Chongzhen of Great Ming: Abandoning the Capital for the South, Crushing the Eight Banners with Firearms

Chongzhen declares: “If this plan is carried out perfectly, then short of Heaven itself forcing the destruction of my Great Ming, I can’t imagine how I could lose!”

A modern civil servant transmigrates into the seventh year of the Tianqi era and becomes the Chongzhen Emperor, burdened with the infamy of losing his empire! Taking charge of a hopeless mess, he refuses to repeat the old mistakes: instead of killing Wei Zhongxian, he keeps the eunuch as a weapon, binding the powerful court fixer to him with a seventy-thirty split of the spoils. He purges the eunuch faction, investigates corrupt border officials, and fills the imperial treasury with a million taels of silver. Then he pours money into firearms and soldiers’ pay, locking down Liaodong!

He abandons the empty talk of the Donglin faction and stands up to the gentry and vassal princes. He abolishes tax exemptions and imposes fair taxes, recruits Zheng Zhilong to monopolize maritime trade, and brings all the wealth of Jiangnan into his hands. Rather than make a doomed stand in Beijing, he secretly relocates to Nanjing to build up his strength. Mass-produced firearms forge a powerful army, with Dragon Cavalry and the Divine Machine Battalion crushing the Eight Banners through superior weaponry! Instead of suppressing the refugees, he wins their hearts, grants them farmland, and settles the realm, stamping out the rebel Li Zicheng before he can rise. When the time is right, he leads three northern campaigns in person, seals off the Bohai Sea, bombards the Eight Banners, and surrounds Beijing. In one fell swoop, he destroys Later Jin and reclaims the lands of Great Ming!

This Chongzhen will secure the northern frontier with firearms, enrich Great Ming through maritime trade, restore the prosperity of Hongwu, and bring order to the realm!