The thirteenth day of the first month of the seventh year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty, Beijing City. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Another year is coming, and starting tomorrow, the three-day Lantern Festival in the capital will also be launched, when the entire Beijing city will become a sea of lights and joy, whether it is dignitaries or peddlers and pawns in these three days will enjoy the whole city, enjoy the peaceful scenery of the prosperous times.

It's just that the current Ming Dynasty is really a peaceful and prosperous era? At least in the Ninefold Palace, when the lord of the day, the young Son of Heaven Wanli Zhu Yijun seems to be the case, not to mention the Mongolian people who often harass the north and bring great pressure and military spending to the imperial court, nor the continuous reduction of grain production and displacement caused by various bad weather in recent years, just the rebellion that is getting bigger and bigger in the southwest is enough to make him feel a headache.

Just a few years ago, Wanli had received a note from Guangxi, which said that the ferocity of the rebels led by Yang Yinglong not only suffered great damage to the local people, but also many cities in Guangxi are also facing a great test, Guilin and other cities are even more precarious, just ask the imperial court to send a large army as soon as possible to quell the chaos.

In this regard, there are two voices in the DPRK and China, the first is that the situation in the southwest is indeed dangerous, and the imperial court must immediately send more troops and horses to pacify it. The second is that they believe that this is just a deliberate exaggeration of the rebel forces by Guangxi officials in order to protect themselves, which is not credible.

You must know that not long ago, they had already said that the local rebellion had been quelled, and even the White Lotus Sect, which had been causing trouble to the world for a long time, had been uprooted.

What's more, the imperial court had mobilized people from several nearby provinces to rush to the rescue, but it had not arrived for the time being due to road and climate reasons. What the imperial court has to do now is to urge the officials of Guangxi to defend the city to the death, and never lose any city!

This kind of hard-line attitude was very much to the appetite of the Manchu officials who could only study to the death, but had never even been on the battlefield, so the latter received more support, and some people even distrusted the officials in Guangxi, and shouted at them and killed them.

In this regard, Wanli will not accept it. Although he has never been on the battlefield, he is much more sober than those courtiers who are definitely angry in later generations, and this turmoil in the southwest can be really serious, and it must be pacified as soon as possible, and at the same time, it must be the imperial court to spend a lot of effort to pacify.

Guangxi officials only sent their local critical situation, but there is more than one Guangxi in the southwest. Even Guangxi, which is still under the rule of the imperial court, is still like this, but what about Sichuan? What about Guizhou and Yunnan? Isn't the situation in these three provinces even more unbearable, and the lives of the people there even more miserable?

Every time he thinks of this, Wanli feels unsettled, almost to the point where he doesn't know what to eat and can't sleep. However, because of the long distance, after this report a year ago, Guangxi did not send even a letter about the war, which made people even more uneasy, for fear that the final message would be the fall of Guilin and even the entire territory of Guangxi was seized by the rebels.

Let me ask, in such a state of mind, this year, how can Wanli, as the Son of Heaven, go to this Lantern Festival with peace of mind and be happy?

Thinking of all this, Wanli once again walked to the wall where the map of the southwest was hung, and his eyes only wandered on it. Since the chaos in the southwest has intensified, he has asked people to hang this map on the palace wall of his daily government affairs, so that he can always pay attention to it.

It's a pity that those maps composed of simple graphics and lines can't provide more detailed information for the emperor at all, and he can't see too many tricks after looking at it for a long time, and his last gaze only wanders between the large mountains and mountains: "Yang Qing, can you worry about me again?" Where are you now, and what are you doing? ”

At this moment, the only person who can make the emperor so pinned on him is Yang Zhen, his most trusted courtier.

All the previous merits made Wanli have an indescribable and inexplicable trust in Yang Zhen. So when something happened in the southwest, and he happened to be in the southwest, Wanli would unconsciously feel that he could play a role in turning things around in this matter.

It's a pity that since the report of that year ago mentioned that Yang Zhen had rushed to Sichuan, there has been no further news. This is also one of the reasons that makes Wanli even more uneasy, even Yang Zhen, who he pinned his hopes on, no longer has any news back, and he really doesn't know who he should hope for.

Just as the emperor stood helplessly in front of the map for a long time without any gain and sighed, there was a small movement outside the warm pavilion, as if someone had lightly touched the portal. This made Wanli, who was already restless, even more unhappy, so he turned around and asked, "Who is it?" ”

"It's a slave maid...... the door was gently pushed open from the outside, Zhang Whale walked in cautiously, and saluted in a proper manner, and then whispered: "Your Majesty, there are a few notes waiting for you to review here...... " As he spoke, he raised a few copies of the notes in his hand.

Different from the situation known by later generations, Wanli at this time was not the otaku son of heaven who had lived in the deep palace for thirty years and had not seen his ministers, on the contrary, he had just ascended the throne for only a year or two, and he was full of energy, and he would approve any of the notes submitted to him as soon as possible, and almost no overnight.

But today, Wanli, who was extremely restless and irritable, didn't want to do such a mechanical thing. Because he knows very well what kind of music will be sent to the palace today, it is nothing more than a fancy article that welcomes the horse and praises the peace of the world.

So he just frowned: "Got it, leave it there." He wanted to send Zhang Whale out. Although this personal eunuch has won his trust, he will sometimes give some face.

Zhang Jing naturally understood what the emperor was worried about, so he didn't dare to disturb too much at the moment, so he hurriedly agreed. But then he remembered something and said, "Your Majesty, when the cabinet sent the concert to the house, it was said that there was a matter of great importance, and it was an urgent report from the north, and I hope Your Majesty will not be negligent." ”

"Huh?" When Wanli heard this, his body was shocked. At this time, I didn't care about the unhappiness in my heart, so I hurriedly came to the imperial case in a few steps, grabbed the few notes, looked at the content on the cover, and finally took out a copy and quickly browsed it.

And under this look, Wanli's heart was tensed for a while, and his body almost stumbled. It's just that there is only one thing mentioned in the song - on the fifth day of the new year, there were actually Mongolians who attacked the border forts, and according to the spies, this is because the Mongolians have known about the chaos in the southwest of the Ming Dynasty and have come to make a test. Once it is confirmed that there is any problem in the chaos in the southwest of the Ming Dynasty, they will take the opportunity to invade the south!

"Are even the Mongols starting to move?" Wanli, who pressed the table to stabilize himself, gritted his teeth and said softly: "Is it true that I have no one to cure you?" If that time comes, I'll come and wipe out all of you thieves in person! At this point, he threw his hand to the ground, and with a wave of his hand, he knocked down all the flowery congratulatory articles on the case.

In the midst of the clatter of a large pile of things falling to the ground, the door that had just been closed was knocked again. This made Wanli even more irritable, and shouted: "What's the matter? He just said that Zhang Whale went and returned.

The door opened, revealing Sun Hai's somewhat worried face, seeing that the emperor looked unhappy, he hurriedly stepped forward and saluted: "The slave and maid are guilty, the slave and maid should not come to disturb Your Majesty at this time." ”

"Tell me, what's the matter?" Wanli saw that he was also holding a song, and his heart was even more crooked. His two personal eunuchs are always incompatible, and he has long heard of fighting each other. And these two also have some skills, and they actually gave them all the errands that sent them to play.

This is actually a good thing for the queen mother to tell him, only when the people under him are hostile to each other, as the son of heaven, can he control everything. The original Emperor Sejong relied on this trick to hide outside the palace for many years and still be able to control the government, otherwise he would be easily deceived by the colluding internal and external courtiers.

But today, Wanli, who doesn't like anything, is obviously not in such a good mood, so he doesn't fake any words about Sun Hai, and even has some disgust.

Sun Hai didn't know this, so he just handed his hand up: "Your Majesty, the great joy is the good news sent by Jinyiwei, and there are also eight hundred miles in the southwest to expedite the ......."

Listening to what he said, Wanli was about to scold him, my country was in such a mess, what a happy event is just a Lantern Festival! But listening to what he said later, the words that came to the emperor's lips were suffocated: "News from Jinyiwei? But Yang Qing has news coming back? As he spoke, he reached out and snatched the few copies from Sun Hai's hand and quickly opened them to look at them.

At this look, the sadness that was entangled in his heart and brows suddenly dissipated, and he even couldn't believe his eyes, rubbed it vigorously, and looked at the two pieces of music from Jinyiwei and Guilin respectively again, to be sure that this was not his own mistake.

But that's just the way it is, it's all true.

Guilin's Soshu said very clearly, after the rebels attacked the city for a long time, they finally withdrew on the 26th day of the lunar month. According to the subsequent investigation, it was learned that Yang Yinglong, who was in Banzhou, Sichuan, was assassinated, and now the rebels have already made a mess in order to compete for the forces left behind by him, and the situation in the southwest is already very good.

In another Jinyiwei note, it is written more clearly that Yang Zhen took Cai Yingyang, Wang Hai, Zhu Kongyan, Ruan Tong and Jiao Wu and other five people into Sichuan and assassinated Yang Yinglong!