Chapter 511 Liu He's Counterattack and Control
Dozens of people gathered in the Prince's Palace, all with gloomy faces and fear in their eyes.
It’s so sudden!
For many people, this was simply a catastrophe. The prince walked out angrily, looked at the silent crowd, and sneered, "We are not far from death."
He showed no fear at all, and continued, "Wait until I am deposed as a vassal king, and in two years I will be charged with a crime, and then commit suicide in prison.
My fellow ministers, those who are closest to me should be punished by law and put to death, and the close relatives of my three clans should be punished by death, and the distant relatives should be exiled.
As for the rest of you, those who deserve to be exiled will be exiled, and those who don’t deserve to be exiled will be dismissed from office, and will never be hired again in their lifetime. Even their family members will be implicated. It is really a tragic scene.
Miserable. "
Liu He spoke calmly and described vividly everything he would experience in prison. Everyone who heard it felt a chill in their hearts and fear increased greatly.
"What should I do?"
For a moment, some people were at a loss, which made Liu He annoyed. He shouted, "Why are you panicking? The worst that can happen is death.
Anyway, it's not just you and me who will die. If the emperor wants to depose me, he should be prepared for 100,000 people to be buried with me."
There was a hint of madness in Liu He's voice.
One hundred thousand people!
This is definitely not a lie. If Liu Xun were to do the same thing as he did to settle accounts with Liu Dan, absolutely 100,000 people would be implicated.
The problem is that no matter how many people there are, the powerful people present are unwilling to be implicated. Thinking of this, these people developed hatred towards the emperor.
You elevated the crown prince so highly in the beginning and assigned all of us to be his attendants, but now you are not satisfied and want to change the crown prince?
dream!
“Prince, His Majesty has not issued an edict yet, so we still have a chance. Why don’t we write a letter to His Majesty asking him to investigate those who spread the rumors?
As long as Your Majesty sees the overwhelming public opinion, he will definitely change his mind. Liu She is just a young boy. Can he bear the burden of the world on his shoulders?"
Investigate rumors strictly.
Regardless of whether this person could be caught or not, at least the tone was set: the emperor did not want to change the crown prince.
Liu He heard this and said, "You don't need to write a letter. Once this news spreads, there will be countless people in Chang'an who will be terrified.
Look.
There is no need for me to take action. Someone will object tomorrow, and my father will find out that he has done something extremely absurd."
After these people left the Prince's Palace, Liu He's face suddenly became filled with anger, but his mind was extremely clear.
Until now, he still thinks he is as stable as a rock.
Of course it was not because of the so-called overwhelming public opinion. There were only 100,000 people. Not to mention exile, even killing them was something that even he could do. He did not think that his father, the emperor, would be soft-hearted.
Since his father ascended the throne, he had carried out a series of major purges, killing and exiling countless people, and his butcher knife had never shown any mercy.
His confidence came from the fact that he felt his father was doing something ridiculous.
It can even be said to be stupid!
He never listed Liu She as a competitor for the throne, even though Liu She was also a legitimate son.
Because Liu She was too young.
Liu Xun had a total of fifteen children, but only nine lived to the age of twelve. Two of them died in infancy, one died of illness at the age of three, and three did not live past the age of six.
Even though the royal family had the best doctors, the infant mortality rate was still so high.
Liu He was not cursing Liu She. It was uncertain whether Liu She could live beyond the age of ten.
It is simply crazy to make a child who may die at any time as the crown prince.
Liu He felt that although he was far from being as wise and brave as his father, at least he would not do such a stupid thing and would not entrust the ancestral temple and the country to luck.
"My father has built a great empire, so he can't be so stupid. Is he using this incident to warn me?"
Liu He began to think about other things. "My father has always been dissatisfied with me and criticized me for being too harsh. He may be getting old and confused. It seems that I should go to the palace."
…
There has never been a shortage of political speculators in this world, but Liu She’s base is indeed too small.
His advantage was that he was the legitimate son, which made him the second in line to the throne.
The downside is that all the support from the Queen's family has been taken away by his elder brother, and he is too young. Unlike his great-grandfather Emperor Xiaowu, who has an entire Liang State team at his disposal, he can be said to have no power at all.
As the news gradually spread, many people who had not been able to get close to Liu He before wanted to get close to Liu She, but the problem was that Liu She still lived in the palace and could not get in touch with her even if they wanted to.
So those who were interested began to visit Huo Guang, the emperor's closest minister. Although his official position was not as high as the three dukes and nine ministers, he was often by the emperor's side, assisting him with confidential matters. In terms of power, he was even as powerful as the prime minister and the chief censor. He would be present every time the emperor asked questions, and the powerful people in Chang'an all tried to curry favor with him.
There was no word from the palace, and rumors among the people spread more and more widely. All kinds of rumors appeared. Until before the grand court meeting, the city of Chang'an was filled with a stagnant atmosphere as if a storm was about to come.
The court officials filed in restlessly, almost all of them with a hint of anxiety between their brows. No official liked a political storm because it represented uncertainty. Before a political storm came to an end, no one knew how long it would last and how large its scope would be.
In Ji Zhao's previous life, when the four major cases in the early Ming Dynasty just began, who could have imagined that they would become major cases involving tens of thousands of people?
Who would want a case to go on for years without a conclusion?
Who could have imagined that the emperor's order would eventually become a tool to attack political enemies, with countless officials and ordinary people who had nothing to do with the case being imprisoned and died.
Although the officials of the Han Dynasty had never seen such a one-size-fits-all killing, they had witnessed Liu Xun's purge of Guanzhong with their own eyes. Many people were wrongly accused, but under the strict and severe purge policy, a large number of officials and their three clans were exiled.
This frightened many people, who were very worried that changing the crown prince would be a new political purge.
Liu He had been the crown prince for more than ten years and had connections with too many officials. In the political storm, a small relationship was enough to convict him.
It is better to kill someone by mistake than to let him go.
There has been no exception from ancient times to the present.
This was unacceptable to many people. As Liu He had expected, even if he did not contact them, many officials were ready to write letters to oppose this matter.
Liu He has a bad reputation, but it's not that bad. A person has limited energy, so how much harm can he cause?
Even if he does bad things every day, can he still do more than a thousand things in a month?
Liu He mainly harmed those ministers who had beautiful concubines and wealth at home, while those who harmed the people and ordinary officials were his lackeys who fought in his name.
Liu He didn't care much about it. If someone went too far and affected him, he would kill them with a sword. He usually turned a blind eye to it. After all, he still needed these people to say dirty words to him.
As the court officials entered the palace, Liu He did not attend the court meeting. Instead, he went into the palace to visit his mother on time.
Queen Xu did not expect that the prince would come to visit her. Thinking of what Liu Xun had done and then recalling the choices she had made, she couldn't help feeling a little guilty for a moment and even dared not face Liu He.
Although Liu He was a jerk outside, he was still quite filial to Empress Xu. After paying respects, he smiled and said, "Mother, I haven't come to the palace to visit you for a while. I am unfilial. This is something I bought from a merchant in the Western Regions. It is rare in the Central Plains. I am giving it to you, mother."
The maid beside Empress Xu took the things away, and Empress Xu asked softly, "Is there anything that the emperor needs to do in the palace?"
Liu He shook his head and smiled, "My son is already grown up, not young anymore. I came to the palace this time just to chat with my mother.
My son still remembers that when he was young, he fell seriously ill and almost died.
Fortunately, the Queen Mother prayed for her son, otherwise we would have been separated by death. Last year, your youngest grandson died, and my son was heartbroken. Only then did I understand the feelings of the Queen Mother when she prayed for her son. "
As Liu He was talking, he actually shed tears, his face full of sadness. Empress Xu comforted him, "He is unlucky and cannot bear the fate of being born into a royal family. My son, please don't be too sad."
Liu He barely managed to control his emotions and sighed, "Fortunately, mother gave birth to my younger brother She, otherwise if something happened to my son, I really don't know what you would do."
Queen Xu's pupils shrank slightly. She was a smart woman. She looked at her son deeply and understood what he was doing.
Liu He didn't care whether his mother could see his purpose, because he was speaking from his heart. In this world, sincerity is the most deadly. He was not exaggerating or making up stories. He just talked about a situation that was very likely to occur. He didn't even guide Queen Xu's thinking, but Queen Xu herself would involuntarily think in that direction.
Queen Xu was a little shaken, and she began to think whether what she did was right. Liu He noticed this and smiled secretly. Everyone has a weakness, and if you grasp the weakness, that person can be used by you.
The emperor and his subjects fight a hundred battles a day, so how can it be just the emperor and his subjects?
This is the game between people. Han Fei explained it very clearly in the classics, analyzing human nature and human heart thoroughly.
While the mother and son were conversing here, a heated debate had already broken out in the court hall. Liu Xun himself had not expected that so many ministers would oppose him, many of whom were people he had never expected.
Liu Xun did not fully anticipate the political consequences of his purge. He did not know how many officials across the world would be terrified by the political terror.
Liu He had a bad reputation, and the ministers could accept imperial edicts to reprimand him, deprive him of rewards, or even put him under house arrest, or punish the ministers close to the prince, but no one was willing to let him depose the prince unless it was absolutely necessary.
Liu Xun finally felt a little bit of difficulty, but he was a monarch with great power, so he naturally would not back down.
(End of this chapter)
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