The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 806 The Conspiracy of the Seris Empire
Old ginger is spicier, or rather, Mo Zirong doesn't have the blood of the Habsburg family flowing in his veins, so he can't be fooled by the seemingly ancient and luxurious appearance, and can see the essence more clearly than Mo Gongze.

The postponement of the wedding and the change in King George III of England's attitude were closely related to the battlefields on the European continent.

How could George III, a man of exceptional ability, commanding 25,000 elite troops, and capable of pleasing the sons-in-law of the Seres Empire, with so many daughters that there simply weren't enough princes of equal social standing to marry him, possibly refuse such a man? He would be insane to refuse.

The current changes are actually just England trying to lower the price.

This might not even be George III's intention; it is highly likely the will of England as a whole, which George III, nearing the end of his life, could not disobey.

Frederick William III of Prussia warned that if England supported the Great Rhine Kingdom plan, the long-standing friendship between Prussia and England would come to an end.

Prussian Prime Minister Friedrich Heinz even stated that he did not rule out the possibility of Prussia intervening militarily.

At 10 Downing Street, the King personally visited the Prime Minister's residence to hear reports from ministers and a few members of the House of Lords.

The plan of the Greater Rhineland Kingdom actually provoked Prussia the most, because the full name of the Holy Roman Empire was the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.

In a sense, this Roman Empire was roughly equivalent to the Cheng-Han state of Li Xiong of the Di people. The Roman elements it contained were far less than those of the Han-Zhao state of Liu Yuan of the Xiongnu people or the Later Tang state of Li Cunxu of the Shatuo people.

This German nation, besides its two big brothers Austria and Prussia, also has hundreds of smaller brothers, such as the more famous Saxony and Hesse.

The fact that the Habsburgs were able to obtain the title of Holy Roman Emperor only shows that they had the upper hand in their struggle with Prussia and became the leader of the Holy Roman Empire, not that the Holy Roman Empire belonged to Austria, represented by the Habsburgs.

Therefore, when the Austrians agreed to the Greater Rhineland Kingdom plan, the Prussians were outraged and vehemently opposed the idea of ​​Mogonze, a grandson of the Habsburgs, becoming an important monarch of the Holy Roman Empire and ruling the Rhineland.

This is also the key reason why, in a very short period of time, Grand Duke Karl went from supporting Mogongze to subtly rejecting him.

At this point, Austria simply could not afford the consequences of offending Prussia, even if Prussia was merely causing trouble within the Holy Roman Empire.

However, King George III, who was squinting, looked quite disgusted when he heard this, and he snorted coldly.

"Traditional friendship? Do the Prussians still remember having a traditional friendship with us?"

"The big idiot raised a little idiot. The big idiot brought the country to financial collapse, and the little idiot got kicked in the butt by the French with pointed boots, but still wanted to kneel down and kiss the French shoes."

Two years earlier, in 1797, King William Frederick II of Prussia died.

This man was quite tough on France, but Prussia was too poor, and its ruling class was a bunch of rich kids with ambitions that didn't match their wealth, so they quickly brought the country to the brink of collapse.

William Frederick III, who succeeded to the throne, had witnessed the martial prowess of the French on the battlefield and was terrified. Seeing that the country was on the verge of collapse, he actually became a coward.

When the French beat him, he didn't fight back; when the anti-French coalition insulted him, he pretended not to hear.

While this saved Prussia's nearly bankrupt finances, it also turned Prussia from a prominent European power back into a nobody.

“Frederick William III was not a good king, but we cannot afford the consequences of Prussia sending troops to the Rhineland, especially since it involves the safety of Hanover,” said Prince George IV, the Crown Prince of Wales.

King George III had intended to reprimand his son, whom he disliked, but upon hearing the name Hanover, he immediately backed down.

At this time, the Electorate of Hanover was like the testicles in the crotch of the English royal family. Whenever anything threatened Hanover, the Kingdom of England always remained very calm.

“Your Majesty, a Greater Rhineland Kingdom with the Lower Netherlands as an ally is not in the interest of the Kingdom of England.”

Foreign Minister Baron Greenwell whispered a reminder: "The Habsburg family's Lower Netherlands legal rights include the duchies of Luxembourg, Limburg, and others. In addition, Prince Ferdinand and his son also hold the titles of Grand Duke of Transylvania and Duke of Parma."

Considering the incompetence of Emperor Francis II of the Holy Roman Empire and the brilliance of Prince Ferdinand, as well as the fact that the Prince of Belgium once enjoyed the full support of the Hungarians, effectively becoming the King of Hungary, the situation becomes even more dangerous.

Because if we also fully support Prince Ferdinand, a Holy Roman Empire might emerge from decay and rise again on the continent.

As expected of someone involved in diplomacy, Baron Greenwell had guessed most of Mo Gongze's expectations.

But George III disagreed, thinking it was too far-fetched. He looked at Baron Greenwell.

"Your Excellency, do you really think Prince Ferdinand can integrate the Lower Netherlands, which does not belong to the Holy Roman Empire, into the Rhineland?"

As for a Holy Roman Empire reborn from a decaying body, ha! Are we now facing not Prince Ferdinand, but Alexander the Great, or Octavian?

The two consecutive rhetorical questions revealed George III's attitude.

Baron Greenville nervously swallowed hard and replied with a forced smile, "Your Majesty, six years ago none of us expected that Louis XVI would be beheaded by a mob, and ten years ago we also did not expect that the Bourbon family's rule in France would end in such a way."

And it wasn't just Prussia and Austria that were expressing their discontent; His Highness the Prince of Orange and Nassau, the Perpetual Consul, also expressed the same concerns.

He believed that if Prince Ferdinand received too much, he might use the opportunity to unify the entire Netherlands.

Since we're going to scare them anyway, let's make it even bigger.

Well, it's not entirely nonsense; there are indeed calls for the unification of the Upper and Lower Netherlands.

Because no matter how much the French army claimed to be a revolutionary army, it still did not break free from its old ways.

After they took control of the Upper and Lower Netherlands, the French government bought up the agricultural products of Dutch farmers at low prices, and French soldiers harassed Dutch girls everywhere.

They also acted as conquerors everywhere, engaging in forced buying and selling, and considering themselves superior to others in all places, which greatly aroused the national sentiment of the people of the Upper and Lower Netherlands.

Even the French army didn't need to do much evil; they just needed to use their status to be lenient with people throughout the Upper and Lower Netherlands.

These men, very few can resist watching outsiders flaunt their success and pick up girls in their hometown.

Seeing a former crush embracing a foreigner is something very few people can resist, and this is the easiest point to trigger local consciousness.

This was the situation in the Upper and Lower Netherlands, to the point that even farmers in Belgium and the Netherlands rose up in rebellion, which is how the historical Kingdom of the Greater Netherlands came to be.

After listening, George III remained silent for a long time before finally giving up, because he realized that this was the collective will of the Kingdom of England as a nation, and not something he, as king, could forcibly reverse.

Perhaps he could have had a strong grip on Parliament ten years ago, but now George III is ill and his control over Parliament has been greatly weakened.

"Okay, after discussing so many aspects, we still need to look at it from the perspective of the battlefield."

"If the Allied forces perform well this time, especially if Frederick's military operations in the United Provinces Republic go smoothly, then I also support not giving the Belgian prince and his son so many benefits." Although George III sometimes succumbed to madness, he was still clear-headed and could see the essence of things.

All sorts of schemes and plans must be put to the test on the battlefield.

If things can't be handled on the battlefield, and we still have to rely on Mo Gongze later, then we'll probably have to pay an even higher price in the future.

Thinking of this, George III waved for some lower-ranking ministers and members of the House of Lords who were not close to him to leave, then looked at his son, the Prince of Wales, and Prime Minister William Pitt Jr., and said:

"I want to know some more real reasons why your attitude towards Ferdinand changed so quickly?"

Don't use those reasons, because those reasons don't warrant going to that extent.

As expected of a king who had ruled England for nearly forty years, George III quickly realized something was amiss after a moment's thought.

The people in the room exchanged glances and decided to let Prime Minister William Pitt Jr. handle the matter, as he was the one in charge.

William Pitt Jr. shifted uncomfortably, which seemed quite out of character for aristocratic etiquette, so he simply stood up.

"Your Majesty, we have discovered the plot of the Great Emperor of the Seres Empire, a plot against all of us Europeans!"

"A conspiracy?" George III was somewhat puzzled.

“That’s right, we’ve discovered that His Majesty Emperor Seres is attempting to interfere in the internal affairs of our Europe through the Prince of Belgium and his son,” William Pitt Jr. stated emphatically.

But George III almost laughed when he heard this. "Isn't it obvious that Emperor Seres is trying to interfere in European affairs?"

Moreover, where did we get the name "Europe" from?
Europe has never had the concept of "Europe," not even the Roman Empire achieved this goal.

Europe is not Seres; division is our norm. I, George III, am merely the King of England, not yet to the point of being king or emperor to all of Europe!

George III's words were quite blunt.

His conflict with William Pitt Jr. was not triggered by this trivial matter, but was related to religion.

William Pitt the Younger advocated lifting legal restrictions on Catholics and reaching a legal reconciliation with small Catholic populations in Ireland and Great Britain in order to ease domestic tensions and concentrate efforts on dealing with France.

However, for George III, a devout Protestant, maintaining the special status of Protestantism in England was the bottom line of his life, which he would never cross.

Moreover, Protestantism is the foundation of England, and it is because of this that the Hanoverian royal family was able to become kings of England.

Therefore, any relaxation of Protestantism would undermine the Hanoverian rule, something he, as the King of England who was of Hanoverian descent, would never agree to.

At the same time, the vast majority of people in England strongly opposed lifting restrictions on Catholicism, which strengthened George III's determination not to compromise on this issue.

William Pitt Jr. also knew that his conflict with the King was escalating. Even now, the King's harsh words, seemingly addressed to Prince Ferdinand, were actually aimed at his Catholic policies, or rather, the two were intertwined.

The relaxation of restrictions on Catholicism was intended to allow for greater intervention in European affairs.

Reducing the benefits that the Belgian prince and his son could gain would be more conducive to winning over other European countries and maintaining the balance of power on the European continent.

“Your Majesty, we cannot use past experience to judge the current situation. The intervention I am referring to by Emperor Seris is not military, but cultural.”

Emperor Seres the Great and his empire are leveraging Seres' rich history and culture to continuously influence Europe through the Belgian prince and his son.

They even described our Enlightenment as occurring under the influence of Seresian culture.

They also said that the Seres Empire saved Europe because if they hadn't killed the terrifying Mongol Khan, all Europeans would have become slaves of the Mongols.

Therefore, the Europeans should accept and be grateful to the Seres.

“They,” William Pitt Jr. took a deep breath and made his final statement, “are turning the Seres Empire into a natural participant in European affairs.”

They don't even recognize the division between Europe and Asia, believing that we all live on the same continent, and they call this continent the Sacred Continent (Divine Continent).”

William Pitt Jr. described it as if it were a thrilling or dramatic event, but King George III remained unmoved, even giving William Pitt Jr. a pitying look before slowly speaking after a long silence:

“Little William, as I said, I am only the King of England, not the Emperor of Europe, and you are only the Prime Minister of England, not the Prime Minister of Europe.”

What you're talking about isn't your concern. Your concern should be how to defeat the French as quickly as possible and safeguard England's interests in every way, not creating obstacles for this cause!

After saying this, George III, escorted by the King's Guard, left 10 Downing Street and said to the Hampton Court Butler beside him, "Go and invite the Prince of Belgium and his son to Buckingham Palace. Tell them I'm inviting them to a dinner party at my home."

After watching the king leave, William Pitt Jr. suddenly appeared much more tired. He unscrewed the bottle full of port wine, poured himself a large glass, and drank it all in one gulp.

Port wine is a type of fortified wine, which is made by adding spirits to wine. Its alcohol content is usually around 20%.

William Pitt Jr. believed that port wine could enhance his health and even alleviate gout symptoms, so he drank a bottle every day from the age of fifteen.

This severely damaged William Pitt Jr.'s health, making the forty-year-old look older than Mozibu, who was almost sixty.

"Without lifting the restrictions on Catholics, the kingdom cannot gain the loyalty of the Irish, who will become bombs planted under our beds unless we can kill them all."

If the power of the Belgian princes cannot be limited, then Prince Ferdinand, after receiving the title of Duke of Cambridge, will become the sharpest sword in the hands of the royal family.

With the Belgian prince's army, the king can do many things he couldn't, and the power dynamics of the Kingdom of England, particularly the balance of power between the monarchy and Parliament, will undergo a dramatic change!

In front of his cousin and political ally, Baron Greenwell, William Pitt Jr. finally revealed his true thoughts.

Prince Ferdinand's rise to power was, in effect, an expansion of royal power.

Baron Greenwell was at a loss for words. After a long silence, he could only say, "You should drink less; I'm worried it might affect your judgment."

William Pitt Jr. shook his head. "I became Prime Minister with the King's support, but now I have strayed from the direction the King expected."

The only thing that can save my relationship with His Majesty the King is the good news of victories against the French. May God bless those brave soldiers!

(End of this chapter)