The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 427 Conspiracy
It is now midsummer in the capital.

The sun was already high in the sky at around 9:00 in the morning, and it was very hot outside.

However, it was not hot in the Hall of Mental Cultivation, and even the small printing houses around it were not hot, because there were sinks filled with ice cubes everywhere in the Hall of Mental Cultivation.

Collecting, storing and selling ice has now become an industry in Daming Morning.

To put it bluntly, this industry is a physical job. Whether it is digging an ice cellar or collecting ice cubes, it is all physical work and does not require much technical skills. As long as you are willing to put in the effort, it is no problem to store ice cubes worth ten or two taels for a winter.

The border troops and even the soldiers in the capital camp have plenty of strength, so wherever there are rivers and lakes in the nine borders of the Ming Dynasty, including the capital area, there are ice cellars everywhere.

Collecting ice in the winter became a necessary subject for soldiers stationed at the border and in the capital to exercise their bodies and even to educate their children and nephews.

This is actually equivalent to a welfare. After all, nowadays, ordinary soldiers, whether they are border troops or Beijing camps, only have one tael of silver and one stone of grain per month. After working hard for several months in winter, earning twelve taels of silver is equivalent to doubling their salary.

Wanli gave his full support. He built countless carriages and speedboats for transporting ice for his soldiers. He even ordered people to build countless water tanks to store ice and sell them in the capital.

Therefore, the industry of collecting and selling ice cubes developed rapidly in the Ming Dynasty. People were used to buying some ice cubes to cool down in the hot summer or to store food that would spoil easily due to heat. The sales volume of ice cubes was also increasing.

At this time, every wealthy family in the capital used ice cubes, so it was no surprise that ice cubes were everywhere in the Yangxin Palace.

When he arrived at the west wing hall where business was held, Li Tingji and others were sitting there comfortably writing articles.

When everyone saw him coming, they quickly stood up and saluted.

Wanli nodded slightly, walked to the main seat vacated by Li Tingji, raised his hand to signal everyone to sit down together, and then said solemnly: "Er Zhang, are you busy now?"

How do you say this?

The official gazettes published by the Ming Dynasty had already fixed their sections. The content of each page and each section, and even who was responsible for writing the articles, had all been fixed.

The front page contains the national policy that the current emperor wants to implement, and the following pages contain the various decrees issued by the cabinet, six ministries and other government offices based on this national policy.

For example, the reform of artisan households and the reform of military households are the main national policies implemented in the past two years.

As for the war strategy and even the battle situation between Ming Dynasty and Japan, those were kept secret by court officials and naturally would not appear in the official newspapers.

Li Tingji thought about it carefully, then said carefully: "Your Majesty, we haven't been very busy in the past two years. We were only busy for a while when we were about to publish the Japanese tabloid. The rest of the time we were relatively free."

Ah That's good.

I was thinking that if you were too busy, you should quickly add more people.

It doesn't seem to be necessary now.

Wanli nodded slightly, then said solemnly: "Er Zhang, we will also publish the Japanese tabloid continuously, but not every ten days, but every two weeks. After all, the distance between Ming Dynasty and Japan is quite far. It takes time to transmit news back and forth, and it also takes time to deliver it."

Will Japanese tabloids also be published on a journal basis?

Li Tingji nodded slowly, then speculated, "Your Majesty, how about we schedule it for publication on the first and fifteenth day of the lunar month? This way, it will coincide with the three issues of the Ming Dynasty, and it will be easier for us to prepare."

Upon hearing this, Wanli nodded without hesitation and said, "Okay, let's do it on the first and fifteenth day of the lunar month. Anyway, as long as there are two issues every month, it will be fine.

This time we won't hide it, just give the Japanese tabloid the full title, and indicate in Japanese that this tabloid was printed by the Ming Dynasty Ministry of Rites."

what?
Li Tingji was stunned for a moment before he said carefully, "Your Majesty, do you want everyone in Japan to know that we printed this Japanese tabloid?"

Wanli nodded without hesitation and said, "Yes, this time we will play an open conspiracy with the Japanese pirates, and we will do it openly."

He used to play dirty tricks on Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and both sides were playing dirty tricks on him.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi was a guy who liked to play dirty tricks and was quite good at conspiracy and intrigue.

He directly used an open plot against this guy, which probably made him stunned and confused.

Li Tingji was also a little stunned at this moment.

For things like this, just be transparent, okay?
Forget it, I don’t want to think too much about it. My mentor taught me that I should do whatever His Majesty says. This is the most important thing.

He was stunned for a moment, then asked carefully, "Your Majesty, what kind of articles should we write for this Japanese tabloid?" Wanli explained carefully, "In the first few issues, you can describe the causes and consequences of the war between Ming Dynasty and Japan with exaggerated details.

Your goal in writing these articles is to make everyone in Japan believe that the Ming Dynasty never intended to go to war with Japan from the beginning, and that it was Toyotomi Hideyoshi who insisted on fighting the Ming Dynasty for his own selfish reasons."

This seems to be true.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi said he wanted to invade Tang and attack Ming through the vassal state of Korea, but the Ming Dynasty ignored him for several years.

At the beginning, the Ming Dynasty really did not want to go to war with Japan, at least that was what everyone saw on the surface.

As for Wanli, he had already decided to take this opportunity to destroy Japan, but outsiders certainly could not see it.

He didn't shout about it everywhere like Toyotomi Hideyoshi did. All this was done in secret and outsiders had no idea about it.

When Toyotomi Hideyoshi used the excuse that his vassal state, Korea, refused to allow him to pass through, he launched an invasion of Korea without the Ming Dynasty even reacting.

If you look at it superficially, this is the fact. At the beginning, Toyotomi Hideyoshi was clamoring to join the Tang Dynasty and attack the Ming Dynasty, and he brazenly launched an invasion of the vassal state of Korea.

Daming acted as if it had no idea and didn't react at all.

As for Toyotomi Hideyoshi's purpose in provoking this war, it was to consume the troops of other daimyo to expand the territory.

In this way, his strength will become stronger and stronger, while the strength of other daimyo will become weaker and weaker.

He wanted to consolidate his ruling position in this way and continue to dominate the position of Kanpaku and even Taiko of Japan.

This is also a fact, and many people in Japan know it.

Later, Wanli mocked Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a sissy and refused to negotiate peace with Japan. This is also easy to explain.

This war was originally instigated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi. This guy didn't give the Ming Dynasty any face at all. He directly led his troops to invade Korea, a vassal state of the Ming Dynasty, and even clamored to attack the Ming Dynasty. Anyone who became the emperor of the Ming Dynasty would be angry.

Moreover, Toyotomi Hideyoshi inexplicably asked for peace talks while the war was going on. There must be something fishy about this.

This guy is making a fool of the Ming Dynasty. He fights when he wants to and talks when he wants to!

Wanli was very angry, mocked Toyotomi Hideyoshi as a sissy, and refused to negotiate, which was normal.

They could even use this as an excuse to slander Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who would hold a grudge against the ridicule and continue to haunt the Ming Dynasty.

As for the fact that the Ming Dynasty suddenly sent troops to recover its vassal state of Korea and captured more than 400,000 Japanese troops, this is also easy to explain.

It was only because the King of Korea, a vassal state, kept begging for mercy that the Ming Dynasty was forced to send troops.

Later, the Ming Dynasty continued to release prisoners to show goodwill, and those prisoners were released in the tens of thousands.

This also proves that the Ming Dynasty had no intention of fighting with Japan. Even when Toyotomi Hideyoshi came to attack, the Ming Dynasty only demanded compensation and cession of territory.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi refused to cede Kyushu Island and the Ming Dynasty did not force him. The Ming Dynasty only asked Toyotomi Hideyoshi to pay an additional one million taels of silver every year.

But Toyotomi Hideyoshi just didn't want to.

This guy is extremely extravagant and spends more than one million taels a year, but he is unwilling to use one million taels to exchange for the captured Kyushu soldiers. What does he mean?
It seems that Toyotomi Hideyoshi meant that he was holding a grudge or wanted to keep his position as Taiko, so he wanted to continue fighting with the Ming Dynasty!

After such a description, the Japanese people would probably think that Toyotomi Hideyoshi always wanted to fight with the Ming Dynasty, but the Ming Dynasty did not want to fight at all.

What's more, what Toyotomi Hideyoshi said, that the Ming Dynasty would attack the Japanese mainland, is even more impossible.

This kind of statement that is seven parts true and three parts false is the most deceptive.

Wanli wanted to use this conspiracy to undermine the will of the Japanese pirates in Japan to fight to the death.

As for how many Japanese pirates will be fooled, that is not important. As long as some of them are fooled, it will affect other Japanese pirates.

(End of this chapter)