Chapter 5: Wu Gao's Choice

Nagasaki.

The true center of Japan is now Nagasaki.

The governor of Nagasaki, Wu Gao, Marquis of Jiangyin, also received an order from the imperial court to attend a meeting in Nanjing.

The current situation makes Wu Gao a little helpless.

At the beginning, if he had followed He Xi, perhaps his current status would be very different from what he is now. Especially if even the spur is above him.

It's just that, for many things, regret is useless.

At the beginning of the war, Wu Gao was very worried about the survival of ***. I hesitated in thought and action, and finally after weighing the pros and cons, I chose the most stable option, which is to sit in Japan and sit back and watch the success or failure.

What Wu Gao did in this big war was almost Mu Chun in Beijing.

If the situation is reversed and Beijing is defeated, Wu Gao's behavior is probably no different from Mu Chun's.

It's just that, now thinking about the original choice, Wu Gao can't talk about regrets. It's just a little sudden.

After several years of war, I don't know how many founding feats have been made, and the Fu family is a typical example. In the future, there will be many families who will step by step from the center of power.

Wu Gao's original approach was doomed, and in this feast, he couldn't divide too much power. But he is also an old minister in Beijing, and he has no merit and hard work. In the past few years since he was in Japan, there has never been a shortage of gold, silver, saltpeter and copper ore in Beijing.

It can be said that most of the time the war on the Beijing side was fought with Japanese saltpeter.

Wu Gao would not be regarded as a foreign minister by the imperial court.

However, I want to go further and keep my home in the midst of this big reshuffle. Wu Gao has to think of a way.

to make up for the previous problem.

It's just that he understands very well that if he goes to Beijing this time, he won't be able to come back here in Nagasaki.

Others may not feel it, but Wu Gao tasted some taste. This time, the conference carried a bit of a sense of cutting the feudal domain.

No, there is really a secession before there is a feudal town. It is a hill inside the Ming court.

In terms of governing the country, He Xi already has three flavors. You can't let there be no hill below, if it's an iron plate below, it means that the top can be replaced. This situation illustrates. The upper layer is completely out of control over the lower layer.

After all, most of the time, it's normal for factions to be infinitely divided.

But for the hills, too, they must be suppressed. Reduce internal friction to a certain extent.

In recent years, the war has come first, and Wu Gao has many privileges in the East. It's as if Mu Chun also has a lot of privileges in Yunnan. This is not isolation. It's a universal phenomenon.

The big war comes first, as long as the big war is not delayed. A lot of things can be put on the go. Now in the army, there are factions such as the subordinate faction, the southern route army, the western route army, the eastern route army and the navy.

He Xi is probably going to disrupt all the factions.

Naturally, it was impossible for Wu Gao to return to Nagasaki. The attitude of the Ming court towards the four countries of the East will also have some changes. It's as if the balance between the imperial court and the Yan Kingdom needs to be re-found to everyone's satisfaction.

Wu Gao thought about it and found the foundation for his future foothold in the imperial court, that is, his good relationship with the four kings of the East.

In the future, the vassal king will be an indispensable part of the Ming ecology.

During the Hongwu period, this was not obvious. Because, the relationship between the vassal kings and the emperor is that of father and son. The vassal kings were able to communicate directly with the emperor. After Zhu Yuanzhang's death, this new ecology should appear.

It's just that the situation is still different.

The outbreak of the war between the north and the south left most of the vassal kings in a wait-and-see mode. Now the Ming Dynasty is set to one. It's time to establish a new vassal relationship.

In the foreseeable future. The Ming Dynasty and the vassal kings of various places will definitely coexist. And some problems between the Ming Dynasty and the vassal king also need to be communicated and coordinated.

The possibility of direct dialogue between the imperial court and the vassal king was impossible.

The reason is very simple, it is easy to collapse when the court and the vassal king talk directly. Once the talks collapse, there will be no room for manoeuvre between the two sides. So, at this time

There is room for political brokers.

In fact, during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, diplomacy between countries tended to be familial. That is, someone is in charge of diplomacy with a certain country, and his children and grandchildren have always been in this position. It's because some connections or something can only be passed down personally. There is no clear line between public and private. There are many things that others can't do. But if this family does it, it can be done.

After the Great Unification Dynasty, the central court did not have any decent diplomacy with the outside world at all, because it was difficult to have countries of the same size around it, so that China could treat each other as equals.

Now that the feudal king has appeared, the transaction between the feudal king and the central government can hardly be said to be diplomatic.

But there are still some diplomatic features.

The reason why Wu Gao was able to serve here was not because of his special relationship with the King of Xiang and his ability to appease the King of Xiang. There are not many soldiers and horses in Wu's hand, most of them are still attached to the army, and once the four kings of the East attack, it is very likely that Goryeo will not be owned by Beijing.

Moreover, during the period of the Northern and Southern War, Nanjing did not send people to rebel against the Four Kings of the East.

Let Wu Gao dissolve.

On the one hand, the Four Kings of the East have their own judgment on the battlefield situation. On the other hand, it is Wu Gao's personal credit guarantee.

That is, what the Four Kings of the East believed was not the Beijing court, but the guarantee of the Wu family, the uncle of the King of Xiang, the Marquis of Jiangyin.

The same situation also gave Wu Gao some opportunities.

Let him be in the center, and he can replace the four kings of the East and negotiate terms with the imperial court. Moreover, after comprehending the intentions of the imperial court, he can also negotiate conditions with the four kings of the East on behalf of the imperial court.

As long as there are no problems with the four kings of the East. Then the Wu family always has a place in the upper class. Of course, there is also a risk, if that day, the Ming court wants to destroy the four kings of the East.

Then the first thing to get rid of is the Wu family of Jiangyin Marquis.

However, Wu Gao does not see this risk now. At the same time, Wu Gao just took this one thing as the family's guarantee. In other words, no matter what it looks like, the Wu family will not become a rich idler in the imperial court.

There is always a bite to eat. But if you want to eat more, you have to do something else.

The first thing Wu Gao had to do was to go to Nanjing immediately and whitewash his identity as a hero of the founding of the country as a hero of Longwu Rebellion.

Because in the future, the heroes of Hongwu's founding will be tomorrow's yellow flowers. If Wu Gao is on his body, there is still this label. The future is not very good.

So Wu Gao didn't just want to go to Nanjing this time. I also want to think that the four kings of the East have all flickered to Nanjing, and let the four kings of the East sing praises for Longwu at the Dingguo meeting.

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Nanyang New State.

Xinzhou, as the residence of the Nanyang Governor's Palace, is also the only directly governed territory of the Ming Dynasty in Nanyang, and has been the territory of the Lu family for so many years. It's been a long time. Many people think that this is the fiefdom of the Lu family.

It's like the kings' fiefdoms overseas.

And Lu Zhongheng also built this place as a fief. Spare no effort in local construction. The Lu family has infiltrated every industry in NSW. The Lu family is worthy of the name of the first family in New State.

And Xinzhou has the current situation, and the Lu family has also made great efforts.

The Han people from the Central Plains to the South Seas were almost all intercepted by Lu Zhongheng. Of course, the old port is a large construction project and promotes farming. More attractive to the population than NSW.

But under the management of the Lu family, the prosperity of Xinzhou is not under the old port.

And after Lu Zhongheng has been in Nanyang for so many years, he has to admit that as a Huaibei man, he is actually not adapted to the climate of Nanyang, and it is easy to say when he is young.

Now my health is getting worse and worse.

With the death of the founding heroes, Lu Zhongheng suddenly had an awakening, that is, his limit is about to come.

After all, tropical life actually brought some damage to Lu Zhongheng's body, and not everyone can adapt to this temperature. And the generals of his generation, the dead died, the dead died, even if they were still alive, and now they are pressed on the head by the juniors.

Let him have some sad feelings of rabbit death.

At this moment, before this Dingguo meeting, Lu Zhongheng suddenly rethought the future fate of the Lu family.

The Lu family has been He Xi's staunchest supporters and best allies in Nanyang for many years. But time is the power that can change everything. People change.

It's the same today. Something has changed.