Pine, Bamboo, and Plum: A Song AAR (MEIOU)

Another day, another update! In fact, this one got to be much longer than they tend to be, and has few pictures, so I split it into two. I wanted to post the conclusion to the arc all at once or else it would have lost some of its punch or hinted at the wrong things... Did my best to get things right.

Also, the AARland Choice Awards have opened for voting! If you're considering voting for my humble AAR, I would ask that it be placed in the EU Narrative category.

This is a result of an... oversight on my part, but for story purposes I have to call Wangyi ~27 years old in '72... I introduced him as prime minister in '65 (when he'd be 20) and kind of had Wangdue say Wangyi had served the Yuan... a rather meteoric rise, but let's just say he was rather capable at a young age and came directly from the Yuan in '65. :/ Making him older than 20 in '65 would cause more problems, and making him younger would require retcons I'd rather not go through, so this seems like the best solution. Sorry! (For reference, I'm calling Wangdue 40-ish at game start and thus mid-50's now.)

And please ignore the fact that the Jurchens have the Qing flag... didn't even notice until just now.

@scholar: Sadly, no cooky king over there trying to claim a 1100-year lineage. The family name is Shi, and the state is just the generic Sichuan-culture revolter state. (While checking online, I discovered my first accidental error on my dialect map: apparently the region spoke the now-extinct Ba-Shu dialect until the middle of the Ming Dynasty... oops!) I'd meant to edit them to just “Shu” to link the name to the two Shus from the Five Dynasties/Ten Kingdoms period but never got around to it... might just Photoshop the screenshots. My apologies!

@Tanzhang: Hahaha. Luckily there aren't any influential eunuchs kicking around in my kingdom, otherwise this would be a very short AAR.

@mayorqw: If only he had a few braincells, he would think, “Maybe I should get a Min-speaking servant to hang around and inform on them,” rather than, “Mmmmm can't be that important!”

@Memento Mori: Crazier things have happened! As Mel Brooks sez, “It's good to be da king.” Although at this point I think Kaiwang would rather eat food than get laid...

@Bagricula: Actually, I do have a Huang Zongxi-esque reformer in mind for the late 1500's or early 1600's... although I'm not sure how much of Wang Yangming's school I'm going to delve into (tbh, I don't fully grasp his unity of action with knowledge...) I do want someone arguing for some form of proto-constitutionalism though. Probably unrelated to the real man's ideas, but I want my guy to deemphasize the Four Books as well, in opposition to the semisacred status they'd been given by Zhu Xi. Whether he succeeds or fails... I dunno, I didn't play that far yet.

But for reasons that shall be revealed, the position of Chancellor will be largely impotent from Wangdue's departure to (possibly) that period though. State Affairs runs the bureaucracy, so they always matter, but since the Secretariat proposes/drafts royal policy, they can dominate a weak king but are powerless under an autocrat.

The “war” with the Jurchens--really, a series of defensive maneuvers meant to prevent a war--at first proceeds according to plan. The Thais and the Lusong islanders grant Song military access, hoping the Chinese may prevent an invasion of their recently-acquired lands. The Song armies march north to the Thai colonies, instructed to look menacing on the Jurchen border but not do much else.

Meanwhile, with the blessing of the Minister of Taxation, Wangdue takes the opportunity to raise war taxes. The boy's ascension to the throne has caused many to lose faith in the country's favor under Heaven; as a result, the military requires more money to maintain than it did before. Cutting its size, however, is not an option until the Jurchen situation is resolved.


Song troops, along with a handful of Tianwan and Zhou, arrive in the north by November.They line the coastline in case retreat becomes necessary. The soldiers do as they're told and do not venture outside of the safe zone. Only a handful of men are sent over the border: spies from Hangzhou, dispatched to assess the barbarians' strength. Their reports are grim.


Kaiwang, however, grows more unmanageable every day. By the end of December, his incessant complaining begins to transform into outright hostility.


“No!” The child bangs his fist on the council table. Wangdue and Wangyi exchange glances, more than a little worried about their king's state of mind. “No no no no no!”

“Sir,” the Prime Minister says in as soothing a voice he can muster, “the time is not yet ripe. Perhaps in the spring the troops will be rea--”

“No! I'm the king, and I want my war!” He bangs both fists now, face growing red with blood, eyes devilish and crazed. Yet despite his infantile temperament, he doesn't issue orders, simply waits for an answer from his elders.

“Sir, the Chancellor and I are doing the best we can right now...”

“Well it's not good enough! I want my war! I want it I want it I wa--” The tinkle of a bell in the next room stops Kaiwang cold. His eyes turn to glass. A spot of drool seeps out of the corner of his mouth. The dinner bell. At once, the boy leaps out of his seat and dashes out into the hallway.

Wangdue buries his face in his hands. “Wangyi.”

“Hm?”

“Liquor.”

The Prime Minister chuckles and fetches the jug. They've been stashing them around the capitol, anywhere they tend to run into the young king. It doesn't exactly help matters... but it's better than the alternative.

Pouring them each a cupful, Wangyi says, “You think he'll realize someday that he can just have us executed?”

Wangdue groans. “I'm beginning to hope so.”

They clink their cups and drink.

“How's this for an idea,” Wangdue says. It's become a private game of theirs. Envisioning situations under which they might legally replace Kaiwang. “We find a bastard of Lin'er's.”

Wangyi scoffs. “Never happen.”

“I'm not saying one exists, I'm just saying, we find someone willing to... claim...”

“No one would buy it.”

The monk shrugs good-naturedly.

Wangyi leans in toward his chancellor. “Have you,” he says, swirling his drink, “thought of being king yourself?”

Wangdue's eyes narrow. He gazes through the bureaucrat, piercing him, not sure what the man means by asking the question. “No. Why?”

“Just a thought.” Wangyi leans back in his chair. He casually sips his drink. “I mean, I think you would make a good one. I... I would back you.”

What is this man's game? Is he probing for some treasonous thought? Or actually proposing... “No. As... difficult as Lin'er's idealism and this boy's idiocy have made made it, my responsibility to is serve their kingdom and their line. A steward of sorts. Anyway, with my vows, I'd never be able to produce an heir.”

“The same vows that let you have these drinking sessions?”

“I doubt the Supreme Buddha Himself would be able to do this job sober.”

Wangyi pauses for a few moments in thought. “So you mean,” he says, “you've never... been with a...?” The Chancellor doesn't understand his meaning. Wangyi then raises his eyebrows suggestively, sending Wangdue into a fit of laughter.

“My dear man, I knew enough to take the vows after that, rather than before.”

They share a few more laughs and more than a few drinks before retiring for the night. Wangdue finds under his doorstep a letter from his chief spy, just as he'd hoped. But there isn't anything new to report. Whatever Li and Wangyi discussed, neither has said a word to anyone else about it. Watertight.


By January, the entire Song court has sunken to a level of despair it never thought possible. Overall, the country is deceptively stable: the Jurchens still have not attacked, the budget is generating a meager surplus due to the war taxes, the populace is calm, and everything runs smoothly. But the entire government knows this depends on keeping the king out of their affairs. Kaiwang, on the other hand, is just beginning to realize the power he holds...

Wangdue and Wangyi confer with their new marshal on the matter of the war. Kaiwang sits in the corner of the room, doing whatever it is he does, when an idea crosses his mind. “Hey... Marshal? I'm the king, right?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“So everyone has to do what I say... right?”

The marshal glances at Wangdue and Wangyi nervously. “Y-yes, Sir...”

The boy's face brightens. “Ok! Tell the armies to attack the Jurchens!”

Visible sweat appears on the marshal's forehead. He glances back and forth, between the men running the country and the boy nominally at the head of it.

“Disregard that order,” Wangdue says. “Not of sound mind.”

“Nuh uh,” the boy retorts, pointing a pudgy finger at the Chancellor. “He can't do that!”

“Sir,” Wangyi tries more gently, “you ought to reconsider. The Jurchens are much stronger than us... if we attacked them, they would crush us and then destroy the whole kingdom.”

“I don't care anymore! I don't care if everyone dies! I don't care! M-m-my dad, he got famous fighting and I need to be even more famous, and even if that's what's gotta happen, I don't care!”

“Sir, be reasona--”

“Shut up! Shut up! I want my war by the end of the month! And if I don't get it, you'll pay! You'll all pay!”

The morning of January 15th, 1373. Queen Zhu Li presides over a meeting of her chief ministers. “Presides” is not entirely accurate: really, she sits at the head of the table while they fight amongst themselves, occasionally turning to her for favor or mediation. Not the most efficient form of government, but not particularly dangerous, either. And she's begun to win herself a small number of ardent supporters, notably her prime minister. The military still detests her, and most of the government still barely tolerates her. But they aren't trying to kill her. So there's that. With the threat of violence receding, she can only hope to somehow persuade them into her camp and build herself a dynasty.

Her son was crowned in October, although more a ceremony than a transfer of power. Li has thought of giving up the throne, but her son isn't the fittest of men. If she can turn this anarchic mess into a reasonably self-sufficient bureaucracy, maybe then she could step down. But at the moment...

“It's disgraceful! Disgusting! Our neighbors laugh at us behind our backs! We should withdraw from this phony Jurchen business and strike!”

“Now, now,” assures the prime minister, “there will be time to regain what we've lost, but backstabbing our--”

A third man scoffs. “Backstabbing? We were stabbed in the back when that bastard in Tianwan used our victory against the Qi to enrich his kingdom!”

“Here here!”

“And the Song presence in Nantong! They ferry us through military checkpoints like common criminals, and we submit to it just to travel throughout our own kingdom! It's degrading, and I for one cannot abide it any longer! We must go to war and reclaim what is ours!”

“You fool, their armies would dash us against the rocks!”

“But we need to do something!”

"Perhaps if we enlist the Jurchens..."

"You would deal with barbarians? You idiot, that's how the Yuan came to conquer the Middle Kingdom to begin with!"

Li remains aloof from their quarrels. She understands their concerns, of course, but hasn't been free to act upon them. The situation is more complicated than these men can appreciate. They insist on seeing a conflict between Ming and all of China: such a stance would bring nothing but ruin on her people. The real war, the real conflict, is between the coast and the interior. Until today, she hasn't been able to speak up, to promise them a solution to the problems. Until today. Because today... today is different. That's all the note said. "Today." No seal, no signature, but she knew what it meant and who it was from. So now she can finally tell them.

“Gentlemen!” At her word, the room falls silent. Li pauses for a beat, surveying the expectant faces in front of her. She stands, puts her hands on the table, and leans forward.

“I hear you,” she says, “and I understand. But there will be no war, and no talk of war. Although we are not allies, the Song Kingdom should be our closest friends. And whatever should... happen inside their borders, we must stand by them. If you are willing to agree, I promise you this: Nantong will again be ours, and I will deliver it through peace.”

“H-how?”

A smirk slides up the queen's face. “Arrangements have been made. Allow me to explain...”


An anonymous guard breezes into the Hangzhou capitol's kitchen. Chefs cook up kettles of soup and huge pots of rice for the hungry bureaucrats, clerks, everyone who works in the building but doesn't have time to go out for food. One of Lin'er's proposals, actually. A rather ingenious--stop. Focus on the plan.

“Yessir,” the chef says as the guard enters the room, “what can I get you?”

“Not for me, for the king. Says he wants some rice.”

The chef shrugs his shoulders and fills up a bowl. “Finicky one, ain't he? Why, if I haven't changed my menu three times this month already on account of...”

“You have spices for this? He complained abou--oh, I can get the right ones myself, just point me in the direction.”

The guard walks to the back of the kitchen and finds the spices. He pretends to toss some into the dish until the chef goes back to his work. Then, when he's sure no one is watching...


Rice bowl in hand, the guard knocks on Kaiwang's door. The fat young boy opens it. No soldiers protect the room. Just as promised.

“What?”

The guard steps inside and closes the door. “I thought you might be hungry, Sir, so I took the liberty--”

The boy snatches the bowl up and digs his hand into the soft rice. But then, in an unbelievable moment of clarity, he stops. He looks first at the rice, then at the guard. Then back at the rice. Even dumb animals can recognize patterns, and an unprompted delivery of food has certainly never happened before...

Kaiwang thrusts his hand under the guard's nose. “Eat some.”

“I'm sorry, Sir, how do you mean--”

“I don't trust the rice. Eat some.”

But the boy's suspicions seem to be unfounded. The guard, somewhat queasily, takes a bite from the food in Kaiwang's hand. A gleeful smile spreads across the boy's face, and he shoves the entire mound into his mouth.

The guard pulls the stolen kitchen knife out of his tunic and stabs the young king in the heart. The food mutes any cries for help.

Working quickly, efficiently, the guard lays the body on the floor. He makes several more amateurish wounds to disguise the killing blow's precision, then drops the knife beside the corpse. He removes the wad of rice from the boy's mouth, then tosses it and the bowl's contents out the window to make it appear as if the murder had occurred long after the food had been eaten. Leaving the door ajar, he goes back to his post in a different section of the building.

About twenty minutes later, a call goes out. “Seal the building, no one in or out! There's been a murder!” The anonymous guard falls into the rank and file, ready to do his duty in locating the culprit.


Not long after, two soldiers tear open the door to Chancellor Wangdue's office. The monk, busy at work, scowls at the men for interrupting him.

“On your feet.”

“What is the meaning of this? Do you have any idea who I am? If that idiot Kaiwang ha--”

One soldier grabs the monk's arm and yanks it forward. “On your feet!” They brusquely pat him down for weapons, then drag him out of his office, the monk yelling and cursing all the way.


The soldiers throw Wangdue inside the Song throne room on his hands and knees, then close the door.

“God damn it, Kaiwang,” the monk says, “when I g--” But when he looks up, his voice stops dead in its tracks. The man on the throne is not Kaiwang, but another: Zhao Wangyi.

Wangdue stands with some effort, joints creaking. Not as young as he used to be. He dusts off the front of his robes and stares the Prime Minister dead in the eye. “Let me guess. Kaiwang has been imprisoned for reasons of mental insta--”

“Wangdue, the boy is dead.”

If the monk has any reaction to this, he doesn't let it show. “Really.”

“We've arrested the culprit. Some lowly kitchen hand, barely worth mentioning. But when put under interrogation, he started to name names. Names a kitchen hand wouldn't otherwise know. Names of men inside the Secretariat... including yourself.

“Naturally,” Wangyi continues, “the penalty for regicide is death. However, I'm willing to consider the... possibility that your subordinates have implicated you in something about which you had no knowledge.”

Wangdue's face remains stone cold. Instead of responding with emotion, he raises his hands to chest-level and slowly, spitefully claps. “Bravo, Prime Minister. It appears you've taken the step that I would not.”

“Did you kill the king?”

“I knew you were planning something, of course, but I underestimated the depths to which you--”

“Did you kill the king?”

“I suppose I should have seen this coming... a young, capable, ambitious man serving a handica--”

“God damn it, Wangdue!” Wangyi slams his fist down on the armrest of the throne. “Do you think this is what I wanted? Do you think, when I came to Hangzhou, I'd planned to become a king? Why do you think I asked whether you would take the throne? I wanted it to be you! But you--because of your idiotic vows--refused! So the responsibility falls to me.”

“Then,” Wangdue says, “why am I even here?”

“This is my offer, and I only make it once: soldiers will escort to the western border. Go back to your monastery in Tibet, and never return.”

“You know I didn't kill the boy. Otherwise I would already be dead.”

Wangyi sighs. He leans forward and massages the bridge of his nose. “I know. But you're far too dangerous to have around. This kingdom needs peace and stability. If Heaven will permit it, I want a reign that is as long as it is dull.”

Wangdue does not soften to the man's idle sentiment. But he knows he's been defeated. The monk's greatest love was always the Song Kingdom... and he knows Wangyi, though an illegitimate king, a usurper, a traitor, is its best hope for survival.

“Tell me,” the monk says, “before I go... what exactly did you and Li talk about during your little excursion to Nanjing?”

Wangyi shakes his head. “I'll not tell you a word. Although she and I only agreed to a few trivial things, I know--and fear--what you can do with any information whatsoever.”

The two men have nothing more to say. Wangyi summons his guards and instructs them to arrange transport for Wangdue out of Song territory. If he tries to escape, he is to be killed. They take the man away.

Wangyi sits in the throne room, alone, for some time to collect his thoughts. He did what needed to be done. Nothing more, nothing less. That's what he tells himself, anyway. His chest has felt heavier every minute since he first sat on the throne. He doesn't expect it to get any better. Only worse. But he's the only man who is capable of setting the country on the right path. State Affairs supports him implicitly. After running the department for seven years, they know him to be capable. The other departments, the foreign kings, the Song people... they will take time. But right now, in this moment, all that matters is the security of the realm.

Wangyi stands up. He leaves the room and walks down the hall to the council chambers. Opening the door, dozens of his subordinates from State Affairs cut off their conversations and stare at the man in front of them.

The deputy minister rises to his feet. He looks to his comrades and coworkers, then back to the man they've all gathered to serve. In a booming voice, the minister calls out, “The king is dead!”

Every man in the room yells back in unison.

“Long live the king!”



-----
((Edit: Btw, just wanted to note... Kaiwang's death was the exact moment I realized the game engine's randomness can pull off plot twists far more epic than anything I could ever imagine, just because its decisions come out of nowhere. The engine is the author, I am but an interpreter. Hail.))

Memento Mori said:

That was certainly unexpected. How can there be a Song AAR without a Song ruler? And without any possibility of a Song ruler appearing in the future?

By the way I'd love Wangdue to make a comeo, at least like Manuel Arachni from General BT's Rome AARisen

Click to expand...

It was unexpected for me too. :rofl: I take notes with the game running on low speed, pausing for popups, and for 1373 they literally say, "Ok so Kaiwang sends the armies in and th WTF." And it isn't the only death that totally comes out of nowhere and wrecks multi-year plans of mine...

To be fair... Han Shantong was a cult leader who claimed a connection to the Song Dynasty through Emperor Huizong, a guy who'd died over 200 years earlier as a prisoner in Manchuria. Quoting Imperial China by Mote, he started a rebellion in 1351 by telling a bunch of laborers that "when a stone figure of a man with one eye appeared [...] it would signify that the whole empire would be plunged into revolt. He had such a stone figure planted [...] where the laborers would uncover it, and made sure that his followers would be present, masking as fellow workers, when it was found, to fan the turbulence."

Han Shantong's claim to be of Song blood is about as dubious as his claim to be the Messiah. I doubt many important folks outside his cult actually believed it, but it was a very useful idea for the Red Turban generals to get followers while they tried to conquer each other. I could have changed the localization every time a dynasty died, but I see my kingdom rather as carrying on in the Song spirit of innovation and development... and Wangyi will probably pop off a few lines to that effect justifying the name.

And a Wangdue cameo isn't totally out of the question... Tibet does do suspiciously well for itself some years after this...

Update time! Picking up the average years per post for a bit. Wangyi just wants some peace and quiet, which translates to "building legit, burning infamy, constructing buildings." I promise, however, you can't always get what you want. The late-middle-ish of his reign is probably the biggest turning-point in the whole game as far as I've played.

@Omen: Thank you! We shall see what it costs whom...

@Ashantai: Thank you! Very high praise. And I was a particular fan of that line too... hoped to evoke the unexpected pie in the face or Chandler's thug with a gun.

@Bagricula: Ohoho, "皇帝" will be making a return eventually... but it's going to be something very, very different. :ninja:

Also, I'd class "20-legitimacy monarch taking a pleasure cruise through wukou-infested waters" inadvisable at the very least. :laugh:

@Tanzhang: Oh yes, he's astute enough to know that after usurping the throne, anything less than righteousness would be like a casting call for monarchs.

@scholar: Haha, I hadn't noticed they had the same score. Luckily, he has the "charismatic negotiator" trait, giving +2 to that so I get to play him as competent.

Related... I'm kind of ambivalent about whether I should show their traits or not. It would explain things better, but I feel like it'd dampen some of the drama if every monarch got at the start, "Ok guys, this one's a master strategist, expect successful wars!" I dunno.

@Stuyvesant: On the contrary, I was rather looking forward to sending my troops into the meat grinder! It's a lot easier to do when you haven't gotten very far... now that I'm in the 1500's, I find it a lot harder to RP "bad" kings b/c I have something to lose.

@Gwyn ap Nud : Thank you!

@Sjiveru: Welcome! Sorry to be a tease, but... I've played 100 years past that by now, but my monarch during that period was one of two who'd live up to a designation of "the Great."

@GregElSho: Thank you!

Zhao Wangyi was born in Suzhou in 1345 to a poor shopkeeper's assistant and his wife. His family had been rich and prosperous during the Song Dynasty: his great-grandfather served in the capital of Hangzhou and was one of the highest-ranking officials in the empire. Wangyi's grandfather was just beginning his schooling when Kublai Khan conquered the whole of China and abolished the imperial examinations. Nevertheless, his grandfather continued his studies and mastered the arts and sciences. The man wandered China, living as a pauper and rubbing elbows with many other scholars disenfranchised by the Mongol conquest. Eventually, he returned home, married, and started a family.

Wangyi's father was born in 1315, the same year the Yuan Dynasty reinstated the imperial examinations. The family, however, had little hope of regaining their status. Under the Yuan, people were classed into the Four Races and Ten Professions: they labeled Han people from below the Yangtze the "lowest" caste and Confucian scholars as the ninth profession, in between prostitutes and beggars. Regardless, Wangyi's grandfather taught Wangyi's father everything he knew, and when Wangyi was born, the process went the same. The torch passed down the generations, an unbroken link to the great Song Dynasty, not through blood, but through knowledge.

The Red Turban Rebellion broke out when Wangyi was eleven. Although the kingdoms were run by and for the Han people, the constant state of warfare forced the family to flee Suzhou to the north.

At sixteen, Wangyi defied his father's orders in standing for the imperial examinations. His father disowned him, saying that no son of his would serve the Mongols that ruined their family. Wangyi didn't see it that way. No matter who controlled China, the bureaucracy served the Han people. He took the exam and scored first in his group. Despite this, he received only a minor appointment on account of his Chinese ancestry. He served in Dadu until 1365. By then, the Song Kingdom had convincingly beaten the Ming, and Chancellor Wangdue put out a call for Confucian scholars to come to Hangzhou and take their rightful place at the head of government. Wangyi packed up and headed south, and, thanks to a brilliant essay he wrote while on the road, was named head of State Affairs. Thus, just as his great-grandfather did, Zhao Wangyi served a Song government based in Hangzhou. The Will of Heaven sometimes designs the most interesting patterns.

But now the year is 1373, and the situation could not be more different. Wangyi is no longer a bureaucrat. He is the leader of a kingdom. Sometimes the Will of Heaven conforms to no pattern mere mortals can possibly comprehend.

Wangyi knows he is a usurper, and knows the only way to maintain his position and establish a dynasty is to bring peace and prosperity to the Song people. He has no plans to reunite the Middle Kingdom, no plans to change anything unless he absolutely needs to. He leaves glory and conquest to his children and grandchildren. Let his reign be pleasant, but unremarkable.

His first action is to send tribute to the Jurchen barbarians before they decide to make good on their threats of invasion. This costs him nearly his entire treasury, but he considers the price a bargain. With Song as the leader of the war, all the other kingdoms have no choice but to assent.


To replenish the treasury, Wangyi instates an aggressive policy of printing money. Being an ex-minister, he knows the dangers of inflation well enough, but views it as a temporary loan to be paid back in better times. He slashes the army's size to what the kingdom can realistically support and lowers their monthly maintenance to generate a larger budget surplus.

At the same time, he begins dismantling the powerful Department of the Secretariat. In his mind, a government branch intended to propose and draft royal policy is not only dangerous, but useless if the the king is competent enough to do all that himself. Showing mercy, he merely relieves the men he sees as threats of their jobs, rather than their lives. He elevates State Affairs to be the most important of the Departments, choosing chief advisors who can increase his tax revenue and generate much-needed legitimacy. As for a new chancellor, he tells his ministers to find a man “who is excellent at calligraphy, and not much else.”

Naturally, his taking the throne and his destruction of the Secretariat are not taken lightly by those involved. Pretenders rise up with armies in Hangzhou and further to the south. But the royal guard keeps Wangyi safe while the White Lotus Army puts down the rebels. The residents of Jeju also prove a constant thorn in his side.


All throughout 1373, Wangyi raises funds for a number of “educational works” tying him to the Song Dynasty of old through his great-grandfather. Although the man had been important, he likely wasn't the “emperor's right hand, and his left as well,” like Wangyi's literature now claims. Wangyi also commissions tapestries commemorating the common soldiers' heroism at the Battle of Baoding, leaving Han Lin'er out of the depiction. Although he is still considered by many to be illegitimate, through these expensive efforts it seems convincing the people otherwise may take years rather than decades.*


The navy Wangyi had been building before his reign finally becomes necessary at the end of 1373. Wukou pirate raids continue unabated, and the navy is ordered to plan an expedition to destroy them at their source.


In January of 1374, Wangyi's wife gives birth to their first child: a son. With Wangyi's legitimacy still in question, the boy does not have a solid claim on the throne, but they don't let it dampen their spirits.


In the west, Tibet has waged another war on the edge of the Middle Kingdom, vassalizing the Thai realm of Dali. Rumors suggest the Tibetans get right to work integrating the two governments into one. Idle speculation, but Wangyi can't help but wonder if Wangdue Sengge has managed to work his way into their king's good graces. Meanwhile, talk of the merchant-king of Zhou's possible madness grows when he launches another war against the Yuan. Zhou seizes large swaths of worthless, ungovernable territory in Mongolia and establishes a border with the Jurchen barbarians.


All through 1374, Wangyi remains in correspondence with Queen Li of Ming. He hasn't forgotten their deal, and she held up her end of the bargain by not taking advantage of Kaiwang's disastrous reign or untimely death to wage a war of reconquest against Song. By September, although sporadic rebellions are still cropping up from time to time, Wangyi feels safe enough in his position to take a cadre of diplomats and travel north for a face-to-face meeting.

Zhao Wangyi, Zhu Li, and their respective entourages meet in a small government building in Song-controlled Nantong. With both of their realms not entirely stable--Wangyi still building the trust of his people, Li dealing with increasing hostility from her warmongering generals--they've agreed beforehand to make a great show of mutual respect.

The two sovereigns bow to each other and begin the tiresome exchange of pleasantries. The courtly mode of speech is to some extent scripted and ritualized, the basic idea being to praise one's opposite number without calling their judgment into question in their praise of you. The main advantage is that this exchange allows for frank, even hostile if necessary, discussion afterward: rather than dancing around issues of politeness all throughout a conversation, they get it out of the way before one begins.

They laud each others' leadership skills, pledge friendship and cooperation, and both claim they'd lose a future war against the other. Wangyi cites the size of the massive Ming armies, which since the war, have grown far larger than they used to be.


To this, Li replies, “Our numbers are indeed vast, yet the drilling regimens established by your late marshal are far superior to ours.” The response so far is not unusual, but with a sly look on her face, she adds, “I've studied them in some detail, in fact, in the hopes that I might implement them here. Although, surely, my adaptation would be inadequate.”

Although he doesn't let it show, the second part of her response surprises Wangyi. By stating she's imitating Song's armies, the standard replies become insults: any suggestion that her troops are superior would imply that her reforms are misguided. Furthermore, he knows she's lying. Her generals hate her, and the idea of their allowing her to change army policy is ludicrous.

But she isn't trying to deceive him. She knows he knows this. Essentially, she's taking a tired system of flattery and turning it into a dance of intellect. Wangyi smiles. What an interesting woman.

“Wongkwai's methods are ingenious,” he says, carefully choosing his words, “yet, of course, any policy has its flaws. I'm sure you would think them elementary, and I know you've already located and corrected them.”

Without missing a beat, Li says, “You are right. But, of course, you must have seen them before I did to even speak of them now. And it follows logically that any method with such, as you say, elementary flaws would necessarily have more subtle ones I must not have noticed.”

Wangyi's mind races trying to find a way out of this new trap. The problem is that he can't agree, for obvious reasons. But he can't disagree either, because in doing so, he'd be suggesting his powers of analysis surpass hers. But, in a flash of insight, he finds an out. In fact, he finds the line Li should have just spoken if she'd wanted to win the tussle.

“That thought hadn't even occurred to me. Clearly your understanding of the methods far exceed my own.”

Li can't help but smirk. She nods slightly, acknowledging the adroitness of the remark. “Perhaps we should both reexamine them, then.” A concession of defeat.

“Perhaps you're right.”

They debate for a while of the terms of the treaty, but all for show, to give their retinues a nice display of their negotiating skills. Li and Wangyi already knew the terms before they left their capitals. The document is written up and sealed by both leaders, and with great pomp, the Song guards on the walls of Nantong stand down, to be replaced by those from Ming.**


With the business of the day over, the two monarchs prepare to return to their capitals after a brief discussion of other matters. But Li happens to make an offhand remark on the “cleverness” of Wangyi's Baoding tapestry, and the Song king jokes he normally prefers paintings with actual artistic merit.

“I assume by 'merit'” Li says, “you mean those garish court painters the bureaucrats so love.”

Wangyi scoffs. “Hardly. I have little respect for men who create 'art' by following a pattern. I'd rather have one monochrome landscape with feeling than a hundred meticulou--”

“You're familiar with the literati painters?” she asks, pleasantly surprised. “Hardly anyone in my court has even heard of them.”

“Familiar?” Wangyi chuckles and shakes his head. “My grandfather was one.”

They forget about the political business they'd planned to discuss and instead launch a conversation on art. Diplomats slowly filter out of the room, one every twenty or thirty minutes, as their talk meanders through painting, to poetry, music, philosophy... all the pleasant things they can't discuss at home, for lack of anyone willing to risk the ire of their monarch over “trivialities.” It gets to be late in the night before they decide to part ways.

“We should do this again sometime,” Wangyi says. “Get together to chat, I mean.”

“Pity,” Li says with a playful smile, “I thought you meant cede me territory.”

“Not without another war,” the king jokes.

“Don't tempt me,” she replies. “I might start one just for your art collection. It'd get the military off my ass, at least.”

Although she says it in good humor, Wangyi can't help but note a tinge of worry in her voice. He begins to say something, to offer some support in dealing with... but before he can speak, Li realizes what she accidentally revealed. Reverting to her usual cold facade, she offers a curt goodbye and leaves.

When Wangyi arrives back in Hangzhou, there's one word on every one of his ministers' lips. That little fishing village everyone thought so inconsequential before the Treaty of Nantong is now the sole point of Song control over the Yangtze, the only city with easy access to both the mighty river and the vast ocean. And now it all makes sense to them why Wangyi had an entire port built on a plot of land with no more than a few thousand inhabitants. They see why he moved the entire navy to an area that was, at the time, worthless, but is now the most strategically important province in the entire kingdom. In September of 1374, no one can stop talking about Shanghai.***

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*Although these methods seem crude by today's standards, it cannot be understated how massively influential they were on the sophisticated campaigns of the 15th and early 16th centuries. Although Mei's reign is considered to be the “beginning” of the modern propaganda machine as we know it (even this is debatable, since those methods were not seen again for centuries), it is unlikely this could have developed without Wangyi's influence.

**((My first modded event. Besides plot purposes, I'd only taken the province in the hopes Ming would move its capital and I could grab Nanjing but it being cut off was starting to screw with the AI. Also it made my borders ugly. Since the MEIOU “Mandate of Heaven” event spams cores across all the borders in China anyway, everyone still has cores on everyone, and removing Ming's on Shanghai is more symbolic than practical. I also changed the island to be part of the Shanghai province in the map file. Plot purposes, no effect on gameplay.))

***((Y'all may have already noticed, but I'm kind of obsessed with the incredible transformation (linky http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/9295/picture2017.png) Shanghai has made from 1990 to today. Call it the New Yorker in me, but big cities enthrall me. I'm hoping to turn Shanghai into a major entity much sooner than our timeline. [Also because I need to justify that it's given a 150k starting pop when it should probably have less than a tenth that, but shhh, work in progress.]))