That night, Emperor Jiajing hugged Shang Meiren, who had made a fortune, and they were chattering on the dragon bed, chirping again and again.
Feng Bao touched a golden hairpin given by Shang Meiren in his arms, and couldn't close his mouth. He just mentioned it when the emperor was turning over the cards. It was snowing. Shang Meiren led the palace maids to have a snowball fight with his pet dog.
It was just a fall together.
Huang Jin arranged for his factory guards to work hard overnight to verify the Suzhou defense battle.
Luo Longwen and other members of the Strict Party were staying up late urging their clerks to write a memorial to impeach Suzhou for the false news...
The heavy snow outside is continuous and has no intention of stopping.
More than ten miles away from the capital, Liu Mu led a battalion of Zhejiang soldiers and soldiers from Suzhou Prefecture, driving a cart full of Japanese pirate heads, driving shackled Japanese prisoners, and drove through the night in the heavy wind and snow.
"Brothers, let's continue our hard work for five miles and then find a village to set up camp and rest for the night. By then, the capital will be close at hand. Let's go on our way before dawn, just in time to have breakfast in the capital."
"When we get to the capital, we will sacrifice the prisoners. We will have plenty of fish, meat, and wine, and we will let the brothers have a good rest for two days."
Liu Mu rode his horse in front of and behind the team and said loudly to everyone.
"Brother Mu, there is no need to say more. We are going to the capital to offer prisoners to your lord. Your lord has treated us with great kindness. We will go even fifty miles away, let alone five miles."
"That's right, sir, you don't have to say anything to us. There is meat and soup every time along the way. Even with the heavy snow, we are all hot and sweating. Even if we walk to the capital all night, we just need to eat."
All the Zhejiang soldiers replied loudly. Although they braved the wind and snow to travel at night, their morale was high.
In comparison, the soldiers in Suzhou Prefecture were slightly inferior.
However, before leaving, the Suzhou prefect still generously rewarded everyone, and their morale was not bad.
As for the Japanese prisoners, they were like zombies. Not to mention their morale, they even lost their energy and spirit.
They were full of evil deeds and deserved to die. If the purpose of this trip was not to sacrifice prisoners, they would not be allowed to die easily.
However, it won't make things easier for them.
To wear, in the coldest month of winter, there are no cotton clothes to wear, only ragged linen clothes, just to avoid freezing to death; to eat, there is food, but only to not starve to death; to sleep, sleeping on the floor, there is no bedding or anything like that;
There are also people who are on the road, wearing shackles, and must keep up with the schedule. If they can't keep up, they will be whipped, and no one will be lenient.
The prefect Zhu Ping'an also gave Liu Mu and others a death target, as long as the death rate of Japanese pirate prisoners was not higher than 20%.
Now, Liu Mu and the others have no pressure at all, and they are still far from reaching this target.
Braving the wind and snow, they continued on their way. For more than half an hour, Liu Mu and the others walked five or six miles and arrived outside a village.
This village is named Wulihou, because five miles further away is the capital city.
In order not to disturb the village, Liu Mu took several people into the village to meet with Li Zheng, the village elder. After learning his identity, he also bought bacon and rice noodles from the village through them, set up camp outside the village, made fire and cooked rice.
There was a stew of bacon in a pot, pancakes were put on it, rice porridge was cooked, and everyone ate it steaming hot.
As for the Japanese prisoners, they could only eat some leftovers after everyone had finished eating, so as not to starve to death.
It was already late at night, and Liu Mu followed Zhu Ping'an's instructions and arranged the night watch personnel to ensure that nothing went wrong before resting.
A night of silence.
While Liu Mu and the others were setting up camp and resting, a group of more than fifty Feiyu clothing factory guards rushed past outside the village.
"Why are there so many people outside the village? There seems to be an army stationed here." A factory guard noticed the simple camp of Liu Mu and others and said warily.
"The Governor ordered us to quickly go south to verify the war in Suzhou. This is an important matter of concern to the Holy Emperor. It is better for us not to get into trouble. We should go south day and night." The factory guard beside him reminded, "Besides, this is the capital city.
Near Ji, there are many yamen with divisions managing them. Without proper procedures, they would not be able to get here and would have been stopped and dealt with long ago."
"What Zhao Baihu said makes sense, let's go south quickly, drive..." The factory guard nodded vigorously.
A group of factory guards rushed past.
"Okay, you can rest now. The unknown team has left." The night watchers in the camp couldn't help but breathed a sigh of relief when they saw the factory guards leaving.
Along the way, their hearts were tense, lest something unexpected happen and miss the important event that Monk Zhu Ping'an maintained.
Whenever a dangerous person approaches the team, they become highly nervous and alert, just in case.
Just like this team of factory guards, they did not wear factory guard uniforms. In order to facilitate the investigation, they wore regular clothes, but they wore swords.
In the eyes of the prisoner-offering team, these were dangerous elements. Their departure made the prisoner-offering team breathe a sigh of relief.
Nothing happened all night.
The next day, before dawn, Liu Mu and the others broke camp and set off, speeding towards the capital that was just around the corner.
Similarly, before dawn, Luo Longwen and others had already gone straight to the General Affairs Office with the impeachment memorial they had planned to write.
Special instructions were given to the officials of the General Affairs Department to not reach Xiyuan until after the end of the year, creating a situation where "I only learned about the good news from Suzhou Prefecture in the morning, I felt dissatisfied, and immediately wrote a letter of impeachment." This requires a time lag.
Just when Luo Longwen came out of the General Affairs Department, a note was sent from Xiyuan, summoning the ministers on duty in the cabinet, as well as the principals and deputy officials of the Ministry of War, the Ministry of Households, the Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of Personnel, Dali Temple, the Supervisory Office and other major yamen.
There are meetings in Wuyi Hall in Xiyuan.
This is almost equivalent to a court meeting.
For the ministers in the capital, this is very difficult. Emperor Jiajing has not held court meetings for many years. He always summons one or more ministers to Xiyuan at random times and by unknown persons to meet the saint.
It is quite rare to summon so many ministers to Xiyuan to discuss matters at once like today.
In previous years, even at the end of the same year, the number of people summoned by Emperor Jiajing to Xiyuan could not be compared with today.
The chamberlain who sent the note from Xiyuan also informed the summoned ministers of the main topics of the meeting.
The theme of this meeting revolves around the major events that have occurred in the government and the public in the past few months, including the Mongolian government policies, the military pay policy in various frontiers, the snow disaster relief policy in the north, the flood relief policy in the south, and the promotion and removal of long-term officials in various border and local areas.
Adjustment policies, the Ministry of Industry's money-casting policy, the salt law policy, the royal family's food policy for the common people, and the Jiangnan Japanese policy.
The Suzhou Prefecture Victory ranked last on the agenda.
"That's good now. There's no need to go through the General Affairs Department to send the message to Xiyuan. I can just take it myself."
After getting the news, Wang Shilang, who was one of the summoned people, took the memorial back from the General Affairs Department and said excitedly.
There are several others like him.
The Strict Party occupies most of the government and opposition parties, and Strict Party members also account for more than half of the people summoned.
As for Luo Longwen and others, they were not qualified to be summoned by Emperor Jiajing. The memorial to impeach Zhu Pingan still had to be submitted to Xiyuan through the General Affairs Envoy.