Chapter 1035: The Great Light Sect Grand Patriarch Ma Liang Dies for the Faith

"What a good thing, you still want to go to Fengyang to farm?" Zhu Yijun smiled. Feng Bao could take turns with Li Yougong to listen to orders before the imperial throne, or he could be an ancestor in the palace, but he could not go to Fengyang, otherwise he would become a

Having served as an attendant before the Emperor for twenty-one years, he had mastered far too many secrets, and these secrets determined that he could never leave the imperial palace.

Farming in Fengyang is the final destination for most elderly Ming eunuchs, but it is absolutely not the destination for these 'ancestors' of the palace; they can only die of old age within the palace walls.

"Then I shall leave everything to Your Majesty's arrangement." Feng Bao smiled upon hearing this. He was actually acting; after all, he was a veteran actor of a lifetime, but this kind of performance would be seen through at a glance. Moreover, he was testing the waters—he was actually testing whether His Majesty would protect him.

"You are a meritorious official of the Wanli Reform. If you go to Fengyang, how will you be buried in the Jinshan Imperial Cemetery? Just rotate with Li Yougong for the time being. You should also mentor him; he is a bit too young and impetuous." Zhu Yijun made the arrangement; it was an arrangement, but also a promise.

Feng Bao was a meritorious official of the Wanli Reform, and Zhu Yijun never had any intention of making things difficult for Feng Bao because of those minor matters from his youth.

Once, twice, but not a third time; Feng Bao had not committed any new offenses, and making things difficult for a meritorious official would only grieve those close to him and gladden his enemies.

"Your subject obeys the decree and thanks Your Majesty for your immense grace." Having received the Emperor's promise, Feng Bao immediately beamed with joy, and even the sinister air that eunuchs could never quite shed dissipated by several degrees.

Eunuchs are the Emperor's household servants. If they wish to leave a good name in history and become a virtuous eunuch, they must share in the Emperor's merits. His Majesty clearly did not care about such merits, or rather, His Majesty had never really cared about his posthumous reputation.

Feng Bao truly, truly wanted to be a virtuous eunuch. Just as he himself had said, a person's life boils down to just those two things: fame and profit.

As for profit, having gained control of the imperial estates, he never lacked silver. Moreover, the people of Ming all pursued the goal of living on in the world through their names; as long as the world did not forget him, he would still live on in the hearts of the people.

"Li Yashi has written an article." Feng Bao presented a miscellaneous gazette before the throne and said with a complex expression: "Doctor Lin Fucheng says: Li Yashi is being sycophantic to the extreme."

"Oh?" Zhu Yijun picked up the gazette and read it for a long time. This gazette was bilingual, in Latin and Chinese, with the title: *The Darkness Before Dawn, Long Enough to Despair*.

After finishing the article, Zhu Yijun found that it was indeed just as Lin Fucheng had said—sycophantic to the extreme.

【Western technology has been stagnant for a long time. From 2,400 years ago, when legends were first recorded, until 1,200 years ago, the entire West could not even produce pig iron, nor could they manufacture long swords exceeding two feet in length.

After the Roman Empire split and fell, from 1,100 years ago to 100 years ago, there was not a single advanced technology, technique, or theory. It was not until 100 years ago, with the start of the Renaissance, that they began to value mathematics.

Meanwhile, on this land of China, there successively appeared achievements in metal smelting such as pig iron, cast iron, malleable cast iron, ductile cast iron, the steel-cladding method, the steel-stirring method, blast furnaces, and blowers;

There appeared excellent and convenient textile machinery such as the inclined loom, the jacquard loom, the hand-cranked spinning wheel, the foot-pedal spinning wheel, the vertical loom, and the multi-spindle spinning wheel. These machines are ingenious; their complexity is such that even today's top Western craftsmen cannot imitate them. These tools are at least 60 times more efficient than hand-weaving.

There appeared multi-tube seed drills, water-powered trip hammers, curved-shaft plows, and so on. The agricultural machinery in agricultural books is as vast as the ocean. They even popularized animal-powered farming more than 3,000 years ago.

The latest oracle bone script shows that as early as the era called the Shang Dynasty, they already possessed livestock farming, and these livestock were so abundant that they could be used for sacrificial offerings.

To this day, the entire West remains dominated by labor-intensive hand-weaving and manual sowing. The majority of commoners still live in darkness.

From ancient times to the present, from legend to today, the ruling class in the West remains the nobility, who can kill or spare commoners at will.

These nobles, relying on bloodlines and intermarriage, pass down their power. The ugly custom of close-kin marriage among royalty and nobility has caused the curse of hemophilia to hover over the West.

From legend to today, the West has not evolved a system of selecting officials through examinations. Any commoner wishing to achieve a breakthrough in class can only engage in religious industries or fight endlessly on the battlefield, striving for a chance to survive.

Meanwhile, in China, a public health system was established very, very long ago. And long ago, at an unknown time, they already possessed the collective experience that "those of the same surname should not marry, for evil will not propagate; if men and women share the same surname, their offspring will not flourish." Moreover, amidst blood and fire, they gradually established a complete system for selecting officials and talent through examinations.

These experiences have been passed down from generation to generation without interruption to this very day.

Serfdom has existed for a long time. People living in the Ming Dynasty find it hard to understand the horror of the serf system.

Serfs must farm land for landlords without compensation and perform labor service. Commoners have almost no possibility of receiving an education; only nobles, clergy, and their apprentices can receive literacy education. It can be said that the entire West is almost entirely illiterate.

Production resources such as mills and ovens were once monopolized by landlords, and landlords possessed independent judicial power, allowing them to ignore all laws and punish serfs at will.

Ming landlords and local gentry still need to take advantage of natural disasters to create man-made ones in order to annex land. This annexation process is very long; it took the Ming Dynasty two hundred years to complete this. Even after completing annexation, landlords and gentry still cannot kill or spare tenant farmers at will; even demanding annual gifts can trigger riots that break through city walls.

The rebellion of the field soldiers in the three counties of Ninghua, Ruijin, and Ningdu still shocks me to the point of speechlessness. It was also on that day that I fully realized the complete difference between the Ming Dynasty and the West, and understood what the Mughal envoy Shah Muhammad said: the Ming Dynasty has no nobility.

Ming people seem to naturally believe that a murderer must pay with their life, believing it should be so. Even Ming nobles cannot kill commoners at will; even the Emperor himself requires a travel permit to kill someone legally and legitimately.

Western agricultural production is extremely backward. It was not until 400 years ago that a tenancy system appeared in a very small part of the West, paying farmers a meager, negligible labor reward.

Due to the lack of iron, labor tools are extremely scarce, agricultural yields are extremely low, and farmers have no planting experience. Every planting is a reclamation, infinitely cycling between reclamation and abandonment.

The sale of offices and titles in the West is so prevalent that no one thinks this behavior is wrong or needs to be corrected.

With only a small amount of reward, one can obtain a permanent official position; with only a small amount of tax, one can wantonly abuse one's power to seek profit. Everyone also thinks this is completely legitimate and reasonable, and silently endures these sufferings.

The Dutch East India Company has recently gradually appeared in the vision of the Ming people. Ming officials in the Ministry of Rites were quite surprised that as long as one pays a little tax, one can exist beyond the order.

Western laws are extremely chaotic. I communicated with officials of the Ministry of Rites about the many Western codes. The contents of these codes left the Ming officials dumbfounded and completely unable to understand. Absurd trial-by-ordeal laws and the practice of whipping vagrants would not cause resistance.

I tried my best to explain to my colleagues that we Westerners have resisted; the Dutch are resisting this ignorance, resisting this cruel and bloody rule.

But this resistance is not universal.

In the West, law is a tool from beginning to end, completely maintaining feudal privilege, church authority, and oppressing the bottom-level commoners. But the Ming Dynasty is not like this. The Ming Dynasty uses law to shape the collective consensus of society; they call it public order and good customs.

When the Ming Dynasty concludes major criminal cases, it requires seven types of evidence, including confessions, witness testimony, documentary evidence, and physical evidence. During the trial, it requires on-site inspection, examination of corpses and injuries, and verification of murder weapons. What is most surprising is that if one is dissatisfied with the verdict, one can actually appeal to a higher level.

For difficult cases, one must even use the procedure of joint ruling by the elders of the Senate; the Ming Dynasty calls it the "Joint Discussion of the Nine Ministers."

What is even more surprising is that the elders of the Senate are all from commoner backgrounds! Because nobles are not allowed to participate in the imperial examinations.

Even if the law is not universally observed, and even if some local officials do not rely on the law to judge cases but rely on their own judgment, the Ming laws still allow people to live like human beings.

Today, the morning star of dawn has risen. Marion, this Great Shepherd, used her own life to ferry the wisdom of the Ming Dynasty from the East to the West.

As long as one knows of the existence of light, one can no longer tolerate darkness.

...】

This article is very, very long, discussing the differences between the West and the Ming Dynasty from many aspects, including technology, labor relations, talent selection, industrial and agricultural production, law, and political system.

The darkness before dawn looks like the dawn is imminent, but this period is also the darkest time.

The morning star of dawn has risen. Li Yashi believes that the widespread dissemination of the Great Light Sect will bring huge changes to the West.

Li Yashi has completely taken on the appearance of a scholar-official. He certainly noticed the possibility of "acclimatization issues," but he believed that those minor problems were not worth mentioning compared to the harm of darkness.

"Isn't Li Yashi a devout Catholic? He swore never to marry for the sake of his faith. Is he now converting to the Great Light Sect? His tone is too similar to those priests of the Great Light Sect." Zhu Yijun finished reading the article.

"Knowing light, one cannot tolerate darkness"—this is entirely the doctrine of the Great Light Sect.

Feng Bao said with a face full of smiles: "He is now a believer of the Great Light Sect. As for faith, didn't King Henry of Falanxi just perform such a show once?"

"That's true." Zhu Yijun chuckled. Henry IV's conversion gained him widespread support; this faith is like a prostitute's waistband—a bit too loose.

Li Yashi's article can be used as a manifesto for ideological colonization. He wrote it in Latin, hoping that this article could be passed back to the West to bring enough changes to the West. Moreover, he wrote this article also to commemorate Marion, who might already be dead.

Marion had more courage than Li Yashi. Marion chose to die, becoming a torch to illuminate the path for those who followed.

Li Yashi hides in the Ming Dynasty, muddling through life and enjoying peace.

The Ming Dynasty is busy dealing with the changes in heaven. The Ming Dynasty has its own underlying logic; if the imperial court cannot lead the people to safely survive the changes in heaven, it will lose the Mandate of Heaven.

For the past Li Yashi, this was hard to understand. Isn't disaster a punishment from God? Are those who suffer disaster all sinful people? Why should people save them? Why should the imperial court bear the responsibility?

Now Li Yashi can fully understand: the Ming Emperor is alive and can be judged, but God cannot be judged.

Li Yashi thinks Marion is dead, but at this moment, Marion, who was locked in the Bastille, is still alive.

Her condition is very, very bad. During the defense of the Great Light City, she was at the forefront, suffering multiple fractures throughout her body. Her left hand had completely lost its ability to move, and there was a half-foot-long wound on her right leg, deep to the bone. Her chief physician had stitched the wound for her and applied wood ash.

Her lips had completely lost their color, and her hair was scattered casually, losing its former luster, making her look more like a ghost. But her expression was unusually peaceful, leaning against the cold stone wall, looking at the light cast by the small skylight.

She likes light, likes the feeling of light shining on her body.

The Bastille was built 100 years ago for the purpose of defending against England's invasion of Falanxi during the Hundred Years' War. The Bastille is right in front of the city gate of Paris, initially existing as a military castle.

As the scope of Paris expanded, the Bastille gradually became the King's prison, specifically for detaining various criminals. Likewise, this is the commanding height of all of Paris.

After Henry IV captured the seriously wounded Marion, he let Marion's chief physician treat her. This chief physician had studied at the Ming Capital University for four years and was a physician Marion had cultivated herself at the cost of 10,000 silver in tuition fees.

Marion's life or death was very troublesome for Henry IV. He was even unwilling to send his own court pharmacist to treat her.

Once Henry's pharmacist treated Marion to death, the believers of the Great Light Sect would certainly think that he, Henry, had secretly executed Marion.

Fanatics of any religion are not to be trifled with, let alone the even crazier Great Light Sect.

Henry IV had seen the fanaticism of the Great Light Sect with his own eyes. Marion had clearly sent almost all the missionaries out of the Great Light City, leaving only the Free Knights who believed in honor to face the destruction of the Great Light City.

Yet all the priests who received the news unanimously chose to return to the Great Light City to be destroyed along with it.

Martyrdom is the most fervent and sincere expression of faith.

Henry IV won against the Free Knights, but after the battle, he felt that he had lost completely.

Once Marion died, Henry IV would become the target of crazy assassinations by fanatics. In the riddled Falanxi court, he, Henry IV, would never have a day of peace.

Therefore, Henry IV would rather let Marion's chief physician and a few saints be present to treat her than send his own court pharmacist.

"Open the door. This is the Great Shepherd. I want to see how she is different from other women." A voice broke the silence of the Bastille.

Arguments came from in front of the cell. Not long after, a clattering sound rang out, and the cell door was slowly opened.

Robert Spier walked into the cell. He held his neck high, revealing the ruff collar on his neck, like a proud swan.

"What a pitiful woman, she doesn't even have clothes." Spier looked at Marion's figure. To make treating her injuries more convenient, Marion only covered herself with a piece of linen cloth. Although simple, it was very clean.

The wise prophet had told Marion that cleanliness can prevent disease. The more injured or ill one is, the more one must be clean.

"Who are you?" Marion asked calmly.

"Robert Spier. You must have heard my name. I am a member of the Paris Committee of Sixteen. Without the support of our Committee of Sixteen, Henry IV could not have become the new King of Falanxi, nor could he have entered Paris." Spier puffed out his chest and said proudly.

Marion thought carefully. Blood loss made her thinking not so agile. It took her a long time to recall who this person was.

"Is it that Spier who, because of whoring, contracted syphilis, leading to the ulceration of his neck and calves, who had to use a ruff collar and high boots to cover those ulcers, and had to use perfume to cover the rotten stench, and is known as the ugly Spier?"

"Oh, right, you are also Philip II's lackey, wanting to work with the Duke of Mayenne to let Falanxi return to the embrace of the Lord." Marion's tone was very calm, stating the things she had remembered.

This person was very famous in Paris. He went whoring and contracted a disease. Syphilis rotted both his neck and calves.

Philip II attacked Falanxi in the 17th year of Wanli, attempting to interfere with the succession to the Falanxi throne, but was defeated by Henry IV.

The Duke of Mayenne was a traitor to Falanxi, and this Robert Spier had an extremely close relationship with the Duke of Mayenne. Parisians all said that once the Spanish Tercios arrived in Paris, Spier would open the city gates and surrender.

"You!" Spier was incomparably angry. He stepped forward and said with extreme anger: "You are finished. I tell you, no matter who comes today, I must try to see how you, this Great Shepherd, are different from those Parisian prostitutes!"

Marion lost interest in talking and looked at the skylight. Spier was delaying her sunbathing. This was the only half-hour of the day when there was sunlight.

"Why aren't you afraid?" Spier was even angrier.

Marion ignored him completely. He could do whatever he wanted. She was already seriously injured and could not resist; she didn't even have the strength to commit suicide.

As for why she wasn't afraid? She wasn't even afraid of death.

Just as Spier was about to approach, he heard hurried footsteps.

"Robert Spier, by the King's order, I command you to leave immediately!" A man like a lion walked into the cell, drew the sword in his hand, and pointed it at the other party.

The warlike Falanxi King Henry IV had come to the Bastille.

For various reasons, he had always kept his hand on his sword. At the critical moment, he saved Marion, sparing her from harassment.

"Hmph!" Spier's eyes kept flickering, and finally, he left the cell.

After Spier walked far away, only Henry and Marion were left in the cell.

"Boring tricks." Marion was a bit disappointed. The sunlight had left, and her complexion looked even worse.

Marion was not a fool. Clearly, Henry IV had arrived long ago and was waiting outside, just waiting to come out to buy people's hearts.

"What a troublesome fellow!" Henry saw that his plan had failed, but he was not annoyed. He sat on a chair, looked at Marion, and said: "I came to find you to seek your cooperation. I will create a disturbance after you recover."

"After you get out of prison during the disturbance, you can continue to lead the Great Light priests to preach. I will issue a Light Edict, allowing the spread of the Great Light Sect in Falanxi. You can continue to kill those nobles."

"You have also seen that these nobles do not seem to respect me, the King. I ordered that no one should disturb your rest, but Spier still came."

Marion then said with some surprise: "Your courage is truly great. You want a very expensive fur—that is, to truly sit on the throne of the King, with everyone obeying your orders and no one daring to disobey your commands—but you are negotiating with the devil. In the Ming Dynasty, this is called 'seeking skin from a tiger'."

Human desire for power is endless. When not a king, one wants to be a king; after becoming a king, one feels that the ministers are not obedient enough and the power of the nobles is too great.

Henry IV smiled, revealing a wry smile. He saw hatred in Marion's eyes.

Henry shook his head and said: "Perhaps. Although I am a noble, my mother's ambition caused me to suffer endless hardships."

"I grew up in a mountain village in Béarn. You might not know where it is—a very remote village. There was only black bread that was so hard you couldn't bite it, muddy cold water, and linen clothes that couldn't cover your stomach."

"At that time, I swore that one day, when I became King, I would let every farmer in Falanxi have a chicken in their pot, because that was the most delicious thing I had tasted when I was young."

"I hope we can cooperate. As for the throne, if you are truly strong enough to defeat me, I can give it to you."

"I don't think you can do it. I used only 3,000 men to defeat Philip's ten Tercios—as many as 30,000 men were defeated by my 3,000."

"I am very strong. I am not afraid of your threat to the throne. If the Great Light Sect can truly bring light to Falanxi, I don't mind the Great Light Sect becoming the state religion."

"You know, I am a Protestant. Now that I have converted to Catholicism, I can also talk. I can believe in the Great Light Sect."

Marion understood Henry IV's meaning. Henry IV needed a knife to clean up those disobedient nobles, allowing him to take a step further and become the true King of Falanxi.

After seeing the supreme power of the Ming Emperor, Henry IV naturally could not tolerate the situation of being constrained by nobles, and these nobles were even planning to betray Falanxi at any time, defect to Spain, and let Falanxi return to the embrace of the Lord.

"You might succeed, but that person will definitely not be me." Marion shook her head and said: "I am going to die."

"Can't even the medical students cultivated by the Ming Dynasty save you?" Henry IV asked in shock.

Marion said with a wry smile: "Those are medical students, not omnipotent messengers of God."

What the two said could be described as "donkey lips not matching horse mouths" (talking at cross-purposes).

Henry IV clearly had a very deep misunderstanding of the Great Light Sect. This misunderstanding was caused by listening to those rumors. He thought the Ming Dynasty was omnipotent, and even such serious injuries could be cured.

"But I heard that the Naples disease can be cured in the Ming Dynasty, and smallpox too." Henry IV unconsciously spread his hands and asked: "Isn't the Ming Emperor a god walking on earth who knows everything and can do everything?"

"Uh..." Marion was stunned, but soon felt relieved.

This is the difference of the Great Light Sect. The Great Light Sect relies on human wisdom, not God's great power.

The Naples disease is syphilis. No one knows how this demon, which cannot be eradicated, appeared. Italians and Germans call it the "Falanxi disease," the Falanxi call it the "Naples disease," the Russians call it the "Polish disease," and the Poles call it the "German disease."

This virus spreads everywhere in the West through dirty environments and prostitutes.

"Does the Ming Dynasty have no way to treat the Naples disease?" Henry IV asked with some confusion.

"Yes, it can be cured." Marion answered this question very affirmatively. Her chief physician had studied medicine in the Ming Dynasty for four years, had seen with his own eyes the use of old brine to treat tuberculosis, and had read the medical books written by the chief physicians. It could indeed be treated.

This virus spread throughout the world along the great shipping routes. The Songjiang Prefecture Medical School of the Ming Dynasty discovered this disease, which makes Westerners talk about it with fear, for the first time in the 14th year of Wanli.

The originally hesitant Songjiang Prefecture government decisively closed all brothels, completely banned the legal existence of prostitution, and severely cracked down on secret prostitution.

Soon, coastal towns in the Ming Dynasty followed the footsteps of Songjiang Prefecture, banning brothels. Any foreigner entering the Ming Dynasty had to undergo repeated inspections to prevent the spread of this disease from the source.

In this day and age, those who can afford to visit brothels are all powerful and wealthy squires and gentry. Poor laborers at most eat a fast meal. The horror of this imported disease made the powerful and wealthy squires immediately choose to agree with the government's ban and execute it quickly.

People cherish their lives, not to mention this shameful disease.

The Ming Dynasty has medicine to cure mild syphilis. Old brine can curb symptoms before the "plum blossoms" grow too much, and long-term use can cure it.

But old brine is very precious. The microbial engineering bacteria factories only have three official factories, and the scale is too small. Even the public welfare pharmacies in each prefecture of the Ming Dynasty do not have many bottles of old brine.

"Isn't that a god?" Henry IV immediately said as a matter of course: "I understood it correctly."

"This is human wisdom, not a miracle!" Marion weakly refuted, correcting Henry IV's statement again.

"You cannot die. If you die, those fanatics will definitely use various methods to assassinate me." Henry IV looked at Marion's very weak appearance and asked with slight urgency: "Is there anything I can do?"

It was useless even to let Marion write a suicide note saying she died in battle. Marion had ordered the priests to leave the Great Light City and not return, but those priests still returned to die.

"His Majesty bestowed upon me twelve bottles of old brine, which were for me to save my life, but I have already used them up. I cannot be saved, so don't try to find a way." Marion said with a calm face: "I can only wish you good luck."

"Then, can this holy water be found in the Portuguese palace?" Henry IV thought of a possibility. He had never suffered such a big loss in his life.

The Battle of the Great Light City was won, but it was more uncomfortable than losing. If he had known, he wouldn't have fought it!

"Time is running out." Marion revealed a bleak smile. Even if Antonio were willing to give it and bring it back to Paris, there wouldn't be enough time.

Three days later, Marion passed away in the Bastille.

Seven days later, the remaining priests of the Great Light Sect, angry to the extreme, launched a riot and broke into the Bastille.

The priests retrieved the Great Shepherd's body and, according to the Great Shepherd's last instructions, threw the body into the fire, burning it into ashes, placing them in a box, wrapping it in the last linen cloth that covered her body, and sending it to Lisbon.

His Highness Antonio had once promised that if Marion sacrificed herself for the light, her remains would be sent back to the Ming Dynasty to rest in peace.