Zhao Jiu's Sudden Enlightenment

Southern Song Dynasty. Jianyan era.

North of the Yellow River, the sun was shrouded in smoke and fire. Wanyan Zongbi's iron cavalry ravaged the Central Plains.

Zhao Jiu, a time traveler in the body of the future Emperor Shizu of Song, is leading a large army in preparation for a northern expedition to reclaim lost territory. Inside the central command tent, a giant tallow candle burns, dripping crimson wax tears.

Outside the camp, Yue Fei was training the Beiwei Army. Spears flashed like dragons, and the battle cries shook the heavens.

Zhao Jiu sat behind his desk, staring at the sky, his hands and feet growing cold. Zhu Dijun's statement, "Xu Jie was of mixed Pu and Pu descent," was like a rusty chisel, forcefully piercing through all the logical blind spots in his mind regarding this period of history.

Pu Shougeng. Yang Shiqi. Registered residence changed.

As a time traveler from the future, Zhao Jiu was well-versed in history. However, he had always had one extremely perplexing blind spot.

The original Zhao Gou, the emperor who fled and didn't even care about his own father, was not cowardly in his early years. During the reign of Prince Kang, he dared to go to the Jin camp as a hostage and dared to recruit volunteers in Hebei.

Why did Zhao Gou become a completely different person after arriving in Yangzhou, crossing the Yangtze River, and reaching Lin'an?

Historical records judge him to have been terrified by the Jin soldiers, lost his fertility, and become a spineless coward who only sought to live in peace.

Is the truth really that simplistic?

Zhao Jiu recalled the fate of the Jiajing Emperor in the Heavenly Canopy: being fed poison pills, having his imperial physicians' defenses compromised, having all those around him bribed and replaced, and finally dying under mysterious circumstances.

How skillful that technique is!

The original Zhao Gou experienced the "Ming Shou Incident" in Yangzhou, where he was forced to abdicate by rebel forces. Later, he fled south to Hangzhou, where his personal guards and close ministers had long been purged and replaced by the Jiangnan gentry.

Jiangnan. That was the stronghold of the remnants of the Pu family, foreign compradors, and powerful gentry.

What role did this group play in the Southern Song Dynasty? They controlled the tea and salt taxes and occupied the fertile land in the Taihu Lake basin.

A Northern Expedition? A Northern Expedition requires money, but whose money? Naturally, it will come from taxes levied on the wealthy clans of Jiangnan. After the Central Plains are recovered, the political center will shift north, and the status of the Jiangnan gentry will plummet.

Based on this, the gentry of Jiangnan would never allow the Northern Expedition to succeed.

They needed a sterilized, terrified emperor who only knew how to negotiate peace. The original Zhao Gou, most likely, drank the same laced tranquilizer as Jiajing during his escape. On a dark and stormy night, his guards were replaced with assassins from the Jiangnan gentry. He was completely sidelined and held hostage, becoming a puppet used to stamp peace agreements.

What about Yue Fei?

Zhao Jiu slammed his fist on the wooden frame of the sand table, and a splinter pierced his fingertip.

Yue Fei had to die. Not only because the Jin dynasty wanted him dead, but also because the literati of Jiangnan wanted him dead!

Yue Fei's recapture of Xiangyang opened up the supply lines for grain and provisions in the Central Plains. The Yue Family Army maintained strict discipline, even surveying and cultivating land in the local areas to achieve self-sufficiency.

Whose sore spot did this touch? The gentry of Jiangnan! Once Yue Fei marches straight to the enemy's capital and welcomes back the two emperors, the Song Dynasty will undergo an extremely brutal redistribution of post-war interests. Qin Hui is merely a knife pushed to the forefront by these Jiangnan compradors.

"So that's how it is. No wonder. That's exactly how it is!" Zhao Jiu stood up and paced back and forth in the tent. With each step, the killing intent intensified.

The southward migration of the Song Dynasty was not a continuation of the Han Chinese tradition, but rather a land grab and spoils feast led by mixed-race compradors from the south. They used the northern lands and people as food to secure their own century-long wealth and power.

The tent flap was lifted. Lü Yihao, a secretary in the Imperial Secretariat, entered carrying several documents and bowed respectfully.

"Your Majesty, another memorial has arrived from Lin'an. Several gentry from Jiangnan East Circuit have jointly submitted a memorial, stating that years of war have exhausted the people, and earnestly requesting Your Majesty to postpone the advance and negotiate peace with the Jin. They are also willing to donate ten thousand taels of silver to fund the military."

Ten thousand taels of silver.

Zhao Jiu snorted coldly. These millionaires, these bloodsuckers, think they can buy out the Song Dynasty's Northern Expedition plan with a mere ten thousand taels of silver.

"Peace talks?"

Zhao Jiu strode up to Lü Yihao, drew the Emperor's Sword from his waist, and the blade grazed the civil official's neck.

"Tell me, among the gentry in Jiangnan, how many families have the character 'Pu' in their names? How many of them have ancestors who were Arabs or Semu people? How many of them have used the Song Dynasty's imperial examination system to acquire tens of thousands of acres of fertile land in this land of fish and rice?"

Lu Yihao was drenched in cold sweat, his legs were trembling, and he couldn't utter a single word.

"Give me 10,000 Tabai troops. Don't fight the Jurchens yet. Turn around and cleanse Jiangnan for me."

Zhao Jiu sheathed his longsword; the clanging of metal was crisp and piercing.

"Any aristocratic family that submits memorials obstructing the Northern Expedition or advocating for peace talks, regardless of how many prime ministers their ancestors produced or how many protégés or former officials they had, will have their property confiscated, their male members sent to the army, and their female relatives sent to the brothels. I am determined to fight this war. If the festering sores within us are not burst, how can I face the elders of the Central Plains?"

That night, the Jianyan imperial court, through a revelation that transcended time and space, turned its attention to the civil officials and scholars. The Song emperor raised his sword against them.

The order to purge was issued overnight. The Tabai Army broke away from the front lines against the Jin and headed straight for Lin'an and the surrounding prefectures. The powerful families of Jiangnan, who were still drinking and making merry in their mansions and plotting how to suppress their generals, were met with armored soldiers breaking down their doors.

Account books were unearthed, and land deeds were confiscated. Those scholar-officials who championed integrity were stripped of their official robes and escorted to prison carts. In the misty rain of West Lake, besides the sounds of silk and bamboo instruments, there were also bursts of mournful wails.

Zhao Jiu wanted to use the blood and bones of the wealthy and powerful people of Jiangnan to commemorate the Northern Expedition route that Yue Fei should have traversed.

The Ming Dynasty. A parallel Hongwu era.

The clouds hanging low and oppressive over Yingtianfu were so thick and humid that you could wring water out of the air.

In the large square in front of the Fengtian Hall, hundreds of Imperial Guards, wielding embroidered spring knives, stood in formation like a wall. The cold glint of their blades made the blue bricks on the ground appear deathly white.

Zhu Yuanzhang sat upright on the dragon throne on the steps of the main hall. The content displayed on the screen had ended, but the murderous intent in his mind was surging like magma.

Pu was of mixed race. Xu Guangqi. A collaborator. A Jesuit. A renowned Confucian scholar from Jiangnan.

These words, combined and arranged, formed a death warrant that would drain the Ming Dynasty dry. Zhu Yuanzhang, who had been begging, a monk, and conquering the world, hated nothing more than the corrupt officials and compradors of the Yuan Dynasty. He ordered the Pu family to be relegated to the lowest social class, believing that this would eliminate future troubles and ensure the eternal stability of the Ming Dynasty.

Who would have thought that these bastards would play the trick of registering their residence elsewhere, changing their appearance and brazenly sneaking into the Ming Dynasty's imperial examinations.

Even worse, during the reign of their descendant Zhu Houcong, these people rose to the high position of Grand Secretary. They flooded the capital, used poison to slowly assassinate the Ming emperor, and used Chinese technology to curry favor with the foreign devils.

This is not a matter of corruption; it is a struggle over a path that leads to the extinction of the race and the annihilation of the people.

The "sky curtain" refers to the list of traitors to be eliminated sent by Zhu Dijun, a descendant of later generations.

"Mao Xiang".

Zhu Yuanzhang called out the name of the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. His tone was low, but his voice was extremely penetrating.

Mao Xiang knelt on one knee at the foot of the steps, his back taut like a bow: "Your subject is here."

"The Xu family of Huating County, Songjiang Prefecture. And the remnants of the Pu family in Jiangnan, trace them down through the family genealogy. All those who are related by marriage within three degrees of kinship, and all those who were students or former officials registered under their names."

Zhu Yuanzhang paused for a moment, a ruthless glint appearing in his eyes.

"Arrest them all. Don't interrogate them. These scoundrels spout morality and righteousness; you won't get the truth out of them. Just put them in the clamps and skin them alive. Anyone who matches the description, regardless of age or gender, leave no one alive."

Li Shanchang and Liu Bowen stood at the front of the civil official ranks. They looked at each other and both felt a chill run down their spines.

This is not just about exterminating nine generations of aristocratic families; it's about completely uprooting and burning the entire aristocratic ecosystem of the Jiangnan region to the ground.

The Minister of Revenue's knees buckled, and he collapsed to the ground, his voice trembling:

"Your Majesty, Songjiang is a major tax-paying area. If you were to implicate so many people in this way, it would likely cause an uproar among the scholars of Jiangnan, leading to a strike against examinations and tax resistance, which would put the imperial treasury in dire straits. Moreover, history is an ironclad record; Your Majesty's indiscriminate killing of Confucian scholars will surely bring eternal infamy..."

"A name that will be vilified for all time?"

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

Memorials and inkstones were scattered all over the floor, ink flowing freely.

He strode down the steps and approached the Minister of Revenue. His shoes slammed heavily over the memorials on the ground.

"I'm a rough man, I came from a beggar monk background, I'm not afraid of the pens in the hands of you scholars."

Zhu Yuanzhang looked down at his ministers, his anger turning into a forced laugh.

"The infamy you speak of throughout history is nothing more than accusations of our cruelty and the slaughter of our meritorious officials. But if we leave these mixed-race comprador spies alive, allowing them to climb to high positions and ruin our Ming Dynasty, sending our Chinese people to be slaves to foreign tribes again, how can we face our ancestors after we die?"

He turned around, drew the embroidered spring knife from the waist of the guard beside him, and slashed off a corner of the imperial desk.

"Strike back at the exams? Resist taxes? We conquered this land with our swords, not their pens! If the Jiangnan gentry dare to act recklessly, we'll send a large army to Taihu Lake. We'll uncover hidden land and distribute it to the poor and landless. Anyone who dares to speak up for those collaborators will be considered an accomplice and their entire family will be executed!"

The final purge that swept across the northern and southern provinces of the Ming Dynasty, affecting tens of thousands of people, was thus launched.

The first to be affected was Songjiang Prefecture.

The Imperial Guards sped out of the capital under cover of night. Thousands of their men stormed into the grand mansions of Huating County. The Xu family ancestral hall was razed to the ground, the family genealogy was unearthed, and the trail was followed to trace the family's lineage. Those literati and scholars who usually composed poems and engaged in lofty discussions were dragged through the streets like dogs, their collarbones pierced with iron chains.

The Confucian scholars of Jiangnan attempted to submit a joint memorial, trying to use Confucianism and Mencius' teachings to resist imperial power. Mao Xiang's response was extremely blunt: anyone who signed the petition would have their property confiscated.

Countless tax-free farmlands were re-surveyed, and the hidden population was forced to come out. What was unearthed from the cellars were not only piles of silver, but also their privately made armor, letters exchanged with overseas merchants and even pirates.

At Caishikou in Yingtian Prefecture, blood flowed like a river. The guillotine blades were chipped and worn, and executioners came and went, yet they could not finish beheading the long list of names.

The women were supposed to be sent to the brothels. Zhu Yuanzhang, remembering the methods those bastards in the heavens used to collude with the West, broke with precedent.

"We don't want the brothels. We can't give these compradors any chance to multiply and infiltrate."

Old Zhu's imperial edict was extremely ruthless.

"All adults, regardless of gender, shall be beheaded, and minors shall be exiled to the far north, to the bitter and cold lands, never to be pardoned, and shall be deprived of their reproductive capacity."

In the imperial court, officials trembled with fear. But the common people at the bottom of society erupted in thunderous shouts of "Long live the Emperor!" After the downfall of the powerful gentry of Jiangnan, the land that had been seized and the miscellaneous taxes that had been waived were returned to the hands of the farmers.

Zhu Yuanzhang, dressed in hemp clothing, stood on the city wall, watching the bloodstains on the execution ground in the distance.

He was well aware that he bore the infamy of a tyrant. In later historical records, civil officials would use the most vicious terms to portray him, calling him a bloodthirsty madman.

But he didn't care at all.

As an ambitious and aspiring Chinese monarch, his task was to clean up the ship of rotten wood, rats, and even foreign traitors who had dug holes in its hull, all for the sake of future generations.

No matter how great the cost, it cannot be greater than the sinking of China.

No matter how ruthless the methods, they can't poison the comprador hearts of those hypocrites. Thunder roared and lightning flashed, and torrential rain poured down.

The founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty used the most primitive and violent means to carve out a way out of this dead end.

These awakenings, spanning time and space, used the emperor's blade to put an end to the morbid chain of official corruption. The heavens still hang high, awaiting the next trial. The blood of the land is boiling anew in this upheaval.