Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 697 Epilogue

"Dang...dang...dang..."

In the middle of the night, when the bells of cities and towns all over the world rang again, it seemed that everyone had thought of what was behind the bells.

Since October of the 26th year of Shaoqing, Emperor Shaoqing's health problems have often appeared in newspapers.

Even in Daming, where the average life expectancy has reached 75 years, the life expectancy of emperors and vassal kings is still a problem.

According to the statistics of the Academy of Military Armaments in the 25 years of Shaoqing, in the past 150 years, the average life expectancy of the emperor and the vassal kings was only 64, far below the normal average life expectancy.

Against this background, the 71-year-old Shaoqing Emperor Zhu Bohai has already performed exceptionally well.

In March of the 27th year of Shaoqing, Emperor Shaoqing was transferred to the intensive care unit. This incident was no secret in the Ming Dynasty.

To this day, the emperor who has dealt with the officials of the two parties has finally come to the end of his life.

On the fifth day of the fifth lunar month in the 27th year of Shaoqing, at 72:[-] a.m., Emperor Zhu Bohai of Shaoqing died in Beijing Huimin General Hospital at the age of [-].

Before his death, he passed on the 47-year-old crown prince Zhu Zhongbing, and canonized his grandson Zhu Jianhuan as the crown prince.

On May [-], when a new edition of Da Ming Pao was released, the news of Emperor Shaoqing's death was set on the front page.

In the newspaper, the front page details the life of Emperor Shaoqing.

He supervised the country at the age of 32, ascended the throne at the age of 45, and implemented the Shaoqing New Deal. At the age of 53, officials from both parties were completely cut off, reducing the cost of living of the people and increasing the income of the people.

During his reign, he did not launch a major foreign war, and mainly focused on countering rebellion and internal governance.

But even so, many people in Ming Dynasty still felt that Emperor Shaoqing was a hero.

Judging from his attitude towards the common people, he was among the best among the nineteen emperors of the Ming Dynasty, and in terms of personal conduct and inner court life, he could be regarded as extremely self-denying.

He had no more than six concubines in his life, and although he had eight heirs, he did not seal them overseas, but let them settle down in the country, and their salaries were also allocated from internal funds, hardly occupying any of the country's finances.

He doesn't build palaces, but only listens to opera occasionally, and he also uses his own money.

In addition, after a local disaster occurs, he will also allocate money from internal funds in the name of the clan to relieve the disaster.

During his 27 years in power, he successively allocated more than 430 million taels of silver and more than 270 million shi of grain from internal funds.

He is not only lenient to the inside, but also the most lenient king of all dynasties.

He opened up many technologies, which liberated the productivity of the feudal clans and eased the internal pressure among the feudal clans, so that civil strife would not break out among the feudal clans.

He tried his best to appease the foreign vassals, saying: "All the land in the world belongs to China, and all the vassals in the world are my vassals. I am the master of the world. Why do you need to rob the land of the vassals?"

Therefore, when the news of his death spread, all the vassal kings from all over the world came to Beijing. King Li Chang of North Korea and King Qi Yan of Boni even asked for his funeral, but Zhu Zhongbing declined.

On June 24, Emperor Shaoqing was buried as "Emperor Cheng Zongping".

On the [-]th, Zhu Zhongbing held a meeting of all feudal vassals in Taimiao, and named the year of Ming Dynasty as "Wu Shou".

In August, Nian Gengyao, the governor of the Western Army, died at the age of 73. Emperor Wushou Zhu Zhongbing posthumously granted him the title of Uncle Guangning, with the posthumous title of "Wuxiang".

In October, the Qi Academy of Sciences invented smokeless gunpowder and shared the results with Ming Dynasty.

In the same year, in the Beizhou Capital Exchange Office, the electrician bachelors of the two countries jointly developed the fourth-generation generator.

Compared with the third generation, the fourth generation generator has greater power and conversion rate, and can maintain a power generation capacity of [-] kWh under normal operation.

If the two countries replace the motors in local power stations with fourth-generation generators, the power generation will increase by two to three times.

In April of the first year of Wushou, Ouyang He, the minister of river affairs of the Ministry of Industry, made a statement: "Officials of various governments along the Yellow River and Huaihe River will arbitrarily lose money and food for emergency repairs at the age of year, resulting in the loss of work materials."

Upon hearing the news, Emperor Wushou ordered the Metropolitan Procuratorate Youdu Censor Wang Mian to lead the Metropolitan Procuratorate officials to investigate, and in July of the same year, he discovered all kinds of fraudulent fraud, with a total deficit of more than two million taels.

In addition, the Haiphong Yamen in Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Shandong and other places also embezzled public funds, so that the Haiphong of the three provinces have not been repaired for many years.

In September, Emperor Wushou ordered the officials of the Metropolitan Procuratorate to behead a group of officials who had embezzled treasury banks during the investigation process, and spread the news to the coastal provinces as an example.

In the first month of the second year of Wushou, Zhou Dong, Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, reported last year’s financial situation. The annual revenue of the treasury was more than [-] million taels. Nearly [-] million taels are leftovers from the Shaoqing period.

Knowing that the national treasury was so abundant, Emperor Wushou ordered the construction of local power stations, and set a 20-year policy to allow rural people in Daming to use electric lights.

In March, the Ministry of Industry drafted a list, intending to build more than 20 hydropower, thermal power and other power stations within [-] years, and at the same time recruit workers in rural areas to generate income for rural people.

In April, Wang Mian, the right capital censor of the Metropolitan Procuratorate, brought back the officials of the Metropolitan Procuratorate to Beijing, and brought back the documents recording corrupt officials and the amount deposited in the bank by confiscating his family property.

According to statistics, there were more than 50 officials who committed the crime this time. Excluding accomplices and officials who were less than 740 taels of corruption, there were still [-] people who were all beheaded.

The confiscated property was handed over to the local government office for sale and deposited in the bank, totaling more than 430 taels.

In April of the third year of Wushou, "Old Stories of the Zhumen" written by Zhu Zhongyu, King of Liang, was put on shelves in major bookstores in Beijing, and more than 12 copies were sold on the first day alone.

Although the book tells the story of a family, many people have seen many things about the Tianqi Dynasty from it.

Among them, the patriarch Zhu Qi and his younger brother Zhu Qi perfectly fit the identities of Emperor Tianqi and King Wen of Qi.

Therefore, in the following month, the book was successively put on the shelves in the bookstores of Daming, Qi, and even the feudal lords.

On July 500th, the sales volume of "Old Stories of Zhu Men" exceeded 500 million copies, becoming the best of the Ming Dynasty except "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", "Water Margin", "Journey to the West", "Jin Ping Mei", "Strange Tales from a Liaozhai Studio" and "San Yan Er Pai" In addition, the seventh popular novel with sales exceeding [-] million copies.

On the first day of August, Zhu Zhongyu received his first manuscript fee, [-] Mingliang banknotes.

It seems that Zhu Zhongyu's behavior and manuscript fees stimulated the remaining seven sons of Emperor Shaoqing. In the days that followed, relying on their status as princes, they consulted historical materials and documents in the Six Departments and the National History Museum, and wrote many novels successively.

However, compared to them, Qi Guo left novels early, and black and white comics and many comic books appeared.

In September, Huayang Boyue Zhongqi died in the mansion, with the posthumous title of "Wuding".

In the same month, Voltaire, the French writer, adapted "The Orphan of Zhao" into a new play called "The Orphan of the Ming Dynasty", and it began to be staged in various theaters in Paris on the fifth day of October, with unprecedented grandeur.

On the sixth day of October, a major earthquake broke out at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean to the west of Libens. This huge earthquake was felt throughout Europe, and even Kyrgyzstan as far away as West Kunlun was affected.

According to Huang Jin, the captain of Qi State stationed in Beihai Port (Hero Port), the earthquake caused the lakes on the island to rise and fall with the shock waves.

After the disaster, they went to Portugal to inspect, and the local situation was horrible.

On the day when the disaster broke out, the city of Lisbon in Portugal was shaken three times in succession.

The local residents did not find any warning signs of disaster beforehand. The earthquake destroyed the city buildings, ignited a fire, and caused a large number of casualties.

Then the seismic waves on the bottom of the sea caused a tsunami, which destroyed a large number of ships and buildings in Portugal and Spain, as well as the North Sea Port, and Libens was directly submerged.

Almost none of the buildings in most of the Portuguese city of Lisbon survived the massive earthquake, and many people died when buildings collapsed.

According to Huang Jin's estimate, the number of residents who died due to the earthquake was probably no less than [-].

In the twelfth lunar month, Zhang Tingyu died at home at the age of 84, with the posthumous title of "Wending".

In the fourth year of Wushou, countries such as Britain, France, Spain, and Holy Rome successively applied steam engines to agriculture.

Under the leadership of hundreds of Han Chinese bachelors, they are walking the old path of the Ming Dynasty.

Although this is an old road and a new one, because of the lessons learned from the past, they are walking very smoothly, and European productivity has been improved.

However, due to the immature iron-smelting technology, they were unable to manufacture breech-loading guns, and could only focus on large-caliber artillery.

During this period, they created many ridiculous products, such as the "European Cannon" weighing 25 tons.

In the same year, Emperor Wushou traveled by car to Shanxi, Shaanxi, Hexi, Anxi, Beiting, Hezhong, Taixi and other provinces to inspect the people's conditions.

On April 84th of the fifth year of Wushou, Emperor Wushou, who was inspecting the people's situation in Taixi, received the sad news that Qi Wang Zhu Yiming passed away in Xijing City at the age of [-].

Hearing the news, he quickly sent someone to send a telegram, and sent the prince Zhu Jianhuan to the state of Qi to mourn the king of Qi, and at the same time gave the king of Qi the posthumous title "Zhuang".

In June, Zhu Jianhuan arrived in Xijing City. After expressing condolences, he was given the posthumous title of "King of Qizhuang", and enshrined his son Zhu Bomu in accordance with the etiquette.

In July, Franklin and Washington successively entered the British House of Lords and House of Commons.

In October, Emperor Wu Shou negotiated with Zhu Bomu to jointly lay the Daming Ocean submarine cable.

At the same time, Qi State also negotiated with the three countries of Tang, Ji, and Huaihe to lay the Atlantic submarine cable.

In March of the sixth year of Takeshou, the two projects started successively, but the former was stopped due to technical problems.

In May, the third-generation generators were basically eliminated in the power stations of Daming and Qiguo. Qiguo Electric Power began to enter the countryside, and Daming completed the construction of urban electric power.

In the same month, Emperor Wushou went to Dading Palace to escape the summer heat, and Emperor Wushou ordered the prince to supervise the country.

In June, the mileage of the Daming Railway exceeded 15 kilometers, and that of the Qi State was [-] kilometers. At this time, Europe had not yet solved the pressure problem of steam trains.

In July, Frederick, Duke of Prussia, suggested to the Holy Roman Emperor Franz I to train the imperial soldiers, and proposed that "attack is the best defense".

He believes that Mongolia is different from Dingguo. Although Mongolia is also a member of the vassal system of the Ming Dynasty, the population of Mongolia is only more than [-] million, most of whom are Poles.

If the empire can march into Mongolia, instigate the local Poles, place the battlefield in Mongolia, and continuously plunder materials and bring them back to the country, then the strength of the empire will be strengthened in the long-term tug-of-war.

However, his proposal was not approved by Franz I.

In this regard, Frederick believed that Austria had already declined, and only Prussia could lead the Prussian people to fight against Ming Dynasty.

At this time, it has been the No.18 year since Frederick succeeded the Duke of Prussia. In the past 18 years, he has actively reformed Prussia, focusing on education, military affairs, and economy.

As for the government agencies in charge of domestic affairs, Frederick made many reforms to the agencies.

Generally speaking, these reforms are mainly to establish some new functional government departments to replace the all-powerful Zongli Yamen and strengthen the leadership of the departmental economy.

Between the 20th year of Shaoqing and the sixth year of Wushou, he successively established new functional departments such as the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, the Ministry of Military Management, the Ministry of Finance and Customs, the Ministry of Mining and Metallurgy, and the Ministry of Forestry.

These departments enable Prussia to have a sound government economic department and strengthen the unified and effective leadership of economic work.

Secondly, Frederick noticed very early on that the main reason why Europe could not develop breech-loading guns was that the fire cap and metallurgical technology were not up to standard.

Therefore, he adapted measures to local conditions and adopted different policies to promote the development of the mining and metallurgical industries. At the same time, he strongly supported more than [-] Chinese and foreign scholars in China to conduct research on the composition of flash caps.

In order to strengthen the development and leadership of Prussian heavy industry, Frederick also established the Prussian Ministry of Mines.

He directed Heinitz, the head of the department, to draw up plans for the reorganization and expansion of the Prussian iron industry, and to allocate sufficient funds for the expansion and improvement of mining and metallurgy.

In addition, he saw the importance of food to Europe at the moment from some of Newton's suggestions to Charles II.

In the situation where European countries were heavily dependent on imported food from the Ming Dynasty, his travel policy restricted food imports, and he began to carry out in-depth reforms on Prussian agriculture.

He used the army in his hands to abolish serfdom in Prussia, and continued to encourage immigration to expand the production team of the Kingdom of Prussia.

During his 18 years of ruling Prussia, more than [-] new peasant villages were built in Prussia, and more than [-] peasant households immigrated to Prussia.

These immigrants brought with them their skills as well as a great deal of physical objects.

For these immigrants, Frederick also actively reduced taxes, exempted them from military service and other measures to give preferential treatment to immigrants.

After the increase in residents, he began to vigorously build water conservancy, reclaim wasteland, and expand the country's cultivated land, which made Prussia's agricultural environment flourish.

Finally, he also reformed the army, completely following the example of France and other Ming vassal states. While developing the armament industry, he reorganized the training methods of cavalry and artillery, strictly enforced military discipline, and improved the army's strategies and tactics.

Under his reforms, Prussia's national strength continued to improve.

By the end of the sixth year of Wushou, Prussia had a standing army of 4000, more than 120 cannons, [-] mortars, and [-] howitzers. , The whole army is equipped with [-] armaments and weapons.

Therefore, at this time, Prussia did not become weak because of Ming's intervention in the European political structure, but continued to grow stronger amidst many turmoil in the Holy Roman Empire.

After Franz I rejected his proposal, he already understood that the Holy Roman Empire was not far from the day of collapse, and began to actively prepare for war.

In May of the seventh year of Wushou, the dispute between Deyang County and Zhou State resumed, and Shu State joined it.

The dispute quickly developed from one county and one kingdom to a dispute between two kingdoms, in which many counties behind Zhou Fan and Shu Fan were involved and forced to stand in line.

Upon hearing the news, Emperor Wushou issued an order to reprimand the kings and restrict their immigration for one year.

Although the two parties were forced to stop fighting on the surface under the pressure of the government, the fighting behind the scenes never stopped.

In March of the eighth year of Wushou, the rebellion broke out again in the three provinces of Persia and the four provinces of Tianzhu. Zhou Dong, Minister of the Household Department, believed that it was caused by the uneven distribution of local resources, and listed the local resource distribution.

In his memorandum, the indigenous people with a huge group of more than 6000 million only occupy less than three-tenths of the resources of the seven provinces, while the nationals occupy more than [-]%. This is the main contradiction.

Zhou Dong suggested distributing production materials to the natives to appease them, but was rejected by the cabinet.

In the same month, Emperor Wushou sent his prince Zhu Jianhuan and Li Shoubi, the governor of the Western Army, to fight against the rebellion.

In September of the same year, King George II of the United Kingdom died suddenly due to the rupture of a dissecting aneurysm caused by too much force when defecating in the morning, and George III succeeded to the throne.

In May of the ninth year of Wushou, the rebellion in seven provinces was suppressed. Emperor Wushou issued an order to reward the anti-rebellion army, and Li Shoubi, the governor of the Western Army, was able to restore the Duke of Qin. He was also the only Duke during the Shaoqing and Wushou years.

In the same month, Emperor Wushou ordered Prince Zhu Jianhuan and Qin Guogong Li Shoubi to stay in the three provinces of Persia, striving to restore the state before the war.

In July, Zhu Jianhuan, the prince who stayed behind in the three Persian provinces, drove into a house and killed a Persian family.

This move aroused the dissatisfaction of the Persian natives. Qin Guogong Li Shoubi also went to Emperor Shuwushou to ask the prince to return to Beijing.

However, before Li Shoubi waited for the news from the capital, on July [-]th the Persian natives set fire to the prince's mansion, Zhu Jianhuan fled by car, and the natives rebelled.

Although Li Shoubi suppressed the rebellion afterwards, the three provinces of Persia hated Prince Zhu Jianhuan deeply.

Zhu Jianhuan asked Li Shoubi, Duke of the State of Qin, not to perform the performance, but Li Shoubi still did so, so Zhu Jianhuan hated him.

After the news came back to the capital, Emperor Wushou was furious and ordered Li Huanglai, the guard of the East Palace camp, to escort the prince to the capital.

In October, Zhu Jianhuan was escorted back to Beijing, and Emperor Wushou fined him with a salary of three years and banned him from the East Palace.

In May of the tenth year of Wushou, Qin Guogong Li Shoubi completely put down the rebels in the three provinces of Persia, and Emperor Wushou called him back to Beijing to report on his duties.

In June, Lu Wang Zhu Zhongjian built the Tingyin Hall in Changsha (Mumbai), the capital of the Lu State, and held his own concert in the Tingyin Hall in October of the same year. More than [-] people attended, and the most prestigious one was King Jin Zhu Muxuan.

In August, Zhu Fangcun, a farmer in Yanhe Town, Cangwu County, Nanzhou, Ming Dynasty, privately made a dragon robe, calling himself the illegitimate son of King Wen of Qi who was living abroad, and calling himself Emperor Wen.

An hour later, he was arrested by two yamen servants and exiled to Shan Yufu to plant trees for 30 years.

In the same month, Franklin of the United Kingdom became prime minister, and the United Kingdom carried out Chinese-style reforms. Except for religion, it fully followed the example of Ming and Qi.

In February of the tenth year of Takekari, Watt, who was born in Scotland, was admitted to Oxford University.

In July of the same year, the laying of the "Mingqi" submarine cable was completed, and the two countries realized telegraph communication.

In the same month, Emperor Wushou lowered the electricity fee again, lowering the price of a kilowatt-hour of electricity to five Wen. At this time, the price of electricity in Qi State was three Wen.

On the first day of the first lunar month in the 11th year of Wushou, Zhou Dong, Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, made a statement and said, "The population of the country has exceeded [-] million, while the population of Qi has exceeded [-] million."

In addition, Zhou Dong also posted news about the discovery of a large amount of oil in Kunlun, including Yongguo, Ruiguo, and Chenguo, and seven countries in the Middle East, and suggested purchasing oil from the seven countries at a price.

On the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, according to the documents sent to the Ministry of Households by the State of Qi, Zhou Dong went to the eunuch again to celebrate the country's annual revenue exceeding [-] million Mingliang.

On the first day of February, Emperor Wushou fell ill and recuperated in the Qianqing Palace. He ordered his second son, King Wu Zhu Jianzhen, to supervise the country.

Since Zhu Jianhuang's teacher when he was not out of the cabinet was Li Ziren, the first assistant, the two cooperated well during their supervision of the country.

However, after the news reached the East Palace, Zhu Jianhuan, who was grounded, felt jealous.

Before that, Zhu Jianhuan had supervised the country for several years, so he had his own followers.

When the news spread that King Wu supervised the country, the officials of the Prince's Mansion ran around the East Palace all day long.

Such domineering behavior displeased Emperor Wushou who was recuperating, and on the fifth day of March, he directly sent someone to reprimand Zhu Jianhuan for "causing troubles all the time."

On March [-]th, King Zhu Bomu of Qi, who was informed of the issue of the crown prince of the Ming Dynasty, sent a telegram to Qianqing Palace, admonishing Emperor Wushou that if he wanted to abolish the crown prince, he must make early preparations and start with the officials of the Eastern Palace.

However, Emperor Wu Shou seemed very hesitant about this. He didn't want to destroy the Ming Dynasty's centuries-old heir apparent system, but this also gave Zhu Jianhuan a chance.

Knowing that King Qi urged the emperor to abolish it, Prince Zhu Jianhuan felt uneasy, so he could only send Li Huanglai, the general of the East Palace Camp, and Luo Changgong, the commander of Jinyiwei, to contact the officials of the Prince's Mansion inside and outside Beijing.

In the next few months, Li Huanglai first persuaded the Wanping Camp, Daxing Camp, Changping Camp, Tianjin Camp and other eight camps around the capital, and then went to Shenyang in private to persuade Zhang Bingzhong, the governor of the Eastern Army who had been promoted by the Eastern Palace.

At the end of June, Li Huanglai returned to the capital with Zhang Bingzhong's trustworthiness, and Zhu Jianhuan was overjoyed when he heard about it.

Soon, Luo Changgong, the commander of Jinyiwei, persuaded Luo Fu, the governor of the Southern Army, and some of the generals of the provinces directly above, so Zhu Jianhuan decided to force the palace.

He set the date of forcing the palace to be the Mid-Autumn Festival on August [-]th, and asked Luo Changgong to be vigilant against Jinyiwei officials leaking secrets.

At the beginning of August, Zhu Jianhuan first confessed his mistakes to the officials, common people and Emperor Wushou, and lifted the confinement. After that, he often lived in the East Palace to study and practice calligraphy. Emperor Wushou was very happy when he saw this, and thought that the confinement was quite effective...

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