Chapter 835: The Poison of the Jimi System, the Deep-seated Illness Attached to the Bone

The Korean envoy Li Houbai dared not commit suicide. If he had dared to commit suicide, he wouldn't have waited until now. Ending one's own life requires courage, especially for someone like Li Houbai who has read many books, understands reason, and has no worries about food and clothing.

He had many opportunities to commit suicide, such as when the Japanese pirates swept through like autumn leaves in a month and reached Pyongyang, and the destruction of the country was imminent; or when Li Yan was killed by Li Shunchen, his monarch was dead, and Korea was substantially destroyed, he could also have committed suicide.

But he didn't. Yet, on the eve of the Great Ming cleaning up the mess in Korea, when the Emperor was receiving foreign envoys, he insisted on raising some inappropriate conditions to let the Great Ming kill him.

He didn't have the courage to commit suicide. While wanting to use the Emperor's knife to kill himself, he also wanted to leave his name in history.

Zhu Yijun saw through Li Houbai's true face. He actually hadn't decided whether he wanted to die or where Korea should go. If the deposed Korean King Li Yan had been a monarch worth following, and if the Korean royal family and the civil and military officials had diligently governed the country to peace and prosperity, Li Houbai would definitely have died for his country when it fell.

But it wasn't worth it.

Li Houbai knew deeply that being beaten to Pyongyang by Japanese pirates in one month was a total collapse. That Korean royal family and that Korea were not worth dying for.

Zhu Yijun didn't care much about Li Houbai running to Korea and leading the Korean people to resist the Great Ming.

The Annam of the Yongle and Xuande years was completely different from the current Korea. The Korean population of 9 million had fallen to 4.5 million in just two years. This blood feud was avenged for Korea by the Great Ming army.

When Gao Qiyu was negotiating with Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Toyotomi Hideyoshi proposed a condition, hoping that the Great Ming would not send soldiers and civilians from Korea to Japan's mines. Toyotomi Hideyoshi would rather have Great Ming people stationed there than have Koreans enter, because in the eyes of the Japanese, they were all Great Ming dependencies, but there was still a distinction between high and low.

The Japanese always believed that they were defeated by the Great Ming, not by Korea. As a defeated party, Korea had no qualification to station troops in Japan.

On the other hand, the Japanese were afraid. They were afraid of Korean revenge. These Koreans didn't care about any moral anomie at all and had no hesitation in killing.

Influenced by Wan Shihe's view that "barbarians are wolf-hearted and beast-hearted," Zhu Yijun always believed that the barbarians of this era could only understand the language of fists. If you beat them up, they would be honest, and they would adapt themselves.

Secondly, Zhu Yijun was not worried at all that Li Houbai could make any waves after returning to Korea.

Great Ming people could not understand the thoughts of these people—Koreans, Japanese, Annamese, and Luzonians. Even though they were all in the Confucian circle, there were still huge cognitive differences.

These people could never decide their own destiny and could only let others decide it. They were completely unable to imagine what it was like to decide their own destiny, and the experience their ancestors left them was not

to grasp their own destiny, but to adapt to the experience of recognizing a father and the mode of thinking.

Even the meat-eaters and scholars in these places were like this. When discussing problems, they opened their mouths and closed their mouths with "Ming father," "Spanish father," "Foreign father." Saying "parent state" was this typical self-adaptive father-recognizing mode at work.

Without a father on their heads, these people instead felt panicked and strange. They had to have a father riding on their heads, pointing fingers at them, before they felt at ease.

Even the Westerners were like this—Red-haired barbarians, Golden-haired barbarians, and even the Ottomans were like this. It's just that the father on their heads was that invisible and untouchable God, that is, religion.

This caused great trouble for the Great Ming Ministry of Rites, because the barbarian envoys from these places liked to recognize fathers themselves and habitually thought that others would also recognize fathers. Because these barbarian envoys could only be chess pieces and chessboards, they particularly liked to choose sides, and naturally assumed that the Great Ming also had to choose sides.

But the Great Ming knew deeply that it was a chess player and did not need to choose sides.

For example, in the conflict of the Spanish expedition to England, while the Great Ming and Spain were friendly states, it also provided salt to the Netherlands for the oath-breaking alliance, provided new ships to Falanxi for cargo distribution, and would also do business with the Ottomans.

Making money, it's not shameful.

Wan Shihe once defined this self-adaptive father-recognizing thinking pattern as "the poison of the Jimi system, the deep-seated illness attached to the bone, without spirit or master, the spine is hard to straighten."

That is: the colonial thinking trap.

Even Annam, which had gathered a consensus of resistance for various reasons, had never escaped this colonial thinking trap.

During the Jiajing years, because of the rebellion of powerful ministers, Annam chose to kneel. During the Yongle years, Annam changed from a dependency to an inner prefecture of the Great Ming. During the Xuande years, it changed from an inner prefecture of the Great Ming back to a dependency. During the Jiajing years, it changed from a dependency of the Great Ming back to a territory of the Great Ming.

The Mo clan of Annam was the Great Ming's Annam Pacification Commissioner, with a rank of 2b, a hereditary local official.

From beginning to end, Annam had never escaped the prefix of the Great Ming.

Korea was also deeply trapped in this colonial thinking trap, without a universal consensus of resistance. Li Houbai returning to Korea would not be able to make any waves.

"Summon the Spanish special envoy Pedro for an audience." Feng Bao flicked his whisk and summoned the envoy for an audience.

"See the Great Ming Emperor. Long live the Great Ming Emperor, long live, long live." Pedro performed the ceremony. Even though he had made many efforts, this mission still did not achieve his wish. The relationship between the Great Ming and Spain as friendly states seemed to be drifting further and further apart.

This was not Spain's fault, nor was it the Great Ming's fault. As time passed, the competition between the Great Ming and Spain over the ownership of the "Empire on which the sun never sets" intensified, and their interests no longer converged, leading to this situation. Although they possessed some very beautiful memories, they eventually gradually walked to the situation today.

"Exempt from the ceremony. Has the fire in the Rich Bai Yin Mine not ended yet?" Zhu Yijun asked about the situation of the Rich Bai Yin Mine.

The Great Ming and Spain were friendly states, but the boat of friendship said it would capsize.

This all started with the mountain fire at the Rich Bai Yin Mine. Spain used the mountain fire at the Rich Bai Yin Mine as an excuse to reduce the input of silver to the Great Ming, which caused the Great Ming's economic development to fall into the fear of a money shortage again.

Pedro took a deep breath and said: "Reporting to Your Majesty, the fire at the Rich Bai Yin Mine has been extinguished, but it will take some time to restore production."

"You must guard against fire. If your country cannot prevent fire, the Great Ming can provide some help. Oh, by the way, has the barbarian riot at the Rich Bai Yin Mine subsided?" Zhu Yijun asked with a smile again.

This was another reason Spain gave the Great Ming. The mountain fire led to a decrease in land output, the natives of the Rich Bai Yin Mine began to riot, the Viceroyalty of Peru could not control the situation, the silver output of the Rich Bai Yin Mine was blocked, so it could not provide sufficient silver.

"The unrest has gradually subsided," Pedro answered, biting the bullet.

"You have also heard that the Great Ming has successively established the Golden Pool Viceroyalty and the Great Iron Ridge Guard. One produces gold, and the other produces iron. The Great Ming's expedition to Japan has also been quite smooth. Japan has agreed to hand over all mineral production. I hope the Rich Bai Yin Mine will not have any more fires or riots," Zhu Yijun added sarcastically.

What fire, what riot—they were all excuses. Bai Yin was transported back to Spain by the treasure fleet to prepare for the expedition to England.

"The problem Your Majesty mentioned, after I return to the West, I will definitely report it to His Highness," Pedro was not a fool, of course he understood the Emperor's dissatisfaction.

Zhu Yijun asked again: "Rui De gave you a stack of Great Ming treasure notes. What do you think of these treasure notes?"

The Great Ming had established a brand-new currency issuance system around the treasury of Tonghe Palace and had already begun pilot projects in Shuntian Prefecture. These treasure notes were generally regarded as silver notes among the people. Bai Yin notes and treasure notes were very similar, but there were still differences. Bai Yin notes were bookkeeping currency, while treasure notes were credit currency.

Pedro thought for a while and said: "The printing is very exquisite, and the paper is wear-resistant and waterproof, not easy to damage, and the anti-counterfeiting is excellent. It is more exquisite than the silver notes in many banks in the capital, and also better than the gold bonds currently circulating in Spain."

Pedro spoke the truth. Compared with Great Ming treasure notes, the gold bonds that Philip had come up with were no different from toilet paper. They were just handwritten bonds, easy to lose and easy to damage, and inconvenient to use.

Of course, the subtext was also very clear: the Great Ming had supplemented liquidity in its own way, and silver would not be an obstacle to the Great Ming's development.

Rui De instructed Pedro not to threaten the Great Ming with silver. First, threats were useless, and second, provoking confrontation would only be harmful to Spain.

"Supreme Great Ming Emperor, as a distant friendly state, can we obtain some of Your Majesty's

promises?" Pedro said with a heavy face.

Zhu Yijun sat up straight and asked: "What kind of promise do you want?"

"Do not sell firearms, ships, and other military items to England." Pedro put forward his request.

Zhu Yijun nodded and said: "Regardless of whether Spain requests it or not, as long as England has not met the Great Ming's requirements and revoked the privateering license, the Great Ming will not sell firearms, warships, gunpowder, bows and crossbows, armor, long and short weapons to England, and will not even allow English merchants to obtain Great Ming goods."

"Of course, if the English buy from others, I am powerless and beyond my reach."

The English could of course obtain some commodities through re-export, but the cost and premium of re-export would be paid by the English.

After one hand in the sea, it was a premium of more than 30%. England did not have many colonies now, and the wealth accumulated by enclosing land was not enough for them to squander.

Zhu Yijun added: "This is a consensus based on morality. The risks at sea are already great enough. The existence of pirates seriously affects free trade. Fighting pirates and maintaining the business environment of the ocean is a basic morality, not a promise I made to Philip. Once England revokes the privateering license, the Great Ming will also consider the relationship between the Great Ming and England based on its own position."

It was possible for England to ban privateering, but it was unlikely.

England needed Great Ming goods, but the Great Ming was far away, and it was facing Spain, which was about to launch an expedition against it. To deal with Spain's Invincible Armada, England could only use its privateer fleet. Therefore, England could not ban privateering licenses no matter what.

Zhu Yijun did not give a specific promise, but he told Pedro the principle of the Great Ming's actions: fighting pirates and maintaining the order and health of the ocean's business environment was very beneficial to the Great Ming.

"Thank you, Your Majesty, even if it is based on moral consensus." Pedro breathed a sigh of relief. This was another purpose of his visit to the Great Ming: to ensure that the Great Ming would not intervene in the Anglo-Spanish War.

Even if the boat of friendship had capsized, Philip did not want the Great Ming to affect the situation in the West, especially the Anglo-Spanish War, just as the Great Ming did not want Spain to interfere in any matters in Nanyang.

Zhu Yijun chose to respect Philip's choice.

"I solemnly warn Spain: the Great Ming provides affordable and high-quality commodities, and you use silver to buy them. This is trade, not me bullying and oppressing your Spain. Don't always put on a victim's posture. You don't have to come to the Great Ming to buy goods. If you keep chattering, don't blame me for closing the gates." Zhu Yijun gave a serious warning about Spain's narrative style.

This warning included the punishment of closing the gates.

What is called Spain coming to the Great Ming to pay tribute? What is called Spain suffering huge losses in trade with the Great Ming? What is called a huge trade surplus causing Spain's price crisis? What is called Great

Ming goods impacting and causing the ruin of workshops in Spain and even the entire West?

You don't have to come!

Spain's style was a unilateral narrative. They only saw that they had lost silver and gold, but didn't see that they had taken away ship after ship of goods. Every ounce of these goods was the labor achievement of the Great Ming people, and every ounce of silver was the hard-earned money of the Great Ming people.

Zhu Yijun valued silver because it was all earned by the people through labor, and every ounce was worth valuing.

"Taking every bit, using it like mud"—that is a betrayal.

The reason the Great Ming Emperor could warn Spain in such a tone of admonition was entirely because the Great Ming could now issue currency. The Great Ming had taken down Japan's mining rights and had this confidence, so it didn't need to rely on the influx of Western silver. Only then could it stand from the perspective of strength and admonish Philip's delusional narrative.

Before, Zhu Yijun would not have done this. After all, many of the Great Ming's policies were closely related to the silver flowing into the Great Ming from the West.

Now that the currency no longer relied on the West, Zhu Yijun began to deny this narrative. The West had never been a victim of the galleon trade; otherwise, it wouldn't have come once a year for sixteen years.

Spain's style was actually related to Spain's economic distribution model at the time. Spain's distribution model, in the final analysis, was one word: rob.

The most typical example of this was the Spanish treasure fleet.

The treasure fleet usually had two branches. One was the Caribbean fleet, formed by the Spanish royal family and nobles together, sailing from the mainland to the New World, anchoring in the Caribbean Sea. The goods looted from the New World were usually assembled at the port of Acapulco in Mexico and transported by land to the port of Veracruz in the Caribbean.

The other was the Manila fleet, sailing from the two Americas to Manila in Luzon.

The Spanish royal family extracted one-fifth of the treasure fleet as tax, and the rest was divided among the nobles, shipowners, and crew. The credit of gold bonds was not gold, but these treasure ships.

People generally believed that Philip could pay these bonds because the treasure ships brought back countless treasures every year.

Philip usually sold licenses to maintain his power from being challenged, using the treasure ship licenses to reward and win over his allies.

The Red-haired barbarians who were used to robbing came to the Great Ming, but they couldn't beat them and couldn't rob them, so they honestly took out silver, handed it to the Great Ming, and exchanged it for the goods they needed. However, because silver flowed to the Great Ming, they talked nonsense and used a unilateral narrative.

Zhu Yijun said with a stern face: "People cannot be so shameless."

"If you are worried about silver flowing to the Great Ming because of trade, you should try your best to improve the variety and quality of your commodities; if you fear the impact of Great Ming goods, you should try your best to reduce the cost of commodities to prevent Great Ming goods from entering the West; if you fear the quantity of Great Ming goods, you should improve production efficiency and methods."

"Instead of this kind of pretense, isn't this bullying the Great Ming people for being honest and not talking much! Should honest people be bullied like this?"

"Your Majesty's lesson is correct." Pedro was choked and couldn't speak. After a long time, he finally accepted this admonition. It was indeed fair free trade, and it was indeed voluntary.

Pedro knew very well that every word the Emperor said seemed to be correct. The Emperor was not old, and he didn't talk much truth.

The Great Ming had military power to protect itself. If you couldn't beat them, you couldn't rob them. If normal means could compete with the Great Ming, they would have long ago brought ship after ship of goods to the Great Ming for dumping. Would they still be here playing the victim?

Spain, England—even five or six-year-old children were drilling into chimneys!

In fact, Philip II knew very well how to become a strong opponent of the Great Ming, and that was for the entire West to unite closely. Those with food provide food, those with artisans provide artisans, those with raw materials provide raw materials, and work together to study constantly. Even a loose commercial alliance could greatly improve the competitiveness of the West.

It was a pity that Philip had made great efforts for this, but the results were minimal. He knew very well that this was difficult to achieve. If he wanted the entire West to be united, there was only one way, and that was for Rome to return like lightning.

However, Rome was dead, and the Romans in Italy were a minority.

Pedro gained and lost something in this audience with the Emperor. The deep friendship with the Great Ming was becoming thin, and the two countries had changed from cooperation to cooperative confrontation. However, what was gratifying was that the Emperor's dissatisfaction with the privateering license made it impossible for the English to obtain any help in the Great Ming.

This year, the English envoy was not even allowed to rush from the Ten Thousand Nations City in Songjiang Prefecture to the capital for an audience. The English envoy came for nothing.

Zhu Yijun successively summoned the envoys of Falanxi, the Netherlands, and other countries, fulfilling his promise to sell salt and distribute Great Ming goods in the Great Bright City. Both parties returned satisfied.

"Envoy of the Shah, I cannot agree to your proposal of exchanging 50,000 taels of silver for permanent residency and freedom of movement in the Great Ming." Zhu Yijun looked at the state letter in front of him and said very firmly: "After the students from the Mughal Empire finish their studies, they should return to the Mughal Empire. What are they doing staying in the Great Ming?"

"I cannot promote them."

Since the An Lushan Rebellion, neither the Song Dynasty nor the Ming Dynasty had used many Hu people. After all, there was such a big historical lesson there, and it could not be ignored.

The Mughal people were also Hu people. They should go back to where they came from. Zhu Yijun could not agree to exchanging silver for permanent residency and freedom of movement.

"I heard that the Great Ming treasury and the inner treasury were empty, so I boldly put forward this suggestion. If Your Majesty doesn't need it, then I will tell His Highness Akbar." Shah Mamaiti was not particularly concerned. This matter was proposed by the Mughal King Akbar, just asking whether the Emperor allowed it.

50,000 taels of silver per person was really a lot, and it was just buying an identity, but the Emperor didn't agree, so that was it.

The Great Ming was the Celestial Empire. Some students wanted to stay while studying, so they wrote back to the Mughal Empire to inquire.

"The joint anti-drug matter is highly recognized by the Great Ming. You can communicate with the Ministry of War and the Ministry of Justice to crack down on opium trafficking together." Zhu Yijun mentioned another matter in Shah Mamaiti's request: cracking down on opium trafficking.

"Moreover, your king is a bit worried about nothing. According to the research of the Great Ming Dissection Institute, as long as the imperial court and the government offices can still perform their basic functions, crack down on drug dealers, and suppress the circulation of drugs, then the death rate of opium users will be greater than the spread rate of drugs."

"In the end, the scale of users will never be able to expand, and the scale of production areas will not be able to expand, because the users are extinct, and a large amount of opium will be unsalable."

After Akbar heard about the Great Ming's strict anti-drug measures, he wanted to learn from the successful experience. The Great Ming immediately expressed its welcome and shared anti-drug technology, working with the Mughal Empire to crack down on drugs.

However, Akbar was overly afraid of the harm of opium. He was worried that the opium that could not enter the Great Ming would all run to the Mughal Empire, causing a crisis.

Shah Mamaiti bowed and said: "Respected Your Majesty, not every imperial court is like the Great Ming, operating like a precision machine. In our Mughal Empire, it is a loose alliance, which makes the anti-drug cause very difficult to push downward. Therefore, banning opium from flowing out of the Ma Liujia Strait still needs to rely on the Great Ming."

This was also the purpose of Akbar preparing to buy "Great Ming nationality." Akbar was just sending money, and whether he stayed or left didn't matter. He just wanted to send some silver to the Emperor, hoping that the Emperor would continue to work hard to ban drugs in the Ma Liujia Strait to prevent opium from spreading to the Mughal Empire.

If opium spread to the Mughal Empire on a large scale, he, Akbar, would have no ability to ban it.

Oda Shi was the last envoy to have an audience. She submitted a detailed rule for mineral handover.

This detailed rule was to hand over the ownership of the minerals to the Great Ming. This detailed rule made a very clear plan for the establishment of the mining area, such as the ten-mile radius around the mine being the territory of the Great Ming, organizing the Japanese slaves to mine, and other related matters.

This detailed rule was exactly the same as the one submitted by Gao Qiyu, and there was no deception.

After Oda Shi left, Zhu Yijun held this detailed rule in his hand and said: "These Japanese daimyo strongly support this detailed rule, because after the Great Ming stations troops in these mines, the Great Ming army cannot mine them themselves, so they need these Japanese brokers and agents to organize and recruit artisans and Japanese slaves to mine."

"The brokers and agents, and even these daimyo, have not suffered any loss of interests, and their status has even become more stable. The peasant uprisings will become timid because of the stationing of the Great Ming army."

This detailed rule could be described as extremely harsh. If it were imposed on the Great Ming, it would definitely be unacceptable. Even if it were imposed on the Qing, the Qing would not dare to sign it.

The "Kyoto Treaty" required the cession of mineral rights, but there was no time limit, and the Great Ming also possessed the right to explore mines. The discovered minerals also belonged to the Great Ming.

Such a treaty had won the support of many daimyo, because these daimyo were beneficiaries, not victims. The Great Ming needed to use them. The minerals were worthless if left there. Everything mined out belonged to the Great Ming, and the Great Ming would give Japan circulating treasure notes.

"The Great Ming should take this as a warning. Being too restrictive on commercial exchanges and always talking about 'accumulating wealth and promoting profit' and 'material desires flowing everywhere' is the rotten talk of pedantic Confucians. But if one is too focused on commerce, the country will definitely not be a country. To some extent, the heartbroken appeals of the restorationist pedants have played a certain role." Zhu Yijun concluded.

These brokers and agents and daimyo were really damned. Selling out collective interests without any psychological burden.

"Japan has wolfish ambitions. Now the Japanese respect the Great Ming because the fast sailing ships built by the Great Ming are used for war, not for fishing. If we really listened to what these pedantic Confucians said and 'cultivated literary virtue to soften the distant people,' I am afraid the Japanese would be shouting to enter the Tang now." Zhu Yijun felt that he had been too affirming of these pedantic Confucians, and added a little more.

"Cultivating literary virtue to soften the distant people"—one can neither cultivate literary virtue nor soften the distant people, because these barbarians simply cannot understand any reason other than fists.

"Your Majesty is wise." Zhang Juzheng led the ministers to sing praises. The restorationist pedants were not completely useless. Being too suppressive of commerce was of course not okay, but being too focused on commerce would indeed make the country not a country.

After the court discussion, Great Ming Emperor Zhu Yijun changed into casual clothes and, leading a group of Embroidered Uniform Guards, set off from the Grand General's Mansion toward the Yanxing Tower. Young Master Huang of the Penglai Huang clan had a gathering today that he wanted to listen to. The content of the discussion was Great Ming treasure notes.

Zhu Yijun wanted to know the views of the Great Ming scholar-officials on the issuance of treasure notes.

The Great Ming was issuing currency again. Wealthy merchants were scrambling for it, while scholar-officials had set off a discussion about treasure notes. Recent gatherings were all centered around treasure notes.

Most scholar-officials expressed surprise and shock!

The Great Ming Emperor actually used the gold in the inner treasury as a reserve to issue currency. It was more terrifying than the sun rising from the west. Some even thought that the Great Ming had suffered the biggest defeat since the Wanli Reform in Japan, so the Emperor was willing to take out gold as a reserve for issuing currency.

The prejudice in people's hearts is like a mountain.

Great Ming scholar-officials generally believed that the Emperor, who would rather watch the Aoshan fireworks show with a telescope at the Bell and Drum Tower during the New Year than reward the hundred arts, was very frugal. Qi Jiguang losing a battle was more reasonable than the Emperor taking out gold.

This was undoubtedly prejudice! Thorough prejudice!

The Emperor, who had always been frugal, had made such a huge concession for the prosperity of the Great Ming!

The gold treasury was only for entry and not for exit, and

every year, 1 million to 1.5 million taels of gold would be added to increase the credit of the treasure notes.

Zhu Yijun stood in front of the Taibai Tower, looking at the topic of today's gathering, his face full of confusion. He was reflecting on himself: was he too kind and gentle on weekdays?

Today's topic: "How about issuing twelve guan of treasure notes to Great Ming commoners every year?" ===== CHAPTER 836 =====

Furthermore, it will increase gold reserves by 1 to 1.5 million taels each year, increasing the credibility of the treasure notes.

Zhu Yijun stood before the gate of the Taibai Tower, looking at the topic for today's discussion, his face full of confusion. He was reflecting on himself, wondering if he had been too kind and gentle in his daily life.

Today's topic: "How about issuing twelve strings of treasure notes to the people of Great Ming every year?"