In May of the eighth year of Yongle (1410), the Ming Imperial Palace was shrouded in a terrifying atmosphere, the Janissaries were heavily guarded, and the Emperor Zhu Di had a solemn expression, and he said to the leader of the East Factory with hatred: "This murder case must be investigated, otherwise, you will be asked to pay tribute to the concubine." ”
What does Zhu Di want to look up? Who is Concubine Quan?
Bizarre death
Ming Chengzu Zhu Di and his father Zhu Yuanzhang are out of the same mold, one is grumpy, the other is not very lustful.
Although Zhu Di had many harem beauties, he loved only three women: Empress Xu (daughter of the founding hero Xu Da), Concubine Quan guifei and Wang Guifei.
Empress Xu died in the fifth year of Zhu Di's reign as emperor, and Zhu Di was sad for a while, and then turned his grief into strength and imported 5 beautiful women from Korea: Quan Nu, Ren Nu, Li Nu, Lü Nu, and Cui Nu.
Among them, the Kwon woman is the most adorable, and the "History of Ming" says: "Gong Xian Concubine Quan Clan, Koreans ... Posture of the peasants, good at blowing jade strings, the emperor loves to pity. ”
Zhu Di fell in love at first sight, and when he was crowned a concubine, he let him be the first of the concubines, and from then on he never left his side, even if he marched and fought.
However, this concubine died mysteriously at such a young age.
Fictional murder
Concubine Quan came to Zhu Di's side at the age of 17, and when she died, she was in her twenties, and the cause of death was accidental wind chill, to put it bluntly, it was a cold.
So Zhu Di became suspicious, and said that it was just a small illness, how could my ai concubine die? Someone must have framed.
The eunuchs in the palace were all horse-ass spirits, and seeing that the emperor suspected the cause of death of Concubine Quan, he said conclusively, yes, it must be murder.
So Zhu Di ordered the secret service to organize the East Factory to start tracking down.
This investigation did find out the problem, and a palace maid named Jia Lu stood up and exposed: "Concubine Quan was actually killed by Concubine Lü." ”
Lü Fei (劉妃), the daughter of Lü Guizhen (劉桂真), a Korean protector, came to Zhu Di with Consort Quan.
The palace maid said that the reason why Concubine Lü wanted to harm Concubine Quan was very simple, jealous of her monopolizing the imperial favor.
As for the murder process, the palace maid said that Concubine Lü bribed the imperial doctor, eunuch and silversmith to poison Concubine Quan with arsenic.
Kill the ring
Princess Lü is a Korean who doesn't speak Chinese at all, no one trains her, and at most she says "Hello!" "Did you eat it?" These schedules are colloquial, and there is no complicated conversation at all, how can they conspire with the Han people?
But Zhu Di was already very sad because of the death of Aifei; he heard that he had been killed and turned into an angry lion, losing his mind and no normal judgment.
Therefore, he ignored the three seven twenty-one and went on a killing spree.
He lingered all the eunuchs and silversmiths involved in the case, and the main culprit, Concubine Lü, ended even worse.
A North Korean girl like a jade flower burned a red soldering iron for a month and burned her alive.
The aftermath is gone
After Zhu Di killed the murderer, his anger did not subside, because his beloved person left him forever, and people could not be resurrected from the dead.
And soon after, another of his favorite princesses died.
This made Zhu Di immersed in great grief, and he was also worried about the killing of Aifei and began to speculate about the association.
He said in his heart, how did the palace maid know about such a secret matter of the murder of Aifei, and it seemed that this woman was not a good person and was not innocent.
So he secretly sent someone to investigate the palace maid named Jalu who exposed the murder, and although the investigation did not find evidence of the crime, it was very rewarding.
It turned out that this Jia Lu had committed adultery with a eunuch named Wang Gang, and in order to please him, she had been using her savings to buy gifts for Wang Gang's eunuchs.
Hearing that the emperor was tracking down the murder, In order to get the bounty, Jia Lu fabricated the murder case to frame Concubine Lü, who was not good to her in normal days.
It is said that it is not a big deal for palace women to get along with eunuchs, which was tacitly allowed in the Ming Dynasty, and people called it "eating against food" (living with eunuchs).
However, this palace girl actually framed others in order to please the other party, and the nature changed.
As a result, Zhu Di was furious and ordered that a palace maid named Jia Lu be severely punished.
The palace maids were bleeding
Jia Lu heard that Zhu Di wanted to hold himself criminally responsible and committed suicide in fear of his crime.
Where Zhu Di was willing to give up, he thought that Jia Lu must have accomplices, it was a gang crime, and perhaps Wang Guifei also died of murder.
Therefore, he ordered the East Factory to start an investigation into the palace maids in the harem, and if they did not open their mouths, they would torture and extort confessions.
Where the delicate-skinned and tender-fleshed palace ladies could be tortured, they made up nonsense, not only saying that someone had murdered Wang Guifei, but also breaking out thunder—someone wanted to kill the emperor.
At this point, Emperor Zhu Di was even more furious, and many palace ladies in the harem were arrested and severely tortured.
The result was astounding that thousands of palace ladies confessed to their involvement in the murder.
What the emperor hated most was rebellion, and these palace women were naturally executed by Ling Chi.
Not only that, Zhu Di personally supervised the execution himself in his busy schedule, so that he did not understand the hatred, he also personally killed two palace girls, tired and breathless.
Originally, the matter was over, but a palace maid said a word and brought the eunuch in.
Hit the pond fish
It turned out that when Dongchang was cleaning up the relics of the palace maid Jia Lu who committed suicide, she found that she left a suicide note to the emperor.
The testament said, "Long live Grandpa, you can kill me, but please don't trouble me with King Kong, he is innocent and I love him very much." “
Zhu Di saw that this place was even more on fire, and his heart said inferior, you also deserve to say love?
He went so far as to order someone to paint an ambiguous picture of Jalu and the eunuch together to humiliate the living palace women.
Moreover, Zhu Di also had people expose the behavior of eating.
Eunuch palace women who have such behaviors are severely punished.
At that time, Zhu Di was really enchanted.
When these palace women were slaughtered alive, the sky struck five thunderclaps, and the lightning struck Zhu Di's palace.
In the eyes of people in the past, this was a warning given to Zhu Di by God.
But Zhu Di did not restrain in the slightest, and killed even harder!
After killing, Zhu Di still felt empty and determined to become an empress.
However, during the selection process, a concubine named Yu Shi was found to be closer to the eunuch.
After the news spread, Concubine Yu also committed suicide in fear of sin.
However, Zhu Di was not relieved, and all the palace women around Concubine Yu were taken away and severely tortured.
To be fair, Zhu Di wasn't that bad either, just because he had lost his beloved woman and hit him too hard.
In his later years, he still remembered Concubine Quan: "When Concubine Quan was born, everything that was eaten was suitable for herself; after death, all those who ate and made wine, such as raccoon clothes, were uncomfortable." ”
The gist is that when Concubine Kwon was alive, he saw everything that was good; after she died, he was not satisfied with anything.
It's true that you love someone, but what about these palace ladies and eunuchs? They have no right to pursue love, nor do they have the right to life?
Postscript: The details of Zhu Di's handling of the case are not recorded in the Ming history.
Volume 113 of the History of the Ming Dynasty records that "Consort Gongxian of the Quan clan, a Korean, Yongle Shi, a Korean tribute woman chong ye Ting, concubine and yan." The posture is childish, good at blowing jade strings, the emperor loves to pity, seven years of the title of concubine, ordered her father to always be Guanglu Qing. In October next year, emperors marched north, and Kai returned. Killed in Lincheng, Buried Peak County. ”
However, perhaps because Concubine Kwon was a Korean, it was written very clearly in the Korean "Records of the Lee Dynasty": "The emperor mourned bitterly, so he was sick and lost his heart." Since then, he has been wrong and cruel. ”。