Sky Curtain: The opening scene explains the four major cases of the Ming Dynasty plus the early Ming

"Alright, everyone, let's not dwell on those emperors' miraculous feats. Let's get back to the main topic and look at this internal strife in the eighth year of the Jiajing reign!"

Zhu Dijun grabbed the blackboard eraser and wiped away all the messy accounts about the Northwest border on the whiteboard. Then he used a red marker to draw a huge blood circle in the area of ​​Jiangnan.

"As I just mentioned, this turmoil, triggered by the unequal distribution of profits among the Jiangnan smuggling groups, is called the Jiangyin Hou Zhongjin Rebellion."

On the big screen, a yellowed photocopy of the "Veritable Records of Emperor Shizong of Ming" crashed down.

"Family members, when you see the character '侯' (hou), does your first reaction think that some founding marquis or hereditary noble of the Ming Dynasty has led a rebellion? Do you think it's a case of top-level powerful figures double-crossing each other?"

Zhu Dijun gave a mocking sneer and shook his head sharply.

"Wrong! Utterly wrong!"

"This Hou Zhongjin is not the Marquis of Jiangyin of the Ming Dynasty at all! 'Hou' is his surname; he is just a commoner from the lowest rung of society, someone who can't even afford to eat!"

"However, this very peasant, in July of the eighth year of the Jiajing reign, was able to gather a crowd and launch an uprising in Jiangyin, the most crucial financial and tax center of the Ming Dynasty, and kill more than two hundred regular Ming soldiers on the spot! The momentum was so great that it scared the entire Jiangnan officialdom so much that they wet their pants!"

On the big screen, in the waterways of the Jiangnan water town, several dilapidated awning boats were set ablaze, and blood stained the river surface red.

The era of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Yuanzhang stared intently at the sky, his brows furrowed into a deep knot.

"How could an ordinary commoner gather a force that killed over two hundred government soldiers?!"

Zhu Yuanzhang's voice was filled with murderous intent, "Are all the officials in Jiangnan dead?! Where did these bandits even come from?!"

On the sky, Zhu Dijun gave an extremely chilling answer.

"Fellow family members, historical records characterize Hou Zhongjin and his ilk as 'notorious bandits.' But Xia Yan, a Ming Dynasty official who remained observant at the time, incisively exposed their true identities in his memorial to the throne!"

Two large, blood-stained characters were nailed to the center of the screen—【Salt Path】!

"They're not professional bandits at all; they're all smugglers of salt along the coast!"

Zhu Dijun moved closer to the camera, his eyes so sharp they seemed capable of peeling off a layer of skin.

"Why would the prosperous Jiangnan region of the Ming Dynasty give rise to such a massive armed smuggling ring? The answer lies in the Ming Dynasty's utterly absurd 'maritime prohibition policy'!"

He wrote the five characters "Strict laws lead to a miserable people" heavily on the whiteboard.

"Remember what we talked about earlier? In the second year of the Jiajing reign, the Ningbo Tribute Dispute broke out. In order to cut off the Japanese pirates, Xia Yan and his group of civil officials abolished the Maritime Trade Office in one fell swoop, completely closing the door to official trade! The maritime ban was extremely strict!"

"Furthermore, after the mutiny on August 11th of the fifth year of Zhengde's reign, the Zhengde New Policies were abolished, and the Maritime Trade Office was put in charge of the Japanese pirate defense forces. The original intention was to crack down on private smuggling trade, but Xia Yan was somewhat naive."

"What did the gentry and high-ranking officials in Jiangnan do? Their private ships still went out to sea! They made a fortune through smuggling! They treated the imperial orders as worthless, and even went so far as to kill four emperors from Emperor Yingzong Zhu Qizhen to Emperor Wuzong Zhu Houzhao."

And what about the ordinary people who have relied on the sea for generations, making a living by boiling salt and fishing?

Zhu Dijun slammed his fist on the podium, making a dull thud.

"The government has completely destroyed the people's livelihood! If they don't smuggle, they'll starve to death! But if they go to sea to boil salt or run smuggling ships, even just to earn a living, they'll be beheaded if they're caught by the government's police!"

"They're going to die anyway! These lowly salt workers, driven to desperation, might as well pick up knives and guns and fight the government!"

"This was the earliest prototype of the Jiajing-era Japanese pirate raids that would later plague the Ming Dynasty for decades and strike fear into the hearts of the entire world! The Ming Dynasty's bureaucratic and aristocratic system, through its extremely hypocritical maritime prohibition policy, forced the good citizens of the Ming Dynasty into becoming fearless armed pirates!"

Inside the modern live streaming room, the barrage of comments scrolled wildly.

[The ultimate evolution of the "only officials are allowed to set fires, while commoners are forbidden to light lamps!"]

"It's surreal that civil officials who smuggle are considered respectable, but ordinary people who smuggle are labeled notorious thieves!"

"If you can't survive, you have to rebel. Those two hundred soldiers died so unjustly; they all became cannon fodder for the policy."

Zhu Dijun looked at the comments, picked up his teacup and took a sip of water, then pointed to the river defense map on the screen.

"Alright, the salt laborers were forced into rebellion. Logically speaking, the Ming Dynasty has so many garrisons stationed in Jiangnan, and even a special anti-Japanese army, so why couldn't they even capture a few salt laborers, but instead had more than two hundred of them killed?"

"Because the Ming Dynasty's military command system at this time contained an extremely fatal flaw—the 'fragmented' design!"

A red dotted line abruptly cuts the Yangtze River and the East China Sea in two.

"Fellow countrymen, in the military system of the Ming Dynasty at that time, the Yangtze River defense line, also known as the river defense, was under the jurisdiction of the Imperial Censor in charge of the Yangtze River defense! The coastal defense line, also known as the sea defense against Japanese pirates, was under the jurisdiction of the local generals and governors!"

"These two systems are not subordinate to each other! This has led to an extremely farcical cat-and-mouse game!"

Zhu Dijun picked up the pointer and started drawing circles on the map.

"Hou Zhongjin and his gang of salt smugglers are too clever! When the government troops come to arrest them in the river, they sail out to sea! When the river defense troops see this, they think, 'Oh, they've gone out to sea, they're no longer under our jurisdiction,' and retreat! But when the coastal defense troops come to arrest them, they immediately turn around and dive into the Yangtze River! When the coastal defense troops see this, they think, 'Oh, they've entered the river, they're no longer under our jurisdiction,' and retreat!"

"Amidst this incredibly incompetent departmental buck-passing, Hou Zhongjin's team grew stronger and stronger, seemingly unstoppable!"

The emperors of countless worlds and timelines twitched at the corners of their eyes as they listened.

At the Weiyang Palace of the Han Dynasty, Liu Bang spat out the mouthful of wine he had just poured into his mouth.

"This is what they call fighting a war? This is child's play! Military intelligence is at stake, and these officers are still arguing about who gets to command the defense zone?!"

"At the crucial moment, it was Xia Yan, the one who had initially proposed abolishing the Maritime Trade Office, who stepped forward."

Zhu Dijun tapped Xia Yan's name on the whiteboard.

"Xia Yan was a ruthless man. He saw through the drawbacks of this system of multiple government departments at a glance, and the real reason behind it was that the civil service group did not want the emperor to have any involvement in maritime power and trade. So he immediately submitted a very forward-thinking memorial to Jiajing!"

He requested the emperor to appoint a special "General Commander-in-Chief to Garrison the Jianghuai Region" in key locations such as Zhenjiang, thus consolidating command over both river and sea defenses and establishing unified command for joint river and sea defense!

A phantom image of an imperial edict bearing the imperial seal appeared on the screen.

"Upon reviewing the document, Emperor Jiajing immediately approved it without hesitation! With unified command, the Ming navy was finally able to encircle and, not long after, successfully and completely suppressed Hou Zhongjin's rebellion!"

In the live stream, a viewer was about to send a comment praising Xia Yan as "awesome" or "Jiajing was decisive."

Zhu Dijun's face turned extremely cold in that instant. Without warning, he grabbed the blackboard eraser and violently wiped the seven large characters "General Commander Garrisoning Jianghuai" off the whiteboard, leaving not a trace of ink!

"Family members, do you all think that the Ming Dynasty has finally learned its lesson and is preparing to take this opportunity to build a modern river and sea defense system?"

Stop dreaming!

Zhu Dijun's voice was like a chilling gust of wind, freezing everyone to the bone.

Four large, highly sarcastic characters slammed onto the public screen: 【Spin! Set! Spin! Stop!】

"The Veritable Records of Emperor Jiajing of the Ming Dynasty clearly state in black and white that the very next day after the Hou Zhongjin Rebellion was quelled and the rebels were wiped out, the Ministry of War immediately submitted a memorial to the Jiajing Emperor: 'The rebellion has been quelled; please dismiss the Commander-in-Chief of the Jianghuai Army!'"

"The battle is over! It's no longer needed! Immediately and damn well revoke this extremely crucial position of Commander-in-Chief of the Jianghai region!"

boom!

The entire live stream chat exploded instantly.

"Holy crap?! That's ruthless!"

"They just patched the loopholes, won the battle, and then immediately reopened them? Is the Ming Dynasty's Ministry of War filled with shit?!"

"Use it and then throw it away, even a chamber pot isn't this useful!"

In the Hongwu era of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang slammed his palm down on the imperial desk, creating a crack, and trembled with rage.

"Absurd! This is utterly ridiculous! Officials and guards are there to prevent problems before they arise, not to appoint officials when thieves come and dismiss them when they leave!"

On the sky, Zhu Dijun sneered, cutting open the underlying logic of the Ministry of War's brain-dead operation.

"Why withdraw? Four extremely realistic, and extremely disgusting reasons!"

Zhu Dijun held up four fingers.

"First! Financial considerations! Establishing a General-in-Chief means assigning him a direct force, which requires paying him the military salary of a high-ranking military officer! The Ming Dynasty's treasury has already been emptied by the military expenses of the Nine Garrisons and the tax exemption in Jiangnan! The civil service group feels that now that there is no war, maintaining a General-in-Chief is too wasteful of money!"

"Secondly! The civil service's extreme aversion to military generals! Once a powerful military commander is permanently stationed along the river and sea defense lines, the power of the River Censor and the Coastal Inspector will be greatly weakened! How could the civil officials tolerate a mere soldier riding roughshod over them?!"

"Third! Systemic inertia! Those bureaucrats in the Ministry of War, sitting in the Forbidden City enjoying the breeze, think that they could get by with the garrisons and patrols before, and this time it was just an accident. Continuing to maintain 'separation of powers and checks and balances' is the 'ancestral law' of the Ming Dynasty's officialdom!"

"Fourth! And most importantly, we cannot allow Jiajing to have actual military power in Jiangnan. He is already so difficult to deal with if he only has a little military power in the Northwest and the capital. If he gains a lot of military power in Jiangnan, he will restore the policies of the Ming Wuzong era, or even the Ming Taizu era. This is the most important thing!"

Zhu Dijun pressed his hands firmly on the podium, his eyes filled with heartache and resentment.

"Family members, this is a classic example of 'malicious shortsightedness' in the Ming Dynasty! Treating the symptom, not the cause! Once the pain subsides, they even tear off the plaster and sell it for money!"

"Xia Yan astutely recognized the importance of joint river and sea defense as early as the eighth year of the Jiajing reign. This was the only and last window of opportunity for the Ming Dynasty to establish a complete coastal defense system in the early Jiajing period!"

"However, because of the power-hungry desires of the civil service, the Ministry of War personally and firmly sealed off this window of opportunity!"

The image on the big screen suddenly turned blood red, and the sound of the rolling waves was like the roar of a demon.

"They deliberately dismissed a general, saving several thousand taels of silver and preserving the power of the civil officials."

Zhu Dijun stared directly into the camera, each word like a death knell striking the very marrow of history.

"But they had no idea that this shortsighted 'let it go' approach would, decades later, inflict a terrible bloodbath on the Jiangnan region of the Ming Dynasty!"

"Or perhaps it doesn't matter if they know, because those who die are the lowly people they see!"

"They can be maritime merchants, pirates, or even transform themselves into the [Ming Dynasty Navy]."

----split line----

Here, I found information that doesn't match this. The "Veritable Records of Emperor Shizong of Ming" records that in the 8th year of Jiajing's reign, Chen Qing (from the Shanxi uprising) or Hou Ben (a refugee from Shandong) were involved.

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• In the sixth and seventh years of the Jiajing reign (1527-1528), around the time of Chen Qing's uprising, there was indeed a leader of refugees in Shandong and Henan named Hou Ben (sometimes also called Hou Bendao).

The Veritable Records of Emperor Shizong of Ming records Hou Ben's activities in the Cao County and Shan County areas of Shandong.

• Speculation: Later sources may have confused the name "Hou Ben" with the time of "Chen Qing" (the eighth year of the Jiajing reign) or the background of "Jiangnan" (because Shandong is close to Southern Zhili, it is sometimes generally classified as the eastern coast), thus evolving into "Hou Zhongjin".

·

Possibility Two: Confusing with "Japanese Pirate Leader" (Jiangnan background)

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During the Jiajing era, there were indeed many pirate/Japanese pirate leaders in Jiangnan (Zhejiang and Fujian), such as Xu Dong, Wang Zhi, and Xu Hai.

Xu Dong (Xu Er) was an active figure in the mid-Jiajing period.

• Speculation: If the information emphasizes "Jiangnan", it may be that the deeds of a Japanese pirate leader have been attributed to an incorrect name.

Therefore, this book uses the year 8 of the Jiajing reign as the reference point. Please forgive any errors, as there are too many genuine and fake documents, and even the ones I have are not guaranteed to be authentic. Please forgive any mistakes.

Just as we are now clarifying the facts, and the Man in the Iron Mask in France was Zhu Cilang, and God was Zhu Youjian, I cannot guarantee that everything I write later will be correct.