Ji Han Grand Commander

Chapter 206 200. Luoyang Court Meeting
More than a month ago, Feng Xi was still in Yong'an, dealing with Lao Liu's funeral and discussing the subsequent arrangements in Jingzhou with Zhuge Liang.

The letter that Old Liu wrote to Xu Shu before his death was arranged by Feng Xi to be handed over to the messenger together with a letter written by himself, and the messenger was asked to send it to Jiangling as soon as possible. Huang Quan, Wang Fu and others arranged to send a spy to deliver it to Luoyang, the capital of Cao Wei.

Huang Quan and others did not dare to delay upon receiving the news. They immediately found their best spies, carefully put on makeup, disguised themselves as a caravan, and headed north under the escort of some well-armed soldiers, preparing to sneak into Luoyang to meet Xu Shu.

Back in Luoyang, the news of Liu Bei's death in Yong'an City was not deliberately concealed by Ji Han, so Cao Wei's spies found out this shocking news without much effort. They immediately sent the news to Luoyang and handed it over to Cao Wei's central brains.

A few days later, the news of Liu Bei's death appeared on Cao Pi's desk. He was incredulous at first, but after carefully reading the information over and over again, and confirming that the information was correct, a feeling of joy suddenly surged in his heart.

Liu Bei can be said to be a hero in troubled times who is comparable to his father. He started from scratch and divided the world into three parts, which shows his extraordinary ability.

To be honest, Cao Pi has always felt pressured by this and has always been wary of Lao Liu and Ji Han.

This attitude reached its peak a month ago.

Cao Ren, who was seriously injured, dragged his sick body back to Luoyang to plead guilty to Cao Pi. From Cao Ren, Cao Pi learned about the Battle of Fancheng and the heavy losses suffered by his Wei army in the Nanyang area.

Xu Huang, who knew that his father praised him for having "Zhou Yafu's style", was surrounded and killed by the Han army;

Knowing that Cao Ren had suffered heavy casualties, less than half of his 100,000-man army remained;

I know that many of the remaining soldiers are crazy and they scream in fear when they hear the name of the Han army.

If Liu Bei had not died, and the Han army had won a few more great victories like the Battle of Fancheng, his head would probably have been placed on Liu Bei's desk in no time.

However, Liu Bei still couldn't resist the erosion of time and became an "ancient man" in the past. It is said that Liu Bei had a son in his old age. Now his eldest son is only in his teens, which is the age when he is stubborn. In addition, because of the existence of Liu Bei and Zhuge Liang, he does not have much political experience. Therefore, even if there is no major turmoil in the Shu Han Dynasty, there will definitely be political turmoil, which is undoubtedly a good thing for Cao Wei.

Such a great thing would naturally not only please Cao Pi himself, but everyone should enjoy it.

So the next day, when the civil and military officials of Cao Wei saw Cao Pi holding a court meeting with a smile on his face, it seemed as if there was some great happy event.

"I have good news to share with you today."

After the greetings, Cao Pi did not keep the conversation going and spoke directly.

"I respectfully ask for your Majesty's words."

The ministers in the hall would naturally not be ungrateful and spoil Cao Pi's mood, and at this moment they cooperated very well and asked Cao Pi to continue speaking in unison.

"The spies in Sichuan have reported that the old villain Liu Bei passed away a few days ago, and his son Liu Chan has ascended the throne."

Cao Pi smiled as he picked up the letter of intelligence sent back by the spy and shook it slightly, his joy beyond words.

The ministers in the hall had different expressions. Some, like Cao Pi, were stunned for a moment and then suddenly looked overjoyed. Some were still unable to recover from their surprise and at this moment, they still had their eyes wide open and their mouths slightly open, looking incredulous.

There was another person in the corner, who was struck by lightning. Although he was also dazed, two lines of hot tears had already flowed out of his eyes, across his cheeks, and dripped from his chin without hindrance, landing on the stone floor of the Luoyang Palace. Needless to say, this person was Xu Shu. Xu Shu had heard that the Han army had defeated the Wu army in Yiling, Jiangling, and Dongting, and had been invincible all the way, and then defeated Cao Ren in the Battle of Xiangfan. He was quite excited and happy for the bright future of the Han army. But he didn't expect such a shocking bad news to come today, which made Xu Shu's heart, which was like a dead tree, tremble a few times.

"Your Majesty, is this really credible? Is there any suspicion that the false emperor deliberately faked his death to interfere with our judgment?"

Sima Yi, who was the one who took action, stood up and poured cold water on Cao Pi. In the past, Cao Pi would have thought Sima Yi was just being cautious.

But now, because of the incident of the three horses feeding in the trough, and Sima Yi's suggestion of a strategy of attacking with all-out force rather than attacking from many fronts, the result was a great defeat at Fancheng. Although Cao Pi did not implicate or blame him, he became even more unhappy with him in his heart.

So now Cao Pi dislikes Sima Yi, but it is just because Sima Yi does have talent that Cao Pi keeps him.

"It must be true. After all, we have just been defeated. There is no reason for old Liu Bei to fake his death. We are temporarily unable to attack Jingzhou again."

Seeing Sima Yi jumping out to pour cold water on him, Cao Pi's smile faded a little, and his tone became a little colder.

"Your Majesty, please do not blame me. I am just worried that the fake Han wants to play some tricks, so I have this question. Since Liu Bei is dead, his son is just a child, how can he be a match for Your Majesty? Your Majesty is wise and powerful, and our Great Wei will surely be able to wipe out this rebellion and restore the prestige of the Great Wei."

Sima Yi had a very high emotional intelligence. When he heard that Cao Pi seemed somewhat dissatisfied with him, he quickly apologized and patted Cao Pi's horse. This made Cao Pi's expression slightly better and he stopped making things difficult for Sima Yi.

"Old Liu Bei is dead, and his son's ascension to the throne will surely lead to instability in the court. Do you have any good ideas to help our Great Wei weaken the strength of the pseudo-Han?"

Seeing that Sima Yi was sensible, Cao Pi turned the topic to how to make use of Liu Bei's death.

Cao Pi would feel sorry for himself if he didn't resort to some tricks while the new emperor of Ji Han was still unstable.

"Your Majesty, I heard that the fake Han was able to invade Jingzhou from Sichuan thanks to one person. Why don't we focus on this person and do something to alienate one or two people? Even if we fail, we can deepen their suspicion of Sichuan."

Shangshu Liu Ye came out of the army and made a request to Cao Pi.

"Are you talking about the new military commander of the pseudo-Han, whose name is... Feng Xi?"

Cao Pi had never heard of Feng Xi's name before. He took some time to recall it before he dug out Feng Xi's name from the depths of his mind.

"Your Majesty is wise, it is this man. It was this man who faced the general in the Battle of Fancheng. He had many unique strategies in marching and fighting, which made it difficult for people to defend against him. If we can get rid of this man, we will cut off the arm of the fake Han."

Liu Ye bowed and confirmed that the target was Feng Xi, then continued to speak.

"I heard that Liu Bei was shot in the arm by a Wu general in the Battle of Yiling, so he led some soldiers to withdraw to Yong'an after the battle, and the strategy of conquering Jingzhou was completely handed over to Feng Xi. Now Feng Xi has conquered Jingzhou at lightning speed. Although it is a great achievement, it is inevitable that there is a tendency for it to be difficult to get rid of it."

Liu Ye pointed out that from a normal perspective, Feng Xi’s biggest problem was that he had too much power. Liu Bei was okay, as he could definitely control Feng Xi, but what about Liu Bei’s son?

(End of this chapter)