Iron Dynasty

The palace maids shuttled back and forth in the Baifu Hall, and the delicious food was placed on the table, and the fragrance became more and more intense.

The King of Huainan and the King of Ruyang looked at the emperor and King Yong who sang and harmonized, and their hearts were complicated.

After all, they are not royal families with the same surname, King Yong can calmly let go of the feudal kingdom, but they can't do it, because for them this is the foundation of their ancestors, how can they easily hand over to others? At least the imperial court has to give them a satisfactory placement.

Xiao Ming swept across King Huainan and King Ruyang from the corner of his eye, and he had something to think about.

After pondering for a while, he did not rush to mention the matter of cutting down the vassal, but greeted: Everyone, the food and drinks are ready, you have come from a long distance, and today I will have a drink with you.

After all, Xiao Ming raised his glass.

Seeing this, King Huainan and King Ruyang immediately stood up with their wine glasses and drank all the liquor in them.

Xiao Ming nodded, and also drank the liquor in the cup. Then he didn't mention anything about cutting the vassal, but talked about the interesting things about Qingzhou.

After three rounds of drinking, the atmosphere of Baifu Hall gradually relaxed. At this time, Xiao Ming showed a smile. The time for negotiation has come, Today, the three of you entered the palace together to meet me, it must be for the purpose of reducing the clan. He Finally got the topic right.

King Yong's face was flushed when he drank, and King Huainan and King Ruyang also drank very happily.

Yes, Your Majesty, it is for this very reason that we entered the capital this time. King Huainan and King Ruyang looked at each other, and they were much more courageous over the wine.

And King Yong said directly: Isn't it just cutting down the vassal? No one in the world can see that today is different from the past. The emperor is an ambitious person. This Great Yu Kingdom cannot continue to be chaotic. , this king is the first to support the emperor.

After a pause, he continued: However, cutting the vassal will return to the cutting vassal, and I hope the emperor can keep our glory and wealth.

The King of Huainan and King Ruyang nodded, and King Ruyang said: What King Yong said is very true, now all the civil and military people in the whole dynasty are clamoring to cut the vassal, it can be seen that this is the general trend of the world, the little king does not dare to go against the current, and is willing to accept the cut. The decree of the vassal is just that we have guarded the borders and expanded the territory for the Great Yu Kingdom for so many years, there is no credit or hard work, and I hope the emperor can consider it.

The King of Huainan also said: The matter of cutting down the vassal is already on the line. Now I don't ask much, and I hope the emperor will have mercy.

The topic was opened at once, but Xiao Ming was relieved. In fact, he understood that the three of them had already figured out that Chu Fan was his support.

Because it is impossible for newspaper articles to be published without his review, and this is something everyone knows well.

After thinking about it for a while, he said: Ai Qing has been worrying too much, I have no intention of depriving you of the feudal kingdom, and the ministers have no intention of putting you to death. This feudal country is still your feudal country, but the military power will be taken back from now on. In terms of government affairs, you obey the orders of the imperial court, and from then on, Fengguo will take part of the taxes and turn it over to the imperial court, which means that you are still the king of Huainan and the king of Ruyang in the feudal country.

He didn't want to be too drastic in this time, because it would only have the opposite effect.

So he decided to take a more moderate approach, that is, to turn the feudal country into their food town, just to take their military power and make them lose their independence in government affairs.

In this way, they became nominal vassal kings, and they would no longer pose a threat to the Great Yu Kingdom, but were just ordinary officials.

The King of Huainan was silent for a while after hearing the words. For him, this was already acceptable. Except for the military power, he retained everything else. He was still a noble prince in Jingzhou.

Thank you, Your Majesty, for your grace. King Huainan bowed and said.

King Ruyang also decided to accept the proposal, got up and said, Thank you for your grace.

King Yong had originally planned to give up the feudal kingdom, but he was overjoyed when he heard this. He said gratefully, Your Majesty is Holy, Your Majesty is Holy.

Xiao Ming coughed, and he said, But I'm the one who said the ugly words up front. You can't have any ambiguity in the government's decrees, otherwise I'm afraid I won't be able to keep you.

The three looked serious, they bowed and said, Yes, Your Majesty.

The matter of cutting down the vassal was easily resolved, and Xiao Ming was in a good mood. In his opinion, the success of the slashing of the vassal was entirely due to the strength of the Qingzhou government, otherwise the slashing of the vassal would likely lead to a rebellion.

But now that they understood their own strength, the three did not dare to take any risk, because if they did, they would completely lose everything, and even drag down their relatives.

The heart knot was untied, and the atmosphere in the Baifu Hall became more and more soothing. The four of them started drinking and enjoying food again.

The banquet ended at three o'clock in the afternoon.

Asking Qian Dafu to send the three feudal kings back, he went to the imperial study and began to write the imperial edict. In order to avoid night long dreams, he decided to quickly finalize the matter of cutting feudal feudalism.

Once the imperial decree came down, this time the slashing of the vassal became a sure thing.

It took half an hour to prepare three imperial decrees, and Xiao Ming was going to issue them to the three of them at the court meeting, so that the matter of cutting down the clan could be counted to an end.

The next day, at the court meeting, Xiao Ming announced the decision to cut the vassal. The King of Huainan, the King of Ruyang, and the King of Yong all waited for the imperial decree at the Zhengdaguangguang Hall.

At this time, Qian Dafu took out Xiao Ming's imperial decree and handed it over to the corresponding vassal king each time he read it.

In the imperial decree, Xiao Ming clearly stipulated the content of cutting down the vassal, and asked the three to formally hand over the army to the accompanying generals of the forbidden army after returning to the vassal.

The generals of the forbidden army will select elites from their army and retrain them into the military system of the Great Yu Kingdom, and they will no longer have the right to interfere with the army.

In addition to the imperial decree, in order to appease the three, he also presented them with death-free gold medals to show his sincerity.

The plan to cut the vassal has been decided, and Xiao Ming felt relieved for a while. Since then, the Great Yu Kingdom has made further progress towards the goal of reunification, and now he will concentrate on dealing with the Chu Kingdom.

At the same time, he also looked overseas. In recent years, he could see some Westerners in the turmoil around the Great Yu Kingdom.

This matter made him very unhappy, but he had been enduring it for the sake of domestic reunification. Now that the reunification was in sight, the desire for revenge was aroused in his heart again.

After all, if it wasn't for their involvement, the Great Yu Kingdom would not have killed so many people.

He was thinking when Pang Yukun came out and said: Your Majesty, the first batch of firearms and transported to Lin'an, of which there are a total of 20,000 arquebuses and 8,000 flintlock guns, these firearms Li Chuyuan is willing to pay three million taels of silver. .

Three million taels of silver? Xiao Ming frowned, You tell Li Chuyuan's people that the court does not accept silver, so let him go to the bank to exchange it for gold dragons and then trade with us, and all transactions between him and the court must be Use the new currency.

Pang Yukun understood, he showed a wicked smile and said, Yes, Your Majesty, the lower official understands.