Ming Dynasty 1571

On the fourteenth night of the twelfth lunar month in the forty-fifth year of Jiajing, Qianqing Palace. The emperor of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Houcong, passed away. Xu Jie, the chief assistant of the cabinet, locked the news in Nuan Pavilion and summoned a person - Zhang Juzheng, a bachelor's degree student at Hanlin Academy and a lecturer of King Yu, who was forty-one years old and ranked fifth. The edict has not been written yet. Xu Jie handed a red pen into his hand. That night, Zhang Juzheng wrote the largest self-incriminating edict in the forty-five years of the Ming Dynasty. Stop the fasting and feast, summon officials, pay internal money, and stop mining taxes. Every stroke is a reversal of the verdict, and every word is an enemy. The old era is over, but it is far from certain who the new era belongs to. King Yu is about to ascend the throne, and there is an undercurrent in the court. Sixty-three-year-old Xu Jiedou defeated Yan Song and sent Jiajing away, but he could not suppress one person - Gao Gong, the Minister of Rites. Gao Gong is King Yu's master, and he is close to him from the bottom of his heart. He slapped his palm on the table in the cabinet duty room: "I entered the cabinet based on nine years of teacher-student friendship, not because of a posthumous edict from you, Mr. Xu Ge!" Zhang Juzheng was caught between his teacher and his political opponents. He is the author of the imperial edict and a thorn in Gao Gong's side. No foundation, no team, only the ink pen in the sleeve. Gao Gong said he was not yet ready. He doesn't argue. He said to himself in his heart: The heat is created by tempering, not by waiting. A 2 million-word historical novel that takes you through the bloody events of the Longqing court and how Zhang Taiyue finally climbed up to the supreme position of prime minister step by step.