History of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

Chapter 815: Lame Assist (Part )

At that time, the elite forces of the Southern Tang were all in Jiangbei to resist the Later Zhou. Chai Kehong was assigned thousands of old, weak, sick, disabled and pregnant women. Moreover, the weapons and equipment allocated to him by the Deputy Privy Councilor Li Zhenggu (a member of the "Four Evils and Five Ghosts" group) were all counterfeit and shoddy imitations (the spears and armor were all rotten and dull).

Chai Kehong went to Li Zhenggu to seek an explanation and asked him to distribute qualified weapons and armor, but he ended up getting scolded by Li Zhenggu.

Li Zhenggu said that Wu Dalang kept a night owl, and people play with birds like they like. A good horse deserves a good saddle, and elite soldiers and generals naturally wear shiny helmets and armor. There are all kinds of legends and epics, but you, the old, weak, sick and disabled, are only equipped with crutches and foot bindings. Anyway, you are cannon fodder to die, so why care about these?

Since Chai Kehong had always refused to attach himself to the "Four Evils and Five Demons" and never flattered them, Li Zhenggu was very disgusted with Chai Kehong. He not only refused to replace his weapons and armor, but also used his power to scold Chai Kehong. Chai Kehong was only a general of the imperial guards, while Li Zhenggu was the deputy envoy of the Privy Council, several levels higher than Chai Kehong.

Chai Kehong's subordinates were very indignant, but Chai Kehong remained calm, as if he didn't hear anything.

In this way, Chai Kehong rushed to the Changzhou front line with the elderly, the weak, the sick and the disabled, carrying rotten and broken equipment.

Li Zhenggu was narrow-minded. Even though Chai Kehong did not retaliate when he was scolded or beaten, Li Zhenggu still felt it necessary to increase the punishment. So he sent people to the front line to summon Chai Kehong back to the court and replace him with Zhu Kuangye. He would wait for him to come back and then slowly punish him to death.

As soon as Chai Kehong arrived in Runzhou, he received a conscription order from Li Zhenggu.

Crown Prince Li Hongji hated the actions of the "Four Evils and Five Demons", so he detained Chai Kehong and said to him: "Fight as you want, and let go. I will help you deal with the political affairs in the rear."

Afterwards, Li Hongji personally submitted a petition to vouch for Chai Kehong, and stated that Changzhou was in imminent danger and that the commander could not be changed at any time.

Chai Kehong's mother also submitted a petition, saying that Chai Kehong inherited his father's style very much. If Chai Kehong cannot win, I am willing to be killed with him!
The eldest son of the emperor, Li Hongji, backed him up, and the widow of a meritorious veteran bet her life to guarantee him, so Li Jing could only express his confidence in him. However, Li Zhenggu was determined to put Chai Kehong to death, and secretly sent an envoy to the front line again to summon Chai Kehong back to the court.

At that time, Chai Kehong had already led his troops to the Changzhou battlefield and was organizing resistance. When he heard that there was another envoy sent by Li Zhenggu, he was immediately furious. He ordered the envoy to be tied up, and then shouted angrily: "I am wholeheartedly defending the enemy and defending the land. At this critical moment, you asked me to retreat. You must be a spy sent by the enemy!" He then ordered him to be beheaded.

The envoy cried out that he was wronged, "It was Privy Councilor Li who sent me here!"

Chai Kehong pointed to the big banner with the word "Shuai" fluttering in the wind, "Here, I have the final say." He then pointed to the sword under his ribs, "Even if Li Zhenggu comes, I will still kill him!"

Afterwards, the envoy was executed in front of the army. The morale of the Southern Tang soldiers was greatly boosted.

Let's look at the Wuyue army. Prime Minister Wu Cheng was in charge, with two generals, Bao Xiurang and Luo Sheng. However, this trio was not an iron triangle. Bao Xiurang, Luo Sheng and Wu Cheng had a bad relationship and had old grudges.

This feud dates back to about ten years ago, when the Southern Tang Dynasty annexed Fujian. At that time, Bao Xiurang was the commander of the Fuzhou occupation army and "helped" Li Renda to govern Fuzhou. Li Renda was unwilling to succumb to the control of the Wuyue Kingdom, so he planned to assassinate Bao Xiurang, but the plan was exposed and Bao Xiurang killed him in return.

It is not clear whether Li Renda was plotting against Wuyue or Bao Xiurang was plotting to secede from Fuzhou. In order to avoid exacerbating the conflict, Wuyue recalled Bao Xiurang back to Hangzhou and let Wu Cheng stay in Fuzhou.

So in Bao Xiurang's opinion, it was Wu Cheng who was behind the scenes and took over his comfortable job as the "Emperor of Fujian". From then on, a rift arose between the two.

This time, Wu Cheng is the top boss of Bao Xiurang and Luo Sheng. Wu Cheng deliberately makes things difficult for the two of them, adding new hatred to old ones.

Prior to this, Li Jing of the Southern Tang sent Qiao Kuangshun as an envoy to the Kingdom of Wuyue, asking Liangzhe not to take advantage of the situation and add insult to injury. Chai Kehong outside the city came up with a clever plan. He used a large curtain to disguise the warship as an ordinary yacht, claiming that he was here to welcome the envoy Qiao Kuangshun back to his country.

The trick was crude and the deception was low-level. Bao Xiurang and Luo Sheng saw through Chai Kehong's trick at a glance.

However, when the Wu Yue patrol reported the matter, Prime Minister Wu Cheng only talked about it and said, "It has been said since ancient times that when two countries are at war, they do not kill envoys. Don't listen to those rude warriors and don't doubt them unreasonably. It's not in line with the style of a great country like us." Then he ordered the water fort to be opened, allowing the Southern Tang ships to land, pass through, and pick up people.

Bao Xiurang and Luo Sheng looked at each other, then glanced at the central army tent with great contempt, thinking, "Wait for death!"

Sure enough, after the ship docked, countless Southern Tang soldiers suddenly poured out of the cabin and rushed straight to the Wuyue camp. At this time, an interesting scene appeared. Bao Xiurang and Luo Sheng not only did not resist, but instead became guides, guiding the Southern Tang soldiers to catch the "big fish". Historical records record that "Luo Sheng did not fight hard and let them go to Cheng's tent."

Wu Cheng's deputy general Shao Keqian fought desperately. Shao Keqian's son died in front of his horse, but he didn't even have time to look back. This is very different from movies and TV shows. On the screen, whenever a supporting character dies in battle, the protagonist always rushes over, shouts his name, hugs him tenderly for a moment, and then explodes and kills. In fact, in reality, Shao Keqian should be like this, and he has no time to care even when his own son dies in front of him.

After a fierce battle led by Shao Keqian and others, Wu Cheng finally managed to escape and saved his life. In this battle, more than 10,000 Wu Yue soldiers were killed, dozens of generals were captured, and Changzhou was recaptured by Chai Kehong.

The captured Wu Yue generals were escorted to Runzhou, and Li Hongji ordered them all to be beheaded.

According to records, there is a temple of Chen Gaoren in Changzhou. Chen Gaoren was born in the Southern and Northern Dynasties and was active in the Sui and Tang Dynasties. Later, his father-in-law Shen Faxing plotted a rebellion and separatism. Chen Gaoren learned about it and poisoned him to death for fear that he would leak the secret. Chen Gaoren was a native of Changzhou and was famous for his loyalty and filial piety. There was a record of "cutting his own flesh to serve his parents". He was highly respected by the people of Changzhou, so a temple was built in Changzhou to commemorate him.

When Chai Kehong first arrived in Changzhou, he was thinking hard about how to defeat the enemy. At night, he suddenly dreamed that Chen Gaoren came to visit him and said to him, "I will lead the ghost soldiers to help you fight." The next day, when the decisive battle was about to begin, two big black bulls suddenly appeared inexplicably and charged at the Wu Yue soldiers. Chai Kehong immediately ordered a general attack and won a great victory.

After the war, Chai Kehong recommended that Chen Gaoren be honored as "Emperor Wulie".

I personally think that the so-called help from Chen Gaoren's ghost soldiers is most likely a way for Chai Kehong to protect himself. The gods helped him to seize Changzhou, which means that the gods recognized the Southern Tang regime and Li Jing's rule, which was what Li Jing liked to hear the most, so Li Jing readily approved Chai Kehong's request and conferred the deceased Chen Gaoren as Wulie Emperor. In this way, would Li Zhenggu dare to make things difficult for Chai Kehong again? To recognize Li Jing, one must acknowledge the help from Chen Gaoren's ghost soldiers; to acknowledge the help from Chen Gaoren's ghost soldiers, one must acknowledge the person he helped - Chai Kehong. In short, Chai Kehong successfully bound himself to Li Jing, thus making Li Zhenggu hesitant.

Chai Kehong had previously served as the inspector of Xuanzhou. After taking office, he found that the city defense system had almost completely collapsed, the city walls had collapsed, the trenches had been in disrepair for a long time, and the city defense equipment was incomplete and ineffective... Chai Kehong was shocked and angry, and hurriedly called the relevant person in charge to ask what was going on.

The official smiled bitterly and said, it was a long story. Xuanzhou was originally one of the most important towns of the Huainan Group. It was both the capital of Xuanshe Road and the headquarters of the Ningguo Army. However, since Yang Xingmi, there had been successive major rebellions here. In 903, Tian Yu rebelled against Yang Xingmi, in 905, Wang Maozhang defected to Wuyue, and in 912, Li Yu rebelled... So from then on, no one dared to repair the city defenses. It was hard to explain why they were caught in such a situation.

Chai Kehong felt both angry and amused, and said, "Times have changed. How can this be possible! Repair it for me!" Under Chai Kehong's supervision, Xuanzhou city defense system was repaired.

Therefore, when Wuyue general Lu Yanzhu was ordered to attack Xuanzhou, he failed to capture it after a long time. When Lu Yanzhu heard that Changzhou was recovered by Southern Tang, he was worried that his retreat would be cut off, so he took the initiative to withdraw his troops and retreated back to Wuyue.

In the Battle of Changzhou, Chai Kehong became famous overnight. History books said, "When it came to self-preservation and border affairs, no one was more meritorious than Kehong in defeating the enemy." This means that among the many foreign wars since Li Jing ascended the throne, Chai Kehong's contribution in the Battle of Changzhou was the greatest and could be called the best.

After resolving the crisis on the eastern front, Chai Kehong volunteered to go to the Shouzhou front to resolve the Shouzhou crisis. Li Jing readily agreed, but history always likes to play tricks on people. Chai Kehong suddenly fell ill halfway and died a few days later. Li Jing was deeply saddened and gave him the posthumous title of "Wei Lie".

At this point, following Wang Kui of Hunan on the western front, the friendly forces of the Wuyue Kingdom on the eastern front also withdrew from the Huainan battlefield.

(End of this chapter)