The most reckless man in the Ming Dynasty

The clan meeting ended successfully.

Under the shock of His Majesty the Emperor and Marquis Zhongshan, the kings finally agreed to this slightly harsh new system of vassalage.

After all, His Majesty the Emperor's attitude is very obvious. The vassal ban can be lifted, but the clan kings must fully support His Majesty the Emperor and fight with the civil servants and gentry to consolidate the power of the emperor.

Zhu Houzhao left Xing Wang Zhu Youqi alone. This fourth uncle was his real choice as the head of the clan.

In the main hall, besides Xing Wang Zhu Youqi, there were Tang Hao, Chen Kuan and Zhu Houzhao.

Now that things have happened, Zhu Houzhao no longer pretends.

"Fourth uncle, I think you should understand."

"I do intend to bring the power of the clan into the court to fight against the civil servants and gentry."

When Xing Wang Zhu Youqi heard this, he nodded subconsciously.

But it was difficult for him to understand why the emperor chose to focus on him?

When it comes to the influence of the clan, he, the new vassal king, is naturally not as good as the old vassal kings such as King Qin and King Jin.

When it comes to the financial resources of the royal family, there is no way to compare with these old lords who have been passed down for hundreds of years.

Even the ten thousand taels of silver that he had previously dedicated to the court could not be obtained by Zhu Youqi now, and he had to find a way to sell his property.

Therefore, no matter how you look at it, the person His Majesty the Emperor should choose should not be him, Zhu Youqi, the Xingwang.

Perhaps seeing Zhu Youqian's doubts, Zhu Houzhao said sincerely: "Fourth uncle, you are my direct fourth uncle. Based on this close relationship alone, I can trust you."

"In addition, Fourth Uncle treats the people well in the fiefdom and has never done anything illegal. This is what I respect the most about Fourth Uncle."

"So, I hope that my fourth uncle can fully support me and win this war!"

war!

What war?

The war between the emperor's family and the civil servants and gentry!

Zhu Youqian sighed in his heart. He had long expected the result today.

Even though His Royal Highness Prince Xing has never had any intention of fighting, he has no right to refuse until now.

Whether it was for Lao Zhu's family or for himself, Zhu Youqi could only agree.

So he immediately stood up, knelt on the ground, and said loudly: "I will do my best, even if I die!"

"But Your Majesty, this Zhu Chenhao..."

Now that he had made up his mind to completely surrender to His Majesty the Emperor and take charge of the clan for him, Zhu Youqian also corrected his position and began to remind Emperor Zhu Houzhao.

"I heard that this Zhu Chenhao has done many illegal things in the fiefdom. He supports desperadoes to eradicate dissidents and persecutes the people, and plunders the people's wealth. This thief obviously wants to...conspire against him!"

Hearing this, Zhu Houzhao was in a good mood.

This means that from this moment on, Zhu Youqi has become his absolute confidant.

"Four uncle, don't worry, I naturally know what Zhu Chenhao has done."

"If that's the case, why would your Majesty still..." Zhu Youqi couldn't understand.

"Giving the position of Minister of Guanglu Temple to Zhu Chenhao, a traitor, is like adding more power to a tiger!"

After all, Zhu Youqi came from the royal family, so he still knew the basic knowledge of the court. What's more, he was always shrewd and analyzed the problem immediately.

"Zhu Chenhao was appointed Minister of Guanglu Temple. Firstly, he could take the opportunity to collude with other vassal princes and clans. Secondly, he could monitor His Majesty's daily movements. Thirdly, he used his power to commit corruption and accept bribes. Didn't he help this thief in his rebellion in disguise? "

Tang Hao looked at Zhu Youqi thoughtfully.

No wonder his son was so shrewd that he came to Beijing as a young man and ascended the throne, and then defeated the civil and military officials of the court. This father is not a simple thing!

Zhu Houzhao also smiled and nodded, very satisfied with Zhu Youqi's performance.

"I did it on purpose."

"If he wants to rebel, I will help him plot it."

"When the overall situation is stable, I can uproot these rebellious officials and traitors and purge the entire court!"

Zhu Youqiao was shocked when he heard this. What a courageous person!

If this goes wrong, the house will change hands that day!

But since His Majesty the Emperor has already been prepared, there is nothing more to say.

Such an emperor, such an emperor, coupled with the peerless general Tang Hao, the Marquis of Zhongshan, might really be able to... revive the Ming Dynasty?

For a moment, Zhu Youqi was in a daze.

Zhu Youqi knew his third brother, Emperor Hongzhi, whom the world praised very well.

Their father, Emperor Chenghua, only favored Concubine Wan Gui, so much so that Concubine Wan Gui dominated the harem. However, she was too old to give birth to a son. Unfortunately, her only son also died in infancy, so this poisonous woman began to secretly plot to kill Long Zi, using all possible means. Abortion for pregnant women.

One day, the palace attendant who had to accompany Emperor Chenghua to bed fell ill, so he asked the palace maid Ji to take his place. Ji became pregnant after spending the night with Emperor Chenghua, and Concubine Wan Guifei, who was favored by Zhu Jianshen at the time, did everything possible to get pregnant. People in the palace had abortions, and Ji's pregnancy was no exception. However, she did not have an abortion. She announced to the outside world that she had had an abortion. In fact, she secretly raised the baby Zhu Youtang in the West Palace. However, Zhu Youtang had several inches of hair on his head, which is the sequelae of abortion pills. .

Until Emperor Chenghua lamented that he had no children one day in the harem, a young eunuch said that Long Live Lord already had a son. Emperor Chenghua was greatly shocked and asked where the child was. The young eunuch did not dare to tell, but the eunuch Huaien reported that he was raising him in the West Palace. , already six years old, father and son were able to recognize each other.

Concubine Wan Gui, a poisonous woman, had been plotting to get rid of Emperor Hongzhi. In the end, Emperor Chenghua's biological mother, Queen Mother Zhou, brought Emperor Hongzhi to her palace to raise him. She was wary of the poisonous woman in every possible way, and finally he grew up safely.

However, because of these early palace fighting experiences, Emperor Hongzhi developed a timid and soft-hearted character, which Zhu Youqi knew only too well.

His third brother was notoriously soft-spoken, and later facts proved that this fact was also taken advantage of by civil servants and gentry.

The so-called Zhongxing sage kings are just sage kings of civil servants and gentry.

However, the Zhengde Emperor in front of him was different.

He had imperial opinions, courage and courage that Emperor Hongzhi did not have, and the Marquis of Zhongshan was a peerless general.

Therefore, Zhu Youyi was also very optimistic about Zhu Houzhao. This emperor seemed to be able to complete the great cause that Emperor Hongzhi failed to complete...reviving the Ming Dynasty!

Tang Hao spoke up and described the third step of the plan.

It was just this third step that made Zhu Youqi's scalp tingle.

The first step is to use the opportunity to regain power to exchange interests with the clan king.

The second step is to announce the new vassal system after reaching an agreement, and delegate the power to restrain the clan to the main lines of each vassal line.

And this third step is to investigate Wangzhuang and Wangtian!

The land in Zhuangzi occupied by the emperor was called Huangzhuang.

The land of Zhuangzi that the vassal king invaded and annexed was Wangzhuang.

Why did Tang Hao propose an inventory of Wangzhuang?

Naturally, it is to curb land annexation!

The name "Huangzhuang" originated from Chenghua Emperor Zhu Jianshen.

In the eighth year of Tianshun, Zhu Jianshen confiscated the eunuch Cao Jixiang's fields in Shunyi and set them as "Huangzhuang".

However, the emergence of imperial palaces in the Ming Dynasty may have occurred earlier. For example, Renzong Zhu Gaochi had Renshou Palace and Qingning Weiyang Palace, and Yingzong Zhu Qizhen established the East Palace, Dewang and Xiuwang Zhuangtian for his disciples.

Zhu Jianshen's approach undoubtedly justified the establishment of Huangzhuang, and thus brought the royal family's custom of acquiring land to a climax.

However, the imperial village is not just the emperor's estate, but includes the estate of the emperor himself, his concubines, the crown prince, and the kings in Beijing. In other words, it is the estate of the emperor, his wife, and children.

Therefore, if a prince leaves the capital and goes to a fiefdom after enfeoffment, the land acquired in the fiefdom will not be considered an imperial village, but a royal village.

Zhu Jianshen's imperial estates soon spread all over Shunyi, Baodi, Fengrun, Xincheng, Xiongxian and other places. By the second year of Hongzhi, there were five imperial estates in the capital, with a total value of more than 13,000.

Zhu Houzhao also did these bad things when he came to the throne, and was pointed at and scolded by the officials. Finally, he followed Tang Hao's suggestion and abandoned the imperial palace to protect the Eight Tigers eunuchs. The result was that Liu Jin used this matter to repay the emperor's death. Those civil servants and gentry who reached out to it were whipped.

Since the emperor took the lead in annexing land, vassal kings, relatives, and eunuchs also requested the emperor to grant land, so there were royal fields and official villages.

The approach of Emperor Hongzhi is the most surprising here. Instead of preventing these powerful and powerful relatives from annexing the land, he took whatever they asked for. As long as he asked, he, the holy king, would be satisfied immediately.

In February of the 16th year of Hongzhi, Jianchang Hou Zhang Yanling was given 751 hectares of farmland, and the land that the two princes of Rujing had dismissed were also given to him.

In April of the 17th year of Hongzhi, in a dispute over the land of a noble relative, Emperor Xiaozong of the Ming Dynasty favored his brother-in-law, resulting in Zhang Yanling acquiring 16,705 hectares of land in one go.

Even the Chongzhen Palace, the family temple built by Emperor Hongzhi for Queen Zhang's family, had to be specially allocated land for worship. The two land allocations were 70 hectares and 50 acres and 24 hectares respectively.

In addition to his brother-in-law Zhang's family, Emperor Hongzhi basically accepted all requests for important land from princes and dignitaries.

In March of the third year of Hongzhi, 215 hectares of land in Sanhe County were given to Princess Renhe.

In April of the third year of Hongzhi's reign, King Yuan Shuntian of Ruian was given 225 hectares of Gu'an village land.

In September of the third year of Hongzhi, the eldest princess of Chun'an was given 160 hectares of farmland in Raoyang County.

In September of the third year of Hongzhi, twenty-seven hectares of farmland in Yongqing County, Shunyi County, Xiu Mansion was granted.

In the first month of the fourth year of Hongzhi's reign, King Qi was granted 575 hectares of land in Xin'an Town, Yongqing County.

In April of the fourth year of Hongzhi's reign, King Qi Liu Wu was given ninety hectares of camp.

In May of the fourth year of Hongzhi, Lu Kai, the eunuch of Maoling Shrine, was given 172 hectares of land in Dingxing County.

In February of the fifth year of Hongzhi, Wang Wangjun was given 200 hectares of terraced land.

In September of the fifth year of Hongzhi, the lord of Shunyi County in Xiufu was given twenty-seven hectares of land in Dong'an County.

In May of the sixth year of Hongzhi, King Heng was given 500 hectares of farmland in Fengrun County, Jianan and other communes to manage the property.

In February of the seventh year of Hongzhi, thirteen hectares of Tongzhou land was given to the eldest princess of Chongqing.

In April of the seventh year of Hongzhi, King Heng was given another 150 hectares of land.

In March of the eighth year of Hongzhi's reign, the lord of Shunyi County was granted an additional 31 hectares of land in Dong'an County.

In September of the ninth year of Hongzhi, your king was given 700 hectares of farmland at Wangjuntai Village in Yutian County.

In October of the ninth year of Hongzhi, King Qi was granted 300 hectares of Guantandian farmland in De'an Prefecture.

In November of the tenth year of Hongzhi, the eldest princess of Deqing was given 474 hectares and 55 acres of land in Jizhou Zhuang.

In February of the eleventh year of Hongzhi, King Heng was granted another thousand hectares of land in Pingduzhou and Shouguang counties in Changyi.

In March of the eleventh year of Hongzhi, the eldest princess of Deqing was granted 130 hectares of land in Hengshui County.

In June of the eleventh year of Hongzhi, King Qi was given 300 hectares of land in De'an Mansion.

In June of the twelfth year of Hongzhi, King Rong was granted 500 hectares of farmland in Fengrun County.

In the first month of the thirteenth year of Hongzhi's reign, the longevity king was given 430 hectares of land in Baoning Prefecture, Sichuan Province.

In February of the thirteenth year of Hongzhi's reign, more than 1,350 hectares of silt land near the lake in Jingshan County, Huguang, Xingwang was granted.

In July of the thirteenth year of Hongzhi, another 612 hectares of land were given to King Qi De'an.

In March of the fifteenth year of Hongzhi, King Heng Youyi was granted 1,240 hectares of land in Weixian County, Shouguang, Shandong.

…

So, why was Emperor Hongzhi able to become the "Saint King of Zhongxing"?

Because he made all the nobles happy and satisfied all the gentry, except for his people who should bear the most responsibility, this "Zhongxing Saint King" had forgotten the ordinary and only indulged in the treatment of him by the powerful gentry. In the midst of singing praises!

Bullshit Zhongxing Shengjun!

Looking at the detailed records listed by Tang Hao.

No matter how much Zhu Houzhao respected his father, he was speechless at this moment.

How many fields did the Ming Dynasty have and how many people were there?

Why don't you reward all these fields?

What are the people doing farming? They can just wait to die!

Zhu Houzhao's face turned pale and his eyes began to turn red.

This was a mistake made by his father, and it should be made up for by his son.

"check!"

"Wangzhuang must be investigated!"

"All the farmland under the vassal king's name that exceeds the quota must be inventoried!"

Hearing this, Zhu Youqian couldn't help but frown.

"Your Majesty, the Tian family has just received the support of the clan. If we backhand and stab the clan at this moment, I'm afraid these clan kings will... become resentful!"

Zhu Youyi is certainly qualified to say this, because he has never annexed any land in his fiefdom of Anlu Prefecture, and there is no such thing as Wangzhuang. He lives honestly on the salary from the court.

But just because he keeps himself clean does not mean that other feudal kings are like this.

Judging from the evidence provided by Tang Hao, Marquis of Zhongshan, each of these vassal kings was more ruthless than the last.

For example, the Prince of Shu's Mansion occupies 70% of the land in the Chengdu Plain. Add in the land annexed by these gentry and gentry, and in the end, less than half of the land fell into the hands of the common people!

Sichuan and Shu are known as the land of abundance!

With millions of people!

Half-grown fields!

What did the court use to collect taxes?

What do people do to support their families?

In addition to becoming the tenants of these powerful gentry, they were forced to flee and become refugees!

Another example is the Prince's Mansion of the Chu vassal. There were many farmlands spread across Huguang, and a large number of them were civilian fields that had been purchased and occupied.

"The fields in Jiangxia, Xianning, Wuchang, Chongyang, Tongcheng, Hanyang, Hanchuan, Jinling, Anlu, Yunmeng, Yingcheng, and Xiaogan in Hubei were formerly Chu leased and renamed fields. They were the property of the Ming Dynasty, and the land was all barren. It was unbearable. It was a barren land for the people and was allocated to the Chu vassal. It was only used for feeding and grazing, and it was called goose and duck field."

It was obviously some fertile land, but it became what the king of Chu called "barren land for the people" and became a "goose and duck field" that they used to make profits for their feeding needs.

The many names and ruthless methods used by these vassal kings to invade the fields are simply jaw-dropping and truly heart-rending!

However, as far as the current situation is concerned, the clan king has just reached a profit cooperation with the imperial family Tianjia. If this third step is taken at this moment, I am afraid that the original cooperative relationship between the two parties will be shattered in an instant.

Zhu Houzhao naturally understood this truth, but he couldn't bear it anymore.

Why can't the imperial court collect taxes?

Why are the people in the world so destitute and their wealth exhausted, and the army and the people so miserable?

All these fields have been occupied by the powerful gentry. What can the court use to collect taxes, and what can the people use to make themselves rich?

Every one of them is a cancer!

"Savage, what can you do?"

Zhu Houzhao looked at Tang Hao with red eyes.

He is so angry that he wants to kill someone!

Tang Hao touched his chin and replied: "What His Highness Prince Xing said is also true."

"The two sides have just reached a cooperation. It is really not easy to directly proceed to the third step and stab these feudal kings."

"We need a reasonable excuse, an excuse that leaves these feudal lords speechless, and then we take the opportunity to start a comprehensive purge."

"Excuse?" Zhu Houzhao asked impatiently: "What other excuse can there be? Why don't we force Zhu Chenhao to rebel now? Using this excuse, we will first cut off the Ning Fan lineage, and then launch a comprehensive purge..."

Zhu Youqi was frightened when he heard this. He opened his mouth several times to say something, but finally chose to keep his mouth shut.

Of course he was well aware of the grievances between Ning Fan's line and Tianjia's line.

Now that Ning Fan has such a Zhu Chenhao, it is really bad luck for eight lifetimes, and Ning Fan is destined to be abolished because of this.

It's just that His Majesty's approach will inevitably make Zhu Youqi feel sad. After all, he is also a member of the clan king!

Tang Hao noticed Zhu Youqian's ugly face, coughed slightly and shook his head.

"inappropriate."

"Zhu Chenhao has just become the Minister of Guanglu Temple. It is not a good thing to change his order overnight."

"This matter needs to be considered in the long term, there is no need to rush..."

However, at this moment, Xiong Xiu, the left minister of the Ministry of War, rushed in with a pale face.

"His Majesty!"

"Emergency military situation!"

"Zhu Chixiu, King of Anhua of Qingfan, rebelled in Qingyang, his fiefdom. He burned the government offices and documents, released prisoners, and robbed the treasury..."

Xiong Xiu turned pale with anxiety, and cold sweat broke out on his forehead.

But he was surprised to find that the four people in the hall looked at each other, and then burst into laughter in unison.

Um?

What does this mean?

You are so angry that you are laughing, are you losing your mind and going crazy?

Xiong Xiuren was dumbfounded and looked at Emperor Zhu Houzhao blankly.

This is a fucking clan rebellion, not some cats and dogs!

Can you show some respect?

Clan rebellion itself is the most feared thing for the imperial court, because if it is not handled well, it will turn into a battle of peace again!

The lessons learned from the Battle of Jingnan are right in front of us, and no one dares to take them lightly.

As a result, His Majesty the Emperor Zhu Houzhao couldn't stop laughing, and even burst into tears.

"Ahem...that Xiong Aiqing, what did you just say?"

"Is Zhu Chixiu, King of Anhua of the Qing Dynasty, really rebelling?"

Is it the other way around...?

Xiong Xiu looked at His Majesty the Emperor with a suspicious face.

Why do you feel so excited?

"Your Majesty, Zhu Zhixiu did rebel. He not only killed a group of guarding eunuchs and local officials, but also burned government offices and documents, released prisoners, and robbed treasury..."

"Okay!" Zhu Houzhao jumped up with joy!

"It's such a good opposite!"

Xiong Xiu: "???"

ah?

ah? ? ?

Did I hear wrongly?

Or is His Majesty the Emperor completely mad?

For a moment, Minister Xiong had some doubts about life.