Chapter 99: Debating in Captivity
On the third morning, the two brothers huddled together in their cart, covered with a layer of frost on their foreheads, entered the city of Beiping. When Xia Yu heard the guards checking their identities at the front gate, he finally confirmed his judgment: "They are indeed people from the Yan Wang Fu! These two noblewomen must be members of the Yan Wang's family, and that beautiful woman is probably the Yan Wang Fei. The young girl is her younger sister... Could she be the youngest daughter of Xu Guo Gong?"
In that case, the identity of the thin and gaunt black-robed monk who was as fierce as a god when angry would also be revealed. The only one who could be so intimate with the Yan King's family was Dao Yan, the monk in black robes, who was actually Yao Guangxiao, the black-robed prime minister of the Yongle era!
Yan Wang Zhu Bi was originally the person he had decided to rely on, but unexpectedly, the two of them ended up in such a strange situation. As soon as Xia Liu knew the identity of the person he had offended, he stopped worrying. As long as he revealed his identity as the King of Qi, he would be safe and sound in the Yan Wang's mansion. The Yan Wang was a great figure, how could he possibly turn against the King of Qi over such a trivial matter?
At the thought of soon having the opportunity to meet this historical Yongle Emperor, Xia Chuan's heart couldn't help but thump with excitement.
For Jianwen Emperor and Zhu Di, Xia Tong had no bias, nor did he have any likes or dislikes produced by the many rumors of later generations. He was a very rational person, out of professional habit, he would conduct reasonable analysis on the materials he mastered and the stories he heard, according to his analysis, he simply did not agree with the statement that Zhu Di had long been secretly plotting to seize power.
As for Jianwen and the Prince of Yan, he did not have any personal feelings towards either side, nor could there be any personal feelings. If we consider the development of the country and the nation, Zhu Di's talents are far superior to those of Jianwen. If we consider personal virtues, Zhu Di is certainly not a perfect gentleman, and Emperor Jianwen is not a good bird either.
One wants to reduce the power of the vassals, so that the great Ming dynasty can be inherited by him and his direct descendants for generations to come. The other wants to protect himself, unwilling to be demoted to a commoner, sent to Hainan Island by his nephew to eat wind and drink dew, and when the time comes, you, the old emperor, still won't let go, and it's easy to get rid of me with a "sudden illness". We are all descendants of Taizu, you good-for-nothing emperor, I'm only because your father was born earlier than mine, so I don't have a share, it's already very annoying. You also want to take away the family property that my father gave me, what right do you have?
From the "motive of crime", neither of the two people has a particularly noble and great reason, they are all for themselves. Since the reasons cannot be said to be very selfless, do not say who is right or wrong. Moreover, it is also impossible to talk about who is right or wrong. After Yan Wang ascended to the throne, he also had the move of reducing vassals, but his reduction was only weakening the military power of the vassal kings, and other rights and interests were not affected. The vassal kings did not have the heart to fight to the death.
The Jianwen Emperor, who was praised by the officials as a benevolent and filial ruler, did not distinguish between the wise and the foolish. He demoted his uncles' families to commoners and exiled them to remote areas to live in poverty. One of his uncles, who was exiled to Hainan Island, had a newborn son whose wife had no milk, and they couldn't even afford a wet nurse. They wanted to eat something nourishing but couldn't afford it, so they had to exchange their clothes with shepherds for some goat's milk to feed their son. Another uncle was forced to burn down his house and commit suicide with his family. If he had only taken away their military power, this uncle would not have been driven to such extremes. Zhu Yunwen did something truly despicable.
As for the rebellion, some later evaluations wrote that Zhu Di had been harboring great ambitions and had long had the intention to rebel. However, judging from Zhu Di's subsequent reactions, Xia Yan did not believe in this view. When Zhu Yunwen was dealing with his uncles one by one, what did the King of Yan Zhu Di do? He sent all his sons to the capital as hostages to demonstrate his loyalty. If these sons were not returned because Zhu Yunwen was foolish and wanted to cover up his intention to deal with the King of Yan, they would never have had the chance to return. If the King of Yan had long had the heart to rebel, he would never have made such a wrong move.
Looking back at the time he started his army, Zhu Yunwen was so hasty that he replaced all the garrison troops and generals in Beiping, and also transferred the three guards of the Yan King. Despite this, the Yan King still did not rebel. His only means of self-preservation was to pretend to be mad, hoping that his nephew would spare him. In this situation, Zhu Yunwen still ordered his capture. Zhu Di relied on a commander who defected at the last minute to inform on him and cleverly tricked two generals who had brought their troops to surround the palace into coming in, where they were detained. Only then did he gather his 800 personal soldiers, raise the flag, and rebel.
This prince was forced to this point before he rebelled, and even had no soldiers. In the end, he risked riding alone to meet with Ning Wang, cleverly seizing military power, which was another unexpected lucky ending that could not have been predicted beforehand. If Ning Wang had been on guard, or even tied him up and sent him to the emperor, he would have been finished long ago. Without mentioning the initial heavy authority of the prince, just looking at the later generations, far from the authority of the Ming dynasty's early princes, even the three guards of the palace were already severely weakened when Ning Wang rebelled against Emperor Zhengde, how many soldiers did he raise? A useless person who had long been severely weakened in military power could still raise so many soldiers. Having commanded the border army for over a decade, Zhu Di was a brilliant and ambitious man, with Yao Guangxiao as his strategist, and under the premise of having rebel intentions from the beginning, how did he manage to get to this point?
Xia Yu is a policeman, he won't listen to one-sided information or make decisions based on emotions. He needs evidence, and if there isn't any, he will analyze the facts and reason things out. He approaches problems with an unbiased and pragmatic attitude. In his view, perhaps the vassal king was an unstable factor in the empire, but at least before the reduction of the vassals' power, none of the princes had thought about rebelling. Zhu Di used every trick in the book, even pretending to be crazy, and still had a knife held to his throat - he had no choice but to rebel.
Take another look at the black-robed monk in front, some books have a record of him that is simply absurd. Something about Zhu Yuanzhang selecting lecturing monks for his princes, Yao Guangxiao took one glance and picked out the Prince of Yan, walked up to him and said he wanted to give him a white hat, adding "white" on top of the king, which means emperor, Zhu Di was overjoyed, two rebels joined forces with just one meeting, from then on they started plotting rebellion. This is purely nonsense.
Not to mention that the Crown Prince Zhu Biao was still alive, Zhu Di could not have rebelled against his nephew, and he would not have been able to rebel against his kind and prestigious older brother. Moreover, at that time, his other two brothers were also alive, even if the Crown Prince Zhu Biao had died, the throne would not have fallen on his head in any case. If Yao Guangxiao really had the ability to predict things like a god, he would have calculated that those people would not live long, and there would be no need for him to rebel so miserably more than ten years later. If Zhu Yunwen himself had not made one mistake after another, Zhu Di would not have been able to succeed.
Furthermore, the books recorded such detailed information about time, place, people, expressions, actions, psychology, and dialogue that it's as if they could be made into a movie. I wonder, how did he know all this? Was it Zhu Di who told him or was it Yao Guangxiao who told him? After ascending to the throne, Zhu Di always insisted that he was forced to take up arms to clear the court due to the difficulties in Jingnan, and this is a secret that only these two people could have known. They would never have revealed it, so how did others come to know about it? It's clearly nonsense.
Even when Zhu Di entered the court to pay respects to Zhu Yuanzhang, seeing that Zhu Yunwen had already been established as the crown prince, some people interpreted his disrespectful words and actions as a sign of premeditated rebellion. However, Xia Xian believed it was quite the opposite. Let's take a look at the most incompetent conspirator and the most foolish rebel, Ning Wang during the Zhengde era. Before he rebelled, he deliberately bought good relations with Emperor Zhengde and the officials in the court, showing unusual courtesy, to the point where many people didn't believe it when they first heard that he was going to rebel.
I'd like to ask, if Zhu Di, who was much more cunning and capable, had been planning a rebellion against his nephew all along, would he have lost his temper and spoken disrespectfully in front of Zhu Yunwen? Was he already fully prepared? Was he not afraid of Zhu Yunwen's large army? Was he worried that Zhu Yunwen wouldn't know about his plan to rebel? Then why did he later pretend to be crazy and act so desperately?
Xia Xun studied criminal psychology and believed that Zhu Di was dissatisfied with his father's decision to pass the throne to Zhu Yunwen, but had no intention of rebelling. He used such an angry tone to vent his dissatisfaction. This is similar to Lin Yang's reaction when he saw Lin Beixia, the owner of Lin Yang pawnshop, and couldn't help but mock him coldly. If he really had ulterior motives, he wouldn't have acted this way.
Think again, Zhu Yunwen forced an imperial uncle's whole family to death and exiled four other imperial uncles' families. These five imperial uncles obediently followed his arrangements without any pity from him. But when the King of Yan rebelled, his filial piety emerged, his familial affection stirred, and he tearfully grasped the hand of the general in command, repeatedly instructing: "Do not harm my uncle!" What a damn lie!
He did this to shake Zhu Di's determination to rebel, telling Zhu Laosan: "Put down your knife and don't resist, I really don't want to kill you." At the same time, he was also comforting other princes: "Don't follow him in rebelling, see how I have no intention of killing him, how would I take you as a thorn in my eye?"
In fact, on the battlefield, there is no room for mercy, and Zhu Di has escaped death many times, all of which were due to his own efforts and the rescue of his subordinates. General Zhang Yu died in battle just to save him. His second son, Zhu Gaoxu, was moved by his father after several bloody battles to save his father, and Zhu Di had the idea of making his second son the heir after a successful rebellion.
Iron Huan staged a fake surrender in Jinan, secretly setting up an agency, almost killing Zhu Di. When Zhu Yun heard about it, he was overjoyed at first, then immediately promoted Iron Huan's official position. Then, facing Qi Tai and Huang Zicheng, he sighed and lamented the greatness of Zhu Lao Si's life. Is this his "Don't hurt my uncle?" He himself is foolish and thinks others are as foolish as him. Which idiot would believe in such a childish political show?
So when Xia Yu wanted to find a way out, the first person he thought of was Zhu Di. Not only because Zhu Yunwen was hypocritical, but also because he was stupid beyond help. Didn't Zhu Yuanzhang leave him any capable civil and military officials? Yang Pu, Yang Shiqi, Yang Rong, Xia Yuanyu, Jin Youzi, Wang Xun, Jie Xuan, Huang Huai, Jian Yi, Xia Yuanyu... all of them only showed their political prowess under Zhu Di's rule. Who did Zhu Yunwen trust and promote? A few bookworms who only knew how to brag, he himself didn't know how to judge people, who could he blame?
As for the martial generals, some people always say that Zhu Yuanzhang killed all the tiger generals, but if those powerful and noble groups were still there, would they be loyal to Jianwen? This is simply treating history and politics as a fairy tale. What Emperor Jianwen did was to reduce the power of the vassals and weaken the status of the martial generals, establishing a regime ruled by scholars.
If those powerful founding ministers' groups exist, once the imperial court disputes arise, they will inevitably seek opportunities to maximize their own interests. Once this situation arises, the Ming Empire will follow in the footsteps of the Two Jin and Northern Dynasties! The Ming Empire will become a short-lived empire. Even if it's not that pessimistic, Bei Yuan has not yet gone through Zhu Di's five sweeps of the north, its strength is still there, and to the west, Timur's great emperor is eyeing covetously, while Zhu Yunwen leads a group of useless and weak scholars who suppress martial arts and promote literature, it's likely that the Ming Empire will also end with the second generation.
Those meritorious officials may have disappeared, but that doesn't mean the brave and skilled generals under their command also ceased to exist. During the four-year Jingnan campaign, Zhu Di narrowly escaped death many times, and there were many capable Ming military leaders who defeated him. Who did Zhu Yunwen reuse? His elder cousin Li Jinglong! The number one big fool of the Great Ming dynasty. If you let a pig lead a group of lions and tigers, can they still exert their abilities?
The most ridiculous thing is that his heart of abolishing the vassals has been known to everyone, but he sent a vassal king - Zhu Zhanji, King of Gu, to guard Jinling. He really read the books of saints and sages to the point of stupidity, thinking that as soon as he put on the dragon robe, whoever he wanted to kill or slaughter would come willingly with a "If the monarch wants his subject to die, his subject cannot but die". In this situation, Zhu Zhanji opened the city gate to let Zhu Di enter the city, what's strange about that?
Finally, he, as the orthodox emperor, grasped the land of the four seas, with millions of brave soldiers, and yet was defeated by Zhu Di, who started with only 800 people and had only one place in Beiping. What benefits does such a waste bring to the country and the people? It is precisely because of these considerations that Xia Yu's heart began to incline towards Zhu Di.
But since he got the identity of Yang Xu, his thoughts began to change. The struggle for the throne between Zhu's uncle and nephew has nothing to do with him. Since he also recognized that the one who is suitable to rule this land is Zhu Di, and in history, Zhu Di became the emperor, then why should he risk his life to be a cannon fodder with an uncertain future? It's better to be a rich man honestly and wait for the change of dynasty.
But who would have thought that when he wanted to see Zhu Di, he exhausted all his efforts and didn't even make it to Beiping. When he didn't want to see Zhu Di, he struggled desperately and escaped for a night, but in the end...he still entered the Yanwang Mansion. The carriage creaked and groaned as it headed towards the Yanwang Mansion, attracting the attention of the citizens of Beiping. After begging the White Lotus Sect members from Beiping for help to search for two days, Peng Ziyun, who had no news of Yang Xu's whereabouts, was wandering aimlessly in the streets when he suddenly saw a procession passing by, and he casually glanced over without paying much attention before walking away.
She took two steps forward, then suddenly stopped in her tracks. After a moment's thought, she felt something was off and quickly turned around to take another look. Her eyes widened in shock, although she had been cooped up in the prison cart for two days and her spirits were somewhat dampened, she still recognized Xia Yu's appearance at once. She never could have imagined that the person she had searched for high and low would appear before her in such a state. Peng Ziqi was about to call out, but quickly came to her senses and shut her mouth.
"What kind of trouble has this guy gotten into now?" As she thought to herself, her feet had already quietly begun moving forward along with the line of vehicles.
The palace of the King of Yan was the imperial palace of Da Yuan, which was quite different from the Forbidden City that came later, but at this time it already had a considerable scale. As soon as he entered the palace, the prisoner's cart was pushed along the side path towards the distance, with high walls on both sides, and only a corner of the gray sky could be seen above his head. Xia Xun suddenly felt like he was entering prison...
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