Chapter 878: What? The Great Qing Is Gone! — Nineteen (Seeking Subscriptions)

Eight executions by slow slicing, eight thousand cuts? You people are far too cruel!

Though Fan Wencheng had already resolved himself to die, he had not expected to die so hideously, and he at once began crying out that he had been grievously wronged.

"Injustice! Fan Wencheng has been wronged! Fan has never been an official of the Ming dynasty, so how can there be any crime of betraying the state and turning against one's lord?"

Zhu Chunjie snorted. "You are guilty only of betraying the state, not of turning against your lord! As a subject of the Great Ming, you went over to the eastern barbarian rebels, and what is more, you wholeheartedly aided the enemy. You are a mortal enemy of the Great Ming Celestial Dynasty. The evidence is conclusive, and you cannot deny it!"

Evidence?

"Where is the evidence?" Fan Wencheng naturally refused to admit the charges. This was no mere beheading — it was eight thousand cuts of slow slicing!

Ji Kun's face was like iron as he said in a deep voice, "Men! Bring the evidence up!"

At once two bailiffs of the Court of Judicial Review carried a carved wooden chest up into the hall. The chest was set down right beside Fan Wencheng, the lid was opened, and inside it was packed full of thread-bound volumes. The volumes even had writing on them: "Huiyue's Notes."

The moment Fan Wencheng saw them, he knew he was doomed. This was his diary! All his glorious deeds were recorded in it! How had this deadly thing fallen into Ming hands?

Right — it was Kong Sizhen. She was the only one who could have done such a thing! The grievance in Fan Wencheng's heart — it was not as if he had wanted to marry that untouchable Princess Kong Sizhen; it had all been Dodo's rotten idea! How had Kong Sizhen come to hate him so? To hate him to this degree — truly, there is no heart more venomous than a woman's!

While Fan Wencheng was crying injustice in his heart, someone had already taken the several volumes of "Huiyue's Notes" that had been deliberately selected and placed on top, and handed them to Ji Kun to read.

Ji Kun had of course already read these several diaries; otherwise he could not have sentenced Fan Wencheng to eight thousand cuts! Since Zhu Cilang had taken power, no one had yet enjoyed such treatment!

Ji Kun made a show of flipping through the first volume, then said in a deep voice, "This is a note you made after you and your elder brother Fan Wencai took the initiative to seek an audience with Nurhaci and were taken into his service. Every line brims with joy, and you even wrote that you were determined to devise plans for the eastern barbarians and help them destroy our Great Ming. At that time you were a subject of the Great Ming, yet you voluntarily surrendered to the barbarians, and what is more, you wholeheartedly aided them. Moreover, you had by then been a subject of the Great Ming for twenty-one years, and in the forty-third year you had passed the Ming xiucai examination, so you were certainly registered in the household rolls. How can you still deny this crime of betraying the state?"

According to the Chongzhen Code, the subject of the crime of betraying the state must hold Ming household registration, and must still have been a registered official or commoner of the Ming at the age of fifteen.

Fan Wencheng was twenty-one when he went over to Nurhaci, and he had passed the Ming xiucai examination at eighteen — without household registration one could not sit the imperial examinations. Therefore Fan Wencheng was fully qualified to commit the crime of betraying the state!

His wife Kong Sizhen, however, was not so qualified. Kong Sizhen had been born on land controlled by the Later Jin, so of course she could not have been entered in the Ming household rolls. But if she were a descendant of Kong Youde, she would still be implicated by law. The Chongzhen Code, whose revision Zhu Cilang had overseen, still retained the system of "collective implication," but its scope had been narrowed — there was no more extermination of nine clans or three clans. The punishment of wiping out a villain's nine clans looks satisfying, but in practice it is the indiscriminate slaughter of the innocent. Clan extermination was a cruel punishment used to strike at powerful clans and great houses; in an age when the scholar-gentry and great clans held the realm, it had a reason to exist.

But Ming society had long ceased to be dominated by the scholar-gentry. Except in certain southern provinces where clan power remained extremely strong, in most places clan ties were relatively loose and posed no threat to the court, so there was no need for harsh suppression.

However, close relatives who could reap enormous benefit from a criminal's unlawful acts would still be implicated! But if the implicated person had committed no major crime themselves, they would not be sentenced to death — at most they would be exiled to an island or to the Western Regions.

Ji Kun continued, "The crime of betraying the state also has degrees of severity. After you betrayed the state, you not only wholeheartedly aided the barbarians and opposed the Celestial Dynasty, you also contributed a great deal. These notes, in black and white, record it all clearly. And you were even enfeoffed as a prince for your service to the barbarians — what is left for you to deny? Your crime of betraying the state is heinous in the extreme, and you deserve death by slow slicing!"

Betraying the state, aiding the barbarians (the enemy), and opposing the dynasty form a set of three. If one only betrayed the state, without aiding the barbarians (the enemy) and without opposing the Great Ming dynasty, then it was not a wholehearted betrayal, and the crime was not severe. If one aided the barbarians but did not oppose the Great Ming dynasty, then the crime of aiding the barbarians was likewise not severe — for example, Wu Sangui helped the Qing fight the roving bandits and killed tens of thousands of Li Zicheng's and Zhang Xianzhong's men. That crime was of course very serious, but the Ming could not pursue it! The Ming could not go seeking justice on behalf of the roving bandits.

Another example: Sun Zhixie and Jin Zhijun were plainly doing the Great Qing a disservice, copying out several chests of blacklists to take back with them and turning all the scholars of the southeast into mortal enemies of the Great Qing. But that crime could not be prosecuted either! There is a crime of aiding the barbarians (the enemy), but no crime of sabotaging the barbarians (the enemy)!

"In this note is also ironclad proof that you advised Dorgon to break the covenant!" Ji Kun flipped open another volume. "The Prince of Dai, the Duke of Liang, and the others borrowed the eastern barbarians' troops to assist in suppressing the roving bandits. Once the bandits were broken, the eastern barbarians were to withdraw their army beyond the pass. But you advised Dorgon to seize the opportunity to take the Central Plain, causing untold suffering, endless war, and the deaths of countless common people. This is truly a crime of the utmost evil!"

In this timeline, Wang Yongji and Wu Sangui had borrowed troops from Dorgon in Zhu Cijiong's name, and Zhu Cijiong himself, once grown, had taken that burden onto his own shoulders and even considered it his own achievement.

And Zhu Cilang's own hands were not clean either. From the very start he had never intended to go to Shanhai Pass to defend Li Zicheng's Mandate of Heaven. His plan had been to pull Wu Sangui's army away so he could go to Jiangnan and dun the scholar-officials for payment, while letting Li Zicheng and the Qing bleed each other dry.

Therefore the Ming could not now pursue the crime of "borrowing troops," but it could pursue the crime of the Qing side breaking the covenant. In later generations' terms, this was a "war crime."

Ji Kun went on, "Here are also records of your participation in devising the laws of land enclosure, house seizure, voluntary enslavement, and fugitive recovery! And here are records of your participation in massacring cities and slaughtering innocent commoners — in black and white, how can you deny it? Each of these crimes is enough on its own to warrant slow slicing!"

These were "crimes against humanity"!

Ji Kun, gritting his teeth, said sternly, "And what is more, you followed Dorgon to Qufu to rob tombs! You dug up the tombs of successive Dukes of Yansheng and plundered the Kong Forest. Should you not be sliced eight times over for that?"

"Wait," Fan Wencheng hastily protested, "that matter is not in 'Huiyue's Notes'!"

The affair was too shameful; Fan Wencheng had been too embarrassed to write it in his diary.

Ji Kun gave a cold snort. "You still mean to deny it? Dorgon's plundering of the Kong Forest is known to all under heaven. You were a Grand Secretary of the eastern barbarians and Dorgon's trusted confidant — how could you not have taken part?"

"I truly did not! It was all Dorgon's doing!" Fan Wencheng refused to admit it even on pain of death. This was two great crimes — tomb robbing and desecrating the Sage — worth two thousand cuts! How could he admit to that?

Ji Kun sneered. "So you admit to all six great crimes: betraying the state, aiding the barbarians, opposing the dynasty, breaking the covenant, plundering, and massacre?"

Fan Wencheng clenched his teeth. "The plundering of the Kong Forest has nothing to do with me. As for the rest, apart from going over to the Great Qing, it was all merely each man serving his own master!"

Ji Kun waved a hand. "Have him put his mark on the confession!"

The two crimes of tomb robbing and desecrating the Sage had been tacked on as extras from the start. In fact, the Kong Forest had never been dug open at all! It was Zhu Cilang blackening Dorgon's name, and that "Zilun Gewu Pian" was also a counterfeit, so the matter could not be pursued too deeply.

Although he had been spared two of the slow slicings, Fan Wencheng looked at the confession in black and white, and tears still streamed down his face. Six thousand cuts! What would that reduce a man to?

What a bitter fate!

While Fan Wencheng was being sentenced to "six thousand cuts," Bumbutai was gazing at the towering walls of Xuzhou and sighing.

She of course knew that Fulin's new Ama was not the same as Dorgon or Hong Taiji! This new Ama was a "strict father," quite capable of killing both Fulin and herself. On the journey to Xuzhou, she had already fully tasted the ferocity of the Zhu Emperor.

Behind the carriage she rode in were dozens of prison carts and tens of thousands of prisoners on foot. Those in the carts were "great traitors" awaiting the butcher's knife, while those on foot were "lesser traitors" awaiting exile to barren islands. And though she herself was still enjoying the treatment of an honored guest, once Fulin rose in revolt in Beijing next year, she would most likely end up just like those in the prison carts!

(End of Chapter)