Chapter 183: The Chongzhen Emperor Who Bullied Others Past All Endurance

The Chongzhen Emperor pulled off his stunt and bolted, but he left the steppe in utter ruin.

When Ligdan Khan finally fled back north of the Gobi and tallied his losses, before he even reached his royal court he was already so furious he could spit blood.

Pinned down relentlessly by those Ming cavalry who had gone mad for some unknown reason, then hit by the White Rod troops and the follow-up Ming forces, this round of losses could basically be called a catastrophe.

Of the hundred thousand troops and twenty thousand herders he had brought, plus the nearly thirty thousand Chahar tribesmen who had come over later, barely sixty thousand or so followed him back.

Well, that was that. Forget about raiding Xuanfu to make up for the losses — now that he had lost even his original capital, from here on he would have to be constantly on guard against the Ming army coming to make trouble for him!

Thinking of this, Ligdan Khan turned his gaze toward his chosen heir, his own son Ejei, and even his eyes carried ill intent: "Ejei, you tell me — what do we do now?"

If not for Ejei's dogshit idea, even if they had clashed head-on with the Ming army, the losses probably would not have been so catastrophic — who knew what madness had seized that dog emperor?

It was not as if they had never raided the Great Ming's barbarian commoners to take as slaves before, and this time he had even negotiated with him properly: as long as he stepped aside, he was willing to release those Ming barbarian commoners.

Ejei was now nursing a splitting headache himself. After this battle, the entire Chahar tribe was finished.

Never mind realizing the great enterprise of reunifying the Mongols and reestablishing the Mongol Empire — from now on they would have to be constantly wary of other tribes coming to annex them.

When the Chahar tribe had been consolidating the Outer Mongolia Mongols, they had offended no small number of people; they had even wiped out three of the five Inner Khalkha tribes, who were of the same root and stock, and the aggrieved parties — the Barin and Jarud tribes — were now still with the Ming barbarians.

And now he had also provoked his father the Khan's displeasure with him. This matter needed to be carefully remedied.

After pondering for a long while, Ejei finally said cautiously, "Father Khan, as matters stand, there are only two paths we can take."

Ligdan Khan grunted. "Let's hear them."

Ejei said, "The first is to send an envoy to sue for peace with the Ming barbarians, to rest and recuperate for now, and plan for revenge later."

"As for the second, it is simply to move eastward again.

In any case, the tribes over here have been nearly wiped out by the Ming barbarians. If we stay here any longer, we can only swallow up a few small tribes — there is not much point.

Better to head east. In truth, of these two plans, suing for peace first is the most prudent."

Ligdan Khan grunted and said, "Enough. We will discuss it after we return to the royal court.

At any rate, we still have sixty thousand tribesmen left, which is far better than running off to Liaodong to provoke the Jianzhou barbarians. Without first uniting all the Mongol tribes, we cannot defeat the Jianzhou barbarians."

Yet when Ligdan Khan hurried back to the royal court with these sixty thousand tribesmen, he still could not avoid spewing a mouthful of old blood and falling straight off his horse — standing before the royal court was precisely that jingguan built from over twenty thousand heads.

In front of it stood a wooden stele hastily carved from timber; that Chongzhen Emperor, wicked to the core and practically smoking with malice, could not even be bothered to grant them a stone monument!

Further back, the royal court had been burned to near nothing by a single blaze.

The only thing that still showed some consideration was that only the immediate vicinity of the royal court had been burned; further out, one could clearly see that the Ming army had dug a firebreak to prevent the flames from spreading beyond control.

Inside the royal court, headless corpses lay scattered everywhere, and dead cattle and sheep were beyond counting. Due to the scorching weather, the entire royal court had long since begun to emit wave after wave of the acrid stench of rotting flesh.

Fortunately, since the tribes on the steppe were nomadic much of the time, the Chongzhen Emperor had not been able to wipe them out completely during his northern expedition; a few small tribes had always managed to escape this calamity.

But escaping the first of the month does not mean escaping the fifteenth. Those tribes that normally numbered in the tens or hundreds, with no real presence to speak of, were all mopped up along the way by Ligdan Khan and absorbed into the Chahar tribe.

And precisely because of this, Ligdan Khan, fearing an outbreak of plague, had his men burn the royal court even more thoroughly, then simply marched several dozen li further east, pitched camp once more, and reestablished the royal court.

Ligdan Khan had fled, and he was still thinking about whether to send an envoy to the Great Ming to see if he could scrounge some benefits — all that fighting and killing was in the past.

Great men like himself and the Ming barbarian emperor, as long as face was preserved, surely they would not be fixated on fighting every day? Besides, there were still the Jianzhou barbarians in Liaodong; there was no fear that the Great Ming Emperor would not accept his goodwill.

Yet at this very moment, the Chongzhen Emperor was indeed thinking about Ligdan Khan.

Although Ligdan Khan had brought his thugs to smash Chongzhen's windows and failed, and had instead had his own home thoroughly demolished by the Chongzhen Emperor and his thugs, whenever he thought of those commoners who had been abducted and then died between the two armies because of him, the Chongzhen Emperor's heart grew uneasy.

So after arranging the matters for returning to the capital in Xuanfu, Chongzhen added, "We also wish to send an envoy to the Mongols, to go to Ligdan Khan and demand compensation for our losses."

Seeing Zhang Weixian and the others looking at him with expressions of what seemed like boundless admiration, the Chongzhen Emperor said, "What is it? If you have something to say, say it."

Zhang Weixian coughed once, cupped his hands, and said, "Your Majesty, now that Ligdan Khan has lost troops and officers and retreated north to Mongolia, if we send someone to demand compensation from him, it would be rather... rather..."

Seeing Zhang Weixian stammer out two "rathers" without making his meaning clear, Chongzhen simply laid the matter bare: "Rather too shameless? To beat Ligdan Khan and still demand that Ligdan Khan pay up — rather too much like bullying him?"

Zhang Weixian gave an embarrassed laugh and said nothing, tacitly conceding the point to the Chongzhen Emperor.

Chongzhen laughed.

"On what grounds?

On what grounds does he, Ligdan Khan, get to come and go as he pleases? That we defeated Ligdan Khan this time can be entirely credited to heaven-sent luck.

If not for the deaths of those thousand-odd commoners before the battle lines, how it would have ended is truly hard to say."

"Since Ligdan Khan's southward march caused the deaths of thousands of innocent commoners, then he must take responsibility for this matter, must he not? As the saying goes, a life for a life, and debts must be repaid."

You shameless bastard! Zhang Weixian and the others all cursed inwardly. Since ancient times, no one had ever heard of an emperor like this. If you want, just lead your men back to the steppe and smash Ligdan Khan head-on, finish him off completely!

And now you still want him to compensate your losses? Are your losses greater or are Ligdan Khan's losses greater?

A thousand-odd commoners, plus the soldiers who died in battle, amount to no more than a few tens of thousands of men. Ligdan Khan lost a full hundred thousand and more.

To rub salt into his wound at a time like this — aren't you afraid that Ligdan Khan, driven to desperation, might do something reckless?

Although Zhang Weixian and the others thought this in their hearts, they could not say it aloud. After weighing his words for a moment, Zhang Weixian continued, "Reporting to Your Majesty, Ligdan Khan has now been gravely weakened.

If we send an envoy now, leaving aside whether he will agree to pay compensation, even the envoy himself would likely be in mortal danger.

If by chance Ligdan Khan, driven to desperation, defects to the Jianzhou barbarians and joins forces with Khorchin, the situation in Liaodong will inevitably stir up trouble once more."

Chongzhen did not see it that way. Ligdan Khan was a xiaoxiong, not a hero.

For a xiaoxiong, assessing the situation and adapting is the most fundamental ability. The Jianzhou barbarians were currently hemmed in by the Great Ming, trapped between life and death, and had already resorted to a head-on assault on Dongjiang.

Ligdan Khan would have to have lost his mind to go throw in his lot with the Jianzhou barbarians.

As for the envoy, however, there was indeed real danger. Even the most forbearing xiaoxiong, faced with such humiliation, would probably be unable to resist killing the man, wouldn't he?

Hadn't that little tart surnamed Yehenara in later ages, in a fit of hotheadedness, dared to declare war on the great powers?

This was rather troublesome. Anyone sent would be walking into possible death.

And this was not the capital, where he could just dispatch whichever civil official he found disagreeable. Of those here in Xuanfu, he could not bear to part with any of them.

As for sending someone from the capital, the round trip would drag on far too long — when bullying someone, you had to strike while the iron was hot!

As he racked his brains, the Chongzhen Emperor suddenly thought of a certain species — damned eunuchs.

Although the damned eunuch clique headed by Fang Zhenghua and Wang Cheng'en had always been utterly loyal to him, it was precisely this utter loyalty that made the Chongzhen Emperor feel he ought to send a eunuch.

What was more, with those jingguan, large and small, arrayed before Ligdan Khan's eyes, Ligdan Khan might not necessarily dare to do anything to a Great Ming envoy.

Especially if this damned eunuch happened to be one who served the Chongzhen Emperor personally — then Ligdan Khan would inevitably be wary of harming the rat for fear of breaking the vase.

A mad emperor like the Chongzhen Emperor was someone Ligdan Khan absolutely did not wish to provoke again.

So before killing the envoy, Ligdan Khan would inevitably have to first consider the consequences of doing so — after all, killing an envoy dispatched by the Chongzhen Emperor would be tantamount to slapping the Chongzhen Emperor in the face.

Having made up his mind, the Chongzhen Emperor spoke: "Fang Zhenghua."

Fang Zhenghua kept his feet planted, still standing firmly behind the Chongzhen Emperor, ready at any moment to respond to those impossible emergencies, and merely bowed. "This slave is here."

Chongzhen said, "Within the Depot and the Guard, is there anyone suitable to make a trip to Ligdan Khan?"

Fang Zhenghua pondered for a long moment, then said with an odd expression, "In reply to His Majesty, as for such a person, there is indeed one. A young eunuch who was purified and entered the palace in the fifth year of Tianqi.

This slave, seeing that his martial skills were out of the ordinary, recruited him into the Inner Depot. This man is meticulous, bold, and possessed of an extraordinarily thick skin — he is rather suited to making this trip."

Chongzhen truly had not known that such talent existed within the Depot and the Guard, and said at once, "In that case, let him make the trip, and assign him a few more guards.

Tell Ligdan Khan that if We do not see him return to the Great Ming within one month, We shall once more dispatch troops on a northern expedition to punish the Chahar tribe for their crimes."

Chongzhen did not see Fang Zhenghua's expression, but Zhang Weixian and the others did. Zhang Weixian asked, "Eunuch Fang, is there something you have not finished saying?"

By now, Fang Zhenghua no longer wore that odd look from before and had resumed his usual deadpan face. Hearing this, he said, "Before entering the palace, this man's original family name was Ren, and his parents doted on him exceedingly, giving him the childhood name Tianzhen.

After his parents passed away, he purified himself and entered the palace, but this name, Ren Tianzhen, was never changed. To send someone with such a name as an envoy would simply be a loss of face."

Though Chongzhen suppressed it with all his might, the corner of his mouth still could not help twitching. He waved his hand and said, "What face or no face. Hmm. Tell him that We bestow upon him the name Ren Yizhen, and have him go as an envoy to the Mongol Ligdan Khan's place."

After making these arrangements, Chongzhen continued, "Everyone rest for now. Tomorrow we break camp and return to the capital."

(End of Chapter)