Chapter 313: A Lifetime's Achievements, All Turned to Emptiness

Yuan Chonghuan brushed the snow from his shoulders and stepped slowly into the platform hall.

Entering the hall, he saw a crowd of red-robed high officials already kneeling on the ground, the atmosphere oppressive to the extreme.

Yuan Chonghuan stepped forward, kowtowed, and paid his respects: "Your subject Yuan Chonghuan humbly wishes Your Majesty good health."

The Emperor did not bid him rise, but demanded sternly: "The rebel army has cut off the grain transport and threatens Nanjing — why have you not sent out troops?"

Yuan Chonghuan's breath caught in his throat. He pressed his head to the ground, unable to utter a single word.

The Chongzhen Emperor pressed on: "Why were the rebel troops able to drive straight in, all the way to Poyang Lake?"

Giving Yuan Chonghuan no time to respond, Chongzhen demanded again harshly: "Your arbitrary arrogance caused this great defeat — how will you fulfill your vow to pacify the rebels in five years?"

"Your subject——" Yuan Chonghuan's voice was parched and dry. The moment he had received the oral summons, he knew his fate. Now he understood that even ten thousand words of explanation would be useless.

Chongzhen's patience was extremely limited. Seeing Yuan Chonghuan struck dumb, he immediately said: "Guards! Take this traitor away!"

The Embroidered Uniform Guard Commander Luo Yangxing, who had long been waiting in the side chamber, led his men charging out, seized Yuan Chonghuan, and was about to drag him out — just then, someone shouted: "Wait!"

The speaker was Cheng Jiming, Minister of Rites and Grand Secretary. Kneeling, he said: "Your Majesty, the rebel troops in the southeast are still at the walls of Ganzhou — this is not a time like any other. Changing commanders in the heat of battle is what soldiers and generals most dread. I beg Your Majesty to be cautious!"

Having spoken, he kowtowed to the ground.

Chief Grand Secretary Han and Second Grand Secretary Qian Longxi both remained silent, sighing inwardly. The two of them were Yuan Chonghuan's backers, yet they did not come forward to plead for him — in truth, they knew pleading would be useless. Beneath the Emperor's sage exterior lay a nature that craved quick results and was cold and ungrateful. With Yuan Chonghuan's defeat, the Donglin Faction's death knell had sounded.

Cheng Jiming had only entered the Grand Secretariat a month ago and was still unclear on the Emperor's temperament. He still hoped reason could prevail, and so he kept pleading.

Chongzhen heard this and said coldly: "An incompetent man who has stolen the post of Governor-General — what good will further delay do for the affairs of state?" Cheng Jiming kowtowed again and urged: "Your Majesty! Though the Ming navy has been defeated, there are still a hundred thousand troops in the Ganzhou, Ji'an, and Nanchang area. To recklessly dispose of the Governor-General will only leave the great army without a leader, and it will be destroyed piecemeal! Moreover, this defeat is truly not the fault of His Excellency Yuan alone — it is truly——"

"Silence!" Chongzhen cut him off with a shout, then said to the Embroidered Uniform Guard Commander: "What are you standing there for? Take him away!"

Yuan Chonghuan offered no resistance and was led off by the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

Han and Qian's faces were ashen; Cheng Jiming lowered his head and sighed.

The next day, news that Yuan Chonghuan had been thrown into prison spread through the court. The remnants of the eunuch faction and the purist power-seekers, like sharks catching the scent of blood, immediately turned their memorials into sharp teeth and tore into the fat piece of meat that was the Donglin Faction.

Qian Longxi was the one who had recommended Yuan Chonghuan, and his entanglement with Yuan Chonghuan was the deepest. He was the first to be impeached by the Censors, and Chongzhen ordered Qian Longxi to return to his hometown to await investigation.

The day after, memorials impeaching Han fell like snowflakes onto Chongzhen's imperial desk.

Han had been Yuan Chonghuan's examination patron and had also vigorously supported Yuan Chonghuan — naturally, he could not escape involvement.

Before the Emperor's verdict was even handed down, Han already knew his official career was over. He submitted a memorial that very night, resigning his post and returning to his hometown.

The Grand Secretariat's Chief Grand Secretary position was taken up by Li Biao. Though he too was of the Donglin Faction, at the start of Chongzhen's reign he had advocated lenient treatment of the eunuch faction in order to reconcile factional strife.

Unfortunately, the battles in the court were ten thousand times more brutal than those on the frontier. Every side had already killed until their eyes were red, and no one listened to him at all.

This lenient Chief Grand Secretary served barely a month. Deeply feeling the chaos of court politics, the intensifying factional strife, and his own inability to mediate, he submitted five memorials in succession begging to retire, and was finally granted permission.

The position of Chief Grand Secretary then fell to Cheng Jiming — and he had only entered the Grand Secretariat two months prior.

Cheng Jiming could be counted among the purist faction, not a thoroughgoing member of the Donglin Faction. He was honest and self-disciplined, steadfast in his integrity, and had a good sense of the bigger picture — a rare official in the Chongzhen court who was neither greedy, nor corrupt, nor stupid.

But now the anti-Donglin forces — Wen Tiren, Zhou Yanru, and their like — were in the heat of the kill. Caring nothing for state or court, or political stability, they smeared Cheng Jiming as a Donglin partisan and hounded him relentlessly.

By all rights, Cheng Jiming was neither Yuan Chonghuan's recommender nor his examination patron. Apart from having spoken two words of sympathy for Yuan Chonghuan during the platform audience, he had nothing whatsoever to do with Yuan Chonghuan.

But literati excelled at fabricating charges. Since ancient times, there had only ever been men who could not be impeached down, never crimes that could not be fabricated.

During that month, factional strife raged fiercely in the court, while in the Imperial Prison, a joint trial by the Three Judicial Offices was being conducted against Yuan Chonghuan.

Cheng Jiming was absent due to a leg ailment, and this was seized upon as a breakthrough — he was impeached for trying to help Yuan Chonghuan escape his crimes.

Furious, Cheng Jiming repeatedly submitted memorials to Chongzhen begging to retire, unwilling to wallow in the mire with treacherous sycophants, but Chongzhen each time detained him with gentle words.

At the same time, Wen and Zhou, to deepen the impact of their attack, deliberately steered Yuan Chonghuan's crimes toward colluding with the enemy and betraying the state.

Allowing Lin Qian into the Yangtze, cutting off the grain transport, and threatening Nanjing — that was the evidence!

And Yuan Chonghuan's ancestral home was Dongguan, Guangzhou, where his elderly mother and principal wife both remained — held in Lin Qian's hands. That was the root cause.

The Donglin gentry clans of Jiangnan did much business with Fujian and Guangdong; to protect their maritime trade profits — that was the motive.

Following this line of reasoning, every one of Yuan Chonghuan's actions could be matched to colluding with the enemy and betraying the state.

Yuan Chonghuan forcing the Jiangxi tenant slaves into revolt, letting Lin Qian go to Liaodong to recruit Mao Wenlong, even pulling away the Jiangnan navy and causing the Zhejiang navy to be utterly destroyed — all of it was premeditated.

Had it not been for His Majesty's sagacity in recalling Yuan Chonghuan in time, perhaps the entire Jiangnan region would have been handed over by Yuan Chonghuan.

On the fifteenth day of the tenth month of the first year of Chongzhen, the Three Judicial Offices fixed the charges, determining six great crimes against Yuan Chonghuan: failing in entrusted duties, monopolizing power through deception, allowing the enemy to advance unopposed, halting troops without fighting, losing the army and disgracing the state, and driving the people to rebellion.

The Chongzhen Emperor wrote his vermilion endorsement: "Execute by dismemberment according to law" — that is, death by slow slicing.

On the very same day Yuan Chonghuan was executed, Cheng Jiming, deeply feeling the darkness of the court and disdaining to keep company with demons and ghouls, again submitted memorial after memorial begging to retire, and was finally granted permission.

Around noon, Yuan Chonghuan, loaded into a prison cart, was escorted out of the Imperial Prison of the Provost's Office. By now his hair was disheveled and his face filthy, his expression dazed.

When the common folk heard he had defected to the enemy — and that the enemy was Nan'ao, not the Jianzhou barbarians, which had even less to do with them — they all went about their own business. Occasionally some thrill-seekers threw stones and rotten vegetable leaves.

Yuan Chonghuan was escorted all the way to the execution ground at the Western Market in the capital, and made to kneel on the execution platform.

Vice Minister of Justice Tu Guoding read out the Emperor's sentencing edict.

After hearing it, Yuan Chonghuan's face was expressionless. Only his lips trembled slightly as he murmured: "A lifetime's achievements, all turned to emptiness——"

Tu Guoding put away the edict and said coldly: "Carry out the sentence!"

The executioner stripped off Yuan Chonghuan's clothes, bound him to the execution platform, and began to cut.

The chief cutter was a slow-slicing master from Beijing, whose skill was at its peak — far beyond the rustic hack who had executed Wei Zhongxian.

The chief cutter needed no fishing net to guide his blade; he could cut with precision every time, slicing steady coin-sized pieces of flesh while accurately avoiding the blood vessels. One cut would reveal only a hint of red; wiped with a towel, nothing but white flesh showed beneath.

Most of the capital's citizens did not know Yuan Chonghuan. No one cheered, and no one cried injustice. They all watched numbly. A few local ruffians and thugs, however, waited by the execution platform, staring with eager eyes.

Each time the executioner cut off a piece of flesh, his apprentice placed it into a snow-white plate and paraded it around the execution platform.

The surrounding ruffians and thugs would then spend silver to buy the flesh.

A piece of flesh was worth roughly one qian of silver — a high price, to be sure. But folk rumor held that human flesh cured consumptive diseases, that is, tuberculosis of the lungs, so no matter how expensive the flesh, there were always buyers. The ruffians and thugs were merely scalpers in the human flesh trade, acting as purchasing agents for the wealthy and powerful.

Only after the ruffians and thugs had spent all their silver and dispersed did ordinary folk with sick family members dare to crowd forward.

These people were all sallow and gaunt, clad in tattered rags, holding chipped coarse-clay bowls, their eyes gleaming with hope.

According to folk remedies, besides human flesh, human blood could cure rabies, skin diseases, chills-and-fever ailments, and a host of other hard-to-treat conditions; ground human bone could cure fractures and diseases related to the internal organs.

Though these commoners did not know Yuan Chonghuan, they all pointed at his body to cure their illnesses and save their lives.

Seeing too many people buying flesh, the executioner's apprentice began openly auctioning and hawking, even advertising which part of the body the flesh in the bowl came from and what effects it had.

These commoners had long been drained by their relatives' illnesses, scraping together silver from here and there; after buying the slices of flesh, they all treasured them like precious gems, carefully cradling them, and left with a thousand thanks.

That executioner's skill in cutting men had reached perfection; seeing dusk approaching, he wielded his knife swiftly, flesh slices flying, dazzling the eyes.

By dusk, Yuan Chonghuan had been cut three thousand six hundred times, yet he still cried out unceasingly from between his heart and lungs.

The executioner thrust a knife into his chest, ending his life, caught a bowl of blood from the tip of the heart, sold it to the commoners who had been waiting long, then took out the internal organs and bones, selling each separately.

The commoners, having received their goods, all departed contentedly.

The sun set beyond the western hills, the sky dyed blood-red.

Beside the execution ground, Cheng Benzhi, bound hand and foot, had already wept until he could not speak; with his hoarse throat, he cried out to the heavens: "Injustice!"

As Yuan Chonghuan's staff advisor, he had accompanied the Governor all the way from Jiangxi back to the capital; after Yuan Chonghuan was imprisoned, he rushed about the capital, writing many articles proclaiming his innocence, and in those articles he even said he was willing to die together with Yuan Chonghuan.

This act angered the Emperor, who sentenced him to death by beheading as well.

At this moment, having witnessed Yuan Chonghuan's execution with his own eyes, the executioner behind Cheng Benzhi pressed his head down on the execution block, then raised a great blade and swung it down fiercely—puchi—blood splashed three feet, and the head tumbled to the ground.

In the Forbidden City, Chongzhen received the memorial from the Ministry of Justice reporting that the two traitors Yuan and Cheng had been executed.

Chongzhen said flatly: "Noted."

The Embroidered Uniform Guard withdrew.

Before long, another eunuch came to report: "His Majesty, the Chief Grand Secretary requests an audience."

During this period, the Grand Secretariat had seen frequent personnel changes; the Donglin Faction grand secretaries had been almost entirely purged. After Cheng Jiming left, the new Chief Grand Secretary was Zhou Yanru.

Chongzhen rose and said: "Have him wait for me at the Platform."

A moment later, Chongzhen arrived at the Platform and said: "If it's about the Yuan traitor's matter, let it be. Yuan Chonghuan is already dead; I do not wish to implicate more people."

Zhou Yanru said: "To answer Your Majesty, it is the southeast—Shaoxing—"

"Oh, has Governor Zhu set out? When will he arrive at his post?"

In a fit of anger, Chongzhen had disposed of Yuan Chonghuan, leaving the post of Governor-General of Jiangxi vacant with no one in charge. After much deliberation with the Grand Secretariat, he still decided to recall Zhu Xieyuan from mourning despite the rules.

Though this meant slapping his own face and losing face greatly, the military situation was urgent, and Chongzhen could no longer afford to care.

Once the edict recalling him from mourning was written, it was sent to Shaoxing by eight-hundred-li express relay; calculating the time, a reply should have arrived by now.

Zhou Yanru was silent for a moment, then said: "To answer Your Majesty, according to the reports from all levels of Shaoxing Prefecture—Governor Zhu was abducted by bandits over a month ago, and his whereabouts are unknown—"

"What!" Chongzhen was both shocked and furious. "A Governor-General of five provinces, abducted by bandits while in mourning at home?

Absurd! What is the Grand Secretariat good for?"

Zhou Yanru had only taken office a day ago; being berated like this, he felt utterly wronged, but still said: "For the bandits to have succeeded, someone at court must have tipped them off. It must have been the doing of the Yuan traitor."

An inkstone fell from the imperial desk, shattering into pieces that flew in all directions.

Chongzhen raged: "Yuan Chonghuan is already dead! What more do you people want?"

Zhou Yanru was startled, and immediately kowtowed to beg forgiveness.

Chongzhen said to Wang Cheng'en, who attended him: "Summon the Grand Secretariat, along with the heads of the Ministry of War and the Ministry of Revenue—deliberate anew and produce a candidate!"

While the capital deliberated on a new Governor-General, news of Yuan Chonghuan's imprisonment had just reached Jiangxi; at once the servant uprisings grew fiercer, and whether landlord or commoner, everyone feared for their own safety.

Since the Ming army's defeat at Poyang Lake, Ganzhou city had been besieged so tightly that not even water could pass; fortunately, Yuan Chonghuan had prepared enough grain in advance to feed the army for a year, so military morale remained fairly stable.

Lei Sanxiang had commanded troops for a long time and deeply grasped the essence of the Helmsman's art of war—"attacking the heart is paramount"—so he deliberately ordered a small opening be left around Ganzhou, turning a blind eye to traffic and grain shipments in and out of the city.

Soon news of Yuan Chonghuan's imprisonment spread into Ganzhou city, and before long, news that Yuan Chonghuan had been sentenced to death by slow slicing for six great crimes also reached the city.

Ganzhou's military morale immediately fell into chaos.

At this time, the troops in Ganzhou city were divided into three groups: the largest was the Southern Gan camp soldiers, over thirteen thousand men; next were the Zhejiang soldiers, five thousand; and finally Yuan Chonghuan's Guanning army standard troops, two thousand.

These three groups all came from different places, each with different conduct, accents, and customs.

When Yuan Chonghuan was present, the three groups coordinated flawlessly, like an arm directing fingers.

Once Yuan Chonghuan was gone, none of the three groups would submit to the others, and contradictions came to the fore.

And now Yuan Chonghuan had actually been executed by slow slicing on charges of colluding with the enemy and plotting rebellion! How were the Guanning troops in the city to conduct themselves?

Especially the Guanning army's Assistant Regional Commander You Shilu, Mobile Corps Commander Liu Yingguo, Mobile Corps Commander Luo Jingrong, and others—they were so terrified their legs trembled and their whole bodies shook.

They were all Yuan Chonghuan's direct subordinates, on intimate terms with the Governor; if the Governor had colluded with the enemy, had they or hadn't they?

They had all seen with their own eyes how Yuan Chonghuan had served the court; if even a great loyal minister like the Governor had to be cut over three thousand times, how many thousand cuts would they receive?

Southern Gan Governor Zhang Guowei noticed the change in the Guanning army's morale; he held banquets to reward the troops while promising to petition for merits on behalf of the Guanning officers.

At the same time, Southern Gan Assistant Regional Commander Yang Dezheng, Ganzhou Guard Commander Yao Xi, and others quietly moved Gan troops and Zhejiang soldiers near the Guanning army's defense zone—nominally for coordinated defense, but in reality to keep watch.

For the Guanning officers, outside there was the Nan'ao army eyeing them covetously, inside the Gan and Zhejiang armies were deployed in vigilance, above the court could mete out punishment at any moment, and below the terrified soldiers were on the verge of mutiny.

Truly perilous to the extreme.

This damn Ganzhou city—they could not hold it for even one more day.

But a few days later, when a Guanning soldier and a Zhejiang soldier happened to exchange a few words of quarrel, the three armies immediately went on alert and prepared for battle, and the Guanning army seized the moment to seize the gates and rebel.

The two thousand Guanning troops were incomparably valiant, directly cutting through the Zhejiang-Gan allied formation, fighting all the way to Zhennan Gate and opening the first city gate.

But at this point the Guanning army fell into internal strife—You Shilu called a halt to the attack, wanting to lead the men to attack Baisheng Gate in the east instead.

This was only because he had led many raids on the Nan'ao army's camp, killing and wounding untold numbers of bandit soldiers; if he rashly went to surrender, let alone preserving his military command and position, even preserving his own life would be difficult.

The two Guanning brigade commanders, however, were the exact opposite—they had mainly defended the city and had few blood debts on their hands, so naturally they were not afraid to go surrender to the Nan'ao army.

Just as internal strife broke out, the Gan-Zhejiang army arrived, surrounding the two thousand Guanning troops near Zhennan Gate and turning the city-wall cannons to fire into the city.

The Guanning troops numbered only two thousand; facing several times their number of enemies, bombarded by cannons, with narrow city streets preventing cavalry from charging, after several hours of bitter fighting, signs of defeat were everywhere.

Assistant Regional Commander You Shilu was blown into bits of flesh by a cannon blast.

Mobile Corps Commander Liu Yingguo was struck by dozens of crossbow bolts, shot into a hedgehog, and died from loss of blood.

Mobile Corps Commander Luo Jingrong was hit by gunfire amid the chaos, fell from his horse, and was trampled to death by his own men's hooves.

When the battle ended, the two thousand Guanning standard troops had been slaughtered by nearly half, and most of the survivors were wounded soldiers.

The Zhejiang and Jiangxi armies also lost over a thousand men, with more than three thousand wounded, and over five hundred civilian houses were destroyed—untold numbers of common folk perished amid the chaos of war.

This Guanning army was the elite main force personally selected by Yuan Chonghuan, and most of its men had rendered great service during the Jisi Incident. What a pity that such an elite force was buried at the hands of their own people.

After this battle, Ganzhou City had two thousand fewer mouths to feed, and military rations could last longer.

But morale had sunk to rock bottom. With the Guanning army wiped out, the contradictions between the Zhejiang soldiers and the Jiangxi soldiers immediately resurfaced. With Jiangxi soldiers predominating in the city, the Zhejiang troops all feared they would end up like the Guanning army. On top of that, Lei Sanxiang sent men to urge surrender day and night, and every night soldiers climbed over the walls to flee.

The Zhejiang commanders and the Southern Jiangxi Governor and his ilk grew increasingly estranged in spirit while maintaining a façade of unity.

At this rate, Ganzhou would likely fall before its food supplies ran out.

On the other side, Lin Qian took a boat to move his family to a new residence in Guangzhou.

The new mansion was located northwest of Guangzhou, at the foot of Yuexiu Mountain. It had originally been the residence of a Prefect several terms back, and had sat vacant ever since. After a simple renovation, it became the Lin estate.

The house followed a traditional Chinese courtyard layout, naturally inferior to the residence Lin Qian had personally designed on Nan'ao Island, but it had the advantage of convenient transportation, being extremely close to both the Administrative Hall and the General Staff Headquarters.

Su Qingmei looked around and commented, "Seems a bit smaller than the old residence."

Lin Qian pointed at Yuexiu Mountain and joked, "Not small at all—don't you see we still have such a big backyard garden?"

Everyone laughed and chatted as they began tidying up the rooms.

After a period of adjustment, the various administrative affairs fell into order. The matter of proclaiming kingship and establishing a state was only one step away—that was deciding on the name of the state.

Lin Qian adopted Ye Xianggao's suggestion and convened the Supreme Military-Civilian Joint Conference once again in the main hall of the Administrative Hall.

In the past, the Military-Civilian Joint Conference had always discussed matters of life and death, but deciding the state name and era name was not an urgent matter, so the atmosphere of this meeting could be more relaxed—they even had the kitchen prepare an abundant tea spread.

Unexpectedly, everyone from Ye Xianggao on down arrived in formal attire with extraordinarily solemn expressions, their measured steps taken with utmost gravity. Even Scholar Zhou's face carried an air of excited resolve, as if he were going to his death.

No sooner had the meeting begun than all sides immediately launched into verbal sparring, citing classics and quoting authorities to refute one another, yielding not an inch.

Before Lin Qian could even figure out what state names each side was proposing, the debate had already reached a fever pitch.

The discussion shifted from colloquial speech at the start, gradually becoming more literary, then developing into parallel four-and-six-character phrases—everyone was composing elegant prose extemporaneously.

Then the military officers joined the discussion. Their classical citations were somewhat weaker, and the content drifted back toward colloquial speech.

After listening for quite a while, Lin Qian finally began to catch on. The military officers wanted to set the state name as "Wu" or "Yue."

The civil officials mostly supported "Cheng" or "Jing" and the like.

Since the era name "Dashun" had already been rejected by Lin Qian, no one brought it up again.

Chen Jiao waved his hand impatiently: "Enough of this endless prattle. Let me ask you—where did Nan'ao start from? Fujian and Guangdong! In the pre-Qin era, both provinces were the lands of the Hundred Yue. Isn't it only natural to call it Yue?"

Ye Xianggao tried to smooth things over: "Hmm. Using the names of pre-Qin ancient states like Wu, Yue, Chu, and Qi as state names does conform to the convention for naming states.

Think back—when Emperor Gaozu of Han took 'Han' as his state name, and Emperor Taizu of Zhao took 'Song' for his, both derived from the names of their fiefs.

By extension, the state names of Wei, Jin, Sui, and Tang all originated without exception from the places where their founders rose to power.

As the saying goes, 'Award land and confer lineage, establish the state by enfeoffment'—founding a state on a fief's name truly accords with the righteous path of kingship."

Chen Jiao listened with his mouth agape: "Right, right! That's exactly what I meant!"

Scholar Zhou said with righteous indignation: "Wrong. The characters Wu and Yue have been passed down for thousands of years and have long become shorthand for the Jiangnan region. They can only be temporarily used by minor states seeking partial peace—they don't match our ambition of carrying on the past and opening the future.

When Emperor Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang, was conquering the realm, he too was styled the Prince of Wu, yet in the end he founded the Great Ming, did he not? Surely 'Ming' isn't an alias for Fengyang?

The *Book of Changes* says: 'Supreme indeed is the primordial power of Kun; all things owe their birth to it, and it obediently carries out heaven's will.'

The *Book of Documents* also records: 'To inherit the way of heaven, to govern the principles of the people.'

Taking 'Cheng' as the state name precisely accords with the principle of 'inheriting heaven's mandate and responding to the people,' and subtly echoes the prophecy of 'desiring to stop, then stopping.' I think it is the most fitting."

Ye Xianggao nodded repeatedly again, praising the character "Cheng" at length, which left Lin Qian caught between laughter and tears.

Zheng Zhilong slowly shook his head: "According to the numerological principles of the Three Powers, the character 'Cheng' has eight strokes total. Its heavenly stem is Xin, and Xin is yin metal. So if we set 'Cheng' as the state name, does that mean the new dynasty must belong to the Metal Virtue?"

Zheng Zhilong naturally could not be so learned as to rattle off the Five Elements of every character on the spot. Before the meeting, everyone already knew full well what state names the others would propose, and had long since consulted the classics and prepared their rebuttals.

Scholar Zhou and Zheng Zhilong then launched into a grand debate over yin-yang and the Five Elements.

Taking the opportunity, Lin Qian quietly asked, "Grand Secretary, weren't we discussing the state name? Why have we started discussing the Five Elements?"

Ye Xianggao said, "This is the Theory of the Cycle of Five Virtues proposed by Zou Yan, the Yin-Yang School philosopher of the Warring States period. Since then, every dynasty has possessed a virtue, and they generate and overcome one another in turn.

For example, the Southern Song was of the Fire Virtue, and the Great Jin was of the Earth Virtue—this is what is meant by earth being born from fire.

The conquered Great Yuan was of the Metal Virtue—this is metal overcoming wood. And the Great Ming belongs to the Fire Virtue—this is fire overcoming metal."

Lin Qian asked doubtfully, "How is it overcoming one moment and generating the next? Should we ultimately decide on generation or overcoming?"

Ye Xianggao said calmly with a smile, "Each has its own reasoning."

In truth, since the Song and Yuan dynasties, a dynasty's virtue was no longer held in much regard. Setting it was merely for good fortune—no one would make an issue of virtue.

But now, at this critical moment of deciding the new dynasty's state name, naturally every argument available had to be deployed. After all, the most important thing about a state name was also good fortune.

These were matters that could not be clearly articulated, with no formula to calculate that would convince everyone wholeheartedly—one could only argue every which way.

Among those present, the faction led by Zheng Zhilong proposed that the new dynasty be of the Water Virtue, symbolizing the overthrow of the Great Ming, similar to how Qin used water to overcome Zhou's fire virtue.

Moreover, water is said to moisten and flow downward, governing concealment, wisdom, and transformation.

In plain words, a Water Virtue regime cherishes the people's strength, values scientific research, breaks old systems, and promotes reform—consistent with Nan'ao's governing philosophy.

Furthermore, the *Book of Documents* states: 'Heaven generates water in the first position; earth completes it in the sixth.' Thus a Water Virtue dynasty takes six as its supreme number.

As it happened, Lin Qian ranked sixth among his sworn brothers—everything aligned perfectly.

The other faction, led by Scholar Zhou, proposed that the new dynasty be of the Earth Virtue.

Surveying Chinese history, apart from the pre-Qin period and after the Song dynasty, all other dynasties primarily inherited through the mutual generation of the Five Elements, signifying inheriting the previous dynasty's virtue and carrying on the past into the future.

The Great Ming is of the Fire Virtue, and fire generates earth, so the new dynasty should be of the Earth Virtue.

Moreover, earth occupies the center, governing bearing, transformation, stability, and harmony—corresponding to the virtue of the sage-king, and is the orthodox means of receiving all directions

and governing the realm.

Among all the dynasties throughout history, Han and Tang were both of the Earth Virtue, and both were powerful, flourishing dynasties—an extremely auspicious omen.

After all, the new Nan'ao dynasty has not yet conquered the realm. Setting the Earth Virtue also signifies acknowledging the legitimacy of the Ming dynasty, which would facilitate the surrender of Ming officials.

Lin Qian listened to the two factions arguing and felt his scalp go numb, thinking to himself that the Five Elements had so many nitpicky rules. He asked Ye Xianggao beside him, "Grand Secretary, the Virtue of Water and the Virtue of Earth both sound fine—I want both. What should I do?"

Ye Xianggao laughed and said, "This theory of the Five Elements is nothing but baseless talk to begin with; it carries no weight."

Watching the debate drag on all morning without even settling on what virtue the new dynasty possessed, let alone the reign title or era name, was exasperating.

Lin Qian had someone bring out tea for a break, first to cool the tempers of both debating sides.

Just as everyone was sipping tea and eating snacks, a personal guard hurried over to Lin Qian and said in a low voice, "Helmsman, the Hirado fleet is back—one ship was seized."

Yahei

Pink Round

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