Chapter 246: Someone Refuses to Give You Land and Wives!

The Songjiang scholar Luo Dagong and his close friend, Zhang Huangyan of Yin County, courtesy name Xuanzhu, very quickly realized that Huang Zongxi, courtesy name Taichong — the man said to have "inherited the Donglin legacy" and praised by the Chongzhen Emperor as a "loyal subject and orphaned son" — had not been speaking entirely falsely when he listed Zhu Cilang's seven great crimes.

At the very least, the crime of bloodlust was certainly real!

How else had these Tartar heads, pickled in salt yet still stinking to high heaven, come to be? Nearly three thousand armored cavalrymen, each with a hideous, grimacing head impaled on the tip of the lance slung across his back!

Could the great victory at Dagukou, with three thousand Tartars slain, really have happened? Even if it had, you didn't need to carry three thousand heads all the way from Dagukou down to Jiangnan, did you?

So foul-smelling and so horrifying...

This Crown Prince was not merely bloodthirsty — he was a complete madman of a killer!

Besides bloodlust, the crime of heresy was also present!

Because these three thousand cavalrymen, along with the infantry, officials, family dependents, and volunteer commoners who had come with them, were all shouting in unison along the road: "The Great Ancestor, the Exalted Emperor, reborn! Ten thousand years, ten thousand times ten thousand years!"

Clearly, the rumored claim that Zhu Cilang called himself the Great Ancestor, the Exalted Emperor, reborn was also true! And not only did he claim it himself... quite likely he had also made many officers and men of the Hard-Working New Army believe this deluded talk of reincarnation and transmigration of souls.

Taken to its extreme, such a thing bordered on being a heretical cult! Charging him with heresy would be letting him off lightly.

As for greed, there was no need to even mention it — among all the emperors of the Great Ming, none had been greedier than him! In the two prefectures of Huai'an and Yangzhou alone, he had squeezed out several million in salt taxes, confiscated the property of four salt magnates, and seized the lands of eight Guard units!

Tyranny and unfilial conduct were also beyond doubt! A Crown Prince calling himself the Great Ancestor, the Exalted Emperor, reborn — if that was not tyranny, if that was not unfilial, what was?

Five of the seven great crimes were already confirmed; only cunning and debauchery remained... and those were probably certain as well!

Who would have thought the Crown Prince of the Great Ming was such a villain! It seemed that in the future, when serving as an official under the Crown Prince, one would have to be careful and embezzle a little less...

Just as Luo Dagong and Zhang Huangyan were reeling from the shock of Zhu Cilang's seven great crimes, the last company of armored cavalry passed before them, shouting as they advanced: "His Majesty the Emperor and His Highness the Crown Prince, Commander of the Army, are arriving! All officials and commoners, kneel in welcome!"

So the carriages of Zhu Cilang and the Chongzhen Emperor were almost here!

The Chongzhen Emperor and Empress Zhou rode together in one carriage, a very magnificent one. Zhu Cilang, in fact, was not riding in a carriage at all, but advancing on horseback, at the very front of the formation of that last company of armored cavalry, riding abreast with Wu Sanmei and Wu Sanfu.

Seeing the people of Nanjing fleeing and kneeling, Zhu Cilang felt rather pleased with himself. Beside him, Wu Sanfu said with a fawning smile: "After today's show of force, the scholarly circles of the Southern Capital will surely know how formidable His Highness the Thousand Years is!"

Zhu Cilang replied with a cold, mirthless smile: "This is only the beginning. Nanjing is called the Secondary Capital, but it has long since slipped out from under the shadow of imperial authority — otherwise the court's finances would not be so strained... Just watch, there will still be people who jump out to court death!"

Wu Sanfu grinned savagely: "If there truly are any so blind, this subject will deal with them all for Your Highness!"

Zhu Cilang smiled. "Has Qilin Gate been secured?"

"Secured, fully under control!" Wu Sanfu said.

"Good!" Zhu Cilang said with a smile. "We'll make camp inside Qilin Gate shortly. Tonight we can let the Nanjing nobility learn how formidable our Hard-Working New Army is! Sanfu, take some men and set up the central command inside Qilin Gate!"

"At your command!"

Zhu Cilang then raised his voice: "Feng Sizhong!"

"This officer is here!" Feng Sizhong, the captain of Zhu Cilang's personal guard, spurred his horse forward.

"Go and bring Zhang Shenyan, Zhao Zhilong, and Han Zanzhou to Our central command inside Qilin Gate!"

"As commanded!"

Only then did Zhu Cilang turn his head and smile at Wu Sanmei: "Sanmei, we're almost home! This is our new home!"

Inner city of Nanjing, Dagong Ward.

The grand mansion and famous garden passed down from the venerable Xu Da had at last acquired a hint of grim martial severity. Household retainers of the Xu family, dressed in trim riding jackets and bearing swords and finely crafted matchlock muskets, were arrayed from the wide-open main gate of Dagong Ward all the way to the imposing main hall, every one of them puffing out chest and belly, looking quite the part.

Many of Xu Hongji's brothers, sons, and nephews had also come, each in his own official robes, hands resting on sword hilts, standing with great swagger below the hall — what a display of might!

In the courtyard before the main hall, a great banner had been raised at some point, bearing four large characters: "Rally to the Throne by Heaven's Mandate"!

Xu Hongji, who had been sickly and ailing for years and seemed on the verge of death, now somehow gave off an air of radiant vigor. He was hardly coughing anymore, and his sallow, deathly face had gained a touch of color. The bright red python robe he wore covered a frame so emaciated that only bones remained, giving him the illusion of a commanding, awe-inspiring presence.

His sons Xu Yunjue and Xu Zhoujue, his cousins Xu Yongji and Xu Mingji, the fugitive Marquis of Funing, Zhu Guobi, and several marquises, counts, and meritorious officials who clearly had no real strength but insisted on groping for advantage in these murky waters — all sat on either side of the main hall.

As Xu family retainers came and went delivering reports, these fellows all looked increasingly delighted.

The news sounded rather good!

The Crown Prince had brought few troops — perhaps not even twenty thousand — and a great many officials, family dependents, and commoners followed along, which at a glance showed he was not prepared for a hard fight.

Moreover, the Xu family retainers sent to gather intelligence also reported that the Crown Prince's army had countless wagons! Some of the vehicles looked quite heavy, and were guarded by large numbers of Embroidered Uniform Guard and ordinary soldiers together — clearly they carried something valuable, surely the gold, silver, and treasures the Crown Prince had extorted along the way.

If this rally to the throne succeeded, would everyone get a share of that gold and silver?

After all, everyone here had contributed money to this great cause of rallying to the throne...

"My Lord Duke! Bad news! Bad news!"

A trusted head retainer of Xu Hongji suddenly came running up, shouting outside the main hall.

"Come in and speak!"

Xu Hongji frowned deeply, but still beckoned the man into the hall.

The head retainer lowered his voice a little: "... My Lord Duke, the Crown Prince's men have entered Qilin Gate."

Xu Hongji laughed: "That's exactly what we want — let him come in!"

The reporting retainer shook his head, his expression extremely grave, and lowered his voice another two notches. "My Lord Duke, the Crown Prince sent three thousand armored cavalry into the city in formation, and, and..."

"And what?" Xu Hongji's brows shot up; he already sensed a hint of trouble.

"And every one of them has a stinking Tartar head hanging from his lance!"

"A Tartar head? What is that?" Xu Hongji, for all that he was a descendant of Xu Da, did not immediately grasp what a Tartar head was.

"It's a Tartar's skull!" The retainer made a chopping motion at his neck and bared his teeth. "Cut clean off, like this!"

"Fake!" Xu Hongji waved his hand sharply. "If it were three hundred Tartar heads, this old man might believe it. Three thousand... ha, how is that possible? Since when has our Great Ming had soldiers that formidable? Utterly impossible!"

"Indeed, indeed!"

"The Duke speaks truly!"

"How could it be possible..."

The retainer watched the Ming nobles in the hall all shaking their heads dismissively, and merely sighed softly, saying nothing more — how could the Great Ming lack soldiers capable of harvesting Tartar heads in great numbers? The ancestors of everyone seated here had been exactly that!

Xu Hongji then asked with a smile: "Where are the Crown Prince's men now? Are they heading toward Chaoyang Gate?"

"No." The retainer shook his head. "The Crown Prince's troops are now holding Qilin Gate and Xianhe Gate, and have made camp between the two. Everything east of the Qinhuai River is now completely under the Crown Prince's control!"

The Qinhuai River was a winding waterway; its lower course flowed into the Yangtze on the western side of Nanjing's inner city, while its upper course originated near Mount Zhong. In the eastern part of Nanjing's outer wall, near Qilin Gate and Xianhe Gate, it ran roughly north to south.

"What?" Xu Hongji froze. "They've taken everything east of the Qinhuai River — are they... are they trying to start a fight with us?"

"I'm afraid so..." The household retainer nodded.

Xu Hongji gave two dry laughs. "So what? We hold the advantage of terrain, we outnumber them several times over, we have the inner city of Nanjing to fall back on, and the troops of the General Who Pacifies Bandits will be here soon... Victory is in our grasp — nothing can possibly go wrong!"