Yuan Shao, the father of Fanghua in the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 770 Changing the present

But in fact, Xu You was wrong. Yuan Shang did not entrust Xu You with important tasks simply because his comprehensive ability was not as good as Tian Feng and others.

Xu You was different from other counselors in that he was not a native of Jizhou, but was born in Nanyang, Jingzhou. When he was young, he had good friends with Yuan Shao and Cao Cao, and he was also a well-known figure.

Moreover, he was the first among the three to have dissatisfaction with the Han Dynasty and to take action brazenly.

In the fourth year of Zhongping, because he was dissatisfied with Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty, he united with Wang Fen, the governor of Jizhou, Zhou Jing of Pei State and other heroes, intending to take advantage of the time when Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty returned to Hejian to visit relatives, kill his Huangmen minister and other subordinate officials, and Assassinated Emperor Ling and supported the Marquis of Hefei to ascend the throne.

To be fair, Xu You's behavior was highly appreciated by the gentry all over the world after word spread about it, because for the gentry who had endured the scourge of the party and were dissatisfied with Emperor Ling's debauchery and immorality, Xu You's move was undoubtedly an act of justice for heaven. , what he imitated was Zhang Liang's original cone of wave sand. From this point of view, it can be seen that Xu You actually compares himself to Zhang Liang in his heart.

Xu You also asked Cao Cao to work together at this time. Perhaps in his opinion, Cao Cao understood his thoughts better than Yuan Shao, but what puzzled Xu You was that Cao Cao refused to participate in this matter.

The matter was imminent and had to be carried out. Xu You and others hurriedly launched an attack, but as expected, an accident happened. The plan was leaked for some reason. Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty issued an edict to several people to go to Beijing to plead guilty. Everyone saw that they could not do anything. Wang Fen committed suicide. Xu You and others escaped.

It is worth mentioning that the fourth year of Zhongping was also the first year that the Yellow Turban Rebellion was launched. No one knows whether the two are related. However, after Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty encountered these two major events, he lifted the party's prison that year. disaster.

So Xu You, seriously speaking, actually has a very high reputation among the noble families in the world, and it is precisely because of this that he is dissatisfied with the status quo.

It is undeniable that he who dared to kill Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty did not have much loyalty to the rotten Han Dynasty. Therefore, although his original purpose of seeking refuge with Yuan Shao was not necessarily noble, he did see that the Yuan family had seized control of the Han Dynasty. Possibilities in the world.

And during this period of time, he also paid a lot of attention to Yuan Shao's attack on Cao Cao, which can be said to be his best efforts. On the one hand, he wanted to improve his status under Yuan Shao. On the other hand, a problem was also bothering him.

How was the original plot to kill Han Ling Emperor leaked?

Although Xu You felt that he had been a close friend of Cao Cao and that the other party was unlikely to betray him, this unsolved case was always a lingering thorn in Xu You's heart.

After Yuan Shao died and Shen Pei came to power, Xu You suddenly realized that he might never be able to live up to his expectations.

Because Yuan Shao, the only one who could appreciate him, the only one who could tolerate his own behavior, died unexpectedly like this, turning Xu You's ambition into running water. The era that belonged to him and Yuan Shao had passed!

Xu You was once discouraged. He didn't know what he would do in the future, but even though he had thought about leaving many times and even secretly connected with Cao Cao, he never made up his mind to change his family.

Because he felt that he had not fully understood Cao Cao, not to mention that although the Yuan family had suffered a lot from Cao Cao, as long as there was no trouble, even if it failed, there would be no problem in sticking to Jizhou.

Xu You believes that the only variable is Yuan Tan.

So at this gathering, Xu You argued hard and asked Yuan Shang to temporarily postpone the attack on Cao Cao, but should focus on destroying Yuan Tan and then plot against Cao Cao.

This idea was naturally opposed by many counselors, and Yuan Shang finally rejected the idea.

The thoughts of many counselors are actually that the two Yuans can finally reconcile. After all, most of their relatives are serving as officials under Yuan Tan. If the fight between the two sides cannot end, how many people in the family will die?

Therefore, they opposed Xu You's idea. Their starting point was very complicated, but their superficial reason was that they did not want to fight with the same room and make the world laugh at them, and they used this to secretly mock Xu You, saying that because he had an old relationship with Cao Cao, he He came up with this idea, and his selfishness is evident.

After all, Xu You was an outsider, but he allowed his relatives to do evil in Jizhou, which had offended the public and violated the interests of other people.

This is where things got bad. Even though Xu You was thinking about Yuan Shang, he had bad personal ethics and could easily be criticized, so his voice was suppressed.

Xu You was arrogant and arrogant, so naturally he couldn't hold it back, so he was already secretly harboring dissatisfaction.

They are all ostracizing me, right? Then I will vote for Cao Cao and defeat you later. Let me take a good look at you kneeling down and begging for mercy!

Yuan Shang, who was the only one who agreed with Xu You's idea, could not reveal his true intentions at this time because he did not dare to trust Xu You too much for the same reason.

What he has to wait for is the perfect opportunity to suddenly turn around and attack Yuan Tan. Then the winner will be decided and everything will be clear.

Naturally, Yuan Shang didn't know that Xu You had different intentions, otherwise he would have comforted Xu You privately. However, Yuan Shang was still a minor and did not see people's hearts very clearly, and those who could remind him did not do so for various reasons. Xu You spoke.

Xu You discovered that these days, Yuan Shang's army was not only less aggressive than before, but also relatively conservative.

In other words, it's too conservative.

The previous plan was to capture Wuchao Tunliang all the way and attack Guandu all the way, but Yuan Shang didn't know why, so he directly placed the location of the food tun at Baima, a hundred miles north of Wuchao and adjacent to Xinghe's base camp.

Then Yuan Shang stopped moving.

He would rather spend more manpower and material resources to transport grain to the front line than move the grain garrison forward. This made Xu You very confused. In this way, even if the front line failed, Baima would have enough time to transport grain and grass back to Dongwu on the north bank. Positive!

Xu You couldn't help but wonder depressedly, was this a coincidence, or did Yuan Shang know something in advance?

Xu You's guess was not wrong. This was discussed with Yuan Shang when Yuan Xi left Yecheng years ago. Yuan Xi warned Yuan Shang very solemnly that according to the astrology, if he rushes forward greedily for power, there will be great disaster if he raises an army.

In particular, do not move the granary forward. Instead, after laying down a city, start building fortifications to ensure that the city can defend Cao's army's surprise attack before advancing the front line.

This was not a quick-fix idea, but a protracted war of attrition, which put great pressure on Jizhou's logistics, but Yuan Shang still chose to believe in Yuan Xi.

After all, Yuan Xi's actions from beginning to end have never taken away Yuan Shang's interests. He was able to give up Yecheng and had no motive to deceive Yuan Shang in this matter. Nowadays, this kind of fighting style makes Cao Ren, who is good at defense, quite uncomfortable. He stood behind the city head, avoiding the flying arrows and flying stones coming from the opposite side, and sighed to Le Jin: "Why are these Yuan clan members so difficult for each of them?" Deal with it?"

Yue Chu said: "If Yuan Tan hadn't taken refuge with Ming Gong, he would have been more difficult to deal with."

Cao Ren couldn't help but nodded. None of the three sons of the Yuan family was a fuel-efficient lamp. Now he could only hold on with all his strength, hoping that Cao Cao at the rear would consolidate his forces and make the final decision.

Everyone is waiting for Cao Cao to take action, including Yuan Xi who is in Shouchun. After all, whoever takes action first will have clues to follow. The opponent who does not take action is the most terrifying, because you don't know where his fist is going.

Under this invisible pressure, Yuan Xi in Shouchun City looked at Zhuge Liang who was calmly discussing with a group of craftsmen. Not only did he admire the opponent's Qi-nurturing skills, but Yuan Xi also wondered whether Zhuge Liang had never fought in a war. , so you don’t know the horror of defeat?

However, he would not ask Zhuge Liang such boring questions. After all, the most important thing at the moment was how to give Jiang Dong a heart-breaking punch.

He couldn't keep confronting Jiang Dong like this. The longer the time went on, the harder it would be for Yuan Shang. After all, Jiang Dong could wait, but he couldn't afford to wait.

After Zhuge Liang finished talking about his idea, all the craftsmen thought about it and said that the idea was feasible. So Zhuge Liang asked everyone to go back and try to build it. After three days, they made the finished product for testing.

After Zhuge Liang sent everyone away, he felt relieved and said to Yuan Xi: "My lord, what I admire most about you is that you can summon so many outstanding craftsmen!"

No wonder Zhuge Liang was surprised. At that time, the world was in chaos. It was difficult for craftsmen to make a living, and their status was not high. Many inheritances were at risk of being cut off. In a city, there might only be dozens or even a few craftsmen who were skilled in one craft.

But now Yuan Xi has mobilized a large number of craftsmen from Youzhou and Xuzhou to Shouchun through waterways. There are hundreds of experienced old carpenters alone.

Coupled with the disciples he has accepted, Zhuge Liang can realize the ideas proposed by Zhuge Liang in a short period of time, which makes Zhuge Liang, who usually has many fantastic ideas but cannot realize them with his own strength, very happy.

Yuan Xi smiled and said: "They don't have the idea of ​​a military advisor. Many of them just stick to the rules."

He has the knowledge of later generations, so he naturally knows that Zhuge Liang also has unique skills in mechanism skills, so he summoned so many craftsmen in advance, and now it seems that they have really come in handy.

Zhuge Liang sighed: "What I admire is my lord's vision."

"Building a free school and selecting officials will increase the status of craftsmen. Not only can they become officials, but their heirs can also attend free schools. Their status has become close to that of the nobles. My lord's move is extremely bold. He is simply an enemy of the nobles."

"Moreover, using craftsmen to perform meritorious service is calculated according to military merit. It seems to be following the Qin system. In fact, it is a different set of rules. It is very deceptive. It is undoubtedly a disguised form to appease the nobles. It can be said that the method used by the emperor is quite clever."

Yuan Xi smiled and said: "In these troubled times, the nobles have no time to protect themselves, and they still rely on me to gain benefits. How can they have the heart to oppose this?"

In fact, Yuan Xi was also very proud of Zhuge Liang's second point. It was really because of the troubled times and the weakening of the power of the nobles that they could not jointly oppose this method, which gave him an opportunity to take advantage of.

Prosperous times have their own methods, and troubled times have their opportunities. How to snatch the key piece of cake from the hands of the nobles is very particular, so that even the emperor cannot do whatever he wants.

Before the emergence of the imperial examination system, the gentry monopolized the channels for advancement. Neither the imperial examination system nor the nine-rank Zhongzheng system left any opportunities for farmers, industry and merchants.

So the imperial examination system came into being. This solid stone became loosened and cracks appeared. However, as the officials selected by the imperial examination system replaced the gentry as the new solidified class, history entered a similar cycle again.

Because although there were more people studying, the status of farmers and workers remained the same, especially craftsmen. In the Song Dynasty, when commerce was developed, they were even far inferior to merchants.

Businessmen began to combine with officials, forming a new rentier class, called scholar-bureaucrats.

These people's identification with the political power became increasingly weak, and they began to join forces to fight against the imperial power, or to share in the interests of the imperial power. One of the manifestations of this was the disciples and teachers in the imperial examination system. They used this to form a group and gradually emptied the imperial power.

But in essence, it is still the same as that of feudal literati. Therefore, no more fruits can be born in the budding period of capitalism, because the advancement channels of craftsmen are blocked, and the few mathematical and scientific knowledge are taken away by the Qintianjian and other ministries. I went to see the stars, but could not advance practical applications.

This is not a problem of the oppression of the feudal system of the Song Dynasty itself, but the alienation of the budding capitalism. The premise itself is to weaken the centralization of power, fight against the central government, especially the emperor, so that the external predatory and anarchic nature of capitalism can be highlighted. , this is the real sprout.

However, the feudal system itself rejected this behavior. The two fought against each other, resulting in no one moving forward. When commerce developed and reached a bottleneck period, the Song Dynasty was sprouting everywhere. The struggle between the two has seriously hindered social progress.

Moreover, the scholar-bureaucrat class itself is a freak. On the one hand, it needs to maintain the feudal system to obtain privileges. On the other hand, it also wants to try business to obtain profits and weaken the central imperial power. In this case, the Song Dynasty court became a quarrel with each other, changing orders day by day. The place.

Regarding this predicament, the first person in history to make reform measures was an unexpected person.

In the third year of Chongning (1104), Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty Zhao Ji ordered the suspension of the imperial examination and replaced it with the school's promotion of tribute and the selection of scholars. This move was called "abolition of the imperial examination".

(End of this chapter)