Chapter 118 Marshal Li had good intentions, but the surrendered soldiers did something bad
December 3rd, Beijing City Military Headquarters.

A dozen servants from the Ministry of War hurriedly delivered the reports from the garrisons of various passes and cities in Liaozhen and Jizhen to the officials in the hall. The officials and managers of the four departments were also very anxious, running back and forth in the hall and their own public housing. This time, the momentum of the Liao soldiers' rioting for pay far exceeded the expectations of the officials of the Ministry of War.

"The Liao army captured Jinzhou and Ningyuan City, and Governor Yuan fled to Shanhaiguan."

"Wang Jinglie said that the Guancheng can't be defended, and we need to transfer Qin soldiers here as soon as possible, otherwise we won't be able to protect the capital."

"Damn Wu Chunfu, he licked Cui Chengxiu's asshole and climbed up to become an official in the Ministry of Works, leaving us to clean up the mess he left behind. After this matter is resolved, I will file a petition to accuse him even if it means I lose my official hat."

The officials in the Ministry of War were furious. Wu Chunfu, a key figure in the eunuch party, had established a relationship with Cui Chengxiu, another member of the eunuch party. After the recovery of Liaoyang, he embezzled more than one million taels of Liao salary. Only two or three tenths of it was used for the construction of the three main halls, and the rest was distributed by Cui and Wu to the eunuch party officials.

Of course, the eunuchs in the palace's Silijian and Yushangguan also received some silver, but they only received the standard silver as tributes from various officials.

The new Minister of War, Feng Jia, appeared in front of the Ministry of War. The clever servants gathered around him and reported the news from various places to the officials, but were dismissed one by one by the Minister.

"Why are you still talking about such trivial matters at this time? If the two assistant ministers and the officials of the Ministry of Personnel come over and delay the mobilization of troops, no one will be able to save their heads."

This Shangshu was sixty years old. Last year he was still the governor of the military affairs of Xuanda. This year he was promoted from the assistant minister of the Ministry of War to the Shangshu. He thought that this was the beginning of his career, but it turned out to be bad luck.

It is as easy for Marshal Li to chop up the Tartars as to chop up winter melons. Which camp of soldiers inside the pass can deal with him?
The Minister of War sat down on the main seat in the hall and poured the tea brought by the servants into his mouth. He had just been arguing with the eunuch party leaders in the Wenhua Hall of the palace for a long time and his throat was almost smoking.

Although in the Ming Dynasty officialdom, he was also regarded as a member of the eunuch party.

In addition to the few people he summoned, there were also officials from other departments who came to listen to the situation in the palace. Feng Jia would press them lightly a few times to ask them to sit down quickly and prepare for the meeting.

The Langzhong of the Military Affairs Department at that time happened to be Tian Ji, one of the Five Tigers of the Eunuch Party. The old minister Feng Jiahui was furious when he saw him.

"Eunuch Tian, ​​why don't you recognize Duke Wei as your godfather like Wu Chunfu did, so that you can ask our Ministry of War for some money to appease the Liao soldiers?"

At the critical moment, Feng Jiahui no longer cared about etiquette and directly used the word "father-in-law" to satirize Tian Ji.

"If I could lick Cui Chengxiu's asshole like him, I wouldn't still be a palace official in the Ministry of War."

Although Tian Ji, who was in his early forties, was bothered by his father-in-law's derogatory name, he tried hard to pretend that he didn't care.

The Military Affairs Department was in charge of the deployment of troops from various places. He pointed at the map hung in the middle of the hall by the servants and began to arrange for the mobilization of troops from the remaining seven border garrisons to protect the king.

"If the three garrisons of Xuanda send 40,000 troops, and the four garrisons of Yansui, Ningxia, Gansu, and Guyuan send 60,000 troops, plus the 50,000 troops of Shandong and 70,000 troops of Beijing, we can defend the Great Wall."

As an official of the eunuch party, his strength was to please Duke Wei, but he actually knew nothing about military affairs.

Seeing that he pretended to know something when he didn't, Feng Jiahui became even angrier. He stood up, took a big gulp of tea, walked up to Tian Ji who was talking nonsense, and sprayed him in the face.

Tian Ji was stunned. He couldn't understand why a sixty-year-old Shangshu didn't do his job and started to scold him.

"Even if I am incompetent and talentless, you cannot humiliate me like this!"

The Langzhong of the Zhifang Division was rarely angry. It was bad enough that he couldn't please Wu Chunfu, but why was it that even a mere Minister of War was openly trying to mess with him?

Could it be that if the Duke of Wei did not promote Tian Ji, his official position would really be lower than that of the Minister of War?
"Look at what you just said. The general of Gansu Town is Yang Lin, who is known to be a pushover. Gansu Town has also owed wages for many years. If you transfer the border troops over there, I'm afraid that the soldiers who haven't left Qin will also ask for wages.

I have been managing Xuanfu and Datong for two years. I know the soldiers of Xuanfu and Datong better than you. 40,000 soldiers cannot defeat 10,000 soldiers of Liaozhen. It is a waste of food to transfer them here. You send the soldiers of Beijing Camp to Jizhen to guard the Great Wall. What can the emperor and the people of the capital rely on?"

Feng Jiahui's saliva continued to spray on Tian Ji's face.

The latter's facial features were distorted, his face turned redder and redder, he gritted his teeth and said, "Just wait, I'm going to find Duke Wei right now, you can't keep your official hat today!"

"Go, go, go as soon as possible." Feng Jiahui stood up and scolded, "If I am still a soldier tomorrow, you can forget about hanging around in Beijing. Let me remind you, there is another Minister of War named Shang Zhouzuo in the capital, who will take over my position tomorrow."

A total of four people were given the title of Minister of War this year. In order to facilitate distinction, officials verbally referred to the Minister in charge of the Ministry of War as Benbing, and the others as Buyuan or Butang.

Tian Ji did not participate in the Ministry of War's meetings. He shook his sleeves and ran out to complain to Wei Zhongxian.

As everyone knows, Duke Wei likes to meddle in the affairs of the Ministry of War. The more Tian Ji thought about it, the more he felt that it was time to overthrow Feng Jiahui. After driving away the eunuch party leaders, Feng Jiahui immediately changed his face and began to arrange the transfer of troops from various places as if nothing had happened.

"Yansui and Guyuan will each dispatch 20,000 troops, Xuanfu and Datong will dispatch 40,000 troops, and the remaining 40,000 troops from Northern Zhili and Shandong will all be dispatched to the vicinity of the capital. The official documents sent to each town must clearly state that the soldiers of each unit should bring their own rations, as there is no extra food in the capital."

The clerks in the Ministry of War wrote down the Shangshu's order, and all the officials flattered their superiors.

"Even if Li Hao is extremely capable, with me here, the Liao soldiers will never be able to enter the capital."

"If the deployment is timely, there will be a total of 200,000 troops around the capital, with a large number of soldiers and generals, high walls and deep moats, and strict defenses. I don't think Li Hao would dare to cause trouble at the gates of Beijing."

Feng Jiahui looked helpless, now servile people were in power, and these mediocre officials didn't even have a clear idea of ​​their own plans.

"Our defense is not for Liao soldiers and Li Hao to see. They know that Beijing cannot withstand catapults." The Minister of War took a long breath, "The purpose of dispatching elite troops from various places is to let the dignitaries and hundreds of thousands of people in the capital believe that the Ministry of War is still trying to save Beijing."

He saw clearly that if the rewards and back pay offered by the court could not satisfy Marshal Li and the Liao soldiers, it would be useless no matter how many troops were dispatched.

After the officials of the Ministry of War hastily drew up a preliminary troop deployment plan, the palace sent someone to summon Feng Jiahui and the two vice ministers.

The three officials of the Ministry of War, each with their own thoughts, rushed all the way to Wenhua Hall to participate in the final court discussion on the Liaodong Rebellion.

The three-bay Wenhua Hall was crowded with forty or fifty civil officials, eunuchs and nobles. The vice ministers who usually called the shots in the six ministries could only kneel in the last row here.

The emperor, who had been bedridden for a long time, was carried by eunuchs to the front hall of Wenhua Palace. All the ministers knelt down and paid their respects, and the court meeting officially began.

The new Prime Minister Huang Liji took the lead in setting the tone.

"Marshal Li had good intentions, but it was his surrendered soldiers who were behind this, instigating the generals to come to Ningyuan City to demand their salaries."

The main culprits of the crisis in Liaodong were actually the factory owners Wei Zhongxian and Cui Chengxiu. Because they thought the situation in Liaodong could be stabilized, they withdrew part of the food and wages from outside the Great Wall and engaged in massive corruption in the name of building the three main halls.

But now all the cabinet ministers are Wei Changgong's men, and Huang Liji himself is the core of the eunuch party. He dare not let Changgong take the responsibility. He can only appease Marshal Li, and the blame naturally falls on the soldiers.

"Although the current situation is difficult, the Ministry of Revenue still..." Lai Zongdao, the cabinet minister in charge of the Ministry of Revenue, reported to the Thirteenth Office of the Ministry of Revenue on the results of the discussion, "...a total of 330,000 taels of silver and 240,000 dan of grain will be dispatched to Shanhaiguan in the next few days."

The previous court discussion was mainly focused on comfort. Asking the Ministry of War to mobilize troops was only a preparation, while the reward of silver and grain given by the Ministry of Revenue was the top priority.

"It's just over 300,000 taels, you're treating beggars like this! Marshal Li has served the country, and his soldiers have fought through life and death. If you divide up the 300,000 taels, each person won't even get 10 taels. Let's gather more, gather more!"

Wei Zhongxian, who had been given the title of Nine Thousand Years Old, jumped out to be a good person. Everyone knew that Marshal Li had a relationship with him. Now at the critical moment, he naturally had to stand up and uphold justice for his own people.

The officials had no choice but to embezzle whatever silver they could from the Ministry of War, the Ministry of Works, and the Imperial Household Department. Even the Guanglu Temple, which was in charge of food, was asked to contribute money and livestock. Only then did they scrape together 600,000 taels of silver, plus several thousand pigs.

Emperor Tianqi, coughing repeatedly, reluctantly agreed to the amount of the reward.

"Placate first, suppress second. If Li Qing does not enter the Great Wall, everything can be discussed. Zhang Ruitu, a minister from the Ministry of Rites, will go and announce the title of Marquis. All reinforcements will be led by Shang Zhouzuo. Shang Qing will be given the Imperial Sword. The reinforcements will be deployed around the capital and along the three associations of Jizhen."

Several resentful officials who were named stood out and knelt down to express their gratitude. Shang Zhouzuo, who was nearly fifty years old, caught a glimpse of the emperor's swollen appearance and while he was kowtowing, he suddenly felt that leading the reinforcements was not a good job.

The Ji-Liao Jinglüe was only in charge of the Jizhen East Association and the Liaozhen outside the pass. The Jizhen Central and Western Associations were under the jurisdiction of the Jizhen Governor. If he brought reinforcements with him, he could neither command these two senior officials nor manage the cities and passes of the three associations of Jizhen.

Not to mention how many of the nominally hundreds of thousands of reinforcements could arrive, even if they all arrived, they would be no match for the group of surrendered soldiers from Liaozhen in the wild.

As he followed the officials out of the capital, Shang Zhouzuo had already begun planning his own escape route.

His young daughter, Shang Jinghui, also followed him to the capital for the trip. No matter how the fighting on the front line went, the family had to send him back to their hometown in Shaoxing.

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(End of this chapter)