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

In the live stream, the suffocating aftershocks of the Leopard House massacre were still raging wildly on the public screen. The screen was filled with netizens gritting their teeth and demanding that Yang Tinghe and other civil officials be torn to pieces.

Zhu Dijun picked up the mineral water bottle on the podium, tilted his head back, and gulped down half of it.

"Bang!"

The water bottle slammed heavily onto the table.

"Family members, on this last night of the Zhengde reign of the Ming Dynasty, the insidious and ruthless behavior displayed by the civil official group has indeed caused everyone's blood pressure to soar to 220."

A playful glint flashed in Zhu Dijun's eyes, and the tense facial muscles relaxed slightly. "The truth of history is too damn heavy. To prevent any viewers in the live stream from getting a stroke from anger, let's temporarily switch brains."

He tapped a key on the keyboard with his hand behind his back.

"A loyal fan just sent me a screenshot of his own imagined chat group of Ming Dynasty emperors. It's an extremely hardcore conspiracy theory version!"

The bloody files on the big screen disappeared instantly, replaced by a green simulation of a modern group chat interface.

The group name, displayed at the very top, exuded an extremely strong sense of solemnity and killing intent—【The Supreme Court's Pacification of the Rebellion: The Zhu Clan's Top Secret Group】!

"Let's see what kind of chilling chain of logic these emperors of the Zhu family would unravel if they gathered in the afterlife and faced the demise of the Ming Dynasty!"

Zhu Dijun grabbed the pointer and slammed it heavily on the first line of the big screen.

The group leader, Zhu Yuanzhang, whose profile picture was of the Ming Taizu Emperor, was the first to bombard the group with a screen full of red exclamation marks.

[Zhu Yuanzhang: @All members! Get in here! How could the great empire I built be gone?! Explain yourselves, one by one, who is behind this?!]

The setting is the Hongwu reign of the Ming Dynasty. Inside the Fengtian Hall.

The real Zhu Yuanzhang, staring at the image on the sky that looked exactly like himself, flew into a rage, his facial muscles twitching violently. This contraption created by his descendant Zhu Dijun, though seemingly absurd, struck a nerve with him, threatening to explode at that moment!

On the screen, notification sounds blared incessantly.

[Zhu Yunwen: Grandfather... your grandson is innocent! It was my fourth uncle who rebelled and seized the throne from me! To this day, I still don't know who burned to death in the Fengtian Hall in my place during that great fire.]

[Zhu Di (instant reply): Bullshit! You were the one who first reduced the power of the princes and forced them to their deaths, so I was ordered to quell the rebellion and purge the court of corrupt officials! I think you deliberately set fire to the palace to frame me for murdering the emperor and seizing the throne, so you can hide in the shadows and wait for your chance to restore the throne, right?]

[Zhu Yuanzhang (angry emoji): Zhu Di! You really rebelled! I knew it! You've always been dissatisfied with Biao'er, and even more so with Wen'er! Did you secretly sabotage Biao'er's early death?!]

Upon seeing this sentence, Prince Yan, Zhu Di, in the main hall, felt his legs go weak and knelt on the golden bricks with a thud, his face turning ashen with fear.

"Father! Your son did not! Your son would never dare to have such a thought, even if it meant death!"

However, a slow-moving message on the sky immediately heightened the atmosphere of terror.

[Zhu Biao: Father, please calm your anger... Your Majesty, I am inherently weak, and it has nothing to do with my fourth brother. However... When I returned from my northern tour, I did indeed feel that someone had tampered with my medicine.]

[Zhu Di (sweating profusely): Brother, don't make baseless accusations! I was still guarding the capital's borders in Beiping at that time. How could I possibly have reached into the Eastern Palace? If you ask me, it's because Father Emperor, you killed too many meritorious officials, making everyone in the court feel insecure, and some people wanted to install a new emperor ahead of schedule!]

Holy crap!

In the modern live stream room, the barrage of comments instantly exploded.

"What the hell?! The medicine was tampered with! If even the death of Crown Prince Zhu Biao was orchestrated by the civil official group, then this whole scheme is absolutely terrifying!"

Zhu Dijun pointed at the screen, a cold smile playing on his lips: "Family members, keep watching. Before the mess between Jianwen and Yongle is even settled, Fatty Long and Good Saint Sun have already turned their attention to their most familiar old rival!"

[Zhu Gaochi: Your Majesty, I feel this matter is not so simple… After you ascended the throne, you ruthlessly exterminated the former officials of the Jianwen Emperor, even executing Fang Xiaoru's entire clan. Could it be that those Jiangnan officials harbor resentment and have been secretly causing trouble for the Ming Dynasty imperial family ever since?]

[Zhu Zhanji: Father is right! My second uncle, Zhu Gaochi, always wanted to emulate my grandfather's Jingnan Campaign, but I forcibly suppressed him in the end. However, I always feel that there's a force in the court deliberately instigating infighting within our imperial clan so they can reap the benefits!]

As soon as this message was posted, two rabid dogs immediately started biting each other in the group chat.

[Zhu Qizhen: Stop talking! I'm the one who's been wronged the most! The Tumu Crisis wasn't due to my incompetence at all! Someone deliberately leaked military intelligence, selling me out to the enemy! My brother, Zhu Qiyu, wanted to kill me as soon as he ascended the throne, locking me up in the Southern Palace for seven whole years!]

[Zhu Qiyu (angrily): Imperial brother, how dare you speak like that! You personally led an expedition and utterly defeated hundreds of thousands of elite Ming troops, almost causing the country's downfall! I ascended the throne and stabilized the realm, and the moment you returned, you staged the Coup of the Gate to kill me! You even killed Yu Qian, who was protecting the capital! Who the hell wants to disrupt the Zhu family's rule?!]

[Zhu Qizhen (enraged): The defense of the capital? You idiot, have you ever left the capital to see it firsthand in all these years since you ascended the throne? No, right? And the recommendation system that Emperor Taizu abolished was reinstated under your rule. So let me ask you, where is the money? Where are the taxes? Don't think that the Jingtai Restoration is a true restoration. You've ruined so many people after you, just as useless as your useless grandfather Zhu Gaochi!!!]

The Ming Dynasty, Jingtai Era.

Sitting upright on the dragon throne, Zhu Qiyu gazed at the sky, his fists clenched so tightly they cracked. Yes, Yu Qian, such a meritorious official, was killed without a second thought. If there truly was a vast net, were the innocent souls of Tumu Fortress truly victims of his elder brother's folly? Or had the civil officials already planned to use someone else to do their dirty work?

Zhu Dijun pounded on the keyboard, and the page scrolled down rapidly.

"During the Chenghua and Hongzhi reigns, the methods of the civil service changed. They escalated from physical elimination to the most sophisticated form of 'murder through praise'!"

[Zhu Jianshen: Stop arguing... I favor Consort Wan, and everyone says I'm foolish. But I always feel that someone is deliberately exaggerating the affairs of the harem, making the eyes of the whole world watch my bed, just to divert attention from the court and cover up their corruption and factionalism!]

[Zhu Youcheng: Father, please understand! I have been diligent in my duties throughout my life and have been extremely lenient with civil officials, yet factional strife continues unabated in the court! The civil official group is becoming increasingly arrogant, and imperial power is being hampered at every turn. I suspect that since the end of the Yongle reign, civil officials have been deliberately flattering the emperor to their detriment, using morality to completely sideline the imperial clan!]

"Did you understand?"

Zhu Dijun pointed at the screen and shouted angrily.

"Zhu Youcheng was a kind-hearted man, but he raised the fattest rat in the Ming Dynasty! And the next one is the ancestor who risked his life to overturn the table!"

[Zhu Houzhao (laughing wildly): Hahahaha! A bunch of old fogies! I built the Leopard House, I personally led the army, all because I didn't want to be controlled by those hypocrites! They said I was licentious and immoral, that I drowned—all that bullshit! I was killed by those bastards of civil officials!]

At that very moment, an extremely cold and gloomy profile picture with a cultivation icon slowly popped up in the group chat.

[Zhu Houcong: Cousin Houzhao is right! I saw through it the very first day I arrived in the capital! My entire life of cultivating immortality and refining elixirs was just to find peace and quiet and to forcibly balance the power between civil officials and eunuchs! That Renyin Palace Coup that almost strangled me wasn't just the work of a few palace maids. It was someone in the court trying to use the palace maids to carry out a regicide!]

The era of the Jiajing reign of the Ming Dynasty. The Western Garden Abode.

Zhu Houcong, who was meditating, suddenly opened his eyes, a ravenous glint flashing in them. He stared at the chat history on the screen, a cruel, savage smile twisting his lips. "Those who truly understand me are my descendants!"

But could you please stop tying it around the neck? It's so annoying!

The group chat was going faster and faster, and the final collapse of the Ming Dynasty exploded one after another on this small screen like an avalanche!

[Zhu Zaiji: Your Majesty, my reign has been short, so I have little to say. But what I see most clearly is that in the court, civil officials, eunuchs, and imperial relatives are tearing each other apart, all sucking the blood of the Ming Dynasty like leeches!]

[Zhu Yijun: I haven't held court for thirty years because I've seen through these disgusting bastards! The civil official clique forms factions for personal gain, constantly criticizing the emperor to gain fame, while secretly embezzling military funds! Liaodong has long been sold off by them! Nurhaci, that wild boar, was able to rise to power precisely because someone in the court deliberately nurtured a tiger to threaten their own interests!]

[Zhu Changluo (on the verge of tears): I've only been alive for a month! The Red Pill Case, the Clubbing Case, the Palace Relocation Case—they're all conspiracies against me! Some people don't want me to secure my throne, and they don't want the Crown Prince to succeed me smoothly; they're deliberately stirring up trouble in the court!]

Just then, the Carpenter Emperor's avatar flashed and uttered a sentence that sent chills down the spines of the entire internet.

[Zhu Youxiao: I spend my days doing carpentry, just to avoid getting involved in the messy affairs of the previous dynasty! The power struggles between Wei Zhongxian and the civil officials were all orchestrated by me behind the scenes. Yet those people didn't even spare me! In the end, they actually claimed I died from "drowning and shock"! The same way my Emperor Wuzong died! Do you think such a coincidence is possible?!]

boom!

On the live stream's chat, countless comments were spamming "Easily soluble in water, version 2.0." The same disobedient emperor, the same relentless struggle against civil officials, the same sudden death from illness after falling into the water. This is practically the ancestral recipe of the Ming Dynasty's civil service!

The final blow came from the man who hanged himself on the coal hill.

[Zhu Youjian (faced with blood and tears): I was diligent and conscientious, abstinent from women, and indifferent to pleasure! Yet I still hanged myself on Coal Hill! Every civil official spouts righteousness and morality, but in reality, they are all traitors seeking personal gain! Li Zicheng was able to enter Beijing because someone inside opened the city gates! The Manchus were able to enter the pass not only because Wu Sangui surrendered, but also because of traitors within the court who provided assistance!]

The Forbidden City, during the Chongzhen reign of the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Youjian, dressed in his dragon robe, looked at the sky, then at the Donglin Party officials outside the hall who were preparing to attend court. He felt a wave of nausea wash over him, and wanted to vomit. He gritted his teeth, drew his sword from the side, and cleaved a deep gash in the imperial desk.

The chat history on the screen fell into utter silence at that moment.

A few seconds later, the group owner, whose profile picture was of Zhu Yuanzhang, let out a final, extremely violent roar!

[Zhu Yuanzhang: Enough! Enough!!!]

[Zhu Yuanzhang: So my descendants are either assassinated by members of the imperial family, murdered by civil officials, or driven to their deaths by internal and external troubles! Biao'er died young, Wen'er disappeared, Houzhao drowned, Youxiao died suddenly, Youjian brought about the downfall of the country...]

[Zhu Yuanzhang: It's all a conspiracy! It's all a scheme! I should have eradicated these hidden dangers wielding the sages' books from the very beginning, and exterminated them all!]

[Zhu Di: Father, it's too late to say this now. I strongly suspect that since the Jingnan Rebellion, an unseen force has been gradually eroding the foundation of our Ming Dynasty. The infighting among the imperial family, the chaos of civil officials, the monopolization of power by eunuchs, the constant border troubles… all of this is the work of these people over the past few centuries.]

[Zhu Yunwen (in a low voice): Perhaps... I never actually escaped the palace back then. Perhaps... that fire was a trap set by the civil officials of Jiangnan from the very beginning.]

The entire chat box of the Ming Dynasty Imperial Clan Court was completely blocked by a red pinned group announcement from Zhu Yuanzhang.

[Zhu Yuanzhang: @All members, from this day forward, this group will only discuss conspiracies, not kinship! Investigate! Find out who is secretly destroying my Great Ming Dynasty, and I will make sure they are reduced to ashes!!!]

"Snapped!"

Zhu Dijun slammed his laptop shut, and the group chat interface shattered on the big screen.

But the expression on his face showed no sign of relaxation; instead, it exuded a coldness that could freeze one's very bones.

"Family members, although this is just a conspiracy theory joke written by a fan, don't you think the logic behind it is so airtight it's chilling?"

Zhu Dijun walked back to the live broadcast table, his hands supporting him on the tabletop, his body like a fully drawn bow.

"For over two hundred years! The civil service has been like an overwhelming spider web, tightly binding imperial power. Disobedient emperors either drowned, died suddenly, or were branded as licentious. Obedient emperors were simply enshrined on altars as clay idols!"