Wanli Xinming

Chapter 257 The Northern Expedition
King Temur of Shunyi left the Wuying Hall and joined the attendants and interpreters beside him. He followed Zhang Juzheng and several other courtiers and went out from the Xihua Gate. The group walked through a corridor between a towering red wall and came to the Zhengshi Hall. .

The Zhengshi Hall, which was converted from a part of the palace in Xiyuan, is not as solemn as the Forbidden City. The rockery and ponds are scattered, and many officials are hidden among the vegetation.Due to the cold weather, the trees, flowers and grass have lost their leaves, but the snow that has not yet melted on it has added some sparse air to the center of the empire's operation.

Zhang Juzheng took King Shunyi for a while, pointed to a large open space covered with white snow, and said, "King Shunyi, please look, this is Xiyuan Nanhai, now it's frozen, go south from that stone bridge. All of them are the Zhengshitang—from ancient times to the present, my emperor was the first to change the Linyuan Palace as the place for governance.” As he spoke, he bowed his hands in the direction of the Qianqing Palace, and his respect was evident in his words.

Temur did not dare to walk in front of Zhang Juzheng, half a position behind him.At this time, he was stunned by the beauty in front of him, and he thought to himself that compared with the inner city of the naturalized city, it was like firefly and bright moon.

Zhang Juzheng said with a smile: "I once heard that when the old prince and Mrs. Zhongshun built the Guihua City, they imitated the shape of the capital of the Yuan Dynasty. Is there such a thing?"

King Shunyi slipped under his feet, and if it wasn't for the interpreter who was beside him with his eyes and hands to hold him fast, he would have almost fallen into a fart.Zhang Juzheng turned his body to the side, looked directly at King Shunyi and asked with a smile, "Is it flashing? The lord should be more careful."

Prince Shunyi kept saying that he was fine, but his body was sweating in the cold north wind, and there was a chill on his back.Thanks to his many years of military career, this waist is very good, otherwise Zhang Juzheng's two questions will scare him into the urine.

After that, Zhang Juzheng chatted with him warmly and asked him if there was a white disaster on the grassland this year?He asked him about the number of tribes, the number of livestock, and the number of people who controlled the strings. King Shunyi was like pouring beans in a bamboo tube, and he didn't dare to look up at the prime minister along the way.

Zhang Juzheng's office is a yard. The main room is five rooms wide, and the east and west wing rooms are surrounded by a courtyard. There are several trees in the middle of the yard that have lost their leaves.The King of Shunyi was stunned, seeing that all the houses in front of him were like the Forbidden City, with glass windows, and he felt envious.

When everyone entered the parlour, Zhang Juzheng asked the king of Shunyi to sit in the east, and the two of them sat down.The king of Shunyi had almost forgotten the Han etiquette he had learned earlier, so he did not refuse, and sat on the official hat chair.Although he was sitting upright, his eyes still did not dare to look directly at Zhang Juzheng, his head bowed like he was counting ants.

Zhang Juzheng picked up the tea bowl, blowing the heat lightly, and motioned for King Shunyi and everyone to drink tea.When King Shunyi picked up the tea bowl, Zhang Juzheng pointed at the man in Mongolian robe standing beside him and asked, "Is this the interpreter brought by the prince? Is it a Chinese?"

The man first translated Zhang Juzheng's words into Mongolian, and when King Shunyi nodded, he introduced himself: "Returning to the Prime Minister, after the villain is a Han Chinese, my late father was originally a Chinese bodyguard with Zhong Jin Hatun. People who are proficient in Chinese and know Chinese characters, this time, I will serve by the prince's side."

Hearing this, Zhang Juzheng nodded with a smile, pointed to a stack of newspapers on the table beside Shunyi King, and said, "This is a newspaper from the capital, the lord has heard of it."

The King of Shunyi replied, "I heard that, because I don't know Chinese characters, people have read a few of them in the past few days."

Zhang Juzheng laughed and said, "Let your interpreter take a look. This is the idea given to the imperial court in the capital newspaper after the slaughter of Zasaktu from the Chahar tribe. It is about how to solve the problem on the northern border. The lord can let him Translate for you."

Hearing this, Temur had a confused look on his face, and motioned for his interpreter to read the contents of these old newspapers to him in Mongolian.The interpreter picked up the newspaper, and when he saw the need for his translation, he marked it with a red pen.

He only read a page, his hands trembled uncontrollably, his face was pale, his lips trembled, and his whole body was soon dripping with sweat.

King Shunyi asked curiously, "What is written in this newspaper?"

The translator said in a trembling voice: "The newspaper said that, in order to avoid the border troubles of the empire, it is recommended that the imperial court use the method of reducing the size."

"What is the method of reducing the size?"

"Using the old method of the Jin Kingdom, the population reproduction number of each clan is set to be reduced every three years. For example, our Tumut clan has set a number of [-] people, and if they exceed it, they will be killed. For example, the Chahar clan will not listen to Wang Hua. All of them should be wiped out, and no remnants should be left behind.” After flipping through the other newspapers, he continued, “These are the same things—this one, if Tumt and other ministries are a little bit unpredictable, then Kill them all"

King Shunyi heard these inhumane policies, his face turned pale at first, and then a anger burned in his heart, and the blood from his whole body seemed to rush to his face.

He pushed his chest hard on the chair, and the aura of the Lord of the Prairie suddenly burst out from his body, staring at Zhang Juzheng with red eyes.He clenched his fist with his right hand, and just wanted to thump the table heavily, but he met Zhang Juzheng's gaze - as cold as the cold wind outside, his heart trembled again, but he put down his fist.

He slowly stood up from his chair and said loudly, "Although the Mongols are no match for the court's firearms and soldiers, they will not sit still and wait for death. If the court wants to kill me and wait, we may not have only one iron wood from our family. real!"

These words were loud enough to make everyone in the reception room buzzing in the ears.Although the interpreter was pale, he still translated the words of King Shunyi, even imitating the tone.

Wang Chonggu and other courtiers who followed Zhang Juzheng saw him being rude and were about to scold him, but when they saw Zhang Juzheng sitting there drinking tea slowly, they all held back.

Zhang Juzheng sucked and drank tea, and the whole room could only hear King Shunyi's heavy breathing and the sound of his tea drinking. The suppressed King Shunyi's heart was about to explode.After waiting for a while, he saw that Zhang Juzheng didn't respond. He was about to continue talking, but he saw Zhang Juzheng put down the tea bowl and waved his hand again, motioning him to sit down.

Prince Shunyi sat down angrily, still staring, to see what Zhang Juzheng said.At this moment, he already had the heart to die, and he had already given up the act of being a man with his tail tucked into the capital when he entered the capital. It was as if he had changed a person, his face was full of flesh, and murderous aura was overflowing.

If Zhang Juju had not seen it, he smiled and said, "What is said in the newspaper is just the words of the common people. How could the imperial court not know that the Jin Kingdom's reduction of the number of people will harm the heaven and the law? The court is so determined, why should the emperor summon you today?"

When King Shunyi heard this, his face softened again, and the fierce light in his eyes disappeared immediately.He relaxed a little, knowing that Zhang Juzheng had something to say, he sat there quietly and listened.

Zhang Juzheng said again: "My lord, do you know the situation of the world today?" Before waiting for King Shunyi to answer, he instructed Zhongshu around him: "Pull the curtain and let the lord see the map of Kun and Wanguo!"

Hearing the words, Zhongshu in the political affairs hall, who was serving him, pulled back the green curtain behind Zhang Juzheng's case, revealing the map of the universe.Zhang Juzheng stood up and waved, "Your Highness, come and have a look."

When King Shunyi got up and followed him to the bottom of the map, Zhang Juzheng picked up a smooth and straight wooden stick handed to him by Zhongshu and pointed at it: "Lord, please see - this is the place where I live, the royal court The Institute of Geography calls it Central Continent."

King Shunyi rubbed his eyes, pointed to a row of small mahjong-like patterns neatly arranged in the middle of the map and said, "Is this a side wall?" Zhang Juzheng said, "Exactly. This small circle here is Guihua City. This is where the lord came from."

King Shunyi murmured first: "It turns out that Guihua City is so close to the capital." After a pause, he continued: "It's not close anymore, it's thousands of miles away. It looks close on this picture." Zhang Juzheng laughed and gave a thumbs up. : "My lord is smart. The Guihua city wall is 870 miles away from the capital city wall. Comparing it on the map, it is only three fingers wide."

The accurate numbers that Zhang Juzheng reported casually, the amount of information was huge, making King Shunyi turn over in his heart, and he was secretly frightened again.

Zhang Juzheng pointed the stick to the north of the map and said: "My lord, please look at this mountain - this is the Beidi Mountain Range, which is rarely visited by Chinese people. I heard that it is more than [-] miles in length from north to south, Europe on the west, and Zhongzhou on the east. The Europas called the North Di Mountains the Ural Mountains."

King Shunyi was stunned, he never imagined that the northern part of the grassland would be so vast.Seeing him stunned, Zhang Juzheng smiled and said: "The prince just said that the Bo'er Jijin family may not have only one Genghis Khan, but I don't know how much land the Bo'er Jijin family used to occupy in the past—"

With a wooden stick, he pointed to the west again: "Back then, the Batu army used Bangkok's tactical tactics and Huihui artillery to march westward, and they directly attacked Beidi Mountain and entered the Europa Continent. You should have heard that the capital. Some people from the Western barbarians have come, and they are the Europa people. In the past, these lands were all owned by the Boer family."

As Zhang Juzheng spoke, he used a stick to draw a large circle on the map that made King Shunyi stunned. While his blood was strained, he was also a little ashamed - as if he had sullied the blood of the Golden Family.

Seeing his excitement, Zhang Juzheng sneered and said: "The so-called barbarians have no luck for a hundred years, and a land with prosperous culture and education cannot be ruled with a horse whip. In the past, the Great Yuan who established the Central Plains was uprooted by my dynasty Taizu, and Chengzu conquered the grassland several times. In the past 2000 Where are the Great Yuan and the Golden Horde Khanate located thousands of miles away?"

The king of Shunyi blushed, bowed and whispered: "Although Temur admires the achievements of Genghis Khan, he has no ambition to become a king and an ancestor. Now that he can have a place with lush water and grass, his wish is fulfilled."

Zhang Juzheng continued to sneer and said: "Now I am in the Han Dynasty. In the ninth year of Wanli, there were 700 million people. How many people are there in the grasslands? Are there any Han people who have a lot of them? The new army also has the advantage of firearms. Riding and shooting Can it be taken for granted?"

King Shunyi was sweating profusely when he heard the translation, and said in a low voice, "Yes, yes. The survival of our clan depends on the kindness of the Khan's thoughts. The ministers and others must never have any wrong thoughts."

Seeing that he was completely honest, Zhang Juzheng patted his shoulder again to express his comfort.He took a sip of water from the teacup handed by Zhongshu beside him, tapped the map hard with a wooden stick, and saw the picture: "The emperor believes that the east of Beidi Mountain extends to the sea outside Beishan, and the north reaches the sea of ​​Beiming. They should all belong to the land inherent in China.”

"Therefore, next year, the emperor will hold the Mongolian divisions at the Jehol Congress, divide the kings, divide the grasslands, and form the Han-Mongolian coalition to conquer the land that is bigger than China!"

(End of this chapter)