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Part One: Penghu Storm Chapter 519: Royal Family

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    Ding Yunyi was unstoppable in Japan, but Emperor Chongzhen, who was far away in the capital, did not know these things at all, and he was still distressed by his mess.

    Chongzhen believed that the source of all problems comes from two words - silver!

    After ordering Li Guorui to donate 200,000 taels of silver, Chongzhen waited for Li Guorui to surrender to him. On the other hand, he ordered the eunuch Cao Huachun of Dongchang and Wu Mengming, the envoy of Jinyi Guards, to send people to inquire about the opinions of the people in the capital on this matter.  Any discussion can be reported to the palace at any time.  Due to "terrible weather changes" and severe disasters in various places, Chongzhen planned to fast and practice provinces two days ago. However, after much deliberation, he had no idea how to raise money, so he could not leave it alone and live a quiet life of fasting.  Now because of Li Guorui's problem, he was deeply afraid of his ancestor's wrath and felt very depressed, so he had to make up his mind to repair the province, hoping to move God.  So he began to eat vegetarian food from last night, took a bath all over his body, and was exempted from going to court this morning. He also ordered an imperial eunuch to inform the cabinet and all civil and military officials: From today on, he will go to the provincial residence to meditate and meditate for three days, unless  If there are urgent military and national affairs, no reports are allowed.  After giving the instructions, he hurriedly changed into pure blue silk clothes under the service of the maids. He first went to the Fengxian Hall to offer incense and pray to the gods of his ancestors, and then to the Fengxian Farewell Hall.  The side hall.  He prayed to the god of his mother, the Queen Mother Xiaochun, and then took a chariot to the provincial residence.

    The Shengke residence is located behind the Wenhua Hall. The house is built with timber and is three feet above the ground. It is transparent and suspended on all sides, symbolizing isolation from the world.  During the Tianqi Dynasty, the provincial residence had never been used. The railings and wooden steps were covered with dust, spider webs were hung in front of the eaves and on the windows, and the wooden floor was covered with bat guano.  The corridor in front of the house is full of weeds.  When Chongzhen ascended to the throne, it was reused and kept clean.  Today he walked into the provincial residence and kowtowed to the Jade Emperor God. After sitting down, he originally wanted to close his eyes and meditate, and reflect on his faults to the gods, but unexpectedly his heart was so confused.  Sometimes I am thinking about this problem, sometimes I am thinking about that problem.

    At noon, Chongzhen ate the simplest vegetarian meal.  Although the eunuchs in the imperial dining room have a complete set of experiences passed down from their ancestors.  Keep it secret, cook some vegetarian ingredients such as mushrooms, mushrooms, young bamboo shoots, hericium, tofu, gluten, radish and cabbage with chicken soup, duck soup, high-quality soy sauce and precious spices.  It tastes extremely delicious and contains meat, but because Chongzhen was depressed, eating it felt like chewing dirt.  He moved his chopsticks casually and stopped eating. He only drank half of the bowl of rock sugar and white fungus soup.  The eunuch carefully removed the vegetarian meal and put a cup of tea on a plate.  Because it was during the fasting period, the tea cups used could not be painted, but were used as tributes from the kiln, which were purely vegetarian.  It is as white as jade, better than Ding kiln in the Northern Song Dynasty.  Chongzhen took a sip of tea and stared blankly at the teacup.  Brown color is bright yellow and light green, with a vague and non-existent light smoke floating on it.  The light smoke slowly dispersed, and the repulsive phantom of Li Guorui and the remains of Queen Mother Xiaoding sitting on the lotus throne appeared from inside.  His heart moved.  With a blink of an eye, the illusion disappeared immediately.

    He cannot care about the issue of military pay, especially the issue of Li Guorui, and it is impossible for him to quietly reflect on his own mistakes.  The more he thought about these things, the more he could not sit down in Jiku, so he decided to change the three days of fasting to one day.  And on this day, I can't wait for the red sun to set in the west immediately, and quickly return to Qianqing Palace to deal with important matters.

    Because he often lacked sleep, he couldn't help but fall asleep in his chair.  He had some strange dreams, all related to military pay.  Later, I dreamed that thousands of officers and soldiers surrounded Yang Sichang's camp, clamoring for pay.  He saw Yang Sichang walking out in a hurry, comforting him in every possible way, and the noise from the officers and soldiers became even fiercer. It was about to lead to a catastrophe. Suddenly, Yang Sichang rushed into the palace, kowtowed to the ground in front of him, and begged to quickly raise military pay. The noise seemed to have rushed into the imperial city.  , approaching outside the Forbidden City.  He woke up with a start, breaking out in a cold sweat.  He looked at the sun through the window, but at the end of the day, he felt that the day was so long, and this day was actually very long!

    A eunuch at the side brought half a basin of warm water in a silver basin and knelt in front of him. Another eunuch covered his legs with a piece of plain satin, and then rolled up his sleeves for Chongzhen.  Things like this are usually attended by the palace maids. Today, due to fasting and meditation, the palace ladies cannot come with them, so the eunuchs have to do it all.  Although these eunuchs were all young men of seventeen or eighteen years old, with good looks, gorgeous clothes, and light movements, Chongzhen could not help but feel that they were clumsy and could not serve him satisfactorily.  He had no choice but to lean down and wash his face, sighing softly.  No one knows whether he sighed because the eunuchs were not serving him satisfactorily, or whether he was sighing because the state affairs were not going as planned.  After the silver basin and the plain satin covering the legs were taken away, another young eunuch came over, knelt down in front of him, and raised a black lacquer tray made by the Orchard Factory during the Yongle period with mother-of-pearl and plum blossoms embedded in it.  Chongzhen took the tea cup off the tray, rinsed his mouth, and put it back on the tray.  He turned back to the other eunuch and asked:

    "Where is Wang Dehua?"

    "Your Majesty, Wang Dehua just came to the guard room in front of the Wenhua Hall to wait for questioning. Because the Emperor is in trouble, he doesn't dare to come rashly, and the servants don't dare to start the memorial either."

    ?This mysterious cabin was only for the emperor to repair and study, and could not discuss state affairs.  Chongzhen thought for a while and decided to make an exception and leave for a while while repairing the province. He went to the Wenhua Hall to ask Wang Dehua, and then came back to continue repairing the province.  He kowtowed three times to the Lord of the Jade Emperor and walked out of the wooden house.

    As soon as Chongzhen arrived at the back hall of Wenhua, he sat on the dragon chair and ordered a young man to call Wang Dehua to him and asked anxiously:

    "After delivering the order for the second time yesterday, has Li Guorui responded?"

    Wang Dehua bowed and replied: "I'm going to start playing for the emperor, but Li Guorui has not responded yet."

    "Damn it! What's going on at his house?"

    "After lunch, Cao Huachun came into the palace. Knowing that the emperor was repairing the province, he did not dare to surprise him, so he left the palace again. According to Huachun's words to the slaves: Since the first edict was delivered the day before yesterday, although Li Guorui himself was waiting in the palace,  He didn't dare to show his face, but he kept secretly discussing with his close followers and confidants, and also sent people to secretly find several royal relatives and friends who were close friends to discuss ways. "

    "What method should we discuss?"

    "It's nothing more than asking everyone to plead with the Emperor. But it's not clear how the emperor's relatives and ancestors will go to the palace to plead. Anyway, it's just to complain to the Emperor on his behalf, and everyone also complains for themselves."

    "Humph. Who am I complaining to? Which royal relatives have the closest ties to the Li family?"

    Wang Dehua knew that the person who had the closest relationship with the Li family was the queen's father, Zhou Kui, but he would never tell him.  He was not afraid of the queen, who had never been involved in government affairs, nor how Zhou Kui would retaliate against him in the future, but he was afraid that the emperor himself would change his mind.  If he sided with the emperor wholeheartedly on this important matter, he would be in trouble if the emperor changed his mind and regretted it in the future.  So he replied in general terms:

    "Li Guorui is the great-nephew of the Jiulian Empress. The hereditary marquis has the deepest foundation and the highest title among the Qi Wans today. All royal relatives have close contacts with the Li family, not just one family or two."

    Chongzhen asked again: "Do the people in the capital know about this?"

    "My lord, there is no airtight wall in the world. The people in the capital have already spread the word."

    "What do the subjects say?"

    "According to what Cao Huachun told the slave, the people who investigated the matter in Dongchang and Jinyiwei Yamen heard people all over the city talking about it, praising His Majesty for being wise and holy. This is an extremely good thing. Everyone said that the country has been in difficulty in recent years.  , the subjects tried their best to provide food and pay, and took away a lot of worries for the emperor. They, the relatives of the emperor who have been deeply favored by the country, should have repaid the favor. Now the emperor is wise and decisive, and it is reasonable and reasonable. "

    "What else is there to discuss?"

    Wang Dehua knew that there were still various discussions among the emperor's relatives, but he did not dare to let Chongzhen know about it and replied that there were no other discussions.  Chongzhen asked him to withdraw, and ordered an eunuch to go to the cabinet to summon Xue Guoguan.  The cabinet is on the left side of the Meridian Gate, not far from the south of Wenhua Hall.  So Xue Guoguan was quickly called.  Chongzhen looked at the chief minister kneeling on the ground and asked:

    "Yesterday, I gave Li Guorui two strict orders to pay for the country and set an example for his subjects. It seems that Li Guorui intends to rely on favor and resist, which is against my will. According to Mr., what will be done in the next step? Among the gentry in the court, there are  What do you think?"

    In this case, Xue Guoguan was on the side of the ruling Jin gentry.  In the past two or three days, he had come into contact with many colleagues in the DPRK and China.  Regardless of whether they were from the south or the north, although they usually had different interests and had deep opinions, they all sympathized with the emperor's difficulties in this matter and agreed to operate on Qi Wan.  They hoped that the emperor could raise millions of silver from Qi Wan and his ministers to pay for the army, so that the army to suppress thieves could be carried out smoothly without asking them for money; if the emperor's relatives and ministers resisted vigorously, the emperor's army would be destroyed.  This move failed, and the emperor could no longer rely on them for help.  Xue Guoguan naturally refused to tell Chongzhen the thoughts of the Jin gentry in the court, so he raised his head and said:

    "All the gentry in the court know that the current treasury is in ruins, and the emperor's move is out of necessity. However, it is not convenient for foreign ministers to talk about Qi Wan, so they avoid talking about it in the court. In my opinion, this shot must be fired, and the next step is to  The chess is easy to move. I hope your Majesty will act decisively and don¡¯t need to ask more questions.¡±

    Chongzhen nodded, asked two other things, and asked Xue Guoguan to leave.  Now that he knew that the people in the capital heartily supported him and praised his wisdom, he became more determined: If Li Guorui dared to resist, he would be severely punished.  He was worried that some of the more respectable royal relatives would come out to intercede on behalf of the Li family and ruin his plan to donate money.  The more he thought about it, the more uneasy he became, and he was not in the mood to go back to the wooden house to continue sitting alone to study, so he walked out of the Wenhua Gate in a depressed manner, shook his sleeves, and took the chariot back to the Qianqing Palace.

    He had just changed his clothes and was sitting in front of the imperial cabinet in the East Nuan Pavilion of the Qianqing Palace. Wang Dehua brought a memorial from Li Guorui and a stack of other documents to him.  He originally thought that after the second edict, even though Li Guorui was secretly doing something, he could not help but feel panic.?I apologize.  As long as Li Guorui apologized and was willing to spend 100,000 taels of silver as an initiative, he would not only stop looking into it, but also plan to pass on the edict to commend him.  Unexpectedly, Li Guorui not only complained to him in the secret book, but also used it to confront Empress Dowager Xiaoding, asking him to relax the time limit for Xiaoding's sake so that he could borrow 30,000 taels of silver from various relatives to serve the country.  .  After reading this secret memorial, Chongzhen asked Wang Dehua:

    "Is this just here?"

    "Yes, Your Majesty."

    "Have you seen it?"

    "My slave has seen it."

    Chongzhen stamped his foot: "Hmph, thirty thousand taels, he can actually talk about it!"

    "Yes, it's a good thing he can say it."

    "I want to see if he can twist his arm over his thigh!"

    This unpleasant incident made Chongzhen unable to even eat dinner.  The good thing is that today, due to fasting, he only had a dozen or so vegetarian dishes for dinner. He didn't have to play music as usual during the meal, and his ears were very quiet, so he could barely eat a little.  Just after dinner, the eunuch serving nearby reported that Xin Yuehou Liu Wenbing and several royal relatives had come to the palace to seek an audience, and were now awaiting orders at Donghua Gate.  Chongzhen thought that they must have come to plead for Li Guorui and asked:

    "Which other royal relatives are coming with you?"

    "There is also the Prince Consort Gong Yonggu, the old Prince Consort Zhang Guoji, and the old Prince Consort Ran Xingyi."

    Chongzhen thought, but Zhou Kui, the queen's father, knew better and did not enter the palace with them.  He originally didn't plan to see them, but he thought that Zhang Guoji and Ran Xingrang were both senior royal relatives and rarely entered the palace, so he might as well listen to what they had to say.  So he pondered for a moment and then ordered:

    "Tell them to wait at Wenhua Hall!"

    The incident of Marquis Wu Qing greatly shocked the Qiwan people in Beijing. They were panicked and aggrieved.  Families of meritorious officials with noble titles, the so-called "Xunjiu", also became afraid.  They understood that the emperor asked Qi Wan for help first, and then it was their turn.  Furthermore, Qi Wan and Xun Jiu were often related, and when the family was in trouble, all directions were involved.  Therefore, the princes, marquises, and princes in the capital all expressed sympathy for Qi Wan and secretly supported him, hoping that the Wuqing Marquis Mansion would use various methods to resist to the end.  After intense secret discussions and several secret discussions, the royal relatives recommended four people to enter the palace to intercede on behalf of the Li family.  Among them, the tallest person in the class is Ran Xingrang, the son-in-law and consort of Emperor Wanli, who is over sixty years old and has a silver beard and hair.  The second and older one is Queen Yi'an, Queen Zhang of Tianqi, Chongzhen's sister-in-law.  His father, Taikang Bo Zhang Guoji.  He has always been cautious, not asking about foreign affairs and not daring to make too many friends.  This time, because of the sadness of the death of a rabbit and the fox, and the pleading of Li Guorui's family, and Zhou Kui's efforts to encourage him, he had to go against his usual habits and bite the bullet and enter the palace.  Everyone knew that Chongzhen had a bad temper and was very suspicious, so when the four of them were waiting in the Wenhua Hall, they were anxious and nervous.

    Chongzhen came to the back hall of Wenhua and sat on the throne.  The four royal relatives first knelt on the Yong Road of Wenhua Gate to receive him, and then came to the back hall of Wenhua to kneel down and kowtow three times to the emperor.  Chongzhen sat down and asked them with a straight face why they came to the palace.  Before they entered the palace, they expected the old consort Ran Xing to speak first, but when he saw the emperor's serious expression, he did not dare to say anything for the time being.  Xinlehou Liu Wenbing was Chongzhen's uncle's cousin. He was originally a person who dared to speak up, but his deceased sister was Li Guorui's daughter-in-law. Because of this kind of relationship, it was inconvenient for him to speak first.  Commander-in-law Gong Yonggu was Chongzhen's brother-in-law. He was the youngest among them, only twenty-five years old. He had a straightforward temperament and was very favored by Chongzhen.  Seeing everyone looking at each other and not daring to speak, he couldn't help but stand up and play:

    "I came to the palace for no other reason than to ask Your Majesty, for the sake of Empress Dowager Xiaoding, to treat Li Guorui"

    Chongzhen cut him off and said, "I have my own opinion on Li Guorui's matter, so you don't need to say more." Registered members of Piaotian Literature recommend this work
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