Sky Curtain: The opening scene explains the four major cases of the Ming Dynasty plus the early Ming

"What?! Fengtian Hall?!"

"Isn't that where the emperor conducts state affairs and holds grand ceremonies? The mutinous army has reached there! Have these civil officials and nobles gone mad? Are they planning to assassinate the emperor on the spot?!"

The barrage of comments in the live stream and the thunderous sounds that exploded in the minds of countless emperors and generals across countless worlds reached an astonishing consensus at this moment!

The Yongle Era of the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Di's eyes were bloodshot, and his murderous aura was almost tangible. He had spent his life on the battlefield; what storms hadn't he weathered? During the Jingnan Campaign, he himself had led the troops into the capital!

But he attacked his nephew, the Jianwen Emperor, in order to seize the throne!

Now, his descendant Zhu, the rightful emperor of the Ming Dynasty, is being blocked at the gate of Fengtian Hall by troops led by the very noble descendants he himself promoted?!

This is no longer a rebellion! This is crushing the face of the entire imperial power into the ground with military boots!

"Family members, calm down first."

On the sky, Zhu Dijun took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the surging emotions in his heart, but his voice still trembled slightly.

"Besieging the Fengtian Palace does not equate to an immediate attempt to assassinate the emperor. If Zhang Mao and the civil official group truly wanted to kill Zhu Houzhao, they had countless more covert and 'legal' methods."

"For example, they could make the emperor 'suddenly fall ill,' 'accidentally fall into the water,' or even directly forge an edict of abdication."

Zhu Dijun's eyes turned extremely cold, as if he were dissecting a cold corpse.

"The reason they marched their troops to the front of the Fengtian Hall and made such a show of overwhelming force was not for the emperor's sake."

"What they want is to destroy people's spirit!"

"They want to utterly crush the emperor's dignity, his authority, and his last will to resist! They want this twenty-year-old emperor to see clearly who the true master of this Forbidden City is!"

On the screen, the four blank days from August 11th to August 15th of the fifth year of Zhengde, which had been erased from history books, were filled with a shocking crimson!

"During these four days of secrecy, Emperor Wuzong of Ming, Zhu Houzhao, was effectively a prisoner!"

"A prisoner on the dragon throne, confined to his own palace, surrounded by rebel forces!"

Zhu Dijun's voice wasn't loud, but it was like a series of heavy hammer blows, striking everyone's hearts.

"We can imagine the scene at that time. Late at night on August 11, Zhang Mao mobilized five military camps to control the nine gates of the capital. Yang Yiqing, Zhang Yong, and others, carrying the so-called 'evidence of Liu Jin's treason,' stormed into the palace, accompanied by core members of the mutinous civil official group, such as Grand Secretary Li Dongyang!"

"They're not here to request a divine judgment; they're here to issue an ultimatum!"

"They threw a pile of confessions, some true and some false, and a series of impeachment memorials that had been prepared in advance, at Zhu Houzhao like garbage."

"They told the young emperor: Liu Jin was going to rebel, and we have already arrested him for you. Now, all you need to do is stamp your imperial seal and acknowledge all of this, and you will still be the wise emperor, and we will still be your loyal subjects."

During the Hongwu reign of the Ming Dynasty.

"fart!"

Zhu Yuanzhang slammed his palm down and shattered the dragon-patterned desk in front of him, sending splinters flying everywhere.

"This isn't a request for permission! This is clearly holding a knife to our descendants' throats, forcing them to admit that this was a righteous military remonstrance!"

"Those scholars, those damned nobles! We should have slaughtered them all back then!"

Old Zhu was trembling with rage. What he hated most in his life was powerful ministers who usurped imperial power. But he never imagined that what he feared most would happen to his descendants in such a humiliating way.

"That's right, it's a coup!"

On the sky, Zhu Dijun's voice suddenly rose, filled with endless sorrow and anger.

"Family members, can you imagine the utter despair a twenty-year-old faced in the dead of night?"

"His most trusted eunuch, Zhang Yong, whom he regarded as a 'family member,' sided with the rebels and used the most vicious words to accuse Liu Jin, which was tantamount to stabbing him in the heart!"

"His garrison, which he relied on as a bulwark against the rebels, was commanded by Zhang Mao, the leader of the rebel army. The soldiers only obeyed Zhang Mao's orders and did not recognize him as emperor at all!"

"His trusted secret police, the Embroidered Uniform Guard, which he relied on to monitor the entire country, was already in chaos due to the sudden death of its intelligence chief, Liu Jingxiang. Leaderless and completely unmanageable!"

"At that moment, the entire Forbidden City was, for Zhu Houzhao, a huge, cold cage!"

"He has no trump cards! He has no power he can mobilize! He's completely alone!"

Zhu Dijun moved closer to the camera and spoke slowly and deliberately.

"He only has two paths before him."

"The first option is to refuse to acknowledge it. Then, what awaits him might be an 'accidental' death. Then the civil service and nobles will choose a more obedient and younger puppet from the royal family to be their new emperor."

"The second condition is cooperation. Lower his proud head, acknowledge the legitimacy of this coup, admit that Liu Jin is a traitor, and acknowledge that these treacherous officials are heroes who saved the emperor. Then, he can continue to be the emperor of his Great Ming Dynasty, only as a puppet emperor with no real power."

The fifteenth day of the eighth month of the fifth year of the Zhengde reign of the Ming Dynasty.

On the city wall, Zhu Houzhao's body trembled violently, tears mixed with blood silently streaming down his face.

It turned out to be like this...

It turns out that during those few days, what he thought was "peace and tranquility" and the "grand ceremony of presenting prisoners" that he was so enthusiastically preparing were just a magnificent stage carefully built for him by the traitors.

They watched him like a fool, basking in the false glory on stage.

Offstage, the executioner's blade was already sharpened, waiting for him, the protagonist, to personally hand over the death sentence to his trusted minister!

"So, family members, now you can understand why the utterly idiotic account of 'the emperor personally leading four men in a night raid on Donghua Gate' appears in the Veritable Records of Emperor Wuzong of Ming, right?"

Inside the live stream, Zhu Dijun's tone was filled with endless mockery.

"Because this is the political deal that Zhu Houzhao and the rebel group finally reached after countless bloody battles and negotiations during those four days that were erased!"

"A colossal lie used to cover up the truth of the coup, to whitewash the situation, and to provide a fig leaf for all participants!"

On the whiteboard, Judy Jun clearly drew out the logical chain of this lie.

"For the civil service and the nobility, they needed this story to prove that they were not rebelling, but were acting under imperial orders to quell a rebellion! That their actions were legal and that they were loyal to the emperor and patriotic!"

"For Zhu Houzhao, this story was even more crucial! He needed to prove to the world that he was not a puppet controlled by his ministers! He was still the all-powerful and wise emperor! It was he who personally ordered and led the arrest of the treacherous minister Liu Jin!"

"This is the last shred of pitiful, false dignity that this young emperor could salvage from that utter and utter defeat!"

The myriad realms and timelines were utterly silent.

Everyone was so shocked by the cruel political logic behind it that they were speechless.

History can be so easily altered and fabricated.

What was a bloody military coup was transformed in the hands of historians into an epic tale of a wise emperor and a loyal eunuch.

"And so, that absurd drama officially began on the Mid-Autumn Festival night of the fifteenth day of the eighth month of the fifth year of Zhengde."

Judy Jun's voice became ethereal and absurd.

"At the celebratory banquet, amidst the revelry, the traitor Zhang Yong, following a pre-written script, 'suddenly' reported to Zhu Houzhao that Liu Jin was plotting a rebellion."

"According to the script, Zhu Houzhao also showed 'great shock' and then 'decisively gave the order'."

"Then, this so-called 'night raid' wasn't about arresting anyone at all. Liu Jin had already been half-dead and imprisoned by Zhang Mao's Five Armies several days earlier!"

"They simply went to Liu Jin's residence and the Inner Court to conduct a public and legal search of his property!"

"This is the whole truth hidden behind the age-old joke, 'The emperor personally led four men in a night raid on Donghua Gate, struck them at the vegetable market, and captured them!'"

At this moment, the screen froze on Zhu Houzhao's young face, which was filled with humiliation.

In the darkness, only Judy Jun's cold yet pitying sigh echoed slowly.

"And so, the most shameless and successful political lie in the history of the Ming Dynasty was born."

"But for the victors of the coup, this dirty political drama has only just begun."

"Because next comes the part they've been most looking forward to—"

A chilling smile curled at the corners of Zhu Dijun's mouth.

"Divide the spoils!"

"A lavish feast of wealth and supreme power left behind after the downfall of the powerful eunuch Liu Jin, a veritable feast of plunder!"