The Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month is the most solemn festival of the Ming Dynasty every year. In the past, a large lantern tree was erected in the palace, fireworks were set off, and acrobatics were performed. A palace market will also be established in the Donghua Gate, so that the eunuchs and palace maids in the palace will pretend to be market vendors, so that the emperor and the concubines can enjoy the fun of having fun with the people.

However, since Chongzhen came to power, under the pretext of insufficient state use, the cost of holidays has been greatly reduced, so the Lantern Festival in the palace has not been held in a big way for six consecutive years. The palace is frugal and frugal, and the gentry and people outside the palace naturally dare not be too ostentatious, so the Lantern Festival in the capital has been a little dull in the past six years.

But this year, because of the news of the victory in Yiju and the improvement of the country's finances, the newly appointed cabinet chief Qian Qianyi believes that it is necessary to organize a Lantern Festival and let the people of the capital enjoy the good prosperity brought about by the reform, so as to refute those folk remarks that slander the reform.

Zhu Youzhen recognized Qian Qianyi's statement and let Liu Chongqing prepare for the celebration of this year's Lantern Festival in Beijing. However, for the palace, he did not continue the past way of celebrating, and entertained himself behind closed doors. Instead, the Ministry of Internal Affairs cooperated with the Beijing Municipal Government to put most of the entertainment performances on the Yudao Square, where the city wall had been demolished, and it was truly fun with the people.

As for the concubines in the palace, they sat with him on the Wufeng Tower, watching the acrobatics and floats below with special binoculars. Although it is not clear enough, the atmosphere is much more lively than the self-entertainment in the palace in the past. Whether it is the weekday steady Zhou Hou or a few concubines with a more lively temperament, they are all happy like a group of girls at this moment.

Only Zhu Youzhen himself, after watching the performance in the square below, he was a little interested. For a soul who grew up in an era of extreme entertainment life, these performances in the square below are no different from the square dances that have arisen in later cities, perhaps not as much, after all, there are no deafening pop songs here.

"Sure enough, I've lived here for so long that even the square dance music, which was originally regarded as noise, has now become something to be missed." Zhu Youzhen held his chin with his hand, looked ahead with his eyes unfocused, and silently thought so in his heart.

Although Zhou Yufeng, who was sitting on Chongzhen's right, talked and laughed with Concubine Yuan beside him from time to time, he also kept an eye on Chongzhen's movements. Looking at his slowly indifferent expression, although Zhou Yufeng didn't know what troublesome things the emperor remembered again, he took the initiative to reach out and hold Chongzhen's right hand.

Looking at the emperor's slightly surprised eyes, Zhou Yufeng returned a sweet smile, although she was already a mother of two children, but in Chongzhen's eyes, Zhou Yufeng was still the slightly young girl, of course, she was only in her early 20s.

Zhu Youzhen, who came back to his senses, sat up straight, turned over his right hand and gently shook the left hand that the queen took the initiative to stretch out, and the soft feeling from his hand immediately reassured him. Just when he and the queen looked at each other and smiled, Tian Xiuying suddenly picked up the 4-year-old Zhu Cizhao next to him and walked over, muttering: "Ah, does Gui'er want her father to hug her?" Mother, I'll take you to my father..."

Zhu Cizhao, who was holding a lollipop and gnawing happily, was stuffed into Zhu Youzhen's arms by his mother before he could react. The father and son looked at each other for a while, and Zhu Youzhen finally couldn't help but ask for a handkerchief from Wang Chengen and said: "Look at your appearance, what kind of virtue have you eaten, can children eat candy all day long?" ”

Zhu Cizhao, who was very well-behaved by biting a lollipop, suddenly cried out with a flat mouth after his father took away the lollipop in his mouth, and immediately made Zhu Youzhen scramble. Seeing her son's snotty appearance, Tian Xiuying, who was a little unexpected, hurriedly took a small step back in fright, for fear that he would throw himself into his arms.

Zhou Yufeng, who was sitting on the side, obviously had more experience in coaxing children, and quickly took Zhu Cizhao from Chongzhen's arms, and while comforting him, he wiped away the snot and tears on his face with a handkerchief.

Zhu Tingting, who was as big as Zhu Cizhao, also came to Chongzhen's side at this time, hugged her father's thighs and looked up and said, "Hug, the baby wants to watch the fire..."

Compared with his son's more lively daughter, Zhu Youzhen liked her more, so he smiled and bent down to pick her up, walked to the edge of the fence, and let her see the scenery outside the city tower. Looking at this situation, although she was a little unwilling, Tian Xiuying slowly retreated to her seat.

After the bustle of the day, the outside of the castle tower at night was even brighter, and at the suggestion of the emperor, Wang Chengen sent an order in the direction of Banzai Mountain. Half an hour later, dazzling fireworks rose on Banzai Mountain, dazzling the people of the city for a while.

The first month of the seventh year of Chongzhen was also the second New Year for Galileo and his disciples to come to China, and after a year of contact with the Chinese, Galileo and his disciples finally gained a foothold in this land.

After confirming the strength of His Majesty's support for natural science research in the Emperor of China, Galileo regained the courage to fight for natural science in this eastern land. On the one hand, he proved through his books and various experiments that the statement that "the heavens do not change, and the Tao does not change" is wrong. On the other hand, they vigorously refute the stereotypes of various cliques in private opinions and scientific research.

Of course, what Chongzhen values most is that Galileo injected a complete natural science education system into the school system he established. In this way, the most valuable lessons of more than 200 years of natural science education and research in Europe have been disseminated in China through the hands of Galileo and his disciples.

In his spare time, Galileo did not give up his research on astronomy, and on the basis of the basic completion of Chinese scholars, Galileo calculated the trajectory of the moon. He revised the "Table of the Moon" during the Lantern Festival in the seventh year of Chongzhen, which accurately described the position of the moon at any time.

Galileo specifically mentioned the names of several Chinese scholars such as Fang Yizhi and Ye Xiaoluan behind the "Lunar Table", and he believed that without these scholars' research on the relative motion between the earth, the sun and the moon, and expressed it in equations, he would not have been able to complete the "Lunar Table".

The completion of the "Lunar Table" means that the goal of measuring longitude using the lunar distance method is one step closer, and it also means that the era of ships sailing freely on the sea will truly come. The next step was to send astronomers around the world to make observations in order to verify the accuracy of the table.

For Galileo's research application, the customs yamen allocated 150,000 yuan, the internal affairs government allocated 100,000 yuan, and the foreign business association allocated 80,000 yuan, for a total of 330,000 yuan to verify the authenticity of the "Moon Table".

The announcement of this news in the Daming Times made more Ming intellectuals begin to look up at the family outside the Four Books and Five Classics, and re-understand the familiar and unfamiliar natural world around them. And for those who are new to learning, conquering the vast starry sky and the mysterious sea is more exciting and mesmerizing than the boring words of a saint.

Even in the clubs of the capital, it has become fashionable to talk about astronomy and natural sciences, and it is difficult for those who know nothing about the above two to become social stars in the capital.

The education of natural sciences, which had been promoted since the emperor's accession to the throne, finally gave rise to a wave of knowledge after five or six years of accumulation. This wave started from the capital and rushed towards Tianxia Prefecture. Although the farther away from the capital, the more difficult it is to have any impact, but the place where this wave passes will always change.

Just when the Ming people turned their eyes to the starry sky and the sea, North Korea, which was separated from the Ming Dynasty by the sea, was still struggling for its fate. Although the two classes of nobles such as the king of Joseon and the leader of the government surrendered, the people at the bottom of the Joseon Dynasty actively resisted with the support of the prince of Zhaoxian and the Ming people.

In particular, Gyeongsang-do and Jeolla-do provinces in Korea were the first to suffer from the Japanese invasion of Korea, and they were also the places where resistance to Japanese invaders was fiercest after awakening. In particular, Yi Sunsin and other famous anti-Japanese generals and volunteers came from these two regions, so after the Japanese retreated, the king of Joseon had to reward some volunteer leaders as new two classes.

Unlike the corrupt and cowardly two classes of nobles in Gyeonggi Province, these new two classes converted from the leaders of the volunteer army have not yet been completely corrupted, especially after receiving the arms support of the Ming Kingdom, the Jurchen soldiers and horses who went south to plunder the population and property were most widely attacked.

By February 1634, Dolgon, who was in Hanyang, found that although his army was still invincible in southern Korea, the sporadic casualties in various places had exceeded 1,000 people, and although the number of Korean casualties may have been ten times or more than that number, it was still an unbearable loss for Houjin.

In the eyes of Dolgon and the Jurchen nobles, 100 Koreans are not worth a Jurchen soldier, not to mention that there are almost 10 Niu Lu lost now. At this time, North Korea had almost all the areas that could be plundered. There was no progress on Ganghwa Island, which Haoge attacked, and it is said that the important female dependents on Ganghwa Island had been transferred to Jeju Island, and everyone couldn't help but think of returning home.

And Dolgon, who received news from China and Huang Taiji's order, also knew a series of things happening in the country at this moment. He knew it was time to retreat. Under the orders of Dolgon, the troops who went to various provinces to collect food, grass, and goods were summoned back to Hanyang Fortress one by one.

Then, under the persecution of Dolgon, the king of Joseon and the consulate issued a proclamation again, asking the prefectures and counties to levy men to carry various booty for the Jurchens to return home. Prior to this, Houjin had escorted more than 150,000 North Koreans back to Shenyang, and the number of people requisitioned this time exceeded 400,000, and many northern states and counties in North Korea were empty.

As for the property looted by the Houjin from Korea, the value was not less than 3 million taels of silver, and the grain and grass was not less than 3 million stones. The Joseon treasury was largely ransacked, and even the savings of many of the two classes of nobles for several generations were lost.

On 27 February, Dolgon and Hauge left Hanyang City with the last of the Houjin men. Three days later, Zu Dashou and Wu Sangui led more than 5,000 Ming Dynasty coalition troops to recover Hanyang City. Out of some political considerations, Zu Dashou refused to admit that it was North Korea and Houjin that reached a peace agreement with Houjin, and that the Houjin army withdrew from Korea.

Zu Dashou led his troops into Changdeok Palace and said to the king of Joseon: "This official was ordered by His Majesty to come to the aid of North Korea, and I heard that Jin Liu and other traitors coerced His Royal Highness to surrender to Jianlu, signed a series of treaties that betrayed the rights and interests of Korea, and connived at Jianlu to wreak havoc on the Korean people, is this true?"

Now that the official has taken the Ming soldiers and horses and the Korean rebels to recover Hanyang, the official implores His Highness to give the order to arrest Jin Liu and other traitors, rebuild the imperial court, and abolish all treaties that do not conform to the regulations of the Ming Dynasty..."

Li Liang, who came to power by virtue of a coup d'état, is extremely sensitive to the balance of power, and the biggest force in Hanyang City is the Ming Dynasty coalition led by Zu Dashou, and the way of doing things that the lord and faction replaced Houjin to loot property has offended the low-level people and local forces in North Korea.

Therefore, Li Liang quickly agreed to the request to rebuild the imperial court and depose Jin Liu and other lords and faction officials, but he did not want Zu Dashou to punish the lords and faction officials, so as to prevent the other party from completely hollowing himself out. Therefore, on the grounds that Zu Dashou did not have the emperor's explicit authorization to interfere in the internal affairs of Korea, he claimed to send people to Daming to listen to His Majesty's decision on the peace talks, and temporarily saved the lives of the officials of the Lord and the faction.

Whether it is North Korea or Houjin, the future direction of East Asia has once again returned to Beijing's hands.