The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 135: A treacherous businessman pretending to be a good person

In early autumn, the maple leaves turn red.

The breeze is blowing and the ground is golden.

After a summer of fighting, Wanli finally returned to the capital.

He came back on a navy warship, so he wasn't very tired.

However, there was a tiring job waiting for him in the palace.

This tiring task was not about Queen Wang, Concubine Zhang, or Concubine Wang Gong, but about memorials.

He has been focusing most of his energy on the war these days and has little time to deal with memorials.

Therefore, he sent an oral order back to the capital, asking Yu Youcai to screen the memorials. If they were not important or had to be dealt with immediately, they should not be sent to the northwest in an urgent manner over 800 miles.

So many days have passed, and he doesn't know how many memorials have accumulated.

The next morning at about 11:00 AM, he still went to the imperial study and summoned Yu Youcai and all the scribes from the Imperial Household Department.

Li Xuancheng was assigned by him and knelt in front of a table.

If we add Zhang Hong, Zhang Jing, Chen Ju and Sun Xian, there will be five eunuchs wearing red together.

After he had set up his formation, he ordered his men to bring all the memorials over.

This really scared him. On the small table in front of the five eunuchs who held pens, there was a row of heads several feet thick, and the five heads seemed to be buried in it. There must be more than tens of thousands of them.

He was stunned for a moment before he said solemnly, "It's still the old rules. I will conduct random inspections. Anyone who dares to criticize will be dismissed from office, investigated, and punished with property confiscation and exile. Let's begin."

This was originally a popular commodity, but you turned it into a bitter bitter herb.

Zhang Hong, Zhang Jing, Chen Ju and Sun Xian all opened the memorials with sad faces and began to review them. Li Xuancheng couldn't help but frown when he saw the memorials piled up in front of him.

With so many memorials, it is a tiring job to stamp the official seal on them.

Wanli personally sealed it for a while, and his hands became a little sore.

He simply ordered someone to call Sun Hai and Ke Yong over, and asked them to take turns stamping the seal, while he sat there watching. When he saw a memorial that interested him, he would pick it up and examine it carefully.

These five people were actually promoted quite quickly. Even if they had accumulated 20,000 or 30,000 memorials, it would not take more than a few days.

He looked for a while and then prepared to deal with the affairs of the three major families in Puzhou.

Originally, he was planning to do the same as last time, using Yang Junmin's rebellion as an excuse to implicate the three major wealthy families in Puzhou, and then punish all nine generations of the family, ransacking their homes and then killing them all.

Unexpectedly, as soon as Wang Chonggu realized something was wrong, he immediately ordered all the children and even relatives of the three major families in Puzhou who were not in officialdom to hide.

This time, he might not be able to kill even half of them.

Zhang Siwei had seven brothers. Although two of them died, there are still four left.

As a result, they only caught the second one, Zhang Siduan, and the other three disappeared.

When cutting the grass, we must remove the roots. It will not work if we can't kill half of it.

He had to find a way to pry open the mouths of these guys and catch all those who were hiding before he could take action.

If he kills them without any care now, it will leave a huge hidden danger. He won't catch any of the eight imperial merchants!
In fact, the three major families of Puzhou were not scary in the officialdom. After Zhang Siwei died, the three major families of Puzhou had no chance of taking power, let alone entering the cabinet.

Under such circumstances, the people from the three major families in Puzhou in the officialdom could not make any waves at all.

It's really scary that the three powerful families in Puzhou are doing business in secret.

Those guys are the eight imperial merchants.

In history, it can be said that the Ming Dynasty was destroyed by the eight imperial merchants.

Those guys are so scary. Not only can they secretly sell strategic materials to the Northern Tartars, they can also collect intelligence for them and use money to bribe corrupt officials and even border generals.

Unless the eight imperial merchants are eliminated, there will be no peace on the borders of the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, he had to find a way to dig out the hidden people of the three major families in Puzhou.

He was just about to get up and go to the imperial prison to take a look, but Chen Ju got up first.

This fellow held up a memorial and said respectfully, "Your Majesty, I am ashamed. I don't know how to deal with this memorial."

Is there such a thing?
Yu Youcai was quite skilled at sorting memorials. Important and urgent matters were basically sent to him at an expedited rate of eight hundred miles. The rest were probably not very important or urgent matters, but Chen Ju actually didn't know how to deal with them!
How is this going?

Wanli ordered Sun Hai to bring the memorial over and took a look at it, and he couldn't help but frowned slightly.

Shi Xing, the Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War, actually interceded with Han Ji, the Right Minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs! This matter was indeed not an important matter, nor was it an urgent matter.

At least not on the surface.

However, if we talk about the eight imperial merchants in history and the demise of the Ming Dynasty, this is a very important matter.

This Shi Xing should be a person born in the Shen period.

However, this person is a bit like Shen Shixing, also playing both sides, and seems to have some relationship with the three major families in Puzhou.

Shi Xing was originally the Minister of the Imperial Household Department in Nanjing. He was dismissed from his post for writing a letter to impeach Zhang Juzheng for seizing someone's love.

After Zhang Juzheng's death, Zhang Siwei and Shen Shixing came to power, and this guy was soon reinstated as the Minister of the Imperial Household.

Immediately afterwards, this guy was inexplicably transferred to the position of Left Censor-in-Chief of the Inspectorate, and was soon promoted to Left Deputy Censor-in-Chief, and within a year he was promoted to Left Vice Minister of the Ministry of War.

Zhang Siwei and Shen Shixing obviously wanted Shi Xing to take over Liang Menglong's position as the Minister of War.

In history, Shi Xing did become the Minister of War, and, like Wang Chonggu and Yang Bo, this guy exaggerated his achievements to the point of being unparalleled in the world.

As a result, this guy actually advocated peace talks during the Korean War!
The conditions for peace proposed by Toyotomi Hideyoshi were actually to demand that the Ming Dynasty submit to him and pay tribute every year!

Naturally, the Ming court could not agree to such humiliating conditions. When the peace talks failed, Toyotomi Hideyoshi attacked Korea again, which only brought shame to the Ming Dynasty.

After all, these exaggerated achievements are not real achievements.

Finally, Wanli, who could no longer tolerate this guy, threw him into prison and killed him!

Such a two-faced guy actually came out to plead for Han Ji?

Wasn't it he who instigated Shen Shixing to become mortal enemies with the three major families of Puzhou?
How is this going?

Wanli frowned and pondered for a while, then asked, "Bingzhong, have many people come to plead for the three great families of Puzhou and their in-laws these days?"

Yu Youcai nodded repeatedly and said, "A lot, a bit abnormal."

Do you think it’s a bit abnormal?
Upon hearing this, Wanli said coldly, "Don't review it yet. First, look through the memorials at the back. Submit all those that plead for the three great families of Puzhou and their in-laws. I will review them."

This guy has done a lot of intercession for the three major families in Puzhou and their in-laws.

It would be fine if they were just Zhang Siwei's old party members, but these guys were afraid that he would be implicated, so they wanted to exonerate the three major families in Puzhou.

The problem is that many people from Shen Shixing's party and even Zhang Juzheng's old party came out to plead for the three major wealthy families in Puzhou and their in-laws, which is a bit abnormal.

The reasons these guys gave for pleading for leniency were similar. Most of them said that Yang Bo, Wang Chonggu and Zhang Siwei had all made contributions to the country and were loyal and good people. The descendants of these loyal and good people and their in-laws had not committed any crimes, and their examination results were also fine. It was really inappropriate to throw them into the imperial prison without any charges.

Are the three great families of Puzhou loyal and good?

On the surface, they really didn't do anything bad, and they all exaggerated their achievements.

If you didn't know that they were collaborators and traitors, you would really think they were loyal and good people.

When I didn't know before, I thought Imperial Noble Consort Qin Lan and Navy Commander Deng Zilong were loyal and good people.

Communication was so backward these days that it was normal for people thousands of miles away to not know what was happening in the court.

The problem is that many people in the court know that they are collaborating with the enemy and selling out their country.

Could it be that Shen Shixing and his party were unaware that the three major wealthy families in Puzhou were collaborating with the enemy and selling out the country?
Could Zhang Juzheng's old party not know that the three major powerful families in Puzhou were collaborating with the enemy and selling out the country?
These people actually pretended not to know and wrote petitions to plead for them!

It’s okay for others, but what about Shen Shixing’s party and Zhang Juzheng’s old party?

No, in history, Shen Shixing and Zhang Siwei were in the same group!

Although he had instigated a hostile relationship between Shen Shixing and Zhang Siwei, Zhang Siwei was already dead and could not pose any threat to Shen Shixing at all.

Moreover, Shen Shixing is a notorious two-faced guy. For the sake of profit, he will flatter anyone.

This guy could lick Zhang Juzheng when he was in power, and he could also lick Zhang Siwei when he was in power.

Now, the three major wealthy families in Puzhou probably gave Shen Shixing attractive benefits, so this guy licked it back.

This bastard Shen Shixing can be explained here, but the question is, why did Zhang Juzheng's old party intercede for the three major wealthy families in Puzhou?

There is no need to sow discord between them. Zhang Juzheng's old party and the three major powerful families in Puzhou are like water and fire.

Historically, Zhang Juzheng's old party was almost wiped out by the three major families of Puzhou. Now these guys are actually pleading for mercy for the three major families of Puzhou!
What's the matter?

(End of this chapter)