History of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

Chapter 150: Unification of the Two Sichuan Provinces
【Annexation of Dongchuan】

After receiving the imperial edict to attack Fengxiang, the generals of Xichuan volunteered one after another, saying that this was a good opportunity to annex Fengxiang and Li Maozhen, and that the opportunity should not be missed.

Wang Jian rejected the proposal to march north to Fengxiang, saying, "This is a misstep. I have already gained a lot, and there is no need to wait to increase the number of troops under Qixia."

Great wisdom knows when to stop.

Wang Jian analyzed the current situation for his subordinates, explained the pros and cons, and pointed out that Li Maozhen had been separatist in Qi for a long time and had great prestige in the local area. He was not good enough to compete with the powerful vassal states in Guandong, but he was more than enough to defend the territory. Moreover, we had already seized a lot of his territory during the chaos. If we continue to attack Fengxiang, the gains will outweigh the losses. It is better to let him serve as a buffer zone between our Shu and the Central Plains. Not only should we not attack him, but we should support him at the right time (it is better to support and consolidate him, so that he can serve as our shield and oar).

Wang Jian is not only a passionate military strategist and conqueror, but also a cool-headed politician and political strategist. He can give up greed, ignore hatred, and truly be guided by long-term interests, adapt to the current situation, and exchange enemies and friends seamlessly.

Since the start of the "anti-Yang movement", Wang Jian and Li Maozhen have been fighting for the land of Shannan for a long time (since Qin and Sichuan have been at odds for many years). The relationship between Wang Jian of Xichuan and Li Maozhen of Fengxiang is like that between Li Keyong of Hedong and Zhu Wen of Bianzhou. Now, Li Maozhen is in a difficult situation (weakened and unable to defend), and the court has issued an edict to attack him. However, Wang Jian not only did not throw stones into the well, but instead proposed to help Li Maozhen at the right time. This shows Wang Jian's outstanding political wisdom!
When Wang Jian started his army, his great strategist Zhou Xiang presented him with a Sichuan version of the "Longzhong Plan", which laid out his strategic goal, which was to establish a stronghold in Shu. All of Wang Jian's subsequent actions were based on this program.

Now, Dongchuan is Wang Jian's main mission. As for seizing the territories of Fengxiang and Shannan West Road, they are just taking advantage of the situation. The submission of Qiannan area is even more of a windfall.

Therefore, Wang Jian took advantage of Li Maozhen's lack of time to look south and intervene in the affairs of the two Sichuan provinces, stepped up the military action against Dongchuan, and personally led a large army to reinforce the front line of Dongchuan. Dongchuan was defeated repeatedly, and the reinforcements from Fengxiang also suffered a series of defeats and were blocked outside Jianmen Pass.

At this time, an interesting scene was staged again.

Zhaozong appointed the number one seed, Prime Minister Sun Wei, as the commander-in-chief of the expedition to Fengxiang, to lead the troops from all over the world to recapture Chang'an and eliminate Li Maozhen.

Li Maozhen immediately admitted his mistake and wrote a letter of apology, saying that he was confused for a moment and hoped that the court would give him a chance to start a new life. He would definitely turn over a new leaf and take out a huge sum of money to repair the Chang'an Palace to atone for his sins.

And let's look at the so-called loyal army:

At that time, Li Keyong and Zhu Wen were fighting in Wei Bo. Zhu Wen, Li Keyong, Luo Hongxin, and the two Zhus of Yan and Yun were all involved in it and had no time to look west. Yang Xingmi of Huainan and Qian Liu of Hangzhou were also deeply involved in the Jianghuai battlefield, and were hindered by "Dong Chang's enthronement". Only Wang Jian of Xichuan had the ability to send troops to attack Qi, but he was not only unwilling to do so, but instead had the intention of rescuing Fengxiang out of the principle of "the lips and the teeth are cold".

The so-called "Loyal Army of the World" was in name only, and not a single soldier was seen for half a day.

Out of consideration for his own interests, Han Jian did not want to see the powerful vassal states from Guandong actually come to Guanzhong, so he also interfered and secretly obstructed the gathering of the troops to support the king.

The facts were laid out before Zhaozong, and he had no choice but to forgive Li Maozhen. Since Li Maozhen had given the court enough face and left enough room for maneuver, he would of course choose to forgive him.

Thus, Li Maozhen's "second offense" ended in such an anticlimactic way.

Li Maozhen left Chang'an with a depressed look on his face. He had twice taken advantage of others' misfortunes, but he did not gain any benefit. Not only did he lose cities and territory, and suffered heavy casualties, he also became the most notorious thief in the world and a rat crossing the street. Politically, militarily, economically... he failed in all aspects, which was simply horrible.

Powerful vassals in Guandong such as Li Keyong, Zhu Wen, Yang Xingmi, and Qian Liu all gained huge profits at this time, but what Li Maozhen could not tolerate the most was the rapid growth of Wang Jian of Xichuan.

Wang Jian not only occupied some of Li Maozhen's cities, but also made gestures to unify the two Sichuan provinces. If Wang Jian succeeded, Fengxiang would never have peace again.

Li Maozhen then submitted a petition to the court, accusing Wang Jian of annexing the Dongchuan area. Here, he pretended to be defending Gu Yanhui of Dongchuan, and did not mention Wang Jian's occupation of Shannan West Road. Especially since Wang Jian had previously accepted the court's reconciliation edict, he was now openly disobeying the edict, which was really abominable! In response, Li Maozhen expressed strong condemnation and solemn protest!
Emperor Zhaozong issued another ceasefire edict, requiring Wang Jianli to immediately stop all military operations against Dongchuan and withdraw from Dongchuan, and sent special mediator (envoy) Li Xun to mediate.

Wang Jian met with Li Xun at the front line of Zizhou. Wang Jian pointed at the officers and soldiers holding the banners and said, "I can't control the voices of the masses."

This is another blatant violation of the imperial edict.

Li Maozhen was full of righteousness, "Is there still the king's law? Is there still law?"

Zhaozong thought what Li Maozhen said made sense, so he issued an edict: demoted Wang Jian to the position of Governor of Nanzhou, appointed Li Maozhen as the Jiedushi of Xichuan, and appointed Prince Tan Li Sizhou as the Jiedushi of Fengxiang.

I don’t know whether Zhaozong was being humorous on purpose or sincerely trying to disgust Li Maozhen.

When Wang Jian received the edict, he just laughed and ignored it; when Li Maozhen received the edict, he was furious.

Prince Tan Li Sizhou came to "take over" Fengxiang in an orderly manner, but was surrounded by Li Maozhen in Fengtian (now Qianxian County, Shaanxi Province). Fortunately, Han Jian intervened and Li Maozhen lifted the siege, allowing Prince Tan Li Sizhou to return to the Huazhou Palace.

Both the central court and Fengxiang Li Maozhen were unable to interfere in the affairs of the two Sichuans. This was an excellent opportunity for Wang Jian to complete his cause of unifying the two Sichuans.

Wang Jian and Gu Yanhui fought more than 50 battles, cleared the external obstacles, and formally surrounded Zizhou. After that, they adopted the advice of counselor Zhou Dequan and recruited the bandits in Dongchuan, further widening the power comparison between the two sides.

Gu Yanhui was trapped in an isolated city, and his morale was low. Within just one month, the governor of Suizhou led 20,000 troops to surrender to Wang Jian; the governor of Hezhou led 1,000 troops to surrender to Wang Jian; and the Fengxiang reinforcement general Li Jipu led 2,000 troops to surrender to Wang Jian.

In Zizhou City, there is a "Mirror Hall" which is magnificent and famous. Gu Yanhui often holds banquets for his generals here. Gu Yanhui's sword can cut iron like mud, and is called "Scabies". Gu Yanhui gave this sword to his most trusted adopted son Gu Yao. Whenever there is a banquet, Gu Yanhui always lets Gu Yao hold the "Scabies" and serve by his side, and says to the generals: "I swear with you to live and die together. If you break the oath, come and experience this 'big health care' first."

Now, Wang Jian was attacking the city very quickly, and the city would fall at any moment. Seeing that the situation was hopeless, Gu Yanhui enjoyed his last dinner with his trusted generals.

Gu Yao pressed the "Scabies" and said to the generals, "Do you remember our oath? We don't ask to be born on the same day, month and year, but we ask to die on the same day. Now, it's time to fulfill our promise. Come, line up for the 'health care'."

So, all the close friends fulfilled their promise and died together.

Gu Yanhui called his adopted son Gu Chen (Wang Zongbi) to his side and said, "You are not my trusted old subordinate, so you don't have to die with me. Go, run for your life." Wang Zongbi burst into tears, knelt down to Gu Yanhui, then climbed over the wall and defected to Wang Jian's camp.

Afterwards, Gu Yanhui killed his wife, children and the entire family with his own hands, and finally committed suicide by drawing his sword.

At this point, Wang Jian officially annexed Dongchuan, completed the unification of the two Sichuans, and laid a solid foundation for his future rule over Shu.

After Wang Zongbi escaped, the generals around Wang Jian accused him of being ungrateful and fickle and asked Wang Jian to kill him. However, Wang Jian did not bear grudges and treated him as before, which once again demonstrated his broad mind.

When Gu Yanhui committed suicide, there were still 70,000 troops in the city, but Gu Yanhui did not choose to fight to the death, but saved the lives of these 70,000 soldiers with his own death. Since the defeat was already determined, it was an immortal merit to minimize the casualties of the enemy and our own soldiers and civilians.

In this regard, Gu Yanhui is also a good guy, a man of affection and righteousness.

After Wang Jian entered Zizhou, he naturally did the usual things, such as recommending his adopted son Wang Zongdi as governor of Dongchuan, pacifying the people, sealing up the government treasury, rewarding people according to their merits, and reorganizing the surrendered prisoners... In addition to these routine steps, he also did a special action:

Wang Jian took out a small notebook full of names. He had carried this notebook with him for nearly ten years. Now, it was a death list. Anyone on the list would be killed without mercy!

Ten years ago, when Wei Zhaodu led the expedition against Chen Jingxuan in Xichuan, Wang Jian, Gu Yanhui and others were under Wei Zhaodu's control and dispatch. At that time, Wang Jian and Gu Yanhui had a brief experience of working together. But this experience is an eternal pain in Wang Jian's heart.

First of all, Wang Jian was a rising star. He had just been ostracized and suppressed by the "Yang faction" in the court, and was sent to a remote area to be a small governor. He was a poor boy who started out as a poor boy; while the brothers Gu Yanlang and Gu Yanhui of Dongchuan were the governors of Dongchuan, and their family background was rich.

So Gu Yanhui looked down on Wang Jian.

Secondly, Wang Jian's main force was composed of 8,000 desperate criminals and young barbarians from the caves and streams, with a strong exotic atmosphere. After Wang Jian entered Sichuan, when he bid farewell to his godfather Tian Lingzi at the foot of Chengdu city, he and his trusted followers shaved their heads to express their determination. Therefore, Wang Jian's troops were all dressed in the costumes of barbarians from top to bottom (with shaved heads and tattooed faces like ghosts).

There is also a lot of "secret language" in Wang Jian's army, such as "Du Ming Long" for sword, "Xiao Xun Xun" for knife, "Pan Shang Shu" for bow, "Sheng Niu Er" for drum, "Xiang Ba" for gong...

When trying to scare Wei Zhaodu, they also used horrific methods such as cutting and eating people alive in public. Wang Jian's troops were the outliers in the coalition army, incompatible with the civilization of the Central Plains, and resembled a tribe of barbarians.

Gu Yanhui was "meticulous and slow, with the demeanor of a Confucian scholar" and was a famous scholar with an elegant demeanor and a wealth of knowledge.

When the two men led their trusted followers to attend the military meeting chaired by Wei Zhaodu, Gu Yanhui, wearing a tall hat and a wide belt, a feather fan and a green scarf, was elegant and graceful, giving advice on the state of affairs and writing passionate articles, just like Kong Ming resurrected; Wang Jian, with his hair shaved and his face tattooed, wearing strange clothes, looked like Meng Huo who was immortal.

Gu Yanhui looked at Wang Jian with disdain, his contempt evident in his words, and his followers also pointed fingers at Wang Jian, sneered at him, and even disregarded basic etiquette and laughed at him in person.

At that time, Gu Yanhui did not hide his contempt for Wang Jian, and was so rude that sometimes even Wei Zhaodu could not stand it and often privately admonished Gu Yanhui to consider the overall situation and unite with his comrades. However, Gu Yanhui was not moved at all and still maintained a high and condescending attitude.

Wang Jian's strength at the time was not enough to maintain his dignity, so he chose to endure it, but secretly took note of all those who laughed at him.

A gentleman's revenge is never too late.

Ten years later, Wang Jian entered Dongchuan as a conqueror. He took out the little book he had treasured for ten years and "killed all those who recorded the jokes".

Behind Wang Jian's mask of generosity and kindness, there is also a narrow side.

Thanks to my old friends "最爱一笑" and "纯正lsp" for their recommendation votes and support, thank you!

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(End of this chapter)