Ming Dynasty: I am truly not the Emperor of Longevity

"Mongolians actually have such customs."

Li Dali suddenly realized.

"No wonder the Mongols frequently raided and plundered, but the Ming army rarely captured the heads of Mongol nobles."

With nearly four hundred heads, this is quite a feat.

After the war ends and the Ministry of War examines these heads, Father will surely be promoted and ennobled.

"I don't even care about these official positions in the Ming court."

Zhang Yin stroked his beard.

"The main purpose of asking Anda for these heads was to make him think that our giving him 30,000 followers was just a transaction."

Our real focus should still be on the territory of the Ming Dynasty.

Now that we've taken so many Mongol heads, how can our own casualties be small?

This is a field battle against the Mongol cavalry!

It is reasonable to report one or two thousand casualties and a large amount of military equipment and armor destroyed.

It's the perfect time to apply for one last large batch of weapons and equipment from the arsenal!

With the dust settling on the war in Shanxi, it's about time to take action in the capital!

"If the emperor and the regent prince die on the same day, the court will inevitably be thrown into chaos. That will be the perfect opportunity for our sect to rise up."

"Father is a man of great foresight; I assure you this uprising will surely succeed!"

Hearing Zhang Yin's words, Li Dali was also very excited.

"A secret letter has been sent from the capital. Duan Chaoyong and Chen Furong have already made arrangements for the assassination of the emperor."

Duan Chaoyong, as expected of a veteran who had followed his father for many years, actually came up with the idea of ​​using the emperor's pursuit of immortality to drive Consort Wang Ning and the palace maids under Chen Furong to their doom.

The latest news is that several palace maids have been beaten to death by the emperor for failing to complete the tasks he demanded.

Even Consort Wang Ning was whipped several times.

Taking advantage of the situation, Chen Furong incited several palace maids to secretly form a sworn brotherhood. More than a dozen palace maids had already secretly sworn brotherhood. All that was needed was one last spark to make them risk their lives and perish together with the emperor.

The final fire has been prepared for them.

Duan Chao secretly prepared a batch of pills with a higher concentration than the "Red Lead" elixir, intending to have Chen Furong give them to the palace maids on the day of the operation.

After taking this product, not only will you have extremely high energy levels, but you will also become impulsive and courageous. The effect is much better than drinking alcohol to boost your courage!

Those palace maids were already on the verge of collapse, feeling that they would die at the hands of the emperor sooner or later.

Once the drug takes effect, and with a little encouragement from Chen Furong, they'll definitely forget the consequences and turn their long-suppressed thoughts into action!

"Duan Chaoyong had followed his father since the Zhengde era, and he was quite resourceful."

Zhang Yin laughed.

"Chen Furong is somewhat beyond my expectations. An orphan I picked up and raised casually actually has such abilities."

Empress Fang actually found Chen Furong to frame Consort Cao; it's truly a blessing from heaven for our sect.

"With the emperor dead, we have evidence of her regicide; we're not afraid she won't obey us."

"Father, with Empress Fang's cooperation, the assassination of the Emperor should be foolproof."

Li Dali continued.

"However, the King of Ying may not be so easy to deal with."

We didn't have Wang Ziyan take the assassination plan back to Duan Chaoyong and Chen Furong; instead, we arranged for another group of people to carry it out.

However, the son had just received a secret letter from them, requesting that the sect send several more top experts to the capital to participate in the operation.

They alone probably can't complete the mission!

Why is that?

Hearing his son's words, Zhang Yin was also taken aback.

"The team sent to the capital is the most skilled assassination team in our sect, with experts in hidden weapons and poison."

Their leader, Wu Nian, was also a master of internal martial arts.

I have been operating in the capital for many years and have a considerable number of connections behind the scenes.

While getting these people involved in a rebellion was far from feasible, it wouldn't be difficult to find out the whereabouts and preferences of the King of Ying.

The Prince of Ying is only in his early twenties, even younger than Li Tong. A young man will always have some hobbies. If we cater to his interests and lure him out of the palace, it shouldn't be difficult.

When traveling in the capital, he wouldn't have many guards. If an ambush were set up beforehand and a sudden attack launched, with Wu Nian's martial arts skills, plus a dozen or so skilled assassins, how could they possibly fail?!

"This is Wu Nian's secret letter. Father, please take a look."

Li Dali handed a letter to Zhang Yin. The letter contained many coded messages, and even if an ordinary person received it, they would not be able to understand its meaning.

"I never expected that!"

Zhang Yin took the secret letter in his hand and read it carefully twice.

"Prince Zhu Houyu of Ying is very likely a master of external martial arts!"

As a professional assassination team, the first thing they did upon arriving in the capital was naturally to gather intelligence on their target.

Information about Prince Zhu Houyu of Ying is very easy to obtain.

But this information is far from enough to carry out the assassination mission; they need more detailed information.

More than a decade ago, the Maitreya Cult sent spies into the palace, and several of them have now risen to a certain position.

There were eunuchs, female officials, and palace maids, and Chen Furong was one of them.

Wu Nian used a secret code to lure one of the eunuchs outside the palace, asking him to find an opportunity to go to the Southern Palace and find out what the Prince of Ying did in his spare time and what his hobbies were.

This matter was not difficult for eunuchs with official ranks in the palace.

Sure enough, a few days later, the eunuch secretly met with Wu Nian again outside the palace.

However, the information brought by this eunuch greatly surprised Wu Nian.

In his spare time, Prince Zhu Houyu of Ying often practiced martial arts!

Emperor Zhengde, Zhu Houzhao, was also fond of martial arts, but due to his limited aptitude, he was only at the level of an ordinary martial artist.

But Zhu Houyu is different. It is very likely that he broke through the bottleneck, found the feeling of Qi, and developed external internal strength while practicing external martial arts!

Moreover, his mastery of external martial arts and internal strength is quite high!

When Zhu Houyu practiced martial arts at the training ground in the Southern Palace, he would often summon people from the Ceremonial Guard of the Prince of Ying's Palace to spar with him. It was not difficult for a eunuch to extract information from the people in the Ceremonial Guard.

The Prince of Ying never asked those who practiced martial arts with him to keep quiet, as these people were quite willing to praise their prince's martial arts skills in front of the eunuchs.

The eunuch extracted some accurate information from people who had served as sparring partners for the Prince of Ying.

Zhu Houyu's personal sword was a two-handed longsword weighing 27 jin (approximately 18.5 catties), named "Duan Yue" (断岳).

He used this sword every time he practiced his swordsmanship.

This extremely heavy longsword was not commissioned by the Prince of Ying himself, but was a trophy from his time as the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard in Linqing. It was simply fitted with new fittings and a new scabbard.

The original owner of this knife was a notorious bandit known as "Ghost-Scaring," who was captured and killed by Zhu Houyu, who was then called Lu Chen.

Wu Nian had heard of the name "Ghost's Bane," a renowned external martial arts master.

Zhu Houyu was able to use a 27-pound two-handed longsword that he had seized from "Ghost Sorrow" back then, as his old subordinates who had followed him in Linqing knew.

Not only that, Zhu Houyu was also an exceptional archer. In battle, he could fire dozens of arrows in succession from the Kaiyuan Heavy Bow, which had a draw weight of 100 jin, without changing his expression.

These are things that ordinary martial artists without internal strength cannot do!

Although internal martial arts masters can use these heavy weapons for a short time with the support of their internal energy, the consumption of internal energy is too great, and they cannot sustain it for long.

No master of internal martial arts would carry such a heavy weapon with them.

All this evidence points to one answer!

The emperor's own younger brother, the Prince Regent, was actually a master of martial arts from a different family!