The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 227: The situation is getting worse and worse
Compared to Huang Zhen's indignation and the cursing of Chen Guangyao, Chen Lian, Wu Wenyong and others, Mo Zibu was much calmer.

As expected of an emperor who controlled China for more than half a century, Qianlong was not confused even though he was almost sixty years old.

Although he was far away across mountains and oceans and could not find out what was actually happening in Southeast Asia, he still tried his best to exert his influence tens of thousands of miles away by relying on his own political abilities.

As an emperor who has been on the throne for thirty-five years, he can still be equal and not trust anyone.

He didn't even trust Li Shiyao, a slave who was born into a family of traitors, served him loyally, and was more loyal than many Manchus.

He also maintained the highest level of vigilance against Mo Zibu, the foreign king who had solved a huge problem for him and conveyed all kinds of very reasonable "truths" to him through various channels.

Mo Zibu pondered for a moment, thinking that it was probably that letter that made Qianlong keenly aware of his ill intentions.

But Mo Zibu had to write it at that time. If he didn't, Qianlong would definitely be reluctant to continue to make a heavy bet in Myanmar, causing such heavy casualties among the Eight Banners soldiers.

But as he thought about it, Mo Zibu realized another problem, and suddenly he smiled at his trusted ministers.

"The Qing Dynasty was ultimately weak. Although Emperor Qianlong was wise, his aging body could no longer keep up with his mind.

Just like the corrupt Qing dynasty, which is no longer able to properly utilize all its capabilities."

"I dare say that if this had happened twenty years ago, the imperial court would have asked Siam and Guangnan to cooperate with the South China Sea pirates to force us, or even to suppress us. There would be no need for such secret instigation now."

Mo Zibu was not deliberately saying nice things to boost morale, but he suddenly figured out what tactics Qianlong was going to use.

Judging others by his own experience, Mo Zibu reviewed Qianlong's actions based on the information he collected.

It was probably his memorial that made Qianlong keenly aware of a hint of ill intention, and then he began to doubt Mo Zibu's purpose.

But because he needed to use Mo Zibu, Qianlong did not show any emotion until Li Shiyao and Yang Ning spoke well of Mo Zibu, and even Fu Heng expressed his reliance on Mo Zibu.

Qianlong almost immediately realized that Mo Zibu's strength was definitely not as simple as what his subordinates had told him.

According to Qianlong, he could allow his civil and military officials to perform in this way.

Either this person is really good at fighting, so the officials below him need to rely on him. Or this person is very rich and willing to spend money lavishly.

Qianlong probably didn't care much about Mo Zibu's identity as a Mingxiang person, but when he knew that Mo Zibu was unwilling to accept the title, he immediately prepared to divide him.

As a person who had sat in the highest position for thirty-five years, Qianlong naturally understood that no group could be a monolithic entity.

Therefore, he planned to appoint Wen Fu as the Governor-General of Fujian and Zhejiang, and then send people to Ha Tien to find out the details. At least he had to mark who was on Mo Zibu's side and who was not.

After figuring this out, he can then differentiate.

If Qianlong really understood the situation of Hexian, he would choose to directly enthrone Ou Tianci, and then grant official titles and make wishes to Wei Rikun, Wu Wenyong, Chen Lian, and even Li Xianwen under Mo Zibu.

They could even raise the stakes and directly give the Mo family a banner, appointing Ou Tianci as the commander-in-chief of the Han Army Banner, and allowing their family to become bannermen.

Chen Dasheng and Chen Dali were given official titles, their property on the mainland was returned, and they were allowed to return to their hometown in Wuchuan County, Gaozhou to retire.

Qianlong is definitely willing to give up all these. By doing so, although he may not be able to kill Mo Zibu, he can definitely destroy Mo Zibu.

Because in the face of such huge interests, Mo Zibu would never go his own way despite everyone's opposition.

At most, he could unify the Chan and Chan states and establish a powerful Nanyang nation on par with Siam. Such a nation would not only be no match for the Qing dynasty, but could also be used as a thug in many cases.

At the same time, this also shows that if Mo Zibu is really willing to crawl down and be a dog, he can still survive and even live a good life.

But Mo Zibu really couldn't swallow this.

He also understood that even if he could establish a unified country between the Zhou and Chen dynasties, what would he do after the Qing Dynasty weakened?
Not everyone has the opportunity to become a buffer zone between Britain and France. Without the Mekong Plain, France would not be able to establish the Indochina Federation.

In the end, the Mo family still had a doomed fate. They were killed by the French who instigated the natives to rebel. Like thousands of other Chinese in Southeast Asia, they became fat pigs kept by the white people.

As for the fate of the nation, there is no need to mention it.

Fortunately, there is always a way out, because Qianlong had a good idea, but he got stuck at the first step.

Governor Wen Fu of Fujian and Zhejiang was quite capable, but he was still unable to motivate the Han people of Fujian to fight for his country. The Eight Banners of Fuzhou under the command of the Fuzhou General had long been corrupt and unusable.

So Wen Fu could only rely on Cai Xin, but Cai Xin was already scared by Qianlong.

You have to know that during the last Batavia incident, the correspondence between Grand Secretary Fang Bao and Cai Xin was a state secret.

How is it possible that shortly after Cai Xin replied to the letter and Emperor Qianlong decided to ignore the Chinese in Batavia, the contents of the letter began to spread widely in Fujian Province, and the contents were distorted.

It is obvious that someone leaked this information specifically in order to shift the blame.

"The emperor still cares about you, but there's a traitor among your own people, and the emperor has been deceived by him, so he says he doesn't care about you."

So for Cai Xin, it is enough for him to take the blame once, and he will never take it a second time. He doesn't want his ancestral grave in Zhangpu to be dug up by someone.

The most important thing is that before Wen Fu arrived in Fujian, the plan was leaked to Yu Minzhong by the eunuch Gao Congyun.

Then Yu Minzhong took Mo Zibu's five extremely precious palm leaf scriptures and sold Wen Fu and Cai Xin to Mo Zibu.

This resulted in the secret mission to the Hexian Sect being constantly delayed and disrupted, and it was never completed.

By this time, the Jinchuan War broke out again, and Wen Fu was forced to be transferred to the front line to serve. His successor, Zhong Yin, was a confused man who had read too much.

This man was neither greedy nor cruel, but he was a complete fool. After passing the imperial examination, he rose through the ranks of government, often being criticized by Emperor Qianlong for being negligent, indulgent, incompetent, disrespectful, and incompetent in managing his subordinates, and was severely reprimanded many times.

If he were a Han Chinese, he would have rushed back home to enjoy his old rice. However, there were really no capable people among the bannermen in Beijing, so Zhong Yin was punished many times and then reinstated as a senior official.

Mo Zibu smiled. Qianlong transferred Zhong Yin to be the Governor-General of Fujian and Zhejiang, which meant that he had given up the original plan.

Because compared to a small local chieftain who runs a few counties in Southeast Asia and can mobilize tens of thousands of people, even if he is a Mingxiang person, he is just a small figure in Qianlong's heart.

If it were twenty years ago, when Emperor Qianlong was full of energy, Mo Zibu would definitely not have escaped the fate of being put under a tight ring.

But now, Qianlong is old, and he needs to enjoy himself, to pursue his ten military achievements and to have all nations come to pay tribute.

He needed more money and more luxuries to maintain his quality of life and make up for the regret of no longer being young.

Along with him, the Qing Empire also grew old. It looked glorious and prosperous, but corruption was rampant from top to bottom and the bureaucracy was corrupt.

Most of the Manchu officials had low abilities, while the Han princes had a clear understanding of themselves. They would take whatever they could get as long as nothing happened. As for the others, they were not even considered as household slaves, so who would really consider the Qing Dynasty?

This is the true situation of an empire that is declining. It has tremendous power, but it can no longer use much of it. Every part of the empire is having various problems.

Mo Zibu guessed correctly. Emperor Qianlong in Beijing had quickly forgotten his vigilance against Mo Zibu.

Now I, Shiquan, who was irritated and embarrassed by the Jinchuan, was ready to adopt a more radical strategy of using the barbarians to rule the barbarians than in history after learning from Myanmar's "successful experience". I wanted to kill Sonom and Sengge Sang of the Jinchuan at all costs.

At the same time, the Burmese princess that Mo Zibu asked Mingde to bring, the second daughter of the White Elephant King, was very much loved by Qianlong. The feeling of capturing the princess of the enemy country made him feel ecstatic.
Qianlong even found in this woman the same excitement as when he captured Hezhuo, the wife of Huo Zhanji, the young Hezhuo.

Qianlong specially brought this woman with him on his upcoming trip to the south of the Yangtze River.

Four months later, the returning hero Wubashi would lead the Torghut tribe back to his homeland after a journey of thousands of miles, and once again present Emperor Qianlong with a gift that would make him feel elated.

In such a torrent of the times, a lord of several counties in Southeast Asia who still missed the Ming Dynasty would soon become a small wave that Qianlong would only worry about when he occasionally woke up in his dreams at midnight.

This is the general trend. When the Qing Dynasty was corrupt and weak, even Emperor Qianlong was powerless to save the situation!

. . . .

Lin Qiaoyin left the envoy group, and did it in a fair and open manner.

Because he directly told the envoy Qinggui and the spy Eun-myeong that he would go to investigate the actual situation in Ha Tien personally.

Why is he the only one who can go?

Because he was from Fujian Province, he could hide in the vast number of Fujianese in Southeast Asia, and his fellow villagers were willing to protect him.

Bannermen like Qinggui and Enming, who only spoke Beijing dialect, naturally did not have this ability.

Naturally, the two men did not doubt Lin Qiaoyin, because no one would think that a Juren of the Qing Dynasty, who had served as a county magistrate and a deputy envoy of the enthronement group, would be recommended by a top Han official like Cai Xin.

As long as the task is completed, you can be promoted when you return. Officials with a future as at least a prefectural official will collude with small local chieftains like Hexian.

Qinggui and Enming only thought of one possibility, that is, Lin Qiaoyin was still thinking about making meritorious deeds, and he might be a little worried about the future of the prefecture.

After all, Lin Qiaoyin was only a juren, and did not pass the jinshi exam. His background was not very good, so if he wanted to go further in the future, he would definitely need some merits.

Of course, it was impossible to let Lin Qiaoyin go alone. The four followers around him were all bannermen who followed him from Fuzhou City.

These Eight Banners stationed in Fuzhou were descended from the remnants of Geng Zhongming who was pacified. They have lived in Fuzhou for one or two hundred years and are no different from real Fuzhou people.

"Four of you." Seeing the River Fairy right before his eyes, Lin Qiaoyin smiled mercenarily, "Do you all know what we are going to do?"

The four Fuzhou bannermen chuckled, their faces revealing understanding. One of the older ones said, "Master Lin, just wait and see. We'll see to it that you don't have to say anything."

Another person said, "The Emperor paid a huge price this time. Mr. Mo Wu should at least give us, the people from the motherland, a share of the profits.

As long as the price is right, I'll say anything nice to him. If he doesn't know what's good, don't blame me for being blunt."

"That's right, that's right!" Lin Qiaoyin laughed heartily, "I feel relieved that everyone thinks so.

I heard that the Imperial Household Department's long-servant followed this gentleman and made a fortune of tens of thousands of taels of silver. After returning, he was promoted from a long-servant to a clerk in the Imperial Household Department's Guangchusi, a lucrative position in charge of the Emperor's inner treasury silver!

"Damn it!" Several Fuzhou bannermen drooled when they heard this.

"This is the fucking world. We men are out here in the southeast wind and sun guarding the border for the emperor, but in the end it's extremely difficult to get out of the city.

These bannermen in Beijing travel all over the country, making tons of money, and are given all the official perks, as if we, the bannermen from Fuzhou, are being raised like servants."

"I dare not think about Changbao. I am not the emperor's beloved one, so I don't have that kind of fate.

If I can get a couple of hundred taels of silver this time, I can go back and act like a big shot in front of my wife and children!"

When several Fuzhou bannermen heard about Changbao's treatment, they were filled with jealousy.

According to Qianlong's policies, the bannermen took 70% of the benefits in the world, and of this 70%, the bannermen in Beijing took another 70%.

Therefore, not many of the Eight Banners stationed in various places and the Eight Banners outside the Great Wall felt that Qianlong was a good master.

Therefore, Lin Qiaoyin's few casual words aroused the greed and fire in the hearts of these Fuzhou bannermen.

(End of this chapter)