Spoiler History: Starting from the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 787 Lingbei Turning Point
“Eating pufferfish can even help you live longer?”

In the Ganlu Hall, Li Shimin's sigh was a mixture of emotions, making the people around him couldn't help laughing.

After all, whether it was Empress Changsun and the Crown Prince, or the former ministers of the Prince of Qin's Palace, who didn't know how much His Majesty loved fat sheep?

Although it is said that the sweet and sour fish has been invented in the palace and shocked Sun Yaowang, it is enough to prove that Your Majesty is not as fond of fish as Cao Cao.

The meaning of this sigh is not difficult to guess.

The "Classic of Mountains and Seas" says that puffer fish is poisonous and eating it can be fatal.

However, from the Spring and Autumn Period to the early Sui Dynasty, people still ate puffer fish in an endless stream, especially in the Southern Dynasties, where many elegant scholars regarded eating puffer fish as an elegant thing and were not afraid of death.

Looking at the example of the Ming Dynasty, eating puffer fish even led to the long-lived Emperor Hongwu.

In comparison, His Majesty, who loves lamb the most, has a lifespan of...

As if he knew what these old ministers were thinking, Li Shimin looked around with obvious warning in his eyes.

However, this behavior did not scare the ministers, and Du Ruhui smiled and said:
"Your Majesty, why don't you send an order to summon the chefs in the southeast who are good at preparing fish? Who knows, they might be able to change their taste for talking."

Li Shimin shook his head and thought it was unrealistic, but then he had an idea:
Otherwise, why not find someone in Chang'an who is good at cooking puffer fish and see how delicious this thing is?

[This version rollback in the Ming Dynasty was relatively complicated.

As someone who was determined to restore China, Zhu Yuanzhang would naturally support the imperial examination system. In the third year of Hongwu, he officially announced to the world that the imperial examination system would be used to select talents.

But Zhu Yuanzhang, who was still a novice emperor, soon discovered that the talents selected by the imperial examination were completely different from his expectations.

"The officials recruited many young people, and saw if their writing skills showed promise, and then gave them a trial. However, very few of them could put what they had learned into practice."

In fact, this is not surprising. After all, the common problem of scholars taking the imperial examinations having high expectations but low skills had already been discovered in the Song Dynasty. The three attempts to promote education in the Northern Song Dynasty over a hundred years did not lead to any good improvement. Even the abolition of the imperial examination system during the reign of Emperor Huizong of Song did not help.

Logically speaking, this was not a big deal, but a failed Northern Expedition made Zhu Yuanzhang change his mind.

After announcing it to the world in the first month of the fifth year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang officially launched the Second Northern Expedition, which lasted for eleven months and ended with the defeat of Xu Da in the middle, the victory of Li Wenzhong in the east, and the victory of Feng Sheng in the west.

Because ancient histories kept the names of respected people secret, the description of this battle in "The Veritable Records of Ming Taizu" only has nine words: "We lost the battle with the enemy and withdrew our troops to guard the border."

However, based on the records of this battle in "Guoqie" written by Tan Qian of the Ming Dynasty and "Yanzhou Historical Materials" compiled by Dong Fu, combined with the records in "The Golden History of Mongolia", we can still preliminarily restore the events before and after this battle.

The central army was undoubtedly the real main force, and facing the fierce attack of the Ming army, Kuyuk Timur (Wang Baobao) had been deliberately luring the enemy deep into his territory.

The vanguard army led by Lan Yu was constantly defeated and retreating, but Lan Yu, eager to make a contribution, continued to pursue them without stopping. From the battle reports he sent back, it can be seen that the Yuan army was defeated in Yemachuan at the end of February, and in mid-March, news was received that the vanguard army had won a small victory in Tula River.

The two battlefields are 500 kilometers apart. Even if we deduct the time it took the messenger to deliver the letter, we can still conclude that Lan Yu pursued the enemy for 500 kilometers in just 20 days.

Even without considering the fatigue caused by the forced march, it was a little too early to reach the Tula River in mid-March. The river is now called the West Tula River, located near Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. The average temperature in March is about minus five to eight degrees Celsius.

This strategy of luring the enemy deep into our territory continued all the way to the north of the Ling Mountains, where the follow-up troops of the Northern Yuan Dynasty, led by He Zongzhe, had been waiting for a long time.

Under the sleepless advancement of the big fool Lan Yu, the Ming Dynasty's central army stretched its supply line to an unprecedented length. Not only did it lose contact with the east and west reinforcements, but it also led Xu Da's central army into an ambush by the Northern Yuan Dynasty.

But even in the face of such an unfavorable situation, the Ming Dynasty's Tiger Guards remained fearless and did not collapse. However, according to "The Golden History of Mongolia", because of Lan Yu's reckless advance, the central army arrived in Lingbei earlier than expected. Unfortunately, a blizzard destroyed the Ming army's fragile supply line, leading to a collapse.

Later generations speculated that the Ming Dynasty suffered a large shortage of war horses and a considerable loss of elite troops due to this defeat, which greatly damaged the national strength and forced it to recuperate. Even in the face of the successive deaths of Wang Baobao and the ruler of the Northern Yuan Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty restrained itself from attacking until fifteen years later when it launched another Northern Expedition.

The figures in the "Veritable Records of Ming Taizu" can also support this speculation. According to records, there were 28754 military officers in the garrisons inside and outside the capital in the early years of Hongwu. Five years later, when the Northern Expedition started, this number dropped sharply to 12980. Until the 16489th year of Hongwu, the total number of military officers in the garrisons inside and outside the capital was . The military officers of the Ming Dynasty have always been mainly supplemented by hereditary succession, which is enough to give us a glimpse of the great losses in northern Lingnan.

In addition, "The Veritable Records of Ming Taizu" and "The Imperial Records of Taizu" include letters written by Zhu Yuanzhang to Prince of Jin Zhu Gang, which summarize the gains and losses of this battle and also show the changes in Zhu Yuanzhang's mentality.

"I have been a military commander all my life, commanding many generals, and never been defeated" is the glorious past, "I exhausted my troops in Horqin, trusted their troops recklessly and had no strategy, which resulted in tens of thousands of casualties" is the helpless reality.

Therefore, the failure of the second Northern Expedition to Lingbei was a great blow to Zhu Yuanzhang. It is no wonder that when Zhu Yuanzhang saw Wang Guangyang drinking heavily in the Secretariat, he was furious and sent him to Guangdong. The failure of this battle also made Zhu Yuanzhang lose the operating space to slowly deal with the malpractices of the imperial examination.

After all, this was the early Ming Dynasty, and when the news of Xu Da's defeat spread back to Hebei, it was probably true that "some were happy while others were sad."

Whether it was to recruit practical officials or to quickly extract the unstable factors in Hebei and incorporate them into the Ming Dynasty's rule, Zhu Yuanzhang needed a way to gather talents that was faster and more direct than the imperial examination.

So it was natural that at the beginning of the sixth year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang issued an order:

Now the imperial examinations in all places should be suspended and cancelled, so that officials can select talented people... so that they know where to go and scholars can return to their basics. 】

Zhao Dezhao saw the undisguised envy on his father's face, so he simply asked:

"Father, do you also want the Song Dynasty's imperial guards to whip the enemy outside the Great Wall like this?"

This was not the first time that he had seen the light screen. Adding on the extra lessons his father gave him in his spare time, Zhao Dezhao was able to understand about 70% of the map. Therefore, when he saw the three armies of the Ming Dynasty advancing deep into the northern desert, he actually felt his heart fluttering.

For him, since he got married, all he had seen and known was that the Song Dynasty's imperial army was invincible and its territory was constantly expanding. It seemed that his father's dream of restoring the world was not just empty talk.

Therefore, when Zhao Dezhao saw the marching map of the Ming Dynasty and imagined the brave warriors unfurling their flags on the grassland like in the Han and Tang Dynasties, he felt extremely unbearable.

My father’s Song Dynasty imperial army is also strong and brave. They can attack the Han Dynasty, conquer the Tang Dynasty, and conquer the Ming Dynasty. Why can’t our Song Dynasty advance?
In response to Zhao Dezhao's question, the expression on Zhao Kuangyin's face was particularly intriguing. As usual, he glanced at his brother slowly, and then patted his son on the shoulder.

It seemed as if I could see the elite soldiers sleeping by the river, or the brave general with scars all over his body bent over by the ridicule and criticism, or even more as if I could vaguely see a Confucian general holding a gold medal and looking north, his eyes full of unwillingness.

"It is not what I thought, but it must be the future of the Song Dynasty."

Zhao Kuangyin's voice was not loud, but it seemed to have an inexplicable persuasive power, which made Zhao Dezhao's face jump up a little, and also made Zhao Guangyi's head droop a little.

As Zhao Kuangyin's most loyal minister in founding the Song Dynasty, Zhao Pu felt a little disappointed when he saw the grand scene of the three armies of the Ming Dynasty marching out together:

"The unfinished achievements of the Song Dynasty made it even more difficult for the Ming Dynasty."

"In order to maintain stability in Hebei, we were forced to resort to this desperate measure."

Zhao Kuangyin shook his head and said:
"If what the younger generation said is true, then the people of Hebei Province have lost their hearts to the Song Dynasty, and the hearts of the Han people in Hebei Province are also with the Song Dynasty. The surrender of the ancient Chinese land of Hebei Province to the Hu people is also with the Song Dynasty."

"So it's more than just an unfinished achievement. Just as the younger generation said, the Ming Dynasty is cleaning up the mess left by the Song Dynasty."

The words of the King of Song Dynasty were somewhat frivolous, so everyone in the Political Hall had different expressions. For example, Zhao Pu and Cao Bin's faces looked a little unhappy, and they all patted their chests and promised that they would not abandon their hometown.

Qian Chu and Li Yu, one called for donating money to support the army to restore the country, while the other expressed his desire to learn from Xin Qiji, a descendant of the Tang Dynasty, to compose a heroic poem to reward the army.

The most impatient one was Zhao Dezhao:
"Father, the cause of conquering Northern Han has been decided. Please send me to join the army to resist the Khitan later!"

"Since I died while seeking rewards for my warriors during the campaign against the Khitan, I should go to Hebei now! And my father is in good health, so I will definitely do my best to exchange for rewards!"

Regardless of his brother's expression, Zhao Kuangyin laughed out loud and finally answered with just one word, "OK".

Different from the excitement in Guangzheng Hall, Zhu Yuanzhang's face in Huagai Hall was more sad.

Even Li Wenzhong, who had been laughing, sighed:
"Lingbei...it would be great if we won. Then the athletes..."

Thinking back to the time when every household was in mourning after the defeat, Li Wenzhong was speechless and could only say bitterly:

"Lan Yu, this big fool, actually returned with his entire division!"

Xu Da pursed his lips and said nothing, but the regret in his eyes was about to overflow. After hearing Li Wenzhong's complaint, he stood up and said:
"The vanguard failed in his duty, and I am also guilty. I only hope that this guilty body will be used to destroy the remnant Yuan."

"When we return victoriously to pay tribute to our comrades, I will then tell the heroic souls of Lingbei about my crimes!"

(End of this chapter)