Ming Dynasty: Ask Zhu Yuanzhang to abdicate at the beginning

Chapter 387 The Origins of the Slave Trade! Their crimes are heinous; take them all down!
Bago.

The Golden River.

Looking around, the riverbanks were filled with people dressed in rags.

Their bodies were hunched over, each of them bent over, laboriously swinging their hoes, intently "mining" under the scorching sun.

What they unearthed was a precious gemstone—jadeite!
Jadeite was discovered in this area as early as the 13th century AD.

However, it has never been developed on a large scale for a long time.

In the Central Plains dynasties, the literati had always preferred the warm and understated Hetian jade and the colorful and bright jadeite. Because they had not been discovered before and lacked historical and cultural heritage and depth, they were not favored by the literati.

Because the scholar-officials controlled the discourse, they also controlled the direction of popular culture throughout the Central Plains dynasties.

In real history, although some scholars and merchants used jadeite during the Ming Dynasty, it was never particularly popular.

Until the Qing Dynasty, the Manchu rulers who entered the Central Plains had limited understanding of the profound cultural connotations of Hetian jade and did not have any preconceived notions. In comparison, they preferred the more visually appealing jadeite.

Thus, under the guidance and promotion of the Qing Dynasty imperial family, a craze for jadeite swept through society.

However, the appearance of Zhu Yunwen directly changed this historical process.

Because the Ming Dynasty promoted a policy of encouraging commerce and trade, advocating that everyone could engage in business, it abandoned the traditional national policy of "emphasizing agriculture and suppressing commerce".

Those businessmen who have rapidly accumulated wealth urgently need a highly "stylish" decoration to showcase their wealth and status.

And so, the crystal-clear jade naturally came into people's view.

Within the Ming Dynasty, the price of a jade ornament crafted from high-quality jadeite has been driven up to an astronomical figure.

The main production areas of jadeite were concentrated within the territory of the Pegu Dynasty.

It was the Ming Dynasty's policy of opening its doors to the world and encouraging overseas expansion that led to a large influx of jadeite, sparking a craze.

Businessmen have always pursued profits and have an extremely keen business sense.

When they learned that mining jadeite rough here could yield huge profits, merchants naturally flocked to the area.

However, how easy is it to accurately select jadeite rough stones from countless riverbed mud and stones?
Even if one person works themselves to death, they can't dig up much in a day.

Soon, the merchants realized that they had to hire someone to do this.

However, hiring people in a normal way presents many thorny issues.

First of all, these people are not subject to any personal restrictions. Once they realize how profitable it is to mine jadeite rough and process it into jadeite, they will definitely no longer be willing to work for others, but will choose to work on their own.

After all, nobody's stupid. Why would anyone willingly let someone take a cut of their profits for no reason?

Moreover, they usually take the lion's share.

He left only a pittance of wages to distribute to the hired workers.

However, completely concealing the fact that the jadeite rough is extremely difficult, almost impossible.

Secondly, they also have difficulty preventing the people they hire from secretly taking away the jadeite rough stones they have painstakingly dug out.

Furthermore, since they only hire local natives, once the news spreads, it will inevitably attract even more people who covet the job.

……

The most "ideal" way to solve these thorny problems is undoubtedly to use slaves to mine!

Slaves had absolutely no personal freedom.

Even knowing that the raw jadeite is priceless, they can only lament their helplessness, unable to break free from their master's control and work independently.

Everything a slave possesses, including their last shred of dignity, has been stripped clean by their master, leaving no possibility of them secretly keeping the jadeite rough and taking it away!

The slaves were not allowed to reveal any information to the outside world, keeping the local natives as in the dark as possible.

The natives are either completely unaware of the secret to this enormous profit, or only have a vague understanding of it, so there won't be many people who are envious or jealous, thus minimizing the obstacles to mining jadeite rough.

While complete concealment is impossible, it is enough to keep most people in the dark and make many people half-believing and half-doubting.

Then, as long as one bribes the local governor and officials with large sums of money, negotiates the distribution of profits with them, and under their protection blocks the riverbed, one can unscrupulously develop jade mines on a large scale.

As for the source of the slaves...

Merchants initially considered using local slaves.

The number of slaves that can be purchased through legitimate channels is pitifully small, far from meeting the enormous mining demand.

Did they secretly capture local poor people to be enslaved?

Even the most ruthless warlords wouldn't dare to try something like this.

After all, if the news were to leak and anger the local indigenous people, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Importing slaves from nearby Siam and other places was equally difficult.

Crossing the border to capture Siamese people as slaves will inevitably provoke a strong counterattack from the Siamese army.

Another point the merchants discovered was that neither the slaves of Siam nor those of Bago were nearly as hardworking and resilient as the people of the Ming Dynasty.

Even when whipped and beaten, the slaves remained unmoved.

If pushed too far, they simply give up, lie down on the ground, and let you beat, scold, or even kill them, rather than work hard.

In contrast, the people of the Ming Dynasty were much more diligent. As long as they were given even the slightest reward, even if it was just a vague hope, and without any coercion, they would willingly work from dawn till dusk without slacking off in the slightest.

If the moonlight is bright at night, they will voluntarily work overtime, as if they never get tired.

The people of the Central Plains have cultivated the fine qualities of diligence and hard work since ancient times, which is incomparable to the Siamese and Bago people who are inherently lazy.
Therefore, even if slaves were to be used, slaves captured from the Ming Dynasty would be the best choice.

They work incredibly hard; one of them can do the work of several.

Upon discovering this, the merchants began to meticulously plan the importation of slaves from the Ming Dynasty.

Since the normal methods were definitely not going to work, they came up with a sinister plan.

First, they lured the people of the Ming Dynasty to overseas, and then colluded with local warlords to coerce them into signing indentures and becoming slaves.

The number of slaves required for "mining" is extremely large, and ordinary methods of luring them are still too slow.

These greedy merchants soon discovered that they could also use the Ming Dynasty's advanced "postal system" to force the slaves they had lured to write letters to their families, using false and beautiful words to continuously deceive more and more people.

They welcome all kinds of people, no matter who they are.

Slaves who were too weak to do the heavy work of mining were resold to officials in Siam or Bago to extract the last bit of value from them.

Female slaves with some attractiveness were used as a "magic weapon" to bribe officials and warlords, becoming playthings in the exchange of power for sex.

They suffered abuse and torture.

Soon, this heinous "slave industry chain" grew wildly, like a snowball rolling downhill.

In just one or two years, tens of thousands of Ming Dynasty citizens had been lured here.

If the Ming Dynasty court had remained unaware and Zhu Yunwen had not issued an edict to stop it, this black market industry would have continued to expand, dragging more innocent people into the abyss.

The jade mines of Bago were the final destination of this heinous slave trade.

The Ming slaves in Siam and other parts of Bago were merely a small amount of "scraps" that overflowed from the jade mines.

Witnessing this inhumane human tragedy.

On the banks of the Liujin River.

It was divided into hundreds of different mines, owned by different mine owners, that is, slave owners.

This river was named "Golden River" because it brought huge profits to many mine owners.

The murky river water, tinged with blood, gleamed oily under the blazing sun.

Li Erniu knelt on the hard, sandy ground. His ten fingers dug into the putrid mud, and the blood seeping from under his fingernails was evaporated by the scorching sun before it could drip off.

He heard the rattling sound of chains dragging on the ground in the distance, and he shuddered. He grabbed the rusty sieve and began to shake it wildly.

"Hurry up!" The foreman with gold teeth raised his nine-tailed iron whip, the barbed tip of which swept across Li Erniu's back, instantly tearing his coarse linen clothes in nine bloody welts.

The new slave next to him was a little slow, and was immediately pushed into the mud and beaten by two thugs.

His mouth and nose were filled with mud and sand.

His body was covered in whip marks, a shocking sight.

Three corpses hung from a wooden frame at the edge of the mine, their empty eye sockets, pecked at by crows, staring blankly at the sky.

These are the miners who tried to escape yesterday; they were dragged half a mile through the mud before their Achilles tendons were severed.

Dark brown bloodstains stretched from the mine pit all the way to the edge of the jungle.

Then, they were hung up again and tortured to death using all sorts of the most vicious methods.

This is the fate of slaves who attempt to escape in the jade mines along the River Flowing Gold.

The mines primarily used this to intimidate every slave.

"Dinner's ready!" With the sound of a gong, several servants carried in a moldy wooden bucket.

Li Erniu stared at the thin porridge with maggots floating on it, his Adam's apple bobbing with difficulty. Three months ago, he could still smell the aroma of rice.

Now, even the stench of decay can no longer stimulate my numb nasal cavity.

The slaves, like a swarm of hungry ants, dragged their shackles one after another towards the so-called "dining area".

The iron chain carved grooves of varying depths into the rough, gravelly ground.

Without bowls or chopsticks, they stood hunched over, forming a long, winding line, and dipped their hands, covered in sand and blood scabs, into a wooden tub half their height.

Those rice balls, congealed with dark yellow grime and already wrinkled, were mechanically stuffed into their mouths, mixed with the sand between their fingers, and swallowed whole.

Their movements were numb and mechanical; after a few bites, they would helplessly step aside and signal the next person to come forward.

The overseers deliberately compressed mealtimes to half an incense stick's time, and the sour, rotten smell of fermentation lingered all day long—this was a carefully designed method of domestication by the mine owner, using continuous humiliation to crush the last shred of dignity in these people.

Let them lose all will to resist in endless humiliation.

They lived like zombies, working for him day and night.

However, there are always exceptions.

At a table not far away sat several slaves who were being "specially cared for" by the mine owner.

In stark contrast to the miserable plight of other slaves, the food served here was clean and hygienic, including fish and meat, along with neat chopsticks and bowls.

Unlike their companions, they didn't have to struggle to find food in rotten wooden barrels with their dirty hands.

"Two months ago, number 204 brought his brothers, parents, and clansmen to our mine by writing a letter."

"He brought more than a hundred people with him, and they made great contributions to the mining industry!"

A foreman, looking smug, shouted loudly at the slaves.

His voice echoed over the mine, filled with extreme arrogance and swagger.

"From today onwards, he won't have to fight for food in that bucket that even pigs would refuse, like you guys!"

As the foreman spoke, he glanced sideways at the slaves around him, whose faces were filled with envy and resentment.

“You all need to learn this well! Think carefully about how to bring your family, friends, and clansmen here to enjoy a life of luxury.”

"As long as you do it, you can live such a good life. Stop being so stubborn and inflexible!"

The foreman became more and more agitated as he spoke, and the fat on his face began to tremble.

"You can't even write a proper letter, you can't recruit new people, and you can't find any top-quality raw stones. Do you really think you'll ever get ahead? You're just daydreaming!"

"If a person doesn't look out for themselves, they'll be punished by heaven and earth. How can you not understand such a simple truth?"

His tone was full of impatience and disdain, as if he were reprimanding a group of hopeless idiots.

In this dark and gloomy mine, everyone was deprived of the right to use their names and could only be addressed by their numbers.

Therefore, the foreman would only call out "number 204" instead of his original name.

No sooner had he finished speaking than the foreman pulled a whip from his waist, shoved it into number 204's hand, and said with a sinister smile, "Go, give those lazybones a good lashing!"

"Let them know what happens if they don't work hard and don't obey!"

The "those people" he was referring to were Number 204's biological father, older brother, and younger brother.

As for Number 204's wife and his underage sister, they had long since become playthings of the mine owner.

After suffering countless inhuman tortures, he was arbitrarily given away by the mine owner to his overseers.

At this moment, they were being held tightly in the arms of the overseers, being wantonly violated, and uttering painful whimpers.

However, number 204 turned a blind eye to this.

It was as if those suffering were not their own loved ones, but complete strangers.

No, not even a stranger, but an enemy.

After all, it was he who wrote those deceptive letters, luring his loved ones here into slavery.

With trembling hands, he took the foreman's whip and walked unsteadily toward where his father, brothers, and younger brothers were.

His heart was filled with mixed feelings: guilt, helplessness, but mostly numbness from being blinded by self-interest.

He didn't want to be a slave, so he had to sacrifice his family!
He raised the whip and lashed it hard across his father's thin, bony back.

The father slowly raised his head, staring blankly at him, without uttering a single shout or uttering a sound.

But in his eyes, there was endless pity and deep pain.

That gaze, like a sharp blade, pierced straight into the depths of Number 204's heart.

Number 204 dared not meet his father's gaze and hurriedly looked away.

Then came several more lashes, each aimed at his older brother and younger brother.

With each lash, his heart trembled violently, yet he seemed to be controlled by a demon, unable to stop his actions.

In the mine, the other slaves stared blankly at the scene.

Their lips were tightly closed, and not one of them made a sound.

The extreme torment they have suffered over a long period of time has made many of them almost rigid in their thinking, and they feel utterly numb and desperate about everything in front of them.

Only the foreman laughed triumphantly, clapping his hands excitedly and shouting, "Good, well done! That's how it should be. Only by being ruthless and heartless can you make money and live a life of luxury!"

He waved for Number 204 to come over and sit down at the table, then, with a broad smile, personally placed a piece of meat in his bowl.

Number 204 picked up his rice bowl and, like a wild beast that had been starving for a long time, quickly wolfed down his food.

In this dark and dreary mine, the slaves had only two paths to escape their miserable fate.

One is that they were extremely lucky and unearthed priceless jadeite rough stones one after another.

The mine owner would then consider this slave a lucky star who could bring him great wealth, and thus treat him with special regard.

This was also used to set an example for other slaves, to let them see a glimmer of hope, that as long as they worked hard and dug up "big treasures", they would be treated well.

However, this "kindness" is nothing more than a fleeting bubble.

If the slave fails to unearth higher-quality jadeite rough in the following months, the so-called "kind treatment" will vanish instantly.

Instead, they were subjected to double the abuse and torture.

Another way was to write letters to lure their family, friends, and even all their relatives and acquaintances to the mines to work as slaves.

Once the total number of new slaves tricked reaches more than one hundred, the person can be promoted to "overseer" and transformed into a slave leader.

But this also means a complete betrayal of family ties and the utter loss of humanity.

Many people would rather endure all the hardships in the mines until they die than write those sinful letters.

He even resolutely refused to reveal news of his hometown and relatives to the scholar invited by the mine owner.

Because they knew that if they gave any hints, the scholar would stop at nothing to keep writing letters to their relatives.

They went to great lengths to lure their own relatives to this hell on earth.

Moreover, even if a letter is written, unless enough people are deceived, the treatment will only be slightly changed for a short period of time, and will soon return to the same.

In this way, even if they write a lot of letters, it will be of no use if their relatives and clansmen are not deceived, or if the number of people who are deceived is not that many.

The mine owner didn't care about any of that.

He simply intensified the torture and punishment inflicted on these slaves, attempting to force them to submit as quickly as possible.

He kept writing letters to more relatives, friends, and clansmen to trick them into giving him more new slaves to help him mine more jadeite rough stones, thereby making huge profits.

That's why we witnessed that horrific scene just now.

Seeing that not a single slave had responded and agreed to write to their family, the foreman's face instantly darkened.

"Hmph, a bunch of ungrateful bastards! Don't they know that their families are far less important than themselves? One day, you'll all obediently submit!"

After he finished speaking viciously, he pinched a certain part of the body of a beautiful female slave next to him who was trembling with fear.

The female slave screamed in pain and curled up into a ball.

The foreman, however, tilted his head back excitedly and laughed heartily, poured himself a glass of wine, and drank it all in one gulp.

Just then, a sudden commotion broke out outside.

A group of soldiers, armed with sharp blades and fully geared up, rushed in like a tidal wave.

The leading general, with a cold expression, said loudly: "Your mines, in order to make huge profits, dare to force good people into slavery, and then abuse them in every way, wantonly killing and raping them. Your crimes are heinous."

"By order of the Governor, this mine shall be sealed off!"

"Take everyone here away!"

(End of this chapter)