And at this time,
Great Ming's next Minister of Personnel was pondering how to ascend to heaven and undergo the Investiture of the Gods.
To undergo the Investiture of the Gods, they had to solve Great Ming's current new problems.
After two hundred years of governance and several successful revivals,
Great Ming had expanded its territory by several thousand li.
It had relocated refugees to the borders.
The nation was prosperous, and its people were strong.
Because it had opened up much land and moved people there,
it had also built many highways to make defending that land easier.
This greatly reduced the conflicts caused by land annexation.
At the same time, it increased taxes on the wealthy
and reduced taxes on the poor.
The wealthy contributed money and grain; the poor contributed labor and grain.
In the past, these officials naturally lacked such powerful motivation for reform.
Faced with so many difficult matters, they would surely muddle through.
Then the dynasty would gradually decay.
From the emperor to the ministers, then down to the lower-ranking generals, they were all the same.
Only a handful possessed great ambition, revitalizing the court and leaving their names to later generations.
But they were a minority, after all.
But things were different now.
Now, there was the enormous incentive of ascending to heaven and undergoing the Investiture of the Gods.
These shrewd people who had emerged through the Imperial Examination, as the empire's highest elite, naturally unleashed all their strength.
The emperor was the same.
For immortality, which emperor did not take elixirs? In their blind belief in eternal life, emperors could even execute their own sons.
Let alone support these ministers' reforms.
Thus, relatively speaking, the reformists, the progressives, and the expansionists grew more powerful.
They were the mainstream.
If there were