zhou Chu saw a milky white, lumpy object that emitted a strange fragrance.

"Is this ambergris?"

Zhou Chu asked, somewhat puzzled.

“That’s right, the weighing instrument is indeed very knowledgeable, even recognizing ambergris.”

Jiajing said happily.

Upon hearing Jiajing's confirmation, Zhou Chu suddenly understood.

Ambergris is actually a solid piece from the intestines of a sperm whale, formed after the whale excretes it. The amazing thing about ambergris is that it only emits this fragrance when it is naturally excreted by a sperm whale and then picked up on the beach or found in the sea.

If you forcibly kill a sperm whale and take it out of its stomach, it will taste fishy and foul, its value will be greatly reduced, and the effect will be completely different.

In his previous life, Zhou Chu had read a story that the Jiajing Emperor had specially ordered people to collect ambergris for alchemy, and he never expected it to be true.

However, it is likely that at this time, Jiajing simply liked ambergris and had not yet started alchemy.

In reality, even if they were to refine elixirs, it wouldn't be a big problem. The Taoist priests who refined elixirs for the emperors realized, through the evolution of dynasties, that adding too many heavy metals to the elixirs would kill the emperor, and they were constantly improving the elixir formulas.

In fact, starting from the Song Dynasty, the elixirs made by Taoist priests for the emperor were basically free of heavy metals, and the elixirs they made could be described as pure tonics.

This can be seen from the officials who tested the medicines for Emperor Jiajing in the original history. Yan Song and Xu Jie were taking these elixirs and lived longer than the last. The Taoist priests who tested the medicines for Jiajing lived to be over eighty years old.

Emperor Jiajing was one of the few long-lived emperors in the entire Ming Dynasty. It should be noted that Jiajing was frail and sickly when he was young.

"This ambergris is a fine product. Take this piece and have it ground into powder. You can burn it like agarwood."

As Jiajing spoke, he placed the box containing ambergris in Zhou Chu's hands.