Before hanging himself, Chongzhen lifted the table

Chapter 226 Activating Internal Response
  As for Yan Yingyuan, after he completed the reorganization of the Fujian Navy, he returned to the Nanjing Navy in accordance with the original requirements of the decree and took his two years of naval experience in Fujian with him.

At this point, the Ming Dynasty had a total of Dongjiang Navy, Nanjing Navy and four naval divisions reorganized from the Fujian Navy. There were six regular naval divisions in total, with a total of more than [-] large and small warships, and two naval officers and men. There are more than [-] people.

Among them, the four naval divisions reorganized by the Fujian Navy have basically taken shape. Although new ships join the ranks every year, they are only four or five.

The Nanjing Navy and the Dongjiang Navy are still undergoing rapid expansion. Due to the strong support of the imperial court, more than [-] warships are added each year.

In addition to the memorials about the navy, Emperor Chongzhen also had memorials sent from the capital, mainly reporting a few things.

The first thing is the competition in various industries that Emperor Chongzhen asked when he left Beijing last year. The results came out at the end of last year.

Among them, there are two that attract the most attention. One is a picture of medicine. Wu Youxing, who was nowhere to be found before Emperor Chongzhen, appears. Anyway, I don’t know if he is a figure mentioned by the emperor, so he won the first prize. The memorial from the capital also specifically mentioned that Emperor Chongzhen was indeed a god in predicting events, and Wu Youxing's understanding of the plague was truly unique.

Another thing that attracts attention is that the three fathers and sons of the Song family in Jiangxi have won the top three in many industries. This caused a sensation in the capital and even caused some troubles.

However, the prince Zhu Cixi explained in the memorial that the three father and sons of the Song family did indeed achieve the best results in the competition. An additional palace examination was even held specifically for the three of them. Hundreds of civil and military officials participated in asking questions. Most of the questions, these three fathers and sons were able to do it. Answer it.

Regarding this matter, Zhu Cixi also concluded that these three father and sons were indeed very knowledgeable, but they were the top three in many industries at the same time, which was not good for the court. Therefore, measures will be promulgated to prevent re-examination in the next year.

Emperor Chongzhen was not surprised at all when he saw the name of Song Yingxing among the three fathers and sons of the Song family. "Tiangong Kaiwu" can be regarded as an encyclopedia. Everyone in every industry knows something about it, so there is nothing to make a fuss about.

Compared with people of this era, those who can read and write are all studying the Four Books and Five Classics. Even if they are just scratching their heads, they are definitely not as knowledgeable as these three fathers and sons; and those who are more proficient than these three fathers and sons are basically illiterate and cannot do anything. Take this competition.

Therefore, it is not surprising that the three Song fathers and sons are the top three in many industries!
  In response to this matter, Emperor Chongzhen replied that those who can get the top three based on their ability, why should there be restrictions? I just want to show others that people who are secretly learning have this ability. For the imperial court, there will be no overlap in the titles given. As for the talents needed, as far as the talents are concerned at the beginning, it is actually not very promising.

In addition, Emperor Chongzhen directly appointed Song Yingxing as the prince's lecturer and asked him to teach Zhu Cixiang "Tiangong Kaiwu" to increase his knowledge as a king. In addition, his two sons were also appointed as doctors in the Ministry of Industry and the Ministry of War respectively, responsible for summarizing and recording the experience of the Ministry of Industry's creations and the Ministry of War's ordnance, and forming special book records.

That Wu Youxing, Emperor Chongzhen also made him an official and worked in Taiyuan Hospital, but he was allowed to practice medicine all over the world and continue to travel. It is equivalent to saying that he can receive a salary and have an official status, which will make it easier for him to travel around the world.

The top three in other industries, based on their written examination results, although they had no reputation in later generations, Emperor Chongzhen mostly granted them official titles.

Of course, this official title is still different from an official with a normal imperial examination background. Officials who came from the normal imperial examination usually served as county magistrates in various states and counties around the world, and were from their parents' official positions; but the top three who came out of this industry competition and were awarded the title by Emperor Chongzhen were basically technical officers. They did not care about people and only dealt with technology.

In addition to this matter, the second thing mentioned in the memorial from the capital is the order sent back by Emperor Chongzhen after hearing the news about the industry competition on the way, asking the capital to discuss how to enable more people to study. The literacy thing.

Perhaps through this industry competition, the capital also realized that most people were illiterate, so after their discussion, especially in terms of the emperor's request for easy learning, they also achieved results.

Revitalizing the elementary school system stipulated during the Emperor Taizu's time requires that children of the appropriate age must attend school, otherwise local officials will be blamed for a lack of education.

In terms of teaching, the fanqie method is promoted so that school children can recognize more words.

Regarding this, to be honest, Emperor Chongzhen was disappointed because there was nothing new at all.

In ancient China, people usually learned Chinese characters by following the teacher's pronunciation. According to different histories, five phonetic notation methods were developed in Chinese history, namely Ru Kuang, Du Ruo, Zhi Yin, New Four Tones, and Fan Qie method.

No matter which method is used, it actually requires a certain amount of literacy foundation. The most accurate is the fanqie method, but it also has shortcomings, and it is not possible to find suitable fanqie for all characters.

In the original history, the Fanqie method was abandoned until the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, when the Pinyin plan truly matured.

Needless to say, in his reply on this matter, Emperor Chongzhen gave the idea of ​​simplifying Chinese characters to facilitate writing and literacy, as well as the pinyin scheme.

In fact, this pinyin did not come out of thin air, and the ancients could not understand it. On the contrary, shadows can be found in the five main phonetic notation methods known by the ancients. As long as he puts forward this concept, I believe that those in the court will know how to come up with a pinyin plan suitable for this era.

After answering these memorials, Emperor Chongzhen thought for a while and gave each of Song Yingxing's two sons a test question.

I told the Ministry of War how to draw rifling on the barrel and barrel of a gun, and explained the meaning of rifling.

The person who gave it to the Ministry of Industry directly told him about the principles of steam engines and several of the most critical links, such as condensers, pressure reducing valves, etc., to see how he built the Ming Dynasty, or the world's first steam engine. .

The reason why it was not given to Song Yingxing and asked to take the lead was because Song Yingxing was already old and if he was asked to be the leader, he would lose energy.

If it is given to his son, is it possible that if he knew something, he would not give his son pointers?
  After completing these things, Emperor Chongzhen led the army to Guangxi to quell the rebellion.

………………

In early March of the [-]st year of Chongzhen, the Ming army invaded the territory of Dongwu, and it was overwhelming. There was no possibility of stopping the Ming army in the northern area of ​​Dongwu.

The largest city of Ava also failed to stop the Ming army's offensive and was captured in just two days.

This Ava city was captured by the Yunnan local army led by Liu Ting during the Wanli period, but it was not occupied at that time, and Liu Ting was quickly transferred to Liaodong to participate in the campaign against Jianlu, and ended up dying in Liaodong.

This time, the Ming army that invaded Dongwu was actually holding their breath.

This anger is only partly due to the fact that King Talong of Dongwu actually participated in the rebellion of the Heavenly Kingdom. Shouldn't this be taught a lesson?
  The bigger reason was that in the previously anticipated Battle of Yunnan and Guizhou, there should have been a large number of people who had made military exploits and could be made marquises and generals. Unexpectedly, the thunder was loud, and the rebels had assembled two to three hundred thousand troops. What about the raindrops? Not at all, it was actually put down by the current emperor alone!

For the soldiers of the Ming army, they absolutely could not complain that the emperor was too powerful, leaving them with no military exploits to achieve. Now that the emperor said that he wanted to defeat Dongwu, they naturally revealed all their previously suppressed thoughts of making meritorious deeds. Ava City, the largest city in the north of Dongwu and the capital of several dynasties in Dongwu, was attacked by Zeng Ying and Li Dingguo, but neither side could stop them.

The occupation of Ava City marked the Ming army's control of the north of Dongwu. This is the richest place in Dongwu, and most of the food is concentrated here.

Du Yinxi stationed his central army in Ava City, and sent troops to continue attacking the remnants of the Toungoo dynasty in the south.

Although the Toungoo Dynasty sent wave after wave of messengers to demand peace, they were all rejected by Du Yinxi. At the same time, he also issued a notice that the price for daring to covet and invade the Ming Dynasty would be the destruction of the country. Those in the surrounding areas who dare to accept the enemies of the Ming Dynasty will also be severely punished by the Ming Dynasty.

All of a sudden, the surrounding small countries were in trembling fear.

At this time, the Toungoo Dynasty, under the recuperation and recuperation of King Long, was very powerful. But in their eyes, the powerful Toungoo Dynasty was actually vulnerable to the attack of the Ming Dynasty, and the legendary Ming Emperor was like a god. For those who have not personally led the army, the strength of the Ming Kingdom makes them look up to them, fearing that they will be wiped out by the Ming Army if they do not do a good job.

As the remnants of the Toungoo dynasty in the south of Dongwu began to flee, news about the Ming Dynasty also began to spread throughout the West.

Everyone can see that under the thunderous wrath of the Ming Empire, the Toungoo Dynasty will inevitably cease to exist.

………………

In early April of the [-]st year of Chongzhen, Emperor Chongzhen led his troops into Guangxi.

He was not in a hurry to wipe out Zuo Liangyu's troops, but wherever he went, he implemented land reform, redistributed land, resettled surrendered chieftains, etc.

Although his advance was very slow, Zuo Liangyu was under increasing pressure, and he even felt like he couldn't breathe.

"Cough cough cough..."

A violent cough made Zuo Liangyu almost unable to straighten his back.

Zuo Mengeng saw his father like this and did not step forward to do anything. Instead, he continued to ask his father: "Father, please make an idea quickly. The imperial officers and soldiers led by the emperor are already separated from us by just a few steps." It’s a mansion! If he sends a cavalry to raid, he can kill them all in one day!”

Zuo Liangyu ignored his son. After finally calming down under the service of the maid, he looked at his son and said, "What idea are you making?"

When Zuo Mengeng heard this, he frowned. He felt that his father was in a daze for asking such a question, so he quickly replied: "How to deal with the imperial officers and soldiers? What else can it be?"

"Hehe, hehehe..." Zuo Liangyu laughed when he heard it. Then he seemed to have heard a very funny joke and couldn't help but laugh all the time, "...cough cough cough!"

After laughing, he coughed again, which made Zuo Mengeng very dissatisfied.

After Zuo Liangyu finally returned to normal, he looked at his son and said with some dejection: "You said that with the ability of the current emperor, one person defeated Li Zicheng and his more than [-] troops. What should we use to fight him? You If you have any good ideas, why don't you tell me?"

At this point, he saw his son's helpless look, and then continued: "Have you not seen how many chieftains in our army fled after the emperor's reputation spread? The army's morale was slack, let alone dealing with the emperor's army. , it’s not even possible to deal with those local officers and soldiers, what other ideas can you have?”

Of course Zuo Mengeng knew this situation, but he always thought that his father had led troops and fought in wars for so many years. He had never seen anything, so he might be able to do something about it?
  The result still disappointed him, and there was nothing his father could do.

Just as he was about to speak, footsteps suddenly came from outside, and then he heard the personal guard reporting outside: "Your Majesty, Commander-in-Chief Lu Ding wants to see you!"

Zuo Liangyu was a little confused after hearing this. He didn't know what he was doing, so he ordered him to go in.

So, the door opened, Lu Ding stepped into the lobby, and bowed to Zuo Liangyu and his son in a polite manner.

Zuo Liangyu looked at Lu Ding, his special commander-in-chief. He was full of bookishness. Although he was a commander-in-chief, he was not good at fighting. However, he had always been loyal and had not escaped with him until now. It was not easy.

So, he showed a kind face and asked: "What's the point of looking for Gu? But someone under you is bullying you? Gu will definitely stand up for you!"

Lu Ding was a little embarrassed after hearing this, and quickly shook his head in denial, and then said: "Your Highness, the imperial army will soon come over, but our army has not moved. Are we going to have a decisive battle with the imperial army here?"

Having said this, he paused and said: "General Shu Mo will bluntly say that if we want to have a decisive battle with the current emperor, I'm afraid we won't be able to win!"

After hearing this, Zuo Mengeng said angrily: "Who doesn't know? Do you still need to tell me?"

Lu Ding was not angry, but immediately said: "Since you can't win, why not leave?"

Of course Zuo Mengeng thought about this question and immediately answered: "Let's go? Where to go? There are imperial officers and soldiers intercepting us everywhere. It's not like we haven't passed by yet, and we're not blocked here!"

Just as Lu Ding was about to say this, he immediately took over the topic and said, "We can go to Annan! The next door is Annan's territory, just escape there. The general also heard that Annan also sent troops to Yunnan to participate in the Battle of Kunming . Therefore, we and Annan are considered allies. The emperor has already sent troops to attack Dongwu, so it is impossible to pursue Annan again, right? "

When he said this, he was actually a little confused.

Because these words were not what he wanted to say, but a Jinyiwei spy secretly found him, saying that he knew his intention to submit to the imperial court, and asked him to say these words to introduce Zuo Liangyu's army to Annan.

At this time, as soon as Zuo Liangyu heard his words, he woke up from a dream and immediately cheered up and said: "Yes, I have forgotten that the Annan people also sent troops. Although there are only two thousand, at least they have sent troops. Then you are not afraid. Come on, send the order immediately to enter Annan!"

(End of this chapter)