Facts will not change due to personal will, and human initiative is limited after all.
Just as Su Yonglin could not rely on his own subjective initiative to completely change the Ming army, let alone Chen Kangbo and others who tried to reverse the truth of the Ming Dynasty by relying on their own personal will.
It's pure fantasy.
Maybe they themselves realized that something was wrong. During the rest of the trip, they didn't even mention where to go to see or gather some information. They just kept their heads down and moved forward, a bit like an ostrich after being frightened.
However, Lu You still maintained a strong interest and tried to observe the real folk life of the Ming Dynasty in depth, but was unable to do so because of the opposition of Chen Kangbo and Yu Yunwen.
"Our duty is to go to Zhongdu to meet the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty. There is nothing else to do! We only need to go to Zhongdu to complete our mission. We can wait until we get to Zhongdu to do other things. No need to say more!"
Chen Kangbo severely reprimanded Lu You, making Lu You unable to do anything. He wanted to see the grassroots conditions of the Ming Dynasty along the way but was not allowed, and he felt quite depressed.
In early September of the fourth year of Hongwu, the Southern Song Dynasty envoys arrived in Zhongdu. A few days before that, Su Yonglin returned to Zhongdu from Kaifeng and made some preparations to welcome the Southern Song Dynasty envoys.
Although they had essentially broken with the Southern Song Dynasty and made no secret of their strategy to destroy the Song Dynasty, allowing "Hongwu Political Treatise" to be widely circulated in the Southern Song Dynasty, the Southern Song Dynasty was still nominally a vassal state of the Ming Dynasty and the largest vassal state of the Ming Dynasty. I still have to do some work to save my face. .
Su Yonglin learned a lot about the dissemination of "Hongwu Political Treatise" in the Southern Song Dynasty through the intelligence compiled by the Skynet Army in the Southern Song Dynasty and sent to Zhongdu. He even learned about the man who publicly read the "Hongwu Political Treatise" in Lin'an City and publicly denounced the Southern Song Dynasty system. The matter of the son of an official.
Did he do this out of disappointment with reality and disgust with the imperial examination system, or did he sincerely agree and support his ideas through reading books?
Su Yonglin was not sure.
But he felt something in his heart when he learned that the son of an official did not beg for mercy before he died, but instead laughed.
No one knows what this man is thinking, but his free and easy attitude really has the flavor of a martyr.
Su Yonglin sighed deeply.
On the first day of September, Chen Kangbo led the Southern Song Dynasty envoys to the garrison station in the south of Zhongdu City.
This is the place where troops were stationed when Su Yonglin led his troops to attack Zhongdu. Now it is an important post station that many local officials must pass before arriving in Zhongdu. It is very large, with more than a hundred staff, and is large enough to accommodate six to seven hundred people. People live in it.
Twenty miles to the north from the garrison pavilion is Zhongdu City, the capital of the Ming Dynasty.
The Southern Song Dynasty envoys rested for a day at Garrison Pavilion. On the morning of September 2nd, they set off for Zhongdu City. On the afternoon of September 2nd, they hurriedly arrived outside Zhongdu City at sunset, completing half of the mission. journey.
Looking at Zhongdu City, the members of the Southern Song Dynasty envoys were all shocked.
There is no other reason than that Zhongdu City is too tall and majestic.
As the original capital of the Jin Kingdom, Wan Yanliang actually prepared to move the capital south to Kaifeng before he had time to carry out major construction projects in Zhongdu City. After Su Yonglin captured Zhongdu City, he officially carried out a series of expansions and renovations, turning Zhongdu City into The most powerful city of Ming Dynasty.
The reason for doing this is simple.
One is to enhance the military attributes of Zhongdu City, making Zhongdu City a major military town in North China and a barrier to guard the Central Plains. It will also become a springboard for controlling Liaodong and the Great Wall. It will not only serve as the capital, but also exist as a major military town.
The second is to show the momentum of the Ming Empire. As the capital, if it is not tall and majestic, it is not enough to reflect the strong national power and prosperity of the Ming Empire. This is a symbol, similar to how a person dresses himself when going to a formal occasion to participate in a social event. .
Although this is definitely not the case in normal times, you must dress formally at critical moments to show your dignity and dignity as a social person.
Compared with the Zhongdu City more than five years ago, the current Zhongdu City has completely changed. Su Yonglin almost rebuilt the outer city wall of Zhongdu City, which is nearly three times larger than the original Zhongdu City.
Not to mention, the outer city wall of Zhongdu has not yet been completed and will continue to be expanded in the future, making Zhongdu a truly giant city.
According to the census report in March of the fourth year of Hongwu, the permanent population of Zhongdu City has exceeded 800,000. Counting the daily floating population, the number has exceeded one million every minute.
Urban residents, non-local business population and handicraft population revitalize the entire city. As a transportation hub connecting the Central Plains and connecting Liaodong and the prairie, Zhongdu City has prosperity and prosperity that no other city has.
Against this background of counter-urbanization, the population of Zhongdu City has increased instead of decreasing, business has become increasingly prosperous, and the North China economic system with Zhongdu City as the core is taking shape.
This is enough to reflect the vitality of Zhongdu City under Su Yonglin's management.
Such a huge population certainly requires a huge city to accommodate it.
For now, Lin'an City in the Southern Song Dynasty is actually no worse than Zhongdu City in terms of population size, and is even more populous than Zhongdu City. The business is also quite prosperous, but no matter what angle you look at, the entire city is only You can see the beauty of prosperity.
What can be seen in Zhongdu City is not only the beauty of prosperity, but also the beauty of solemnity and majesty.
Yu Yunwen had some military thinking and vision, and he soon developed an extremely disloyal sense of déjà vu in his heart.
Zhongdu City not only gives people a sense of prosperity, but also gives people a sense of solemnity, majesty, and inviolability. If you feel a little disrespectful, you will be severely punished, thus consciously making outsiders shrink back and abide by the law. Dare to mess around.
Lin'an City in the Southern Song Dynasty gives people the impression that it is more prosperous than solemn. It gives people the feeling that this prosperity can also belong to me. People want to take action after seeing it, and the chance of success is very high. Once successful, Just make a lot of money.
This strange sense of déjà vu made Yu Yunwen very uncomfortable.
He didn't know what Chen Kangbo and Lu You thought of it, but he felt very uncomfortable anyway.
Chen Kangbo and Lu You didn't say anything, nor did the entire Southern Song Dynasty envoy. Perhaps they were ashamed of themselves, or perhaps they couldn't bear it. They lowered their heads and followed Wang Qi and walked forward honestly.
Outside Zhongdu City, Chen Guangyuan, minister of Honglu Temple in the Ming Dynasty, and officials from Honglu Temple were waiting. After meeting Chen Kangbo and others, they exchanged greetings for a while and then brought them into Zhongdu City through the Chengxuan Gate due south of Zhongdu City.
When they entered the city, some ordinary people and businessmen were being inspected by the city gate guards and entering the Zhongdu City in an orderly manner.
As diplomatic envoys of the Southern Song Dynasty, they could be inspected through special passages and pass quickly. When inspecting the belongings they carried with them, Lu You had been observing a series of procedures for normal Ming people to enter the Zhongdu City.
He found that the procedure for these people to enter Zhongdu City was very simple.
If you are just an ordinary person, you will hand a piece of paper to the city gate guard. The city gate guard will look at the paper, make a few notes, and then return the paper to the person. The person can then tidy up and enter Zhongdu City.
If it is a business trip or a horse-drawn carriage or an ox-cart, you need to get off the vehicle and undergo inspection. If you come with goods, you must also undergo inspection to ensure that there is no problem with the goods and that they are not prohibited. You must also hand a piece of paper to the city gate guard. Record, and then you can pack up and enter Zhongdu City.
The city gate is very large and very high, and there are also many people entering Zhongdu City. Therefore, more than twenty inspection channels are set up at the city gate to ensure that people can enter Zhongdu City at a faster speed.
What surprised Lu You was that he didn't see anyone handing money to the city gate guards. It seemed that there was no such link and the piece of paper was obviously not property, otherwise it would not have been returned.
Lu You watched the envoy's inspection for a while. Chen Kangbo and Yu Yunwen were both staring at the gifts brought by the envoy to Su Yonglin, and then quietly approached Wang Qi, who was taken over by Chen Guangyuan.
"Master Wang, don't the people of the Ming Dynasty need to pay the city gate tax when entering Zhongdu City?"
