In fact, Wanli regretted his decision before he had gone very far.

The small umbrella was unable to block the scorching sun when in motion. The hot weather consumed his remaining strength. His back was already soaked with sweat and his legs were burning with pain.

Under the watchful eyes of the crowd, the emperor could not drink water even though he was thirsty, and he could not afford to be disrespectful, so he could only grit his teeth and hold on.

There was nothing he could do. Who had made him so impulsive that he refused to ride in the sedan? Now, he had to continue on the road he had chosen even if he was exhausted.

As a result, it took him a full hour to walk the ten-mile return journey. In the end, his legs had lost all feeling and his brain was completely frozen. He walked back to the Daming Gate purely on instinct.

Without waiting for the officials to say goodbye, he went straight into the Daming Gate and jumped into the imperial sedan chair waiting inside the city gate. He gasped for breath and couldn't even move his fingers. There was only one thought in his mind - if I leave the palace again, I will be a fool...

However, the emperor's efforts were not in vain, at least it allowed his subjects to see that their Majesty was not a nerd who was indifferent to the lives of the people as the legend said.

The emperor's behavior of walking despite being exhausted moved people all over the world. The distressed people silently reduced their complaints. The ministers seemed to be energized, and the court finally resumed its operations, issuing decrees one after another to guide the drought relief work in North China.

Twenty days later, dark clouds covered the sky of North China, and a heavy rain fell from the sky for two days and two nights. The Yongding River, Chaobai River, and moat, which had been dry for a long time, finally began to flow again, and the dry fields were finally moistened...

In fact, it had been almost a month since the rain-praying ceremony at the Temple of Heaven, but no one dared to say that this was not the result of the emperor's moving heaven. Wanli himself took the lead and thanked heaven for its grace with great joy. Of course, he did not go to the Temple of Heaven in person this time, but asked Duke Dingguo to offer sacrifices on his behalf.

Your Majesty, the blisters on your feet from your last hike have not gone away yet... Yes, after returning to the palace that time, Wanli continued to be sick with justifiable reasons.

But that's how the Ming Dynasty was. As long as the emperor didn't make trouble and let the civil servants handle things on their own, the state machine would run smoothly.

Moreover, the cabinet chief minister Zhao Shouzheng, with a magnanimous heart, forgave the censors who impeached him and protected them from retaliation by angry ministers. The censors were so grateful that they said they would never go against the prime minister again.

All officials were doing their jobs well, delayed government affairs were gradually resumed, and there was a rare harmony between the government.

~~

But the young cabinet minister who was far away in Southeast Asia said, "No! How can the emperor just stop it? Wouldn't Zhao be very embarrassed?"

The young cabinet minister also said that the censors cannot always be idle, otherwise how can they write the summary at the end of the year?

Therefore, Jiang Dongzhi, a censor from Huizhou who had participated in the overthrow of Zhang, revealed intentionally or unintentionally that Zhang Jing, a eunuch from the East Factory, was the mastermind behind the overthrow of Zhang. He also ordered the East Factory to search for evidence of Zhang's party's crimes, and even fabricated evidence. He also instigated Li Zhi and others to overthrow Zhang behind the scenes...

Now the censors have finally found the culprit! No wonder Li Zhi, Yang Keli and other censors with thick eyebrows and big eyes went crazy and bit everyone they saw, even Zhang Shoufu, who was loved by everyone. It turns out that it was the dead eunuchs who were causing trouble!

They then directed their attacks at the eunuch Zhang Jing from the Eastern Depot and attacked him in unison.

Zhang Jing was indeed the instigator of the liquidation of Feng Bao and Zhang Juzheng, but who doesn't know that he was just the emperor's dog?

In fact, the fundamental reason why he attracted so many attacks was the natural conflict of interest between civil officials and the secret agents of the factory.

The existence of the Factory Guards caused great insecurity among the civil service group. At any time, if the civil service group wanted to live a stable life, they had to suppress the arrogance of the spies.

In the past few decades, the civil service group, with the censors as the vanguard and the cabinet as the backstage, has always maintained a relative advantage over the factory guards. Even when Feng Bao was at the height of his power, the factory guards and the civil service group have always kept their distance from each other because of Zhang Juzheng's control.

But after Zhang Jing became the governor of the East Factory, this ambitious father-in-law was no longer satisfied with the East Factory being able to extort local rich people and make a few small money. He began to actively target the civil servants. It was obvious that he wanted to make the East Factory bigger and stronger and create greater glory!

How could the civil service group, which had been fighting the factory guards for nearly two hundred years, sit back and watch the East Factory revive? They must nip its ambition in the bud again!

And how dirty are these people in the East Factory? It's as if they have never wiped their butts since they were born. In the past, everyone lived in peace, and the censors turned a blind eye and pretended not to see anything.

But now that the East Factory has crossed the line first, I'm sorry! The censors impeached one after another, not mentioning the previous section on overthrowing Zhang. They only saw the East Factory's cases of abusing the people and exploiting the gentry being exposed one after another.

Emperor Wanli had just been quiet for two days and was in no mood to stir up trouble again. However, Zhang Jing was the man the emperor had chosen to replace Feng Bao, and it was really embarrassing for the emperor to be impeached by the censors.

Zhang Hong, Zhang Cheng and others also cried and pleaded for Zhang Jing, saying that Xiao Jingzi was a hot-tempered and rough man, but loyal and sincere, and they were actually taking the blame for all the eunuchs. Wanli did not want to be led by anyone, so he did not issue an order to dismiss Zhang Jing.

However, this aroused the dissatisfaction of the censor Ma Xianggan, who hoped that Wanli would make a decision as soon as possible to avoid the emergence of another Liu Jin or Feng Bao.

Once the positions were at odds, Wanli finally felt the pressure from the censors. In order to prevent them from going too far, he ordered Ma Xianggan to be taken to the imperial prison for interrogation.

Now the civil service group could no longer sit still, and the Prime Minister Zhao Shouzheng wrote a petition to the emperor, asking him to hand the minister over to the court for interrogation and not to use the palace guards easily.

My goodness, it’s only been a short time and the positions have already been reversed.

Wanli angrily told his chief minister, "I have just told the Ministry of Education that in the future, when censors speak, they should consider the interests of the country and not sacrifice public interests for personal gain. Those who violate this rule will be punished!" They rushed at him again in an unruly manner! Aren't they just turning a deaf ear to my words?

Zhao Shouzheng knew that Zhao Hao was most likely behind this. How could the doting little cabinet minister tolerate the emperor bullying his father and act as if nothing had happened? At least Wanli should be made to feel the pain of being attacked by the censors.

But Wanli didn't know this, so he ignored the Prime Minister's request.

Seeing that the rescue by the Prime Minister was ineffective, the newly appointed Li Yi pointed out that the eunuch Zhang Jing of the East Factory relied on the favor of the emperor to deceive the heaven and break the law. He was bold and daring, and there has never been such a person before! Zhang Jing's evil was a hundred times that of Feng Bao and ten thousand times that of Song Kun. It was not enough to count his crimes by pulling his hair, and it was not enough to eat his flesh to redress his injustice. Therefore, the proverb in the capital said: "It is better to meet a tiger or a wolf than Zhang Jing!"

Zhang Jing was shocked when he heard this. Was he really that sad? That was his ambition, okay? Five years later, he would be very happy if people evaluated him like this. But now, he really felt ashamed and unworthy of it...

Li Yi, who was fearless even when he was just a newborn calf, even dared to mock Wanli. In his memorial, he said, "A few days ago, it was said that Jingguang offered gold and treasures and begged for them from many sides, but the emperor hesitated and could not bear to make a decision. The Chinese and foreign subjects did not believe it at first, because the emperor is rich in the world, how could he lack gold and treasures? He is as bright as the sun and the moon, how could he be treacherous? He is as powerful as thunder, how could he yield to beg?"

The meaning was to satirize Wanli in a sarcastic way, saying that the reason why Zhang Jing was not punished was because he accepted bribes from eunuchs.

How could Wanli put his face? The East Factory also revealed that Li Yi was a fellow villager of Zhang Juzheng, and that this was revenge for him. So Wanli wrote in red that "Li Yi wanted to take revenge with Zhang Juzheng and Feng Bao, but failed, so he slandered the emperor and father." He ordered Li Yi to be arrested and handed over to the Northern Pacification Office to "beat him thoroughly and interrogate him."

A few days later, an imperial decree came down, Li Yiting was caned 60 times and dismissed from his post as a commoner!

The censors were furious, and they all wrote to remind Wanli, "You just promised God last month that no one would bring up Zhang Juzheng again! Why are you going back on your word? Are you trying to stop God from raining?"

If Your Majesty wants to cane Li Yi, then cane all of us...

Wanli was almost mad with anger. How come he had become the target of public criticism in the blink of an eye? Was the world changing too fast, or were these censors really mad dogs? They would bite anyone they caught, not even their master!

But he did promise God that he would not bring up Zhang Juzheng again. He could break his promise to anyone, but he could not break his promise to God, the source of his power!

But it was impossible to take back the order. This made Wanli withdrawn. He announced that his dizziness had come back again, and he closed the door and ignored everyone. No matter how many people wrote to persuade him, he would not listen. Whatever you want to do!

Hai Rui was also furious. He had finally managed to mediate the conflict between the emperor and his ministers and helped the emperor regain the support of the people. Everything seemed to be moving in a good direction, but how the hell did it go back to square one?

That can’t be said, because the situation seems to have gotten worse… Previously, there were censors who were royalists. Now, censors have become the vanguards of attacking the emperor, and Wanli has become a lonely man.

Hai Rui intuitively felt that there was an invisible hand that was subtly manipulating the political situation. Compared with that black hand that could change the situation from thousands of miles away, his own power was really not worth mentioning.

Although he was never afraid of a strong opponent, this asymmetric contest required more strategy. Hai Rui also knew that this was just a small revenge by the young minister against the emperor... It was not even revenge. It could only be said to be a small counterattack against Wanli's previous intention to settle accounts with his father-in-law.

Then, by the way, he tried to alienate the relationship between the emperor and the censors.

This can be seen from the fact that the nine ministers and cabinet ministers did not take any action this time.

Therefore, Hai Rui believed that the emperor's ostrich tactics were a good countermeasure, which could effectively prevent the situation from escalating. So he did not act rashly...

~~

Another person who was going to be furious was naturally the Admiral of the East Depot, Zhang Jing.

He had planned to do great things this year, but he ended up having bad luck all the time.

First, he was nearly slashed with a spittoon by the emperor, and then he was beaten with a stick. Before he recovered from his injuries, he was attacked by the censors again. If they hadn't been too aggressive and made the emperor rebellious, he would probably be finished now.

This is really a show of people and ghosts, only the factory owner is being beaten...

p.s. My right index finger hurts so much. I wrote this chapter with my right index finger hanging in the air. It was so hard.