It turns out that Liu Jinzhong came to Guangzhou to help Wang Fuchen and Wang Zhongxiao as internal agents. There was an appearance fee for the reverse Hongmen Banquet, and it was very high!
This appearance fee is not money, but the "right to support" the third prince Zhu of the Ming Dynasty. It is not the exclusive right to support, but the right to jointly support him.
Speaking of which, Chen Yonghua was the one who ran around, connecting various parties, and organized everything with one hand.
Although this Liu Jinzhong was from the Yongwei camp and was an old subordinate of Huang Degong, he was also the subordinate of the traitor Ma Degong who betrayed the Ming Dynasty and captured Emperor Hongguang alive to present to the Qing Dynasty for credit. He surrendered to the Qing Dynasty along with Ma Degong.
Later, Ma Degong was sent by the Qing court to fight against Zheng Chenggong and Zheng Jing in Fujian. Liu Jinzhong also followed him to Fujian, and the two gradually became the subordinates of King Geng Jimao of Jingnan.
In the Battle of Xiamen in the second year of Kangxi's reign, due to Geng Jimao's incompetent command, the Qing army still suffered major setbacks despite receiving naval support from the Dutch East India Company. Ma Degong, then the admiral of Fujian, even attacked near Xiamen Killed at sea.
After Ma Degong's death, Liu Jinzhong, with the strong support of Geng Jimao, inherited the backbone of the army left by Ma Degong, that is, the group of old people in the Yongwei camp. Later, under the care of Geng Jimao, Liu Jinzhong became the commander-in-chief of the left route of the Guangdong Navy. The soldiers, and later the general soldiers of Chaozhou Town, became the "half-city warlord" who controlled half of Chaozhou Fucheng.
After becoming the "half-city warlord" of Chaozhou Prefecture, Liu Jinzhong gained his own power, but in the final analysis, his warlord was still supported by the old Jingnan King Geng Jimao. Therefore, Liu Jinzhong has a very good relationship with Geng Jimao and Geng Jingzhong. In the Qing Dynasty's official circles, he was a general belonging to the Jingnan King system.
However, although Liu Jinzhong followed Ma Degong and Geng Jimao in the Qing Dynasty for many years, he never forgot to fight against the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty. Many of his old brothers from the Yongwei camp still remembered Looking at the Ming Dynasty - in the Ming Dynasty, they were members of the emperor's personal army and the brave guards, equivalent to the bodyguards and soldiers of the Qing Dynasty!
Therefore, after becoming Chaozhou's "half-city warlord", Liu Jinzhong began to stop being a dog slave of the Qing Dynasty and began to raise bandits and support troops.
And Chaozhou also happened to have the conditions for him to support the bandits and soldiers. Because Shang Kexi intensified his efforts to relocate along the coast, he offended a heroic man named Qiu Hui, who was a duck farmer. He was entrenched in the Dahaodu area of Chaoyang County and gradually became bigger. Later, he occupied Chenghai County, which had been abandoned due to coastal relocation, and accepted the canonization of the Yanping Palace, creating the name Chaozhou Prefecture of the Ming Dynasty.
This was a big deal. Before the collapse of Maolu Mountain and Wu Sangui's revolt, it was Qiu Hui who openly displayed the banner of the Ming Dynasty on the mainland and occupied a county seat.
However, Liu Jinzhong, the Chaozhen general who was supposed to be responsible for annihilating Qiu Hui, did not worry about the court's urgent needs and sent troops to annihilate Qiu Hui, the big bandit. Instead, he teamed up with Qiu Hui to sell private salt - Qiu Hui's "bandits" were said to number in the tens of thousands, while Liu Jinzhong only had a town hall quota of 2,000 people. When 2,000 men fight against 10,000 men, the advantage lies with Qiu. Therefore, Liu Jinzhong had to sell private salt with Qiu Hui first, and when they got the money, they could privately expand the army beyond the number of troops stipulated by the court. After the army expansion was completed, they could suppress the bandits.
Look, how well this plan to suppress bandits is done!
At that time, Shang Kexi's coastal relocation was so severe that all the local salt fields in Guangdong were destroyed. Only the Dahao area under Qiu Hui's rule still had many salt fields. However, transporting salt from other provinces is difficult by sea and land, and there are many people blocking the road to charge, so the cost is very high. If Cantonese people want to eat salt, they can only eat Dahao’s private salt.
Isn’t this money still worth earning?
Therefore, Liu Jinzhong and Qiu Hui sell private salt together, which can not only solve the problem of people in Guangdong having difficulty eating salt, but also raise funds to expand the anti-bandit force, which will facilitate big things in the future. They can also use Qiu Hui to get in touch with the Yanping Palace. , and got acquainted with the Prince of Yanping who spent money to buy a general soldier and proposed joining the army. Chen Yonghua, the helmsman of the Jiangnan branch of the Tiandihui, also joined the Tiandihui himself.
After joining the Tiandihui, Liu Jinzhong immediately discovered that the cause of resisting the Qing Dynasty and restoring the Ming Dynasty not only had hope of success, but also had great potential!
Immediately there was a lot of excitement!
In these days, in addition to "bringing goods" to make money in the name of the Qing Dynasty's navy to suppress the navy, Chen Yonghua was also actively planning an earth-shattering event - to protect Prince Zhu San from going to Jiangnan by sea, and in one fell swoop Captured the city of Nanjing and promoted Prince Zhu San to the position of Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty in Nanjing.
In this way, Zheng Jing can become Prime Minister Zheng, who can control the emperor and command the princes, and Chen Yonghua can be "Chen Kongming" who assists Prime Minister Zheng!
To complete this big plan, Zheng Jing and Chen Yonghua still lack four small, but necessary conditions.
The first is that there is no third prince Zhu - the third prince Zhu has been following Wang Zhongxiao and is not in the hands of Zheng Jing and Chen Yonghua.
The second is that there is no army that can guarantee the victory of Nanjing - in fact, Zheng Jing's army division is not weak in combat effectiveness, but its number is a bit small, and since Zheng Chenggong failed to defeat Nanjing last time, everyone has little confidence and needs to find a strong force. partners to come out of the land division.
The third is that there is no Yangtze River naval force that can move freely in the Yangtze River. The reason why Zheng Chenggong defeated Nanjing was that, in addition to Zheng Chenggong not being good at land warfare and siege, the Zheng family's navy was all navy. Not Jiang Jun.
Sailing in the sea and sailing in the Yangtze River are not the same thing. A fleet that can move freely on the sea may have to be towed by manpower in the Yangtze River!
The fourth is that the strength of the old Zheng family is a bit weak. Even if the sneak attack on Nanjing succeeds and Prince Zhu San is promoted to be Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty, it seems that there is no guarantee that he will be recognized by all anti-Qing forces.
The prerequisite for this thing of holding the emperor and commanding the princes to be successful is that the person holding the emperor is strong enough. When Cao Cao used to hold the emperor and command the princes, he had Yanzhou and had tens of thousands of troops under his command. .
Zheng Jing now only has the territory of Dayuan Island, Penghu Island, and Xiamen Island. Even Qiu Hui, who occupies the two counties of Chaoyang and Chenghai, is at most dependent on Zheng Jing and cannot be regarded as a direct descendant of Zheng Jing.
The army that truly belonged to Zheng Jing was even smaller, with less than 20,000 in total.
With an army with only this small territory, it would be difficult to convince the emperor if he held the emperor hostage.
So Chen Yonghua traveled back and forth between Fuzhou, Chaozhou, and Guangzhou (Foshan) these days, and finally reached a series of anti-Qing agreements, including the plan to "swap the third prince Zhu for internal support" participated by Wang Fuchen and Liu Jinzhong. .
It was Liu Jinzhong who helped the Wang family and his son to act as internal agents, and helped the old Wang family to cooperate with external parties to seize the capital of Guangzhou, in exchange for the Wang family's support for Liu Jinzhong's protection of Prince Zhu San when he took over Nanjing. It was a good agreement, but unexpectedly something went wrong. Wu Sangui sent The imperial envoy Wang Shirong also wanted Prince Zhu San.
This is really troublesome!
There is only one Prince Zhu. And Wu Sangui's strength is obvious. He takes his seat according to "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms". If he is not Prime Minister Cao, he is also Yuan Shao and Yuan Benchu!
And with the current strength of the Zheng family, Liu Bei would be a lonely and poor man. Why should he compete with Wu Sangui?
Guangzhou City, the former Pingnan Prince's Mansion, is now inside the Yamen of the Governor of Guangdong and Guangxi.
"Wang Shangchao, Mr. Liu, Chen Canjun, let me be fair. This Ming, or the new Ming we want to build, is completely different from the old Ming established by Zhu Hongwu. The old Ming is In the world where the Zhu family has only one surname, there are not many ministers who have made great achievements in conquering the world with Zhu Hongwu and have died happily! As for the new Ming Dynasty, it is a country where the world is a commonwealth established by the original monarchs and ministers!
The world is for the public. The world for Prince Zhu San is of course the original emperor for the public, not a powerful sage like Lord Hongwu, let alone someone else's Xiandi! Mr. Yuan is the king of all of us! Is what I said right? "
The person who is laying out facts, reasoning, and saying "Yuan Jun" is of course Huang Zongxi who knows the "Tianxia Weigong Lun" best!
Huang Zongxi is the president of the Reform Society, the dean of the Reform School, and the number one theorist under Wang Zhongxiao.
Wang Zhongxiao knew that it would be difficult to reason with Wu Sangui, Geng Jingzhong, and Zheng Jing, so he sent people to Foshan overnight to invite Huang Zongxi, Huang Zongyan, Lu Liuliang, Wan Sitong, and Wan Sida. The Reform Society's "reasoning heavenly group" composed of , Chen Gongyin, Qu Dajun, Luo Wenzao and others, together with Wang Shirong, Liu Jinzhong, Chen Yonghua, promoted the principles of "original monarch", "original minister", "feudalism" and so on.
In addition to those who reason, there are also those who play the side drum. Wang Fuchen and Wang Zhongxiao, as well as the third prince of Zhenzhu, Wang Shiyuan himself, are responsible for playing the side drum.
As soon as Huang Zongxi finished speaking, Prince Zhu himself began to beat the drum: "What Mr. Lizhou said is extremely good! I don't have the ability of my ancestors. I know nothing, I don't know how to fight, I don't know how to govern the world, and I don't know how to rule the world." What kind of emperor's mind is there? Those "Tianxia is Gong Lun" and "The Land System of the Heavenly Dynasty" were not written by me. They were all written by Shikai and the Tiandihui was also run by Shikai. I don't understand anything!"
Of course, what Prince Zhu said was what Wang Zhongxiao asked him to say.
Since Wang Zhongxiao agreed to the plan of "replacing the third prince Zhu with internal support", he would definitely let the third prince Zhu become the Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty.
As for Emperor Xian of Ming Dynasty, of course, the less he knows, the more appropriate he is. An Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty who could propose "The Theory of the World as a Public" and "The Land System of the Heavenly Dynasty" was not a good Emperor Xian!
Moreover, without the puppet of Prince Zhu, Wang Zhongxiao must personally control the Tiandi Society. At least he must firmly control the Guangdong and Guangxi parts of the Tiandi Society.
So some things must be said clearly!
Everyone's eyes turned to Wang Zhongxiao, and Wang Zhongxiao just smiled faintly: "To be honest with you, this "The World is Public" is actually modified from Mr. Lizhou's masterpiece "Mingyi Waiting for Visits". Lizhou This master's masterpiece was acquired by the Jiangning Weaving Yamen, and was sent to the sticky office in Beijing as a counter-proposal. It fell into my hands. When I saw it, I felt that it made perfect sense and hit the mark, so I took it and revised it. The name of the Third Prince Tuo Zhu spread out. Then I thought, now that we have the principle of rebellion, we need a group to realize Mr. Lizhou’s principle. I left the two masters alone and continued to use the Third Prince’s We organized a heaven and earth meeting in the name. Your Highness, Prince Ding, has really frightened you, and I really feel sorry for you."
Prince Zhu shook his head repeatedly and said with a smile: "It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter. If it weren't for the heroes from all over the world, and if Shikai and Fufu hadn't come to find me, I would still be a teacher in Shaoxing countryside living in panic all day long! Restoring the ancestral legacy is nothing. Yes, I never thought about it.
Of course, if the heroes of the world need me, the Third Prince Zhu, and the former King Ding to step out and serve as a banner, then I will have no hesitation. But to be clear, I can only serve as a flag and make a wood carving and clay sculpture. I really can't do anything else.
Just now Mr. Lizhou mentioned Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty and seemed to intentionally compare me to Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty. In fact, he looked down upon me. I have neither the ability nor the ambition of Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty. If I become Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty and promise not to be troublesome or cause trouble, then whatever the heroes who support the Ming Dynasty think I should do, I have no opinion at all. I am just a vain king, a king who is extremely vain! "
After hearing this statement, Wang Shirong, Chen Yonghua, and Liu Jinzhong were all a little happy. This third prince Zhu is really a talent, and he is the most suitable person to be Emperor Xian of the Ming Dynasty!
As a puppet, if you really have any ambitions and a little bit of ability, you are not qualified.
Wang Shirong couldn't let go of such a rare talent, and the only one in the world. He immediately persuaded with a smile: "Your Highness Prince Ding, if you think so, it is of course a blessing to the world and a blessing to all the people. Now they are rebelling against the Qing Dynasty. The great cause is at a critical moment. His Highness the King of the West already owns the land of eight provinces, has hundreds of thousands of troops in his armor, and has repeatedly defeated the Tartars. He is about to gain a tangible victory in Guanzhong. Why don't you go north with me now, and wait until we arrive in Hanzhong? By the time, maybe Xi'an has been captured, and you will be enthroned in Xi'an."
"Where is it better to go to Xi'an than to Nanjing?" Liu Jinzhong immediately grabbed the topic and said, "Nanjing is the capital of Longxing in the Ming Dynasty, so it is only natural that the third prince goes to Nanjing to become the emperor!
Secondly, the King of the West and Kangxi faced off at Guanlong. The terrain of Guanlong was there. This battle was not easy to fight. Like Zhuge Kongming, he might have to go out one, two, and three out of Qishan! If the third prince could suddenly break into Nanjing at this moment, would Kangxi still be able to take care of Xi'an? He wants to retreat from Xi'an. Doesn't the land of Guanlong belong to the King of the West?
Third, of course they are going to block Li Zicheng's way! Li Zicheng has now occupied most of Wuchang, all of Yuezhou, all of Hanyang and part of Huangzhou. If no one can go to Nanjing to pick peaches before him, once Nanjing falls into the hands of Li Zicheng, it is hard to say who will belong to the world. . "
"Mr. Wang, let me add one more thing," Chen Yonghua waited for Liu Jinzhong to finish and then took up the topic with a smile, "If the third prince goes to Xi'an, it will be inconvenient for the King of the West to become emperor in the future!"
Wang Shirong frowned: "Chen Canjun, what are you talking about? Did the King of the West raise the banner of anti-Qing in order to become the emperor?"
"Haha," Wang Fuchen smiled, "There is nothing wrong with the King of the West wanting to be the emperor. The King of the West was the prince before the rebellion. If the rebellion succeeds, he will still be the prince. Isn't this rebellion in vain? So I fully support the King of the West becoming the emperor. Yes! I have already asked someone to persuade me to enter the table. You can take it with you when you go back."
When Wang Shirong heard this, he didn't know what to say.
He couldn't say that Wu Sangui didn't want to be the emperor and asked Wang Fuchen not to persuade him to join, right?
But if he didn't say that, it would be equivalent to acknowledging that Wu Sangui wanted to be the emperor. Since Wu Sangui wants to be the emperor, why did he invite Prince Zhu to go to Xi'an? To usurp the throne for regicide?
Seeing that Wang Shirong was silent, Prince Zhu smiled and said: "If the King of the West can complete the great cause of expelling the Tartars, he should be the emperor and rule the world. I have no dissatisfaction."
Chen Yonghua also said: "Since the King of the West wants to be the emperor, why bother to establish a Xiao Ming King? Why not let the third prince go north with us to steal Nanjing. If he succeeds, Kangxi will not dare to stay in Guanlong anymore. The king’s situation in the northwest has been completely opened up.”
Wang Shirong looked at Wang Fuchen: "Wang Zhijun, you just said you wanted to persuade the King of the West, so do you still support the third prince to become the emperor?"
"Support it!" Wang Fuchen nodded seriously, "As long as it is conducive to driving out the Tartars and restoring the great cause of China, I will support it! As for who the world belongs to after the Tartars are expelled, that is another matter."
"Then you are one servant and two masters, aren't you?" Wang Shirong frowned.
"Why are they two masters?" Wang Fuchen said, "I didn't say that I would fight against the Qing Dynasty immediately, right? The Ming, Qing, and Xiwang families are all my masters. I, Wang Fuchen, don't have any ambitions to keep this little territory in Guangdong and Guangxi. , I will be satisfied if I pass it on to my four sons in the future.”
"Passed to four sons?" Wang Shirong was stunned and muttered, "Isn't that the same as Yuan Benchu?"
"It's different, it's different." Wang Fuchen said with a smile, "Yuan Shao's ambition is for the world, but I only want to leave four vassal towns for his descendants. Tiannan and Nanyang are places with high mountains and far away from the emperor. If we want to manage them well, we can only set up vassal towns. It’s enough for my family to serve as a vassal town!”
What Wang Fuchen said now was actually discussed with the staff and think tanks such as Wang Zhongxiao, Yao Qisheng, Zhou Chang, and Huang Zongxi.
Now is not the time to be cocky, you have to be low-key even if you have strength!
Moreover, the Wang family is not after Zhu Ming, nor is it King Pingxi who has always been "rebellious". Even if it is high-profile, not many people will respond. It is better to seriously control Guangdong and Guangxi, run the business well, and then go to Annan and Nanyang to reap the benefits if possible.
At the same time, let’s look at the changes in the world from a distance. If it is really determined by destiny, then take a chance. If that doesn't work, then you can settle for the next best thing, a vassal town or even a vassal state in Tiannan and Nanyang.
Hearing Wang Fuchen's statement, Wang Shirong also fell into deep thought, and seemed to be weighing the pros and cons as to whether he should continue to ask for Prince Zhu San?
At this moment, Wang Zhongxiao took up the topic of his father again and continued: "Senior Wang, do you think this is okay? The third prince will leave with Mr. Liu! But I won't let you run away in vain. I can Send 3,500 flintlock muskets, 12 red cannons, eight twenty-pound mortars, and one hundred thousand taels of silver to Huguang, all to Shisun (Wu Shifan) to help him shock China, you What do you think?"
(End of chapter)
