The Forbidden City and the Imperial City are not the same thing.
The Imperial City is big, the Forbidden City is small.
The Forbidden City is a city within the imperial city.
During the Ming Dynasty, only the cabinet's offices were located in the Forbidden City.
The Six Departments of the Imperial Secretariat and the Guanglu Temple were located outside the Forbidden City and inside the Imperial City.
The offices of other government offices are basically outside the imperial city.
Faced with Liu Wenyao's question, Li Banghua was stunned for a moment.
After a simple calculation, he said, "There are 41 officials in the morning court today. If we want to keep all of them in the imperial city overnight, we need to find a larger and airtight room. I've thought about it and the Six Departments' Direct Rooms and Guanglu Temple should be suitable."
Without waiting for Liu Wenyao to reply, Li Banghua frowned and asked, "What do you want to do? Imprisoning a Ming official is a serious crime. When the time comes, not to mention me, even His Majesty won't be able to protect you."
Li Wenyao lowered his voice and said, "This morning, His Majesty issued an order to rectify the problems of the Beijing Camp. Once this news gets out, the Beijing Camp may be in trouble."
"What's the problem?"
"Mutiny!"
"What's the reason?" Li Banghua asked.
Liu Wenyao glanced around cautiously and said quickly, "The capital has three major camps, each of which is divided into twelve camps, for a total of thirty-six camps. There are three hundred and sixty-six officers in these thirty-six camps, of which more than three hundred and twenty are related to the nobles."
"Some were promoted by the nobles through their connections, and some were relatives and servants of the nobles."
"Once the news of the rectification of the Beijing camp spreads, the lower-level soldiers are likely to mutiny under the instigation of these officers."
Mutiny...
Li Banghua narrowed his eyes and thought about the possibility of this matter.
The crackdown on the Beijing camp would destroy the jobs of many people, especially those generals who relied on connections to get promoted.
If these people intend to incite, the lower-level soldiers can indeed be easily fooled.
After all, the Jiannu had just come out of the pass not long ago, and the court's actions were tantamount to destroying the bridge after crossing it and abandoning the donkey after it had served its purpose.
Those old, weak, sick and disabled people who were bought in with money thought they could get a stable job, but they didn't expect the court to smash their bowls.
Can you not be anxious?
Thinking of this, Li Banghua nodded: "It is indeed possible. We have to think of a foolproof plan."
However, the reality did not allow Li Banghua to think too much.
The officials who attended the morning court had already reached Chengtian Gate and were about to leave the imperial city.
Once they leave the imperial city, the news will spread and it will be impossible to hide it.
Liu Wenyao was a little anxious: "Does Lord Li have any solution? If not, I will let them stay here overnight."
"No, let them go." Li Banghua looked calm, not panicking at all. "The capital is under the emperor's feet, there won't be any chaos."
"But..." Liu Wenyao hesitated to speak.
To be honest, he had no idea at all.
If a mutiny really broke out, it would be a fatal blow to the capital city which had just regained its security.
At that time, not only will the capital be in chaos, but he, the governor of the Beijing camp, will also be implicated.
The most important thing is...if the mutiny gets out of hand and affects the safety of His Majesty, he cannot bear the responsibility even if he dies.
"Does Your Majesty know about this?" Li Banghua asked again.
Liu Wenyao replied with a frown: "This may not happen, so I didn't dare to tell Your Majesty."
"Then..." Li Banghua came up with an idea in the blink of an eye, "Let's split our forces into three groups."
"Which three routes?"
Li Banghua did not answer the question, but asked in return: "How many soldiers and horses does the Beijing Camp have now?"
As the governor of the Beijing camp, these numbers are always in Liu Wenyao's mind.
So he answered without hesitation: "After the bandits retreated, the Beijing camp had already begun to lay off the old, weak, sick and disabled, but the progress was very slow. As of the end of October, the three major camps in the capital now have more than 57,800 soldiers."
"Among them, there are more than 20,000 veterans and 37,800 new recruits. Among the 20,000 veterans, there are more than 10,000 waiting to be laid off, and there are 3,000 in the probation period. Only after the probation can they be transferred back to the official registered soldiers."
"New soldiers are fully paid and fully fed, so the chances of them being incited to mutiny are very small. Old soldiers, especially those who are about to be laid off, are most likely to be incited to mutiny."
"Where are your soldiers now?" Li Banghua asked.
"Three thousand people are in Tongzhou, and ten thousand are outside the capital."
Li Banghua stood in the cold wind with a hunched back and a goat beard, like an immortal old tree.
"Ahem," he said after a few heavy coughs. "I am a soldier in the first division. When I return to the Ministry of War, I will immediately ask for an order to transfer the veterans of the three battalions to the parade grounds to take the assessment tomorrow morning."
"Ah?" Liu Wenyao was puzzled. "Lord Li, doing this will only increase their suspicion and may even force them to mutiny."
"If we can't stop the mutiny, then we might as well make it controllable. By then, as long as we block the entrance and exit of the training ground, we can minimize the impact on the capital."
this...
Liu Wenyao stood there and nodded helplessly.
"You are the second-line soldier. I want to ask you, how many direct descendants do you have in the Beijing Camp?"
"Direct lineage? About two thousand."
"Let them blend into the ranks of veterans tomorrow morning. If a mutiny really occurs, let them take the opportunity to lead the surrender."
"Okay!" Liu Wenyao quickly took note of it in his mind.
"Also, ask His Majesty to allow the soldiers outside the city to enter the city. If a mutiny occurs, immediately line up in front of the south of the Imperial City to prevent them from attacking the Imperial City."
(The parade ground of the capital in the Ming Dynasty was located in the Xuanwu Gate area southwest of the imperial city)
"The third group of troops is Fan Jingwen. He served as the governor of the Beijing camp during the siege of the city by the bandits. The soldiers of the Beijing camp have a good impression of him. Tomorrow morning he will patrol the city wall to stabilize the morale of the new recruits."
"As for the others..." Li Banghua said as he thought about whether there were any omissions, "You still have to go to the palace and report this matter to His Majesty truthfully. We don't need to worry about the Yongwei Battalion, Jinyiwei, Dongchang, and Wucheng Bingmasi. Leave it to His Majesty to mobilize."
"Okay, I'll go to the palace right away." Liu Wenyao agreed and left at the drop of a hat.
......
The headquarters of Shenshuying.
Deputy General Liu Fangming and Deputy General Ma Ke were sitting on the kang eating hot pot.
Hotpot has existed since ancient times, and can be traced back to the Shang Dynasty, when a small hotpot for one person was popular, and it was called Wen Ding.
In the Song Dynasty, hot pot began to enter the homes of ordinary people.
Hotpot became even more developed in the Ming Dynasty, and basically anything edible could be cooked in it.
Liu Fangming picked up a piece of cooked frozen tofu and said, "Old Ma, we were all promoted by Zhu Chunchen. Now that His Majesty wants to rectify the Beijing camp, I'm afraid you and I will be the first to be taken down..."
"No way?" Ma Ke drank a mouthful of hot pot soup. "Five of the six deputy generals in the Beijing camp were promoted by Zhu Chunchen. Why would they attack us first?"
There are seven senior generals in the three camps.
In addition to the governor of the Beijing camp, each camp has two deputy generals.
"Besides," Marco took another sip of the spicy hot pot soup, "we defended the city walls during the siege by the bandits. Although we didn't get promoted for this merit, we won't be dismissed from office, right?"
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