Chapter 46 Too Thrilling
Li Shanchang’s body trembled slightly.
The next moment, this immensely powerful Duke of Han, whose word was law in the Central Capital and who wielded authority akin to the heavens, sank to his knees before Zhu Yuanzhang in full view of the assembled crowd.
This carried a vastly different significance from kneeling to welcome the Emperor upon his arrival.
That had been mere protocol, but this was a humiliating admission of guilt.
Following Li Shanchang’s lead, his numerous accompanying nephews, relatives, and officials of the Central Capital dropped to their knees in a cascading wave.
The laborers present had previously been ordered to stand by Zhu Yuanzhang.
Now, they remained standing while Li Shanchang and his retinue knelt face-to-face with them.
Zhu Yuanzhang turned around to face Li Shanchang and the others.
It appeared as though he stood shoulder to shoulder with the laborers, jointly receiving the kowtows of those lofty elites led by Li Shanchang, who ordinarily never deigned to look upon the common people.
Ding Bin’s heart beat wildly. He truly had not expected the Emperor to pull such a maneuver!
Yet, despite his fluttering heart, he did not feel despair.
He believed his uncle could weather this storm.
His uncle’s contributions were too immense, his status too exalted!
Even Zhu Yuanzhang would not dare to move against him lightly!
Besides, his uncle had done nothing fundamentally wrong.
It was nothing more than accidentally capturing the Emperor's own sons.
If his uncle knelt publicly before the Emperor now, the Emperor would retain his dignity and save face, and the matter could be swept aside.
The Emperor would surely not press the issue further!
"Your Majesty, this humble subject is guilty of a capital crime. I truly had no idea that Your Three Highnesses had arrived here.
Had I known, I would have spared nothing to serve you properly!"
Li Shanchang’s voice was fraught with trembling panic.
"Old Li, I believe you when you say that!
Had you known their identities, you certainly would have pampered them to the utmost.
To be honest, I never expected that when I had my three sons disguise themselves as immigrants and secretly come to our ancestral home to live as commoners for two months and experience the hardships of farming,
they would be seized and pressed into corvée labor in the Central Capital the moment they stepped off the boat."
"Your Majesty, this subject was wrong, I..."
"No, you were not wrong!"
Before Li Shanchang could finish, Zhu Yuanzhang interrupted him.
These words caused a surge of covert relief in the hearts of many.
Was the matter to be brushed aside just like that?
The Emperor made a valid point. While the incident was absurd enough, upon closer examination, it was indeed purely a misunderstanding.
A flood had breached the Temple of the Dragon King.
Who could have possibly anticipated that the three imperial princes, whom the Emperor had publicly announced were confined to the Rear Lake for quiet study, would be secretly dispatched here to disguise themselves as immigrants and experience life?
However, Zhu Yuanzhang’s next words dashed cold water over their hopes.
"You did a fine job having people seize them here, Old Li!
Had you not captured my sons and brought them to the Central Capital to endure such treatment, I would never have known how you Old Li went about building this Central Capital!
You treated my previous instructions as mere flatulence!
Is this how you build the Central Capital?
You are treating human lives as mere blades of grass!"
"Your Majesty, this subject was wrong. I was only thinking of getting the Central Capital completed sooner. I will surely reform..."
***
Li Shanchang was exceedingly yielding at this moment, acknowledging every fault in whatever Zhu Yuanzhang said.
On one hand, the maneuver Zhu Yuanzhang had executed was simply too lethal, striking straight at their vital weakness. With the three imperial princes standing right there, any defense appeared pale and feeble.
On the other hand, he knew the Supreme Ruler’s temper well—he was stubborn and could only be stroked in the direction of his fur.
In a situation like this, the more one defended oneself, the more enraged the Emperor would become.
Therefore, it was best to follow his lead, quickly turning a major crisis into a minor one and a minor one into nothing at all,
fudging the matter past.
Zhu Yuanzhang glanced at Li Shanchang, forcibly suppressing the impulse to strike him dead on the spot.
For he knew that what he had seen thus far was merely the tip of the iceberg, and far deeper sins had yet to be exposed.
"It is far too early to ask for forgiveness now! Take a good look at just how many sins you have all committed!!!"
With that, Zhu Yuanzhang paid no further heed to the kneeling Li Shanchang and strode directly toward the city gates.
Li Shanchang scrambled up from the ground, following the Emperor out of the city in silence.
His heart grew increasingly heavy.
He had thought that by kneeling publicly to beg for forgiveness and swallowing such a massive loss of face, the Emperor would descend the steps provided for him,
and the matter would end here.
Yet who could have foreseen that Zhu Yuanzhang would refuse to let go!
That he would insist on digging deeper!
Clearly, he had no intention of sparing any face for him!
"Uncle Miao, do not kneel, do not kneel! Hurry up and eat."
"That's right, eat quickly, I know you've been starving for a long time."
"All of you, dig in."
Zhu Shuang, Zhu Gang, and Zhu Di, the three brothers, stuffed meat-stuffed flatbreads into their mouths while pulling the hesitant Old Miao back up.
They urged everyone to eat without standing on ceremony.
How could Old Miao possibly bring himself to eat?
His mind was completely blank, as if he were dreaming.
The three Wu brothers who had been laboring under his command turned out to be the Emperor's own sons!
The crucial point was that he had even been preaching the Teachings of the Ming Cult to them, attempting to rope them into a rebellion.
This... this affair was too thrilling, too surreal!
The mere thought of it struck him as absurd, turning his legs to jelly.
How could he possibly have the appetite to consume this meat-filled pastry?
"Wu... Your Highnesses, this lowly man is guilty. I should not have spoken to you of the Ming Cult..."
"Uncle Miao, think nothing of it, set your mind at ease.
This is no fault of yours, nor of the numerous laborers here in the Central Capital.
It is those dogs who fail to treat human beings as people!
When life itself becomes impossible to sustain, rebellion is only natural!
Uncle Miao, to say nothing of you lot, even I want to rebel!"
Zhu Di shook his head, reassuring Old Miao to put his mind at rest.
"Uncle Miao, the official post I mentioned earlier still stands. Are you willing to follow me back to Yingtian? I will find a position for you in the Prince's Mansion."
King of Jin, Zhu Gang, was the most flamboyant of them all. While eating his pastry, he did not forget to tidy his hair,
mindful of his image.
Having changed into his dragon-embroidered robe, and with his imperial father, eldest brother, and others personally authenticating his identity, speaking these words now filled him with immense satisfaction.
***
"Right, and I will give you plenty of money too!"
Zhu Shuang chimed in from the side.
The surrounding laborers cast looks of intense envy toward Old Miao.
They cursed themselves for not having treated the three brothers as kindly as Old Miao had over the past few days.
Otherwise, they undoubtedly could have soared to prosperity just like Old Miao!
This was unequivocally the closest they had ever come in their lives to defying the heavens and changing their destiny.
To have missed it so rawly meant that whenever they woke up in the middle of the night hereafter, they would want to slap themselves a few times!
Old Miao was utterly dazed by this massive stroke of good fortune.
He had merely acted on impulse to help them because he could not bear to watch them die violent deaths, yet it had brought him such boundless wealth?
Surprises in life truly lurked everywhere.
While feeling dizzy as if treading upon the clouds, he could not help but think of Shen Jing, the great-grandson of Shen Wansan.
If that young man learned the true identities of these three brothers, he would likely be even more shocked than himself, wouldn't he?
He might actually manage to lodge an imperial complaint!
"Let's go, Uncle Miao, let's go see how Father resolves this matter!
Father will surely deliver justice to everyone here!"
Zhu Di, who had devoured two flatbreads in the blink of an eye, called out to Old Miao as he beckoned him along...
***
Shen Jing felt as though he were dying.
An endless wave of cold and hunger swept over him. Even though he had put on a dead man's garment over his own clothes, he was still freezing.
They had been locked in this place for three days.
Not a single person had delivered food here over these three days.
They had eaten sparingly to begin with, and with such grueling labor day and night on a daily ration of merely four bran-cake buns, their bodies were completely hollowed out by hunger.
Under such conditions, one could well imagine what it felt like to starve for another three days.
He swallowed hard, forcing himself to turn his head away so as not to look at the people not far away who were gnawing on food.
He feared he would succumb to temptation and join them.
He was a human being, not a beast; even driven to the brink of starvation, he could not do what beasts did!
The prospect of starving to death already terrified him, but the mere thought that if he starved to death, he too might become food in the mouths of these people
filled him with an even deeper terror that made his hair stand on end!
Some noises echoed from outside, as if someone had arrived.
Crouched in the corner, clutching a blood-stained wooden stick,
Shen Jing did not even raise his head.
By this point, he no longer harbored any expectation that anything good would ever befall him.
A moment later, the door sealed from the outside was smashed open, and a swarm of armored and armed soldiers flooded in.
Following them, Zhu Yuanzhang strode in, clad in his imperial robes.
His gaze swept across the room, and his body came to an abrupt halt.
His eyes instantly turned bloodred!
The murderous intent that he had always kept deeply suppressed within his heart could no longer be held back.
It erupted outward, flooding the space in its entirety!