The Price of Riding the Wave

The moment the words "going with the flow" were uttered, all the emperors throughout history across countless worlds tensed up.

The era of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Yuanzhang's eyelids twitched violently.

He knew this feeling all too well.

When he fought Chen Youliang, he had too much success in the early stages, but he almost capsized his boat on Poyang Lake and was nearly surrounded and annihilated by Chen Youliang's Han army navy.

"That idiot!"

"What exactly did he do?"

Zhu Yuanzhang gritted his teeth and stared intently at the sky.

The worst thing you can do in war is to disperse your forces.

The same principle applies to governing a country and engaging in court intrigues.

With only a few cards in your hand, how dare you attack from all sides without an absolute advantage?

In the live stream, Zhu Dijun covered his face, looking extremely distressed.

"Family members, we have a profound saying in modern times that can be given to Emperor Xiaozong of Ming, Emperor Xianzong of Ming, or even the great war god Emperor Yingzong of Ming."

"The only lesson humanity has learned from history is that humanity never learns from its mistakes!"

"By the seventeenth year of the Hongzhi reign, Emperor Xiaozong Zhu Youcheng had a very clear understanding of the situation."

"He knew that the oppression of the Ming imperial power came from the civil official group and the maternal relatives."

"When he took action against the civil service, he delivered an extremely impressive combination of punches."

"But that's where the problem lies."

Zhu Dijun drew three glaring red lines on the screen with his finger.

"This emperor, who thought victory was assured, actually chose to fight on three fronts!"

"The front line was the Northwest military affairs, and he sent his trusted military officers and eunuchs to investigate the finances of the civil official group."

"The second line is the cabinet and local governments. He sent out imperial inspectors to overthrow the core of the civil service group."

"If he only focuses on these two lines and plays steadily, he might still have a chance of winning."

"But he deliberately opened up a third front—dealing with the maternal relatives!"

The entire universe was in an uproar.

Yongle Time and Space.

Zhu Di suddenly stood up and kicked over the imperial desk in front of him.

"Foolish!"

"To repel external threats, one must first pacify internal strife; to capture the thief, one must first capture

"Since you intend to target the civil officials, you should first appease the maternal relatives, or conversely, use them to attack the civil officials!"

"If you attack them both at the same time, aren't you forcing them to team up and kill you?"

Zhu Di had an incredibly sharp eye.

He immediately saw through the fatal flaw in Zhu Youcheng's actions.

On the sky, Zhu Dijun's tone became extremely helpless.

"It was the end of the seventeenth year of the Hongzhi reign."

"The overly smooth progress led Zhu Youcheng to do something extremely impulsive, or rather, a foolish thing because he was too concerned about saving face."

"He had the Ministry of Revenue submit a memorial impeaching his maternal uncle, Marquis of Qingyun, Zhou Shou, and his brother-in-law, Marquis of Shouning, Zhang Heling."

"Family members, please pay attention to this detail."

"This is a signal that Zhu Youcheng is going to take action against his maternal relatives."

"But he did not directly send the Embroidered Uniform Guard to arrest them, nor did he directly strip them of their titles."

"He chose the mild approach of letting the censors impeach him, which is a matter of procedure."

A memorial appeared on the screen.

The document was densely covered with accusations of the Zhang brothers and the Zhou family for seizing fertile land and abducting women.

Zhu Dijun sneered repeatedly.

"Zhu Youcheng's mindset is quite peculiar."

"He wanted to be a powerful emperor with real authority, but he was also reluctant to give up the burden of being a 'benevolent ruler'."

"He wanted to use the laws of the Ming Dynasty to try these relatives of the emperor and make them submit to the truth."

"He's too kind, too concerned about saving face."

"He thought he was making a show of force."

"But in the eyes of those civil officials and relatives of the emperor who were cornered, this was a declaration of war to the death!"

The era of the Zhengde reign of the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Houzhao sat on the steps of the Leopard House, holding a drawn embroidered spring knife in his hand.

He looked at his father, who was full of vigor and spirit, on the sky, and his eyes reddened.

"Father..."

"Since you want to kill them, why not just send troops to surround their mansion?"

"You've given them time to breathe, but they won't give you a way out!"

Zhu Houzhao's body was trembling slightly.

He knew better than anyone the ultimate outcome of this political struggle.

That ending became a lifelong nightmare for him.

Above the sky, Zhu Dijun's eyes turned extremely cold.

"Family members, when the civil service group discovers that the emperor intends to exterminate them."

"When the maternal relatives' families realized they were about to lose their immense wealth."

"At this critical juncture of life and death, these two forces have reached an unprecedented tacit understanding."

"They don't need to hold meetings, nor do they need to form alliances."

"They only need to do one thing to completely turn the tide."

The image on the screen suddenly went dark.

The red walls and yellow tiles of the Forbidden City appeared eerie under the gloomy sky.

"Since the emperor isn't leaving us a way out."

"Then let's change the emperor!"

"As long as Zhu Youcheng dies and a young new emperor takes his place, the Ming Dynasty will still be theirs!"

Zhu Dijun's voice carried a chilling undertone that sent shivers down one's spine.

"Zhu Youcheng had planned everything meticulously, but he overlooked the most fatal flaw."

"He thought that with control of the three major camps and the palace guards, he was invincible."

"But he forgot that the sharpest knife in the world is often not in the hands of the enemy."

"And it's in the hands of the person you trust most and are least wary of!"

The background music in the live stream changed to a mournful and eerie ancient piece of music.

On the screen appeared a gaunt old man dressed in the robes of an official from the Imperial Medical Academy.

His eyes were sunken and his gaze was sinister.

She was holding a bowl of steaming hot herbal soup.

"Family members, remember this face."

Judy Jun pressed his finger heavily on the old man's nose.

His name is Liu Wentai.

"The Imperial Medical Academy's Chief Judge."

"A native of Shangrao, Jiangxi."

"He also had a terrifying title that resounded throughout the Ming Dynasty court—'The Divine Healer of Two Emperors'!"

Upon hearing these two words, Zhu Jianshen of the Chenghua era of the Ming Dynasty suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood.

He stared intently at the old man on the sky, his eyes filled with disbelief and terror.

"Liu Wentai..."

"He was the one who cured my illness..."

"Could it be...?"

On the sky, Zhu Dijun gave the answer directly.

"That's right, the Chenghua Emperor, Zhu Jianshen, died suddenly after drinking the medicine he concocted!"

"At that time, Liu Wentai was found to have made a mistake in the administration of medicine, and according to the law, he should be executed."

"But the officials from Jiangxi province in the court defended him to the death, and in the end, they managed to change his death sentence to exile."

"When the Hongzhi reign came, these civil officials found another excuse to bring him back to the Imperial Medical Academy!"

Zhu Dijun slammed his fist on the table, his anger blazing.

Why?

"Because Liu Wentai is a venomous snake kept in the palace by the civil service!"

"It's their ultimate weapon for dealing with disobedient emperors!"

"Now, Zhu Youcheng is about to flip the table."

"That venomous snake has bared its fangs again!"

In the scene, Liu Wentai respectfully hands the bowl of boiled medicine to a woman.

A stunningly beautiful woman dressed in a phoenix robe and adorned with pearls and jade.

Empress Zhang of the Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Youcheng's only wife in his lifetime.

"May of the eighteenth year of the Hongzhi reign."

"Zhu Youcheng caught a cold."

"It was just a minor cold, I didn't even need to get out of bed."

"But Liu Wentai, the chief physician of the Imperial Medical Academy, prescribed a strong medicine."

"This medicine has been handed over to Empress Zhang."

Zhu Dijun's voice became extremely sorrowful.

"Family members, no matter what, Zhu Youcheng practiced monogamy his entire life. Even though Empress Zhang killed one of his sons and one of his daughters, they didn't completely break off relations; she merely abolished and suppressed the current status of the Zhang family as maternal relatives."

But he was wrong.

"On Empress Zhang's scales, her husband's life would never compare to the wealth and glory of his younger brother!"

The image on the screen is frozen in front of the dragon bed in the Qianqing Palace.

Empress Zhang sat on the edge of the bed, holding a bowl of medicine.

Zhu Youcheng drank the bowl of medicine without any suspicion.

He smiled and held his wife's hand, saying that once he recovered, he would take her to Xiyuan Garden to admire the lotus flowers.

However, half an hour later.

Zhu Youcheng bled from all seven orifices and writhed in agony on the dragon bed.

He gripped the bright yellow bed sheet tightly, his fingernails cracking.

He stared wide-eyed at his wife, who stood by the bed watching coldly, his eyes filled with disbelief and despair.

Why...?

"I...have treated you well..."

Zhu Youcheng's voice was stuck in his throat, finally turning into a shrill scream before he died.

He was only thirty-six years old.

In a parallel Zhengde era of the Ming Dynasty.

"ah--!"

Zhu Houzhao let out a beast-like roar.

He cleaved the stone pillar in front of him with a single blow, his eyes bloodshot, tears mingling with blood as they streamed down his face.

"You wicked woman!"

"They're all poisonous women!"

"I will kill them! I will exterminate the Zhang family and their entire clan! I will have Liu Wentai torn to pieces!"

He finally learned how his father had died.

It wasn't just a minor cold; he was poisoned to death by his own mother, who was closest to him!

In modern live streaming rooms, the barrage of comments has seen an unprecedented explosion.

"Holy crap! It's someone from Jiangxi again! Why are they so persistent?!"

"Yan Song was from Jiangxi, Xia Yan was from Jiangxi, Liu Wentai was from Jiangxi! The Jiangxi clique in the Ming Dynasty was a cancer!"

"I finally understand why the Qing dynasty had to restrict and suppress officials in Jiangxi. This time, I'm on Wild Boar Skin's side. Well done!"

"That's not all! Modern times too! How about the Jiangxi Ring Road area?"

"Some sensitive technological, economic, and political projects simply exclude Jiangxi!"

"This shows that the immense power and influence of the Jiangxi clique during the Ming Dynasty directly led to the downfall of the Jiangxi people for the next few centuries!"

"If given the chance, the people of Jiangxi in later generations would love to grab a knife and chop these Jiangxi ancestors to death! What kind of sins have they committed!"

Judy Jun looked at the rapidly scrolling comments on the screen and nodded with a cold smile.

"The netizens have hit the nail on the head."

During the mid-to-late Ming Dynasty, there was a saying in the imperial court: "Half of the officials were from Jiangxi."

"Civil officials from Jiangxi banded together for mutual support, formed cliques for personal gain, and controlled the government."

"They dared to poison even the emperor to protect their own interests!"

"Liu Wentai's medicine not only killed Zhu Youcheng, but also completely extinguished the vitality of the Ming Dynasty!"

"With Zhu Youcheng dead, all the counterattacks he had planned collapsed instantly."

"The accounts in the Northwest will not be investigated."

"The local imperial inspectors have been recalled."

"The Zhang brothers continue to act with impunity in Beijing."

"Those old bastards, Liu Jian and Li Dongyang, not only didn't resign, but instead became regents, continuing to control the government!"

Judy slammed the pointer in her hand hard on the screen, making a crisp sound.

"This is the civil service's ultimate weapon!"

"They used a bowl of poison to not only smooth over all the crises, but also to gain a young and easily fooled new master for themselves."

"That's the fifteen-year-old Crown Prince—Zhu Houzhao!"

"The power games of the Ming Dynasty have once again returned to the rhythm most familiar to the civil service group."