The Ming Dynasty: Starting with the Carpenter Prince!

When Fang Congzhe received the first list in the Cabinet Office, Han Kuang happened to be present.

No sooner had the errand boy from the Ministry of Justice left than Han Kuang strolled over from next door, carrying a teacup, to borrow a fire. The charcoal brazier in the duty room had gone out sometime earlier, and the winter chill was biting, making it difficult to even hold a pen steady while drafting documents. Fang Congzhe ignored him and simply unrolled the register and placed it on the desk. Han Kuang, without any hesitation, squatted down in front of the charcoal brazier and blew on it.

The two went their separate ways, and the only sounds in the duty room were the whooshing of charcoal blowing and the rustling of paper turning.

The register was not long, listing a total of eleven items, with the Crown Prince's vermilion annotations marked on the side. Fang Congzhe scanned it from top to bottom. The first six were all routine official documents, with the Crown Prince uniformly annotating each one with the word "read" in vermilion ink, in a very standard manner.

However, the meaning changes with the seventh step.

The Liaodong Military Governor's Office urged for payment, and the Crown Prince approved it with the word "urgent".

The Ministry of Revenue requested an increase in the Liaodong military levy, but the request was approved with the word "delay".

When he turned to the ninth page, Fang Congzhe's hand did not stop, but the speed of turning the page clearly slowed down by half a beat.

The Ministry of War requested an increase in the number of troops in Liaodong, but the Crown Prince only approved it with a single word.

核。

Han Kuang was still struggling with the charcoal brazier, getting his head covered in ash. He couldn't help but cough twice, and after coughing, he looked up and glanced at the table.

"Did the Crown Prince Zhu approve the word 'nuclear'?"

Fang Congzhe didn't reply. He flipped back to the seventh list and reviewed it again, emphasizing urgency, timeliness, and verification. The military commissioner's urgent need for funds was the priority, as the silver could not be reduced. The Ministry of Revenue's additional levies were a time to be delayed, as they would not be immediately imposed on the people. The Ministry of War's quota of soldiers was the verification point, but he would leave that aside for now and make a decision after further verification.

On the very first day after obtaining the right to read on behalf of others, he dissected three Liaodong questions and found three completely different approaches to them.

Han Kuang probably sensed something was amiss, so he blew on the charcoal brazier, picked it up, and was about to turn back to the next room.

Just as they reached the door, Fang Congzhe suddenly spoke.

"Like clouds."

Han Kuang stopped.

"In the autumn of the 46th year of the Wanli reign, I once reviewed three identical sets of questions." Fang Congzhe spoke at his usual pace, but each word was pronounced with a bit more emphasis than usual. "At that time, the military commissioner complained that he had not received 20,000 troops, the Ministry of War reported 24,000, and the Ministry of Revenue allocated 30,000."

Han Kuang looked back.

"It's been three whole years." Fang Congzhe picked up the teacup on the table, which had long since gone cold. "Not a single word, not a single detail has been touched."

Han Kuang did not inquire about how the Grand Secretary had handled the matter back then.

This question is redundant. The fact that the amount has remained unchanged for three years means that no one has touched that hornet's nest during those three years.

Han Kuang nodded slightly, then took the basin and went out.

The door to the duty room closed, and Fang Congzhe leaned back in his chair. The old locust tree outside the window was bare, and the north wind blew by, making the branches rustle.

Three years ago, when he closed that inventory, he thought to himself, "I've been muddling through for seven years, what's one more pot?"

Now that the Crown Prince has casually uttered the word "core," whether the lid of the pot is lifted or not is no longer up to him.

…………

Early morning of the same day, in the warm pavilion.

After Zhu Youxiao presented the memorials that he had reviewed and annotated, he took the opportunity to report on the matter of the training institute.

"Father, I am dull-witted and my foundation is really too poor. I wish to find a few poor scholars who can read to help me copy and supplement my studies in a side room of the Eastern Palace, and at the same time, I would also like to give my fifth brother a lesson."

Emperor Taichang was flipping through the list of questions, without even looking up.

"How much silver will it cost?"

"It won't cost much; a meal will suffice."

"Who should be sent to search?"

Zhu Youxiao opened his mouth as if to say "Mr. Sun," but the words suddenly changed: "Your subject will have Wang Daban help with the arrangements."

Emperor Taichang paused in his reading, then continued reading.

After a long while, he suddenly asked a question casually.

"Is Sun Chengzong aware of this?"

Zhu Youxiao's neck suddenly tightened.

Emperor Taichang spoke casually, as if it were just a casual remark, but he had experienced this countless times over the years. A man who had been the crown prince for thirty years would never utter the word "casually."

Emperor Taichang was weighing the implications of whether the training institute had any connection with Sun Chengzong. The Crown Prince already had a lecturer who could publicly present data in grand discussions, and now he was gathering another group of people. With these two things happening at the same time, even someone with a dull political sense should have sensed something was amiss.

"Your Majesty, Mr. Sun is a lecturer at the Imperial Academy, and the training institute is merely for tutoring and initiating my fifth brother's education. The two are unrelated." Zhu Youxiao scratched his head.

Emperor Taichang glanced at him, then quickly looked away.

"Granted. But do not spend extravagantly. Once the list of candidates is ready, present it to me for review."

Zhu Youxiao's heart skipped a beat. This was the first time since his transmigration that the Taichang Emperor had taken the initiative to ask to see the Crown Prince's secrets. In the past, he had always acted first and reported later, but this time it had become a case of reporting first and then acting.

"Your subject obeys the decree."

Emperor Taichang gave a noncommittal "hmm," then flipped to the Ministry of War's memorial that the Crown Prince had marked with the character "核" (hu), examined it for a long time, and placed it in the "pending approval" pile.

Setting aside the "pending approval" status meant that the emperor's will was undecided. Once the word "verify" was issued, if the Ministry of War handled it properly, it would be considered "verification by imperial decree," but if it handled it poorly, it would be considered "the crown prince interfering in military affairs," a crime of usurpation. Emperor Taichang was weighing the pros and cons repeatedly.

Zhu Youxiao remained silent and did not urge him; if he had, he would have forced Zhu Youxiao to abdicate.

…………

Upon returning to the East Palace, the roster handed in by Sun Chengzong was already on the table.

Zhu Youxiao unfolded the scrolls and examined them one by one. The first three were not worth mentioning. Two were failed scholars and one was a math student. They could serve as scribes in the Ministry of War without any problem.

Turning to the fourth person, next to their name is a note in red ink written by Sun Chengzong in tiny characters: "Formerly a soldier of the Shenyang Guard in Liaodong, he was wounded and retired in the 47th year of the Wanli reign."

The fifth person: "Formerly a soldier of the Guangning Guard in Liaodong, retired due to illness in the 48th year of the Wanli reign."

Before Zhu Youxiao could even pick up his pen, the curtain was lifted and Wang An entered.

He was clutching a note tightly between his fingers, his expression quite solemn.

"Your Highness, Fang Congzhe's secretary in the Imperial Secretariat just went to the office of Vice Minister Sun."

Zhu Youxiao raised his eyes.

"As it happened, the servant was not present. He exchanged a few pleasantries with the doorman and then left. However, according to the doorman's report, he specifically inquired before leaving, 'Which noble person is the servant serving for recently?'"

Zhu Youxiao lowered his head, staring intently at the two lines of small characters on the roster: "Shenyang Guard of Liaodong" and "Guangning Guard of Liaodong".

The old fox had just noticed the word "nuclear" on the list that morning, and by the afternoon he had sent someone to investigate. His political intuition was sharper than expected. He was not investigating the training institute, because he was unaware of it. He was investigating where the Crown Prince's confidence in lightly commenting on the word "nuclear" came from, and among all the officials, the only person most likely to give the Crown Prince this confidence was Sun Chengzong.

But if the Imperial Secretary were to follow the trail and find out that Sun Chengzong was indeed looking for candidates for the training institute, and the military records of these two retired veterans on the roster were presented in black and white, the accusation of "the Crown Prince privately keeping assassins" could be firmly pinned on the Crown Prince's head the next day.

There was no time to leisurely alter the roster; this was a fight to the death against Fang Congzhe's informants.

"The original roster is here. Does Mr. Sun still have a copy?"

"A copy should be prepared."

"Tell Mr. Sun to burn the register immediately, and say that I have already received the list and there is no need to keep it."

Wang An accepted the order and was about to leave.

"Wait." Zhu Youxiao picked up his brush, dipped it in ink, and forcefully erased "Liaodong Shenyang Guard" and added "Literate Tenant Households of Gaoyang County" to the side. He then crossed out "Liaodong Guangning Guard" and changed the note to "Mathematics Students of Baoding Prefecture".

He threw the pen down on the table, the ink still wet.

"The name of military personnel must not appear on the roster of the training institute. If someone with a military background appears next to the crown prince, it will fall into the eyes of those with ulterior motives, and they will use this as an excuse to expose the fact that he is privately raising assassins."

Wang An paused.

"Your Highness, even if one has changed their place of origin, one is still the same person. The way those two walked and the accents they spoke in the training institute could not possibly escape the keen eyes of discerning people."

Zhu Youzheng was about to argue when the curtain was suddenly lifted high.

Zhu Youjian sneaked in.

The nine-year-old younger brother, clutching half a piece of osmanthus cake tightly in his hand, his cheeks bulging, exclaimed as soon as he entered the door, "Big brother! Have you found the classmate you mentioned?"

Zhu Youxiao and Wang An remained silent.

"Found them, six in total."

"Six!" Zhu Youjian jumped for joy, cake crumbs scattering all over the ground. "Who are they?"

"An introduction will be given at that time, but don't rush. For the first lesson, I'll test you with a math problem. How much will it cost to transport one shi (a unit of dry measure) of military rations from the capital to Liaoyang?"

"Was the expense enormous?"

"Even more so than the provisions themselves."

"Huh?" Zhu Youjian's eyes widened. "Wouldn't that mean losing everything? Transporting one shi of grain costs more money than buying one shi, so what's the point of transporting it at all!"

"Therefore, you need to carefully calculate and get to the bottom of it to find out where this deficit has actually gone."

Zhu Youjian stuffed the remaining osmanthus cake into his mouth, mumbled something like "Then I'll go and think about it," and then lifted the curtain and disappeared.

The curtain swayed on its own, and the room returned to silence.

Wang An remained standing in the same spot, clutching the register tightly in his hand, waiting for the Crown Prince to finish speaking.

Zhu Youxiao flicked away the crumbs of cake from the table.

"What Otomo said is absolutely right. Pretending will only arouse suspicion, so let's just not pretend. The training course is nothing more than calculating the grain supply, measuring the distance, and verifying data. Veteran soldiers can do these things more than ten times faster than pedantic scholars. This speed of learning is not a flaw, but a talent."

Wang An pondered for a moment.

"However, for the first few days, we still need to remind them to avoid causing trouble," Zhu Youxiao instructed. "The rogue-like mannerisms of soldiers are ultimately more noticeable than their physical prowess. Once they become well acquainted with the scholars, these rough edges will naturally be smoothed out."

Wang An nodded.

"Make a clean copy of this register and present it to the Emperor tomorrow morning. The original copy must be burned immediately, as must the copy kept by Mr. Sun. Go quickly and finish this before Fang Congzhe's spies find out."

Wang An tucked up the roster and strode out, his hurried footsteps echoing all the way to the end of the corridor.

…………

In the evening, the cabinet was on duty.

Liu Yiju was looking through a copy of the same inventory.

Han Kuang sat opposite him, reviewing official documents from the Ministry of Revenue, and leisurely sipped his fragrant tea.

Liu Yiju flipped through the documents at lightning speed, skimming over the first six and heading straight for the seventh, the Liaodong Military Commissioner's demand for payment.

"Urgent." Good, the Crown Prince intends to expedite the payment. "Delayed." Good, no pressure was put on the Ministry of Revenue. "Verify."

Liu Yijing's brows, which had been furrowed for most of the day, gradually relaxed. The Crown Prince's thorough investigation of Liaodong coincided with the methods strongly promoted by the Donglin Party, and he almost clapped his hands and laughed to himself.

However, as he continued to examine the items, the smile froze on his lips.

The tenth report, a routine dispatch from Xiong Tingbi's military headquarters, relayed the military situation along the Puhe River defense line.

The Crown Prince's vermilion annotation contained only two characters.

pay attention to.

Liu Yijun's hand hovered above those two words, his fingertips almost touching the paper. "Pay attention" meant to protect him and wait and see what happens, while "await investigation" was the prelude to questioning him. Faced with the report from the military governor's office, the crown prince had no intention of pursuing the matter.

Han Kuang, sitting opposite Liu Yijuan, kept his eyes down and didn't look at him, but Liu Yijuan knew perfectly well that he had heard everything clearly. When the sound of turning pages on the desk suddenly stopped, Han Kuang could immediately guess which page he had turned to.

"Like clouds."

Han Kuang raised his eyes.

"The Crown Prince's thorough investigation into the Liaodong military expenditure is the same as ours, albeit with different directions," Liu Yiju said in a low voice. "However, his official comment to the Military Commissioner's Office was simply 'Pay attention.'"

Han Kuang took the list, turned to the tenth page, examined it for a while, then closed the list and spoke.

"Ji Hui, have you ever thought about this carefully? When the Crown Prince presented the accounting data at the lecture, he was pointing the finger at the corrupt chain that had disappeared along the way, but he didn't mention the Military Commissioner's Office at all. During the court deliberation, he questioned 'Where exactly did the silver go?' He was looking for the black hands that had been exploiting people along the way. Now, it's another 'be careful' thing."

Han Kuang returned the inventory list.

"These three things corroborate each other, showing that his 'investigation' and your 'investigation' are ultimately not on the same path."

These words, spoken in the duty room, carried immense weight.

Liu Yiju tapped the table.

The Donglin Party was determined to replace the leader, but the Crown Prince was interested in protecting him. The thorough investigation into the embezzlement of Liaodong funds was indeed carried out by comrades, but the personnel arrangements in Liaodong were a dead end. This Crown Prince was at best a half-ally.

"In Xiangyun's opinion, what should be done?"

Han Kuang picked up his teacup and took a small sip, but as he put the cup down, he uttered a completely unrelated remark.

"This year, 30% of the autumn tributes from Jiangnan have not yet been sent to the capital, and the Ministry of Revenue is in a state of great anxiety."

Liu Yiju frowned deeply. Han Kuang was dodging the question and unwilling to engage with the topic of "how it should be done." Once engaged, he would have to take a stand, and once the words were spoken, they would be difficult to take back.

However, not expressing an opinion in itself is also a form of detached observation.

Liu Yijing silently folded the list and put it into his sleeve pocket, while Han Kuang had already lowered his head again to review the official documents.

Outside the duty room, a cold wind carried withered leaves, swirling and turning in the courtyard.

…………

Night falls in the Eastern Palace.

Wang An returned to report back.

"The records have all been burned. Sun Shuzi has handled the matter very well, leaving not a single piece of paper behind."

"How is Fang Congzhe's position as a secretary in the Imperial Secretariat doing?"

"I went to Sun Shuzi's office again in the evening. This time, I happened to find Sun Shuzi inside. During the conversation, the servant asked what duties he had been supervising recently. Sun Shuzi replied that the Crown Prince had instructed him to select several people to copy the lessons. The list had already been sent to the Eastern Palace, and I did not keep a copy."

Zhu Youxiao nodded.

Sun Chengzong handled the situation flawlessly, and the entire roster ended up in the hands of the Crown Prince, leaving no trace elsewhere. Once the Imperial Secretary returned to report, Fang Congzhe would have no other choice but to wait for the Crown Prince to present a copy to the Grand Secretariat after the Emperor had finished reporting.

The words "Liaodong Shenyang Guard" and "Liaodong Guangning Guard" had already been erased from the copy that was about to be exposed.

"There is still one unexpected event," Wang An said in a low voice. "On my way to inform Prince Sun, I happened to meet someone."

"Who is it?"

"Li Jinzhong is the old eunuch who used to travel around the palaces supplying charcoal."

"What should he do?"

"He's no longer doing the menial work of delivering charcoal; now he works in the Imperial Pharmacy. I heard he was just transferred there a few days ago, and he just happened to fill a vacancy."

Zhu Youxiao's fingers, which were turning the pages of the test paper, suddenly stiffened.

Imperial Pharmacy, filling the vacancy.

The last imperial eunuch who resigned from the Imperial Pharmacy to return home due to illness was the very person who secretly concocted the sedative tonic in Chapter Thirty with polygala. The empty seat left behind by that eunuch was quietly filled by Li Jinzhong.

Who exactly was the person who secretly transferred him to this position? And who is it that is patching up this fatal hole left behind?

"Investigate and find out exactly how Li Jinzhong gained access to the Imperial Pharmacy, what path he took, and which deity he worships."

"This old servant obeys the decree."

Wang An withdrew.

Inside, only Zhu Youxiao sat alone under a solitary lamp. A wall away, his fifth brother's snores rose and fell, even and long, like the sound of a bellows being pulled.

On the desk lay a newly transcribed list of instructors, the origins of the six individuals thoroughly erased. Tomorrow, it would be presented to the Emperor for review, and this hurdle should be cleared without incident.

However, Li Jinzhong's infiltration of the Imperial Pharmacy, a sinister and underhanded act, had become a thorn in his side.

From deep within the eaves, the faint sound of Mr. Ke's footsteps could be heard as he headed straight for the backyard. After a while, he turned back, lingered outside the door for a moment, and seemed to peek inside. Seeing that the lamp was still lit on the window paper, he did not knock on the door and entered. The sound of his footsteps gradually faded into the distance.

Zhu Youxiao put the roster into a dark drawer and blew out the candle.

Tomorrow, I must first deal with my father's wrath. As for Li Jinzhong, that hidden danger, I'll leave that for later investigation.