Chaos of the Three Kingdoms Summons

Chapter 2464: Yuan and Cui's alliance, the death of Emperor Shenwu

Gao Huan went from being a "virtuous minister" to having a tough attitude now, and began to reveal his true colors.

If it were a capable monarch, he might have endured it at this time, and waited for an opportunity to completely eradicate Gao Huan's faction.

However, Yuan Xi obviously doesn't have such cunningness.

As a result, within a short period of time, the two sides seemed to have torn their faces apart and became almost hostile to each other.

In fact, at this point, combined with the previous rumors that Yuan Shao had a relationship with Gao Huan, people who originally did not believe these rumors now began to believe them.

After this incident, Gao Huan's evil ambitions became clear.

During this period, Qinghe Cui suddenly announced their support for Yuan Xi, which reversed the situation for Yuan Xi, who was originally struggling.

The Qinghe Cui family was originally a famous aristocratic family in Hebei and a well-known prominent family in the local area.

During the late Han Dynasty, the family had just begun to rise, and had not yet reached its peak. The peak of the family should be considered during the Southern and Northern Dynasties.

It entered its heyday during the Southern and Northern Dynasties and reached its peak in the early years of the Northern Dynasties. During the reign of Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, the family was included in the four noble families of "Lu, Cui, Zheng and Wang"; in the Tang Dynasty, it was ranked among the "seven surnames and ten families" and produced twelve prime ministers. It was known as "Cui Lu" together with the Cui family of Boling and the Lu family of Fanyang.

Although the Qinghe Cui family during this period had not yet reached its peak state a hundred years later, the birth of Cui Hao, one of the most famous people in the Qinghe Cui family, made the family more prosperous than it should have been at this time in history.

Cui Hao was once one of the two major advisers under Yuan Shao. In the beginning, he was even the first adviser under Yuan Shao. It was not until the arrival of Yuan Xi that someone could be on par with him.

As for the princes promoted by top aristocratic families like Yuan Shao, some of his policies were also beneficial to the aristocratic families. They also represented the interests of these great aristocratic families. Of course, it was precisely because of this that he was able to gain the support of a number of great aristocratic families.

And Yuan Tan, with the support of Yuan Xi, decided to temporarily unite with his brothers to get rid of Gao Huan and other outsiders first.

Yuan Xi hated Gao Huan to the core at this time, and with the support of Cui Clan of Qinghe, he felt that he was back on his feet, so he did not reject Yuan Tan's suggestion. He was even ready to roll up his sleeves and do something big to teach this traitor in his eyes a lesson.

Under the combined suppression of the two brothers, and with the assistance of Yuan Xi, Que Hao and others, the weak Gao Huan soon fell into an all-round unfavorable situation and was at a disadvantage in every aspect.

However, at this time, they still maintained a certain degree of restraint and had not yet started fighting, and the situation had not turned into actual military struggle.

In other words, the three of them are more or less bidding time, waiting for them to recover enough strength from the previous epidemic. Once they have enough power in their hands, they will naturally not let the other party off easily.

However, in this regard, Gao Huan was naturally not as good as the remaining two people who had a lot of support from the noble families. In terms of recovery speed, he was lagging behind.

Logically speaking, the longer the time dragged on, the lower his chances of winning would be. But what he didn't expect was that he underestimated Yuan Xi's courage. Just when everyone thought that the most urgent task at this time was to recuperate, with the support of Yuan Xi, Yuan Sheng led 500 soldiers to attack Gao Huan's mansion and killed all the Gao family members including Gao Huan, Gao Cheng and Gao Yanzong.

Only one senior official was able to save his life because he surrendered beforehand. Not only did he save his life, but he was also promoted.

Yuan Shao really raised Gao Gan as his half-son. The treatment he received from Yuan Shao was no less than that of his other sons. And his nephew did not disappoint Yuan Shao. After Gao Huan revealed his evil ambitions, he had already planned to part ways with Gao Huan.

After all, even though these two people are from the same family, the Chenliu Gao family is not a small family, and there are many children in the family. He is a main branch, and the other party is just a side branch. Although there is some brotherly affection in the family, it is not that deep.

Yuan Xi also understood that the most urgent task at this time was to recuperate and restore his previous strength.

Therefore, he, who originally had the advantage, did not want to delay this matter at this time. Instead, he adopted this method of cutting the Gordian knot and ended this political struggle in this way.

If this kind of internal strife continues for a long time, it will seriously affect Jizhou's efforts to recuperate.

Originally, after Gao Huan was killed, Yuan Xi also wanted to have a bite of the piece of cake that was left over. He couldn't let Yuan Tan eat it all alone.

If the other person were to eat it all by himself, by the time he had digested it, Yuan Xi would probably have to act as a good younger brother in front of Yuan Tan, even though he was already a younger brother.

However, Yuan Xi was not worried that Yuan Xi would dare to use the same method against him. Just because they could use the same method against Gao Huan did not mean they could use it on him. Their identities and status were fundamentally different. If they used the same method, something bad would happen!

Even if this method was used to deal with Gao Huan, even among their own people, no one knew how many people would oppose it afterwards.

To put it bluntly, what Yuan Xi did was simply breaking the rules and overturning the table.

However, what made Yuan Xi helpless was that at the most critical moment, the Qinghe Cui family, who had originally expressed their support for him, stabbed him in the back.

It was not until this time that Yuan Xi suddenly realized that even Cui Hao, who was originally neutral, was persuaded by Yuan Xi to secretly support Yuan Tan. The reason why the Qinghe Cui family supported Yuan Xi at that time was just to get rid of Gao Huan first.

In fact, the Qinghe Cui family never truly supported Yuan Xi.

Fortunately, although Feng Ji, Shen Pei and others were not the most famous strategists of the time, they were not unknown people and they all had some abilities.

Fortunately, they decisively suggested that Yuan Xi make a decisive move and withdraw from Bohai, leaving the center of the power struggle. Therefore, with the remaining supporters, he gained control of Zhongshan and Changshan counties.

(End of this chapter)