Take control of Wei Zhongxian at the start and confiscate 100 million from him!

Chapter 195 Stud is a kind of wisdom

The emperor's words, "I did not misjudge you," are more valuable than any reward in the world and heavier than Mount Tai.

The moment those five words reached his ears, Wen Tiren felt a scorching current spread from his heart to his limbs, causing his body, which was slightly stiff from prostrating himself on the ground, to tremble.

He felt that he was no longer a minister who was trembling and trying to guess the emperor's intentions, but for the first time, he had truly become the person standing by the emperor's side in this storm that was about to sweep across the world.

This realization filled Wen Tiren with unprecedented power and joy.

In this state of exhilaration and confidence, he became increasingly convinced that his memorial, which listed numerous crimes committed by the Kong family, was a sharp blade that had been tempered to its limit, incomparably sharp, waiting only for His Majesty's command to sever this giant parasite that had been entrenched in the Ming Dynasty for a century, sucking its lifeblood.

However, the emperor did not issue the order as he had expected, and did not even show the slightest sign of satisfaction.

The room fell eerily quiet again, with only the incense burning silently. The slightly rapid heartbeat that had been audible to Wen Tiren just moments before now sounded exceptionally loud.

After a long while, the emperor slowly put down his teacup.

"Wen Qing."

The emperor spoke, "Do you think the greatest crime of the Kong family is their current greed and arrogance?"

Wen Tiren felt a sudden chill run down his spine.

He was completely unprepared for this question.

He thought the battle on the chessboard was over, and all that remained was the details of how to tally the results, but unexpectedly His Majesty began to re-examine the essence of the game.

Wen Tiren dared not be negligent and carefully organized his words, bowing as he replied: "Your Majesty, I am foolish and dull. However, the Kong family has seized official land and private land, competing with the state for profit; they have protected criminals and disregarded the law. Every single one of these acts is a major scourge to the country. I believe that without eliminating this scourge, it is impossible to rectify the court or appease the people."

The emperor listened, but instead of nodding, he let out a very soft laugh.

"No." Zhu Youjian shook his head, his gaze shifting from Wen Tiren as if piercing through the walls of the warm pavilion and looking into the endless depths of history.

"What you're describing is just a skin condition, a boil on the skin. It looks disgusting, but you can just dig it out and be done with it."

"Their true disease lies in their bones, in their bloodline that has been passed down for thousands of years. This disease rots their hearts and souls, and erodes their integrity." The emperor's voice suddenly turned cold, each word seeming to come from beneath a frozen lake. "This disease is called 'lack of integrity'! A spineless disease that makes people kneel down at any time for wealth and power, and sell everything!"

The words "unprincipled" made Wen Tiren's eyelids twitch violently.

"I have a question for you," the emperor said, his gaze distant and profound, like a chess player examining a chessboard, the chess pieces representing hundreds of years of time, "After the Jingkang Incident, the confrontation between the Song and Jin dynasties, and the division of the North and South, what did the Kong family do?"

Wen Tiren's forehead instantly broke out in a fine layer of cold sweat.

He quickly turned his quick-thinking mind, adept at discerning the emperor's intentions, and swiftly followed the emperor's train of thought, replying in a deep voice:
"Your Majesty, I know. The Jin people destroyed the Northern Song Dynasty and established their capital in Zhongdu. Kong Duancao, the 48th generation direct descendant of Confucius and the Duke Yansheng, kowtowed and surrendered, and was conferred the title of 'Duke Yansheng' by the Jin state. Meanwhile, his brother Kong Duanyou escorted the wooden statues of the sage and his wife in the Confucius family temple and fled south in haste to join Emperor Gaozong of our Great Song Dynasty. To demonstrate the legitimacy of the lineage, Emperor Gaozong also conferred the title of 'Duke Yansheng' on him in Quzhou."

The emperor's lips finally curved slightly, but it wasn't a smile; rather, it was extreme mockery.

"One family serves two masters. One is a monkey in the Jin Kingdom, enjoying the honor of the false dynasty; the other is in the Southern Song Dynasty, living in a corner of the country, continuing to be a descendant of the great Song. If the Jin Kingdom in the north wins, the wealth of Qufu will remain; if the Southern Song Dynasty can successfully launch a northern expedition, the wealth of Quzhou will also remain. No matter who ultimately controls the world, the Kong family's legacy and wealth will be guaranteed."

The emperor's voice was very soft, as if he were telling an ancient story that had nothing to do with him.

"What a brilliant plan to have two stores, one on the east and one on the west, and two eggs on the same blockbuster! Is that all?"

Zhu Youjian's breathing suddenly intensified, like the prelude to a storm, pressing on relentlessly: "When the Mongol hooves swept south from the grasslands, shattering the beautiful land of the Jin Dynasty, what did Kong Yuanyong, who was the 'Duke Yansheng' in the Jin Dynasty, do? He surrendered faster than anyone else, faster than any Jurchen noble! Before the Mongol Khan's army had completely swept through the Central Plains, his letter of surrender had already been delivered to the Mongols' desk."

The emperor's gaze suddenly turned back, like two sharp swords piercing Wen Tiren: "Wen Qing, have you ever heard of the magnificent sights that once graced the land of my China?"

Wen Tiren felt his mouth was dry and his throat was tight.

He had fully understood the emperor's intentions.

Wen Tiren spoke with difficulty, his voice hoarse: "Your Majesty is wise... I have heard that at one time, there were three 'Dukes of Yansheng' standing side by side in the world."

"One of them was Kong Zhu, who was conferred an official title by the Southern Song court in Quzhou."

"One of them was Kong Yuancuo, the former Duke Yansheng of the Jin Dynasty, who was temporarily employed by the Mongols after the fall of the Jin Dynasty."

"There is another one, Kong Yuanyong, who was eager to surrender and was newly appointed by the Mongols."

"One family with three high-ranking officials, serving three different kingdoms... truly... an unprecedented and extraordinary tale."

"An unprecedented phenomenon?"

The emperor slammed his hand on the armrest of the dragon throne, making a sharp "smack" sound!
"I see this as an unprecedented disgrace!"

Zhu Youjian's voice was no longer calm, but filled with anger and contempt. His long-suppressed imperial rage erupted at this moment!

"Therefore, when the Mongol army was sharpening its swords and drinking from the Yangtze River, preparing to march south and destroy the last Han dynasty, Kong Zhu, the Duke Yansheng of the Southern Song Dynasty, took the initiative to write to Kublai Khan, requesting that his title of 'Duke Yansheng' be revoked, I was not surprised at all!"
This is no longer just one person's choice; it's become an instinct etched into their bones! A business acumen flowing in their veins!

He suddenly stood up and paced slowly around the room, each step seeming to tread on a historical juncture.

"So, Wen Qing, you'd better remember this!"

The emperor's voice, like a resounding bell, echoed throughout the pavilion, making Wen Tiren's eardrums buzz.

"The Kong family is not some eternal teacher who shares the fate of the nation! They are a family that has been cultivating subjugation for generations!"

"World-Cultivation-Submission Letter!"

The emperor pronounced those four words almost one syllable at a time.

Every single word shattered the sacred and sublime image of the "Duke Yansheng" that had been held in Wen Tiren's mind for decades!
"When the Jurchens came, they surrendered to the Jurchens! When the Mongols came, they surrendered to the Mongols! Whoever has the sharpest sword and the hardest fist is their master! What kind of descendants of saints are these? They are clearly the most cunning, shrewd, and shameless merchants in the world, treating the fate of the nation as mere commodities!"

This scathing critique struck like a bolt of lightning, shattering everything Wen Tiren had learned and believed in throughout his life.

He stood there blankly, feeling a chill run through his body. He had spent his whole life studying power politics and trying to understand people's hearts, and he thought he had seen through all the ways of the court. But only now did Wen Tiren realize that compared with the young emperor on the throne, his tricks were nothing more than child's play.

The emperor didn't give him much time to be shocked; the chilling questioning continued.

"Speaking of the mansions of merchants," Zhu Youjian's eyes sharpened, like a newly tempered steel knife, "Kong Kejian, the Duke Yansheng of the late Yuan Dynasty, took this to the extreme. He was highly valued by the Yuan court, rising to the positions of Chancellor of the Imperial Academy and Minister of Rites. He enjoyed immense honor and was the face of Han Confucian officials in the Mongol Yuan court, right?"

Wen Tiren dared not be negligent any longer and immediately nodded in agreement: "Your Majesty is absolutely right. I have heard that during the Zhizheng era, the Red Turban Army swept through Shandong and once approached Dadu (Beijing). Emperor Yuan Shundi wanted to abandon the city and flee north. It was this Kong Kejian who, in court, overruled the objections of the majority, argued the pros and cons, and shouted that 'the emperor should live or die with the state and the ancestral temple,' and finally persuaded Emperor Yuan Shundi to stay. His loyalty to his lord is truly evident."

"Ah."

Zhu Youjian let out a short, cold laugh, filled with undisguised contempt.

"What a fine example of loyalty to one's lord! What a fine example of 'the emperor shall live and die with the state and the ancestral temple'!"

He turned around and stared at Wen Tiren, his eyes flashing with a cold light that seemed to have seen through all the hypocrisy and trickery in the world.

"But when my great-grandfather, Emperor Gaozu, led his northern expeditionary army to Shandong, what was this Minister Kong, who was so loyal to the Yuan court, doing?"

"He claimed to be ill and refused to leave the city to welcome our Great Ming army. However, he secretly sent his son, Kong Xixue, to the front lines to meet with General Xu Da and sound him out. When our Emperor Taizu Gao established the capital in Nanjing and summoned him to the capital for an audience, he again claimed to be ill and only sent his son to Nanjing to meet the Emperor! Wen Tiren, tell me, what do you call this?"

This is no longer a question, it's an interrogation!

Wen Tiren felt a chill run down his spine, and he almost instinctively chimed in, "This...this is called being two-faced, waiting for the right price! He's watching, he's waiting! He's watching to see if my Great Ming can truly hold onto this empire!"

"Well said!" Zhu Youjian suddenly flicked his sleeve, his voice resolute. "Only when he realized that the Yuan Dynasty's defeat was inevitable and that our Great Ming Dynasty was as solid as a rock did he drag his ailing body to Nanjing in a hurry! Do you think that the Taizu Emperor was really too old and blind to see through his intentions?"

Wen Tiren's mind cleared instantly, as if struck by a thunderbolt: "Your Majesty, I understand. I've heard that Emperor Taizu was extremely dissatisfied with him because of this. Although he was a model for the world and his title was preserved, after his death, the title of 'Duke Yansheng' was passed directly to his second son, Kong Xixue, who had twice come to serve in his place. This... this so-called succession is in fact a severe rebuke known to all!"

"How wise the Great Ancestor was!" Zhu Youjian finally walked to the window, stood with his hands behind his back, and looked at the sky outside. His voice was full of unquestionable determination. "The Great Ancestor saw through the opportunistic and unreliable nature of such people at a glance! He could tolerate the continuation of the Kong family in order to stabilize the hearts of the people, but he would never tolerate a 'Duke Yansheng' who was two-faced and had ulterior motives to hold this honor!" He turned around abruptly, his gaze once again shooting at Wen Tiren.

"So, Wen Qing, do you think that my decision to take action against the Kong family today is just a spur-of-the-moment thing, or a youthful impulsiveness?"

"No!"

"I am emulating the founding emperor! I am using the mirror of the founding emperor of the Great Ming Dynasty to expose the true nature of these unworthy descendants! I am cleaning house for the sake of the Great Ming Dynasty and for the sake of the world!"

"Follow the example of the founding emperor" and "clean house"!
These eight characters are as grand and resonant as a great bell!
It instantly endowed the impending swift and decisive action with irrefutable legal rationale and supreme legitimacy!
At this moment, Wen Tiren's heart was swept away by a huge wave.

He truly believed this was just another action by the emperor to crack down on powerful clans and replenish the national treasury. Only now did he realize that what the emperor was about to do was to thoroughly settle accounts with the Kong family from a historical, moral, and legal perspective!

Just as Wen Tiren was deeply moved and immersed in the grand historical narrative and the emperor's ruthless tactics, the emperor's actions once again surprised him.

He returned to the throne, his tone returning to its initial calmness, as if his earlier remarks, which were enough to overturn the court, had never happened.

"The matter of the Kong family is settled then." The emperor's voice was devoid of any emotion, as if he had casually brushed away a speck of dust.

He then casually picked up a memorial from the table, and without even looking at it, threw it in front of Wen Tiren.

"Look at this again."

This abrupt turn of events made Wen Tiren's heart skip a beat; the emperor's will and authority could shift in the blink of an eye.

The light memorial landed in front of him, but he felt it was as heavy as a thousand pounds. He quickly and respectfully bent down to pick it up and unfolded it to take a look.

The memorial came from the censor Mao Yujian, and its content was a request to the court to drastically reduce the number of post stations throughout the country in order to save expenses and eliminate the malpractices of officialdom.

In an instant, Wen Tiren's thoughts raced through his mind, and he subconsciously tried to find an inherent connection between these two seemingly isolated "major national affairs".

Got it!

His Majesty just denounced the Confucius family for "competing with the state for profit," clearly showing his deep abhorrence of wasting state funds and encroaching on the people's interests.

Now they've produced this memorial to "abolish the post stations"... The drawbacks of the post stations have long been a consensus between the court and the public. Mao Yujian's statement in the memorial that "two-tenths of the post stations in the country are for official business and eight-tenths are for private business" hits the nail on the head.

Your Majesty's actions are by no means accidental!
This is to start with the matter of the Confucius family and set off a massive storm to rectify officialdom and promote frugality!
The Duke of Yansheng's mansion is the number one "national parasite" in the world, and this post station is another major carbuncle on the body of the court! His Majesty is trying to punish the ringleaders first, and then eliminate the accumulated problems, taking a two-pronged approach to scrape the bone and remove the poison from the Ming Dynasty, which is now terminally ill!
Having figured this out, Wen Tiren thought he had once again accurately guessed the emperor's intentions.

He gently closed the memorial, bowed, and said in agreement, “Your Majesty is wise! Censor Mao’s suggestion is indeed a wise and experienced advice for the country. The problems with the post stations are deeply entrenched and difficult to reverse. There are too many redundant staff, and the annual expenditure of money and grain is more than a million, which has long been a heavy burden on the country.”

Now, abolishing the post stations will not only save the national treasury a huge amount of money, but also eliminate the corrupt practice of officials using their positions for personal gain, thus restoring a clean and honest bureaucracy. I believe this is a brilliant solution that kills two birds with one stone! I second that proposal!

After he finished speaking, he quietly waited for the emperor's approval.

What Wen Tiren received, however, was an even softer laugh.
The emperor looked down at his neatly trimmed nails and softly uttered eight words that nearly made Wen Tiren kneel down again in fright.

"A woman's kindness is short-sighted."

Wen Tiren froze on the spot, his confidence instantly turning into bewilderment and horror.

"Your Majesty... Your Majesty?"

He even wondered if he had heard wrongly.

How could my thoughtful and well-considered answer, which closely followed the Emperor's wishes, have earned me the eight-character criticism of "womanly benevolence and short-sightedness"?

This was even more humiliating for him than a direct verbal attack!

The emperor raised his head. "Canceling the post stations will save the national treasury a million taels of silver every year. You can do the math, Mao Yujian can do the math, and I can do the math too."

"But have you considered another factor?"

The emperor continued in an irrefutable tone:

"Throughout the country's post stations, there are countless people who rely on these postmen, grooms, cooks, laborers, and odd jobs for their livelihood. How many more than 100,000 people do this? You, Mao Yujian, with just an official document and a decree, are about to cut off the livelihoods of these 100,000 people!"

The emperor's tone suddenly became more serious, no longer a calm narration, but a chilling interrogation.

"Especially in the northwestern border regions like Shaanxi and Shanxi! There are years of severe drought there, with barren land stretching for miles, and it's no longer news that people are resorting to cannibalism! Those post station workers are already destitute people struggling on the brink of life and death. The post station is their only way to survive, the only place where their entire families can receive money and food so they don't starve to death!"

"Now, you must cut off their livelihood!"

"Wen Tiren, tell me, what did you order them to eat?!" The emperor's voice suddenly rose, filled with a chilling and oppressive aura, "To eat dirt?!"

Wen Tiren knelt down with unprecedented precision this time.

"They have nothing to eat, yet they are in their prime, having worked as porters at the post stations and tamed wild horses; they possess immense strength! Tell me, what will these tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of young men you've wiped out do? Will they sit idly by and wait to die, or will they 'gather together as thieves,' fighting for a chance to survive for themselves and their families?!"

"Mao Yujian's memorial today, seemingly to share the nation's burdens, is in reality a personal delivery of tens of thousands of the strongest, most familiar with the roads, and most desperate soldiers to the already struggling refugees in the Northwest! If I ignite this fire, it will surely spread throughout the entire Northwest within three years, becoming a prairie fire!"

"Then you tell me! Will the little bit of silver I've saved be enough to fill that bottomless pit of bandit suppression?!"

Inside, this time, there was truly a deathly silence.

The incense burner had burned out sometime earlier, and as the last wisp of smoke dissipated, only a suffocating heaviness remained in the air.

Wen Tiren was struck as if by lightning, his body trembling slightly, not from fear, but from the earth-shattering shock!

Closing down post stations...unemployed post station workers...natural disasters in the Northwest...unable to survive...rebellion...bandits...wildfire!
A terrifying yet clear chain of cause and effect, which he had never imagined before, suddenly took shape in his mind. Every link was perfectly connected, and every inference was indestructible!

emperor!

From a single small memorial concerning cost-cutting, one can foresee the course of events in the world three years from now!

Wen Tiren only saw the national treasury's accounts, but the young emperor in front of him saw the volcano about to erupt at the very bottom of the entire Ming Dynasty society!

At this moment, Wen Tiren felt that he was merely standing at the foot of the mountain, smugly believing that he could see the outline of the entire mountain.

The emperor before him was already standing on the clouds high in the sky, overlooking the entire land, taking in the mountains, rivers, wind, rain, thunder and lightning!

An unprecedented sense of shame, mixed with an even stronger sense of awe, overwhelmed him in an instant.

Wen Tiren's voice trembled violently with extreme excitement, shame, and awe:

"Your Majesty...Your Majesty is wise! I...I deserve to die ten thousand times!!"

"Your Majesty, I only know how to calculate money and grain accounts, but not how to calculate the accounts of people's hearts! I only know how to observe the court, but not how to observe the world! Your Majesty sees the big picture from small details and has a keen insight. Such extraordinary talent is beyond my comprehension! I... would rather die ten thousand times than be worthy of your comprehension!"

He looked up and glanced at the figure who was still standing by the window with his hands behind his back.

As sunlight streamed in through the window, backlit, the emperor's figure, though not particularly imposing, seemed to be bathed in a dazzling and sacred golden glow, making him appear so unapproachable, like a god or a demon!
At this moment, the scheming and opportunistic power-hungry minister deep within Wen Tiren's heart completely collapsed.

Instead, there was an almost fanatical belief.

Only one insane thought remained in his mind, repeatedly and violently eroding all his reason—

How could we lose if we followed an emperor like that?

To hell with betting on both sides! That's a mediocre move by the Kong family!
Lao Tzu's glory and wealth, Lao Tzu's life and fortune, Lao Tzu's name in history!
I'm going to bet everything on this!!!
(End of this chapter)