“Yan Lan, just you wait, I’ll be back! Even though you’re fickle, it’s not your fault—you’ve been deceived by that treacherous, shameless, despicable, vile, indecent, beastly, scheming, hypocritical Zhu Ping’an! I don’t despise you for it!” Ouyang Zishi’s voice, full of unwillingness and struggle, echoed from the distance.
“Wang Ma, you’ll have to work harder these days, take turns guarding the entrance, don’t let him step foot in my courtyard again!”
Hearing Ouyang Zishi’s voice, Yan Lan’s delicate brows furrowed in disgust, her pretty face contorted with anger as she gritted her teeth and gave the order.
“Don’t worry, Miss, we only follow your instructions, we won’t let that brat take half a step into the courtyard again.”
Wang Ma and the other sturdy old servant women responded in unison, they were long-time servants of Yan Lan’s courtyard and loyal only to her.
“Chop down that crabapple tree outside and use it for firewood, it’s been hugged by a filthy pig, it’s only fit to be burned.”
Yan Lan added.
As the saying goes, love extends to the house, and hate does too—now, every time Second Miss Yan saw that crabapple tree in the courtyard, she’d recall Ouyang Zishi clinging to it like a stupid pig, making it utterly repulsive and an eyesore.
“Yes, Miss.”
A few young maids immediately obeyed, and soon the crabapple tree was felled and tossed into the woodshed to be burned.
Poor tree, caught in the crossfire because of Ouyang Zishi.
After a while, Yan Lan seemed to think of something and instructed her personal maid, “Go to the front courtyard and find out what merit Zhu Ping’an has earned this time to drive that idiot into such a frenzy.”
“Miss, you—you don’t actually…” The personal maid hesitated, her meaning clear to anyone who understood.
“Nonsense, I’m just curious, that’s all! Being smeared as some fickle woman by that idiot for no reason, shouldn’t I at least figure out what’s going on? I can’t even die as a confused ghost!”
Yan Lan’s face flushed slightly as she glared at her maid, speaking with a hint of irritation.
“Yes, yes, of course, Miss is right, I knew Miss couldn’t possibly be like he said.”
The maid nodded repeatedly, relieved of a heavy burden in her heart.
“Go quickly,” Yan Lan urged.
“Miss, I’m on it, don’t worry, I’ve got connections in the front courtyard, I’ll find out soon enough.”
The maid said confidently.
“Good,” Yan Lan praised, and the maid, beaming with pride, scurried out of the courtyard.
In the front courtyard, Yan Shifan, Luo Longwen, and others were huddled in intense discussion, plotting how to attack Zhu Ping’an’s recent victory report from Suzhou.
“Let’s confirm once more—did Zhu Ping’an sign the Suzhou victory report himself? Is it his personal signature?”
Yan Shifan was meticulous in his work, leaving no room for error, living up to his self-proclaimed title as one of the three smartest men in the Ming Dynasty.
“Rest assured, Brother Donglou, I’ve already checked, I compared it with Zhu Ping’an’s previous memorials, it’s definitely his own signature.”
Luo Longwen replied with certainty, eager to climb onto Yan Shifan’s coattails, he’d long adapted to Yan Shifan’s style and had verified Zhu Ping’an’s signature in advance.
Yan Shifan gave Luo Longwen an approving look, and Luo Longwen immediately beamed with satisfaction and pride, like a dog who’d just caught a bone tossed by its master.
“Then proceed with the impeachment as planned, of course, it still needs to go through my father first,” Yan Shifan decided.
“This matter is significant, but Zhu Ping’an has the emperor’s favor and has earned merit multiple times, we might not be able to bring him down fatally this time,” Yan Maoqing said, stroking his chin, “Perhaps the emperor will be furious at first and have him arrested and jailed pending judgment, but after a few days, once his anger subsides, he’ll release him, demote him, and keep him in service. As much as I hate to admit it, Zhu Ping’an has the emperor’s trust, he’s not like Shen Lian or Yang Jisheng.”
“True, just a few days ago he earned great merit at the sea sacrifice, and he’s had plenty of achievements before that, especially the Tai Treasury silver case—Zhu Ping’an’s investigation recovered so much silver, bolstering the treasury and easing the emperor’s urgent needs back then. Based on the emperor’s past handling of people, Zhu Ping’an might suffer a serious setback this time, but it won’t be fatal,” another official nodded in agreement.
That was the advantage of having the emperor’s trust—it granted a higher margin for error compared to those without it.
It was human nature, after all.
For someone you know and understand, you’re willing to give them a chance to make mistakes without condemning them outright, but for strangers you don’t know, one misstep often leads to a swift, final judgment.
“Heh, I know all this, let’s speak frankly behind closed doors, though the emperor gives off an impression of being cold and ruthless—back when Emperor Zhengde passed without heirs, Empress Dowager Zhang and Grand Secretary Yang Tinghe, following the ancestral rule of ‘succession from brother to brother,’ decided the current emperor should take the throne, per tradition, as a collateral descendant succeeding to the throne, his imperial father should’ve been Emperor Hongzhi, Zhu Youzhang, and his biological parents, Prince Xingxian Zhu Youhang and Consort Jiang, should’ve been demoted to uncle and aunt, yet after ascending, through the Great Rites Controversy, he honored his birth parents as Emperor Xingxian and Empress, later even elevating his father to Emperor Ruizong, enshrining him in the Imperial Ancestral Temple above Emperor Zhengde, as for Empress Dowager Zhang, who’d decided on his succession, she wasn’t even allowed birthday celebrations from court officials and noblewomen, dying in melancholy, while Yang Tinghe, who’d championed his ascension, was stripped of rank and forced into retirement, his son Yang Shen beaten and exiled to Yunnan, abandoned for life, and then there’s Xia Yan’s fate—no need to elaborate, right? Though we pushed it, without the emperor’s approval, Xia Yan wouldn’t have been executed in the market after years of loyal service.”
“But we can’t just look at the surface, we must see the essence—whether the emperor is ruthless depends on your usefulness, if you’re useful, he won’t be cold, if you’re not, don’t blame him.”
Yan Shifan spoke freely among his trusted circle, in the most heavily guarded study of his home, holding nothing back.
“Zhu Ping’an is still useful right now, the emperor might not take his life, but this is just the beginning, after this impeachment, once the emperor deals with him, we’ll keep impeaching, as long as he’s human, he’ll make mistakes— you can find flaws even in an egg if you look hard enough, keep watching him, catch his errors, and impeach again, one or two more times, and he’ll become useless.”
Yan Shifan smirked faintly, speaking leisurely, “Speaking of merit, can Zhu Ping’an compare to Zhu Wan, who served as the military governor of Zhejiang and Fujian’s coastal defenses with such toil and glory?! Yet what happened to the highly meritorious Zhu Wan? With our maneuvers, he ended up a ghost under the blade! What can Zhu Ping’an do against that?!”
“No wonder you’re Brother Donglou, let’s do it this way,” Luo Longwen was the first to jump in support.
“Good, good, let’s go with this,” the others quickly chimed in, reaching a consensus in no time.
