Take control of Wei Zhongxian at the start and confiscate 100 million from him!

Chapter 201 What is the World! Even if rivers of blood flow, even if war rages across the land!
As the emperor's grand blueprint for recreating the world was fully unfolded, this small room in the Dezhou post station seemed to transform into the crater of a volcano about to erupt.

The air was thick with the smell of sulfur and flames, and the heat was suffocating.

Lu Xiang-sheng and Tian Er-geng, one a military man with the ambition to pacify the world and the other a ruthless official eager to rectify the chaos of the world with cruel methods, were both filled with fervor and an unprecedented passion. They wished they could immediately draw their swords and ride their horses to flatten the turbulent Jiangnan region for the emperor before them.

However, amidst the magnificent scene of blazing fire and blooming flowers, Yang Sichang sensed the acrid smell of burning everything.

Just moments ago, Yang Sichang was overjoyed at being entrusted with such an important task, but now his usually composed face had turned from flushed to a near-transparent deathly pale.

He wasn't afraid; it's just that, upon careful consideration, he felt that every deduction he made seemed to lead to the same result.

That was not a glorious era of abundant national treasury and universal peace, but a desolate and scorched wasteland.

The fine beads of cold sweat on his forehead were not from fear of the emperor's power, but from a clear foresight.

Hou Xun, who was beside him, also slowly recovered from his initial shock and excitement.

As a former Donglin scholar, he knew better than anyone else present just how deeply entrenched and profound the power of the gentry, whom the emperor contemptuously called vermin, truly was within the very roots of the towering tree that was the Ming Dynasty.

They are not vines, they are part of the tree roots!

Looking at the emperor's young yet resolute and almost cold profile, the two men felt a fierce interplay of awe and deeper confusion.

After a brief, chilling silence, Yang Sichang took a deep breath, a breath that seemed to drain all his strength and blood.

He trembled as he performed an unprecedentedly solemn prostration, his voice hoarse as if it had been honed by the winds and sands of the Gobi Desert for decades.

"Your Majesty... Your subject has a worry that weighs heavily on my mind, like a thorn in my back, and I must speak it out. This is not because I fear difficulties or seek personal safety, but because I am concerned for the longevity of our Great Ming Dynasty and the safety of our nation!"

The emperor's gaze fell on Yang Sichang.

"speak."

There was only one word, yet it seemed to carry the weight of Mount Tai, making the air in the entire warm pavilion feel heavy.

Yang Sichang did not get up. He remained prostrate on the ground in the most humble posture. But every word he uttered next was like a thunderbolt, instantly extinguishing the fervent fire that had just ignited in the warm room!
"Your Majesty, your 'New Policies of Economics and Management,' especially the tax system of '70/30 split between officials and commoners,' is, in my view, no longer an ordinary financial management strategy, nor the reform method of our ancestors..."

He suddenly raised his head, and his usually sharp eyes now gleamed with a near-desperate clarity and a resolute determination to face death.

"...In reality...a change of dynasty!"

He emphasized the phrase "dynastic change," as if he had used up all his life's energy on it.

"This move is to abolish the very foundation of the political system of 'the emperor and the scholar-officials jointly governing the world,' which has existed for two hundred years since the founding of our Great Ming Dynasty, and even for a thousand years since the Qin and Han Dynasties! Your Majesty, what you are shaking is the very foundation upon which the entire scholar class relies for their livelihood!"

As soon as the words were spoken, the excitement and fervor on Lu Xiang-sheng and Tian Er-geng's faces froze instantly.

They may not fear the charge of thousands of troops, but they cannot help but be shocked by such a heart-wrenching and soul-crushing assertion that strikes at the very foundation of the nation.

Yang Sichang did not stop.

He knew that once he opened his mouth, there would be no turning back.

He did not speak vaguely about obstacles, but instead used meticulous and outrageously logical reasoning to clearly deduce for everyone present the interlocking nooses that the Ming Dynasty was capable of strangling any reform.

"Firstly, it is the strangulation of 'public opinion'."

His voice trembled slightly with excitement, yet it was clear and articulate, each word distinct.

"Within three months, Your Majesty's holy name will be smeared by scholars across the land as 'Jie and Zhou' or 'Emperor Yang.' The academies and lecture halls of Jiangnan will become a wellspring of proclamations, copied and circulated in all directions, day and night denouncing Your Majesty for 'competing with the people for profit, abandoning ancestral systems, and implementing the policies of cruel officials'! At that time, public opinion will boil over, rumors will spread, the people's hearts will waver, and the foundation of the nation will be in imminent danger!"

"Secondly, it is the 'strangulation' of government orders."

"Your Majesty wishes to implement new policies, which require the reliance of officials throughout the land. However, from the Six Ministries and Nine Ministers of the Imperial Court to the local prefectures and counties, eight or nine out of ten civil officials are from scholarly circles, or share the same fate, their fortunes rising and falling together. They don't even need to openly defy the imperial decree; they can simply use excuses like 'minor illness,' 'old age,' or 'incompetence' to passively neglect their duties and outwardly comply while inwardly resisting. Your Majesty's magnificent decrees may not even leave this Dezhou post station! At that time, the Ming Dynasty will fall into an unprecedented paralysis of ineffective decrees and complete isolation between the upper and lower levels!"

"Thirdly, it is the calamity of war."

"These people have been operating in their hometowns for generations, accumulating vast landholdings and maintaining local militias and retainers. They are deeply entrenched and practically local tyrants. Once they are driven to the brink, they will resort to desperate measures and, under the pretext of 'purging the emperor's inner circle,' incite the ignorant to rise up in rebellion! At that time, our Great Ming will be beset by bandits rising up in Qin and Jin, and the Jurchens will be eyeing Liaodong with predatory intent. If internal strife breaks out again in the fertile southeast, we will be attacked from three sides... and the nation will cease to exist!"

"Fourth, and most severe, is the strangulation of 'livelihood'!"

This last point was, in Yang Sichang's eyes, the most fatal and unsolvable killing move.

"The silk of Jiangnan, the cloth of Songjiang, the porcelain of Jingdezhen, the salt of Lianghuai, the tea of ​​Wuyi... Behind every commodity trade in the world lies the shadow of powerful families. They don't even need to use a single sword or spear; they only need to join forces to shut down markets, hoard goods, and close textile mills and kilns. In less than half a year, prices in the capital will soar, all industries will decline, military supplies will be insufficient, and refugees will be everywhere! Without the need for enemy countries to attack, my Great Ming will collapse from within!"

These four nooses, like four giant pythons, have tightly bound the "Jingwei New Policy" from four directions: public opinion, administration, military, and economy.

They progress in layers, each one enough to deter any ambitious monarch.

Tian Ergeng frowned as he listened. His proud guards could arrest people, but they couldn't control public opinion, let alone get the closed workshops back to operation.

Cold sweat gradually seeped from Lu Xiang-sheng's clenched fists. He then realized that this was not a simple military campaign, but a total war that spanned the four seas.

However, Yang Sichang's foresight went beyond this.

"Your Majesty, even if the new policies succeed... there will be endless troubles in the future."

“If local governments retain only 30% of the taxes, it will likely be insufficient to cover the salaries of local officials, construction and repair, and education. The division of power and responsibility creates obstacles between higher and lower levels. In order to make up for the deficit, local officials will inevitably establish additional exorbitant taxes in addition to the regular taxes. The severity of their exploitation and the cruelty of their demands will likely far exceed today's ‘fire loss’ tax. In the end, it will be the helpless common people who suffer.”

"Secondly," Yang Sichang's voice grew increasingly somber, "in their pursuit of wealth, these people either turn their attention to land. Some collude with unscrupulous merchants to resell government-owned land; others forcibly seize land from the people under the guise of creating 'achievements.' If this continues, even with strict national laws, local corruption will only escalate, leading them down the evil path of making money from land. This is not a long-term solution; it is truly a case of drinking poison to quench thirst, leaving a legacy of disaster for future generations!"

After speaking, Yang Sichang kowtowed to the ground again, tears streaming down his face: "Your Majesty, I would rather die than obstruct Your Majesty's will, but this plan will shake the world and threaten the very survival of the nation. I beg Your Majesty to think it over carefully!"

The entire warm pavilion was deathly silent.

Yang Sichang's analysis is incisive and his logic is so meticulous and his reasoning so clear that it is irrefutable.

He was like a master chess player, laying out all of his opponent's possible killing moves, variations, and even deeper strategies on the chessboard, revealing with a bloody reality that this game was, from the very beginning, a dead end leading to destruction!

Faced with this almost hopeless analysis, the young emperor remained expressionless.

Zhu Youjian did not refute, explain, or even waver in the slightest.

He looked at Yang Sichang, who was lying on the ground, trembling slightly with fear and excitement, and then, gently but resolutely, waved his hand.

It was a gesture brimming with supreme majesty and boundless contempt.

He despised the so-called fourfold noose, the so-called gentry class, and everything that stood in his way—the so-called will of heaven and the hearts of the people.

"What Minister Yang said..."

His voice was eerily calm, as if he were not responding to a minister's advice, but stating a fact that he already knew by heart.

"...I know everything."

"The affairs of the state are dire, like a serious illness. Only drastic measures can cure this deep-seated disease. The four nooses you mentioned, I have not only thought of them," the emperor said with a cold, murderous laugh, "I have also prepared for them—the guillotine."

His gaze, like two solid icicles, shot towards Tian Ergeng.

"Tian Ergeng, is the Imperial Guard's prison still big enough to hold people?"

Upon hearing this, a fierce glint flashed in Tian Ergeng's sinister eyes. He bowed sharply, his voice hoarse and excited: "Your Majesty, although the imperial prison is full, the world is vast, where can't it be used as an imperial prison? Your Majesty, I can clear out several cities at any time!" The emperor nodded slightly and then looked at Lu Xiangshan.

"Lu Xiang-sheng, are the muskets your new army uses for training enough?"

Lu Xiang-sheng stood up abruptly, his armor not yet on, yet he exuded the air of a warrior on horseback, his voice booming like a bell: "Your Majesty, my soldiers have their guns gleaming and their chambers full of bullets, awaiting only Your Majesty's command!"

The emperor laughed, but there was no joy in his laughter, only boundless arrogance and ruthlessness.

"it is good!"

"I want them to play all their cards!"

"Public opinion is raging? My royal press will publish the names of those sanctimonious people, how much land they own, how many tenants they have, and how much they have lent out! Let the people of the world see who the real culprits are who are causing them to go hungry and cold!"

Is the government order ineffective? I have already prepared a group of capable and willing people among the officials who have passed the imperial examinations and the military. Anyone who dares to shirk their responsibilities will be replaced by me!
A band of rebels? Perfect! It will clear the final obstacle for my grand land survey, allowing all those unclaimed territories to fall into the hands of the court!
"Trading is difficult? That's even better! We can confiscate all their assets, bring them under government control, and use the profits to fund our imperial treasury for the northern expedition against the Jurchens!"

He descended the imperial steps step by step, stood before Yang Sichang, and looked down at him. His gaze was like that of a god looking down upon the mortal world.

Even if rivers of blood flow, even if war rages across the land, even if my Great Ming Dynasty is plunged into years of turmoil and internal strife...

The emperor paused, each word carrying a resolute determination.

"I will spare no effort!"

These words shattered all of Yang Sichang's rational deductions.

He despairingly discovered that, faced with the emperor's absolute will to spare no expense and disregard all consequences, all his plans for the country and its people seemed so pale and ridiculous!

The emperor didn't care at all whether he would destroy this "empire" with his own hands first!

Just then, Hou Xun, who had been silent all along, could no longer support his body weight on his knees and suddenly collapsed to his knees.

Hou Xun raised his head, his refined face now bloodshot. He seemed to have used up all his courage, and asked in a trembling voice the ultimate question that had been lingering in his heart, and in the hearts of all the scholars and officials of the Ming Dynasty.

"Your Majesty... Your subject risks his life to ask..."

"Why...why do you choose to be an enemy of 'the world'?!"

He emphasized the word "天下" (all under heaven).

For him, these two words represented Confucianism and Mencius' teachings, ancestral rites and laws, the social order that had maintained the Ming Dynasty for hundreds of years, and the civil service group he represented that "ruled with the emperor"!

This was not an interrogation, but a final question uttered by a martyr about to betray his lifelong beliefs to the emperor he was about to follow, a question about existence and meaning.

This question was like a bolt of lightning that swept across the heavens and earth, instantly striking the souls of everyone present.

Yang Sichang, Tian Ergeng, and Lu Xiangshan all held their breath, staring intently at the emperor before them.

They want to know too.

What was it that supported this young monarch as he embarked on this thorny path, destined to be bloody and utterly lonely?
The emperor did not answer immediately, nor did he look at Hou Xun, who was kneeling on the ground and on the verge of a mental breakdown.

He slowly, step by step, walked back to the enormous map, his back to the crowd. His figure, cast by the flickering candlelight, cast a huge shadow that enveloped the entire room, as if to encompass all the light and darkness of the world.

"Hou Xun, before answering your question, I also want to ask you a question."

Zhu Youjian's voice was frighteningly calm.

What is meant by 'all under heaven'?

Before Hou Xun could react to his chaotic thoughts, the emperor suddenly turned around. His eyes were no longer cold, but instead held a deep and sharp light that pierced through the mists of history spanning a thousand years.

"Are you the scholar-officials who 'rule with me' that you speak of? Are you the so-called virtuous ministers and scholars who hold the lives of millions in their hands, yet only know how to form cliques and pursue personal gain, engaging in empty talk about morality and misleading the country in the court?"

"Are you the so-called local gentry and elders who came from among them, entrenched in the area, seized land, protected their clansmen, disregarded national laws, and treated the people like straw dogs?"

The emperor spoke faster and faster, each question like an invisible but heavy whip, striking Hou Xun and Yang Sichang hard in the heart!

"I'm telling you, they aren't!"

He raised his voice, which carried an unquestionable air of judgment.

"They are nothing more than a private clique that uses literature to disrupt the law and words to disrupt the government. They do not engage in farming or hoeing, yet they enjoy the benefits of the world and form their own faction! They are a faction that uses monopolizing the classics and controlling official positions to make their exploitation seem legitimate and respectable!"

"The faction driven by self-interest!"
Although these four words were unfamiliar to them, their meaning pierced their deepest thoughts like steel needles! It made Hou Xun and Yang Sichang dizzy and cold all over!

The emperor strolled to the table, picked up the "yellow register" presented by the prefect of Dezhou—a meticulously crafted document with perfectly accurate figures—and his face was filled with utter contempt. Then, with a casual flick of his wrist, the register, which embodied the "hard work" of countless officials, fell to the ground like a withered leaf.

"You are well-versed in the books of sages and virtuous men, and you are full of talk about 'the rule of the king' and 'benevolent governance and love for the people.' But I have searched through your vast sea of ​​books over and over again, and after a lifetime of studying them, all I have seen is the word 'cannibalism'!"

"Your 'benevolent governance' forces farmers to toil their entire lives, toiling from dawn till dusk, yet they can only keep less than 30% of their harvest. The remaining 70% flows into the granaries of landlords and gentry under the guise of 'land rent'! This is not benevolent governance; it is a ruthless exploitation of their very bones!"

"Your 'royal way' involves increasing taxes at every level, from the central government to the local governments. In addition to the regular taxes, there are extra taxes, and in addition to extra taxes, there are corrupt practices. Meanwhile, you yourselves enjoy the privilege of 'sharing the nation's fate' and amass vast wealth without paying a single penny in taxes! This is not the way of the king; it is a method that empties the foundation of the nation and is like drinking poison to quench thirst!"

"Your local gentry, on the one hand, are lending out 'mother-child money' in the village, causing countless self-cultivating farmers to be ruined and forced to sell their wives and children, becoming your tenants; on the other hand, they are taking advantage of the situation to seize their land, completing the most primitive and bloody accumulation of their so-called family fortune! This is not education, this is using neighbors as pawns, hoarding the source of livelihood, and acting like robbers!"

With the simplest yet most irrefutable language, the emperor shattered the veil of "benevolence and morality" that had been passed down for thousands of years, revealing the bloody and cruel truth about wealth and its distribution.

"You are no longer the cornerstone of the nation."

Looking at the distraught Hou Xun, the emperor pronounced his verdict slowly and deliberately, each word like a boulder crashing into a deep pool!

"You are like a malignant tumor clinging to the body of my dying Ming Dynasty, sucking its marrow, gnawing at its flesh, making it weaker and weaker, unable to move—a bone-deep abscess!"

"Therefore, I do not intend to be an enemy of the world."

"I am willing to scrape away the poison from the very core of my Great Ming Dynasty! Even if it means scraping away three layers of flesh, I will not hesitate!"

Hou Xun collapsed to the ground, his face ashen.

The emperor finally approached him and looked down at him. This time, his eyes were filled with a flame that was grander, more compassionate, and more resolute!
"You ask me why this is so? Very well, I will tell you today."

"Because I have seen the military registers of the nine border households. Three generations, five generations, have guarded the frontier, and they haven't even changed their names. They shed blood for the country, while their families in the rear are starving and poorly clothed!"

"Because I have seen famine victims who exchanged their own children to eat. Before they died, they did not curse me, the emperor, for being incompetent. Instead, they kowtowed in the direction of the capital, praying for favorable weather and a good harvest in the coming year!"

"Because I know that the land and wealth of my Great Ming Dynasty were woven inch by inch by the weavers of Jiangnan; fired piece by piece by the potters of Jingdezhen; and dug out of the soil by farmers all over the world, hoe by hoe! They are the ones who added every bit of value to the Great Ming Dynasty and to this land!"

The emperor's voice, filled with anger and boundless majesty, resounded throughout the room, as if it were about to pierce through the windows and walls to proclaim to the world!

"My 'empire' belongs to them! It belongs to the hundreds of millions of silent, exploited, and oppressed laborers who still love this land deeply!"

"They are the essence of this country! They are the roots of China!"

"Therefore, I don't care what history says about me! If upholding the interests of the gentry and officials of the land can make me famous for all time, then I would rather be a tyrant who is infamous for ten thousand years!"

(End of this chapter)