The arrival of news inevitably comes with some delay, but only after the Chishan Association completed assembly of over two thousand large and small vessels and over forty thousand robust boatmen and sailors at Xichuan, East Lake, and Tangyi did Jinling receive accurate information. Shen Yang, Yang Zhitang, Du Chongtao, and others absolutely wouldn’t consider this normal.
After Han Qian submitted his memorial on the tenth reporting the plan to unite with Liang to attack Yong, the Political Affairs Hall specifically had relevant offices pay more attention to Chishan Association vessel movements.
Yingzhou, Xiangcheng, and Canglang City were necessary passages for the Chishan Association heading to Xichuan, while Chi, Shu, Run, Yang, and other places were necessary passages for Chishan Association vessels assembling at East Lake and Tangyi. These places were all under surveillance by court forbidden armies like the Right Martial Prowess Army, Left Martial Prowess Army, and Right Dragon Martial Army.
Dragging all the way to the end of the first month before accurate news of Chishan Association vessel and troop assembly arrived—how could this possibly be normal?
Not only was such delayed news abnormal, but Tangyi’s intent in this troop mobilization and assembly was also abnormal, absolutely not as simple as Han Qian claimed—deploying troops to unite with Liang to attack Yong.
Not to mention Yang En and Shen Yang—Yang Zhitang, Du Chongtao, Zheng Yu, Zhang Chao, one by one these ministers and veteran generals who had survived in such times, which one would be a fool?
Deploying troops to attack Yongzhou didn’t require naval forces.
Even if materials within Tangyi’s territory were insufficient and needed to be purchased from other prefectures and counties, what scale of material assembly required mobilizing over forty thousand men for waterway transport all at once?
The over two thousand Chishan Association vessels assembled at the three locations combined had total transport capacity, if not a full million shi, then very close to it. This also meant that such enormous transport capacity, if fully utilized at once, could transport materials sufficient to guarantee fifty thousand troops’ combat consumption for nearly two years.
For normal logistical support, even if all materials needed for this Tangyi army’s joint attack on Yong with Liang were procured outside Tangyi, calculated with a three-month waterway transport cycle, the Tangyi army would only need to assemble one-sixth to one-eighth of vessel transport capacity to suffice.
As for overland transport after materials arrived at Jingzi Pass, Wuguan, and wharves along the Ying River banks, that might require several times the scale of transport troops, but that had nothing whatsoever to do with the Chishan Association.
Under current circumstances, Tangyi’s previous commercial goods exports to the Jiang and Huai regions, Shu, and other places through the Chishan Association had also temporarily ceased.
Besides the Chishan Association’s abnormal assembly, when Han Qian memorialized on the tenth about deploying troops to attack Yong, he also requested the court provide in advance this year’s eight hundred thousand shi of grain and cereals that should be allocated.
Han Qian’s memorial was naturally shelved, not brought to the Political Affairs Hall for deliberation, much less submitted to the Two Empress Dowagers for decision, and naturally wouldn’t be handed to the Finance Office or Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office for execution.
Theoretically, Tangyi couldn’t obtain an extra grain of rice from the court.
However, when Shen Yang dispatched people to investigate many details of this abnormal Chishan Association assembly, he suddenly realized with shock that grain and fodder military supplies that should have been transported in batches from various prefecture granaries to northern Xiang after the New Year to supply the Pacification Army—in the two or three days after the New Year festival, had successively received documents from the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office requiring all grain and fodder materials already gathered in advance at various prefecture granaries be handed entirely to Chishan Association vessels for early dispatch.
These matters all occurred before Han Qian formally submitted his memorial.
The Chishan Association possessed large granary ships with capacity exceeding five thousand shi. For long-distance transport of bulk materials they were fast and economical. In recent years, several of Great Chu’s main grain transport prefectures had basically all assigned transport to the Chishan Association.
The Pacification Army assembled over eighty thousand troops and in just half a year last year consumed nearly eight hundred thousand shi of grain, fodder, and other materials.
This year, considering ultimately promoting Zhao Zhen to lead forces out of Wuguan, taking control of Deng and Jun prefectures, and maintaining military strikes against Liangzhou rebel forces, the allocation of military materials to northern Xiang, even considering solving part locally, still planned to requisition no less than one million shi from external prefectures and counties.
These grain and fodder materials naturally wouldn’t be directly transported from Jinling but would designate several grain transport locations, coordinate arrangements to directly transport grain tribute and various other requisitioned materials to Jingling, Xiangcheng, and other places.
Through the Han family’s mediation, material transport both before and after was basically all undertaken by the Chishan Association.
Now the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office sent documents for early concentrated dispatch of a batch of materials. Though somewhat inconsistent with plans, prefectures and counties didn’t really become suspicious.
At that time Han Qian hadn’t yet formally submitted his memorial, and the capital hadn’t yet ordered all offices to pay attention to Chishan Association’s unusual movements. Even when subsequent imperial orders reached prefectures and counties, almost everyone believed the Tangyi army’s various abnormalities were intended to compete for administrative jurisdiction over Deng and Jun prefectures. Not many people directly connected these matters.
Handing these grain and fodder supplies to Chishan Association vessels for transport, all localities would simultaneously also dispatch grain escort officials.
However, during vessel transport, these locally dispatched grain escort officials received documents from the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office mentioning that because Tangyi was procuring materials needed for the campaign against Yong, this batch of grain and fodder materials would change plans and needed to be directly transported to Xichuan, East Lake, Tangyi, and other places for unloading.
Grain escort officials were mostly minor clerks with lowly official positions, difficult to directly oppose the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office’s written orders.
Moreover, the Chishan Association was entirely Tangyi’s forces—their opposition would have no effect whatsoever.
Some people were relatively alert but could only dispatch people ahead to transmit news back to their respective prefectures and counties, then have prefectures and counties send people to Jinling for verification.
Besides grain and fodder originally meant to supply the Pacification Army, there was also a batch of grain tribute that should have been successively dispatched to Jinling only in the second and third months after the New Year, which was also intercepted early by the Chishan Association using the same methods.
Tallying it up, various prefectures and counties had a total of over four hundred thousand shi of grain and fodder intercepted by the Chishan Association.
At this point who could still consider all this normal?
As new information continuously assembled, the atmosphere within the Ministry was oppressive like the moment before a violent storm’s arrival. No one could guess what exactly Tangyi intended to do this time.
“The public documents the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office transmitted to various locations were all signed and sealed by Han Daochang around the New Year festival. After two prefectures received the orders, they even dispatched people carrying documents to urgently rush to the capital to verify with the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office, but the two duty administrators at the office after the New Year were both Han Daochang’s people—the news was concealed just like that. These two administrators borrowed the pretext of inspecting Tangyi’s grain transport three days ago and all went with Han Daochang to East Lake. I just dispatched people to investigate—these two administrators’ family members also secretly left Jinling several days ago.” Zhang Chao, as Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner, sat in the Political Affairs Hall. Seeing Shen Yang, Yang En, Du Chongtao, Yang Zhitang, Zheng Yu, Zheng Chang, and others staring at him intently with glaring eyes, he felt deeply ashamed.
As Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner, not only salt administration and various monopoly policies, but even grain tribute transport and transfer, as well as numerous market supervisory offices established in various locations, were all under his management.
For Chishan Association merchant ships to travel through prefectures and counties, they first had to obtain transit permits from the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office before negotiating with prefectures and counties. The market harbor taxes and transit taxes paid by the Chishan Association were also all dealt with directly by market harbor offices and Salt and Iron Supervision Offices under the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office in various prefectures.
When Emperor Yanyou originally agreed to let the Chishan Association trade commercial goods in various prefectures, he also issued edicts requiring the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office to be responsible for strict supervision.
Right under the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office’s eyes and nose, the Chishan Association reported over seven thousand boatmen and sailors but actually possessed forty to fifty thousand boatmen and sailors. That this time the Chishan Association directly intercepted over four hundred thousand shi of grain and fodder from various prefectures and counties wasn’t discovered until now—the oversights all occurred at the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office.
Of course, all this could be said to result from the Han family’s growing power, with Han Daochang serving as director in the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office yet able to stand as his equal. But as Vice Minister of Revenue concurrently leading the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office, how could Zhang Chao deflect all responsibility?
“We should immediately request the Two Empress Dowagers issue an edict having the Court of Judicial Review apprehend Han Daoming and others, and have the Right Dragon Martial Army and Left Martial Prowess Army strengthen alert in Runzhou and Chizhou, with Prince Xin in Chuzhou also strengthening preparedness to prevent upheaval!” Zheng Yu said with grave expression. Even though his Zheng family had previously cooperated quite well with Tangyi, facing such a severe situation, he needed to be first to step forward and state his position.
“Regardless of Han Qian’s intent, the post-New Year court rumors that Han Qian was determined to unite with the Liang army to attack Yongzhou to seize administrative authority over Deng and Jun prefectures flourished greatly—this must have a direct relationship with all of this. Tangyi secret agents won’t be limited to just the Salt and Iron Transport Commissioner’s Office and Ministry of Revenue. Rather than immediately apprehending Han Daoming, the Court of Judicial Review, Censorate, and Ministry of Justice perhaps need more to follow this thread and clearly determine to what degree the court has actually been infiltrated by Tangyi.” Yang En said with furrowed brow.
Tangyi at this moment seemed thickly shrouded by leaden storm clouds. He also completely couldn’t see through what exactly Han Qian intended to do, but on one point he felt deep lingering fear.
Jinling had actually been completely toyed with in the palm of Tangyi’s hand, so close at hand, for a full month or even longer!
On many positions, Yang En was quite close to Tangyi, but that didn’t mean he would tolerate Han Qian having rebellious ambitions to seize power.
No matter what, besides having the Guard Imperial Army and the Right Dragon Martial Army and Left Martial Prowess Army guarding the capital region’s two flanks maintain hundredfold vigilance, besides dispatching messengers to rush to Chuzhou to see Prince Xin Yang Yuanyan and have him raise combat readiness levels, sorting out the degree to which the court had been infiltrated by Tangyi was, in Yang En’s view, also an urgent matter needing doing.
Otherwise, not only would Jinling’s every move be known to Tangyi, they would be constrained everywhere by Tangyi.
“Should this Yun Puzi also be immediately apprehended by the Court of Judicial Review? With Court of Judicial Review torturers taking over, they should be able to dig more things out of him!” Huang Huixiang asked with a gloomy face.
Hearing Zheng Yu say this, many people were again startled.
The Cishou Palace upheaval clearly indicated that Yun Puzi was a hidden agent planted near Changxin Palace under Han Qian’s orders. But if they directly apprehended Yun Puzi and had Court of Judicial Review cruel officials take over, they might possibly dig out more things and very likely uncover more hidden twists and turns behind the palace upheaval—but this would necessarily directly shake the foundation of the new emperor’s succession and the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin Palace.
Was this Huang Huixiang’s intent?
Emperor Yanyou’s assassination and death, and the Cishou Palace upheaval had occurred just half a year ago. Were they really going to depose the new emperor and establish Prince Fu as emperor instead?
“Whether to apprehend Yun Puzi—perhaps we should report to the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin before further discussion.” Zhou Qinian, as Palace Writer, wasn’t granted a seat when Political Affairs Hall deliberated. He, Zhang Xian, Qin Wen, and others stood behind the two rows of long tables where the seated ministers sat, stepping forward to express opinions only when necessary.
To discuss deposing and establishing now seemed most beneficial to the Huang family, but Zhou Qinian deeply knew that discussing deposition and establishment now would directly damage the prestige of Political Affairs Hall ministers, and mid- and lower-ranking officers and ministers in the capital region as well as all prefectures and counties would inevitably have unsettled hearts.
Without the urgent threat of Tangyi before them, having such an opportunity, the Huang family would naturally utilize it. After the capital panicked for a while, they’d endure through it. But if Tangyi truly had some hidden ambition, and they now recklessly discussed deposition and establishment, first making themselves weak and chaotic—what was that but foolishness?
Though Huang Huixiang currently represented the Huang family in the central government, Zhou Qinian couldn’t help but think of the overall situation.
“In facing such a major matter of right and wrong, the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin should have proper judgment. For now, the Guard Imperial Army should temporarily just ensure gate defenses don’t show any abnormalities without alerting the enemy. We’ll enter the palace to see the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin and request she make the decision!” Yang En looked toward Shen Yang, Yang Zhitang, and Du Chongtao and said.
Their directly dispatching people to arrest Han Daoming and Yun Puzi versus the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin personally issuing edicts to arrest Han Daoming and Yun Puzi—behind this lay an essential difference.
Even if the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin and the new emperor had ascended with Tangyi’s covert assistance, if Tangyi truly had rebellious ambitions to seize power, Yang En also believed the Grand Empress Dowager of Changxin would know how to make the choice.
He absolutely didn’t dare imagine what benefit recklessly discussing deposition and establishment at this time could bring…