History of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

Chapter 267 Calming the Second Fan, Soul Binding

[Calm down the two vassals, bind their souls]

The Dingzhou Yiwu Army and the Zhenzhou Chengde Army were models of good-neighborliness. Although the two major vassal states were closely adjacent to each other, they were not like other neighboring vassal states with frictions, conflicts, attacks, and annexations. The two towns maintained close relations for decades.

In addition to being closely connected geographically, the two vassal states also have many things in common. For example, they are both powerful vassal states in Hebei. Their overall strength is not weak, but their presence is very low. They almost never launch wars of aggression against other countries. The only few military conflicts were also caused by forced involvement and they were just defending their territory.

For example, the core leadership was very stable. Wang Rong guarded Zhenzhou for 38 years, and Dingzhou only changed twice in these decades (Wang Chucun - Wang Gao - Wang Chuzhi), and the political situation was stable.

Due to the stable political situation, the will of its leaders can be easily implemented and upheld, and the leaders of both sides have reached consensus on key issues such as geopolitics, so the two towns have been able to develop peacefully and stably for a long time.

Their consensus has been analyzed in detail in the previous article, and can be summarized as glorious isolation. They do not interfere in the internal affairs of other vassal states, nor do they want others to interfere in their internal affairs.

Their military threats mainly came from three directions: the Hedong Group in the west, the Bianzhou Group in the south, and the Youzhou Group in the northeast. No matter which side attacked them, Zhenzhou and Dingzhou would unite and seek support from the other two sides. This was their tacit understanding and way of survival.

Now, Zhenzhou was in turmoil, and the Hedong Group launched a war to suppress the rebellion. As the Hedong army approached Zhenzhou, Dingzhou also exploded.

Wang Chuzhi was terrified, thinking that the two vassals of Zhenzhou and Dingzhou were closely connected. From a geopolitical perspective, Dingzhou had to do its utmost to ensure the integrity and independence of Zhenzhou. If Zhenzhou was lost, Dingzhou would be lost! So Wang Chuzhi wrote a letter to Li Cunxu to persuade him to make peace, saying that the king was fighting with the Later Liang Dynasty and it was not appropriate to start a war in the rear. He should choose to forgive Zhang Wenli.

Li Cunxu replied: "Zhang Wenli murdered our lord, which is an unforgivable crime. He also secretly seduced the Later Liang army, which also had an adverse impact on your Dingzhou. I am helping you." In a word, mind your own business!
Wang Chuzhi became even more frightened.

The two vassals of Zhenzhou and Dingzhou only expressed their submission to Hedong. Although they belonged to Hedong's sphere of influence, they enjoyed a high degree of autonomy. Li Cunxu was ambitious and had great ambitions. It was only a matter of time and method to take over the Heshuo area. Now, Zhang Wenli's rebellion provided Li Cunxu with an excuse to take back Zhenzhou. If Zhenzhou was taken back, would Dingzhou be far behind?
After much thought and repeated weighing, Wang Chuzhi finally did a foolish thing: colluding with the Khitan and resisting Li Cunxu.

The envoy sent to Khitan was Wang Chuzhi's own son, Wang Yu.

Wang Yu was Wang Chuzhi's illegitimate son, not a legitimate son, and was disliked by Wang Chuzhi since childhood. When Zhu Wen was pacifying Heshuo, Wang Chuzhi led his troops to resist under the order of Wang Gao, the then governor. After the defeat, he launched a mutiny and seized power. His nephew Wang Gao was forced to flee to Hedong and rely on Li Keyong. It was this Wang Yu who fled to Hedong with Wang Gao at that time.

This also shows the delicate relationship between Wang Chuzhi and his son Wang Yu. Wang Yu would rather follow his cousins ​​into exile than stay with his biological father.

After Wang Yu arrived in Hedong, Li Keyong married his daughter to him as a political investment, expecting a high return in the future. However, man proposes, God disposes. Li Keyong would never have thought that Wang Yu's investment would not only lose all the principal, but also go bankrupt, requiring additional margin.

Now, the Hedong Group placed Wang Yu in Xinzhou, which happened to border the Khitan. So Wang Chuzhi secretly contacted Wang Yu and asked him to lure the Khitan army south to create pressure on Li Cunxu to ease the difficulties in Dingzhou. Wang Chuzhi promised him that after the matter was accomplished, he would let him come back to inherit the Dingzhou Yiwu Army.

A father is a father, and blood is thicker than water. Wang Yu was overjoyed and fled to Hedong with his entire family, sneaking into Khitan territory and surrendering to Yelu Abaoji. He told the Central Plains the truth and the potential of the Central Plains, and expressed his willingness to lead the Khitans to invade his motherland.

Yelu Abaoji was overjoyed and immediately adopted Wang Yu as his son.

Wang Chuzhi did not love his biological son, but deeply loved his adopted son, Wang Du.

Wang Chuzhi also had a Lu Yongzhi-like figure by his side, named Li Yingzhi, a well-known Taoist priest. Once, Wang Chuzhi fell seriously ill, and all the major hospitals failed to cure him. He was desperate and asked Li Yingzhi to use unorthodox methods to cure his illness. It happened that Wang Chuzhi's illness was cured during the master's performance, so he believed that it was the effect of Li Yingzhi's magic, and from then on he regarded Li Yingzhi as a semi-immortal.

Wang Chuzhi offered Li Yingzhi a military post and handed over the military and political power to him. The generals of the army were quite disgusted by this, but no one dared to persuade Wang Chuzhi.

Wang Chuzhi had no children in his early years, so Li Yingzhi offered one of his adopted sons, a boy whose real name was Liu Yunlang. Li Yingzhi said that this boy had amazing bones and would be rich and powerful in the future, so he adopted him as his adopted son. Now that you have no children, I am willing to offer this little lucky star to you to repay your kindness to me. So, Li Yingzhi adopted Liu Yunlang to Wang Chuzhi as his adopted son and changed his name to Wang Du. Out of trust in Li Yingzhi, Wang Chuzhi firmly believed that Wang Du would be invaluable in the future, so he took good care of him and promoted him. First, he carefully selected a large new army for him in the army, and set up a complete set of independent and complete officials, command and other systems as the personal guards of the "prince".

It was a taboo in the army to set up a new army outside the existing military system. The generals thought that this would be a time bomb for Dingzhou, but the lord favored treacherous officials and was obsessed with unorthodox ways, so no one dared to advise him.

Later, Li Kuangchou of Youzhou passed through Dingzhou. Wang Chuzhi secretly hid soldiers in preparation for an emergency. After Li Kuangchou passed through the border in an orderly manner, the soldiers launched a "military remonstrance", captured and killed Li Yingzhi, and asked Wang Chuzhi to kill Wang Du to eliminate future troubles. Wang Chuzhi refused.

The soldiers of Dingzhou were braver than those of Huainan, and Wang Chuzhi was more sinister than Gao Pian.

On the second day of the military remonstration, Wang Chuzhi convened a meeting, made a profound self-examination, denounced the evil man Li Yingzhi for misleading the people, affirmed the soldiers' military remonstration, and took out a large sum of money to reward the righteous warriors who participated in the military remonstration yesterday. The Dingzhou soldiers were delighted and praised their lord for his wisdom and bravery.

However, this was Wang Chuzhi's trap. Wang Chuzhi secretly recorded the names of the award recipients, and over the next twenty years, he killed everyone on the list for various reasons.

He used rewards for merit as bait to obtain the list, and then spent twenty years to clean it up... Wang Chuzhi's insidiousness and viciousness are simply horrifying.

Now, the adopted son Wang Du has been promoted by Wang Chuzhi to deputy envoy of Yiwu Army. According to Wang Chuzhi's will, if nothing unexpected happens, the adopted son Wang Du will be his only legal heir.

Wang Yu's previous defection to Hedong was directly related to his father's preference for his adopted son Wang Du. It was not uncommon for adopted sons to drive away or kill their own sons during that period, such as Zhu Yougong of Zhu Wen, Xu Zhigao of Xu Wen, and Li Congke of Li Siyuan.

Colluding with the Khitan also became an infighting between Wang Yu and Wang Du for the Dingzhou family property.

When Wang Du learned that Wang Chuzhi had sent Wang Yu to collude with the Khitan, he became extremely anxious, fearing that Wang Yu would take away Dingzhou, which belonged to him, with the support of the Khitans.

At that time, the officials of Dingzhou Yiwu Army unanimously opposed Wang Chuzhi's collusion with Khitan. After all, no one wanted to be a traitor. If given the opportunity to choose, everyone wanted to make money while standing.

Therefore, Wang Du secretly incited the officials' discontent and conspired with his trusted generals to launch a mutiny.

On that day, Wang Chuzhi and Zhang Wenli's envoys had a banquet in the east of the city and returned to the headquarters in the evening. Wang Du led hundreds of his personal soldiers to ambush near the official residence, kidnapped Wang Chuzhi, put him under house arrest, and killed all of Wang Chuzhi's descendants and confidants. Afterwards, Wang Du claimed to be the governor of the Yiwu Army and reported the whole story to Li Cunxu.

Li Cunxu immediately appointed Wang Du as the Jiedushi of Dingzhou Yiwu Army, replacing Wang Chuzhi.

The Later Liang in the south had not been completely resolved, and the traitor Wang Yu had seduced the Khitan to move south again. The situation in Hebei was not optimistic. Li Cunxu left his generals Li Cunshen and Li Siyuan to defend Desheng Jiacheng, while he personally led the main force to attack Zhenzhou, in order to capture it before Zhenzhou and the Khitan army joined forces.

Under the tremendous military pressure from the Hedong Army, Zhang Chujin sent his younger brother Zhang Chuqi to meet Li Cunxu, expressing that he had admitted his mistakes and was willing to surrender and reconcile.

Li Cunxu decisively rejected Zhang Chujin's conditional surrender and sent all his elite forces to attack Zhenzhou City. Firstly, Zhang Chujin's surrender was just a delaying tactic to wait for the arrival of Khitan reinforcements; secondly, as Wang Chuzhi worried, Li Cunxu needed to find an opportunity to solve the problem of Zhenzhou and Dingzhou once and for all.

Zhang Chujin was unable to hold out, so he sent his trusted Han Zhengshi to lead a thousand cavalrymen to break out and ask for reinforcements from Dingzhou, but they were eventually destroyed by the Hedong Corps.

(End of this chapter)