Yuan Shao, the father of Fanghua in the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 1354 Differentiation
Sima Yi naturally didn't know that Zhuge Liang was one of the few people who knew Yuan Xi's overall strategy. From Zhuge Liang's point of view, since Yuan Xi gave him absolute autocratic power, he had to consider not only the perspective of attacking Chang'an, but also the standpoint of the entire world.

In fact, Yuan Xi was not prepared for a quick victory on the way to Chang'an. After all, the territory he had taken needed to be rebuilt, especially those areas that had been poisoned by Cao Wei, which were particularly vulnerable. If he could not handle them properly after occupying them, it would affect the military advancement in logistics and stability. More haste, less speed.

Zhuge Liang also knew that what Yuan Xi really cared about was the Xianbei in the north, so he left enough soldiers in Yecheng and Yijing to prevent accidents. The strategy of attacking Chang'an depended on the pressure Cao Wei was under.

At the same time, this strategy was to force Cao Wei into Yizhou. However, Cao Wei had another choice, which was to go all out and move south from Jingzhou, directly destroy the Hannan Kingdom, and turn the entire Jingyi region into a mess.

Yuan Xi had underestimated this possibility before, so after discussing with Yuan Xi before sending troops, Zhuge Liang took a detour to Shouchun to discuss the response from the Jianghuai area with Lu Xun.

Finally, the two reached a consensus. Zhuge Liang sent troops as usual, and Lu Xun sent Wen Pin's navy to support Wei Yan and Huang Zhong stationed on the Jiangling defense line to see if they could tear open Cao Wei's defense line from Maicheng to Nanyang.

After Zhuge Liang left, Lu Xun also informed the Kingdom of Hannan of the matter, but he did not expect the young King of Hannan, Liu Chan, to be of any help. After all, the Kingdom of Hannan had exhausted its national strength in the Battle of Chaisang, and it would be impossible to start another war for another three to five years.

Lu Xun's move was just to let Hannan know about it and take care of it. However, news came from Hannan soon that Guan Yu had gone to pacify the Nanman and could not spare time, but he would send dozens of warships to the Han River to cooperate in putting pressure on Cao Wei.

This was already the best situation. After receiving the reply, Lu Xun was relieved. Yuan Xi did not let him participate in the war against Wei, but asked him to find a way to pacify Jiaozhou first. Therefore, this time Lu Xun was the most relaxed among the important officials of Jin State.

Although as one of the three core counselors of Jin State, he did not become the prime minister, but the power of the Grand Commander of Jianghuai was very large and the territory he governed was more, which had already made Lu Xun a little overwhelmed, so this time staying away from military affairs was actually a relief.

He looked at his wife Liu, who was still in mourning, and said, "There has been no military action in Hannan recently. If you want to visit your brother, you can go over there."

After hearing this, Liu said, "Let's wait until the situation becomes clear. The relationship between the two countries is unclear now, and I don't want to cause trouble for my husband."

"Besides, my uncle's widow is about to give birth and needs my concubine to take care of her."

After Lu Ji was assassinated, his widow Zhang was about to give birth. Lu Xun took over as the head of the Lu family again and asked all the Lu family members to move north to Shouchun.

He did this for a reason. When he reached a position like his, it was impossible for him not to worry about what would happen after his death. It was true that the Lu family was a big family, but the bigger the family, the more troubles it would have.

The Lu family's status has always been quite delicate, as they once opposed the Sun family. Now that the Wu Kingdom has been destroyed, although the Sun family has weakened, families like the Wu family still have a superior status, and these families have all had some disputes with the Lu family.

After Lu Xun came to power, there were some domineering children in a large family like the Lu family, and the local officials would definitely have concerns about how to deal with such people. So after considering various factors, Lu Xun simply let the Lu family move to Shouchun and personally supervise the actions of the Lu family's children to make them restrain themselves.

Lu Ji's widow was pregnant at this time, and Liu happened to go over to take care of her. Lu Xun understood Liu's intention and sighed, "It's really a pity for my uncle."

Liu said, "Luckily, my uncle still has a posthumous child. This is also a blessing from God."

"Just like my late father was able to give birth to a child at the age of over 40, I feel that although good people sometimes don't live long, God will definitely compensate them."

Lu Xun thought to himself that that wasn't necessarily true. He had seen too many people die over the years. After all, they were only the nobles who were able to marry wives and concubines. How many soldiers on the battlefield died before they could get married?

Lu Xun suddenly realized that he had unknowingly started to think from the perspective of an ordinary soldier. If it were seven or eight years ago, he would fight just to win and would not consider the life and death of the soldiers at all. He even allowed the soldiers to plunder the local area when Jiangdong was short of military pay. But now it is absolutely impossible to do such a thing.

Have I been influenced by my brother without realizing it?
Lu Xun didn't know how this idea would change his future, but he vaguely felt that the path his sworn brother was taking was completely different from that of previous emperors. Perhaps if he continued to follow him, he would really create a completely different world.

However, thinking of a certain unlucky guy who had been imprisoned in Shouchun for almost three years, Lu Xun could not help but smile bitterly, thinking to himself that this guy was really unlucky. Could it be that his sworn brother had forgotten about him?

Lu Xun's guess was correct. Yuan Xi had indeed almost forgotten about the Shouchun matter because he believed that Lu Xun could take on the responsibility alone. He was also very confident about Zhuge Liang, as Zhuge Liang had filled the gap in the direction of Jingzhou. Now Cao Wei was like a bug caught in a spider web, with its hands and feet bound by spider silk from all directions. The more it struggled, the tighter the web became.

Yuan Xi knew that Chang'an would fall within three years, but it was unnecessary to defeat them this year. Instead, it might make Cao Wei struggle to the death. It was better to give them a break before that. After all, several of his actions in the north had reached a critical moment. First, Goguryeo and Eastern Xianbei sent envoys to Jicheng one after another.

The negotiations on Goguryeo had almost been completed. They were just waiting for Yuan Xi to confer the title on them. Then they would be incorporated into Jin as a vassal state. After that, if the princes and ministers were settled, they would discuss the next step of converting the vassal state into a county.

This would certainly cause resistance from some of the old guard, so Yuan Xi did not force it. Instead, it was the Eastern Xianbei who sent people over, which was somewhat beyond Yuan Xi's expectations.

After understanding the inside story, Yuan Xi discovered that Suli could no longer hold on.

The situation of the Eastern Xianbei was extremely complicated, and the Suli tribe was only one of the larger tribes. The Book of Wei records: "From Youbeiping to Liao in the east, it borders Fuyu and Shemo in the east, with more than 20 towns in the east. Its leaders are Mijia, Queji, Suli, and Huaitou."

That is to say, there were more than 20 large and small tribes in Suli's territory, among which Suli was the most powerful surname at that time, so he was elected as the Chanyu King by the tribal leaders. His status was more like that of the leader of the alliance. If something happened, he could not arbitrarily mobilize personnel from other tribes without the approval of the alliance.

The problem with the Eastern Xianbei was that the power of the Suli tribe had declined in recent years, while other tribes had risen. In addition to Miga Queji, the Huaitou tribe was also very powerful. For example, the leader of the Yuwen tribe, Yuwen Mohuai, had governed well and had become one of the four major Xianbei tribes, with a power that had surpassed that of the Suli tribe. In later generations, he became the ancestor of the famous Yuwen family of the Sui and Tang dynasties.

In addition, the Eastern Xianbei also has the rising Murong and Duan tribes. As these people's power grows, their voice is also increasing, which is also a very headache for Suli.

In the tribal alliance system of the Xianbei, prestige was particularly important in this situation. Kobinen bought over many large and small tribes through favors and thus gained their support. Many people moved to the Central Xianbei, which made Kobinen seem to be the only one in power.

The tribes that remained on the Eastern Xianbei side were all die-hards who were unwilling to leave the Xianbei ancestral lands of Xianbei Mountain and Wuhuan Mountain. Facts in later generations also proved that these people were the most persistent. At that time, because of the Eight Kings Rebellion in the Western Jin Dynasty, many Han refugees moved to the Northeast, strengthened the tribes, brought Central Plains technology, and allowed the Eastern Xianbei tribes to develop rapidly. They played an extremely important role in the Five Barbarians Invasion of China.

The leaders of the Eastern Xianbei, led by Suli, were naturally unaware of this, otherwise they might have insisted on doing so. However, from Suli's perspective, the Eastern Xianbei were facing internal and external troubles, and the people were in panic, so they were eager to make peace with the Jin State.

There are now five or six similar forces within the Eastern Xianbei, and none of them are willing to submit to the other. They are unable to elect a leader like Kobinen who has absolute say. Externally, they are facing the annexation of the Central Xianbei and the covetousness of a number of forces that have defected to the State of Jin. They have only two ways out: one is to join forces with Kobinen to create a powerful Xianbei to confront the Central Plains; the other is to simply exchange conditions to become dependent on the State of Jin, kill Kobinen, and then retain as much of the Xianbei territory as possible.

Both options have a large number of supporters, but after quite a while of bargaining, the latter's voice became louder and louder, overwhelming the former.

The reason is very simple. Most of the leaders of the Eastern Xianbei were descendants of the earliest branches, while Kobinen was a lowly person who came out of some unknown small tribe. Asking the old nobles to bow to Kobinen was as insulting as changing their surnames.

Therefore, driven by the mentality of preferring to be friends with foreign countries rather than domestic slaves, the Dong Xianbei decided to try to contact the State of Jin. After all, the Dong Xianbei had seen the development of the State of Jin over the years, and there were real benefits to being dependent on the State of Jin.

Yuan Xi was naturally very welcome to this attitude, but he also knew in his heart that there was still a considerable gap between his own goals and the bottom line of the Xianbei.

What Yuan Xi really wanted to do was to completely dismember the Xianbei from its culture to its traditions, living habits and ways of thinking, and finally completely integrate them into the Han nationality in the Central Plains.

If he made his purpose known, the Eastern Xianbei would definitely not accept it, so Yuan Xi could only take it step by step. As for how to do it, there is no very successful precedent in Chinese history, and many foreign tribes would eventually return and rebel again, so Yuan Xi had to try a new path.

He racked his brains for a long time and finally found a relatively successful example in later generations. Although the method was a bit unkind and inhumane, it seemed quite appropriate in this era where survival contradictions were so acute that there was not much humanity left.

He had already used the first trick earlier, sending caravans to trade with the Eastern Xianbei and selling luxury goods to the Eastern Xianbei nobles at very low prices. Yuan Xi called it economic infiltration.

So he began to use his second trick against the envoys sent by the Eastern Xianbei.

Infiltration of consciousness and cultivation of agents.

(End of this chapter)