Chapter 589: Summoning Wang Zaijin

The reason Zhu Youxiao had the confidence to act this way and say such things was that his armies had all returned—even Xiong Tingbi had come back.

The fighting in Liaodong was over. After pacifying Liaodong, his army's losses had not been great. And with Liaodong secure, he could free up his strength.

The only thing to do now was see how much grain he had left and how long it could sustain him—this was a very important matter. If his grain was sufficient, he could deal with some of the disobedient ones on the Mongol grasslands.

But now with the Khorchin, he didn't need to do any of that at all—he only needed to use his army to maintain deterrence. Whenever anything came up, shut the door and unleash the Khorchin. Whoever dared to disagree this time would be wiped out.

Zhu Youxiao wasn't worried about anything else—only the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha.

Nurhaci had once tried to force the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha to do exactly that, but they refused and even turned against Nurhaci. In the end the two sides fought a chaotic battle that concluded with the defeat of the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha.

In that war, two of the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha were annexed, one tribe was destroyed, and the remaining two tribes submitted to Ligdan Khan before being annexed as well.

And now it was the Great Ming's turn. The five tribes of the Inner Khalkha truly might not agree—especially the Jarut tribe, which held a particularly hard-line stance.

But there was another problem here: the Great Ming was not Nurhaci. The Jarut bore a grudge against Nurhaci, so they had some reason to use that incident to break relations.

Zhu Youxiao felt that what it really came down to was that the Jarut tribe did not want to break with Ligdan Khan. Even though they had already split off, deep down they still considered themselves Mongols—same roots, same origin. Ligdan Khan was still the Great Khan, and they could not betray their own Great Khan.

Under these circumstances, Zhu Youxiao had no choice but to prepare for both contingencies. If the Jarut tribe did not come this time, then he would crush them.

With the Khorchin's cooperation and the strength of the Great Ming army, there naturally wouldn't be much of a problem. Once they were eliminated, things would become much easier—no one would dare be disobedient again.

The only concern was that with only the Khorchin left in the east, Zhu Youxiao felt somewhat uneasy. But there was no helping it—he couldn't very well leave the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha sitting there, could he?

If they wouldn't obey, what was there to play at with them?

So he could only pin his hopes on the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha not having a lapse of judgment.

Wei Chao, standing beside Zhu Youxiao, hurriedly replied upon hearing the question: "To report to Your Majesty, the inventory work is already underway. Lord Sun said it would be delivered within the next two days."

Zhu Youxiao nodded, then turned and instructed Wei Chao: "Send an edict to Wang Zaijin, Governor of Guangning, telling him to come here."

"I intend to meet him. I've been to Liaodong twice without seeing him—that's not quite right."

"Yes, Your Majesty." Wei Chao said hurriedly.

Over these past few years, in that place called Guangning, Wang Zaijin had done exceptionally well—far more skillfully than the Wang Huazhen of the original history.

What Wang Zaijin built in Guangning was a defense system that matched exactly what Zhu Youxiao had imagined. Tall walls and deep moats, stockpiled grain, trenches and bunkers outside the city, plus all kinds of watchtowers.

Though it had cost no small amount of money over the years, its effect was extremely obvious—no one dared attack from that direction. Because before you could even reach the city walls, you'd have lost a good half of your men.

This made Zhu Youxiao very satisfied.

Ministers who could loyally execute his orders and complete their tasks to perfection—those were the ones Zhu Youxiao liked most.

Since coming to the Great Ming, he had experienced several years and seen all kinds of ministers. What Zhu Youxiao feared most were those eloquent, seemingly talented ministers, because such men invariably had ideas of their own.

Put plainly, the scholars of this era all harbored a desire to display their own ambitions, and they were quite stubborn about it. Assign a man to a position, and he would always want to achieve something—but that achievement might not be what you wanted at all.

They would act according to their own ideas, according to what they thought was correct behavior, completely disregarding the bigger picture, refusing to follow orders, always believing that doing it their way was right.

In the original history, the situation in Liaodong was exactly like this. Sun Chengzong and everyone else all felt that Liaodong could support a big push, that Liaodong could be recovered—they all felt that adopting a defensive posture did not serve the Great Ming's interests.

It sounded stirring and heroic, but in reality it was nothing of the sort. What Wang Zaijin advocated was precisely the truth of the matter.

The Great Ming no longer had the energy to spend more time fighting this war in Liaodong. That place itself had little worth recovering anyway—if they wanted to fight, let them fight a bit.

The Great Ming's domestic problems were what truly mattered and needed to be resolved as a priority.

After the Battle of Sarhu, Liaodong's strength had been too severely depleted. As long as one maintained and preserved sufficient defensive forces, that was enough—there was no need to spend more money building such things.

Such cowardly talk naturally did not meet the expectations of the Chongzhen Emperor. To the Chongzhen Emperor, this was too shameful—in his heart, he wanted to accomplish great deeds.

Calling Chongzhen someone with great ambitions but meager talents was hardly an unfair assessment.

And so Wang Zaijin was finished—he did not succeed. The Great Ming kept increasing its investment in Liaodong, giving everyone from top to bottom the opportunity to line their own pockets. The already crumbling finances were utterly crushed by that final straw.

There was no money for domestic disaster relief, no money for suppressing domestic rebellions, soldiers couldn't receive their pay, Shanxi descended into complete chaos, and the entire Great Ming dynasty simply collapsed.

In the end, we also forget that when Wei Zhongxian was around, at least through his hands he could extort all kinds of officials and obtain considerable money. Though he was cursed at, there was money to spend—when imperial authority was weak, this sort of thing was often done.

Because regular taxes couldn't be collected, one had to take an unorthodox path and raise a great corrupt official, letting him embezzle and letting him extort.

Even if the Emperor only got a portion, it didn't matter—because when the Emperor needed money again, he would cut down that great corrupt official with one stroke, and all his family property would revert to the Emperor.

But Chongzhen had no such person at all. No one collected wealth for him, taxes couldn't be raised, so he could only wait to die.

Everyone knew that the Great Ming's fragile finances originated from land annexation, from the donation of land to powerful households, from the collapse of the self-sufficient peasant economy. Did the officials of the Great Ming not know this?

There wasn't a single one who didn't know—they all knew. So what was the root cause in the end?

Wasn't it simply that the scholar-officials didn't pay taxes?

If only they were made to pay taxes, every problem would be solved. But had anyone ever proposed it?

No one. Everyone pretended not to see it, and instead desperately increased the levies on the self-sufficient peasants.

Once the Three Additional Levies were issued, the harm was boundless.

The court officials and those scholars took the opportunity to frantically purchase the land of commoners who couldn't pay their taxes, driving them from their homes.

Add natural disasters on top of that, and everything collapsed in an instant.

And the current Zhu Youxiao naturally would not repeat such mistakes.

Wang Zaijin had done very well in Liaodong. After Zhu Youxiao ascended the throne, he had sent him and Xiong Tingbi to Liaodong—it could be said they had solved a great problem for him.

Over these years, Wang Zaijin had rendered distinguished service through hard work, so Zhu Youxiao planned to take him along this time as well.

The court was in dire need of talent! A man of such ability couldn't be left sitting there.

If not for him and Xiong Tingbi maintaining things in Liaodong, Zhu Youxiao wouldn't have had the energy to reform the court, nor the energy to train his current army; while frantically amassing wealth domestically, the court wouldn't have remained so stable either.

So the main thing was to acknowledge their contributions. Although Wang Zaijin hadn't fought a single battle this time, those skilled at war need not always have spectacular achievements.

On Zhu Youxiao's side, he was preparing to summon Wang Zaijin, while on Wukeshan's side, he had already spread the news.

The Great Ming side moved very quickly as well. Sun Chengzong soon transmitted the message to the representatives of the various Mongol tribes through official channels, telling them: "Bring your chieftains here—the Great Ming is going to hold an alliance meeting at this place."

After this news spread, what also spread was what Wukeshan had said to Zhu Youxiao.

For a time, the Mongols were seething with indignation—some cursed loudly, some even wanted to kill Wukeshan; but more fell into silence, not knowing what to do for the moment.

The angriest was naturally Hasal of the Ordos. He hadn't expected this.

He truly hadn't expected that Wukeshan would surrender so quickly, and in such a manner. He felt he had already been stabbed in the back.

He had originally thought that you lot would have some backbone—you're a major tribe! But this move of yours has no bottom line at all!

If I'd known you were like this, I would have done it long ago. What kind of nonsense is this?

What made him even angrier was that when Qasar went to see Sun Chengzong last time, Sun Chengzong refused to meet him. These past few days he had been frantically seeking an audience, but Sun Chengzong acted as if Qasar didn't even exist.

Only a servant came out, who directly told Qasar: "Our master has no time. He is far too busy right now. When he has free time, he will notify you and see you."

That was as good as saying nothing—they couldn't even be bothered to make up an excuse.

Sun Chengzong could afford to stall, but Qasar could not! If he kept dragging things out, his own side would be finished.

However, Qasar also knew that relying on the Ordos, a mere small tribe, alone would not work.

So he began frantically networking, trying to find those small tribes that shared his aspirations.

Of course, on the surface it was called sharing aspirations, but in reality it was contacting the small tribes that had been scared out of their wits, in order to achieve the effect of huddling together for warmth.

In fact, these small tribes moved very quickly as well. After the news came out, the Ordos was not the only one panicking.

Those small tribes were even more panicked, knowing that they could not keep going on like this—war might break out at any moment. If they did not band together before the fighting started, it would be too late once battle commenced.

On the one hand, they contacted each other; on the other hand, they frantically probed for the Inner Khalkha's intentions.

The Inner Khalkha's intentions would determine whether the eastern grasslands would become a battlefield.

If the five tribes of the Inner Khalkha surrendered, then perhaps all would be peaceful.