Chapter 197: Imperial Kinsmen

Zhou Wang, Zhu Gongxiao, basically agreed to the conditions Zhu Youjian had set, but proposed coming to the capital to meet His Majesty in person before discussing details.

In his personal memorial, Lu Jun gave a detailed account of how he had made contact with Sun Sansheng, the senior advisor to the Prince of Zhou's household, how he had persuaded him to stand with the court in advising the Prince of Zhou, and how he had laid out facts and reasoned with the Prince of Zhou until he was thoroughly won over.

Zhu Youjian was greatly impressed by Lu Jun's actions, though the contents were somewhat exaggerated.

Officials who could actually use their heads to get things done were as rare as phoenix feathers and unicorn horns in the Ming Dynasty, so a bit of exaggeration was acceptable.

Very few officials in the entire Ming court possessed administrative ability—to put it simply, they lacked the capacity to manage public affairs in society.

Though they had memorized the Four Books and the Five Classics from childhood and knew all manner of allusions, they lacked basic logical judgment and the ability to make fundamental analyses based on specific circumstances.

Because the classics never taught them how to do concrete things—at most they offered lofty moral maxims of an idealist nature, all high-sounding and metaphysical stuff. The saying "a scholar is useless for a hundred things" probably came from this.

The vast majority of officials spent their days on amassing wealth and lusting after women, composing poetry and matching couplets, cultivating good relations with local gentry and official circles, and finding patrons to climb the ladder.

In sum: they couldn't do things, only talk emptily. They pursued only private gain and ignored the common people.

They could talk a blue streak, but when it came to action, they were timid and hesitant.

People like Lu Jun, who could actually use various means to solve problems when they arose, were far too rare. Whatever the final outcome of this matter, at least Lu Jun had made the effort, and that was very much worthy of recognition.

Such officials should be promoted and rewarded, so as to encourage more officials to do practical work and less empty talk.

Isn't it said that practical work prospers the state, while empty talk ruins the country?

How should he be promoted and rewarded?

A thought suddenly struck Zhu Youjian.

Governor Song of Yunyang was old and frail; His Majesty, pitying his advanced age, specially approved his retirement.

Though I am aged, my vigor far exceeds that of my peers, and I am still willing to share Your Majesty's burdens and serve the court.

I never said I wanted to retire—why approve my retirement? Is there some mistake? I haven't squeezed out enough silver yet.

Yes, you didn't submit a memorial requesting retirement. You were retired.

Go home and enjoy your old age. Talk any more nonsense and beware of the Embroidered Uniform Guard at your door.

Prefect Lu of Kaifeng Prefecture showed compassion for the people under his jurisdiction and acted with courage in his post. He is hereby promoted to Governor of Yunyang. It is hoped that this official will not disappoint His Majesty's expectations, guard against arrogance and complacency, diligently perform his duties, and follow the example of military farmland settlement in Shaanxi in applying himself to his work, awaiting future advancement.

Mm.

That's settled then.

"Awaiting future advancement" wasn't hard to understand—it was almost saying outright: Lu Jun, do well, and your future prospects won't stop at Governor. I have my eye on you.

Only with hope comes motivation. Lu Jun could be trusted to know what to do—Sun Chuanting's great success with military farmland in Shaanxi had already been proclaimed to the realm by imperial edict; he just needed to follow that example.

Yunyang was poor, but its population was also small. He could decide how to proceed based on local conditions.

Sun Sansheng, mentioned in Lu Jun's memorial, caught Zhu Youjian's attention. He and Lu Jun had worked from inside and outside respectively, both exhausting every effort to persuade Zhu Gongxiao until his attitude finally softened—this was a model of cooperation and mutual benefit.

Sun Sansheng was not qualified to submit memorials directly to the emperor, so Zhu Youjian had no idea how he had spoken with the Prince of Zhou, but one thing was certain: this Sun Sansheng had played a very important role in the matter.

If Lu Jun was the mastermind, then Sun Sansheng was the executor.

He seemed to be someone with considerable ability to carry things out.

Zhu Youjian summoned Li Erxi and had him send someone to the Ministry of Personnel to retrieve Sun Sansheng's records. He also sent word to Luo Yangxing to dispatch men to ride through the night to Kaifeng and secretly meet with Sun Sansheng to inquire in detail about the whole process.

As for Zhu Gongxiao wanting to come to the capital to meet His Majesty—let him come. Have the Yongwei Camp send three hundred men to Kaifeng to escort the Prince of Zhou, with Li Erxi leading the way.

Zhu Youjian summoned Li Erxi and gave him his instructions, adding a special admonition: when traveling to Kaifeng, first survey the area and note which prefectures and counties were impoverished; later, when accompanying the Prince of Zhou back to the capital, take him to see them—let this prince, who had never left the city walls his entire life, see how miserable the common folk were, and how difficult it was for this emperor himself.

Anyway, there was no hurry, and the Prince of Zhou had no urgent business in the capital. With the warm spring season approaching, it would be good for him to enjoy the magnificent rivers and mountains his ancestors had conquered along the way.

During the time Li Erxi was away on this trip, having Wang Cheng'en come back to attend to His Majesty would suffice. The Eastern Depot was under his elder nephew's control and wouldn't have any problems.

Wang Cheng'en had nagged openly and covertly countless times, even going to Empress Dowager Yi'an and Empress Zhou to weep and wail, all because he was single-mindedly determined to return to the emperor's side—saying he felt at ease only when standing beside His Majesty. He had gotten to the point where Zhu Youjian was almost afraid to see him. Could this old fellow have some other peculiar preference? Zhu Youjian couldn't help but shudder.

Wang Cheng'en's loyalty warmed Zhu Youjian's heart. If only the ministers could be so considerate.

Sitting in this position meant being alone for life—it was impossible to have friends, and there was no one to confide in. The immense loneliness sometimes left Zhu Youjian feeling lost and oppressed.

Even if Sun Chuanting and Lu Xiangsheng were ever so loyal, their respective positions determined that they could never become friends.

He was destined to grow old alone in this life—spiritually, at least.

The realm was now basically pacified. The remaining petty bandits were not worth mentioning; having the Yongwei Camp and the Capital Camps take turns sending out small detachments to train against them would suffice.

Unfortunately, the Capital Camps had been established a bit too late to gain experience through fighting large bands of roving bandits and discovering their own shortcomings. This could only be compensated for through more intensive drilling.

Hong Chengchou's post as Governor-General of the Five Provinces and Lu Xiangsheng's post as Commander-General of the Five Provinces had both been relinquished. Now suitable positions should be found to place the two of them.

Wu Aheng, Governor-General of Ji-Liao, was a mere figurehead occupying his post. His disgraceful performance when the Manchus invaded in the eleventh year of Chongzhen in history was contemptible. The Jianzhou barbarians had already broken through the passes, yet this fellow was still drinking and making merry, dying a muddled death beneath the barbarians' blades.

Since he was incompetent, let him retire.

Hong Chengchou would take over as Governor-General of Ji-Liao.

Sun Chengzong had been serving at Xuan-Da for nearly two years. During that time he had consolidated the troops, tightened military discipline, and weeded out the old and weak. With personnel sent by the Ministry of War and the Embroidered Uniform Guard added in, the appearance of the two garrisons at Xuan and Da had greatly improved—at the very least, they could now put up a fight against the Jianzhou barbarians.

But the old gentleman was after all past seventy. It was truly hard to bear letting him brave wind and snow and eat sand at the frontier. Bestow upon him the title of Grand Secretary and let him return home to enjoy his remaining years in comfort. If any of his sons or grandsons showed outstanding talent, they would naturally be promoted and given important posts.

Lu Xiangsheng would, as in the original history, take over as Governor-General of Xuan-Da—though he would no longer fight alone to his death at Zhuolu.

Whenever he thought of how Gao Qiqian had led forty thousand Guanning cavalry and sat watching from dozens of li away as Lu Xiangsheng was besieged and killed by the Qing army in history, Zhu Youjian couldn't help but feel hatred rising from his heart and malice growing in his guts.

That damned eunuch deserved to be chopped into several pieces with a clean slash.

What pretext could he find to kill that old bastard?

Offending His Majesty by entering with the left foot first, and being sentenced to death for it?

No, too frivolous.

In this era that valued proper justification for action, he couldn't let the ministers look down on him with such childish behavior.

He'd think about it more. Anyway, that fellow was as good as dead—not killing him wouldn't vent the anger in his heart. Consider it avenging Lu Xiangsheng from history.

The Prince of Zhou was willing to trade benefits for freedom. Of the other twenty-some princes, who knew how many would follow suit? Probably very few. They were all a bunch of greedy, violent creatures who, relying on their untouchable status, treated human life like grass and ran wild.

They knew the emperor didn't dare move against them openly.

They were all of Grand Ancestor's bloodline. If Zhu Youjian openly dealt with them, it would stir up an uproar across the realm and throw the people's hearts into chaos.

In this era that valued kinship and blood ties, if you could lay hands on your own relatives, then who in the realm was safe from your reach? Following such a cold and ungrateful emperor, whose heart could be at ease?

Do you still speak of shielding one's kin? Do you want to rule the realm by filial piety?

Never mind that you're relatives—even in our village, when Old Li's eldest son passed the jinshi exam and became a high official, the villagers who went to see him still got politely arranged some petty post. If he truly couldn't arrange anything, he'd at least send them off with travel money. How can you, as Emperor, be so unreasonable? What's wrong with your relatives skimming a bit of silver? When one man attains the Way, his chickens and dogs ascend to heaven—that's a tradition handed down from the elders. And you want to have them killed? Is there no law left?

Since he himself was the embodiment of the law, he could only watch helplessly as those law-defying fellows existed in perfect ease.

Their very existence existed to disgust the Emperor.

Keeping all eighty generations of our ancestors trapped alive in this prison—if not to disgust you, then who?

Still, he couldn't just let them run wild, or the Zhu family's reputation would be ruined by them entirely.

What method should he think of?

Got it—Zhu Youjian had a flash of inspiration.

If the law of the realm can't touch you, can the law of the clan not touch you either?

Isn't the Court of the Imperial Clan precisely the office in charge of the royal family's black sheep?

Besides handling the tedious rites of legitimate and concubine births, titles and enfeoffments, succession, marriages, births and deaths, posthumous names and burials of imperial clan members, recording their crimes was also a major function of the Court of the Imperial Clan.

Though the Court of the Imperial Clan had long become a mere ornament—by now pigs were probably being raised in its courtyard—restoring it wasn't difficult.

What worked most in Zhu Youjian's favor now was this: Emperor Taizong had revised the rules of the Court of the Imperial Clan. Originally, Taizu had decreed that the Clan Patriarch could only be held by a Prince; Zhu Di directly changed it to be held by meritorious officials or relatives by marriage of the imperial house.

He made that change because after seizing the throne from his nephew, he felt guilty, believing that if another Prince held the post of Clan Patriarch, that person would surely impose restrictions on him at every turn.

The meritorious officials were all military men who had conquered the realm alongside him—who among them would cross him?

Though he never used an imperial in-law as Clan Patriarch, we can use one.

Gong Yonggu, the Imperial Son-in-law Commandant, was a ready-made candidate—his own diehard loyalist.

As for the subordinate officers of the Court of the Imperial Clan, the original rules allowed only one Registrar of the fifth rank, so we might as well add more men to handle the actual work.

The Registrar would naturally be drawn from the Records Office of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, and the clerks would also be pulled from the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

This way, the Court of the Imperial Clan from top to bottom became his own exclusive organ—one could say it moved as nimbly as an arm directing a finger.

Haha.

You little bastards, want to fight me? If I can't kill you, I'll cripple you.

Dispatch Court of the Imperial Clan personnel to all twenty-eight princely fiefs, plus one Centurion station of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. Tell them clearly: don't bother about whether they're Commandery Princes or Princes—once you've got evidence, come down hard; those with a long list of crimes get their titles stripped directly.

Told you not to stay in line with the Emperor, told you not to unite tightly around the Emperor, told you not to obey the Emperor's words, told you not to part with silver in exchange for freedom—from now on I'll force you to spit blood.

Start with those Commandery Princes and Town-Protecting Generals.

Any who commit crimes, oppress the good, scheme to seize fields and property, take others' wives and daughters, or cause deaths—all shall be arrested by the Embroidered Uniform Guard and tried by the Court of the Imperial Clan.

This should be killing the chicken to scare the monkey, right? First deal with the Princes' sons and grandsons, and see how the old ones at home react; those who behave and rein in are let off, those who react violently get dealt with together.

Now who can say a word against this? You all cry out that a prince breaking the law is judged the same as a commoner, don't you? Then today let me show you whether I'm setting an example and leading by demonstration for the realm.

What clan has no family law? Break the family law and you get dealt with—that has nothing to do with shielding kin or practicing filial piety.