Wei Ni

During the war between Wei and Wu, Wu was famous for its false surrender.

In the past, Huang Gai achieved the burning of Chibi, and in the later, Zhou Li made Wu and Wei easy to attack and defend. The reason why Wang Lingyou, the governor of Yangzhou, was willing to believe that Sun Bunai was sincere in surrendering was because there were so many Wu generals who sincerely surrendered.

Leaving aside Li Shu, the prefect of Lujiang who was attached to the semi-separatist regime, there were two more influential people.

One is Jin Zong, the guard at the theater.

He killed his colleague Wang Zhi and rebelled against Wei. The Wei state regarded him as the governor of Qichun and led troops to invade the Wu Kingdom several times. However, Sun Quan later sent He Qi as governor and Mi Fang and Liu Shao as generals to attack Qichun County and captured him alive. .

The other is Han Zong.

He is the son of Han Dang, the third important minister and founder of Wu Kingdom.

In the year when Wei Wen, Cao Pi, and Cao Rui succeeded to the throne, Sun Quan took advantage of the great mourning in Wei and raised troops to go north, but he was left to garrison in Wuchang because he was in mourning for his father.

However, he actually committed adultery (sleeping with his late father's concubine) during the mourning period.

At that time, Sun Quan didn't want Han Dang's reputation to be ruined when his body was still cold, so he kept silent and did not pursue the case when someone exposed him.

But I didn't expect that Han Zong was in danger.

He felt that Sun Quan was only leading the army outside and did not pursue him. If he had stopped and returned, he would definitely be captured and punished.

After all, it is a matter of human ethics, so how can we tolerate it?
Therefore, he had the intention to defect to Wei.

And in order to have a solid foundation after surrendering to Wei, he also planned to take away the tribe of his late father Han Dang.

At that time, the Four Thousand Buqu affiliated to Handang was very famous in Jiangdong, and was named "Dare to Die". It was an elite division with superior combat power in Jiangdong at that time; another "Jiefan Army" formed before the Battle of Yiling ”, and were often placed under the supervision of Han Dang when facing battle.

Han Zong didn't dare to explain Fan Bing's idea.

Although Han Dang's last battle before his death was to supervise the troops to quell the Shanyue Rebellion in Danyang, Sun Quan planned to let Chen Xiu, the son of the late Chen Wu, come to Jie Fan after Han Dang's death so that he could not get involved.

However, the Suicide Squad is fine.

After inheriting the death-defying department, he first deliberately allowed the soldiers of the death-defying department to plunder the common people wantonly, and then claimed that Sun Quan had known about it and would punish him, making all the generals panic. Finally, he claimed that in order to save everyone's lives, he had no choice but to cross the river. I went to join Wei.

In order to fight for the death of his troops, he also summoned his aunts, sisters and other relatives at home in the name of mourning, and forcibly married them and his concubines and maids to military lieutenants and generals, making blood alliances.

Finally, carrying Han's coffin supported by his mother and four thousand men who dared to die, he crossed the river to surrender to Cao Xiu, who was then the general of Zhengdong.

After arriving in the Wei Kingdom, he was awarded the title of General and the Marquis of Guangyang, and stationed troops at the Three Passes of Yiyang behind Jiangxia County. Later, he repeatedly led troops to invade the Wu border and killed Li Shu, which made Sun Quan gnash his teeth and heart more than once.

The defection of Jin Zong and Han Zong also harmed Zhai Dan.

Zhai Dan is from Yuzhang County.

He came from a powerful family. Although his family was not ranked high in Jiangdong, the clan and his disciples were able to raise five to six hundred private soldiers, so he was awarded the position of school captain by Sun Quan.

Initially, it was garrisoned in Qichun, under the command of General Wang Zhi.

When Jin Zong killed Wang Zhi and rebelled against Wei, he was unable to resist and led his troops to flee back to the south bank of the river.

In this regard, Sun Quan did not jail him for questioning.

After all, he had few soldiers and did not join the rebellion, but it was inevitable to put him in the rear as a sinecure.

There is no loyalty to death~
At that time, Zhai Dan felt that his career was in darkness.

Later, when he was stationed in Wuchang, he heard that Han Zong violated human ethics and was immoral, so he wrote a letter and reported it to Sun Quan.

But what he didn't expect was that Sun Quan ignored him.

What caught him even more off guard was that Han Zong actually defected to Wei because of this!

I didn't kill Boren, but Boren died because of me.

This indirect relationship made Zhai Dan anxious and sleepless at night. He always felt that Sun Quan, who had lost all face because of the hero's defection to the enemy, would definitely find an opportunity to punish himself in the future.

Regardless of whether he has been conscientious and hardworking since taking office.

In fact, you can't blame him for doubting himself.

Jiangdong has always been feared in terms of punishing crimes.

Don’t you see, even Zhou Yu’s son Zhou Yin, Gan Ning’s son Gan Gui, and Ling Tong’s son Ling Lie were all exiled?
Therefore, Zhai Dan, who learned that Han Zong had defected to Wei, thought about it all night, convened the clan to discuss it, and finally decided to cross the river to defect to Wei. He and Han Zong almost paid homage to Cao Xiu.

But the difference between him and Han Zong is that he still has a moral bottom line.

Although he was also awarded the position of general by Wei, he gave most of his private soldiers to Wei in exchange for trust, hoping that Wei would treat his clan well.

Wei Guo will not let down such a knowledgeable person.

Not only was a large plot of land given to him, but as he wished, he was not responsible for military affairs and was allowed to handle some clerical matters in Huainan as a general, which was regarded as a way to provide for him in his old age.

This is why many Huainan generals do not recognize him.

After Man Chong took charge of Huainan, he was also very polite to him and allowed him to continue to hide in the General Zhengdong's office to help consult some scouts or write down the military information after they returned.

He did a great job.

Not only did he work diligently during his tenure, but he also relied on the convenience of Wu General to develop many detailed projects in Jiangdong.

Although many of these detailed works were discovered and punished, they actually provided a lot of help to Man Chong in resisting Jiangdong's invasion.

It was precisely because many of the details were discovered that Jiangdong's monarchs and ministers knew that Zhai Dan was still serving in the Huainan and Wei Zhengdong generals' offices.

Therefore, some generals who had been wronged in Jiangdong or powerful men who had a very unsatisfactory life also spontaneously came to contact Zhai Dan.

I hope that through Zhai Dan's introduction, they will have the opportunity to return to Wu and return to Wei.

These people are all little-known figures in Jiangdong. They don't have much real power, and they can't be called handsome. Whether they defect to Wei or stay in Wu, they have no impact on the war situation.

Therefore, Man Chong didn't care much about them.

He just asked Zhai Dan to reply, claiming that the Wei State had no plans to attack Wu across the Yangtze River and did not have the troops to welcome them to Wei, so they were allowed to choose their own future.

If he can come to Huainan by himself, Wei Guoding will not hesitate to reward him and submit him to him.

But if you are unable to escape the pursuit of Wu soldiers and surrender, then you can stay dormant first to protect your own body. It will not be too late to switch sides and return to Yi when Wei invades Wu.

This somewhat perfunctory answer caused many people who wanted to attach themselves to Wei to stop sending people to ask for help.

But it also made some people increase their stakes in seeking surrender - they felt that the reason why Man Chong was not tempted was not only because Wei and Wu had easy offensive and defensive situations, but also because they felt that the pros and cons of accepting them were out of proportion.

Therefore, one person roped in his relatives to help attack Jiangdong's garrison at Guangwu Lake in Guangling County, and even helped the Wei army ambush Sun Shao's reinforcements by defecting before the battle. As a way to advance to the rank, he asked the Wei army to attack Guangling and then kill them. They were brought back to Huainan for resettlement.

These two people are not pretending to surrender. Zhai Dan had already found out the details and current situation of the two of them through detailed work.

The leader was called Wang Li, who was from Dantu County, Wu County; his relative Liu Yu was from Jiangcheng County, Danyang County.

Although they are in different counties, the two families are only dozens of miles apart. They both live on the south bank of the river's estuary. Therefore, they have been in contact with each other for many generations and often get married. They can be regarded as family friends.

Both families can be considered small tycoons, able to assemble a corps of three to four hundred private soldiers.

In Wudi, where land annexation is particularly serious, they can only be regarded as minor players, but in their respective counties, they can also be regarded as a large clan running sideways.

Moreover, behind Dantu and Jiangcheng County are rolling mountains, which have always been the hiding places of Shanyue and Huawai mountain people.

They had tracts of fertile land to cultivate and fish to harvest, and in their spare time they could take their private soldiers into the mountains to capture the Shanyue people or the mountain people as slaves. Their original life was quite comfortable.

But since the Battle of Chibi, their lives have become worse day by day.

Sun Quan, who defeated Wei Wu and Cao Cao to preserve Jiangdong's foundation, also began to work on expanding his territory. Not only did he recruit small powerful men like them into the army, but he also captured the people of Shanyue everywhere to replenish his troops, and organized the women, children, old and weak of Shanyue to work in the fields to supply the army.

Among them, because of the relationship between Danyang County and Wu County as the core areas of Jiangdong, Sun Quan sent troops and horses to attack them most frequently.

This also seriously damaged the interests of the Wang and Liu families.

The people sent by Sun Quan to besiege Shanyue were either from great families in Jiangdong or from noble families. They were all beings they needed to look up to, so every time they conquered the prisoners, they would not get a share of the pie.

If you just didn't participate in it, forget it.

But every time, the two families were assigned to provide accommodation, send troops as guides, guard prisoners and other chores!

Who would be happy to send troops and work hard but gain no profit?

However, although they were resentful, they did not dare to show it.

After all, ants are still greedy for life.

They know their own strength and don't want to be quick and face the disaster of annihilation.

Later, Cao Pi attacked Wu three times in five years.

Under the pressure of Wei State, Sun Quan no longer left them to maintain order locally and guard against rebellion in Shanyue. Instead, they were reorganized into the command of Sun Shao, the prefect of Guangling, and transferred to the north bank of the river to garrison.

The euphemistic name is: "Keep Wei at bay and preserve the clan."

For such an arrangement, they had to obey. The situation was stronger than the people.

And Sun Quan’s words are not wrong either.

If the Wei army crossed the river from Guangling County, the first place they would set foot on was their family's manor and acres.

But what Sun Shao did later became unbearable for them.

The borders between Wei and Wu in the Xu, Si, Jiang, and Huai areas each had hundreds of miles of uninhabited areas.

However, since the Battle of Shiting, Sun Shao, who was stationed at Dantu Jingkou, also gradually increased his troops to Guangling County, and went north along the Zhongdu River (the Hangou dug by King Wu Fucha) connecting the Dajiang River and the Huaihe River, and successively attacked various lakes and rivers. Set up garrison points and garrison fields in other places to prepare for the future attack on Qingxu or the war in Huainan.

Coincidentally, in order to restore its war heritage as soon as possible, the Wei State at that time also increased taxes on Qing, Xu, Yanzhou and other places, which in turn induced many scholars and people to flee and seek asylum in Wu State.

This made the Wang and Liu families very happy.

Because according to Jiangdong's practice, these young generals who guard the front line can take the fleeing people as disciples and integrate them into their troops.

They all felt that coming to the north bank to garrison could make up for the loss of being unable to capture the people of Shanyue as tenants.

However, they were all happy too soon.

Sun Shao, who was already the general in charge of the north, strictly ordered all generals not to accept Wei people as their disciples.

Instead, these people were brought back to Wu County to paint their fields and resettle them, in order to stimulate more Wei people to flee to Wu.

It is also to establish a banner for the common people of Jiangdong who often rebel. Even the common people of Wei State can't stand the harsh government and come to Wu to seek a living. You native people of Jiangdong should be content and stop rebelling every now and then. Got it!
From the perspective of Jiangdong Foundation, Sun Shao's approach was appropriate.

But for the Wang and Liu families, this meant that Jiangdong was not giving their family a way to survive.

Jiangdong's law is that the big fish eats the small fish, and the small fish eats the shrimp.

And if the big fish eats all the shrimps belonging to the small fish, then the small fish without food will have to flee elsewhere to find a place to eat in order to survive.

Wang Li and Liu Yu felt that they were small fish whose shrimps were robbed by the big fish.

If you don't leave the waters of Jiangdong, even if you are lucky enough not to be eaten by big fish, you will one day face the fate of starving to death.

Therefore, they frequently sent people to look for Zhai Dan.

Not only did he inform Sun Shao of the true and false status of the soldiers under his command, Jiangdong also drew pictures of various garrison points and farmland accumulation areas in Guangling County and sent them to show his sincerity in surrendering to Wei. He also made a promise and claimed that the Wei army would come to Guangling. At the time of the attack, it was the time for them to defect on the battlefield.

Willing to be an insider, begging for soldiers to meet, and defecting in the face of battle
This kind of bargaining chip is a common method used by Jiangdong to fake surrender. It is almost the same as the previous fake surrender by Wu Poyang Governor Zhou Li.

And in the past, in order to earn Cao Xiu's money, Zhou Yi even cut off his hair!

But Zhai Dan felt that Wang and Liu were trustworthy, and claimed that he dared to use his wealth and life as a guarantee.

Man Chong also believed that they came to vote sincerely.

There is no other reason.

The aristocratic family under the rule of the Sun family, from top to bottom, attaches great importance to personal agendas.

For example, the Lu family, one of the four surnames in Wu, lost most of its clan when Sun Ce attacked Lujiang County. Even the head of the clan, Lu Kang, the prefect of Lujiang, died of grief and anger after the city was broken. But later, when Sun Ce dominated the east of the Yangtze River, the Lu family Regardless of past grudges, he served the Sun family, and Lu Xun even became Sun Ce's son-in-law.

For the vast majority of people in Jiangdong, as long as they don't focus on their personal interests, it doesn't matter whether they violate filial piety or have their family members killed in a blood feud. Time can heal all wounds.

On the other hand, if Sun Quan invades one-third of their land, it will be a sworn enemy.

Crossing the river and heading north to find another Ming Lord is urgent!
Therefore, Man Chong's previous plan with Li Changshi to have Xia Houhui attack the garrison at Guangwu Lake in Wu Guangling County was based on the fact that Wang Li and Liu Yu were willing to act as internal collaborators and felt that there was no danger.

It's just that Man Chong wanted to make a small fuss and let Xia Houhui get some merits of beheading and surrendering people in exchange for the leadership of the five hundred cavalry.

But now that he has changed his view of Xia Houhui and feels that he seems to have a somewhat calm demeanor, he doesn't mind expanding the results of his victory.

No matter what, he is Wei's general who conquered the east.

Faced with Sun Quan's repeated invasion of troops, how could he miss the opportunity to hurt Jiangdong?

Moreover, although he did not like Xia Houhui's greed for merit, he also quite appreciated Xia Houhui's general strategy! (End of chapter)