Chongzhen's domineering

Chapter 17 The Scheme to Exterminate a Child is Extremely Cruel
Even the Grand Secretary Gu Bingqian was so frightened that he begged to retire!

Wei Zhongxian then dismissed Tian Ergeng, the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, and replaced him with his nephew, Duke Ningguo, Wei Liangqing.

This caused widespread panic in the court, especially among the Qi, Chu, and Zhe factions.

They had all schemed to change the emperor, and even exposed Wei Zhongxian's plot to rebel. Why did this new emperor still favor Wei Zhongxian as much as the Tianqi Emperor?
Zhu Jue certainly did not favor Wei Zhongxian.

He simply didn't have the time to deal with those demons and monsters in the outer court.

This was also a lesson he learned from his previous life: don't waste time on useless people; it's a waste of time, energy, and resources.

He didn't plan to use those demons and monsters in the outer court, and he was too lazy to waste time scheming against them. He would let Wei Zhongxian, that insidious and vicious villain, handle it.

Emperor Chongzhen, or rather Zhu Youjian, failed to grasp this point and insisted on fighting against the demons and monsters in the outer court. As a result, after seventeen years of fighting, he destroyed the Ming Dynasty and also killed himself.

Since learning a painful lesson, he has never wasted time on useless people again; he would rather use that time to cultivate useful people.

As soon as Wei Zhongxian left, he ordered someone to summon Lu Xiangshan and Sun Chuanting.

After the emperor and his minister exchanged greetings, he solemnly said, "Boya, the money and provisions will be gathered by tomorrow. You should go to Liaodong."

So fast!
It's a good thing that the money and grain have been collected, but the problem is that these money and grain need to be transported to Liaodong.

Upon hearing this, Sun Chuanting cautiously replied, "Your Majesty, I dare to say that I currently have no soldiers under my command, and such a large amount of money and grain cannot be transported. If troops and grain carts are transferred from Liaodong Town, it will take at least ten days."

I summoned you here for this very reason.

Zhu Jue nodded slightly, then asked, "Jian Dou, is it alright for the Beijing Garrison to immediately conscript 10,000 able-bodied men? Originally, the capital region had more than 100,000 troops, and there should be quite a few grain carts equipped with them, right? Have you checked this?"

How do you say this?

Lu Xiang-sheng thought carefully for a moment before cautiously saying, "Your Majesty, the capital garrison has more than 400,000 households. It should not be a problem to recruit 10,000 able-bodied men. The problem is that it may be difficult to recruit them all in one or two days."

Moreover, they had never been trained at all, and the Ministry of War's armory only had ordinary swords, spears, and halberds; they didn't even have longbows or arrows. A force equipped like this had virtually no combat power.

As for the grain carts in the capital region, according to Qi Jiguang's "True Records of Military Training: Explanation of the Supply Battalion", one supply battalion was required for every 10,000 troops, and one supply battalion was required to have 80 grain carts.

If we calculate based on this number, the original force in the capital region was over 160,000, and there should have been more than a thousand grain carts. However, it's unclear how many are left now.

Alas, the Ming Dynasty is truly in dire need of rebuilding.

Zhu Jue nodded slowly, then decisively said, "I will first allocate 50,000 taels from the Imperial Treasury to you. You shall issue a notice to all the guard posts of the Capital Garrison, and all able-bodied men who come to enlist shall be well fed. Those selected shall be rewarded with one tael of silver. As for the officers, you shall also select a group of those with real talent and ability, and those selected shall be rewarded with five taels of silver."

It shouldn't be a problem to gather enough men in a day or two. As for equipment, I'll find a way to gradually equip you with it. Wei Zhongxian has just made 10,000 suits of iron armor, so the Imperial Guards won't have to risk their lives on the battlefield. Wearing them would be a waste. These 10,000 suits of iron armor will be provided to the soldiers of the Beijing Garrison first.

As many grain carts as you can gather, that's a million shi of grain, it's definitely not something you can transport in one trip. First, help Boya transport the pay and some of the grain to stabilize the morale of the Liaodong army.

This grain transport will take at least a month, and the capital region still needs the autumn harvest. After you deliver the pay and some of the grain to Boya, you can hand over the remaining grain transport to the soldiers in Liaodong, and then return to gather more troops for training.”

what?
Those selected even receive a bonus!
The garrison troops of the capital will probably rush to the capital like madmen.

Furthermore, you even stripped the Imperial Guards of their armor and gave it to the soldiers of the Beijing Garrison!

Wearing this armor is like having an extra life. The combat power of these 10,000 Jing garrison soldiers will instantly soar once they put on the armor. They might not be able to defeat 10,000 ordinary border troops. If they are trained properly, they might not be able to defeat 10,000 Jurchens.

Bo Ya was right after all; the current emperor truly has the qualities of a wise ruler.

What a blessing for the Ming Dynasty! What a blessing for the Ming Dynasty!

Lu Xiang-sheng said with admiration, "Your Majesty is wise, I understand."

Oh, and warhorses too.

Zhu Jue thought for a moment and then asked, "How many warhorses does the Beijing garrison have left?"

It’s hard to say.

Lu Xiang-sheng explained in detail: "Your Majesty, originally the ratio of cavalry to infantry in the border army was roughly 3:7. At the beginning of the Wanli era, Qi Jiguang trained more than 160,000 men and horses, and equipped them with more than 48,000 warhorses."

Currently, the Beijing garrison, including the Jizhou garrison, has less than half its original number of warhorses left, and most of them are old horses, only suitable for pulling carts. The number of truly rideable warhorses is probably less than ten thousand.

This is impossible without warhorses; the capital region's defenses need sufficient cavalry to ensure absolute safety.

Where can we find warhorses nowadays?

The Northwest is about to be overrun with rebels. Since no large army will be mobilized to suppress them in the next few years, it would be better to use those warhorses for the soldiers of the Beijing garrison rather than leave them to the rebels.

Zhu Jue pondered, "There should be quite a few warhorses in the border towns of Shanxi and Shaanxi. I have them gather all the usable ones here. You'll need to train at least 30,000 cavalry."

what?
All the warhorses from Shanxi and Shaanxi have been mobilized!

As they were discussing, Fang Zhenghua suddenly rushed over with a memorial in his hand, bowed, and said, "Your Majesty, the Cabinet has sent another memorial."

Gu Bingqian was so frightened that he begged for his life, yet the cabinet still dared to submit a memorial impeaching Wei Zhongxian.

Is Feng Quan really that bold? Zhu Jue took the memorial and frowned slightly.

This time, it wasn't that Wei Zhongxian did anything more egregious than treason.

The problem is that this memorial is too long, it's as long and rambling as an eight-legged essay for the imperial examination.

Ni Yuangong, the Censor of Guangxi Circuit of the Censorate, submitted a memorial stating that Xu Zhiji, the Chief Justice of the Court of Judicial Review, was extremely cruel and had harmed the villagers, resulting in nine out of ten households in Huizhou being deserted and almost wiped out!

What follows is a long and detailed account of the whole story.

It turns out that Ni Yuangong was originally the magistrate of Shexian County, and Shexian County was the capital of Huizhou Prefecture.

At that time, Wu Kongjia, a compiler in the Hanlin Academy, had a feud with his cousin Wu Yangchun over a dispute over family property. Wu Kongjia then directly became Wei Zhongxian's adopted son and then instigated Wu Yangchun's servants to accuse their master of hiding in Huangshan.

Because Wei Zhongxian coveted the Wu family's enormous wealth, he ordered Wu Yangchun and his son to be imprisoned in the imperial prison without explanation. They were tortured to death. Upon hearing the news, Wu Yangchun's wife, daughters, and elderly mother committed suicide one after another.

After Wu Yangchun's entire family was exterminated, Wei Zhongxian sent Lü Xiawen, the head of the Ministry of Works, to Huizhou to confiscate Wu Yangchun's home and implicate many others. He used torture to force Wu Yangchun's relatives to pay so-called embezzled funds, which aroused a popular uprising. Lü Xiawen was so frightened that he abandoned his wife, children and elderly parents and fled by breaking through the wall.

This popular uprising was finally quelled thanks to the desperate efforts of the county magistrate, Ni Yuangong, who risked his life to persuade the people to stop.

As a result, Wei Zhongxian did not stop there and even sent Xu Zhiji to continue to recover the so-called embezzled funds.

Xu Zhiji was extremely cruel. He didn't care whether they were Wu Yangchun's relatives or not. As long as they were wealthy Huizhou merchants, he would torture them and extort money from them. As a result, the whole of Huizhou was filled with resentment, and merchants and even ordinary people had no choice but to flee.

Unable to stop Xu Zhiji from harming the people of Huizhou, Shi Wancheng, the prefect of Huizhou, shaved his head and became a monk, resigning his post and leaving the capital.

Ultimately, Huizhou Prefecture, the most prosperous area in Southern Zhili, was almost deserted, with nine out of ten households empty, becoming a ghost town!

Wu Yangchun was innocent. Even though Wei Zhongxian ordered his men to throw him and his son into the imperial prison and torture them to death, he still couldn't find out a single crime.

Wei Zhongxian even ordered people to fabricate the story that the Wu family was the Donglin treasury, thereby implicating the Donglin members on a large scale!
The Wu Yangchun family was pitiful. During the three major campaigns of the Wanli Emperor, they donated more than 500,000 taels of silver to support the army. The late Emperor Wanli even ordered the governor to build a memorial archway for the Wu family, which was truly a meritorious act.

If the Wu family truly was the treasury of the Donglin Party, then the Donglin Party had rendered meritorious service, as evidenced by the merit archway built by the late Emperor Wanli!
After reading it, Zhu Jue frowned even more deeply.

This Huizhou merchant committed a crime that caused the entire Huizhou Prefecture to be almost deserted.

Moreover, Wu Yangchun was wronged; he didn't do anything wrong at all!
This matter is too absurd and outrageous, and behind every absurd and outrageous thing lies an ulterior motive.

Wei Zhongxian was being used. The Donglin Party and the Qi-Chu-Zhe Party were exploiting Wei Zhongxian's greed to carry out a plan to wipe out his family line!

This is because since the Jiajing reign, the Ming Dynasty had formed three major merchant groups: the Shanxi merchants made their fortune by trading with the northern barbarians, the Zhejiang merchants made their fortune by trading with the Japanese pirates, and the Anhui merchants did legitimate business.

After the wealthy merchants from Shanxi and Zhejiang provinces amassed their fortunes, they sought to control the entire trade of the Ming Dynasty. Therefore, they used Wei Zhongxian to carry out a scheme to wipe out the Huizhou merchants in one fell swoop!
The claim that Wei Zhongxian used Wu Yangchun to implicate the Donglin faction is nonsense; the Donglin faction was backed by Shanxi merchants!

This matter is beyond repair.

However, Wei Zhongxian could return the money.

Zhu Jue frowned and pondered for a while, then announced loudly, "Summon Wei Zhongxian to come and pay his respects."

Wei Zhongxian quickly scurried over, cupped his hands and bowed, saying, "This servant greets Your Majesty."

Zhu Jue remained silent and handed the memorial directly to Wang Chengen, who was standing to the side.

Wang Chengen picked up the memorial and read it aloud.

Upon hearing this, Wei Zhongxian's expression changed again.

Xu Zhiji has turned Huizhou Prefecture into a ghost town!

As soon as Wang Chengen finished reading, he couldn't help but exclaim, "Your Majesty, this servant did not allow Xu Zhiji to be implicated so recklessly!"

They are exploiting your greed to carry out a destructive scheme.

Zhu Jue coldly asked, "How much tribute did Xu Zhiji give you?"

Can I say this?

If we don't speak up, the consequences will be severe.

Wei Zhongxian honestly replied, "He only handed over a few hundred thousand taels to the servants in total."

Xu Zhiji has amassed quite a fortune. The Wu family alone has more than a few hundred thousand taels of silver. They were able to donate more than 500,000 taels to aid the army. How could they only have a few hundred thousand taels of silver in assets?
Zhu Jue stared at Wei Zhongxian for a while before saying sternly, "Xu Zhiji has embezzled more than a million taels of silver. Tian Ergeng is playing dumb with you, and Cui Wensheng has not yet been escorted to the capital. You can only recover this month's dirty silver from Xu Zhiji."

"Immediately order Xu Zhiji to be thrown into the imperial prison and beaten to death. See how much he has embezzled, and bring it all to me."

This unfilial son dared to embezzle so much money; he truly deserves to die.

Wei Zhongxian repeatedly cupped his hands and bowed, saying, "This servant obeys the decree."

(End of this chapter)