One topic followed another, and by the time the midday meal hour arrived, three issues remained unresolved.
“Order the Imperial Kitchen to prepare something simple and serve it quickly. We’ll continue the discussion after eating,” Emperor Jiajing instructed a young eunuch to relay the order to the Imperial Kitchen.
The court session paused temporarily for lunch.
Though Emperor Jiajing had asked for something simple, the Imperial Kitchen didn’t dare take it lightly. If they did, they’d have long been dismissed from their posts.
The kitchen wasn’t a place detached from the world—they kept their eyes and ears open. Upon hearing that Emperor Jiajing had summoned the ministers for a court session, they’d already prepared to serve meals. Ingredients had been prepped, washed, and chopped in advance; stoves were fired up early, soups simmering in pots, cold dishes pre-mixed, and hot dishes partially cooked.
When the young eunuch arrived with the order, a dozen imperial chefs sprang into action, wielding their woks. Hot dishes were ready in minutes.
Soon, trays of fragrant, visually appealing imperial meals were packed into food boxes and carried by the eunuchs to the grand hall.
Emperor Jiajing dined with the ministers in the hall.
Naturally, his meal was far more lavish than the ministers’. They received a modest four dishes and a soup, while Jiajing enjoyed ten dishes and a soup.
The young eunuch whispered to Huang Jin, who nodded slightly and stepped forward to murmur something to the emperor.
Jiajing listened and gave a faint smile, addressing the ministers with a hint of pride, “My loyal subjects, you must savor this bowl of noodle soup. The flour for these noodles comes from wheat I personally planted in the fields I opened in the Western Garden. The yield reached a full two hundred jin per mu.”
“Thanks to Your Majesty, this humble servant is fortunate today. No wonder these noodles smell so good—even before the food boxes were opened, the hall was filled with their aroma. So it’s the wheat Your Majesty grew yourself!”
*Slurp, slurp.* “Oh, this is the most delicious bowl of noodles I’ve eaten in my half-century of life. Truly exquisite!”
“Fragrant, utterly fragrant.”
Following the emperor’s words, the ministers launched into an eating performance, devouring their meals with gusto and showering praise nonstop.
When it came to eating for show, Yan Song took the crown. Despite his advanced age and usually small appetite, he polished off a large bowl in a flash, not leaving a drop of soup.
“Your Majesty, once the session ends, may I take a bowl of this noodle soup home for my old wife to taste?” Yan Song wiped his mouth with a handkerchief, rose from his seat, bowed to Jiajing, and shamelessly requested a bowl to bring home.
“Haha, Weizhong, you’re truly a model of marital devotion—never forgetting your wife even at a time like this. I’ve never heard of you taking concubines or visiting brothels, which is no small feat. One bowl of noodle soup? I grant it. And I’ll reward you with ten jin of flour as well.”
Emperor Jiajing showed his favor toward Yan Song, not only approving the soup but adding a bonus of ten jin of flour.
Good heavens, no wonder he’s a Grand Secretary, the other ministers thought, suddenly feeling their own eating displays were too amateurish. They wanted to follow suit.
“Forget it, you’re too late. I only cultivated one mu and three fen of land, yielding just over two hundred sixty jin of wheat, which ground down to about two hundred jin of flour. After rewarding Weizhong with ten jin, I’m left with less than two hundred jin. I still have a vast harem to feed, so don’t set your sights on this flour,” Jiajing waved his hand, quashing the ministers’ budding requests.
A wave of regretful murmurs rippled through the group.
Soon, Jiajing finished his meal and signaled the attendants to clear the table.
Once the emperor was done, the ministers—even if they hadn’t finished—couldn’t continue eating and followed suit, allowing the attendants to remove their dishes.
The discussion resumed.
One issue after another, with differing factions, affiliations, and interest groups, the ministers argued heatedly over every topic. Even within Yan Song’s faction, disputes were fierce.
If you take more benefits, I get less; if you do less work, I end up with more.
I have to answer to my subordinates too, don’t I?
The hall buzzed with contention. Yan Song’s faction held the upper hand, leaving Li Mo and Xu Jie at a disadvantage. Xu Jie, in particular, was still currying favor with Yan Song, yielding on key issues, which allowed Yan’s group to dominate and pass resolutions with their numbers.
One topic after another.
By late afternoon, they reached the issue of the Japanese pirate problem.
“On the matter of the current Japanese pirate threat, my loyal subjects, what are your thoughts? Speak freely—no need to hold back. I’ll pardon all remarks, wise or foolish,” Emperor Jiajing set the tone, encouraging open discussion.
“There’s no other way to deal with the pirates but to strike hard—deploy heavy troops to wipe them out completely, so they’ll never dare covet our dynasty again,” an official from the Ministry of War spoke first.
“You make it sound easy. How do we strike hard? How do we kill them all? The pirate problem began in the false Yuan dynasty, persisted through the founding of our Great Ming, and has grown worse in our reign. It’s been centuries—if they were easy to eradicate, they’d have been wiped out long ago. Why else would we face this trouble today?” another official countered immediately.
“Then, Lord Ma, how do you propose we solve the pirate issue?” the Ministry of War official shot back, unconvinced.
“We can’t just rely on brute force. The pirates have persisted for centuries, proving they can’t be exterminated that way. We should combine suppression with appeasement—win over some, strike others,” the official suggested a dual approach.
“Why do the pirates raid our southeast? For wealth, plain and simple. Why not lift the maritime ban and allow sea trade? If they can gain riches through trade, why risk their lives as pirates?” Another official seized the chance to boldly propose lifting the ban and permitting maritime commerce.
But his words were cut off. “Nonsense! The maritime ban didn’t cause the pirates—the ban came because of the coastal pirate surge. Lord Wang, you’ve got it backwards!”
“Did the false Yuan have a maritime ban? No! Did they have pirates? Yes!”
“The pirate chaos stems from Japan itself—fractured and war-torn, with defeated warlords turning pirate, displaced peasants becoming pirates, and cash-strapped warlords joining them…”
“The only way to deal with them is to kill—kill one when one comes, kill a pair when two arrive—kill until they dare not come again!”
“The pirates plunder our people, burning, killing, and looting without restraint. They’re no better than beasts. How can our great dynasty negotiate with animals?!”
“It’s about using them, like the Song dynasty used Song Jiang—appease some to pit them against others, let them tear each other apart. Once the pirates are quelled, whether to kill or spare them is just a word away.”
The ministers’ views on handling the pirates clashed wildly, their arguments boiling over into a chaotic mess.
