Three Kingdoms: My Strategy Simulator

After returning to the governor's mansion to continue his duty and dealing with the most urgent preparations for the expedition to Linyi, Li Ji finally found time to look through the latest intelligence from the Jinyiwei on the movements of the Yangzhou aristocratic families.

There are only three days left before the one-month deadline that the aristocratic families believe is coming.

All the noble families in Yangzhou, big and small, whether or not they participated in the anti-Wu coalition, have sent a considerable number of representatives to Wu County or are in the process of coming to Wu County.

Moreover, the entire Yangzhou family is now gradually split into three factions.

The surrender faction was headed by Gu Yong's Gu family, and also included Zhou Yu's family.

The licking faction, headed by Zhu Zheng's Zhu family and joined by many other noble families who changed their views according to the situation;

And the vast majority of stubborn people who still hope for the best or are still a bit arrogant.

It is true that triangular relationships are stable.

These three factions were at odds with each other and fierce conflicts broke out among them, which also made the originally elusive attitudes of the various families become clearly clear.

Of course, the diehards among these three factions are not afraid, but they believe that as long as they pay a certain price and make concessions, they can ensure that the family can continue to exist in the local area for a long time.

It's not that they can't see the situation clearly, but that the scope of what everyone can see is limited.

In the eyes of these diehards, giving up the fight for power with Liu Bei and at most compensating Liu Bei with money and food would be the biggest concession.

Yangzhou today may be Liu Bei's world, but it may not be Liu Bei's world tomorrow. However, the aristocratic families will still exist in Yangzhou for a long time.

"In the final analysis, it is still a lack of respect for the real 'Iron Fist'."

Li Ji couldn't help but sneer.

What these diehards did not realize was that they believed that Liu Bei and Li Ji were forced to make concessions under pressure, delaying the inevitable exchange of interests for a month and then dealing with some of the aristocratic families in order to establish their authority.

Little did he know that Li Ji only needed this month to truly control every county in Yangzhou, so as to avoid serious turmoil in the local area after touching certain noble families.

This month, although it seems like a concession, is actually also a process of paralyzing the Yangzhou families.

Including the licking faction headed by Zhu Zheng, who, according to Li Ji's instructions, have been biting everywhere like mad dogs in recent days, making the diehards particularly angry.

But Zhu Zheng was not only a target, but also a way to paralyze the Yangzhou family, making them think he was taking revenge...that was all.

"First of all... there are still too many aristocratic families in Yangzhou..."

Li Ji chuckled and looked at the list of noble families reported by the Jinyisi, which showed that exactly 30% of them had participated in the anti-Wu coalition army but had not yet arrived in Wu County.

Immediately, Li Ji picked up a brush and wrote his comments at the end of the list.

【Execute】

Xu Chu, who was standing beside Li Ji, couldn't help smacking his lips, and a word that Li Ji had said in private accidentally emerged in his mind - "Wan La".

The noble families on the list are probably completely wiped out.

As Li Ji's personal bodyguard, no matter how honest and upright Xu Chu was, he knew that with a wave of Li Ji's brush, countless heads would fall to the ground.

Li Ji sent someone to give the list with comments to Xiahou Bo again. Xiahou Bo looked at the densely packed names on the list and felt a little frightened.

Every family that has been rooted for more than four generations, with children giving birth to grandchildren, and grandchildren giving birth to children, continues to branch out, and the number of relatives is at least a hundred people.

Xiahou Bo hesitated for a moment. As thousands of people would be killed, he could only find a good opportunity to hand the list to Liu Bei.

Liu Bei opened it and took a quick look, then looked at Xiahou Bo with some confusion and asked.

"Hasn't Zikun already made a final decision on this list? Why did you submit it to me?"

? ?
Xiahou Bo.

Is your focus wrong? These are thousands of heads!
However, Xiahou Bo naturally did not dare to say that he was somewhat worried about Li Ji's decision, so he could only explain. "If only the Jinyi Division is in charge, it will not be able to do it. We need to mobilize troops from all over the country, so we need to ask the lord for permission."

The Jinyisi under Liu Bei was, after all, just an intelligence agency, and combat and assassination were not the areas in which the Jinyisi was good at.

"I see."

Upon hearing this, Liu Bei stamped the list with the governor's seal and handed a letter of troop mobilization to Xiahou Bo, allowing Xiahou Bo to mobilize soldiers from all over the country to assist the Jinyi Division in carrying out its mission to a certain extent.

Seeing that Liu Bei had no intention of objecting at all, Xiahou Bo said no more.

At the same time that Xiahou Bo began to deal with the aristocratic families according to the list, Li Ji did not wait until three days later to hold a meeting of the aristocratic families. Instead, he summoned the aristocratic families who were already waiting in Wu County on the same day.

After many noble families with different thoughts arrived at the meeting place, the scene was full of undercurrents.

Moreover, there were more than 200 representatives from aristocratic families, both large and small, who attended the conference.

The governor's mansion did not have a meeting hall that could accommodate so many people, so the meeting place was arranged in an empty courtyard, and the people gathered in three groups, one large and two small.

Each family had prepared their own chips and plans, and since there were still three days until the one-month deadline, almost all the families thought that this was a meeting to agree on the exchange of interests in advance.

However, after Xu Chu escorted Li Ji to this empty courtyard.

Li Ji glanced at the representatives of the noble families standing in the courtyard. He did not specially offer them seats or arrange tea and snacks, but spoke directly. "The one-month deadline has come. I am very pleased to see you all here."

When these words were spoken, many representatives of the noble families were stunned.

In the one-month rule set by Li Ji, the noble families naturally continued to conduct research and there was no way they would make a mistake in the date, so a representative of the noble family raised a question on the spot.

"Wait, isn't there still three days left before a month?"

"Three days?"

Li Ji kept a calm smile on his face and asked Zhu Zheng, "Ganglie, didn't you tell everyone on my behalf to call for a meeting three days in advance?"

Zhu Zheng was slightly stunned.

When did this happen?!
Have it?

Meeting Li Ji's gentle gaze, Zhu Zheng was extremely certain at this moment... this was definitely happening!

Immediately, Zhu Zheng answered loudly.

"Reporting to the Duke of Guoshi, I have tried my best to inform each family in person, but some families expelled me without allowing me to speak, so there may be one or two families who are unaware of it."

At this moment, facing Li Ji's calm and warm gaze, everyone present felt a cold wind blowing into their hearts.

As soon as Zhu Zheng finished speaking, the licking-the-bootlickers faction, originally led by the Yuzhang Zhu family, reacted one after another and took the initiative to speak.

"Of course."

"Brother Ganglie did tell me personally."

"Could it be that some people are pretending to be ignorant? In order to be arrogant to the nobles?"

Refers to a deer as a horse?

Before the others could react, Gu Yong, the representative of the Gu Group, trembled all over and realized something.

At this moment, it no longer mattered whether what Li Ji said was true or false, or whether Zhu Zheng took the opportunity to exclude dissidents without informing everyone.

Zhu Zheng bore all the blame just like Zhao Gao, and Li Ji was undoubtedly also classifying those noble families with "connection".

Gu Yong stood up almost as a reaction and was the first to express his opinion.

"I was also informed of this by Brother Ganglie a long time ago."

Seeing this, the other surrenderers naturally reacted and spoke one after another.

However, although it seems to be only three days different from the original one-month period, the difference is actually a huge gap.

Some of the stubborn families who had vaguely sensed something trembled all over and kept sweating on their foreheads.

Immediately, a representative of a stubborn family did not even bother to argue with Zhu Zheng about whether he had informed him of this matter. He hurriedly stepped out to salute and pleaded.

"Could you please give us a little more time, as some of the noble families have not yet arrived in Wu County? I have received news that they will arrive the day after tomorrow... no, tomorrow, tomorrow."

Li Ji shook his head slightly and said, "There is no need for this. Even if we wait for another five or ten days, no other noble families will arrive in Wu County."

After a pause, Li Ji sighed and said.

"Rules are rules, deadlines are deadlines. Since I need to raise money and food for the expedition, I can't take care of you for the time being, so I've given the task of confirming the participating families to Wenhe."

"When I had some free time today, I found that Wenhe had already started dealing with those noble families that did not come to participate in the meeting."

At this moment, speculation becomes reality.

There was horror in the eyes of every member of the aristocratic family present.

Even though they did not have the specific list compiled by the Jinyisi, they could roughly judge how many noble families had not yet arrived in Wu County.

There were many Yangzhou noble families who were proud of their status, or who hoped to appear not to be too despicable, so as to prevent Liu Bei from asking for too much.

One of the representatives of the noble families was visibly shaken, and holding on to the last glimmer of hope, he asked, "Please... State Scholar, what does it mean to... deal with it?"

"Are you related to those noble families?" Li Ji asked gently.

This sentence is nothing but nonsense.

Marriage between aristocratic families is the most common means of expanding one's network of relationships and influence. For example, Sun Jian's wife, Mrs. Wu, was from the Wu family of Wu County.

However, the Wu family of Wu County was particularly annoying to Jia Xu, who believed that the Wu family had too much influence in Wu County, which would be detrimental to Liu Bei's control of Wu County, the seat of Wu County, so the Wu family disappeared early.

In response to Li Ji's question, the representative of the noble family nodded quickly.

"Then if nothing unexpected happens, you will hardly meet him again." Li Ji replied with some helplessness. (End of this chapter)