Rebirth of the Ming Dynasty: Sixth Generation of Glory, I don't want it

The night talks at Hyodeok Palace moved very quickly.

Before three o'clock in the morning, Zhang Xin and Zhu Gaochi returned to Yande Palace.

The couple talked about this on the way back. Finally, Zhu Gaochi summarized what Zhang Xin once said:

"The emperor is far away, so why don't we just declare ourselves kings?"

"My uncle's family is all in the capital."

"Ugh..."

"Our family wants to establish itself as king, and the other uncles will follow suit, leaving the court with only an empty shell. What can they do?"

"Ugh..."

"Don't worry about it, use your brain, isn't the prince the most handsome man in the world?"

"That's called fantasy - you still call yourself a fool, are you really a fool?"

"I admit I'm really stupid. Wasn't it me who first said I'd declare myself king..."

"You are cruel!"

"Go to bed, there are still a lot of things to do tomorrow."

"Well, it's a new day after waking up."

~~~~

The people Zhu Di brought out came back quickly. When Zhu Di had been unconscious for a whole day and had not yet woken up, the entire team entered the city of Beiping.

Following them came people from the capital who delivered the imperial edict.

Zhu Gaochi was mentally prepared and accepted the order with great sincerity.

Zhu Gaoxu and Zhu Gaosui had sour faces.

The two of them didn't get along well with the Emperor's grandfather, not to mention Zhu Yunwen.

This time he had to kneel three times and kowtow nine times to the emperor Zhu Yunwen who had ascended the throne.

Anyone could see that they were unhappy.

The man who came to deliver the imperial edict was quite old and acted as if he could not see the rebellious nature of the two men. After he announced the imperial edict, he only added one more instruction, that the Crown Prince and the Prince must set off immediately after receiving the imperial edict.

This obvious provocation almost made Zhu Gaoxu and Zhu Gaosui go out and beat the other person up.

After a period of chaos, Zhu Gaochi took his two younger brothers away for re-education.

Zhang Xin and Wei were busy preparing everything for the three brothers to go out.

After sending them away, Wei, who was too tired, fainted on the way back.

Yao Niang rushed over and after taking Wei's pulse, she found out that she was pregnant.

Although everyone cannot be happy at this moment, it is still a happy event for the palace.

After Wei woke up, she laughed and cried in the room, with tears and snot running down her face. She also hugged Zhang Xin and said that Zhang Xin was very smart in speaking.

Let Zhang Xin tell her whether the baby in her belly is a boy or a girl.

Zhang Xin was so annoyed that she finally revealed it.

Wei was as satisfied as if she had received an imperial decree, holding her belly.

After comforting Wei, Zhang Xin had to rush to Xiaode Palace to see her father-in-law who had not yet woken up.

Perhaps because of the happy event, Zhu Di had already woken up when Zhang Xin arrived.

Xu was feeding Zhu Di porridge.

The old couple huddled close together.

Seeing this, Zhang Xin's old face turned red. After asking if everything was okay, he hurried back to his Xiaode Palace. As soon as he sat down, he felt sore all over and wanted to lie down to rest, but he forced himself to sit in front of the desk.

What is going to happen next, if it happens in advance, will be a major event that will have a real impact and run through the entire Yongle Dynasty.

~~~

Between Peking and the capital was a large province of the Ming Dynasty, Shandong Province.

There are six prefectures in Shandong: Jinan Prefecture, Gunzhou Prefecture, Dongchang Prefecture, Qingzhou Prefecture, Laizhou Prefecture, and Dengzhou Prefecture.

The initial incident happened in Zhangqiuhe, which was under the jurisdiction of Dongping Prefecture, Gunzhou Prefecture.

There is a folk saying, there is Suzhou and Hangzhou in the south, and Linzhang in the north, Lin is Linqing and Zhang is Zhangqiu.

Zhangqiu has always been known as Little Gusu and Little Suzhou.

Zhangqiu River is a famous commercial port in Shandong Province because it is the confluence of two major rivers, the Grand Canal and the Daqing River, with frequent trade and economic prosperity far exceeding that of the county town.

But for some unknown reason, the imperial court did not build a town in Zhangqiuhe.

The town around Zhangqiu River is under the management of three counties.

In other words, officials from three counties sent people to Zhang Qiuhe to collect taxes and make money.

In the previous life, in the month when my great grandfather passed away and Zhu Yunwen ascended the throne, the Zhangqiu River broke its banks and caused massive flooding.

The land planted in the spring was supposed to be harvested, but it was all soaked in water overnight.

Three counties are in charge of one place, which is like three monks with only one bowl of water to drink.

This resulted in 200,000 refugees.

The flood had not yet subsided and an epidemic broke out. Zhu Yunwen, who had ascended the throne, summoned the whole country to seek good doctors to go to Shandong to prescribe medicine and treat diseases.

In September of the same year, before everyone died, the epidemic was finally brought under control and did not spread outside Shandong Province.

But the disasters did not come in pairs. Following the floods and epidemics, from the beginning of the following year to July, there was no rain in the entire Shandong province.

All the newly planted crops died of drought, and the government granaries in various places were completely emptied of grain.

At that time, Zhu Gaochi was so angry that he jumped up and down in the Prince of Yan's Mansion, cursing Zhu Yunwen, saying that he had time to reduce the power of the princes but no time to provide disaster relief, and that he was unworthy of being the ruler of the people.

It was in July of that year that the sword of reducing the power of the vassal states reached the Yan area.

Zhu Di raised the flag, interrupting the court's plan to provide relief to the famine in Shandong.

The battle lasted for three years.

A large province sandwiched between Peking and the capital became the main battlefield for the war between the two sides and also the source of conscription for both sides.

The people of Shandong Province experienced floods, droughts, and then three consecutive years of war.

This is not over yet.

In the fourth year of Yongle, a locust plague broke out in Shandong.

In the fourth year of Yongle, my father-in-law ordered the construction of the imperial city in Peking. Naturally, the laborers were drawn from places closer to Peking, and Shandong Province suffered again.

In the eighth year of Yongle, my father-in-law began to plan a northern expedition to Mongolia. In addition to money, the northern expedition also required people.

After eight years of recuperation, Shandong Province had just started to show some signs of improvement, so my father-in-law recruited 100,000 civilians in Shandong to transport supplies.

According to Zhu Gaochi, his father-in-law's successive victories over the Tatars and the Oirat were achieved by the civilians from Shandong who left their homes and traveled to the northern border to follow his father-in-law's army through life and death, using "wheelbarrows" to push the army forward.

In the ninth year of Yongle, the Minister of Works Song Li presided over the reopening of the canal, mainly the Huitong River from Dongping to Linqing. In Shandong alone, 100,000 civilian workers were recruited.

Not to mention the huge scale of the project, in order to shorten the river channel and prevent it from turning, countless fertile fields on both sides of the river were dug up.

It is said that the imperial court will provide subsidies, but the imperial court itself has no money. It squeezes out some money with great difficulty and transfers it to lower levels, but after deducting money here and there, what reaches the hands of ordinary people is not even a drop in the bucket.

After several years of construction, the Huitong River was finally completed, but the price was that countless Shandong people lost their homes and became displaced.

It's just the bad luck of this province that it happens to be right next to Peking and the capital.

Later, a minister from Shandong in the court said with a wry smile that the people of Shandong were really difficult to kill.

In addition, during the Yongle period, Chen Cheng visited the Western Regions five times and Ma Sanbao made seven voyages to the West.

The money and manpower invested in the early stages of preparation were all the result of the blood and sweat of ordinary people across the country.

It would be fine if they just sold their labor and paid money, but these feats attracted tributes from all nations.

For the sake of the reputation of a great country, counties and cities across the country built roads, constructed palaces and pavilions, which cost countless people a lot of labor and money.

You have to know that the expenses incurred by the envoys while traveling around the country will be passed on to the local people.