Emperor Zhengde

Chapter 119 Please Let Me Die
Li Mengyang hadn't come to his senses at all. When he came to his senses, he had already knelt down and said, "Your Majesty, why are you so partial to Ma Wensheng? He is harming you. He is making you cut off from the literati and the world! I am a loyal minister! I impeached Ma Wensheng not only for myself, but also for your Majesty and for the Ming Dynasty!"

"You are right for yourself, but you said it was for me and the Ming Dynasty. You really treat me like a child! But I understand what you mean. You just think that you scholars should not be provoked. If you provoke you, you will only get into trouble. Even if I am the emperor, I want to tell you that I would rather get into trouble than be a puppet emperor of you scholars!"

Zhu Houzhao turned and left, and issued another decree: "Pass the decree, award Grand Tutor Ma Wensheng a bullfighting suit, ten antiques and jades, and a mansion! His son will be granted the hereditary title of a thousand households of the Imperial Guard!"

Zhu Houzhao now wants to elevate Ma Wensheng to a high position. This is not only to support and give confidence to Ma Wensheng and other reformers, but also to express his attitude to the people of the world.

"Thank you, Your Majesty, for your kindness!"

Ma Wensheng knew Zhu Houzhao's intention, and he also knew that His Majesty treated him in this way just to make his Ma family prosper and flourish, so as to give himself confidence. He could not even regret it and could only go his own way and resolutely implement the reform. As for whether the royal family would abandon him in the future and abandon him, he didn't know, but he knew that he could not turn back.

A few days later, Li Mengyang was taken to the execution ground, and Zhu Houzhao specifically instructed that signs such as "selfish villain", "traitor", "scum of the literati circle", and "incompetent official" be hung around his neck, and he was criticized by officials and Li Mengyang's relatives.

"Swear or not!"

At this time, an eunuch asked a clean official.

"No need to curse! Lord Li is a loyal minister!"

The clean official replied.

"cut!"

The Qingliu official was chopped to the ground.

The second Qingliu official couldn't help but widen his eyes when he saw this.

The eunuch asked again: "Do you want to curse or not?"

"I curse! I curse! Li Mengyang is a traitor and a shameless villain!"

The upright official replied tremblingly.

"You can go back now, but you didn't scold well enough. According to His Majesty's order, if you didn't scold for more than half an hour, you won't get the reward!"

The eunuch replied.

The upright official was so frightened that he ran away like a mouse.

Then, another official, and a clean official at that, pointed at Li Mengyang and cursed him without waiting for the eunuch to ask, "Li Mengyang! You are a despicable fellow! You are unworthy of being a scholar!

In the 13th year of the Hongzhi reign, you raped a merchant's wife but manipulated the criminal justice system to have the merchant charged with murdering his wife!
In the 14th year of the Hongzhi reign, you allowed your slaves to beat a villager to death just because he did not pay his rent!
In the fifteenth year of Hongzhi, you returned to your hometown to visit your relatives. Because the postman did not provide you with a good reception, you forced the county magistrate to beat the postman to death! You are unworthy of being a gentry!
Although you love your official position, you do not love the people! You only dare to impeach your relatives but not your clan members! You are a person who bullies the weak and fears the strong, and you have no regard for the law. You deserve to be killed..."

"That's a good scolding. Write it down. When the time comes, let the Hanlin Academy compile it into a book and distribute it to the whole country. I will give him 20 shi of grain!"

As the eunuch spoke, he handed the grain receipt to the clean official.

Li Mengyang started to curse at this: "Zhou! I wasted my time pleading for you! How dare you slander me like this! You are the villain!"

The upright official named Zhou had already left, and only Li Mengyang was left there cursing.

Next, more officials came to scold Li Mengyang, some even spat at him, and some couldn't help but hit him with their fists and kicks, because the angrier they acted, the more food they would be given. In this day and age, food was equal to currency and money, so more food meant more money. "Bah! Li Mengyang, how could our Li family produce a scum like you! It's you, this disloyal and unfilial person, who forced our Li family to change their surname from now on! It's you who destroyed our Li family tree!"

After Li Mengyang's clansmen arrived, they naturally began to scold Li Mengyang in order to save their own lives. Of course, they had originally intended to blame Li Mengyang for disregarding the safety of their own family. If Li Mengyang died himself, it would naturally be good for the family to earn a reputation as a loyal and heroic family, but now that the family has been implicated, these clansmen are not polite.

Seeing that his parents and nephews were scolding him and wanted to break off relations with him, Li Mengyang couldn't help crying: "Master! I know I was wrong! Clan leader, please stop scolding me! I was doing this for the good of the family. If I can earn a reputation as a loyal hero for the Li family, you will be more respected by the officials and gentry in the village in the future!"

"Bah! Don't think we can believe what you say, you are an orphan like me! Where is the Li family? Don't you look at who you are? You still want to earn the name of a loyal hero? My Li family is ashamed of you. We should not have allowed you to learn to read and write. You should have drowned you when you were born! It's all because of you that our whole family was exiled!"

These tribesmen cursed each other without any courtesy.

The tenants, servants, neighbors, and commoners of the Li family who had followed him to Beijing also began to curse Li Mengyang. These people cursed even more harshly and with tears and snot, and their curses were more real!
Li Mengyang completely collapsed. He felt like he was abandoned by the whole world. He wanted to commit suicide! He also regretted why he did that and what he got from it.

……

After the meeting to criticize Li Mengyang was over, Liu Jin came to ask Li Mengyang in person: "Do you know your guilt now?"

"I know my crime! I am a traitor, a villain, shameless, and despicable! I was wrong, I was really wrong! I have sores on my head and pus on my back. I am going to hell and I will not die a good death!"

Li Mengyang instinctively repeated the words that the officials and villagers had cursed him with, and then he broke down and cried: "Please, please stop scolding me, let me die, I will die, that's all!"

"Then how do you want to die?" Liu Jin said steadily.

"Beat him to death with sticks," Li Mengyang replied.

"Drag him away and beat him to death with sticks!" Liu Jin ordered.

So, Li Mengyang was dragged down and pressed to the ground.

Snapped!
When the first stick hit him, Li Mengyang screamed and struggled, "It hurts! I don't want to die anymore, I don't want to die anymore!"

Snapped!
Of course, this was not his call.

In this way, Li Mengyang was beaten to death with sticks.

……

at this time.

In a large courtyard, an official clenched his fists and asked, "Did Li Mengyang really get beaten to death?"

"Yes!" one of his students replied.

The official could not help but frown: "Zhu Houzhao! You are really vicious! I never thought you would use this trick to forbid people from slandering Ma Wensheng and let people criticize Li Mengyang. By doing this, you have made all the scholars go against their original intentions and become villains! Cruel, really cruel!"

"Teacher, what should we do next?" asked the student.

"Don't do anything. Let's talk about it after you enter the cabinet!" The official said, and then he gritted his teeth and said again: "Zhu Houzhao!"

(End of this chapter)