Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 357: Detained
Ningyuan City.

Yuan Chonghuan was in a very complicated mood at this time because Xiong Tingbi had died.

Emperor Tianqi finally killed Xiong Tingbi and cut off his head to send to the nine frontiers. As the defender of Ningyuan, Yuan Chonghuan had seen Xiong Tingbi's head. When he saw the head with slightly open eyes in the box, Yuan Chonghuan was at a loss for words.

Yuan Chonghuan was still a minor official in the Ministry of War at that time. He once visited Xiong Tingbi in Tianlao and asked him for advice on the Liaodong war. Xiong Tingbi did not look down on Yuan Chonghuan because of his humble position. He even taught him everything he knew, which benefited Yuan Chonghuan a lot.

The reason why Yuan Chonghuan was able to get started quickly after arriving in Liaodong, stand out among this group of civil servants, and eventually gain recognition and support from Sun Chengzong, and in just a few years he was promoted step by step from a head of the Ministry of War to his current position, was that Xiong Tingbi provided him with great help.

From this point of view, Xiong Tingbi can be regarded as Yuan Chonghuan's benefactor and half of his division commander. Without Xiong Tingbi's selfless help, there would be no Yuan Chonghuan today. But now, Xiong Tingbi has died, and his head was sent to the nine frontiers in such an inglorious way, which can't help but make Yuan Chonghuan feel sad.

As a well-known general in the court and the former governor of Liaodong, Xiong Tingbi's death means that he has completely fallen off the stage of history. And his death is very unexpected, because Xiong Tingbi was imprisoned and sentenced to death with Wang Huazhen a few years ago because of the Liaodong war. But Xiong Tingbi's death sentence has not been executed, and Emperor Tianqi has never urged him to do so, as if he had forgotten Xiong Tingbi.

Most people thought that Xiong Tingbi might escape death. Emperor Tianqi would lock him up for a few years and then find a chance to pardon him. After all, Xiong Tingbi's talent was recognized, and it would be a pity to kill him directly.

But no one expected that the Tianqi Emperor would suddenly acquiesce to Wei Zhongxian's killing of Xiong Tingbi. This was too unexpected. When Yuan Chonghuan's eyes swept over Xiong Tingbi's head, a chill rose in his heart. Living with the emperor is like living with a tiger. The Tianqi Emperor and Wei Zhongxian were so vicious that they not only chopped off Xiong Tingbi's head, but also used Xiong Tingbi's incident to make a point, pointing their sharpness directly at the Donglin Party.

With a long sigh, Yuan Chonghuan shook his head silently. The lesson of Xiong Tingbi made him think deeply. Although Xiong Tingbi fell into such a state due to his character, the fact that Xiong Tingbi never really grasped the military power of Liaodong when he was in charge of Liaodong was the root cause of all these consequences.

As the governor of Liaodong, Xiong Tingbi was the top leader in the Liaodong war. However, he was suppressed by Wang Huazhen, the governor of Liaodong. Wang Huazhen relied on his connections in the court and did not take Xiong Tingbi seriously. He monopolized the power of Liaodong, making it impossible for Xiong Tingbi, as the top leader, to mobilize the Liaodong army except for the 3,000 Beijing troops given to him by Emperor Tianqi.

This was also the reason for the conflict over the Liaodong economic and trade disputes, and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty's disastrous defeat in Liaodong and the direct loss of the defense line east of Shanhaiguan. In fact, when Wang Huazhen was defeated, Xiong Tingbi had the opportunity to stabilize the Liaodong war, at least he could still defend the Ningyuan line at that time, but Xiong Tingbi did not do so. Instead, he took the initiative to lead his troops to retreat, ignoring Wang Huazhen's pleading, and directly gave up all the territories east of Shanhaiguan and led his troops to withdraw to Shanhaiguan.

Xiong Tingbi was unwise to do so. Perhaps he was already blinded by hatred at that time, and was holding back a rage to make Wang Huazhen look bad. He believed that the defeat was entirely due to Wang Huazhen, and there was no need for him to clean up Wang Huazhen's mess.

Now Wang Huazhen fled back in a panic. If he helped him, Wang Huazhen would escape the disaster, which was something Xiong Tingbi, who hated Wang Huazhen, didn't want to see. Xiong Tingbi simply gave up the task out of spite, in order to use this incident to bring down Wang Huazhen. In his opinion, Wang Huazhen had committed such a serious crime that he would not only lose his position as governor, but also bear the main responsibility for the defeat in Liaodong.

Although he was the governor of Liaodong, everyone in the court knew that Xiong Tingbi was just a figurehead in Liaodong. He had no army that obeyed him, let alone the ability to counterattack. So Xiong Tingbi had no choice but to retreat to Shanhaiguan. If he wanted to blame someone, he should blame Wang Huazhen.

But Xiong Tingbi never thought that he really overestimated himself, or his approach of only caring about personal revenge and ignoring the overall situation angered everyone including Emperor Tianqi. This was also the reason why Xiong Tingbi was eventually imprisoned with Wang Huazhen, and ended up with such a miserable end.

The fate of Xiong Tingbi made Yuan Chonghuan feel sad, but also strengthened his belief in absolute power. In his opinion, Xiong Tingbi was talented and capable, and his fate today was actually caused by his failure to grasp the real military power. As the top leader of Liaodong at that time, he was always suppressed by Wang Huazhen. It was really pitiful that Xiong Tingbi was so frustrated as a commander.

Because of the example of Xiong Tingbi, Yuan Chonghuan attached great importance to the control of military power in Liaodong. When he was the military supervisor, Yuan Chonghuan used the power in his hands to win over the Liaodong generals. After Sun Chengzong sent him to preside over the Ningyuan defense line, Yuan Chonghuan did more such things, especially trying his best to win over his two deputies, Man Gui and Zu Dashou.

Among them, Man Gui was the Ningyuan garrison commander appointed by Sun Chengzong, and Zu Dashou was born in a military family in Liaodong and was also a senior general in Ningyuan whose status was second only to Man Gui.

By giving them money, supplies and many promises, Yuan Chonghuan tried to pull these two people to his camp and use them for his own purposes. Unfortunately, Man Gui was very straightforward. As a Mongolian, Man Gui was very straightforward and looked down on Yuan Chonghuan. He was extremely dissatisfied with the direct intervention of civil officials in the military. In addition, Man Gui's official position was relatively high, and although Yuan Chonghuan was a civil servant, his official position was not as good as Man Gui. As a result, Yuan Chonghuan not only failed to win over Man Gui, but also threatened Man Gui with military pay and food in order to control Man Gui, forcing Man Gui to take sides, which made Man Gui very dissatisfied with Yuan Chonghuan. The relationship and contradiction between the two became increasingly deep.

At this time, seeing that Man Gui was unmoved, Yuan Chonghuan gave up the idea of ​​continuing to win him over and instead set his sights on Zu Dashou.

Compared with the stubborn Man Gui, Zu Dashou is completely different. Zu Dashou is much more smooth-talking. In addition, as a civil servant and superior, Yuan Chonghuan is courteous to others and is very close to Zu Dashou. This makes Zu Dashou, who comes from a military family, have a very good impression of Yuan Chonghuan.

After a while, the two of them fell in love with each other. As time went on, Yuan Chonghuan quickly became Zu Dashou's close friend by giving him money and favors. Then, he asked his younger brother Yuan Chongyu to do business with Zu Dashou and secretly got a lot of benefits from him.

As the saying goes, there are three iron bonds in life. With these means, Yuan Chonghuan and Zu Dashou directly occupied two of the three iron bonds. One is that they served in the army together (they were superiors and subordinates in the Ningyuan garrison), and the other is that they shared the spoils together (they did business together privately, and Yuan Chonghuan even took special care of Zu Dashou when distributing military pay and food).
As for the third iron, it is probably true that they had visited prostitutes together. Anyway, in that era, listening to folk songs and looking for beauties in brothels were considered elegant things. Having a beautiful woman by your side has always been what scholars pursued. Although Zu Dashou was a military general, he often tried to be elegant, so they had similar interests.

As a result, the relationship between Yuan Chonghuan and Zu Dashou deteriorated rapidly, almost to the point where the two of them beheaded chicken heads and burned yellow paper.

In addition, the Zu family was one of the general families in Liaodong, and had a very good relationship with other general families in Liaodong, and they were also related by marriage. Among them, the deputy general Wu Xiang was Zu Dashou's brother-in-law and held real power in the Liaodong army. Because of Zu Dashou, the Wu family also had a very good relationship with Yuan Chonghuan. The two sides exchanged glances and soon hooked up.

Although Wu Xiang later became the general of Liaodong, he was considered a general in the army. However, he did not have many real achievements in battle, and he was not very famous in history. Throughout the Ming Dynasty, there were many generals like Wu Xiang, who were not very famous at all. However, he had a famous son, who was the young general Wu Sangui, who was known as "loyal and scorching" in Liaodong.

In this way, with Zu Dashou's assistance, Yuan Chonghuan's power in Ningyuan became increasingly stable, and he also had a group of reliable generals who could be used. At present, Yuan Chonghuan's foundation in Ningyuan was solid, and he even had the final say. Even the general Man Gui had to avoid his edge.

The fate of Xiong Tingbi gave Yuan Chonghuan a great warning, which was also the real purpose of Yuan Chonghuan's efforts to win over military generals and control absolute power. While winning over people, Yuan Chonghuan did not forget to suppress his opponents. Anyone who was disobedient was either marginalized by Yuan Chonghuan or he used his power to deduct military pay and food when they were allocated, in this way forcing the other party to submit.

Yuan Chonghuan was doing quite well in this respect. Even Man Gui, who was not on good terms with him, could only maintain a tolerable attitude on the surface and did not dare to confront Yuan Chonghuan directly on major issues. Yuan Chonghuan did not have a good way to deal with Man Gui for the time being, because Man Gui was a general and was assigned to Yuan Chonghuan by Sun Chengzong. He had to give Sun Chengzong face anyway. As long as Man Gui did not cause trouble for him, Yuan Chonghuan would turn a blind eye.

"Big brother!"

Just as Yuan Chonghuan was concentrating on thinking, the voice of his younger brother Yuan Chongyu suddenly came from outside. When he looked up, he saw Yuan Chongyu walking in hurriedly.

“Why are you so flustered?” Seeing Yuan Chongyu looking so angry and frustrated, with beads of sweat on his forehead because he walked so fast, Yuan Chonghuan, who always said “stay calm when facing big things”, frowned. His younger brother was too untalented and could not read. He could only do some business under his protection. However, after so much experience, he was still so rough. What kind of person was he?
"Something happened! Something big happened!" When he saw Yuan Chonghuan, Yuan Chongyu hurriedly said, his face full of anxiety.

"Big deal? What big deal can you have?" Yuan Chonghuan sneered. His younger brother was just doing some business. He was neither an official appointed by the court nor a general in the army. What big deal could that be?

"This is a big deal!" Yuan Chongyu sat down and said to Yuan Chonghuan anxiously, "Hong Xiu and his goods were detained by Mao Wenlong, and Fang Feng was also arrested by Mao Wenlong's subordinates when he went to negotiate. If this isn't a big deal, what is?"

(End of this chapter)