Zhu Yuanzhang rubbed his hands together. “Biao’er.”
Sitting on the kang bed, Chen Biao twisted his little bottom and turned his back on Zhu Yuanzhang.
Zhu Yuanzhang continued rubbing his hands together. “Biao’er.”
Chen Biao flopped onto the bed and buried his head under the quilt, leaving only his little bottom sticking out, like a tiny kitten fooling itself into believing no one could see it.
Zhu Yuanzhang patted the little upturned bottom. “Biao’er, help your father out. I boasted in front of the Marshal and even made a military pledge…”
Chen Biao, dressed only in the red dudou embroidered by his mother, angrily popped out from under the quilt and bit down hard on Zhu Yuanzhang’s large hand.
Zhu Yuanzhang patted his puppy-like son. “Why are you biting people again?”
In a muffled voice, Chen Biao said, “My teeth are itchy. Dad, you’re trying to drive me to death.”
He couldn’t break through his father’s defenses by hitting him, and all it did was make his own little fists hurt. The only weapons he had that could actually injure his father were the tiny baby teeth in his mouth. He was helpless too.
Zhu Yuanzhang immediately said, “Don’t say ‘death.’ It’s bad luck.”
Chen Biao grumbled, “And making military pledges every chance you get is supposed to be lucky?”
Zhu Yuanzhang laughed awkwardly. Seeing how angry Chen Biao was, he also felt that dragging his son into trouble over a fit of stubbornness wasn’t very appropriate.
“I’ll go back and talk to the Marshal. At worst, I’ll get scolded.” Zhu Yuanzhang spoke casually. “Anyway, it was only a verbal military pledge I made to the Marshal in private. He probably didn’t take it seriously.”
Although Chen Biao was annoyed and full of complaints, the moment his father said that, he immediately objected.
“No! If you’ve made a military pledge, you have to fulfill it. Even if he doesn’t punish you now, he’ll punish you sooner or later!”
Zhu Yuanzhang couldn’t help laughing. “The Marshal isn’t the kind of person who settles scores afterward.”
Chen Biao patted his own little chest. “Dad, trust me. I’m an immortal child. Between you and me, who knows Marshal Zhu better?”
Zhu Yuanzhang: “…”
“You do. You know him best.”
Zhu Yuanzhang climbed onto the kang as well, lay down, pulled his chubby son into his arms, and rubbed him vigorously.
Chen Biao patted Zhu Yuanzhang’s thigh, then frowned because the muscles were too hard. He dragged over a soft cotton cushion, made a little nest on his father’s lap, and only then settled comfortably against Zhu Yuanzhang’s chest with his short arms folded, thinking about Yangzhou.
He had always known his father was an honest, kind-hearted man who was almost excessively good-natured.
But he had never imagined that his foolishly kind father would be so foolish as to take on the enormous burden of Yangzhou just to kill Zhang Mingjian.
Because Zhu Yuanzhang disliked the Jiangnan gentry, his father had gone and made a military pledge that he could revive Yangzhou without asking those gentry for any help?
It wasn’t impossible.
It was just extremely troublesome.
Thinking of Jiangnan, Chen Biao couldn’t help making a bitter face. Sighing like an old man, he said, “With Marshal Zhu so openly guarding against the Jiangnan gentry, the scholars of the future are definitely going to blacken his name until it’s as black as charcoal.”
Absentmindedly pinching his son’s chubby cheeks, Zhu Yuanzhang replied, “Oh. My… our Marshal is already as black as charcoal.”
Chen Biao folded his little arms and rolled his eyes dramatically at his father.
“Can he be darker than you?”
Every time his father came back from a campaign, he was so dark that he wouldn’t even need black clothes to sneak around as a thief at night.
Zhu Yuanzhang said, “About the same.”
Chen Biao nodded. “Then he really is pretty dark.”
After exchanging a few random remarks, Zhu Yuanzhang continued kneading his son’s plump cheeks and ruffling his chubby head, while Chen Biao kept his little arms folded and sank back into thought.
“The biggest problem in Yangzhou is that there aren’t enough people,” Chen Biao said. “Right now, ordinary commoners throughout Jiangnan are basically attached to the local gentry. If they refuse to provide manpower, our Chen family can’t possibly produce that many people. We can only rely on soldiers.”
Zhu Yuanzhang replied, “Our Red Turban Army has always combined soldiers and civilians. Once we reach Yangzhou, we’ll begin military farming.”
“The military colonies and civilian colonies have to be kept separate. Military farming alone can’t support a place as large as Yangzhou.” Chen Biao paused. “Is Zhang Mingjian really doomed?”
A flash of viciousness crossed Zhu Yuanzhang’s face before he sneered.
“He’s absolutely doomed. I just hope he’s stubborn enough to die in battle.”
Otherwise…
I’ll flay him alive with my own hands!
Chen Biao asked, “What about the remaining Qing troops?”
Zhu Yuanzhang answered calmly, “The Marshal intends to dig one huge pit and bury them all alive, so they can accompany the Yangzhou people who were eaten in death.”
Chen Biao wasn’t frightened by the bloodiness in Zhu Yuanzhang’s words. He calmly said, “As far as I remember, the Marshal doesn’t execute prisoners lightly.”
“He doesn’t execute them lightly,” Zhu Yuanzhang replied, “but that doesn’t mean he never does. If these men are left alive, they’ll only bring even greater disasters later.”
Chen Biao sighed.
“The Marshal has, at most, only around a hundred thousand troops who are truly capable of fighting. The Qing army numbers nearly twenty thousand. Is the Marshal worried that if those twenty thousand are broken up and absorbed into the Red Turban Army, they’ll ruin the military discipline that was so hard to establish?”
Zhu Yuanzhang rubbed his son’s big head.
“My son is so smart.”
“But now that the Marshal’s cause has only just begun to gain momentum,” Chen Biao continued, “executing so many prisoners of war will severely damage his reputation. In the future, whether he wants to accept surrendered generals or recruit talented recluses, everything will become much more difficult.”
Remembering the “Four Scholars of Eastern Zhejiang,” Zhu Yuanzhang’s expression darkened.
“If they won’t come, then let them stay away!”
Chen Biao laughed.
“Dad, you can’t be so stubborn. The Marshal must have a headache over this too. Go persuade him to spare these men’s lives. Give him a way to back down gracefully.”
Zhu Yuanzhang muttered, “I’m not going.”
Chen Biao turned around and pounded his father’s stomach with his little fists.
“Go already! There are more ways to punish them than burying them alive!”
He didn’t want to bite anyone, so all he could do was pound on his father’s stomach. It might not hurt his father, but at least it didn’t hurt his own hands.
Zhu Yuanzhang stuck out his belly and let Chen Biao hit it to his heart’s content.
“Biao’er, then what do you suggest?”
Chen Biao said, “Have the survivors in the city and the rank-and-file soldiers testify about the crimes committed by those officers. Execute the worst offenders, then erect a monument in Yangzhou recording everything they did so they’ll be remembered with everlasting infamy. Let the remaining Qing soldiers stay in Yangzhou as laborers, rebuilding the city to repay their crimes through hard labor. Those who work well can earn reduced sentences and be released early. As for the detailed arrangements, let the Marshal gather everyone together to work them out. He has so many capable people under him—we can’t be the only two using our brains.”
After thinking for a while, Zhu Yuanzhang reluctantly nodded.
“Fine. We do need people right now. But can Yangzhou really be revived just by relying on them?”
“Of course not.” Chen Biao shook his head. “The Marshal controls too little territory and has even fewer people. He can’t even cultivate all the land he already has. I do have a way to free up much more labor, but the Marshal would definitely never agree.”
Zhu Yuanzhang looked puzzled.
“Why?”
Chen Biao leaned against his father’s shoulder and whispered into his ear.
“My idea is to imitate the equal-field system of the Han and Tang dynasties. Women should also receive land, widows should be encouraged to remarry, and foot-binding should be prohibited. But Marshal Zhu is famous for disliking women. If you dared suggest letting women work outside the home, he’d definitely chop your head off.”
Zhu Yuanzhang was speechless.
“Your mother… your mother and the Marshal’s wife both work outside the home. What nonsense are you talking about? Didn’t the Marshal just order that all the women taken by the army be returned to their families, and those with nowhere to go be given money and grain so they could remarry? In times like these, countless widowed mothers are raising children alone. If women aren’t allowed to remarry or work outside the home, wouldn’t entire families simply starve to death?”
Chen Biao looked puzzled.
“Exactly. That’s what confuses me too. Why would the Marshal prohibit widows from remarrying and forbid women from working outside the home?”
In a feudal society, trying to lecture the rulers about women’s status was like playing the lute to a cow. The cow might even kick you to death.
But from the standpoint of practical interests, none of it made sense.
After founding a new dynasty in the aftermath of chaos, the most important task was restoring the population. In a feudal society, population was the foundation of everything.
At the beginning of the Han dynasty, in order to restore the population, women who remained unmarried beyond a certain age, and widows who stayed single for too many years, would cause their fathers and brothers to be punished.
In order to ensure enough people, Cao Cao would send soldiers off to war and then immediately dispatch men to take away their wives and daughters of childbearing age to remarry, allowing childbirth to continue without interruption.
As examples of feudal societies oppressing women, at least the early Han dynasty and Cao Cao’s policies had a clear logic and tangible benefits.
The Ming dynasty founded by Zhu Yuanzhang was built upon ruins. Across its vast territory, nine out of every ten households stood empty, and fertile fields stretched for thousands of miles with no one to cultivate them.
At such a time, he should have followed the examples of the early Han and early Tang dynasties by implementing the equal-field system while land was abundant, distributing more land to ordinary people—including women.
Although powerful clans and local magnates would inevitably seize the land again by every possible means, the more land that was distributed in the beginning, the faster the dynasty could recover, and the longer its golden age would last.
Yet Zhu Yuanzhang not only refused to allocate land to women, but in the first year of Hongwu he also issued policies honoring chaste widows and virtuous women, restricting widows from remarrying.
Afterward, women’s natal families and their husbands’ families sought rewards through those policies. Widows were often forced into suicide. Those who survived were still forbidden from going out to farm or work.
Ordinary peasant households became even more impoverished, child mortality remained extremely high, and the population failed to recover rapidly. As a result, the Ming dynasty’s period of recuperation was much more difficult than that of earlier dynasties.
Could Zhu Yuanzhang’s dislike of women really be more important than the future of the Ming Empire?
Chen Biao couldn’t understand it.
Neither could Zhu Yuanzhang.
He himself had grown up poor. He understood perfectly well that if widows were forbidden to remarry, then poor young men like his former self would probably never find wives.
Zhu Yuanzhang frowned.
“Biao’er, don’t listen to rumors. The Marshal has never done those things.”
At present, Zhu Yuanzhang’s policies toward women were actually quite reasonable and in line with those of any major feudal power—for example, encouraging women to farm and weave, discouraging foot-binding, and encouraging widows to remarry.
With all the men away fighting wars, if women didn’t farm and weave, where would his soldiers get food to eat and clothes to wear?
Even when Zhu Yuanzhang later captured the Yuan capital, he released the women of the Yuan imperial harem and encouraged them to remarry. He was like a completely different person from the Zhu Yuanzhang of the first year of Hongwu.
Chen Biao was still very young and rarely left home. Nearly all the information he received came from what the Chen family gathered for him.
From what they had collected, he also knew that Zhu Yuanzhang was still fairly normal at this stage.
Scratching his head, he said, “He hasn’t done those things yet? But in the future, that’s exactly the kind of person he’ll become.”
Zhu Yuanzhang frowned.
“In the future…”
He knew his son was an immortal child who occasionally spoke of things yet to come.
Zhu Yuanzhang often practiced fortune-telling. Back when he had been a monk, he had even pretended to be a wandering fortune-teller, so he understood some of its rules.
The greatest rule of fortune-telling was that one must not deliberately reveal Heaven’s secrets. Accidentally letting something slip was one thing, but intentionally observing the future would certainly bring punishment—and the future itself would change.
After all, the whole point of seeing the future was to avoid misfortune and seek good fortune, so naturally the future would change.
Thus, although Chen Biao seemed able to glimpse fragments of what lay ahead, Zhu Yuanzhang never took the initiative to ask him. Instead, whenever Chen Biao accidentally let something slip, Zhu Yuanzhang would simply think about how to make use of that knowledge.
Zhu Yuanzhang didn’t believe he was someone ruled by emotion. A man like that could never become the master of a great power.
How could his future self possibly do something that brought nothing but harm? He wasn’t some pedantic scholar who cared whether other people’s widows remained chaste…
Wait.
Pedantic scholars?
Zhu Yuanzhang suddenly recalled something that had happened recently and guessed why his future self might make such a decision.
He gently rubbed the little topknot on his son’s head.
“Recently, the civil officials under the Marshal have been urging him to acknowledge some distinguished ancestor to elevate his family background. You know, because the Marshal was once a peasant, a monk, and a beggar, many talented scholars refuse to join him. The ancestor they’ve chosen for him… is Zhu Xi.”
Chen Biao looked up. “Zhu Xi deserves that?”
Zhu Yuanzhang laughed. “Isn’t Zhu Xi considered half a sage? Why wouldn’t he deserve it?”
Chen Biao asked, “What exactly makes him a sage?”
Zhu Yuanzhang hadn’t read many books yet. He was currently studying history and hadn’t gotten around to Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism. He only knew that Master Zhu was famous.
He stammered, “No matter what, his background is better than the Marshal’s current one, isn’t it?”
Chen Biao snorted.
“So what you’re saying is that after the Marshal acknowledges Zhu Xi as his ancestor, he’ll vigorously promote his ancestor’s teachings, making them the dominant school of thought of the age. Then he’ll elevate Zhu Xi into a sage on par with Confucius, all to raise his own status and win more support from scholars?”
Zhu Yuanzhang nodded vigorously.
“Looking at the pros and cons, that’s the most likely explanation.”
Chen Biao continued irritably, “Then was it also Zhu Xi who taught him to make all the women in the imperial harem die in burial with him? Was it Zhu Xi who told him to revive the barbaric practice of human sacrifice, something that had already been abolished back in the Zhou and Han dynasties?”
Zhu Yuanzhang stared blankly.
“Huh? What? What human sacrifice?”
Chen Biao said, “Enough. Stop making excuses for him. Your Marshal Zhu is just that cruel. Every single time, you speak well of him as though he’s some benevolent ruler. Dad, wake up. I know you’re an honest, loyal man. Marshal Zhu recognized your talent, so you’ve devoted yourself wholeheartedly to him. But people change.”
Chen Biao had said so much because he was genuinely angry about his father’s military pledge.
As a transmigrator who understood the cannibalistic nature of feudal society, he naturally knew that no matter how high an official one became, it could never compare to being Emperor—especially an official under Emperor Hongwu. Today everything might be fine, but tomorrow you could lose your head simply because you stepped into the room with your left foot first.
Unfortunately, Chen Biao looked down at his tiny arms and legs.
By the time he grew old enough to rebel, Zhu Yuanzhang would already have been Emperor for years.
Trying to rebel against Emperor Hongwu just after the Ming dynasty was founded?
That would probably be like reenacting the classic showdown between the transmigrator Wang Mang and Heaven’s favored son Liu Xiu. Even ten lives wouldn’t be enough to throw away.
So Chen Biao had once set his sights on his own father.
Our father Chen Guorui is also a military general, and I’m a little God of Wealth. Maybe, while Zhu Yuanzhang and Chen Youliang are fighting, we could stab Zhu Yuanzhang in the back, kill him, and establish our own kingdom.
If you, Beggar Zhu, can sit on the Dragon Throne, then why can’t I, Chen the wealthy merchant?
Of course, Chen Biao hadn’t bluntly told Chen Guorui to rebel against Zhu Yuanzhang.
Getting beaten by Chen Guorui wasn’t the issue.
The real problem was that Old Chen was an honest simpleton who couldn’t keep anything to himself.
If Chen Biao openly talked about treason, even if Chen Guorui had no intention of rebelling, he’d probably still look guilty and nervous whenever he saw Zhu Yuanzhang.
And who was Zhu Yuanzhang?
A paranoid old madman.
Even though he wasn’t old yet, his paranoia was surely already severe. The moment Chen Guorui’s expression changed, Zhu Yuanzhang would become suspicious. By then, their family probably wouldn’t even live long enough to see the founding of the Ming dynasty before Zhu Yuanzhang had them all killed.
So Chen Biao had only tried to subtly increase Chen Guorui’s distrust of Zhu Yuanzhang. Even if his father never rebelled, at the very least he shouldn’t remain as completely unguarded as he was now.
But after years of subtly influencing him, what had Chen Guorui done?
He had gone and made a military pledge just to preserve Zhu Yuanzhang’s good reputation!
That nearly drove Chen Biao mad.
What the hell does Zhu Yuanzhang’s reputation have to do with you, Chen Guorui? And what does Zhu Yuanzhang’s dislike of the Jiangnan gentry have to do with you?
Who knows? Maybe one day I’ll even have a younger sister, and she might end up entering Zhu Yuanzhang’s harem—or one of his sons’ households—and then be forced to die in burial!
You may be loyal to Zhu Yuanzhang, but Zhu Yuanzhang won’t necessarily treat you well!
Chen Biao was furious.
How could he possibly have such a dense father?
Yet the denser his father was, the harder it was for him to stop worrying.
Chen Biao considered his own moral standards to be highly flexible, but at least he still had a conscience. People like him naturally admired those whose moral principles were rock solid and couldn’t help wanting to protect such “simpletons.”
Besides, if his father hadn’t been such an honest, straightforward man, then a prodigy as full of obvious flaws as himself would either have been burned alive as a monster or worshipped and exploited by his own family…
Well…
He seemed to be getting exploited now anyway.
The more Chen Biao thought about it, the angrier he became, scratching Zhu Yuanzhang’s arm as though it were a scratching post.
Zhu Yuanzhang had long known that Chen Biao was extremely resistant to “Marshal Zhu.”
He had originally thought that Chen Biao disliked “Marshal Zhu” because Zhu Yuanzhang himself had unintentionally shifted too much blame onto that imaginary “Marshal Zhu.”
But now he realized that Chen Biao’s prejudice had nothing to do with the blame he’d been shifting.
Deep down, Chen Biao truly believed that “Marshal Zhu” would eventually destroy their entire family.
Zhu Yuanzhang felt deeply dejected.
Just what sort of bizarre image did his son have of him?
No matter how hard he racked his brains, he couldn’t imagine himself ever doing those things his son described.
Well…
If he really acknowledged Zhu Xi as his ancestor, perhaps he really would elevate the status of Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism.
But what about human sacrifice?
That practice had been revived by the Mongol Yuan. When Genghis Khan died, not only were the people around him buried alive with him, but everyone encountered during the funeral procession was slaughtered as well and forced to accompany him in death.
He hated the Yuan bandits more than anything.
Why would he ever adopt one of their burial customs?
Awkwardly, Zhu Yuanzhang said, “Biao’er, could it be that you have some prejudice against Marshal Zhu? I understand, I understand. Marshal Zhu comes from an extremely humble background. Before joining the army, he was practically illiterate. Even now, he hasn’t read as much as any random xiucai you could find on the street. He was a monk, a beggar, an ordinary soldier. Outsiders all say he’s nothing but a thug, cruel by nature. Learned men refuse to serve him, and men of high moral standing always dislike him. Other people can proudly trace their ancestry, but all the Marshal has are generations of poor peasants, so he has no choice but to shamelessly claim Master Zhu as his ancestor…”
Before Zhu Yuanzhang could finish speaking, Chen Biao reached into the little pocket sewn onto the front of his dudou, pulled out a piece of hard candy wrapped in paper, peeled it open, and stuffed it into his father’s mouth.
Zhu Yuanzhang held the candy between his lips and blinked in confusion.
Chen Biao said irritably, “Dad, please shut up. If those words ever get out, our whole family is finished.”
Zhu Yuanzhang lowered his head, looking even more dejected.
Sucking on the candy, he murmured, “Biao’er… do you… do you also think that someone born a beggar simply isn’t worthy of becoming Emperor?”
Standing on Zhu Yuanzhang’s thigh, Chen Biao stretched his arms as high as he could and rapped his father’s forehead with his tiny clenched fist.
“Marshal Zhu’s claim to the throne is more legitimate than any in history.”
Zhu Yuanzhang’s eyes flew wide open.
My son is praising me?!
Did I hear that right?!
Seeing his father’s eyes bulging wider than a cow’s, Chen Biao assumed he didn’t understand, so he patiently explained in his childish voice.
“Dad, you’ve started studying now, haven’t you? I remember the first books you read were histories.”
Zhu Yuanzhang nodded vigorously.
He studied incredibly hard!
Every night he burned the midnight oil reading by lamplight!
Chen Biao sighed.
“The sages of the pre-Qin era already said: ‘The people are more important than the ruler. The people can support the boat, and they can also overturn it.’ Do you think the sages didn’t know that, in reality, an Emperor’s life was worth more than an ordinary person’s? Of course they knew. That’s precisely why they said those words—to remind Emperors that the people must never be mistreated.”
“Some members of the gentry deliberately twist the sages’ meaning. They claim that ‘the people’ actually refers to scholars or the aristocratic clans. They say that scholars are the finest among the people, and that winning scholars’ hearts means winning the people’s hearts. That’s complete nonsense. Dad, once you’ve read the ancient pre-Qin texts, you’ll know that only those registered for corvée labor were called ‘the people.’ ‘The people’ and ‘the scholar class’ were never the same social class.”
“Looking through history, what sounded the death knell of the Qin dynasty? The uprising of Chen Sheng and Wu Guang. What tolled the funeral bell of the Han dynasty? The Yellow Turban Rebellion. Even after surviving the An Lushan Rebellion, the glorious Tang dynasty managed to usher in another golden age, yet it was the Huang Chao Rebellion that ultimately dealt it the fatal blow. And now, there’s no need to look any further than the present. Marshal Zhu and you, Dad—you are the Red Turban Army.”
“Dad, every prosperous dynasty throughout history has ultimately fallen because the people overturned the boat. But who eventually became Emperor? The Sima family of the Jin dynasty were powerful aristocrats. The Yang family of the Sui dynasty were powerful aristocrats. The Li family of the Tang dynasty were powerful aristocrats. As for the Song dynasty, there’s even less to say. The maternal relatives seized the throne from an orphaned child and his widowed mother. There was nothing legitimate about it.”
“Dad, tell me—which of those Emperors who founded prosperous dynasties wasn’t born into privilege?”
Chen Biao reached up and touched Zhu Yuanzhang’s forehead again, his little face completely serious.
Without thinking, Zhu Yuanzhang blurted out,
“Liu Bang!”
Chen Biao smiled.
“That’s right. Liu Bang.”
“At the end of the Qin dynasty, nearly every major power was led by nobles descended from the Six States. Only Liu Bang came from humble origins. He led a band of poor brothers, carrying nothing more than a battered iron sword, and ventured into the chaos to seize the world.”
“How is that any different from Marshal Zhu?”
“Liu Bang began as nothing more than a village headman who hadn’t even served very long. Marshal Zhu began with nothing but a broken begging bowl. They threw themselves into a world in turmoil and won the empire. Was it because they possessed encyclopedic knowledge? Because they were paragons of virtue and universally respected?”
Zhu Yuanzhang shook his head blankly.
None of those descriptions fit Liu Bang.
Nor did they fit himself.
Chen Biao nodded.
“Exactly. They didn’t.”
“It was Heaven’s will.”
His tone was calm, but to Zhu Yuanzhang those words rang like a great bronze bell, making his ears buzz and his heart thunder in his chest.
Heaven’s will…
Heaven’s will?!
Chen Biao tried to clasp his short hands behind his back, but his body was a little too round and his little arms were too short, so he gave up in frustration.
“Dad, you said I’m prejudiced against Marshal Zhu? You’re right—I am.”
“Heaven chose Liu Bang, a man of humble birth, to become Emperor so he could restore order and allow the suffering common people to enjoy years of peace.”
“Liu Bang accomplished that. The Liu family produced several benevolent Emperors in succession. Their dynasty possessed immense heavenly fortune. Even after Wang Mang usurped the Han, another flourishing Eastern Han dynasty rose again. Today, Han is no longer merely the name of a fallen dynasty—it’s the name of a people. You and I are both Han.”
“Now it’s Zhu Yuanzhang’s turn. But what did he do? He acknowledged Zhu Xi as his ancestor. He embraced the doctrines of those aristocratic clans and powerful gentry. Once he himself had been weak, but after becoming strong, he raised his butcher’s knife against those even weaker than himself just to curry favor with the scholars who upheld Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism.”
“What kind of person was Zhu Xi? During the Two Song dynasties, the great scholars of the age looked down on his Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism with contempt. Even the Yuan dynasty paid him little attention. If Zhu Yuanzhang hadn’t vigorously promoted him, would he have dared call himself a sage?!”
“The dragon slayer failed to become the Dragon King who protects the people. Instead, he became a savage dragon himself.”
Chen Biao took a deep breath.
“He betrayed the Heaven’s will that chose him. So, Dad, it’s not that I’m prejudiced against him. It’s…”
“Ah? Dad, what are you doing?”
Overjoyed, Zhu Yuanzhang leaped straight off the kang, scooped up his chubby son, and repeatedly tossed him high into the air.
Did you hear that?!
My immortal son said it was Heaven’s will that I become Emperor!
Ha ha!