Spoiler History: Starting from the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 803: Fengtian Jingnan
[In fact, if you, Old Zhu, had just said casually that Lan Yu was planning a rebellion, most people would have believed it.

After all, logically speaking, once Zhu Biao died, the only two who could be appointed as crown princes were Zhu Yunwen and Zhu Yunhuan. One was fifteen and the other was sixteen. If they fell into Lan Yu's hands, they would be crushed and twisted at will.

And according to Zhuge Liang's style of striking first, logically speaking, Lan Yu had been forced into a corner and there was indeed a possibility that he would make a desperate attempt.

But this possibility is definitely not as recorded in the "Records of Traitors" that old scholars, kiln operators, fishermen, rice sellers, etc. were summoned to sit in a room together to plan something big.

This method of conviction is, to put it bluntly, a bit insulting to one’s intelligence. 】

For Zhu Yuanzhang, the keen eye honed from handling memorials every day for a year was put to good use.

Although the Guo Huan case had been on Zhu Yuanzhang's mind before, for him this was a case that had to be handled and investigated, so he didn't need to worry about it for the time being.

Although he frowned at Lan Yu's arrogance and the destruction of the pass, he thought that since these things had not happened yet, it would be okay to let it go for the time being.

But after comparing the two, Zhu Yuanzhang felt more and more that he should cherish the Xu Da brothers.

What's the point of just being able to fight? The most important thing is to be a role model for military officials and have the demeanor of a famous general. From this point of view, even though Lan Yu had the merit of destroying the remnants of the Yuan Dynasty, in Zhu Yuanzhang's heart he was still not as good as Xu Da.

And if Brother Chang Yuchun hadn't met with misfortune...

Shaking his head to let go of the irrelevant sentimentality, Zhu Yuanzhang treated the joke of "the emperor wielding the golden hoe and the empress of the East Palace making pancakes" as if it did not exist at all.

We will definitely not compile any "Record of Traitors" as this matter is completely false!

Ignoring all the other things, Zhu Yuanzhang was the first to express his disapproval after becoming the most prominent crown prince:

"At that time, the hero should be crowned, so why can't he be the crown prince?"

Although he said so, Zhu Biao seemed to be able to hear a sense of weakness in his father's words.

The one who reacted faster than Zhu Biao was Empress Ma, but she didn't know what to say for a moment. She could only hold her husband's hands tightly and lean her head towards that side.

She heard her husband take a few quick breaths that seemed to be squeezing the air out of his chest, then he let out a long sigh, and said to his eldest son, who seemed a little at a loss, with a hint of regret:

"Or maybe it's like what the younger generation said, we killed too many people and brought disaster upon you, causing both father and son to suffer the pain of losing a son."

Zhu Biao felt his throat tighten a little. It was very rare to see his father so weak, but every time he saw it he felt like his heart was being cut by a knife.

"father……"

After calling out once, Zhu Biao turned his head and called out softly again:
"Yongying."

Although this son had a mighty name, he was born with a quiet and taciturn character. He did not inherit any of the bravery of his father and King Kaiping. Instead, he was quite fond of reading and did not talk about military affairs.

Zhu Biao once comforted himself by saying that his father ruled the country with fierceness, and he would need to be lenient with people when he came to power.

Under such circumstances of combining leniency and severity, when Xiongying gets involved in government affairs, he will be able to practice benevolence and benefit the people, emulating the example of Emperor Wen and Emperor Jing.

In this situation, there is no need to know too much about martial arts, and it doesn't matter even if you are a little weak. But now it seems that it is this slight leniency that has prevented Xiongying from strengthening his body?
Zhu Biao didn't know, but he knew what to do at this moment, so he stretched out his hand to his seven-year-old son:

"Don't be afraid or worried, Dad is here."

Zhu Xiongying looked at his uncles' puzzled but somewhat regretful expressions, and his grandfather's slightly sad face, and carefully approached and hugged his father around the waist.

Judging from the gradually tightening force, this son seemed to have understood something, at least... understood some of the misfortunes that had happened to him. But it was also good this way. Zhu Biao tried hard to shake off the haze in his chest, lowered his head and showed a smile:
"Xiongying, how about you practice boxing with daddy starting tomorrow?"

Seeing the little head nodded, Zhu Biao's smile became a lot more relaxed. Never mind, just take it one step at a time.

However, this made Zhu Bo cheer:
"Brother, I also want to practice martial arts with you and keep fit. What do you think?"

Zhu Biao glanced at his twelfth brother, who was about the same age as his son. He then thought about how many younger brothers they had that were yet to be born, as indicated on the screen before. Then he pondered the age of his younger brother. He couldn't help but admire his father's lingering vigor like the fourth brother.

But why hasn't the fourth brother come back yet? Is he full?

As if he understood his son's glance, Zhu Yuanzhang couldn't help but cough. Thinking about how he and Guangmu had laughed at Emperor Gaozu of Tang being raised as a stud, he wanted to hold his forehead with his hand.

However, these things eventually successfully dispersed the unpleasant atmosphere and made Zhu Yuanzhang finally start to think about other things.

Which of Biao'er's two sons would he appoint? He had the answer in his mind, so would he worry about the young ruler and the country being suspicious? Perhaps this was the beginning of a major case, no wonder there was a deep affection between uncle and nephew.

Ming Tianzi was silent and felt that the fog seemed to have been cleared a little, but there seemed to be more things that were difficult to explain.

Then he raised his head in silence.

[He did not die because of his arrogance, nor did he die because of treason. It is no wonder that the Lan Yu case is closely related to Zhu Biao's death.

As for why the work is so rough, it is probably related to age.

When dealing with Hu Weiyong, Zhu was still in his prime, so he was able to kill people with a soft knife and plan every step, but in the end his true intentions were revealed.

By the time of the Lan Yu case, Zhu Yuanzhang had already run out of time, so he acted quickly and ruthlessly, emphasizing the importance of cutting the Gordian knot.

Some even speculated that "Record of Traitors" itself was a manifestation of Zhu Yuanzhang's Alzheimer's disease. However, this is pure nonsense. After all, it was the 30th year of Hongwu when Zhu Yuanzhang was handling the North and South List cases, but there was no sign of dementia at all.

All I can say is that this thing is probably similar to the "History of Yuan Dynasty". It was edited quickly, hastily and roughly. Old Zhu was only responsible for checking it, but unfortunately his level of checking has never been very good, and eventually he produced something like this.

But this is going too far. In fact, the Hu-Lan case can be viewed as a whole. In this major case that lasted for half of the Hongwu period, Zhu Yuanzhang displayed political means that far exceeded his military talents, and he made it quite clear that killing was not an end but a means.

Starting from the Hu Weiyong case, Zhu Yuanzhang used this extremely simple but effective method of winning over one faction, stabilizing one faction, and killing one faction over and over again, and eventually completed the complete annihilation of the entire noble group of the Ming Dynasty.

In the first stage, he used the noble group as a weapon to break the Secretariat and the Grand Marshal's Office, and also took with him the nobles who had surrendered, such as Kang, Zhu, and Hu, to ensure the interests of the nobles in the right side of the Huai River. Naturally, no one opposed it, so it was natural to confer titles on a group of new nobles, which made all parties very satisfied.

In the second stage, the newly emerged nobles were used as a weapon to clean up the corrupt old party in Huaixi. In the case of Li Shanchang, as many as twenty-two nobles were implicated in the name of the Hu case, but the twenty nobles who were conferred titles after the third year of Hongwu were basically intact, which can be found in the history books.

Under normal circumstances, these nobles who had been cultivated and had gone through a period of adjustment with Zhu Biao would become the best team, but with Zhu Biao's sudden death, these plans had to be changed, and Zhu entered the third stage.

The seventeen noble families involved in the Lan Yu case were all new nobles after the third year of Hongwu. They were all caught in one fell swoop. Although this weakened the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang obviously did not think there was any problem as the foreign threat had been eliminated.

But Zhu Yuanzhang probably didn't expect that even with all his efforts, Zhu Yunwen would still fail miserably. He was both inexperienced and playful.

However, from another perspective, if it were not for Zhu Di's three-stage campaign of suppression, it would be hard to say whether Zhu Di could have successfully evolved into the Yongle Emperor through the Fengtian Jingnan Rebellion.

After all, as long as Lan Yu was alive, it would be unclear whether Zhu Di dared or could overturn the table. But from another perspective, it was obviously impossible for Lan Yu to obey Zhu Yunwen's orders under such circumstances - even if Zhu Yunwen was replaced by Zhu Yunhuan, it would be the same.

This assumption makes it more certain that from the moment Zhu Biao died, the outbreak of the Lan Yu case was only a matter of time.

(End of this chapter)