Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 655 Extra Story ([-]) A Small Country Difficult
On the third day of the winter month in the 24th year of Tianqi, Sun Chengzong, the former chief assistant of the cabinet, died at the age of 81.

As the emperor's teacher, after the cabinet deliberated, Zhu Youxiao decreed to pursue his posthumous title of Wenzhong.

Sun Chengzong's death disrupted Zhu Ciran's plan.

He didn't believe that Sun Chengzong and Hong Chengchou would reverse the case of corrupt officials in the four major cases, but Sun Chengzong's death made him have to increase his suspicion of Hong Chengchou.

Hong Chengchou was well aware of these suspicions. Therefore, in the Chang Dynasty on the tenth day of the winter month, Hong Chengchou, as the chief assistant of the cabinet, ordered officials from various provinces to re-count the names of officials and their families involved in the four crimes.

Hong Chengchou used actions to express his position, and Zhu Youxiao, who got the news, also sent people to the East Palace to order Zhu Ciran to suspend the investigation of the "burning of the memorials of the four major cases", and the matter was handed over to the cabinet for disposal.

Zhu Ciran was unwilling, but he was only the prince after all, so he could only reluctantly hand over the matter to the cabinet.

On the seventeenth day of the twelfth lunar month, the chief ministers of each province recounted the number of offenders and their families involved in the four crimes. However, some officials from the Ministry of Criminal Justice reported that the number of people on the new list was less than [-]% of the original number.

Just 10,000% of the omissions may not seem like much, but for the more than [-] million people involved in the four major cases, even if it is only [-]%, it represents the escape of [-]+ people.

It's not that this group of people can't be found out, it's just that they are unwilling to find good people.

The criminals did not escape, but it is not known whether any of their descendants can escape...

Zhu Ciran wanted to put his mind on this, but he didn't have Zhu Youjian's effort after all.

On the tail of the twelfth lunar month, Lin Dan Khan sent envoys to listen to the heaven, the army training was over, and the second western expedition to the Crimean Khanate would be launched on the second day of March.

The first Western Expedition was already in April. Although the war lasted only one month before being interrupted by reinforcements from the Ottoman Empire, Lin Dan Khan still plundered more than [-] taels worth of gold from the Crimean Khanate. Cattle, sheep, horses, gold, silver and precious stones, and a population of more than [-].

However, due to the timely Ottoman reinforcements and the lack of gunpowder, Lin Dan Khan did not acquire too many cities and land. The main grazing area of ​​his herders is still the Taixi Province pastoral area that has been sold to Daming.

Lin Danhan complained about the difficulties, and Zhu Youxiao didn't make it difficult for him. After all, Mongolia is now the Northwest Ping Fan of Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Youxiao let Lin Dan Khan's herdsmen graze in Taixi Province, but it only lasted until the end of the second Western Expedition.

Zhu Youxiao was not worried that Lin Danhan would occupy the magpie's nest. After all, only Daming would provide them with gunpowder.

Without gunpowder, Lin Danhan's new [-] flintlock cavalry would be useless.

Lin Danhan is not stupid, he understands his situation.

Since he chose to be a dog, at least he has to be obedient until he is strong.

The purpose of sending someone to play this time is to show that he has no intention of occupying the magpie's nest.

At the same time, he also presented the cattle, horses and sheep worth 30 taels, as well as gold, silver and jewelry, as tribute gifts.

Zhu Youxiao was quite satisfied with his gift, and Zhu Ciran also knew what Lin Danhan wanted when he saw it, so he ordered Anxi Gunpowder Bureau to transfer [-] tons of black powder in custom packs as a gift.

Three hundred tons of black powder sounds like a lot, but the cost is only 6000 taels. Compared with the value of Lin Danhan's tribute gift, it is not worth mentioning.

But even with so much gunpowder, for war, I am afraid that it is only the consumption of Mongolia's western expedition.

In order to make Mongolia no longer like the first Western Expedition, where he did not dare to go deep because of logistics, Zhu Ciran also gave Lin Dan Khan a reward of [-] shi from the western province of Taixi.

The price of gunpowder and food was only more than [-] taels, but Lin Danhan donated more than [-] taels. It seemed that he was losing money, but he was helpless.

Daming is the suzerain country and has the pricing power of trade in the suzerain-vassal system, even if Lin Danhan knows that he is at a disadvantage, he can't help it.

Now nearly [-]% of the saltpeter consumed by gunpowder in the war in Western Europe is provided by Daming. For countries in Europe that can produce gunpowder, the cost of gunpowder is basically no less than four renminbi.

If it was sold to a Mongolian like Lin Danhan, they might increase the price to eight coins.

This is still available, but the reality is that there is a shortage of gunpowder throughout Europe, and Lin Danhan has nowhere to buy it.

In this comparison, buying gunpowder from Daming is already a relatively affordable option, and it is also a choice to show loyalty.

The Mongolian envoy left the capital contentedly, and within half a month, he took the train to Anxi City in Anxi.

He chose to change to a carriage, used the imperial decree to obtain [-] tons of black powder from the Anxi Gunpowder Bureau, and took the gunpowder to Taixi Province.

On the third day of February in the 25th year of Apocalypse, he arrived in Taixi Province, used the imperial decree to ask for [-] shi of rice, and then returned with a full load across the Volga River, completing his mission this time.

With gunpowder and food, Lin Dan Khan began to order the ministries to prepare for war.

On the second day of March, Lin Dan Khan led [-] cavalry to launch the second western expedition, and the Crimean Khanate asked the Ottoman Empire for help.

On March [-]th, Ottoman sent [-] reinforcements to support the Crimean Khanate.

At the same time, Zhu Fuju, the commander-in-chief of Anxi, led [-] cavalry into the Khyber Pass, and Ma Xianglin, the commander-in-chief of Yunnan, led [-] cavalry out of Sishui Pass in Zhouguo. Two cavalry troops swept the east and west sides of the Mughals.

When Shah Jahan heard the news, he ordered his eldest son Shuke and his third son Aurangzeb to lead [-] troops to defend against the enemy.

However, this time the goal of the Ming army was to destroy villages and towns as small and medium-sized supply points, which frustrated Mughal production.

Therefore, when Shuke and Aurangzeb arrived at the front line on March 24 and March 27 respectively, all they were left with was scorched earth, messy horseshoe prints, and displaced untouchables.

In April, Zhu Fuju and Ma Xianglin led their troops back to Hezhong and Demasa respectively.

In this battle, the two troops captured more than 16 cattle and horses, and grain, gold and silver worth about [-] taels.

In terms of seizures, this battle is considered a small profit compared to expenditures, but from a strategic point of view, if the Mughals want to send troops from the east and west, it will take at least one or two years to restore local production.

This is only the time required to restore local production, and recruiting refugees is the bulk of the Mughal's expenditure.

Although not many troops were dispatched, but in the Southwest Taiping for a year or two, this deal was undoubtedly earned by Daming.

It's just that compared to the way of sending troops on a large scale during the reign of King Qi, Zhu Ciran and Li Dingguo's way of sending troops on a small scale caused many generals who could not share their credit to complain.

On April 26, Hong Chengchou, the chief assistant of the cabinet, and Sun Chuanting, the second assistant of the cabinet, represented the cabinet and proposed to award 140 and two generals in the five army governors' mansion.

On April 28, Zhu Youxiao issued a decree to reward 140 and two generals and generals of the five armies with money, [-] total soldiers and [-] generals.

The gift of money is modeled on the one or two silver coins of Tianqi Tongbao, cast in gold.

After receiving the reward, the complaints in the Dudu's Mansion of the Five Armies subsided.

From this incident, many officials also saw clues.

Compared with the emperor, the crown prince was still too young, and even though he had been in charge of the country for many years, he seemed rather edgy.

In addition, the emperor was just over forty years old and in good health, so many officials chose not to express their support for the prince for the time being, but chose to be neutral.

Although this did not bring difficulties to Zhu Ciran's career in supervising the country, it also made Zhu Ciran realize that the government is not so easy, and he, Li Dingguo and others are still too young.

Therefore, on some important matters, Zhu Ciran still mainly relied on the opinions of his teacher Jin Xuan and his second assistant Sun Chuanting.

Such a choice made Zhu Ciran not have any major troubles in the next six months. After the incident, Donggong's position in the army was still stable.

In July of the same year, Gustav II led an army to surround Vienna, the capital of the Holy Roman Empire, and the Battle of Vienna broke out.

At the beginning of the battle, Ferdinand III, the Holy Roman Emperor, advocated peace negotiations to end this chaotic 27-year European war as soon as possible.

He played some role in bringing about a reconciliation between the imperial government and the German Protestant princes, especially Saxony, but France, Sweden and Spain did not agree to the peace talks, and the peace talks failed.

In July, 4 reinforcements from the Spanish Empire arrived in Vienna. The number of the Catholic League reached 2, and they faced the Protestant League with only [-].

In terms of numbers, the Catholic Alliance Army has the upper hand, and with its back to Vienna, the strategic goal of the Alliance Army has changed from "relief" to "counterattack".

Just before they were happy, Prince Condé of France led [-] new French troops to the battlefield, and the battlefield became [-] against [-] again.

Under such circumstances, the escalation of the Battle of Vienna, which was originally just a battle, became the focus of the entire European battlefield.

Both sides want to gain an advantage on the battlefield and do not want their own side to use refueling tactics. Therefore, while maintaining the stalemate on the western front, countries have sent troops to support.

As of the second day of September, the number of Protestant troops led by France and Sweden reached 4000, and the number of Catholic troops led by Spain and the Holy Roman Empire reached 6.

Under such a situation, the two sides still resisted the idea of ​​being the first to shoot the first shot, but sought opportunities to benefit their own side.

Prince Condé believed that the domestic economies of Spain and the Austrian Habsburg dynasty could not maintain such a large army for a long time to fight a war of attrition with their own side.

However, after a month of continued stalemate, a piece of news bankrupted Prince Condé's plan.

On the [-]th day of October, grain from the Gyeonggi Prefecture of Qi landed at the port of Adela on the Iberian Peninsula.

The first batch of grain was 10 tons of dried meat with a tonnage of [-] taels.

This batch of cured and sun-dried meat became the best Spanish supplies for the Battle of Vienna, and they were not the only batch.

On October [-]th, October [-]th, October [-]th... Qi State shipped [-] tons, [-] tons, and [-] tons of dried meat to the port of Adela respectively, totaling [-] tons of dried meat.

Dried meat worth 40 taels was transported by the Spanish fleet to the Balkan Peninsula, and then to the Vienna battlefield.

When they arrived on the battlefield, Gruber, who received the military supplies on the front line, recorded in his diary the appearance of the soldiers when they received the dried meat supplies that day:

"They never imagined that they could eat such a delicacy on the muddy battlefield, and everyone jumped up excitedly."

"Even though I told them they could eat it, it turns out the soldiers had more ideas than I did."

"They cut the jerky and threw it into the water, and soon a pot of broth appeared in front of us."

"Qi's jerky is rich in salt, pepper and a spicy spice, which enriched the soldiers' diet. This may be the best thing we have eaten since the outbreak of the war 27 years ago."

"Without any dissent, it made the greatest contribution to our winning the war!"

There was nothing wrong with Gruber's diary records. The [-] tons of dried meat shipped from Qi State enriched the diet of the Catholic League Army. Only these dried meat made Spain no longer worry about the food problem for the next month.

Not only that, in the follow-up trade materials, Qi State kept its promise and shipped the remaining 120 million shi of wheat to Adela this year in the treaty.

When the news reached the front, the Protestant Union army was like a beaten eggplant, unable to recover after a setback.

Gustav II, who noticed something was wrong, did not wait any longer, but fired the first shot of the battle in the early morning of November 24.

The Swedish army has a lot of experience in besieging cities, and within two days they built tents and camps, large and small, outside Vienna.

A large number of coolies dug long trenches, completely cutting off the connection between the inside and outside of the city.

The hundred cannons brought by Gustav II, under the operation of the gunners of various armies, began to continuously bombard the city walls of Vienna, but the rugged terrain of the Balkan Mountains limited the transportation of Swedish siege guns.

In the absence of convenient waterways, the twelve-pound artillery of the Swedish army fell far behind the main force.

Due to the bastion defense system that Europe has continuously implemented and upgraded since the sixteenth century, this system also greatly reduces the shooting effect of artillery.

On November 1645, 11, the Swedish army began to attack the city, but was quickly repelled.

Therefore, Gustav began to attack the city wall by means of tunnel blasting.

He adopted the parallel trench tactics that were popular in Europe at the time, using artillery to cover engineers to dig a trench near the corner, and then used troops to garrison the newly dug trenches to cover the sweating engineers to dig again.

When they got close enough, the engineers of the Swedish army dug tunnels, planted explosives, and detonated the foundations of the entire wall.

However, soldiers from Spain and the Holy Roman Empire would also dig tit-for-tat tunnels and use explosives and other means to destroy tunnels or positions.

In just ten days, the two parties jointly detonated more than 300 times.

The defenders of the Holy Roman Empire fought back with [-] artillery pieces of various types, while trying to deal with the enemy's siege tunnels.

They continued to dig anti-siege tunnels against enemy engineers, and they also inserted huge tree stumps into the soil to build new temporary obstacles.

After more than a month of stalemate, the Protestant Alliance Army finally blasted a huge gap in the Vienna City Wall for 30 people to pass side by side.

A large number of religious cannon fodder from the extremely poor began to launch a desperate charge. The flags of Sweden and France were even planted on the top of Vienna, but these positions were quickly lost without exception.

The armies of both sides were using Ming's musket and flintlock muskets. They installed the inserted bayonet produced in Daming, and a fierce battle broke out on the city wall.

The soldiers and civilians in Vienna will stab out the overwhelming "heretics".

Then, the engineers and soldiers in the city built a temporary retreating city wall behind the gap, and set up a door of Daming Yanshan five-jin artillery on it.

Due to fear of the strong firepower of the defenders, Gustav II has always refused to send out the whole army for a storm. He did not want his army to be shot down in pieces under the city where there were almost no shooting dead ends.

The war again reached a stalemate, and this stalemate lasted until December.

After the time entered December, Prince Condé and Gustav II decided to withdraw their troops due to lack of supplies.

On December 12, the Protestant Alliance retreated, and the Catholic Alliance won the Battle of Vienna.

All this came from the batch of life-saving food in October, and Felipe IV, who learned that the front line had won the victory, also wrote a personal letter to Zhu Youjian, thanking him for his "contract-keeping" behavior.

At the same time, in February of the 26th year of the Apocalypse, the direction of the capital also received news from the European Jinyiwei Qianhu Office.

"My brother is still so good at controlling the battle situation. It is estimated that Europe will have to fight for a few more years."

In the Qianqing Palace, the 41-year-old Zhu Youxiao held the report of Jinyiwei, and the smile on his face was completely exposed without hiding it.

Compared with three years ago, his figure is a little thinner, and it's all because after Zhu Youjian left, Zhu Youxiao finally put into action his brother's reminder.

Sports and meals have become Zhu Youxue's most concerned things. Every week he insists on making a piece of furniture and teaching riding skills at the same time.

In terms of diet, he also started to eat less and more meals, more vegetarian and less meat.

It's just that the behavior of dunton seafood back then eventually led to the disease, and gout also came to the Emperor Tianqi without any surprise.

"Long live, drink more water. Only drinking water and taking medicine on time can relieve gout."

Li Zhongzi, the envoy of the Imperial Hospital, was writing prescriptions while explaining some taboos to Zhu Youxiao who was excited next to him.

The former imperial hospital made Wang Kentang unable to live past a hundred years old, but died at the age of 93 last spring.

But despite Wang Kentang's death, Zhu Youjian still left many famous doctors to his brother.

Without accidents, Li Zhongzi, Wu Youxing and others may survive until the birth of Zhu Youxiao's great-grandson.

"Understood, envoy Li Yuan can rest assured!"

For imperial physicians, Zhu Youxiao, who is old and cherishes his life, is quite respected. 41 years old is very young in the eyes of later generations, but in the Ming Dynasty, an era when the average life expectancy of emperors was only over 40, Zhu Youxiao can already call himself an old man.

"The minister will leave..."

After Li Zhongzi finished writing the medicine, he handed it to Wang Tiqian, and then bowed and left.

As the envoy of the imperial hospital, he not only needs to help the emperor treat illnesses, but also needs to pay attention to the Huimin Pharmacy Bureau and medical school all over the world. It is not an exaggeration to say that he is busy with government affairs.

Seeing him leave, Zhu Youxiao smiled, looked down at the message in his hand, and the smile on his face was even bigger.

He walked to the window with his hands behind his back, looking at the rare clear sky outside the window, he couldn't help laughing:

"I don't know how my brother's health is, whether he is healthy or not, he should be living well..."

(End of this chapter)