Chapter 120: Wang Huazhen's Confession

Gao Panlong gained a new understanding of Sun Shenxing's ruthlessness, and at the same time realized that he had previously underestimated Sun Shenxing, feeling somewhat helpless in his heart.

Within the Donglin Faction, when it came to strategy, the best was Ye Xianggao, but unfortunately Ye Xianggao was not here now.

And although Sun Shenxing and Han Kuang also had strategic minds, neither of these two men was truly and sincerely standing on his side. This made things rather difficult. But at this point, he had no other choice.

In fact, for Sun Shenxing, he understood Gao Panlong and the others better. If it had not reached the point of utter desperation, Gao Panlong would absolutely never have listened to old Sun.

So before this, he basically expressed no opinions and offered no advice, letting them do whatever they pleased.

Only when they truly needed him would they soften their stance and listen to him.

If they had truly been willing to listen, they would have listened to Han Kuang from the very beginning. If they had followed Han Kuang's approach from the start, how could things have come to this state today?

But this was fine as well — from now on they would know old Sun's importance.

"Then everything will be done according to what you say, sir." Although Gao Panlong felt somewhat uncomfortable in his heart, he had no choice and directly agreed.

At this point today, there was no choice left.

At the same time, inside the Eastern Depot's prison.

Wei Zhongxian wore an excited expression on his face, waving a confession in his hand.

He had finally obtained what he wanted!

Yang Lian and Zou Yuanbiao were both hard-boned men — this was something Wei Zhongxian had not expected.

In the past, Wei Zhongxian had interrogated these Donglin men before, and they were often fierce in appearance but weak within, actually having no real ability.

This time, however, he was taken by surprise.

He had given Yang Lian a thorough beating and used some ruthless methods, but it was still useless — the man refused to confess.

When Yang Lian was beaten to the point of having no strength left, that was one thing, but whenever he regained enough strength, he would curse Wei Zhongxian.

Aside from his anger, Wei Zhongxian was also deeply shaken.

There really were people in this world with such hard bones!

But not everyone was hard-boned. Although Liaodong Governor Yuan Yingtai also said nothing, one person finally opened his mouth.

That person was Guangning Governor Wang Huazhen.

Wang Huazhen could no longer endure the beating and opened his mouth to confess the Donglin Faction's embezzlement of military funds in Liaodong.

He admitted that his collusion with Li Ruzhen was real, and that the court indeed had some problems — the court's problem was the embezzlement of money, grain, and military pay.

Beyond that, many goods that came out of the capital's storehouses would never even be transported away — they would simply disappear. If what actually reached Liaodong amounted to sixty percent, that was already good; the rest was all gone.

Aside from these goods, the shoddy muskets produced by the Ministry of Works were also a way for the ministers to line their pockets. The soldiers at the border did not dare use the muskets produced by the court, because the muskets would burst their barrels.

Even the cannons were the same — they would also burst their barrels. Often before they could be used to kill the enemy, they would first blow up Ming soldiers.

This showed how severe the shoddy workmanship was — this was the Ministry of War's method of making money.

In short, Liaodong was like a sumptuous feast, with everyone reaching their hands into it.

The border generals were the same — with Li Ruzhen in charge, after goods arrived at their destination, they would skim off another layer first. What actually reached the hands of the common soldiers was less than one-third. It could be said that from top to bottom, everyone was reaching into the supplies to grab money.

As for where these supplies went — when a battle was lost, they would simply report slightly more losses, and they could also ask the court for even more.

In Liaodong, the Ministry of Personnel made money through promotions — whether Liaodong officials wanted to be transferred out, someone wanted a promotion, or someone had been impeached and wanted to smooth things over, the Ministry of Personnel handled it all, and they were the ones collecting the money.

The Ministry of Revenue was even simpler — they directly skimmed off the supplies that were allocated, and money was the same, even grain was skimmed.

As for the Ministry of War, the money for manufacturing military equipment was all embezzled by them, and all sorts of low-quality, substandard military equipment and supplies appeared at the borders. Some soldiers could not even get clothes to wear, left ragged and exposed like refugees.

As for the other ministries and offices, although they had no direct means of getting rich, they would basically receive a portion of tribute payments every year — in winter there was "charcoal tribute," and in summer there was "ice tribute."

The Censors of the Censorate took money to impeach people, and could even receive bribes to refrain from impeaching people.

In short, everyone was reaching into this pot, and countless sums of money were carved up among them.

According to Wang Huazhen's confession, after the late emperor ascended the throne, he had allocated two million taels of silver from the inner treasury.

Of this two million taels, one million was given to Liaodong to reward the border defense soldiers there, and the other one million was for other places.

Wang Huazhen did not know about the silver given to other places, but of the one million taels given to Liaodong, only 750,000 taels remained when it left the capital.

After arriving in Liaodong, officials and generals at every level divided up 400,000 taels. The remaining 350,000 was what was actually distributed as rewards to the soldiers.

But not everyone received it — only the generals' confidants, that is, their personal guards, could get it.

Every time the court allocated funds, or every time Your Majesty took silver out of the inner treasury, it was a gluttonous feast for the officials.

Although he did not know the situation in other places, in Wang Huazhen's view, it was basically much the same everywhere.

Looking at this confession in his hands, Wei Zhongxian was excited all over.

What was this?

This was evidence of guilt!

Even if they refused to admit it, there was no way around it — he had to hit them hard.

At the same time, Wei Zhongxian's heart burned with fervor. Because these things represented not only power, but also wealth.

Once this case was exposed, countless people would be investigated. First in line would be Vice Minister of Works Zhao Nanxing.

As long as he implicated them, a large group of people would fall within the six ministries, and the Censorate would be the same.

At that time, he could get his hand into it.

The most critical point — if handling these people's cases were given to him in the future, how much benefit could he skim from it?

This was all money! He wanted both power and money!

Thinking of this, Wei Zhongxian was excited all over.

"Prepare a carriage for me." Turning his head to glance at Sun Yunhe, Wei Zhongxian said with a loud laugh.

As long as he had this confession in hand, whether the others confessed or not no longer mattered. With this confession, he could get confirmation on Li Ruzhen's side.

But he could not conduct interrogations now — he had to go seek Your Majesty's guidance first.

"Yes, Your Excellency. This subordinate will go prepare it at once." Sun Yunhe acknowledged and hurriedly turned to go prepare the carriage.

He was also excited now. Ever since his master had taken office, the Eastern Depot's prestige had grown day by day.