Yuan Shao, the father of Fanghua in the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 1268 Elders
Facing Madam Bian's scolding, Cao Pi lowered his head slightly to hide his expression, but a nonchalant smile appeared on the corner of his mouth. He said respectfully: "Mother, my father was already confused before he died. How can his words count?"

"If these concubines are released and allowed to marry randomly, it will ruin my father's reputation. I am also considering the Cao family."

"Nonsense!" Madam Bian was furious. "You married the previous king's concubine and violated human ethics. If you do this, what reputation will the Cao family have?"

"You said the king was confused before his death. Does that mean he was also confused when he asked you to succeed him?"

"I think you are right about this. The king is really confused!"

Cao Pi's face turned cold, he slowly straightened up, and said lightly: "Mother, what you said is a little inappropriate."

"I am the King of Wei now."

"My father has passed away, so there is no need to mention it anymore."

"I know that my mother is not happy with me and has always liked my fourth brother. Do you want me to give up the throne to him?"

Madam Bian looked at Cao Pi in astonishment. She noticed the crazy light flashing in his eyes and felt a chill in her heart for no reason. She sat down on the couch and stammered, "You..."

Cao Pi bowed respectfully and said, "Mother, you have worked too hard and should rest more."

"Leave Cao's affairs to me."

He immediately turned around and strode out without looking back.

Mrs. Bian looked at Cao Pi's back and found him so strange that she was speechless for a moment.

Cao Pi walked leisurely towards the backyard of the palace. He looked up at the sky. Since the death of Cao Cao, he truly felt the freedom under the vast sky and without any restraints. Now, no matter what he did, no one dared to step back and stop him. This feeling was really great!

When he entered the rear quarters, the concubines were standing on both sides, trembling with fear and not daring to make a sound. They were all Cao Cao's concubines. After Cao Cao died, Cao Pi simply waved his hand and took all these women into his harem.

Naturally, the women did not dare to resist the new King of Wei. Of course, there were also some strong-willed women among them who stood up to accuse Cao Pi, but their fate was that Cao Pi ordered the guards to beat them to death on the spot.

As a result, the concubines were completely silent and dared not say anything more. Cao Pi looked around and saw the appearance of the women, and nodded with satisfaction.

He had long coveted Cao Cao's concubines. Although he had some concubines in his room before, he had been recuperating for several years after being stabbed by Empress Fu, but his health had not improved, which seriously affected his life in the room.

Under such circumstances, he found himself having a dark and strong desire for Cao Cao's concubines. This morbid desire made his body stir and restored some of its functions.

Driven by this power, Cao Pi took the action of taking Cao Cao's concubine into his room. This action naturally caused criticism in the city and was why Mrs. Bian scolded Cao Pi.

But Cao Pi was fearless. Although the Wei State had temporarily retreated to Guanzhong, it was surprisingly united internally. The Yingchuan faction had placed all its bets on him, but would not turn against Cao Pi so quickly.

Moreover, Cao Pi was not stupid. He also used checks and balances to make officials from different factions of the Yingchuan faction work for him. At the same time, he also reciprocated the favor by giving many benefits to the officials of the Yingchuan faction. He even gave the interests that originally belonged to the Cao and Xiahou families to the officials of the Yingchuan faction to divide.

Cao Pi thought very clearly that the Cao and Xiahou families would not dare to betray him for the time being, so there was naturally no need to win them over. Moreover, these people such as Cao Zhi would threaten his position. What he had to do in the future was to weaken the foundation of the Cao and Xiahou families as much as possible to ensure his absolute voice in the Cao family!
So let's give some sweet treats to this good dog of Yingchuan Sect for the time being and let it serve our own purposes!

The more Cao Pi thought about it, the more proud he became. He looked around leisurely, then walked over, pointed at Liu, and said, "Come on, follow me into the house."

When the other concubines heard this, some breathed a sigh of relief, some showed regretful expressions, and some just sat there watching the show with a gloating look on their faces.

Cao Pi took Liu into the house, turned around and said, "Take off all your clothes."

Liu lowered her head, with humiliation on her face, and took off her clothes piece by piece. Seeing this, Cao Pi felt his body stirring. While taking off his clothes, he sneered, "You are the mother of Xionghu. Xionghu has been in the limelight recently, but he probably didn't expect that his mother is now serving me, right?"

Liu was about to explain that she was not Yuan Xi's biological mother, but she swallowed the words back.

Cao Pi became more and more proud. He laughed and said, "I heard that Xiong Hu married Sun Quan's biological mother, which means he is Sun Quan's father. I married Xiong Hu's mother, so I am Sun Quan's grandfather, right?"

"When I think that our Wei State is the elder of the Jin and Wu States, I feel inexplicably happy."

"You are lucky to have served Yuan Shao and my father. Now I give you this opportunity again. You must seize it. Otherwise, if you anger me, I will send your head to the fierce tiger!"

Liu was so scared that she knelt on the ground and begged for mercy. Seeing this, Cao Pi became even more proud and shouted, "Climb up on your knees!" Before he could do anything, the room was filled with Cao Pi's triumphant laughter, which went out of the window, flew far away, and echoed over Xu Du.

Even Cao Pi knew about Sun Quan's biological mother, Madam Wu. How could Sun Quan, as the King of Wu, not know about it? At this moment, he suddenly drew out his sword and chopped it hard at the table, cutting the table in half. Madam Xu beside him was so scared that she trembled and dared not make a sound.

Sun Quan was still furious, and he kicked the half-broken table hard, sending it flying.

Previously, Mrs. Wu went to Wankou to ask to see Sun Quan and persuade Jin and Wu to cease fire. Although only a few people knew about this at first, more and more people began to inquire about it. Sun Quan suspected that someone had deliberately passed the news in order to embarrass himself and thus shake the morale of the Wu army!
Sun Quan guessed that the news that Madam Wu was still alive had already spread privately among the ministers of Wu State. Sun Quan felt that he had become a laughing stock for announcing the death of Madam Wu himself. Every day when he went to court, he saw that everyone seemed to have a mocking smile on their faces, which made Sun Quan wish he could kill them all!
Thinking of Mrs. Wu's betrayal of the Sun family, Sun Quan became even more annoyed. No matter what the reason was, she actually attached herself to the evil tiger, which was a disgrace to the Sun family. It would be better for her to die!
When he thought of this, he finally made up his mind and asked someone to summon Zhu Huan into the palace.

Zhu Huan was a native of Wujun. He followed Sun Quan when he was less than 20 years old and served as the commander of Ruxu. Later, when Ruxu was captured by the Jin army, he temporarily followed Sun Quan for protection.

After receiving the order, he hurried to the palace. After being taken into the secret room, he saw Sun Quan and bowed to him, saying, "Your Majesty, is there something urgent that you are calling me for?"

Sun Quan's first words frightened Zhu Huan, "I heard that you are good at taking care of your soldiers?"

"Soldiers are willing to sacrifice their lives, are they as good as dead soldiers?"

Zhu Huan kowtowed immediately and said, "I am only training soldiers to stop the enemy. I have no ulterior motives. Please understand clearly, Your Majesty!"

Sun Quan waved his hand and said, "That's not what I meant."

"I need your help to do something."

Zhu Huan said quickly: "If the king has given the order, I will die to fulfill it!"

Sun Quan nodded in satisfaction and said, "I want you to take people to Wankou to kill someone."

Zhu Huan subconsciously asked, "Who is it?"

Sun Quan said bitterly, "It's that vicious tiger. He is despicable and shameless. He found someone to pretend to be my closest relative in an attempt to ruin the reputation of my Sun family and disrupt the morale of my Wu army!"

"The evil tiger must die, but before that, I need you to kill the impostor!"

Zhu Huan heard this and said quickly, "I will definitely get the job done. Who is the king talking about?"

Sun Quan said slowly, "That fierce tiger has someone pretend to be the deceased queen mother and is now spreading rumors at Wankou. Now is the critical time for our Wu to use troops. You should act in secret and return immediately after the assassination is successful. Don't leave any traces."

Zhu Huan's heart skipped a beat and he quickly agreed. Sun Quan asked him to lead his men out the next day, and Zhu Huan took the order and withdrew.

After Zhu Huan left, Sun Quan calmed down a little. He sat in the room, and as if to escape the guilt of murdering his mother, he picked up the military intelligence report and started reading it.

He had read these urgent reports several times, but he was still quite dissatisfied, because Wu State had tried almost all its efforts but still could not break the situation in the direction of Jin State and Hannan State.

Forget about Lu Ji. The Ruxukou he attacked was not the main attack direction of the Wu State. What's more, the opponent was Lu Xun, who had become famous in recent years. Sun Quan did not expect Lu Ji to really reach Hefei. The key was Changsha County of Hannan State.

This made Sun Quan very unhappy. Changsha mobilized many generals including Cheng Pu and Huang Gai, and Zhuge Jin served as the military advisor, but they were unable to defeat the combination of Xu Shu and Zhang Fei with a bunch of unknown generals!

The two sides have been fighting for nearly two months. The Wu army, whose number is almost three times that of Zhang Fei's army, has been advancing extremely slowly, and its casualties are even higher than those of Zhang Fei's army. As they move from the waterway to the land battle, the Wu army's casualty ratio is still rising. If this continues, I am afraid that before Changsha can be occupied, the last tens of thousands of Wu army's main forces will be consumed!
Sun Quan became more and more annoyed as he read the urgent report. He still underestimated Zhang Fei's strength. The other party was not a reckless man with courage but no strategy. On the contrary, in recent battles, it was revealed that Zhang Fei had a broad view of the overall situation that was no less than that of a counselor. He used a variety of tactics and put the Wu army, which was attacking from both sides, in an extremely embarrassing situation.

I am really blind. I have raised a bunch of useless things. I can't even defeat Zhang Fei alone!

Sun Quan was indignant. He couldn't let Zhang Fei continue to waste time with him like this. He had to find a way to get rid of this thorn!

He picked up a few more pieces of intelligence, which were about Zhang Fei. One of the pieces of intelligence said that Zhang Fei had a bad temper and was harsh on his subordinates. He often used military law to punish soldiers, which made many generals and soldiers dissatisfied.

Sun Quan read through them one by one. When he saw the list of Zhang Fei's deputy generals, he narrowed his eyes slightly as if thinking about something.

In the days that followed, as the weather began to warm up and was about to enter spring from deep winter, Zhuge Liang escorted Zhen Mi back to Yijing and met Yuan Xi.

(End of this chapter)