Chapter 590: Falling

Old White Ox recommends: "Little Brother" Muzi Lanse's *Late Tang* — fresh style, enticing plot, a very fine book. Also recommending *The Ming Official*, with its darkly shrewd and worldly-wise protagonist who never gets the short end of the stick — my absolute favorite.

……

On the fourth day of the month, this palace flogging shook the court and the realm. Nearly thirty remonstrating censors were dragged out together to the Hall of Imperial Supremacy for punishment. They wailed in the freezing wind, crying out the temple names of the Great Ancestor and the Great Ancestor Chengzu, their voices shrill and mournful, like cuckoos weeping blood…

On the spot, five of them were beaten to death, over ten were maimed, and the rest would each spend long days and nights confined to their beds. This bloody incident on the bingxu day struck terror into civil and military officials alike, and into everyone throughout the capital.

Perhaps, after this great upheaval, many shrank back, while even more grew to hate Wang Dou and moved into opposition against him. For the Chongzhen Emperor, his mood was a mix of fury and desolation. The outcome of the flogging was not what he had wanted; it stood in direct opposition to the original intent with which he governed the realm.

Although he had been enraged at the time, he had only wanted to teach Zhuo Buwei and the others a harsh lesson — he had not intended to kill them. Yet after the punishment, it was reported that Zhuo Buwei and his fellows were too frail of body to endure the beating; after only a few strokes, they had died violently on the spot.

Far from feeling joy, a chill crept up his spine, and suspicions swarmed. Who had tampered with things? Who, among all his subjects, could he still trust?

Yet he was now riding a tiger and could not dismount. This matter of rumors had to be brought to a conclusion, and the unrest among the frontier troops could not be left unresolved indefinitely. Under the Chongzhen Emperor's strict orders, and relying on certain confessions and the testimony of the remonstrating censors, the investigations by the Depot and Guard and the Three Judicial Offices were pursued with even greater severity. Shadows behind the scenes gradually surfaced; more people were subjected to palace flogging, demotion, and even exile.

But looking at the list of names in his hand, the Chongzhen Emperor knew: the big fish behind it all had by no means appeared yet. And the fact that Wang Dou could grasp this list meant he would not be satisfied with the results before him.

Only, the investigation thereafter grew ever more difficult. The Great Ming's networks of mutual protection among officials, and the shielding webs of various allied interests, were deployed to their fullest — as if in some masterwork of fiction — just as the case's progress was about to sink into deadlock once more.

Where hills and streams end and no road seems in sight, dark willows and bright blossoms bring another spring. On the seventh day, the Minister of Personnel, Li Rixuan, struck a heavy blow: the Personnel Selection Secretary, Wu Changshi, turned his coat and struck back, secretly visiting Zhou Yanru's retainer Dong Tingxian, and subsequently making contact with Chief Grand Secretary Zhou himself, revealing a series of hidden and secret matters.

On the eighth day, the capital was shaken once more. Cabinet member and Minister of Personnel Li Rixuan, and Minister of Revenue Li Daiwen resigned in acknowledgment of their faults. The Chief Censor of the Left of the Censorate, Li Banghua; the Censor Shi Bangyao; the Vice Minister of Justice, Meng Zhaoxiang; and others were demoted. Beyond these, several dozen more officials fell from power and were punished — some fined of their salaries, some beaten with the rod, some sentenced to penal servitude, some stripped of office and ordered to reside at leisure, and so on.

Such a great upheaval could only be compared to the verdict on the eunuch faction case in the second year of Chongzhen's reign. The configuration of the court was utterly transformed by it.

Not only the court — within the palace, there was also a round of purges.

On charges of accepting bribes, spreading rumors, and killing to silence, the Grand Eunuch of the Directorate of Ceremonial, Wang Yumin, was demoted and banished to Fengyang. The Eastern Depot eunuchs Qi Benzheng, Zheng Zhihui, and others were ordered to commit suicide.

Wang Yumin's demotion also implicated the Army Supervising Eunuch Liu Yuanbin. A censor impeached Liu Yuanbin for allowing his troops to plunder and rape at will. The Emperor was enraged and summoned the Brocade Guard to arrest him and bring him to the capital.

Over the span of a few days, this chain of upheavals at court dazzled and bewildered everyone in the capital. When people regained their senses, those with a discerning eye suddenly realized: the greatest beneficiary of this court turmoil was none other than the Chief Grand Secretary of the Cabinet, Zhou Yanru.

Wu Changshi's turncoat strike had caused the Minister of Personnel, the Minister of Revenue, and a great host of court officials to be dismissed or removed from office. And for the posts of these two ministers, none but Zheng Sanjun and Ni Yuanlu — both of whom commanded immense popular support — could fill them.

These two men were both of the Donglin faction. Long before his return to power, Zhou Yanru had already promised the various members of the Donglin faction that he would elevate Zheng Sanjun, Ni Yuanlu, and others into the cabinet and ministries. Sure enough, this promise of his was about to be fulfilled.

In this upheaval, although Zhou Yanru lost men like Li Banghua, with him occupying the high post of Chief Grand Secretary, men like Li Banghua might well have a chance to rise again. Moreover, in the cabinet of the future, he would be hard-pressed to find a rival; the cabinet would become a situation where his house alone dominated…

The great case of the rumors had come to light, and naturally, certain backroom schemers were terrified out of their wits. For several days running, from the Kang family grain shop outside Zhengyang Gate in the capital, bursts of furious, raging roars could be heard. Several corpses of servant girls were also carried out in succession — girls beaten to death by their master for the most trivial of trifles.

Although those within did not understand why this storm had not touched them, after much pondering, some inside still hastily packed their things and fled in a puff of smoke toward Shanxi.

On the tenth day, at the Datong Garrison encampment, Wang Pu, his face ashen, stared at the several merchants standing before him with hanging heads and terrified expressions. When you counted the connections, they were all his own clan uncles, bound by ties of kinship, though separated by who knew how many generations.

"If you want to court death, don't drag our Wang family down with you!"

Looking at the men before him, Wang Pu's handsome face contorted. His eyes seemed about to spew fire. He suddenly reached out, swung his arm, and delivered a vicious slap, landing heavily on the face of an elderly merchant. With a sharp *crack*, the merchant screamed and staggered backward, the right side of his face instantly swelling up high.

He opened his mouth and spat out a mouthful of blood, along with two teeth.

Clutching his right cheek, shocked and furious, he cried, "Little Zhi, you…"

"You, my ass!"

Wang Pu roared in fury. He stepped forward and dealt another heavy slap. The merchant let out another shrill, miserable scream, his facial expression twisted, and he spun in circles as he toppled to the side. This time, what flew from his mouth were as many as seven teeth.

"H-have… have you no respect for your elders…"

The merchant had taken a terrible, half-dead fall. He lay on the ground, clutching his face, grief welling up from within, and broke into loud, wailing sobs: "This old man… this old man doesn't want to live anymore… Little Zhi, you ungrateful wretch, do you remember… when you were little… when you were a child, how dearly I loved you…"

"And the rest of you!"

Wang Pu bellowed, lashing out left and right. With a series of sharp *slap slap* sounds, he dealt out blows to the faces of each of the Wang family merchants standing before him, one by one, beating them until every one of them was bleeding from the mouth and nose, battered and wretched.

The Datong Garrison officers inside the tent were utterly silent, watching this scene with extreme astonishment.

Their Grand Commandant's extreme fury was beyond anything they had expected. Ordinarily, the Grand Commandant was all smiles, very mindful of his bearing, and he maintained a respectful attitude toward those clansmen and relatives. To see him show no quarter like this, lashing out so violently, was an exceedingly rare sight.

Under Wang Pu's towering rage, they too stood there, hearts trembling with fear, none daring to utter a word of dissuasion. It was only his personal general, Wang Zheng, who stepped forward.

By now, Wang Pu had reached a fat, corpulent merchant — who counted as Wang Zheng's uncle. Watching his clan uncle, ordinarily so genial and exceedingly warm toward himself, being slapped until his mouth was crooked and his nose askew, too terrified to make a sound, Wang Zheng felt his own face lose all luster.

He quietly urged, "Grand Commandant, quell your anger. My uncles and granduncles merely had their hearts blinded by lard for a moment; they did not intend to bring disaster upon the clan."

The merchant sprawled on the ground had by now been helped to his feet. Clutching his face, he wept indistinctly, "All the great houses had a hand in this matter… and besides, the Old Master also gave his approval…"

Wang Pu's fury had just begun to subside, but upon hearing these words, his rage surged anew, and he roared, "Father has gone senile!"

Thinking of Wang Dou, thinking of the fearsome might of the Jingbian Army, Wang Pu could not help but shudder. He also understood Wang Dou's character — was he the sort of man to let things go peacefully?

Outsiders, peering at flowers through the fog, might not grasp the Jingbian Army's strength, but he knew it well. Especially this time — the great upheaval in the capital, was that not all Wang Dou's doing? He had shamelessly insisted on calling Wang Dou his elder brother, utterly disregarding the fact that he himself was three or four years older than Wang Dou. And for what? Was it not to cling to Wang Dou's thigh, to make the Wang clan flourish and grow even mightier?

Yet these hindrances dragging him down had poured all his painstaking efforts into a flowing stream. With one misstep, his mercantile clan enterprise would be utterly destroyed in a single day.

What was to be done? He paced the tent in agony. Beside him, those merchants of the Wang clan also knew they had caused a colossal disaster this time. Especially after the news from the capital arrived, every one of them stood to the side, not daring to let out so much as a loud breath.

Thinking of the methods Wang Dou might employ, of his ruthless cruelty, waves of icy dread kept surging through Wang Pu's heart. He muttered to himself, "What to do… what to do?"

Wang Zheng was likewise racking his brains. Gritting his teeth, he stepped forward and offered a plan: "Grand Commandant, there is no other way. How about going to find the Loyal and Brave Count and laying the whole matter before him openly?"

Wang Pu's eyes lit up, but he hesitated: "Would that work?"

Wang Zheng thumped his chest in assurance: "It will certainly work. Given the friendship between the Grand Commandant and the Loyal and Brave Count, he will surely leave us a way out and not hold it against us!"

A hint of a smile appeared at the corner of his mouth: "Perhaps the Loyal and Brave Count will bathe the various great houses in blood — and our Wang clan might even get a share of the spoils."

The old granduncle at the side cried out in alarm, "How can that be? The Eight Great Houses are linked in spirit and breath; there are even marriages and intermarriages between them all… Wang Zheng, your own sister-in-law is a daughter of the Kang family. Do you wish to push her to her death?"

Wang Zheng declared sternly, "For the clan, appropriate sacrifices are permissible. Besides, the Loyal and Brave Count would not stoop to quibble with a mere woman, would he?"

Wang Pu made his decision: "That is what we shall do. As the saying goes, 'Let fellow Daoists die, so long as this poor Daoist lives'… And if they all die off, that would actually be a good thing for our Wang family…"

At this very moment, Wang Dou was also in his tent, listening to Liu Benshen's report — on the movements in the capital, the progress of developments in the Eastern Circuit and other places, and so on.

There was also some news from the General's residence. It seemed Ji Junjiao had hosted several banquets in Yongning City, and among the invited ladies, she had rather successfully won over a number of people. Xie Xiuniang, likewise relieving her husband's worries, had played an important role in steadying the hearts of those within the circuit.

In this upheaval in the capital, the chief instigators of the rumors had, one could say, been largely swept away. The remonstrating censors who had served as their pawns had suffered grievous casualties. Wang Dou felt no sympathy for them. The censors and remonstrating officials, who had played a vital role in the early Ming, had by now become nothing but a source of calamity and harm to the nation — pitiable, yet detestable.

According to intelligence, although many officials had been demoted and censured, by unspoken consensus, the great local clans — those great Jin merchant houses — had not been implicated, and very few had confessed to naming them.

Perhaps they understood that the various interest-based clans were their very roots. It was like a field of opium poppies: so long as the soil was not destroyed, a day would come for seeds to be sown and sprouts to grow. Take Zhou Yanru, for example — he fell from power several years ago, and has he not now risen again?

So long as the roots remain, a day of revival will always come. Only if the various interest-based clans were destroyed would it be a true and final destruction.

Moreover, the list Wang Dou had given the Chongzhen Emperor did not include those people.

At this, Wang Dou merely sneered coldly. Once he returned to the Eastern Circuit, he would sweep away all the great houses, sweep away their very roots, and let them understand what true despair meant!

Just as he told his men — those fat pigs, we'll keep them and slaughter them ourselves when we get back.

Still, the matter was essentially resolved. The imperial court provided a way out, and they pressed Hong Chengchou to come sound out Wang Dou's intentions.

Advisor Qin Yi firmly believed they should ride the current and let this incident end smoothly. Even the border commanders of the various garrisons, with Wang Dou at their head, should give the imperial court a graceful exit — adopt a posture of bearing thorned branches and begging forgiveness, and let this whole affair vanish into the wind and snow.

Yang Guozhu, Wang Pu, and the others had been discussing it with Wang Dou for days. Wang Dou also felt that this matter ought to be brought to a close.

Only — though both sides might return to a surface harmony in the days ahead, the repercussions would run deep.