The situation faced by the Ming Dynasty today is quite complicated.
The Tatars in the north have captured Beiping City, and Wu Sangui has surrendered after two consecutive defeats.
After Li Zicheng in the west had a big fight with the Manchu Qing Dynasty with real swords and guns, he completely retreated to Xi'an and could not achieve anything.
Zuo Liangyu, who was entrenched in Henan, was still there, but he was a warlord in the late Ming Dynasty. Letting him kill good people for credit and escape to save his life was a first-class skill. Letting him deal with the iron heel of the Manchu Qing Dynasty was undoubtedly a fool's dream.
Zhu Yuanzhang saw clearly that everything north of the Yangtze River would basically fall into the hands of the Manchus in as little as one year or as long as three years.
In the south of the Yangtze River, Zhang Xianzhong seized Sichuan and Zheng Zhilong occupied the coast of Fujian. They should not be underestimated. Of course, the largest power south of the Yangtze River was the Nanming regime of Emperor Chongzhen.
Although Zhu Yuanzhang never showed up to see Emperor Chongzhen, he personally trained the 100,000 troops who protected Emperor Chongzhen's march south.
If Zhu Yuanzhang really left at the end of the Ming Dynasty, this army in the hands of Emperor Chongzhen might really be quickly corrupted by the money of the gentry and wealthy families, but it is a pity that Zhu Yuanzhang came back just a few days after leaving.
The generals of this army, including the middle and lower-level Baihu and Xiaoqiguaner, were basically all members of the Qingshan Hall gang two years ago, and the former direct leader of these gangs was Wu Baihao who was brought over by Zhu Yuanzhang from the early Ming Dynasty. State old pawn.
So in fact, the most elite army of 100,000 in Nanming is still controlled by Zhu Yuanzhang. Even for more than a year, he used this as a fulcrum and used some means to control two more soldiers and horses.
It can be said that in Nanjing today, nearly 90% of the army is loyal to Zhu Yuanzhang.
If you add in Yan Jiu, who is being used by Emperor Chongzhen and has now become the commander of the Jinyi Guards, the entire city of Nanjing is basically under Zhu Yuanzhang's control.
If he wanted to replace Emperor Chongzhen and become emperor himself, or become the general marshal of the world as before, it would be easy.
But Zhu Yuanzhang no longer wanted to do that.
Today's Ming Dynasty is wrapped in a big net, and it is so oppressed that it is difficult to breathe. And whether it is Emperor Chongzhen, the civil and military officials of the Manchu Dynasty, or the nobles and royal family, they are actually in this big net. They themselves are A part of the Ming Dynasty that was so pressurized that it was breathless.
Zhang Juzheng once wanted to tear apart this net, but unfortunately he was also in this net, so he only opened a small hole in this net and was unable to continue.
If you want to completely tear off this net, you can't just use force from the inside. You also need to borrow external force.
This is the reason why Zhu Yuanzhang did not re-enter the court. He has jumped out of this net. What he has to do now is not to go back, but to accumulate strength and complete the career that Zhang Juzheng just started.
"Follow me!" Zhu Yuanzhang took one last look at the bustling city of Nanjing, waved his hand, and led Xu Da and the others into a guest room inside.
This place was transformed into a large conference room by Zhu Yuanzhang.
In the middle of the conference room is a map that is larger than a person. It has countless dotted and solid lines outlined with various lines, as well as more than thirty red dots, large and small.
Xu Da, Li Wenzhong and Mu Ying, who have been fighting for their whole lives, are no strangers to maps.
After just a few glances, I realized that this should be a map of the area actually controlled by Nanming today.
"Do you see the red dots on it?" Zhu Yuanzhang asked.
Xu Da and the other three nodded.
A smile appeared on Zhu Yuanzhang's face: "These are all the rebels who are rebelling within the Ming Dynasty today, and 80% of these people are our own people."
"This...!" Xu Da and the three of them looked at each other in shock. Although they all knew that their lord always liked to play tricks, he was actually organizing people to rebel against the Ming Dynasty. This was really a long time ago.
Zhu Yuanzhang ignored the strange expressions on the faces of the three people and continued: "The total number of these people is almost 100,000. However, it is difficult to control the number of people. Some forces are already showing signs of breaking away from us, so now We need a capable person to integrate these people.”
As Zhu Yuanzhang spoke, he turned to look at Xu Da, Li Wenzhong and Mu Ying, and said without any hesitation: "Leave this matter to Xu Da. I'll give you half a year. I want these people to truly unite as one. Where do we point? How about where they hit?"
"I will definitely live up to my mission!" Xu Da nodded calmly.
The rebel army that had just risen seemed to Xu Da to be easy to organize. He had also been doing this kind of thing for twenty years, so he was very good at it.
"very good!"
Zhu Yuanzhang nodded with satisfaction, then looked at Li Wenzhong and said: "Wenzhong, I need you to join the court as a general. You don't have to worry about your origins. Your mission is to control the court's army. When Xu Da has organized the rebel army, start When the city is captured, you lead the troops to put down the rebellion."
"Of course, this is just your official mission. What you really have to do is cooperate with Xu Da to carry out house confiscation and liquidation of some big clans that I have highlighted."
"You should cooperate inside and outside. Even those big families with more than a thousand clansmen and tens of thousands of slaves will be wiped out in an instant."
"I have a list here. You can take a look at it. When the time comes, we will come one by one and not let any of the nobles go."
Xu Da and Li Wenzhong took a look at the list and couldn't help but grin. It was filled with names. There were probably eighty families if not a hundred. Xu Da even saw the royal family surnamed Zhu on it.
"This is to wipe out all the noble clans south of the Yangtze River!" Li Wenzhong couldn't help but sigh.
"Your Majesty, will the royal family stay still this time?" Xu Da asked cautiously.
"Since we are extracting the poison, how can we leave a piece of it unextracted?"
"Just do it. We have already said that the royal family named Zhu in this plane has nothing to do with us."
Looking at Zhu Yuanzhang's cold face, Xu Da, Li Wenzhong and others couldn't help but feel chilled in their hearts and did not dare to persuade him again.
They saw Zhu Yuanzhang's determination. It was obvious that this time Zhu Yuanzhang was determined to start a bloody storm south of the Yangtze River while the Tatars did not have the energy to go south.
"I know that there are actually people in these big families who are loyal to the emperor and patriotic, but there is no way. In the current corrupt situation, without thunderous means, it is a fool's dream to consolidate the south of the Yangtze River in three to five years, or even counterattack the north of the Yangtze River."
"It just so happens that the country has suffered from the people for more than two hundred years, and this time it can only suffer from these noble families."
Zhu Yuanzhang sighed and spoke as if he was explaining or talking to himself.
"Your Majesty is merciful!" Xu Da and the others were silent for a moment, and finally they all knelt down on one knee and saluted Zhu Yuanzhang.
The three of them were also ordinary people twenty years ago. They were also very poor and were about to starve to death. If Zhu Yuanzhang hadn't led them to fight their way out of the mountain of corpses and the sea of blood, they might have died long ago.
They had almost forgotten these things, but now suddenly, they remembered them again.
