Quick Wear: Random Cheats

Chapter 60: The Princess Takes the Blame and is Granted Death (End)
Faced with Ding Shui's response, the new crown prince Zhu An could only continue to stand there in a daze and remain silent, because he didn't know how to answer or what to do.

Question? He didn't dare...

I don't have the face to question anything.

After all, he knew very well that Meng had done nothing wrong. It was his father who wanted to protect his own reputation and his thirteenth brother, Prince Lu, which led to Meng being unjustly blamed and executed. In this regard, it was their royal family who was in the wrong.

It was his father who was in the wrong.

He was not as shameless as his father. He would not righteously blame others when it was clearly his own fault.

Of course, more importantly, the means and abilities the other party had now displayed were beyond the reach of an ordinary mortal or ordinary spirit. At least from his own perspective, it was unprecedented, and it was unclear whether anyone would surpass it. Even if he wanted to object, to fight, to demand the other party release his father, it would probably be meaningless and ineffective, other than angering them.

Reason and emotion are fighting fiercely in my mind.

After a long time, he sighed and asked:

"What do you want me to do with you?"

No matter how he thought about it, Zhu An felt that he had no ability or room to resist. Since he couldn't resist, he might as well listen to what the other party wanted to do first.

A puppet prince is still a prince, and a puppet emperor is still an emperor. It is better than just dying without cooperating.

"Actually, I can do these things now, but I don't want to attribute these achievements to your father, Emperor Tianwu. Otherwise, you wouldn't be needed. So don't act reluctant, as if you are responsible.

Come, look, this is the plan I have drawn up."

Out of resentment towards Emperor Tianwu, Ding Shui was unwilling to let him achieve any political achievements before his death. Therefore, the policy revision plans that had been decided previously could not be implemented with Emperor Tianwu's body. He could only give these achievements to the new crown prince Zhu Anu for nothing.

Of course, this refers to the future hundreds of years later. It should not be considered a political achievement now. At least the officials, nobles, or royal family members will definitely not admit it. Instead, they may accuse Ding Shui's changes of being chaotic politics and misconduct.

After all, those new policies harmed their interests.

After saying this, Ding Shui showed Zhu An the new policy plan he had written a month ago. Zhu An took it with great curiosity and began to read it carefully. The more he read, the more surprised he became, even to the point of panic and fear. Before he had even finished reading, he looked at Ding Shui with an expression of disbelief and angrily questioned:
"What on earth do you want to do? This is called merit?"

"You want me to die without a burial place."

Zhu An was no fool. Although he hadn't read the entire plan, the first few pages alone had him sweating profusely. Admittedly, these plans seemed promising. If perfectly executed, they would undoubtedly be beneficial to stabilizing the Zhu family's rule. He might even become the greatest emperor of all time, or even create a ranking of past and present emperors.

At least we can fight for the top three and guarantee the top five.

But the key is, can it really be implemented?
Almost every new policy went against the vested interest groups. The gentry were required to serve and pay taxes, which undoubtedly offended the vast gentry group. The fire consumption was collected by the public, which offended the local tax collectors who made money from it. The tax rate was based on the amount of land, which offended all the big landlords. The subsequent demotion and inheritance of titles required an assessment, which offended the nobles.

As for the final reduction of the feudal lords, he has not seen it yet, but even if he has not seen it, the groups he offended before have already made him extremely panicked, and he almost wants to make the whole world his enemy.

He even had some suspicion now that Ding Shui wanted him, the prince, to be the knife for implementing these policies. If they failed, he would sacrifice him as the prince to quell the possible unrest in the world.

Even if it succeeds, it probably won't have a good reputation.

But...how can it be successful?
In just a moment, Zhu An looked at Ding Shui again with eyes full of caution. He felt that Ding Shui simply wanted to harm him. Even if his biological father came, he would probably tremble in his heart and would not dare to do these things.

After all, once these policies were implemented, the emperor would basically have no friends left, and he would become a lonely man.

"Don't worry, I won't harm you. Even if I really want to, there's no need to go through so much trouble. I know these new policies may cause trouble, but the benefits are also obvious.

And I'm not discussing with you, I'm informing you and asking you to cooperate. If you don't cooperate, I have plenty of ways to make you cooperate. After all, I can even control your father's body, so it's no big deal to control you too.

What... never mind, I'll let you experience it."

Ding Shui was still quite unsure of his ability to talk nonsense, and felt that it would be difficult to convince Zhu An to cooperate fully by just talking big. So after thinking it over, he decided to see for himself. With that, he pulled his soul out of Emperor Tianwu's body, then entered Zhu An's body and squeezed him out directly.

The result was that the next second, Zhu An felt as if he was floating in a trance, and then he saw a strange yet familiar self, grinning with his teeth bared.

Fortunately, Ding Shui had told him in advance that he wanted to experience it, so it was not difficult for him to understand what state he was in now. But it was precisely because of this understanding that he became even more panicked and tried desperately to get back into his body.

But it's useless. Not only is it useless, but I can also clearly feel that my soul is rapidly becoming weaker.

If this continues, even if he doesn't die, he will get seriously ill, so Ding Shui can only leave his body quickly and let his soul return to its place smoothly.

Zhu An, who had returned to his body, staggered because his soul had suffered some damage. He held on to a chair beside him and finally managed to stabilize his body. He gasped and looked at Ding Shui in horror.

Really, everything is true.

This guy is really soul-stirring.

At this moment, he completely understood that there was no possibility for him to refuse. The next second, he couldn't help but smile bitterly and said, "I don't understand why you are doing this. Even if you really accomplish these things, it won't be very good for you. Wouldn't the Zhu family still rule the world?

But logically speaking, shouldn't you hate us? When you hate my father, you also hate all the Zhu family members."

"If I didn't care about the suffering of the people and didn't want the world to be in chaos, do you think I would be willing to keep your Zhu family?
Ancient immortals, possessing powers, would at least do something beneficial to the world. I can't just use mine for revenge. The powers I've demonstrated now are just small tricks, amusing jokes, before officially implementing these new policies.

I'll take you to my secret base.

Then you will know where my confidence comes from."

Ding Shui originally didn't want to go through so much trouble. After all, even if she didn't do anything and simply asked her sister to donate those high-yield breeds and excellent livestock cubs, it would be enough for their family to go down in history and have an extraordinary amulet. No one would dare to take the risk of touching their house.

But in this case, Ding Shui really couldn't guarantee whether those high-yield breeds and excellent livestock cubs could flow into the public. After all, hoarding and even blocking the flow of goods up and down are the instincts of some gentry families.

If she came up with so many good things, they would eventually become a means for gentry, officials, and even nobles to make money.

Ding Shui felt like he was really going to be pissed off to death.

In addition, Emperor Tianwu happened to have suffered a stroke and was on his deathbed, so she needed to temporarily take over Emperor Tianwu's body to stabilize the situation. Since she was already here and had become the emperor, it would be convenient for her to do something more.

But some things have to be seen to be believed.

So Ding Shui didn't go into too much detail.

I plan to take him back to the planting base to explain in detail.

"No matter how confident you are, you can't implement all of those new policies at once. You have to do them one by one, slowly. Issue one policy first, completely suppress the group it targets, and stabilize the situation. Then, issue another. Only by dealing with them one by one can you have a slight chance of success."

Since it doesn't make sense, I can't refuse it either.

Zhu An could only make suggestions, at least to give these new policies a glimmer of hope for success. If all of them were implemented at the same time, it would be impossible for them to succeed, and the whole world would inevitably rebel.

Ding Shui rolled his eyes at him.
"I'm not stupid. Do I need to remind you of this? I just showed you my plan, not saying we have to execute it together. The simplest, least resistant, and most urgently needed new policy is on the last page. You didn't see it. It's about reducing the power of the feudal lords. It's a good opportunity to take advantage of the fact that all the feudal lords are in the capital right now and wipe them out in one fell swoop."

If you miss this opportunity, you'll probably have to wait until your father's body celebrates its 70th or 80th birthday.

Or dead.

They were able to gather together just to attend the funeral.

But I didn't plan for him to live that long, so attending the funeral was the only way to gather everyone together again. But it's not nice to say that I'm reducing the power of the vassal states in front of the coffin. It's better to do it while your father is still alive in this body to reduce the criticism. I'm doing this for your own good.

How about it? Any objections?

Zhu An didn't say anything, but quickly picked up the plan that he had not finished reading and carefully read the unfinished part, which was the part about reducing the power of the feudal lords.

It gives local princes two choices.

One is to give up all fiefdoms and other powers and become a peaceful prince in the capital. The other is to go to a place outside the territory of the country and conquer a piece of land for yourself. To truly split the land and become a king, you only need to pay tribute every year.

In short, the ambitious princes who want to take risks can go out and start their own businesses, while those who have no ambitions and are willing to be a peaceful prince can just live a comfortable life in the capital.

In addition, there will be fewer restrictions in all aspects.

Although we can't run around, we can still go out for travel as long as we ask for permission. Overall, we are much freer than before.

But correspondingly, the power is also much less.

In fact, for him, he would rather only implement the first point, that is, to keep all the vassal kings under his own eyes in the capital. After all, those vassal kings who were released would eventually be hidden dangers. What if one day after fighting outside for four or five generations, they became strong and backfired?
The Qin State was the remnant of the six generations of the Qin Dynasty.

Did they finally destroy the six kingdoms?

However, he also knew that he had no say in front of Ding Shui, so he just mentioned it tactfully. Seeing the dissatisfaction on Ding Shui's face, he didn't continue.

As the two sides finally reached a tacit understanding.

Things will be much easier from now on.

The next day, Ding Shui helped Zhu An one last time and personally issued an edict to reduce the power of the princes. Now those princes were all sons of Emperor Tianwu, so his reduction of the power of the princes was like a father beating his son, and everyone had to accept it no matter how dissatisfied they were.

But if Zhu An came to power and reduced the power of the feudal lords.

It is inevitable that some people will think that he is mean and ungrateful, and treats his brothers harshly, etc. In short, his reputation is definitely not good.

The entire process of reducing the power of the princes lasted for three days. The princes cried and made a fuss, but Ding Shui had made up his mind after all, so their crying and making a fuss was useless. The most important thing was that no civil or military officials or nobles were willing to support them.

After all, they have enjoyed so many years of happiness. Who doesn't have some complaints about them, or rather, dissatisfaction with injustice rather than lack of wealth? Anyway, if there is a quarrel, it will be an internal matter of the royal family.

They are too lazy to get involved.

At this moment they were all watching the fun, not realizing the seriousness of the problem and that this was just the beginning.

After all, the arm cannot twist the thigh, so those princes had no choice but to hand over their power, and then send people back to their fiefdoms to move their wives, children, servants, and all their property back to the capital.

Even if they already brought their children back.

I also have to go back and move my property here.

As for going abroad to conquer the world, even if the imperial court was willing to help, no one would be willing to do so. Who would go out and suffer so much for no reason? It sounds good to say that once you go out, you will be directly given a title of king, and the amount of land you conquer will be your fiefdom. But what if you fail? You will lose your life if you fail, so what's the point of being crowned a king?
Ding Shui was actually a little disappointed about this.

Crown Prince Zhu An heaved a sigh of relief. However, Ding Shui didn't force him. After the reduction of the feudal system was successfully completed, she secretly took Zhu An to the Taoist temple where her sister lived in the middle of the night and showed him the high-yield crops and excellent livestock.

Of course, I must have discussed this with my sister in advance.

So the process went smoothly and there were no problems.

Seeing those high-yield varieties, Zhu An, who had originally only a 30% chance of completing his new policy, suddenly felt that with these high-yield varieties, he could at least achieve 70%. Most importantly, his reputation should not be too bad. After all, as long as these high-yield varieties appeared during his reign, even if they offended the literati and were smeared, such a great achievement could not be erased.

He, who attached great importance to his reputation both during his lifetime and after his death, finally breathed a sigh of relief and felt that he could work with Ding Shui with peace of mind.

Immediately afterwards, Ding Shui stated decisively at the next grand court meeting that he had been seriously ill and had not recovered. He had been holding on recently, but he still lacked energy, so he decided to abdicate and become the emperor.

Needless to say, all the officials and nobles were shocked. At the same time, they were not sure, or not sure what the current emperor meant, so they all tried to persuade him to stay.

No matter how happy you are inside.

No matter how much you want to avoid abdication, it would be better if you died suddenly.

On the surface, everyone still says that His Majesty is still young, healthy, and full of energy. Such a wise and powerful leader must not retire and must continue to lead them.

Crown Prince Zhu An also shirked responsibility according to the rules.

It was at this time that some old foxes had guessed that the current emperor might really want to abdicate, because the prince did not show any panic, but declined with a smile.

According to their understanding, if the Crown Prince was unaware of this matter, he would most likely panic, fearing that the Emperor was dissatisfied with him or wanted to do something. After all, since ancient times, there have been very few people who voluntarily abdicated to become the Emperor, and most of them were forced or voluntary.

But now the prince declined so calmly.

It is highly likely that the father and son had already discussed it long ago and wanted to abdicate. Although it seems a bit unbelievable, one even suspects that Emperor Tianwu has lost his mind as he has made so many strange moves recently.

But still actively cooperated.

Follow the process of three refusals and three concessions.

Strictly speaking, this process should have taken three days to complete, but Ding Shui was too lazy to bother, and she wasn't particularly happy being the emperor. She had to get up before dawn every day to review memorials, and the ministers, especially the civil servants, wrote in such a jargon-free manner that it was a headache to read. So Ding Shui managed to compress the entire process into a single day, completing it swiftly during the morning court session.

In the morning she was still the emperor.

When he returned home at night, he became the emperor.

It’s all about efficiency!!!

It can be said that when the court was dismissed, many ministers were still confused. They could not understand why Emperor Tianwu, who looked fine and had no serious illness, suddenly abdicated. Who would go to recuperate with a rosy complexion?

However, out of caution, most ministers ultimately decided not to rush to pledge their loyalty to the newly ascended emperor. After all, if Emperor Tianwu merely pretended to abdicate, while still holding onto power, the new emperor would effectively be no different from the regent, with the added title of emperor. Therefore, with the uncertainty surrounding the situation, most fence-sitters remained undecided about whether to fall.

But they soon discovered.

The development of things was far beyond their expectations.

Emperor Tianwu gave up power very thoroughly. He announced his abdication during the morning court session, completed the abdication ceremony before lunch, and moved to another palace in the evening.

The core palaces such as the Zichen Hall.

All were given to the new emperor.

In addition, all the power in his hands, including a series of personnel such as the Imperial Guards, were handed over to the new emperor. He even directly announced that he would rest and recuperate and would not see guests for the time being.

To be honest, if I didn’t know what Emperor Tianwu was capable of.

Some people suspected that he was forced to abdicate and imprisoned.

After that, the new emperor would primarily stabilize the situation within the previous dynasty and promote his trusted aides, ultimately securing complete control of government. Ding Shui had already left Emperor Tianwu's body and used a synthesis system to restore his body to its original state, a hemiplegic stroke. He then fed him a generous bowl of Crane's Beak Red every day.

You don’t need to eat after eating.

The red-crowned crane alone can feed him.

Every time Emperor Tianwu was about to be poisoned to death, Ding Shui would quickly use the synthesis system to fuse the toxins into his nails or hair, and then pull out his nails and hair, and the poison would be neutralized.

You can continue to eat it the next day.

He ate like this for a while, until all his fingernails, toenails, and even hair were pulled out. Ding Shui then stopped using the synthesis system to prolong his life, and instead synthesized blood clots for him. After a while, a large number of blood clots completely blocked his brain.

A large amount of blood clots caused Emperor Tianwu to die suddenly on the spot.

From then on, the original body's resentment was completely dissipated.

With the death of Emperor Tianwu, Ding Shui naturally informed the new emperor. The mess that needed to be dealt with afterwards, namely collecting the corpse, covering the wounds on the body, and arranging the specific funeral arrangements, were also handed over to the new emperor Zhu An, and there was no need to worry at all that he would not do his best.

After all, the deceased was his biological father, and it was his responsibility to do all these things, including handling the funeral.

Secondly, he didn't dare let anyone see the wounds on his father, Emperor Tianwu. If anyone saw that Emperor Tianwu's fingernails and hair were completely gone, people would inevitably speculate that he had abused and murdered his father. Even the legitimacy of his succession to the throne would be questioned.

As for Ding Shui, there is nothing to worry about.

After all, who could suspect a dead person like her?
For these reasons, no matter how depressed and dissatisfied Zhu An was, he had no choice but to do his best to help cover it up, be a filial son and grandson, and send his biological father on his way.

Next comes the period of mourning.

After the mourning period is over, he continues to work hard to seize power.

Zhu An would never dare to issue the new policies that Ding Shui asked him to implement when the power succession was not yet stable and he was unable to promote his own confidants.

I don't even dare to reveal my thoughts.

Meanwhile, Ding Shui had already moved back to her sister's place and continued to consume the remaining energy in the super synthesis system to conduct more synthesis experiments. She definitely couldn't go back until the energy of this golden finger was exhausted and scrapped, otherwise it would be a waste.

She doesn't have many noble and good qualities.

But frugality is undoubtedly one of them.

So, in order to avoid waste and help his sister Meng Xuan buy more land to expand planting and cultivate more seeds for future planting, half a year after the new emperor ascended the throne, Ding Shui split up the several royal palaces that had been previously put into the synthetic storage space and didn't know where to throw them, and sold them as raw materials.

She had used the royal tombs to smash the Taimiao, but she had kept the royal palace in the synthetic storage space after taking it away. Now she had cleaned it up and split it up to sell it off.

Not only did the synthetic storage space suddenly become much more spacious and tidy, but he also harvested nearly 100,000 taels of silver.

Even though the land near the capital was expensive, one could still buy a lot with ten thousand taels. In addition, with the cooperation of the new emperor, a number of tight-lipped hired farmers were specially transferred from the imperial farm to help with the planting.

Breeding of high-quality crop seeds and livestock pups.

The expansion went quite smoothly.

Finally, two and a half years later, that is, three years after the new emperor ascended the throne, Meng Xuan presented the seeds and made it clear that these seeds were given by the Queen Mother of Heaven. She was just a middleman and helped to cultivate them for a few years.

She didn't want to take all the credit for her sister's work.

Ding Shui originally wanted to let her sister Meng Xuan take all the credit, or at most bring her parents along, saying that they worked together to find these seeds in the wild and even overseas, and cultivated them.

But Meng Xuan said the flaw was too big.

Maybe the whole family will be harassed, so it is better to tell the truth and say that it was a gift from the Goddess of Heaven.

Don't know anything else.

They can't harass the Queen Mother of Heaven.

After being persuaded by Meng Xuan and Zhu An, who also felt that the theory of God's gift would be more conducive to his implementation of the new policy, Ding Shui finally agreed after their persuasion.

Anyway, no one knows who the Queen Mother of Justice is.

Besides, the energy of the synthesis system has reached its limit, and she will have to leave here soon, so it doesn't matter.

After that, it's just normal development routine.

Some officials didn't believe it, and then they were slapped in the face. After it was verified to be true, a group of people went crazy and said that Your Majesty must be a holy emperor, because only the gods could have given him such a good seed.

Next up was the canonization of the Queen Mother of Heaven as a true deity.

Meng Xuan is the first-rank Youguo Yuanjun.

Originally they wanted to confer the title of princess on her, but the ministers all thought that since she was a Taoist nun, she should naturally be given a Taoist title. In Taoism, the highest level of a living person is generally the first-rank immortal, but immortals are mostly canonized Taoist priests rather than Taoist nuns. In addition, many female gods are called Yuanjun, so they made an exception and conferred her the title of first-rank Yuanjun.

She is a lady of the same rank as a super-class lady, and she does not need to bow when she sees you.

As the relevant news spread throughout the world, especially the high-yield and high-quality varieties, Zhu An's prestige reached its peak, and he began to implement the new policy in an orderly manner.

It ended up taking fifteen years.

Finally, the Dingshui New Policy Plan was completed.

It is known in history as the Xingwu Reform, and the last ten years of the Tianwu Dynasty and the thirty-four years of the Xingwu Dynasty are known as the Tianxing Prosperity.

By this time, Ding Shui had long since passed away. To be precise, she had passed away fourteen years earlier, less than a year after Emperor Xingwu Zhu An began implementing his new policies. Therefore, he continued to implement the new policies not because he was threatened by Ding Shui, but because he knew that those policies would help stabilize the imperial power.

When your prestige is strong enough.

Why not continue to promote it?
Not only did he implement it, but before his death he also specially established ancestral precepts to fix certain policies and not allow future generations to modify them.

As for the effect, we can only say that the descendants are unfilial.

(End of this chapter)