The Eighteenth Year of Yongle (I)
The Jianwen Emperor, Zhu Yunwen, was alive.
It was a truth that would shake the world to its roots.
During the Jingnan Campaign, Zhu Yunwen had dressed a bodyguard of similar build in the imperial dragon robes, then disguised himself as a eunuch and slipped from the palace. All that remained in the burning halls was the charred corpse of that bodyguard, still wrapped in the dragon robes. It had been the last desperate measure of Minister of War Qi Tai, Minister of Rites Huang Zicheng, and Grand Academician Fang Xiaoru, who had already sensed defeat.
Having escaped the palace, Zhu Yunwen met with Song Jeon, who had been waiting in readiness, and together with figures from the wilderness they founded Suchengye.
Zhu Yunwen, Master of Suchengye, took the seat of honor. The others sat in rows to his left and right.
"Master, did the Hainan affair go well?" Song Jeon asked, taking a slow sip of tea. The celadon cup gleamed a lovely sea-green in his hands.
"Well? It went better than well. The mountain is crawling with men who seethe at my uncle."
"I should think so. They took the heads of the sect leader, two elders, and the lead disciple, and hung them on the gates."
Zhu Yunwen still called the Yongle Emperor Uncle.
In the three years since he had fled the palace and thrown in his lot with Suchengye, he had sometimes howled himself into a dead faint from sheer rage. At other times he had laughed a hollow, vacant laugh for days on end, like a man who had lost his mind. There had been a stretch when he even felt the emptiness of all human striving. But the road that wound and wound and finally delivered him was, in the end, the road of vengeance — a road that would have to be savage, and absolute. Those three years had quietly remade the man. At a glance he seemed detached from the world's affairs; look closer, and he was plotting treason of the most desperate kind. A double-natured creature. The Zhu Yunwen of today was a monk who was no monk.
"Grand Preceptor, how do you mean to use Hainan?"
"Four thousand li from Yingtianfu. Once the Zhu sovereign relocates the capital, they will be even farther from the imperial city. They are not men to keep close and put to work."
"One would hope not — but they could always change their minds."
"Precisely. Once they hold the true shape of our Covenant in their hands, they might well go running to the Zhu sovereign and beg a pardon."
"There it is! Never take in a black-haired beast, as they say — you can't trust a human. Now then, shall we hear from our lovely Strategist?"
"We strike the Guangdong Jin Clan." Yi Yugyeong answered with a faint smile.
"The Guangdong Jin Clan? Is there any need? Those two have always hated each other, have they not?"
Hainan was the hegemon of Guangxi; the Jin Clan, the hegemon of Guangdong. Since time out of mind they had fought a bitter war for naval supremacy over the Southern Sea — eternal rivals, in a word. When one rose, the other fell.
"This time, command of the sea and the war fleet passed to the Guangdong Jin Clan. If we prevent the Jin Clan from playing the role expected of them—"
"Uncle will begin to distrust them, and the Jin Clan, frantic, will make a move?"
"Hainan and the Jin Clan will come to blows. When they do, we throw our weight behind Hainan and take Guangdong's martial world for the Covenant."
"Give the Jin Clan just enough air to breathe, and draw them into our fold?"
"Just so. Outwardly they will serve the Zhu sovereign. Inwardly, they will serve us."
Drive a man to the brink, then offer him a saving hand. It was a stratagem Suchengye had used more than once in drawing sects and clans to its side. If it succeeded, Guangxi and Guangdong would both fall under their control.
"Already a good number of clans and sects have signed the covenant roll. Is that not enough?"
Suchengye had exploited, with exquisite precision, the competing interests of the martial world's three great camps — the Orthodox, the Unorthodox, and the Demonic. Setting aside the Sacred Cult, successor to the White Lotus that Zhu Yuanzhang had abandoned, and the Demonic Path itself, they had drawn in the rest of both the Orthodox and Unorthodox. In particular, they had picked apart the Orthodox martial world at every scale — the great divide between the Nine Factions and One Sect and the aristocratic clan alliance, and the lesser factions nested inside each — and from those tangled interests they had selected every force worth calling an ally, and bound them to the covenant roll.
"It is not enough, Master. The Zhu sovereign has swollen the Jinyiwei to nearly twenty thousand. We must raise a force capable of butchering twenty thousand Jinyiwei in a single stroke."
This time it was Song Jeon who answered.
Defying Heaven.
From Suchengye's vantage it was Following Heaven — but either way, three things would decide whether the great undertaking succeeded.
First: the power to seal every approach into the imperial capital for the duration of the rising.
Second: to that end, the conversion of more than half of the twenty-one Imperial Guard commands that defended the capital — some one hundred and twenty thousand men.
Third: the power to sweep away twenty thousand Jinyiwei and a thousand martial eunuchs in a single blow.
In truth, the third condition mattered most. The day would come when the commanders of the capital's Imperial Guard would need to be shown, beyond any doubt, that the rising would succeed ten times out of ten. On that day, they would have to display the power named in the third.
"Fair enough. In any case, that quarter is the Grand Preceptor's and the Strategist's domain, so I leave it to you. This humble monk's grown rather tired of temple fare, that's all. I thought I'd ask."
"We are ashamed. We are pouring our lives into this. Grant us only a little more time."
"Come now, what's all this? This poor monk grumbled once, and you carry on so. Very well — shall we speak of New Year's Day? Commander of the Central Guard — the floor is yours, Patron."
"Yes, Master."
The middle-aged scholar-official who had been sitting all this while at Nam Woo-jeong's side answered. At a glance he looked as if he hadn't the strength to wring a chicken's neck. That mild-faced gentleman was one of Suchengye's five Guard Commanders — Gong Jeong-mun, a supreme master who had pioneered the Peak Realm - Late Stage through the way of the bow. In other words, the former leader of the Blood Death Archery Corps.
"Which mountain was it, again?"
"Mount Baohua."
Gong Jeong-mun answered with force, and the others nodded. The site of this undertaking was Mount Baohua, sixty li — some twenty-four kilometers — from the imperial palace.
Three days later — four days before New Year's Day — they gathered at the Ministry of War.
The relevant officers had assembled to discuss the escort plan for the imperial hunt. Zheng He and Jin Myeong attended as representatives of the Directorate of Ceremonial.
"Mount Baohua."
The old civil official who named the mountain was Jin Heup, Minister of War, a Zheng 2-pin. A secular disciple of Zhongnan, his achievement stood at the Peak Realm - Initial. As head of the ministry that oversaw military administration, one might have expected him to have passed the military examinations. He had passed the civil ones.
"Mount Baohua… better than Mount Lao, across the Yangtze, at any rate."
The old general nodding from the seat of honor was Zhang Fu, Left Commander-in-Chief of the Central Military Commission — one of only eighteen Zheng 1-pin officials in the Great Ming. He was the eldest son of Zhang Yu, Duke of Chengguo, who had died fighting at the Yongle Emperor's side during the Jingnan Campaign. A meritorious hero, in short. Diancang's proudest secular disciple, and a supreme master who had reached the Peak Realm - Late Stage with the Sun-Shooting Sword.
"Just so, Commander-in-Chief."
Sa Hapji answered from across the table from Jin Heup. He was present as Commander-in-Chief of the Jinyiwei, representing the Imperial Guard.
"How many guardsmen will the Jinyiwei put in the field?" Zhang Fu asked.
"Two thousand."
"Two thousand? More than in years past. The Central Commission will station four wei around Mount Baohua and form one wei in reserve."
Four wei meant roughly twenty-three thousand men. Draw a rectangle around Mount Baohua and the four sides together ran some fifty li — about twenty kilometers. Four wei would put a soldier every three chi, roughly nine-tenths of a meter.
"Commander-in-Chief, increase it to eight wei, and form two more in reserve."
Jin Heup cut in, as if he had been waiting for the opening.
"Ten wei? Four is already more than in years past. And it is winter, is it not? One does not move a great army in winter."
Zhang Fu pushed back. Ten wei meant a full fifty-six thousand men. The garrisons of Zhili together numbered some one hundred and sixty thousand; this was three-tenths of them. Excessive, surely, for the escort of a winter hunt. Moving that many soldiers was burden enough — and filling the gaps their absence tore in the frontier watch was no small matter either.
"Even so, four wei leaves the cordon far too thin. We should lay it at least two men deep, should we not?"
"Hah! Mount Baohua is no open plain, and His Majesty will not be ranging the entire mountain. Why account for every direction? You economize boldly on ground the enemy cannot approach, and concentrate on the ground he can."
"And where, pray, can men who harbor treason in their hearts not go? What ground can they not cross?"
"You try a man's patience, Minister."
"Please, continue."
There were reasons Zhang Fu and Jin Heup stood at such odds.
The great majority of the military officers in the Five Military Commissions were meritorious heroes and veteran commanders who had stood at the Emperor's side through the founding, the Jingnan Campaign, and the northern campaigns against the Yuan. The Ministry of War, by contrast, was overwhelmingly staffed by civil and military officials who had passed the examinations. Even those who had passed the military exams had nothing like the battlefield experience of the Commission generals. The Ministry's men, in a word, were more at home with brush and inkstone than with blade and armor.
The trouble had begun with the Yongle Emperor's own will. Having taken the throne by rebellion, he pursued the checking of ministerial power and the centralization of authority with something close to pathology. At first he had abolished the princely private armies entirely and entrusted regional defense to the Five Military Commissions. Of late, he had grown suspicious even of that arrangement, and had been adjusting authority piece by piece so that the Ministry of War — kept at the center and wielded by his own hand — would hold overall command of military power.
And so the old generals of the Five Military Commissions refused to let go of the authority they still held, while the desk-bound officials fought tooth and nail to wrest still more of it away. At present the Five Military Commissions retained operations, including training, and a portion of military administration such as the management of army registers — but the power of appointment lay with the Ministry of War.
On top of all that, Zhang Fu was of Diancang and Jin Heup of Zhongnan, and the personal feeling between them had never been warm. Diancang of the Sun-Shooting Sword and Zhongnan of the Peerless Sword were bitter rivals at the head of the orthodox martial world.
"You speak as a man who has never seen the ground. To move fifty-six thousand you must reckon the time for orders to travel, the time for supplies to move, the time for the troops themselves to move. And can you simply leave empty the posts those fifty-six thousand vacate?"
"Go on."
"Until the fifty-six thousand return, the gaps in the watch must be filled. That means moving the surrounding garrisons as well. You would be setting some two hundred thousand men in motion."
"This is the escort of His Majesty. I would move a million if I had to. And since last year, has not the Ministry of War been charged with the escort formation, the deployments, and the palace watch whenever His Majesty leaves the court?"
Zhang Fu and Jin Heup's exchange ran on parallel tracks. Frustration sat plain on both their faces.
Sa Hapji was commander of the Jinyiwei, but that organ was closer to a judicial office than a military one, and in terms of army command he stood well below either a Commander-in-Chief or a Minister of War. His role here, in short, went no further than the plan for close-in protection.
"Hah! Last year the Central Commission and the Southern Zhili garrisons had other duties, so the watch was left to the Imperial Guard commands alone. Spare me the rest of it. This old soldier has not served His Majesty a year or two — I rode with him on two northern campaigns."
"Ah… This subject must report this plan to His Majesty tomorrow, and I find myself in such an awkward position. I only worry that His Majesty might come to doubt the Commander-in-Chief's loyalty — and my own."
"Minister of War!"
Zhang Fu's fury finally broke. Jin Heup's words were a roundabout way of saying Zhang Fu was being careless with the Emperor's escort — a subordinate wrapping a threat in silk and aiming it at his superior.
"If you put so few troops in the field and, heaven forbid, some incident occurs — can the Commander-in-Chief bear that responsibility?"
"Jin Heup! You insolent—!"
The Ministry hall shuddered under Zhang Fu's voice, thick with killing rage.
That was when it happened.
A sharp crack. From the lowest seat, Zheng He, who had watched in silence, struck the table with the folding fan in his hand and rose.
"O-hong-hong. What a productive discussion this is."
…Grand Director.
Jin Heup, who had been about to throw himself forward on the principle that even a superior had no business calling a Zheng 2-pin official this and that — and Zhang Fu, whose whole bearing said he would draw steel at one more word — both checked themselves in the same instant.
"It seems we shall not even manage, before the day is out, to discuss which points are weak, and how and where they are to be defended."
"Stay out of this, Grand Director. This is a matter between the Central Commission and the Ministry of War."
"The Commander-in-Chief is right. This is the Ministry and the Central Commission honing each other. It is not the Directorate of Ceremonial's domain."
Zhang Fu and Jin Heup, having caught their breath, spoke almost in unison. For that one moment they were of a single mind, as if they had rehearsed it. This is none of your concern. That was the meaning.
Zheng He did not yield an inch.
"If escorting His Majesty and the Imperial House is not the Directorate of Ceremonial's affair, then whose, pray, is it? And is it a fitting thing, in the escort of His Majesty and the Imperial House, to draw lines between yours and mine?"
On Zheng He's face, and on Jin Myeong's beside him, there sat an expression only eunuchs and palace women would have recognized. The mouth was smiling. The eyes were not. It was the face a eunuch wore when he was truly, finally angry.
"Grand Director, it is not that we doubt your loyalty. But this is a different domain. Strategy. Army affairs. Do not interfere."
"Indeed. If the Grand Director steps in, the discussion will only drag longer. Withdraw, if you would."
At that, the corners of Zheng He's and Jin Myeong's mouths climbed a little higher.
When a eunuch's lips curl upward, beware. It was a proverb that had been handed down unchanged through the turning of mountains and rivers, through the rise and fall of dynasties.
"A lowly eunuch is not to discuss strategy or army affairs — is that it? Then what is this humble servant even doing here? When you have reached a conclusion, I shall hear it and take measures of my own."
"What did you say?"
"Grand Director!"
Zhang Fu's and Jin Heup's brows twitched. If what Zheng He had just said was not a sneer, if it was not a taunt, then what was it? Emperor's confidant or not — to cut across a first-rank and a second-rank official in a council on military affairs, and then to sneer, to mock—
"Come, Jin Myeong. I doubt they'll have an answer before the day is out."
"Yes, Gonggong!"
Zheng He turned his back without another word, and Jin Myeong turned with him.
That was the moment.
"Stop right there!"
"Halt!"
Steel sang. Shang Yu, a Cong 5-pin secretary of the Central Military Commission attending Zhang Fu, and Jiao Shouheng, a Zheng 5-pin bureau director of the Ministry of War attending Jin Heup, drew their swords in the same breath.
Grand Director or not — when superiors of such towering rank called, who dared turn his back? Rank had its law and its courtesy in the offices of the state, quite apart from real power. What they had just done was nothing short of contempt. There were limits, and those two had crossed them.
A hiss of steel. Shang Yu leveled his blade at Zheng He, who stood nearer; Jiao Shouheng, likewise, leveled his at Jin Myeong. A warning. That was all they meant.
Then Jin Myeong's form blurred.
A shriek of air. The dark serpent coiled at his waist uncoiled and whipped its black body.
A ringing clash — then another.
The ink-dark flood dragon, a full eight chi from snout to tail — some two and a half meters — knocked aside Shang Yu's and Jiao Shouheng's drawing cuts as if they were nothing at all.
Hah!
It knocked them aside, then wound itself around Shang Yu's throat. Below Jiao Shouheng's breastbone, the Jeong-eum Divine Blade — drawn at some instant no one had seen — bared a flash of white teeth.
Where the Cheonyang Biyeon cinched Shang Yu's neck, a thread of red blood welled and ran.
Shang Yu and Jiao Shouheng had meant only to point steel and issue a warning. The result was something far more savage.
!!!!!!
The two men had been subdued so easily that Zhang Fu and Jin Heup started to their feet in shock.
And then Jin Myeong, who had not spoken a single word since entering the Ministry, opened his mouth.
"If you two Excellencies take even one more step, you will have this lowly eunuch to thank for two corpses to clear away."
"You insolent—!"
"Who do you think you are—!"
A slow, tightening hiss. The instant Zhang Fu's and Jin Heup's voices reached him, the Cheonyang Biyeon and the Jeong-eum Divine Blade closed on their captives' throats. Zhang Fu and Jin Heup flinched and stopped dead.
Kh—!
A strangled sound leaked from Shang Yu and Jiao Shouheng, their bodies locked rigid. What followed that sound was Jin Myeong's voice.