Moreover, he not only criticized himself, but also brought Tu Long, Gao Panlong and a group of like-minded people to criticize together.

The output amplifier function of newspapers was clearly demonstrated at this moment. In Jiangnan, public opinion was completely one-sided, and criticizing Emperor Wanli became the code for wealth... Oh no, political correctness!

In this situation where if you don't criticize, you are not a Chinese, not only did the royalists whose minds were full of "loyalty to the emperor" dare not speak, even the conciliators who advocated reconciliation and compromise and concessions did not dare to speak out. They all shut up and planned to wait until this storm of public opinion was over before speaking out.

Now they only regretted not having started a newspaper like Wang. Although it is better to retreat and weave a net than to envy the fish by the abyss, this net cannot be built overnight. By the time they start a new newspaper, this wave of opportunity will be cold, and they can only wait and see...

With the unremitting incitement of the pen holders, the gun holders with abundant martial virtues became more and more agitated. The militias and workers' guards in various prefectures and counties were in a state of indignation, clamoring to fight to Beijing and use the Longqing style in their hands to teach the ignorant son of a bitch, Wanli!

This scene of uproar really made the local officials nervous. They hurriedly tried their best to appease the people and told them not to act on their own to avoid a situation that got out of hand. At the same time, they had to obey public opinion and organize some representatives to go to Pudong to petition.

A bird cannot fly without a head, a snake cannot survive without a head, and this is especially true of a disciplined force that must obey orders in all its actions. How to deal with this situation, of course, depends on the group's decision.

When I arrived at the group headquarters, I found out that Zhao Hao had gone overseas. Of course, I had to wait for him to come back before making a decision on such a big matter.

Jiang Xueying, the president of the group, came forward and did some ideological work for Zhao Hao. He said that the incident happened suddenly and the group was indeed hit hard. But please stay calm, the group will do its best to overcome the current difficulties and ensure that everyone's normal work and life will not be affected.

She said, the more others can't stand our success, the harder we should work! The more they want to mess us up, the harder we should not mess up! As long as we are united, there will be no difficulties that we cannot overcome, and no one can defeat us!

After much persuasion, they finally calmed down the crowd temporarily. Jiang Xueying asked them to go back and do ideological work for everyone, and then sent the petition groups from all over the country away.

~~

Meanwhile, memorials from officials were flying to the Yikun Palace like snowflakes, all of them advising Emperor Wanli not to act on impulse and to not reverse history!

Not only officials from the Jiangnan clique, but also officials from the Shandong clique, the Shanxi and Henan cliques, the Huguang and Jiangxi cliques, and even officials from Sichuan, Shaanxi, Yunnan and Guizhou, all spoke in unison, emphasizing the harms of the maritime ban!

Emperor Wanli was able to make the sweet party, salty party and vinegar party stand in complete agreement on his own. This is unprecedented, but at least it is the only one in the past 200 years.

Even when his grandfather was fighting desperately for his father with the civil service group, there was a small group of successor faction such as Zhang Cong, Gui E, Fang Xianfu, etc. who supported Emperor Jiajing in the fight!

Now, not a single civil official has come out to support Wanli's restoration of the maritime ban. Being able to completely isolate oneself is a skill...

In fact, there are speculators in the civil service group. Speculators always exist in any time and space. However, the previous successive overthrows of Zhang and the struggle for the foundation of the country have seriously torn the relationship between the emperor and the civil service group.

The chasm between the two sides is as wide as the border between Chu and Han. It has reached the point where people no longer consider right or wrong, but only camp.

Since you are a civil servant, you have no choice but to confront the emperor head-on. Therefore, there is no middle ground for opportunists or mediators.

Moreover, the officials nowadays are no longer ignorant people. Who hasn't read a few scientific books? They knew that the world is so big that it is not limited to China. Many people even have the experience of traveling around the world. The young scholars are no longer blindly complacent and have begun to imagine that the whole world can speak Chinese.

Even Liu Daxia's grandson became a fanatical conqueror. Wanli is still trying to reverse history and talk about restoring the maritime ban. Isn't this just asking for trouble?

The Cabinet and the Six Ministries even said that if there was an imperial edict requesting the court to implement the maritime ban policy, they would definitely exercise their power to reject it and would resolutely not execute this chaotic order!

At first, Wanli scoffed at the memorials submitted by officials. He thought that they were always noisy and ended hastily, which was really nothing new.

However, the cabinet and the six ministries publicly stated that they would refute his specific edict, which was a fatal blow to Wanli!

Because that would mean that the civil service group's stance towards him would shift from persuasion to confrontation.

Once the emperor's edict is rejected, his prestige will face a great challenge.

Just like what his grandfather had faced back then, Yang Tinghe "had to return four imperial edicts in succession and submit nearly thirty memorials to the emperor", and the emperor often felt resentful... He became so angry that his liver ached just thinking about it.

At that time, the Jiajing Emperor could either give in cowardly, thus losing his prestige and being bullied by the civil service group, or he could only go down this path and persist in doing so.

Although if the emperor insists on doing it, the civil officials probably can't stop him, but please find the person to do it yourself... If he messes up, you will be labeled a tyrant and your prestige will be destroyed.

Jiajing relied on his own decisiveness and the help of his guides to fight his way out and restore his authority!

But Wanli knew very well how difficult it was to walk this lonely road covered with blood and thorns.

So he was a little scared and wanted to shrink back.

However, at this moment, Zhang Jing came to Yikun Palace with a box full of black materials to ask for an audience...

~~

The winter of the eighteenth year of Wanli came particularly early. Before October, the wind was howling and the weather was freezing cold.

The Yikun Palace was naturally warm like spring. All the doors and windows were covered with thick leather paper and hung with expensive gray mouse curtains.

There were not only floor heating systems in the palace, but each room also had four heated cages lit at the four corners.

The warming cage is also called the fumigation cage, which consists of two parts: the basin and the cage. It is very exquisitely made. It is more than one meter high, and is either tripod-shaped or square-shaped. It is either gilded bronze or cloisonné enamel. In short, it is very luxurious.

But what is truly valuable is the fuel in the brazier with blue flames dancing in it. There is no smell of fireworks at all, only the fragrant sandalwood.

Because what is burning in the stove is sandalwood.

Concubine Zheng was delicate and disliked the smell of silver tribute charcoal, so she started burning sandalwood several years ago.

Sandalwood is very expensive, costing ten taels of silver per pound on the market, and the palace purchases it at eighty taels of silver per pound...and this is the discounted wholesale price negotiated by the Xixinsi, and the manager was even praised by the emperor for being good at living.

Yikun Palace burns 100 kilograms of sandalwood every day...

During the Little Ice Age, heating lasted more than four months a year. The emperor would be short of money if he didn't grow old.

Back to the topic, Wanli, who was standing in front of the imperial desk, was sweating profusely, but it was not because of the heat, but because he was frightened by the table full of materials.

Wanli held in his hand a copy of the "Too Long, Don't Read" version that Zhang Jing had thoughtfully compiled. Just the content on it was enough to make him sweat profusely -

The Jiangnan Group has actually controlled Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong and eastern Shandong. These places only know about the group but not the court, and only know about Zhao Hao but not the emperor.

They also had relative control over Huguang, Jiangxi, and western Shandong. They also formed an alliance with Shanxi, and set up immigration offices and representative offices in various prefectures and counties in Shaanxi and Sichuan. While continuously attracting immigrants, they also frantically bought the hearts of the people and won over officials and gentry.

The Jiangnan Group has established its own government overseas and registered all the people. The area of ​​its 18 overseas provinces is already larger than that of the Ming mainland! It has 20 million most loyal immigrants!

What? The Jiangnan Group has every citizen a soldier. Overseas alone, it has three million militiamen who are well-armed and well-trained, and are no less elite than the government troops!

What Jiangnan Group has sufficient money and food, ten times that of the imperial court. Especially the steel manufacturing industry is extremely developed. Not only is the steel output thousands of times that of the imperial court, but the farmers' farm tools are also better than the Embroidered Spring Swords of the Jinyiwei!

The firearms of the Jiangnan Group are so advanced that they cannot be measured in miles. The Longqing rifles, which are equipped by every militiaman, are much better than the bird guns of the Shenjiying. The Wanli rifles equipped by its elite troops can accurately shoot enemies two miles away. Is its powerful artillery enough to destroy the city wall?

The warships of the Jiangnan Group are extremely powerful, and one of them can wipe out the imperial navy.

Officials bought and cultivated by the Jiangnan Group have spread all over the court. More than half of the civil servants in the Ming Dynasty are absolutely untrustworthy, and the remaining half are also questionable. The bribery of border generals is even more outrageous...

The Jiangnan Group openly carried out reactionary propaganda in China, launched the "Three Antis Movement", promoted atheism, published poisonous works such as "Journey to the West", and smeared Emperor Jiajing. They openly staged "Thousands of Loyal Officials", claiming to overturn the verdict of the loyal ministers of Jianwen, but in fact satirizing the illegitimate access to power of Emperor Chengzu...

Seeing this, Wanli's blood pressure had reached 250.

There was also the Jiangnan Group, which was frantically mining overseas, with various gold, silver, copper, iron, tin and coal mines spread across 18 provinces. There was also the Jiangnan Group, which had monopolized the world's sugar, silk and cotton industries... He could no longer understand it.

One could hear a pin drop in the hall. Zhang Hong and Zhang Jing stood behind the emperor, not daring to breathe.

"Great, great..." After an unknown amount of time, Wanli finally came to his senses. His pale, fat face turned blue, then red like a monkey's butt, and he turned around with trembling cheeks.

Seeing that the sky was about to collapse and the earth was about to break, Zhang Hong and Zhang Jing quickly knelt down.

Unexpectedly, Wanli threw the pile of papers fiercely at Zhang Jing's face, and roared with bloodshot eyes: "Drag this dog slave out and beat him up!"

"Your Majesty!" Zhang Jing was stunned. He didn't expect that after working so hard for more than two years, he still couldn't escape being beaten. "I am innocent!"

"You still have the nerve to cry out for injustice?!" Wanli suddenly raised the materials on the table and roared, "You dare to make up these outrageous lies to scare me just to protect yourself! Is Zhao Hao so awesome that you are so shameless to praise him?!"

"You've praised them as heavenly soldiers and generals, you know that? If you say so, I will just abdicate the throne to Zhao Hao! Why is he still nagging me for so many years?!" Fortunately, because it was too outrageous, Wanli finally came to his senses and almost wet his pants. Do you know that? !

"What are you standing there for? Drag him down and beat him hard! If you can't kill him, keep beating him until he's dead!" The Roaring Emperor shouted at the eunuchs who were hesitating at the door, "Do you also believe his lies?!"

Several eunuchs then rushed in, grabbed Zhang Jing and pulled him out.