Take control of Wei Zhongxian at the start and confiscate 100 million from him!

Chapter 48 On this land, there is only one master.

"You...you...you audacious traitor..."

Zhou Yanru struggled to get up from the ground, still babbling incoherently, threatening with the most vicious words he could think of, "I...I will definitely submit a memorial, I will impeach you in court! I will make sure your whole family dies without a burial place!"

Zhou Quan stepped on Zhou Yanru's face, looking down at him condescendingly.

Zhou Quan's face remained expressionless, as if Zhou Yanru's threat was nothing more than the chirping of cicadas in summer, laughable and powerless.

He pulled out a roll of bright yellow silk with golden dragons embroidered on the edges from his bosom.

“Minister Zhou,” Zhou Quan’s voice was very soft and gentle, like a whisper in a lover’s ear, but it carried a chilling undertone, “Don’t rush to curse me.”

He slowly unfolded the imperial edict in front of Zhou Yanru.

Read clearly word for word:
"The emperor is destined to be carried by heaven, and the edict says:"

"Zhou Yanru, the Right Vice Minister of the Ministry of Rites, is a high-ranking official who receives the emperor's salary but is utterly ignorant of loyalty to the emperor. Instead, he colludes with Shanxi merchants on the border, forming cliques to commit wicked deeds, supplying money and grain to the enemy, aiding bandits, and selling weapons, thus undermining the foundation of the nation!"

"His intentions are despicable! His crimes deserve death!"

"Upon hearing this, I am deeply grieved!"

"Issuing Zhou Quan, the Director of the Western Depot, to immediately arrest the wicked official Zhou Yanru and send him to the imperial prison! All his property shall be confiscated and stored in the treasury! All his accomplices shall be captured without fail!"

"Appreciate this!"

Every word on the imperial edict was like a red-hot iron hammer, smashing into Zhou Yanru's mind.

When the last cold "So be it" was clearly uttered from Zhou Quan's mouth.

Zhou Yanru was completely stunned. Although Zhou Quan's foot had been removed from his face, he had forgotten to get up.

The anger, humiliation, resentment, and malice on his face... all his expressions froze completely at this moment, then shattered and peeled away inch by inch like porcelain struck by a heavy hammer.

All that remained was a deathly, utterly blank space.

They colluded with Shanxi merchants.

They aided the enemy and colluded with bandits.

Shake the foundation of the country.

Treason!
Collaboration with the enemy and treason!

These are all heinous crimes written into the "Great Ming Code," punishable by death by a thousand cuts and the extermination of three generations of one's family!

He is finished.

Everything about him—his talent, his ambitions, his dignity, his future—all of it turned into a colossal joke in the face of these few words of imperial decree.

A scalding, foul-smelling liquid gushed forth from beneath him, soaking his fine silk trousers from Suzhou and Hangzhou, leaving a growing puddle on the cold, polished gold-brick floor.

Just moments before, the Vice Minister of Rites had been vehemently advocating for upholding the law and defending the dignity of civil officials.

It completely collapsed in the face of the unreasonable iron fist of imperial power.

Zhou Yanru even forgot the pain in his forehead.

Like a dog with its spine broken, he crawled on all fours, tears streaming down his face, to Zhou Quan's feet, clinging tightly to his leg and howling in a completely distorted voice.

"No...it wasn't me...Sir...Sir...I...I've been framed! I was framed by that damned, unscrupulous merchant Fan Yongdou! I didn't know anything!"

“I want to see His Majesty! Please, let me see His Majesty! I need to speak to the Emperor! I have something to say! I have so much to say!” “Please… sir… please plead with His Majesty for me… I will never dare to do it again… I will hand over all my money… all of it! Please, spare my life… spare my life…”

A flicker of expression finally appeared on Zhou Quan's face—utter disgust!
He raised his foot as if kicking away something filthy, and kicked Zhou Yanru away heavily.

He turned to the guards behind him, who had remained silent like statues the entire time, and gave them his orders:

“Gag him with a rag.”

"take away."

……

The night is still deep.

But the tranquility of the capital had been completely shattered, though this shattering occurred silently within the tightly closed gates of each mansion.

The same scene was played out in more than a dozen places in Beijing, with the same efficiency and in the same cold-blooded manner.

A doctor from the Ministry of Works was dragged naked from the warm and soft bed of his most beloved concubine by the West Depot's servants, and shackled amidst the terrified screams of his wives, concubines, and children.

A senior official in the Ministry of War, thinking himself clever, immediately hid in the cellar of his study after hearing the commotion. Just as he was carrying boxes of neatly stacked gold bars, preparing to escape through the secret passage, the cellar door was suddenly kicked open.

In the south of the city, the Shanxi Merchants Guild Hall, "Dashengkui," which was usually bustling with activity and could be called the commercial hub of the entire north, was surrounded by layers of guards from the West Depot, as if it were an iron barrel.

All the staff and guards who tried to take up swords to resist were mercilessly killed on the spot. There was no persuasion to surrender, no confrontation, only slaughter!
Blood stained the ledgers that recorded the sinful transactions.

The towering flames illuminated the faces of the usually domineering shopkeepers, turning them deathly pale and filled with terror and despair.

That night, imperial power, this long-dormant machine of state violence, was put into full operation!
With the sharpest claws, they tore apart the hypocritical facade of the civil service class that supposedly exempted high-ranking officials from punishment.

With the coldest, iron fist, he clearly declared to everyone in the entire empire, whether high-ranking officials or wealthy merchants:

On this land.

It has only one owner.

That's the young new emperor sitting in the Qianqing Palace!
When the first wisps of pale gray dawn finally appeared on the eastern horizon.

The midnight thunder that swept through the entire capital city has finally come to an end.

The people who got up early to start their day's work pushed open their doors and stood frozen in fear.

They saw that the usually bustling Shanxi shops had all closed their doors overnight, with two pale seals pasted across them.

Above the seal, the Western Depot's seal, representing absolute power and endless terror, coldly watched every passerby who dared to pry, like the open eyes of the King of Hell.

Groups of people, chained together like livestock with cold chains, were escorted out of mansions that they would never have dared to look up at on ordinary days.

Among them were wealthy merchants who lived a life of luxury and were always surrounded by servants, court officials wearing official robes and hats, and beautiful and jeweled family members.

At this moment, they were all the same: disheveled, unkempt, and their faces were filled with numbness, fear, and despair.

Like a herd of livestock, they were brutally driven by the expressionless servants of the Western Depot, who used their scabbards to drive them staggering toward that hell on earth that everyone feared, a place where it was said no one who went in would ever come out alive.

The capital city was shaken.

An invisible, chilling fear, like the most terrible plague, spread rapidly in officialdom, in the business world, and in the hearts of every self-righteous clever person!
Everyone wanted to know what had happened.
But no one can provide the answer!

(End of this chapter)