Saving the Ming Dynasty: I can exchange bodies with Chongzhen

Chapter 89 Chongzhen: Depriving them of their right to worship

Haoge's eyes widened, and he suddenly lifted up the messenger, "This... How is this possible?"

"Did you see it wrong?"

The messenger lowered his head and said, "Even if my head falls off, I dare not make a mistake."

Not only Hauge found it hard to believe, but the other Eight Banners nobles who were surrounding him also stood there in a daze, unable to believe the result.

The first time they entered the Pass, there were 20,000 cavalrymen.

The second time he entered the pass, there were 30,000 cavalrymen.

The third entry into the pass involved 50,000 cavalry.

In the first three times, not only did the Qing army achieve its strategic goals, but it also plundered a large amount of supplies and people.

In the field battle with the Ming army, they were a direct crushing defeat.

Compared with previous times, the number of people entering the Pass this time was the largest, a total of 80,000, and they were all elite soldiers from Manchuria and Mongolia. With such a large force, they actually lost?

More than 10,000 cavalry were lost in the first battle. Was it so tragic?
At this time, Huang Taiji stood there motionless, his head buzzing as if he was struck by lightning. He stood there in a daze, and could not hear any sound from far or near.

"A crushing defeat? How could it be a crushing defeat?"

"Father Emperor, your nose is bleeding again." Hauge quickly took out his handkerchief to wipe it for Huang Taiji, but the blood was bleeding so heavily that no matter how hard he tried to cover it, he couldn't stop it.

Huang Taiji raised his head and pointed at the messenger, "Give it to me, give it to me quickly!"

He wants to see the original.
Look at the memorial submitted by Yuetuo.

At this time, Prince Heshuo Su Haoge had already taken the memorial from the messenger and handed it to Huang Taiji.

There are two copies here, one is written by Yuetuo, and the other is a letter of apology presented by Beile Dudu.

Huang Taiji first quickly read Yuetuo's memorial, and then opened another one.

In comparison, Beile Dudu wrote in greater detail, describing how he led 25,000 men to pursue the Ming army, and then encountered the Ming army's artillery bombardment, muskets, and finally cavalry pursuit in the valley.

In the post, he emphasized the advanced artillery and powerful muskets of the Ming Dynasty, and their significance to the Qing army... He talked about how he led the Eight Banners men, who were brave and fearless in fighting, and fought fiercely with the Ming army, but failed to get those artillery back.

Not only that, Yuetuo's younger brother Mazhan also died in this battle.

Huang Taiji looked at the memorial and trembled all over. "Cannon? When did the Ming Dynasty have this kind of cannon?"

At this time, Haoge took the memorial from Huang Taiji and was equally shocked after reading it. "The Ming Dynasty actually had such a thing. How come our people in the capital didn't report any news to us?"

The Manchus fostered countless traitors in the Ming Dynasty, especially in the capital, many of whom even became high-ranking officials of the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, the emperor might not know about any disturbance in the Ming Dynasty, but Huang Taiji definitely knew about it.

But now... the Ming Dynasty has created this national treasure, but no information has been sent back.

"Did the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty kill all those people?" The muscles on Haoge's face twitched. "That's impossible... Even if the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty wanted to kill them, it would be impossible for him to kill them all in a short time."

Huang Taiji swayed a few times, but fortunately Hauge supported him and he did not fall.

The servant beside him brought a stool over and Hauge helped him sit down.

Huang Taiji paused for a moment, his pupils focused again, "Don't let the situation get chaotic. Send a message to Dorgon and Yuetuo, and tell them not to split up their forces for the time being."

"Whoo!"

After the messenger left, Huang Taiji looked at the Jinzhou City in the distance and fell into deep thought, "If the Ming Dynasty had such a weapon, why didn't they equip the Guanning Front?"

"Or are Yue Tuo, Du Du and the others lying?"

Not to mention Hauge, even he had some doubts about Beile Dudu's memorial. The Qing army also had cannons, but he had never heard of or seen the kind of cannons that Dudu described.

But failure is failure, and the most terrifying thing is that you can't figure out the reason for failure.

In recent years, the Qing army's strategy against the Ming Dynasty has been too smooth. Since the Battle of Sarhu, the Qing army has never failed in a field battle against the Ming Dynasty. This also made Huang Taiji more unscrupulous in entering the pass.

This defeat in Tongzhou undoubtedly sounded a wake-up call for Huang Taiji.

……

But at this moment in the capital, the atmosphere was extremely strange.

The victory in Tongzhou was undoubtedly a huge victory for the emperor and the Ming Dynasty.

But for the civil servants and nobles, it was a devastating blow.

This means that their strategy of quoting classics and using ancestral rituals and laws to frame and restrain the emperor has completely failed.

Moreover, with the great victory in Tongzhou, it is conceivable that the power of military generals will inevitably rise, which is a huge threat to the vested interests of the Ming Dynasty who controlled the military with civil power.

The rise of military generals will inevitably lead to the regaining of power and the right to speak.

As for the nobles, the more they thought about it, the more they felt that something was wrong. The military power was not in their hands, and the credit was not theirs, but the army had won the battle. This meant that their rights and interests in the barracks would be reduced, which was also something they could not tolerate.

But what ignited their greater anxiety was what happened next.

……

"Minister Huang, why did you call us here?"

Tian Weijia, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of Personnel, looked at Huang Shijun lying on the hospital bed with a pale but anxious look, and couldn't help but ask.

"Yes, you should take good care of your health now." Xue Guoguan, the Left Vice Minister of Rites, could not help but ask.

Huang Shijun was the Minister of Rites.

The Ministry of Rites has four departments under its jurisdiction: the Ministry of Rites, the Ministry of Cultivated Shrines, the Ministry of Food, and the Ministry of Guests and Hosts, which are the departments in charge of sacrifices.

After the great victory in Tongzhou, the emperor wanted to offer sacrifices to heaven directly, which is understandable.

But now the Ministry of Rites has submitted the list of names of sacrifices, but there has been no news.

Huang Shijun called everyone together, and when they were all there, he coughed and sat up with the help of his son, saying, "The way of offering sacrifices has existed since the beginning of human history."

"In the past, when the emperor offered sacrifices to heaven, he would gather all officials in the Fengtian Hall to take oaths and receive ordination. But now there is no list of us. Why is this so?"

During the Ming Dynasty, starting from the Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, particular importance was attached to offering sacrifices to heaven, and the separate sacrifices to heaven and earth were changed to the combined sacrifices to heaven and earth.

Later, almost every dynasty regarded sacrifices as a major event, especially the winter solstice sacrifice, which was listed as one of the three major festivals of the court.

"What do you mean?" Tian Weijia asked tentatively.

Huang Shijun continued, "The most important affairs of the state are sacrifice and war."

"War is the only major issue for a country. This is easy to explain. It is the military. The victory or defeat of a war is directly related to the survival of a country. It is also about deterring lawlessness, upholding justice, and stabilizing the country. Therefore, the military cannot be abandoned."

"Si, the literal meaning is of course sacrifice, but this is not the point."

"But why is it one of the only two major events? Why is it related to the survival of the country? Because it contains the fundamental secrets of the court."

"The sacrifice itself is not important, but being able to participate in the sacrifice is important. This is an identity recognition, and it is the recognition that we, the literati, and the emperor jointly rule the world."

"Cough, cough, cough..." Huang Shijun suddenly coughed hard, as if he was going to cough out his lungs. He pushed away his son who was patting his back, "And this is exactly what I want to say."

"For the Ming Dynasty, the activity of sacrifice itself was very important. Whoever performed sacrifices together with the emperor was considered one of their own. This was very important."

"With this identity, we are one with His Majesty. No matter what kind of conflict we, the civil servants, have with His Majesty, it is just an internal matter." "Since it is an internal matter, no matter how big the conflict is, if someone makes a mistake, it cannot be dismissed or exiled."

"It is nothing more than the promotion of new officials to continue to rule the country together with the emperor and seek benefits for the common people."

"But if there is no such identity, then..."

Everyone present was a smart person, how could they not understand what Huang Shijun meant?
In an instant, his face changed.

In fact, many of them were already worried about the emperor's sacrifice, but because Huang Shijun was seriously ill, they did not come to disturb him.

But now that Huang Shijun suddenly said it out loud, it made their scalps numb even more.

Not one of us?
That means there might be a situation of "genocide", and their so-called "competition for official positions" would become a joke.

The system of civil servants having teachers as their mentors, the mutual help among civil servants, respecting the elderly and caring for the young as well as others'...all have become rootless duckweed.

"Minister Huang, in your opinion, what should we do?"

"Yeah, we can't just sit there and wait for death..."

"This is exactly why I called you here." Huang Shijun struggled to stand up, "Now that your majesty's military affairs are completed, we have to fight for this sacrificial offering."

……

In the Qianqing Palace,

Chongzhen had returned from Kunning Palace and was looking at the list handed over by the Ministry of Rites.

He asked Wang Chengen, "All under heaven belongs to the king; all the people in the world are the king's subjects. I ask you, how do you interpret the word "king"? Is there only the Great Ming under heaven?"

"Your Majesty, the word 'king' here means 'kingship'."

Chongzhen nodded, "Yes, 'King', I am on behalf of the Heaven to inspect and make all the people become civilized people, not barbarians, so we must offer sacrifices and drive out the barbarians."

"The Tartars in the north are barbarians, but aren't there barbarians in my court?"

Wang Chengen swallowed his saliva, looked at Chongzhen's shining eyes, and dared not say anything.

Chongzhen took a deep breath and said, "Uncle, uncle, I didn't expect you to give me such a big surprise."

The reason why he ran out of the soft jade bed was because Zhu Changgan had a conversation with him.

He did not participate in the sacrificial ceremony the day after tomorrow. Zhu Changgan knew nothing about sacrifices, so he thought of taking a day off that day and let Chongzhen perform the sacrifice himself.

Apart from this, Chongzhen could participate in all subsequent sacrificial and ritual matters himself.

Chongzhen agreed without hesitation.

It was an insignificant matter to Zhu Changgan, but in his eyes, it was a royal affair.

He had not been in charge of government affairs for many days and was still a little unfamiliar with it, but he was familiar with this set of procedures. During the day, the minister had already gone to the Temple of Heaven to see the sacrificial animals, so he went to see it in person.

He went to the Taichang Temple overnight and checked the emperor's ancestors and the gods they were offering sacrifices to. However, when he was looking at the list of officials to be offered sacrifices, Chongzhen became concerned.

Civil servant?

Why are they all civil servants and nobles?
Who won the great victory at Tongzhou? Was it the civil officials? Was it the nobles?

Therefore, Wang Chengen simply kept this memorial submitted to the Ministry of Rites and did not send it out.

Chongzhen had to wait...wait for those who had won the battle to come back and add their names. After all, they were already on their way back to Beijing.

Sixty miles,
Enough time!

……

"Who is ahead?"

"I am Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of Xuanda."

"Governor!" A lieutenant general dismounted and saluted.

"Hurry, get up!"

Lu Xiangsheng's returning team finally connected with his own team, "Look what I brought back for you?"

The lieutenant general walked to the side of the carriage, opened it, and saw the silver ingots inside and the bags of rice at the back. He was so shocked that his mouth opened and his Adam's apple rolled.

His chest was heaving and his breathing was rapid.

"This is……"

"Your Majesty allocated it directly to us without going through the Ministry of Revenue or the Ministry of War. It's enough money!"

Sufficient pay?

In the late Ming Dynasty, only eight percent of the food and wages came from the Ministry of Revenue, six percent left the capital, and when it reached the camp... it was only three percent, a terrible amount.

Don’t ask, the only thing you need to know is the rules of the Ming Dynasty.

But now the emperor actually allocated them sufficient salary and houses directly. What is this?
This is the Holy Favor!

How can we prevent these miserable Ming soldiers from breathing rapidly and feeling their bodies boiling with heat?

Sufficient pay!

They dare not even think about things like this in this life, let alone the next life or the life after that. They cannot support themselves, let alone their families.

All they talked about every day was how to escape from this damn place.

"Brothers, help us so that we can return to the camp quickly." Lu Xiangsheng looked at everyone's green eyes, "I have another good news to tell you. The Yongwei Camp, the Beijing Camp, and the White Spear Soldiers won a great victory and killed 16,000 Tartars."

"For every enemy killed, a reward of 20 taels of silver will be given for each rank promoted, or 50 taels of silver. Your Majesty has already paid them."

"Before I came back, His Majesty gave me the Shangfang Sword. I can exchange it immediately without asking His Majesty!" Lu Xiangsheng raised the Shangfang Sword in his arms high.

"Gudu!"

"Gudu..."

Lu Xiangsheng could even hear the sound of people swallowing their saliva.

The Ming army is weak?
It was nothing more than the lack of money and grain. When Yu Qian was in charge of the defense of the capital, he faced two problems.

First, there is a shortage of troops, and it is necessary to mobilize troops from other places. Moreover, the only troops that can be mobilized are second-line troops, so their combat effectiveness is very questionable.

Second, there was no food. There was a large amount of grain shipped from the south near the Tongzhou Canal. If it could not be transported to Beijing, it would be left outside and might be hijacked by the Mongols.

Yu Qian's solution was to have all incoming troops take a detour through the Tongzhou grain base and carry grain into Beijing. He also advanced half a year's salary and used the grain they brought with them to offset the payout.

As a result, morale was high, the soldiers fought bravely, and the battle was won.

Lu Xiangsheng looked at the soldiers with wolf-like eyes and a sharp gaze.

"Now that the money and food have arrived, I want to see how capable you are and how much money you can take from me."

"Governor, will the Tartars pass through our area?"

"Yes, in a few days at the shortest, or more than ten days at the longest, the Tartars will definitely come back again."

(End of this chapter)