Chapter 2180: Shizong Chronicles 48: The Eighteenth Year of Jianlong

In the winter of the fifteenth year of Jianlong, Empress Dowager Xiao passed away at Yuehua Palace in Luoyang at the age of eighty. Emperor Liu Wenji was on his return journey from the Fengshan sacrifices at Mount Tai when the grievous news arrived from the east. Upon hearing it, he wept bitterly, even collapsing in a faint, throwing the field headquarters into turmoil.

Beyond his overwhelming grief at Empress Dowager Xiao's passing, Liu Wenji harbored a hard-to-speak-of guilt, and the problem still lay with the matter of the Fengshan sacrifices — Empress Dowager Xiao had previously been unequivocally opposed to his performance of this great ceremony.

Because of this, Liu Wenji could hardly avoid associating the thought of "whether the Empress Dowager had been angered to death by him," and even if it were only a one-percent possibility, it was enough to leave Liu Wenji consumed by regret.

At the same time, returning to Mount Tai after forty years, in the dignity of an emperor, relying on civil virtue and martial achievement to sacrifice and proclaim to Heaven and Earth, to the spirits and the heroic souls of his ancestors, should have been a moment of supreme satisfaction, pride, and glory — yet in actual experience, it was not all that pleasant.

The Shizu Meritorious Deeds Stele standing atop Mount Tai was, to Liu Wenji, more majestic and solemn than Mount Tai itself, and more apt to make one feel insignificant. Liu Wenji did have his proud side inwardly, yet standing beneath that stele, he could not help but feel a sense of shame at his own inadequacy...

Therefore, although the Fengshan ceremony ultimately proceeded on schedule and concluded smoothly, at the moment he ascended the summit of Mount Tai, Liu Wenji's heart harbored a measure of regret. The death of Empress Dowager Xiao only intensified this guilt, even giving rise to the mentality of "let the faults of all directions fall upon my own person."

Upon returning to Luoyang, Liu Wenji held a state funeral for Empress Dowager Xiao that could be called sensational, its scale far surpassing that of Empress Dowager Murong's passing back then. He had Grand Academician Zhu Qi compose her biography, recounting her wisdom, steadfastness, dignity, and sagacity, while also bestowing upon her the posthumous honorific title of Filial Manifest Bright Empress.

Throughout her life, Empress Dowager Xiao had contributed greatly to Liu Wenji's growth and achievements, especially through key counsel on key matters. Her passing was also a final reminder to Liu Wenji, and one that had great effect.

At the very least, from after the Fengshan sacrifices in the fifteenth year of Jianlong, Liu Wenji set aside his hard-to-suppress self-satisfaction and his behavior of boasting of his merits and abilities — all the way until his own death.

In the fourth month of the sixteenth year of Jianlong, Commissioner of Military Affairs Cao Wei died of illness. The old Duke and Commissioner of Military Affairs Yang Yanlang had passed away in his residence in the thirteenth year of Jianlong, and Cao Wei, on the strength of his achievement in pacifying the southwest, had naturally risen to the position of Commissioner of Military Affairs upon his return to court.

After Cao Wei's death, the Emperor appointed Chief Inspector of the Palace Command Zhe Weichang to succeed him, and also promoted Dong Congyan and Xiao Hui — the two commanders who had destroyed Jin — to Deputy Commissioners of Military Affairs, re-establishing the military command management system of the Great Han Empire.

However, this arrangement also deepened the contradictions within the military command system. Cao Wei was one thing — with his southwest achievement to compensate, no one could challenge him as Commissioner of Military Affairs on any grounds. But as for Zhe Weichang, although he too came from a distinguished family, Dong Congyan was not at all convinced. Just one point: which weighed more, the southwest achievement or the Mobei achievement?

Starting with Cao Wei, it seemed as though the valve for another round of high-level changes in the empire had been opened. In the autumn of the sixteenth year, Chief Minister and Minister of War Cao Liyong was removed from the chancellorship — he had held the position of chancellor for less than a year.

The reason for Cao Liyong's removal from the chancellorship, in the final analysis, came down to four words: spoiled by favor, growing arrogant. And as a confidant from Liu Wenji's days in the princely residence, a meritorious minister who had followed him from the very beginning, he did have the capital to grow arrogant. This was a trait that ran through his entire career at the center of power — it was only that its degree of manifestation varied across different periods.

And once one lost all sense of proportion and boundary, "favor" easily turned into "anger," inviting disaster. Even before becoming chancellor, Cao Liyong often boasted and flaunted his close relationship with the Emperor, and after a few drinks he loved to share "little stories" from the old days in the princely residence.

After the successful Fengshan sacrifices at Mount Tai, he prided himself on having accomplished yet another meritorious deed for the Emperor, and grew even more arrogant and complacent, forgetting himself entirely. When the mood struck, losing composure before the sovereign was one thing, but he loved to boast of his own merits — especially the "achievement of the Fengshan sacrifices" — which increasingly disgusted Liu Wenji...

Cao Liyong was fortunate. If it had been the Liu Wenji of the period before the Fengshan sacrifices, given his psychological state at the time, facing such a situation, whether he would even have kept his life would have been questionable. Fortunately, Liu Wenji ultimately still considered the decades of sovereign-minister relationship and preserved a measure of dignity for him.

On the pretext of unstable popular sentiment in the Qingtang region, Cao Liyong was dispatched as Qingtang Pacification Commissioner, sent there to take charge, suppress unrest, and maintain order. The Qingtang region had been opened up and recovered during the Shizu era, when the great general Yang Tingzhang pursued the remnants of the Ganzhou Uyghurs and expanded the territory in the process.

In terms of administrative divisions and military defense, Hexi and Longyou each bore their own responsibilities. The Qingtang region east of Qinghai Lake fell under the jurisdiction of the Longyou Circuit, but over the past sixty-odd years, the Longxi Circuit administration's operational focus had been limited to the Hehuang area; as for further west, it was in a relatively weak state in practice.

However, thanks to the court's emphasis on the northwest, with elite troops stationed there, no major unrest had occurred. Yet in the last twenty-odd years, several Tibetan forces had gradually risen in the Qingtang region, some swaying people through faith, others gathering soldiers through ethnicity — such as the demon monk Li Lizun and the Miaochuan clan chieftain Wen Puqi.

Of course, while the two expanded their power and influence, they also did not forget to show deference to the Longyou authorities, paying tribute year after year, and actively communicating under the pretext of the tea-horse trade, which was how stability was maintained.

But in the past few years, both forces had begun to grow restless. Struggles among the various Tibetan tribes in the Hehuang region grew increasingly frequent and fierce, with mutual annexation, and the old order began to fall into chaos. The Longyou Circuit authorities were not entirely inactive — they had sent troops to suppress the unrest — but it only achieved temporary effect. Gradually, the situation in Hehuang and Qingtang reached the ears of the Son of Heaven.

Before Cao Liyong departed westward, Liu Wenji specifically summoned him, treated him to a meal with wine, and, with rare emotion, reminisced with him about old times. Finally, he revealed his feelings: "I intend for our sovereign-minister bond to endure long, but your past conduct has been disappointing."

"Though you are past sixty, an old steed still yearns to run. Qingtang is no easy place, and the barbarian tribes cannot be easily pacified. If you can wake up and reform, pursue your old aspirations, establish new merits, and pacify Hehuang, there will still be a place for you in the Zhaolie Temple of the Eastern Capital and the Meritorious Ministers Pavilion of the Western Capital."

As he took leave of the imperial presence and left the palace, Cao Liyong's eyes were still red. The Emperor's heart-to-heart words had greatly moved him. Cao Liyong had set great ambitions in his youth, vowing to serve his country and sovereign. Though arrogant and reckless, his loyalty to Liu Wenji was unwavering. With his fiery temperament, at the time of his demotion he had already harbored thoughts of death.

But Liu Wenji's words not only dispelled his original "plan," they also made him seriously reflect on his own faults, remember his original intentions, and vow to pacify Qingtang and restore peace to the mountains and passes of Hehuang, so as to repay the Emperor's kindness in recognizing his worth.

From Cao Liyong, one can fully see the truth of "able to correct one's mistakes" and "ambition knows no age." From the moment he went west to Qingtang, Cao Liyong threw his entire being into the work of pacifying and settling the local tribes — politically dividing and co-opting, militarily striking hard — devoting all the remaining years of his life to the high plateau.

During the several years he served as Pacification Commissioner in Qingtang, he successively subdued the Li Lizun and Wen Puqi tribes, exterminating their clans and scattering their followers, further accelerating the sinicization of the Qingtang region, and also laying a solid foundation for the subsequent more prosperous and vibrant Qingtang tea-horse economy.

Cao Liyong ultimately died of a stroke while on an inspection tour of the Haixi region — just as the agreement he had made with Liu Wenji upon leaving the capital had it: leave with head bowed, return to court with head held high, a meritorious minister of Zhaolie, taking his place among them, enjoying incense offerings for all time.

After Cao Liyong, Liu Wenji appointed Palace Supervisor Xiao Gong as Minister of War and made him chancellor. Toward this minister of vital support, who was of Khitan origin and outstanding ability, Liu Wenji had prudently used twenty years before openly elevating him to the high position in the Hall of State Affairs, letting him put his talents to full use.

From Zhang Jian and Cao Liyong to Xiao Gong, the custom of civil officials presiding over the Ministry of War was thoroughly established. Of course, none of these three were purely civil scholars — they were all civil officials well-versed in military strategy.

In the summer of the seventeenth year of Jianlong, Ding Wei was removed from the chancellorship. Nominally it was retirement due to illness in his original post, but in reality, someone had anonymously reported Ding Wei's early crimes of forming cliques to attack rivals, persecuting loyal officials, and harming the state through treachery and deceit. Combined with some of Ding Wei's dirt preserved by the Palace City Office, Liu Wenji could no longer tolerate this old minister.

Of course, the deepest reason was that Ding Wei had also committed the same taboo as Wang Qinruo had back then — forming connections with inner palace eunuchs. However, Ding Wei was truly clever and very good at gauging the imperial will. After being summoned to the palace by the Emperor for a "special" interview, he fell ill again the very next day and submitted a memorial requesting to return to his bones.

At this point, Ding Wei no longer coveted the position of Director of State Affairs, no matter how unwilling and sighing he felt inside. But he was also very clear that if he did not retreat while ahead, even the wealth and glory of his clan, brothers, sons, and nephews would not be preserved.

On the other hand, he could not — and did not wish to — endure hardship in the far northwest like Cao Liyong had. By comparison, leaving the court with a bit of regret, withdrawing from the front line of history's tides, and placing his hopes on later generations was not necessarily a bad thing.

In the autumn of the seventeenth year, with Minister of Works Wang Zeng being appointed Administration Commissioner of the Liangzhe Circuit, the three ministers who had once advocated for the Fengshan sacrifices all left the empire's central government — this could also be considered a statement from Emperor Liu Wenji.

In the eighteenth year, with Salt and Iron Commissioner Lü Yijian being promoted to Finance Commissioner and Hedong Circuit Administration Commissioner Li Zhaoxian being promoted to Chief Censor, the political landscape of Liu Wenji's late reign was formally established.

In the eighteenth year of Jianlong, Emperor Liu Wenji was already sixty years old. Whether as an emperor or simply as a man, he inevitably faced his final days.

Appendix: The chancellors of the Great Han Empire in the eighteenth year of Jianlong — Director of the Secretariat, Prince of Xuchang Liu Yao; Director of State Affairs Chen Yaozuo; Vice Director of State Affairs Zhang Jian; Minister of Personnel Zhang Shixun; Commissioner of Military Affairs Zhe Weichang; Finance Commissioner Lü Yijian; Chief Censor Li Zhaoxian; Minister of War Xiao Gong; Minister of Rites Zhu Qi.