Chapter 313: Deliberating on Establishing a New Sovereign

Lingchi—death by a thousand cuts—was much the same in the Song and Yuan dynasties. Though it existed, it was not a statutory punishment prescribed by the court.

By the Ming dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang had personally designated lingchi as one of the capital punishments. It was an extremely cruel torture that originated from a Tang-dynasty penalty called the "bamboo rake," in which the condemned was bound to a bamboo rake and dragged back and forth until his flesh was shredded to the bone, whereupon he was beaten to death.

The first person to suffer this punishment was Niu Xiantong, who was executed by this cruel method for accepting bribes from Zhang Shougui of Youzhou. Niu Xiantong was the first to undergo the slicing penalty, which later inspired Zhu Yuanzhang to use the slicing punishment against corrupt officials.

The "bamboo rake" punishment later evolved into "butchering and cutting," which was mostly used in the military.

During the An Lushan Rebellion of the Tang dynasty, Yang Guozhong was "butchered and cut" by mutinous soldiers. By the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, the slicing penalty was formally used to execute criminals. By the Liao dynasty, the slicing penalty was written into the legal code and simultaneously upgraded to "fish-scale slicing," which is why it came to be called "lingchi."

In the earliest form of lingchi, a fishing net was bound tightly around the condemned's body, and the executioner used a knife to slice off the flesh bulging through the mesh, continuing until all the flesh was gone and only bones remained, until death. There was also no limit on the number of cuts—the victim was sliced until dead.

By the Ming dynasty, lingchi had become the most common and most frequently used punishment.

In the Ming, several ministers in history were executed by lingchi, among whom Zheng Man and Yuan Chonghuan were the most famous. But overall, the majority of those subjected to lingchi in the Ming were corrupt officials, because what Zhu Yuanzhang hated most was corrupt officials.

At the outset, the cruel punishment Zhu Yuanzhang used to execute corrupt officials was even harsher than lingchi—it was called "flaying and stuffing with straw." In fact, the Chongzhen Emperor who had crossed over from another time had also imitated a few cases in earnest. By comparison, the Ten Great Tortures of the later Manchu Qing dynasty were utterly childish.

Later, Zhu Yuanzhang used flaying and lingchi together. In order to "standardize" the cruel punishments, he personally stipulated the number of cuts for lingchi—and this is precisely the origin of the words Ma Shiying had shouted out just now.

Generally speaking, shouting out those words was a way of telling the common people that this person was an utterly vicious and heinous criminal.

Lingchi originally required only six cuts. Zhu Yuanzhang felt that was not satisfying enough, so he changed it to sixty cuts, then later to one hundred and twenty cuts. Still unsatisfied, he personally decreed that those guilty of the most heinous crimes should receive three thousand six hundred cuts of lingchi.

Lingchi was easy enough to speak of, but the executioners of that time did not possess the skill. It is said that Zhu Yuanzhang held a grand executioner competition, and an executioner surnamed Zhao ultimately took first place, slicing three thousand three hundred and fifty-seven cuts before the condemned finally died.

Thereafter, Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang established the rule that the maximum number of cuts for the extreme penalty of lingchi in the Ming was three thousand three hundred and fifty-seven. Zhu Yuanzhang was quite pleased with this number, saying that its homophone happened to be "scatter away my anger."

But in fact, very few people had ever truly been sentenced to the full three thousand three hundred cuts. Apart from Zheng Man, Yuan Chonghuan, and Liu Jin, there was only Ning Wowo, the great traitor personally executed by the executioner Fifth Master Pei, who was quite famous in the capital region.

The profession of executioner was similar to a state-owned enterprise in later ages—though it was an iron rice bowl, it was not an easy job.

When an executioner carried out the sentence, the number of lingchi cuts could only be more, never fewer. If the quota was not met, the executioner himself would be subjected to lingchi; if the number of cuts exceeded the quota, the executioner would be rewarded.

Historically, when Zheng Man and Yuan Chonghuan were executed by lingchi, the executioners sliced as many cuts as possible. Zheng Man and Yuan Chonghuan were sliced three thousand six hundred times, while Liu Jin was sliced four thousand two hundred times—which could be called the number-one slicing of the Ming dynasty.

Apart from that, Ning Wowo was sliced alive by Fifth Master Pei a total of four thousand one hundred and ninety-seven times—just a tiny bit short of breaking Liu Jin's executioner Guinness World Record. One might say it was rather a pity.

Whether it was Fifth Master Pei or Liu Laosi, the famous executioner of present-day Jinling, the procedure of lingchi was the same.

After waiting for the appointed hour, Liu Laosi took a deep breath, rose, drank a mouthful of wine and sprayed it onto the blade. He then took out a small pair of pliers and, without a word, pulled out all ten fingernails of Qian Qianyi. While the condemned man screamed in agony, Liu Laosi took out cotton and stuffed it into his mouth, then made incisions directly on both the left and right sides of his chest.

With the first two cuts, blood gushed from Qian Qianyi's chest like a fountain, unstoppable, seeping all the way down to his calves. The watching crowd was truly horrified, but Liu Laosi remained unhurried. He took out a large knife and carved a huge hole in Qian Qianyi's lower abdomen, then followed with eight more fine cuts.

After the first ten cuts, the seemingly sturdy Liu Laosi was somewhat out of breath. He sat down on a small chair that had been prepared at the side to rest for a while. When he rose again shortly after, Qian Qianyi's body was nearly drained of blood, and then he sliced another ten cuts.

Thereafter, the cycle repeated.

Apart from the first few times of bleeding Qian Qianyi, when Liu Laosi rested a bit longer, the rest of the time he rested only briefly before rising to wield the knife—ten cuts at a time. After three hundred and fifty-seven cuts had been made, Ma Shiying saw that the sky had grown dim and signaled that Liu Laosi should not continue the execution.

The long-unconscious Qian Qianyi was escorted by the Shenwu Army soldiers and the Yingtian Prefecture yamen to prison for safekeeping, to continue the execution the next day.

That evening, at the residence of Duke Weiguo Xu Wenjue, more than a dozen highly influential Nanjing nobles and relatives of the imperial house gathered, including Count Xincheng Zhao Zhilong and Duke Baoguo Zhang Guobi. Speaking of the day's events, everyone was filled with righteous indignation.

Zhang Guobi shook his head and said: "Unheard of, utterly unheard of! Ning Wowo being sliced four thousand one hundred times is one thing—that man was a traitor. But what crime did Old Qian actually commit? To do such a thing—how is this the act of a ruler of men?!"

"Such words must not be spoken carelessly." Seeing everyone burning with indignation, Xu Wenjue instead shrank back somewhat. He shook his head and sat back down in his seat, saying:

"To put it plainly, how Qian Qianyi dies has not the slightest connection to this duke. What His Majesty will do about the commercial tax is what this duke cares about."

Zhao Zhilong nodded and said: "Duke Weiguo speaks correctly. Qian Qianyi was sliced three hundred and fifty-seven times today and clearly will not survive. The Donglin Faction is finished, so there is naturally no need for us to throw ourselves in."

"However, Duke Weiguo, you must think clearly. That fatuous ruler is currently collecting commercial tax in Shuntian Prefecture—clearly a trial move. Shuntian Prefecture is now entirely under the Eastern Depot, the Embroidered Uniform Guard, and that fatuous ruler's new army. You and I cannot control them and can only let things proceed."

"If this commercial tax is promoted successfully in Shuntian Prefecture, the next target may well be Jiangnan. We must guard against it!"

Xu Wenjue was a descendant of Xu Da, but he did not possess his ancestor's civil and military brilliance. He was timid by nature and extremely protective of his own meager interests. Hearing Zhao Zhilong's words, he immediately nodded and said:

"This matter was formerly handled by Old Qian... by Qian Qianyi. Now that Donglin has been eliminated, that is a good thing. The Prince of Tang is of the direct lineage of the founding ancestor—what impropriety or unsuitability is there in his becoming the new emperor?"

"If not for Qian Qianyi's maturity and steadiness, deliberating with that pack of Donglin officials for half a year, we would long ago have deliberated on establishing a new emperor. How could we have fallen to such a state today?"

As he spoke, Xu Wenjue asked again: "How are the connections with the Jiang family, the Li family, and the Zhao family going? Without them, I think this undertaking had best be abandoned early."

Hearing this, Zhao Zhilong chuckled and said: "The Prince of Tang naturally has the intention to become emperor. Not only the Jiang, Li, and Zhao families, but more than ten other families have also sent letters expressing willingness to work together—but only after first finishing the distribution of the Pang family estate. After all, the Pang family's landholdings are no small sum and must be carefully divided."

"Mm, that is excellent."

Xu Wenjue nodded. After Zhao Zhilong and the others had left the residence, however, he sighed to himself alone.

For some unknown reason, though everything was now in readiness, he always felt a chill wind at his back—an inexpressible sense of darkness, as if some voice was telling him in the depths of his being that this was something he must not do.