Ming Dynasty 1627

Chapter 67 Wang Chengen Wants to Eat Meat
In less than half an hour, Zhu Youjian had dealt with two such difficult cases in a row, and he felt a little sweat on his forehead.

He simply stood up and paced back and forth in the empty main room.

There was an indescribable sense of unease in my chest.

This emperor, known as the Son of Heaven, possesses the wealth of the four seas.

In reality, however, he lived deep within the Forbidden City, and everything he saw and heard was what others wanted him to see and hear.

Just now, was the news of Lin Danhan's death true or false? And were Mao Wenlong's five grievances true or exaggerated?
He had no way of knowing.

This feeling is like a giant with his eyes covered, possessing great strength but not knowing where to direct it.

No, it must be changed!
With security initially secured, the civil officials in the court were gradually being manipulated by him.

However, his reforms of the Eastern Depot and the Embroidered Uniform Guard were still too lenient and too slow.

Did you think that paying the atonement money meant you wouldn't have to work?
That's money to buy your lives! Not money to buy your performance bonuses!
He stopped and turned to look at Gao Shiming.

"Gao, you told me yesterday that the Embroidered Uniform Guard's practice of impersonating others is getting worse and worse, and now there are more than 20,000 more of them than during the time of the Temple of Heaven?"

Gao Shiming's heart skipped a beat, knowing that the emperor was about to get serious, and he quickly bowed and said:
"Your Majesty, that is indeed the case. During the Tianqi era, the power of the secret police and the imperial guards was mostly held by Madam Ke and Wei Zhongxian. They abused their authority by granting official positions and recruiting cronies, resulting in an overabundance of personnel and a mix of good and bad."

Zhu Youjian remained silent for a moment.

He could have used some imperial tactics, said some ambiguous things, and let his subordinates guess and speculate.

But he eventually gave up.

That's not what he's good at, nor is it what he wants.

"Preach my will."

Zhu Youjian's voice became exceptionally clear and firm.

"First, he ordered Tian Ergeng, the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, to compile a list of all Embroidered Uniform Guards who had been falsely rewarded since the Tianqi era, and submit it to Wang Tiqian, the director of the Eastern Depot, for review by the Eastern Depot."

"This matter has a deadline: produce a list within five days. Complete the layoffs by next month!"

"Secondly, have the two of them each prepare an intelligence plan to monitor the Nine Borders, the Mongols, and the Jurchens, and then bring it to the palace to report."

He thought for a moment and felt it still wasn't rolled enough, so he added:
Gao Shiming dared not be negligent in the slightest, and firmly remembered the two decrees, replying in a deep voice, "This servant obeys the decree!"

After finishing these two completely unexpected major events, Zhu Youjian finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He sat back down behind his desk and turned his gaze to the last two stacks of exam papers on the table.

He had no time to carefully examine each of the more than two hundred answer sheets from the students of the Inner Academy, so he simply looked at the compiled summary of the results.

Most of the young eunuchs did reasonably well, with a good accuracy rate on all the questions.

In the area of ​​divination, their performance was indeed poor, and many were considered inferior.

His gaze slowly moved across the list, and suddenly, his eyebrows lifted slightly.

—Wang Chengen.

The name stirred something within him.

But it's just a slight expectation.

There was nothing he could do; he had only recently discovered that the surname Wang was a common surname in the capital region.

The two characters "承恩" (Cheng En) are a unique and popular name of this era, just like "建国" (Jian Guo) and "建军" (Jian Jun) in later generations.

To take a recent example, there was a deputy general in the Beijing garrison named Wang Chengen, who led 5,000 troops to assist in the defense of Shanhaiguan during the Battle of Ningjin in May.

That expedition was a complete joke.

As soon as the army left Guangqumen, half of the troops deserted, and the remaining half scattered and looted along the way, causing chaos and disorder.

It took them more than half a month to finally reach Shanhaiguan, only to find that the Ningjin Battle had already been won there.

Then this "army" waited anxiously outside the pass for half a day before receiving orders to withdraw.

This is one of the reasons why Zhu Youjian preferred to bear the punishment of being subject to administrative penalties this morning rather than select officers from the Beijing garrison.

—This Beijing garrison is rotten to the core.

Besides the Beijing Garrison, there was also a Wang Chengen in the Embroidered Uniform Guard. In the palace, he had seen several eunuchs named Wang Chengen in the past few days, but they were all too old to match his name.

But Wang Chengen of the Inner Academy is somewhat possible.

After all, it would be reasonable for that friend who was seventeen years later to have only just debuted from the Inner Study at this time.

Zhu Youjian became somewhat interested.

He put down the general report and said to Gao Shiming, "Bring me Wang Chengen's exam paper to take a look."

Gao Shiming responded and quickly found Wang Chengen's paper from the more than two hundred papers, and respectfully presented it to him.

Zhu Youjian took the exam paper, intending to spend a little more time on it out of respect for the name.

Upon receiving the exam paper, a faint scent of ink wafted through the air, but the handwriting was crooked and uneven, indicating that the author had not been practicing calligraphy for long.

Question 1: What should you do if you encounter an official in the palace demanding a bribe?

The answer was: "I need Grandpa Fang's help."

Zhu Youjian was completely bewildered.

Grandpa Fang? What is that? Like Guan Yu or Yue Fei in operas, is he some kind of deity worshipped by the palace eunuchs?

He suppressed his doubts and looked at the second question. The second question was arithmetic: One dou of rice costs ten wen. If you buy three and a half dou, how many wen will you need to pay?
The answer was: Three and a half coins, ten coins.

When Zhu Youjian saw this answer, he was first taken aback, and then he couldn't help but laugh.

What a brilliant commutative property of multiplication!

This little guy might actually be a math whiz.

He glanced at the other questions briefly, and since most of them were answered in a standard way, he didn't look at them in detail and went straight to the last essay question.

The title is "Thoughts on Entering the Palace".

The opening two sentences are quite literary, giving the impression of a scholar.

"By the Holy Emperor, His grace extends far and wide. Your humble servant, Wang Chengen, kowtows. My family is poor, but I am fortunate to have entered the palace thanks to His Majesty's grace. This is truly a testament to the boundless grace of Heaven."

However, starting from the third sentence, it completely reveals its flaws: the writing is incoherent, rambling, and utterly illogical.

"I don't really remember much, but I do remember that we were always hungry at home."

“My brother was getting married, but the family couldn’t save up enough money for the bride price. My father squatted on the doorstep, wiping away tears all night. And then, I went to the palace.”

"It seems like I waited in line for a long time before it was my turn. It hurt a lot when I entered the palace, and I couldn't get out of bed for several days. But my father bought me a sugar figurine, and it tasted so sweet."

"Speaking of that sugar figurine, it was shaped like a tiger, with big eyes, a few whiskers on its face, and a long tail."

"I tore off the tail and ate it first, but it got too hot later and melted too quickly, so I had to eat it all up before I could taste anything."

"Oh, right, I also want to eat meat. At the beginning of the month, Grandpa Fang said that the Taichang Temple worshipped some gods and ancestors, and some of the leftover offerings were distributed to our academy. The meat tasted so good."

"And last time, Grandpa Fang gave me..."

As Zhu Youjian read on, the smile on his lips grew wider and wider, until finally he couldn't help but chuckle softly.

He shook his head.

This boy was either a recent student or genuinely slow-witted.

But between the lines, there is a sense of unadorned authenticity and simplicity, which is rare in this deep palace.

Could it be you, Wang Chengen?

Zhu Youjian hesitated for a moment, but ultimately decided not to do anything that would force things to grow too quickly.

After all, sometimes overly aggressive promotions can destroy a person's potential.

Let's wait and see.

Anyway, I will come once a month. If you can maintain this simplicity, so what if you are not Wang Chengen?
He casually put the exam paper back into the thick stack of files and said to Gao Shiming, "Issue the rewards according to the results you proposed. As for the other matters concerning the Inner Academy, as I said before, get them done as soon as possible."

"The slaves obey the order."

Gao Shiming agreed and stepped forward to take the exam paper.

But as he took the exam paper and turned to put it back, his right thumb lightly pinched the paper, leaving a very shallow mark.

Zhu Youjian was completely unaware of this, and he picked up another stack of fewer test papers next to him.

These are the answers written by the officials in charge of writing at the Directorate of Ceremonial.

He carefully looked through it.

The more he looked, the more his brows furrowed.

These people's calligraphy and writing skills are naturally far superior to those of the junior scholars in the Inner Academy.

However, after reading the whole thing, he was still greatly disappointed.

It's unclear whether these eunuchs, who had been immersed in the palace for so long, were overly cautious, or whether they were truly influenced by the civil officials in the outer court and had become like them.

Most of the exam papers were extremely ornate, full of classical allusions, with perfect parallelism, and even to the point of showing off their skills.

However, when it comes to specific measures and methods, they all turn into empty talk and clichés.

What about “taking the sage’s heart as one’s own and keeping the affairs of the state in mind”, and “being of one mind from top to bottom and strictly enforcing rewards and punishments”?

Saying it is the same as not saying it at all.

Zhu Youjian felt a wave of weakness wash over him.

He suppressed his disappointment and could only pick out three articles from the pile of flashy but impractical ones that were relatively more substantial.

Coincidentally, he knew two of the three people.

He handed the three exam papers to Gao Shiming.

"Bring these three men in to see me now."

Gao Shiming accepted the order and left. As he left the main room, he spread out the three exam papers in his hand in the sunlight.

On the three exam papers, three names were clearly written in the signature area.

—Cao Huachun.

—Zheng Zhihui.

—Liu Ruoyu

(End of this chapter)