Wandering the Heavens

"The emperor was grateful for my contribution to the sea voyage, and he gave me the surname Zheng and the name Yang, following the story of Emperor Taizong and the eunuch Sanbao." Yu Xian bowed towards the north.

"Haha, so what? The thing missing from your crotch can't grow back. You are still a slave of my Zhu family!" Zhu Chenhao regained his confidence here.

"Take him away. I will escort him to the capital after I have taken care of all the funeral affairs!" Yu Xian ordered slowly.

"Left Censor-in-Chief of the Censorate and Governor of Southern Jiangxi Wang Shouren greets Lord Zheng!" Wang Shouren spoke first after being nervous for a long time.

"Lord Wang, there is no need to do this. You should stabilize the situation in Jiangxi as soon as possible and prepare to go to Beijing!" Yu Xian said to the skinny old man in front of him.

Brain-burning things are also harmful to the body. He is obviously less than 50 years old, but he looks almost as old as Cao Zhengchun.

"What? I didn't receive the imperial edict to go to Beijing?" Wang Shouren was a little surprised.

"I am dying, and the Port of Tianjin is handed over to you, and those good children are handed over to you. Take good care of them, because the Ming Dynasty still has to rely on them! And remember, the emperor can do whatever he wants, except for going to the south of the Yangtze River, the emperor must stay away from the water!" Yu Xian was too lazy to chat with him and told him directly.

Everyone present felt like they were listening to a joke. No one would say that about themselves.

However, the dead eunuch ignored everyone's thoughts, found a clean place to sit down cross-legged, and died with his head lowered.

"Lord Wang, this..." Wu Wendi was a little suspicious that everything he saw was an illusion.

A powerful eunuch who made countless civil officials hate him so much that they ate his flesh and slept on his skin died so easily? Is it really so easy?

"Farewell, Lord Zheng!" Wang Shouren led the generals to pay respectful tribute to the corpse.

"Come here, prepare a coffin and bury Lord Zheng's body for safekeeping. I will write a memorial to the emperor and then deal with it." Wang Shouren stood up and ordered his personal soldiers to prepare the coffin.

"Don't worry, Lord Wang. Lord Zheng has already given instructions." The deputy general wiped his tears and stopped Wang Shouren's order.

The guards brought some bundles of dry firewood, covered the body, and poured some cans of kerosene on it.

"Light the fire! Brothers, let's see Master Zheng off!"

After the deputy general finished speaking, he took off his helmet and held it to his waist. The soldiers raised their firearms and fired three times into the sky. The warships parked in the lake also fired three shots in unison.

Wang Shouren watched all this with a complicated expression. This man has always been extremely clear about his position and knew what he was doing. He wanted to burn the body into ashes so that his enemies and political opponents would have no way to settle accounts with him.

However, when Wang Shouren met Zhengde with the memorial, he realized that he was wrong.

"You damn eunuch, you didn't even say goodbye to me properly before you left. You knew Cao Zhengchun didn't deserve such posthumous honors, so you might as well burn his body." Zhengde pinched the memorial in his hand.

"Wang Shouren, Left Censor-in-Chief of the Censorate and Governor of Southern Jiangxi!" Zhengde looked at the chosen successor.

"I'm here!" Wang Shouren knelt down hurriedly.

"When the Ning clan rebelled, Wang Shouren went through hardships alone and finally defeated the rebels in a battle at Poyang Lake and captured the leader of the rebels. For his great merit, he is granted the title of Xinjian Earl, and the title is hereditary. He is relieved of his posts as Left Censor-in-Chief of the Censorate and Governor of Southern Jiangxi with immediate effect, and is appointed as the Director of the Railway Department of the Ministry of Revenue, Commissioner of Tianjin Port, and Commander of Qiongzhou Guard. He will also be the deputy principal of the Military Academy, the deputy principal of the Railway Academy, and the deputy principal of the Tiangong Academy." Zhengde said as he walked up to Wang Shouren and personally handed the two imperial edicts to him.

These official positions were created by Zhengde himself and were not of high rank. Wang Shouren did not know the value of these positions at that time.

One was an imperial edict conferring a title, and the other was an imperial edict appointing him to office.

"My lord, thank you, Your Majesty, for your kindness!"

"Get up! I thought that Zheng Yang's successor would be Shangguan Haitang, Gui Hai Yidao, or even Cheng Shifei, or a deputy general in the Shenji Camp, but I never expected that it would be a civil servant he had never dealt with before." Zhengde seemed to be talking to himself.

"I have also heard of Lord Zheng's reputation, but I have never dealt with him..." Wang Shouren didn't know what to say.

"I'm afraid it's not a good reputation! He doesn't hesitate to say in front of me that he does dirty work." Zhengde actually joked with a minister: "Go to Tianjin Port and work hard. I want to see the day when the Beijing-Zhengzhou railway is completed and open to traffic!"

Why is the tone exactly the same as when a dead eunuch is explaining his funeral arrangements?

"I will definitely live up to your expectations!"

After attending the banquet arranged by the emperor, Wang Shouren immediately went to Tianjin Port. After completing the secret code and entering the heavily guarded room, he realized what a shocking legacy the dead eunuch had left him.

In this room made entirely of bluestone, eight large characters "Loyal to the Emperor, Loyal to the Ming Dynasty" are written on the wall opposite the door.

In front of one wall was a long iron rack filled with bound books. On another wall was a huge map, much more detailed than the one the emperor gave to his courtiers, with the Ming Dynasty only showing a small part of it. Wang Shouren stood in front of the map and studied it for a long time, then turned his eyes to the table in front of the eight characters, where the books on it were asset lists and personnel lists.

The Shenji Camp of 150,000 people, 100 warships, 1,000 new artillery pieces, 10 super iron mines, 100 million taels of silver reserves, 2 million taels of gold reserves, an industrial city of Tianjin Port with a population of over 500,000, three firearms factories in northern Zhili, three schools with over 8,000 students, 500,000 craftsmen of the Railway Bureau, an entire island of Qiongzhou Prefecture and several farms on the island.

No wonder the emperor dared to carry out such radical reforms, because he held the power to overturn the table.

"Zheng Yang, who are you? How dare you hand over the future of an empire to me, Wang Bo'an? I am really terrified!" Wang Shouren trembled slightly as he looked at the thick list on the table.

A gentleman will die for his friend! Since you trust me, Wang Boan, so much, I will not let you down!

Wang Shouren plunged headfirst into this vast affair and transferred the fleet still cruising in the East Ocean to the north to the waters of Japanese Island and continued to bombard the major ports of Japanese Island.

At the same time, a fleet was formed to set sail again to that strange land to continue the investigation, because according to the information left by Zheng Yang, a large-scale immigration to that strange land should be organized as soon as possible, so as to alleviate the current crisis of the Ming Dynasty.

During this period, the number of railways from Tianjin Port to Beijing City increased from two to eight, and the locomotives running on them became faster and faster, and the loads they carried also increased.

He also ordered the workers building the railway to plant several crops sent from Qiongzhou Island along the line. If the people along the way wanted to plant them, he would give them some and teach them how to grow them.

This matter made Zhang Rong, the deputy director of the British Highway and Railway Corporation who was directly responsible for the road construction, very angry. Building roads was hard enough, and who knew that they had to plant some unknown things. As a high-ranking official, he could only hold his nose and distribute the crop seeds.

Zhengde spent his 34th year in fear, and the inexplicable depression and panic in his heart disappeared. The Railway Department reported that the railway from Beijing to Baoding had been completed, the track from Baoding to Zhengding was being laid, and the railway bridge across the Yellow River had also begun construction.

There was also an unexpected surprise. The crops brought back from the voyages were planted by road builders and people along the way and found to be edible. Then they spread in northern Zhili and have now become one of the staple foods.

"You old man, you always do things so flawlessly!" Zhengde smiled bitterly as he held the memorial about auspicious signs sent by the prefect of Baoding.

"In this world, you came suddenly, and left suddenly..."

Zhengde glanced at the space on his left and seemed to see the dead eunuch still standing there. In his humble body lived a soul that could make himself, the emperor who ruled the world, tremble.