Chapter 383

I Really Don't Attend to My Proper Duties, Main Text Volume, Chapter 394: The Seven Deadly Sins of the Old Slave Chieftain. The qualification for Nurhaci to enter the capital for tribute needed to be fought for by Nurhaci himself, and he had to exhaust every means to do so. For the many tribes outside the pass at this time, being a dog for the Great Ming was the greatest honor, unlike some stray dogs that ran around without knowing who their master was.

For the many tribes outside the pass at this time, and for countries like Joseon, Ryukyu, Annam, Siam, Laos, and Ceylon, this was not a joke, but reality.

If Nurhaci returned smoothly from this tribute mission, he would receive immense benefits.

First is prestige; by stepping on the reputation of the Baturu, he gained the qualification for tribute. Second is profit; he could exchange items like horses, ginseng, and deer antlers for many, many rewards. If he could obtain the qualification for border trade, that would be even better. Finally, by borrowing the tiger's might, having someone in the Great Ming was also a soft power that deterred other tribes. If he could obtain investiture from the Great Ming, he would be legitimate.

These were all the benefits Nurhaci wanted.

San Niangzi San Niang was a typical example. Her ability to sideline Altan Khan was indeed a support and manifestation of the power of the reconciliation faction within the Northern Barbarians, and how could it not be thanks to the support from the Great Ming? Without the support of the Great Ming, the reconciliation forces within the Northern Barbarians would also have adopted a wait-and-see attitude.

Nurhaci would experience a total of three tribute missions. Each time, he gained huge harvests, and through these three missions, he also witnessed the prosperity, decline, and rot of the Great Ming, which ultimately made him determined to oppose the Ming.

After Zhang Juzheng died, the Great Ming began to decline rapidly. By the end of the Wanli era, it could no longer be described by the word "rot."

Nurhaci's military talent was not dazzling; it was definitely not as good as that of Li Chengliang, Xiong Tingbi, or Qi Jiguang. Even He Shiexian, a little-known Liaodong Regional Commander, could pin Nurhaci down and beat him. Nurhaci's success, in the vast majority of cases, was because the Great Ming's cooperation was simply too good.

Do the times create the hero, or does the hero create the times?

Zhu Yijun did not want to debate the reason for Nurhaci's success. From the moment he arrived in the Great Ming, he had been waiting—waiting for the day Nurhaci took the bait. As long as Nurhaci stepped onto Great Ming territory, he would be sent into the Dissection Institute by this Emperor, allowing Nurhaci to witness a little bit of the capriciousness of power.

It was not Nurhaci stepping into the capital, but Nurhaci stepping into Great Ming territory. From the moment he set foot on the road of tribute, the end of his fate was already sealed.

If one paid close attention, one would find that Zhu Yijun was really good to foreign envoys.

The rumors between San Niangzi San Niang and the Great Ming Emperor grew increasingly intense among the people, and the parties involved did not refute them. Tumeng Khan even felt at ease letting his most talented son, Buyan, travel to the Great Ming. Li Yashi received preferential treatment, and even his marriage received the blessing of the Great Ming Emperor, although Li Yashi was ill-fated in love. Antonio received massive investment from the Great Ming Emperor, and of course, the Great Ming also received generous returns. Diego de spoke rudely and was only beaten up. Rui de roared in the palace and was merely expelled.

It was only because of the Great Ming's strategic need to develop both sea and land that they received such preferential treatment. Likewise, it was also a trap set by Zhu Yijun.

This fact caused Nurhaci to never think that entering the Great Ming for tribute would be such a dangerous thing.

Zhu Yijun had envisioned several endings for himself and Nurhaci, among which there were three main directions.

The first was to let Nurhaci stay outside the pass, holding his thirteen suits of armor, stepping on stinking fish and rotten shrimp to show off his power, integrating the three major forces of the Jianzhou Jurchens, Haixi Jurchens, and Wild Jurchens to fight a decisive battle with the Great Ming, and then the Great Ming would win and send Nurhaci to the Dissection Institute.

The second was for the Great Ming to constantly strengthen its military, devote all its efforts to developing the Liaodong direction, strangle Nurhaci in the cradle, capture him, and send him to the Dissection Institute.

The third was for Nurhaci to enter the Great Ming for tribute according to established history, which brought him to Zhu Yijun's home turf. Zhu Yijun would exert the absolute advantage of his imperial power and send him into the Dissection Institute.

Zhu Yijun was doing all of this. Even the partial preferential treatment for foreign envoys was a trap Zhu Yijun deliberately left behind and was also part of the plan. The partial preferential treatment for foreign envoys was the bait necessary to fish, to hook the fish that was Nurhaci.

Zhu Yijun never thought of taking Nurhaci as a lackey. History had already proven that barbarians like Nurhaci were simply wolf cubs that could not be tamed. When the Great Ming showed the slightest sign of decline, they would bite back. Nurhaci's fifth-generation ancestor, Dong Shan, was like this, and Nurhaci himself was even more so. It was only after receiving investiture from the Great Ming that he gained the status to integrate the Jurchen forces, and in the end, he turned against the Great Ming.

When raising a dog, it at least knows how to bark twice when someone comes to the door to invade.

Nurhaci was entering the capital; he set off from Liaoyang.

For the various Eastern Jurchen tribes, Liaoyang was already the most prosperous city they could imagine. Gule Fortress was just a mountain stronghold, and Turen City was less than ten miles in circumference. Having fifty thousand people living inside already made it the largest force outside the pass.

In Nurhaci's eyes, Liaoyang, with a circumference of over thirty miles, was an impregnable Heavenly Capital. It had brick walls, every embrasure was equipped with cannons, there was a moat outside the walls, and outside the moat was a gentle slope that was unfavorable for siege charges but favorable for defensive shooting. When Nurhaci left Liaoyang, he pondered for a long, long time before he thought of a way to break through Liaoyang.

He had to take it. Only by taking Liaoyang could he prove that he was the one destined by Heaven.

Solid fortresses are often broken from within. As long as the imperial court and the local authorities were at odds, the day the Liaodong region relied heavily on surrendered barbarians, Liaoyang might not be impossible to take.

Nurhaci's tribute caravan had not left Liaoyang for long before it arrived at Guangning. As soon as he arrived at Guangning, Nurhaci couldn't wait to climb high and look into the distance, and then he immediately realized the importance of Guangning's location. From Guangning, one could go to three places: Liaoyang, Daning Guard, and the eastern foothills of the Yanshan Mountains at Shanhai Pass.

Only by occupying Guangning could he completely break free from the cage! Only then could he occupy the dominant position of being able to attack and defend!

Only by occupying Guangning could he mobilize troops from Liaodong, break through and attack at any point along the Great Ming's long Great Wall defense line, plunder the money, grain, and population he needed, and further expand to crush the already weak Northern Barbarians and bring them under his command!

In Xiong Tingbi's three-party strategic deployment, Guangning was the key location. As long as Guangning remained in the hands of the Great Ming, Nurhaci's Later Jin would be blocked in Liaodong, and the Later Jin was destined to be a flash in the pan, becoming a meteor streaking across the long river of history, similar to Yesen, Dayan Khan, and Tumeng Khan.

But Wang Huazhen, relying on being a disciple of the Donglin Party leader Ye Xianggao, led sixty thousand troops to fight a decisive battle with Nurhaci, and then Guangning fell into the hands of the enemy.

Perhaps this is part of military talent: one only needs to climb high and look into the distance to immediately understand the importance of this place and why it is important.

Nurhaci left Guangning with reluctance. If they could get Guangning, they Jurchens might not be unable to enter the Central Plains again like the Jin Dynasty in history. Nurhaci's ambition was not achieved overnight. The Jin people defeated the Liao Dynasty, then defeated the Northern Song, and entered the Central Plains; the Mongols went south, defeated the Western Xia and the Jin Dynasty, conquered the Southern Song, and entered the Central Plains.

The two thorough defeats of the Northern and Southern Song dynasties completely shattered the myth that the Central Plains were invincible, giving the barbarians unrealistic ideas.

Logically speaking, with the Northern and Southern Song dynasties and the Central Plains dynasty having fallen, the Central Plains people and the Han regime should have perished and fallen apart, but history is just that unreasonable. Expelling the barbarians and restoring our China, the Great Ming was established. Thirteen times they went north to pacify the barbarians and sweep away the bandits, and the Northern Barbarians, who made the world tremble, were dismembered and left gasping for breath.

Great Ming people are extremely proud of the Great Ming.

Five days later, Nurhaci arrived at the Great Ming's Shanhai Pass. After walking through the southern foothills of the Yanshan Mountains, Nurhaci felt a bit of despair. Wanting to break through those fortresses from the southern foothills of the Yanshan Mountains and then break through Shanhai Pass—in Nurhaci's eyes, this was an impossible task!

From a military perspective, this line of defense was simply impossible to break through.

Without breaking through Shanhai Pass, there was no need to dream of entering the Central Plains. Xifengkou could indeed be broken through, but the mountain roads were narrow. Breaking through from Xifengkou and other places would at most allow for some plundering, but one would have to withdraw troops, lacking follow-up power. To enter the Central Plains, one had to go through Shanhai Pass, but from a military standpoint, it was impossible to fight through here.

Entering the pass was as difficult as ascending to heaven.

Nurhaci, Huang Taiji, and Dorgon—three generations—none of them were able to break through Shanhai Pass. If Wu Sangui hadn't offered up Shanhai Pass, how could Dorgon have entered the pass?

Nurhaci's arrival at Shanhai Pass was the despair of being unable to enter the pass. By the time he arrived at Jizhou, a slight climb to look into the distance turned his despair into complete hopelessness. One only needed to deploy ten thousand combat-ready troops in Jizhou, and the Great Ming capital region could rest easy.

His ambition, stirred by personal bravery and military talent, shrank back again. Perhaps being a dog for the Great Ming was indeed a fortunate thing.

On a military level, the Great Ming's seemingly endless health bar was its layered strategic depth.

First, one had to defeat Nikan Wailan, the dog the Great Ming raised outside the pass, and then deal with the wrath of Heaven—the fury of the Great Ming Emperor and the heavenly soldiers and generals. Only after resisting the Great Ming's punitive expedition could one plot for Fushun Pass, crush the Great Ming's Liaodong Great Wall defense line, and then face the impregnable Liaoyang. Reaching this step already made one an outstanding talent of the age.

Even if a pig were guarding Liaoyang, with the military level of the Jianzhou Jurchens, it would be impossible to capture. But capturing Liaoyang was not impossible; one only needed to incite the surrendered barbarians to rebel, which might be worth a try, but that was as far as it went.

After that were Guangning, Shanhai Pass, Jimen, and the capital.

It couldn't be done; it simply couldn't be done.

Nurhaci lingered at Jimen for a day. Soon, he received the customs clearance documents from the Great Ming Ministry of Rites and the Court of State Ceremonial. He began to lead his people toward the capital, the place where the Great Sovereign of the Four Seas, the Great Ming Emperor, lived.

Nurhaci's ambition, although shrunken, still had some extravagant hopes, such as the Great Ming falling into internal chaos, which might be worth a try.

But when he walked to the capital, Nurhaci felt that his ambition was a joke. All he saw was prosperity.

Countless merchant caravans, even in the situation where heavy snow blocked the roads, were still firmly advancing toward the capital on the official post roads. The ruts and the footprints of people and livestock crushed the accumulated snow, and thus a road was formed.

He thought he had already arrived at the capital, but after a slight inquiry, he discovered that he had only arrived at the grass market outside the city. Those endless rows of civilian houses were not the capital.

At this moment, Nurhaci finally understood completely why Altan Khan and Tumeng Khan broke through the passes and plundered the capital region, yet never had the thought of breaking through the capital.

The endless rows of civilian houses in the grass market outside the city were the greatest enemy of cavalry. As soon as they entered here, the cavalry would lose their greatest reliance: mobility. As long as the Great Ming military and civilians still had the heart to resist, deploying troops among the civilian houses could repel the invading enemy, just like when Yu Qian led troops out of the city to fight and repel the Oirat leader Yesen.

The endless stream of people, the bustling streets, the laughter and harmony—the Great Ming falling into internal chaos was clearly an unrealistic fantasy. At least for Nurhaci at this moment, he couldn't find any reason why the Great Ming would fall into internal chaos. Once he entered Shanhai Pass, Nurhaci clearly knew that he had only been living in hell before; this was the human world.

Nurhaci adjusted his mindset. This trip to the capital was to find every possible way to obtain investiture from the Great Ming. His grandfather, Giocangga, had not obtained the investiture of Commander of the Jianzhou Left Guard. The Great Ming seemed to have forgotten this matter. After eliminating Wang Gao and Wang Tai, they had never invested a new Commander. The Great Ming also hadn't invested the dog Nikan Wailan.

If the name is not legitimate, the words will not be convincing.

And this time, one of Nurhaci's purposes for entering the capital was to obtain the investiture of Commander of the Jianzhou Left Guard. More clearly, it was to obtain the qualification to become a watchdog for the Great Ming in an extremely submissive posture.

"Is that Nurhaci?" Zhu Yijun put down his telescope, holding the waist sword in his hand. He was standing in a high pavilion outside the Four Barbarian Hostel, observing Nurhaci with the telescope. The extremely sturdy old slave chieftain looked like he was really capable of fighting.

He was capable of fighting, but Zhu Yijun had many people, and this was his home turf.

Zhu Yijun had set up a net of justice, waiting for Nurhaci to throw himself into the net.

Nurhaci entered the capital at Deshengmen. This was the military road and also the city gate for tribute envoys from the north of the Great Ming to enter the capital. Under the reception of officials from the Court of State Ceremonial, Nurhaci smoothly checked into the Four Barbarian Hostel.

It was just that the Four Barbarian Hostel on this day seemed exceptionally quiet. After the officials of the Court of State Ceremonial guided Nurhaci and his party to check in, they disappeared without a trace.

Zhao Mengyou stood by the Emperor's side. After the Emperor left the palace, Zhao Mengyou would absolutely never leave the Emperor's side by more than ten feet. He had to protect the Emperor's safety, so the two Assistant Regional Commanders in charge of arrests were responsible for the arrest.

These two Assistant Regional Commanders each led three hundred Embroidered Uniform Guards, lying in ambush inside the Four Barbarian Hostel. Even when everything was arranged, the Assistant Regional Commanders still didn't know what this operation was actually going to do. They received orders and executed them; military orders are like mountains, and that was how it was.

Information is always one-way transparent upward.

The two Assistant Regional Commanders received the Emperor's edict and the Ministry of Justice's arrest warrant. Today's mission finally became clear: the target was Nurhaci, who had just checked in.

The Embroidered Uniform Guards began to act. Nurhaci didn't offer any resistance before being pinned to the ground, firmly bound with ropes. A pair of socks was stuffed into Nurhaci's mouth, and a sack covered Nurhaci. Two Embroidered Uniform Guards carried the sack and returned to the Northern Suppressing and Pacifying Office.

Without a doubt, this was an extremely simple arrest operation. The two Assistant Regional Commanders demonstrated their professional arrest capabilities.

Nurhaci was caught in the net.

When Nurhaci was thrown into the prison, the Embroidered Uniform Guards began to fill in the information on the Ministry of Justice's arrest warrant.

The arrest warrant, personally stamped and approved by the Minister of Justice, was a blank warrant.

When the Emperor personally killed Xu Jie at the Northern Suppressing and Pacifying Office last time, there was no warrant, and it was handled as a "Yellow Paper Case," which made Wang Chonggu quite worried. Therefore, when the Minister of Justice Wang Chonggu had an audience, he handed a thick stack of stamped warrants to the Emperor. In the future, when killing people, he could let the eunuchs write down the charges, which would be legal, compliant, and in accordance with the process.

Zhu Yijun only took ten blank warrants.

Zhang Juzheng repeatedly taught that the most important part of the Emperor exercising power was for the Emperor himself to cultivate his character and not use power capriciously. The imperial power of the Great Ming Emperor was simply too great; the Emperor's little capriciousness was a disaster for the human world.

Just like in "Journey to the West," where the Jade Emperor's little capriciousness caused no rain in Fengxian County for three years, resulting in no harvest and the people suffering unspeakably.

As a disciple, Zhu Yijun learned extremely well. He had never used the power in his hands capriciously, not even once.

Zhang Juzheng testified that the Emperor was never capricious. He even tried several times to get the Emperor to act recklessly, but he never succeeded.

The greedy and stingy Great Ming Emperor actually allowed the Great Ming customs tariff to remain at 6% for so many years without ever thinking of raising taxes, which was enough to see the Great Ming Emperor's caution in exercising power.

The Great Ming Emperor finally acted capriciously once, arresting Nurhaci at the Four Barbarian Hostel.

But this time it was still not a capriciousness of power, because Nurhaci was also a person who deserved to die according to the Great Ming Statutes, the Great Ming Code, and the Great Proclamations, and he deserved to be sliced into a thousand pieces.

Zhu Yijun was in an extremely good mood. Looking at Nurhaci in shackles before him, he revealed a smile. This guy had finally fallen into his hands.

Letting Nurhaci develop and then fighting a decisive battle with him at the end of the Wanli era—Zhu Yijun would never do that, because military operations have wins and losses. The Battle of Sarhu, no matter how you look at it, should have been a sure win for the Great Ming, but the Great Ming still lost. Attacking Liaodong with all one's might was simply too expensive; the manpower, material resources, and financial resources were all astronomical figures.

Taking advantage of Nurhaci entering the capital for tribute to arrest and kill him was both cost-saving and very steady.

This kind of "Son of Heaven" figure—the more you suppress him, the faster he grows. Every suppression brings him new opportunities. Either don't act, or when you do act, kill him in one go and wipe him out completely.

"Greetings to Your Majesty, Long live Your Majesty, long live, long live!" Nurhaci didn't hesitate at all and bowed his head. On the way here, he was extremely surprised: who would dare to act at the feet of the Son of Heaven, in the capital, the place of greatest benevolence?

And then Nurhaci soon realized that he had been arrested by the Emperor.

The person in front of him, although wearing casual clothes, was recognized by Nurhaci at a glance as the Emperor. A noble who lived in luxury, seventeen or eighteen years old, served by beardless eunuchs, plus the respect of the Embroidered Uniform Guards and Assistant Regional Commanders around him—after the sack was removed, Nurhaci determined the identity of the visitor in the first instance: this was the Emperor.

Nurhaci was very smart.

"This sinful subject is terrified. This sinful subject truly does not know how he provoked the wrath of Heaven. I beg Your Majesty to clarify." Nurhaci was very nervous, and cold sweat broke out on his back, but he still chose to plead guilty in the first instance. The supreme Emperor had arrested him, so he must be guilty. He was a sinful subject, but he needed to know what the charges were to argue his case.

In the great crisis of life and death, Nurhaci appeared extremely submissive.

Feng Bao presented a memorial containing Nurhaci's charges.

Zhu Yijun opened the memorial and said with a smile, "Deceiving the monarch, disloyalty, aiding rebels, crossing forbidden borders, disturbing the border, unrighteousness, and immorality."

These were not trumped-up charges, but facts.

First is deceiving the monarch: faking the tribute. The dispute over tribute between Nurhaci and Jaisai was a well-documented act, especially the matter of Nurhaci and Jaisai becoming sworn brothers. There was human, material, and documentary evidence. Faking tribute was an unforgivable capital crime; this was deceiving the monarch. During the Jiajing era, the dispute over tribute by Japanese envoys caused a farce of true and false envoys, making the Great Ming lose face.

Second is disloyalty: Zhang Juzheng said Li Chengliang was raising bandits to increase his own importance. Li Chengliang was indeed doing so. Nikan Wailan was the bandit Li Chengliang raised, but in official definitions, Nikan Wailan was also an important tool for the Great Ming court to control the barbarians outside the pass. He was the Lord of Turen City who had received an official title from the Great Ming court. The conflict between Nurhaci and Nikan Wailan was a refusal to submit to Great Ming rule, which was disloyalty.

According to the rules, Nikan Wailan was the envoy for this tribute mission.

Besides deceiving the monarch and disloyalty, there was aiding rebels. The rebel chieftain Wang Gao set a trap to kill the Great Ming Garrison Commander Pei Chengzu, and Wang Gao's daughter-in-law was Nurhaci's cousin—the daughter of Nurhaci's grandfather Giocangga's eldest son, Lidu. This was aiding rebels. The rebel chieftain Wang Gao and Nurhaci's uncle were in-laws, and Nurhaci's family also served under Wang Gao.

Deceiving the monarch, disloyalty, and aiding rebels—these three charges alone were enough for Nurhaci to die ten thousand times.

Crossing forbidden borders: except for border trade, any unauthorized entry into the Great Ming was crossing forbidden borders. Nurhaci led a group of Eastern Jurchens and often entered the pass to plunder. The border people were repeatedly plundered, and crossing forbidden borders was also one of the major crimes. The Great Ming clearly defined Nurhaci's crossing of forbidden borders not as sneaking into the Great Ming for trade, but as burning, killing, and plundering, which happened three times.

Disturbing the border: when Hou Yuzhao just arrived at the Tieling Guard's flower tower, Li Chengliang took troops out for seven days before returning to the Tieling Guard. The person disturbing the border this time was the Yehe tribe, but the one who came up with the idea was Nurhaci. This included the two beacon tower scouts who were hung in the woods; they were also captured by Nurhaci and sent to the Yehe tribe. After Nurhaci began entering the capital for tribute, Li Chengliang, Hou Yuzhao, Zhou Yong, and others interrogated the prisoners of war and learned of this detail.

Daring to kill the Great Ming's beacon tower scouts—even Altan Khan didn't have the guts to do that now!

Altan Khan released the captured beacon tower scouts, and the Great Ming still welcomed the heroes home with the highest etiquette. Altan Khan only dared to capture the beacon tower scouts and then return them to the Great Ming.

Unrighteousness: Nurhaci cruelly murdered Wula, the horse-supervising official sent by Nikan Wailan to the Fushun border trade. Wula worked under Nikan Wailan and also held an official position as a border trade supervisor in the Great Ming. According to the tally, only Nikan Wailan had the qualification to trade with the Great Ming. After Wula was killed, the position of horse-supervising official for trade with the Great Ming fell into Nurhaci's hands under Jaisai's operation.

Immorality: Nurhaci cruelly murdered a Liaodong family of six outside the pass for two taels of deer antlers. All six died. This was originally a cold case that wasn't even reported. It was only after Li Chengliang captured Jaisai that he learned of this matter from Jaisai's mouth, but five years had already passed, and the victims had already turned into a handful of yellow earth.

"Except for the last case, because too much time has passed and it cannot be thoroughly investigated, let's assume I slandered you. As for the rest, the evidence is as solid as a mountain. Do you plead guilty?" Zhu Yijun closed the memorial. He very carefully explained the seven major charges one by one.

"This sinful subject deserves to die ten thousand times!" Nurhaci was completely terrified. If any one of these charges were true, it would be a capital crime, let alone seven! Six of them were ironclad evidence. Now, besides begging for mercy, he had no other way.

Nurhaci's forehead was covered in sweat. He thought for a long time and immediately kowtowed again, saying, "Noble Your Majesty, what Nikan Wailan can do, I can also do. I beg Your Majesty to give this sinful subject a chance to prove this."

Nurhaci thought that the Emperor arrested him because Nikan Wailan saw him becoming more and more powerful and therefore requested Li Chengliang to eliminate him. So, Nurhaci only needed to prove that he was a good dog, and there might be a way to survive!

This was already the best way to escape guilt he could find in such an urgent situation.

"Nikan Wailan, from the second year of Wanli to the end of the seventh year of Wanli, never once disturbed the border or crossed forbidden borders. You tell me, why should I use you?" Zhu Yijun handed the memorial to Feng Bao, stood up, and left directly.

The process had reached this point; Nurhaci was already a dead man. This life, he, Zhu Yijun, wanted it! Even if the Lord of Heaven came, it would be useless; the Great Ming Emperor Zhu Yijun said so!

Since he was the one who caught him, naturally he would pronounce the sentence himself. Nurhaci was indeed a very smart person, and he had military power and even strategy, but so what? Li Chengliang said Nurhaci could not be tamed and was treacherous and difficult to control.

Facts proved that Nurhaci was indeed difficult to control. After Nikan Wailan submitted to Li Chengliang, for five full years, he never once disturbed the border or crossed forbidden borders. Guarding the house didn't necessarily mean being able to bite the thieves to death, but one must be loyal.

Nurhaci had everything, except loyalty.

As the Great Ming-invested Dragon and Tiger General and Commander of the Jianzhou Left Guard, he brazenly opposed the Ming and tossed about for three generations—from Nurhaci to Huang Taiji to Dorgon. After tossing about for so long, they still didn't break through Shanhai Pass.

This was also the congenital terminal illness of the Qing Dynasty: its legitimacy was flawed.

The Qing Dynasty did not replace the Great Ming, but together with the rebel Wu Sangui, defeated Li Zicheng's Great Shun.

The Great Ming ultimately lost to itself.

The Qing Dynasty was extremely special. Looking at history, only the Jin Dynasty was somewhat similar, with three horses in one trough. And the stench of the Jin Dynasty, even under feudal ethics, was not recognized by everyone as a unified dynasty. When talking about the Jin Dynasty and the Sima family, people would just sigh, "The Three Kingdoms exhausted the heroic spirit, and the two Jins were full of rats."

The Great Ming's natural and man-made disasters were endless, and civil unrest grew higher and higher. Under the Great Ming's internal chaos, the Jianzhou Jurchens stole the Mandate of Heaven.

As the Great Ming Emperor, Zhu Yijun was qualified to mock the Qing Dynasty. Not to mention Liu Bang, Li Shimin, and others, Zhu Yuanzhang started with a bowl and finally obtained the Mandate of Heaven. This was the true legitimacy of a dynasty; this was the true Mandate of Heaven.

Zhu Yijun left the Northern Suppressing and Pacifying Office. The officials of the Ministry of Rites were completely stunned. What happened?

San Niangzi San Niang of the Hui Tong Hostel, the Western envoy Li Yashi, and the Mughal envoy Shah Mamaiti began to request an audience. Zhu Yijun agreed. The Minister of Rites Ma Ziqiang and the Minister of Personnel Wan Shihe brought them to the Wenhua Hall for an audience.

The Grand Secretary of the Wenyuan Pavilion Zhang Juzheng and the Grand General Qi Jiguang followed the Emperor all day. They saw what the Emperor did and did not oppose it; instead, they supported it with all their might. It was just that Zhang Juzheng and Qi Jiguang felt that the Emperor didn't need to come forward personally—just killing a Nurhaci, what a big deal.

San Niangzi San Niang was still full of charm, Li Yashi had walked out of the grave of love, and Shah Mamaiti was still performing his signature move, tossing silver bags to the palace maids he saw.

One had to admit that the way Shah Mamaiti threw the silver bags was really handsome.

"Envoy Shah, if you throw them like this again, it will make me feel even more awkward. I am so wealthy, yet I have never thrown them like this." Zhu Yijun teased, making the atmosphere in the Wenhua Hall change from oppressive to relaxed.

It was clearly for a reason, not because the wind direction in the Great Ming was changing.

"Oh, my noble Emperor, I have studied this posture for a long time. This throwing posture must appear casual and elegant. It is best to use your left hand to pretend to block it. The thrown silver bag doesn't need to be accurate; the servants will go to catch the money bag themselves, just like this." Shah Mamaiti took out another silver bag and threw it toward the Censor of Ceremonies.

The Censor of Ceremonies reached out, knocked the silver bag back, and incidentally placed his hand on his embroidered-spring sword.

Shah Mamaiti was startled. He was really used to throwing them. He hurriedly said, "Oh, my respected Emperor, your personal guards are always so serious. I have no intention of offending. I beg Your Majesty to forgive my sin."

"No matter." Zhu Yijun waved his hand, signaling the Censor of Ceremonies not to take it to heart.

"For such a serious sin of mine, Your Majesty has forgiven me so easily. Even God does not have Your Majesty's forgiveness. I heard that Your Majesty arrested an envoy at the Four Barbarian Hostel. Timid as I am, I beg Your Majesty to tell me some details so that I can sleep well tonight." Shah Mamaiti immediately climbed up the pole and asked about the matter at the Four Barbarian Hostel.

Under his unrestrained appearance, Shah Mamaiti had a delicate mind.

"This is the reason for the matter." Zhu Yijun handed Nurhaci's seven deadly sins case file to Feng Bao, and Feng Bao began to explain.

Shah Mamaiti said angrily, "Oh! Damn it! How dare he offend the gods of the human world like this! Fortunately, I have a submissive heart."

Of the seven deadly sins, only the last one was made up by the author himself; the others were ironclad evidence. Seeking monthly tickets, Awoo!!!!!!!!!!!!