Chapter 17 7. The fire on the platform

Wang Mang's army of more than 400,000 troops was wiped out under the city of Kunyang, indicating that the death knell of this short-lived dynasty has already sounded. After the Battle of Kunyang, heroes from all over the country rose up one after another, killed local officials, changed to the reign title of the Han Dynasty, and waited for the edict. Within ten months, the world was turned upside down.Wang Mang transferred Wang Yi back to Chang'an to serve as guards, and defended Luoyang with Wang Kuang, the Taishi who was attacking the Red Eyebrow Army, and Aizhang, the national general, and shielded Hangu Pass.

Liu Xiu, the victor in the Battle of Kunyang, quickly went northward and captured five counties including Fucheng in Yingchuan County. However, the unfortunate news came immediately—his elder brother Liu was killed by Gengshi Emperor Liu Xuan. Liu Xiu didn't dare to mourn for his elder brother, but ran to Wancheng to apologize to Emperor Gengshi. Now, even the murderer, Emperor Gengshi, felt embarrassed.He worshiped Liu Xiu as the general who broke the captives, and named him Wu Xinhou. Soon after, he used Liu Xiu as the chief minister, crossed the Yellow River north on a festival, and was responsible for recruiting the vast area north of the Yellow River. From then on, he released the tiger back to the mountain.

I really don't understand, in that era, how could so many people despise Liu Xiu, the terminator of troubled times? In terms of strategy against Wang Mang, the Gengshi regime divided its troops into two groups, one led by Wang Kuang, attacked Luoyang, an important town in the Kanto region, and threatened Chang'an from east to west; Chang'an. Wang Kuang's army progressed slowly all the way. It was not until September 23 AD that they captured Luoyang and captured and killed Wang Mang's grand master Wang Kuang (the two generals have the same name, which is also a major tidbit of this battle) and the national general Ai Zhang. At this moment, Wang Mang's The heads have already been sent to Wancheng.

This time, the one who went all the way through Wuguan took the lead. Shen Tujian and Li Song, who attacked Wuguan, got the response of Deng Ye and Yu Kuang from Xixian County. They attacked Wuguan, surrendered Zhu Meng, the captain of Wuguan, and attacked and killed Song Gang, the doctor of the right team.From then on, the Han army marched straight into Guanzhong, defeated Wang Mang's Nine Tiger General in Huixi, and then divided his troops to cross the Weishui River to the north, entered the Zuofengyi area, captured Pinyang, and smashed the back of Chang'an. Li Song's partial general Han Chen and others attacked Xinfeng to the west, defeated Wang Mang's general Boshui, chased the defeated Xinmang army, and reached the Changmen Palace of the Beijing Division—they were the first Han troops to attack the city of Chang'an.

Faced with the situation that the building was about to collapse, Wang Mang had no idea what to do.Da Sikong Cui Fa shared the emperor's worries, and unexpectedly found such a clever plan in "Zhou Li" and "Spring and Autumn Zuo Shi": "If the state has a catastrophe, weep for it."So his old man suggested to Wang Mang to cry. According to the logic of nerds, since it is written in the book, it must work, not to mention that Wang Mang has no other tricks at this time.He really went to the southern suburbs to cry loudly, and recounted the "popular election" incident that year, and then asked God: "Since the emperor ordered my minister Mang, why didn't he kill all the thieves? Chen Mang!"

But we know that God has never had time to take care of these worldly affairs—he will neither help you eliminate the "rebels" nor bother to strike you with thunder. Wang Mang's reading is obviously not serious enough, at least he didn't read the "Book of History"--"Thai Oath" also said that "the sky sees itself and the people see it, and the sky listens to the people itself." It can be seen that God's will is public opinion, and the hearts of the world are controlled by you What's the use of crying when you lose everything? People in the city of Chang'an were in panic, not only the Han army had already approached the city, but also the legendary Kaixiao army from Tianshui was about to attack.The uprising troops around Chang'an gathered under the city one after another, preparing to open the city first, so that they could plunder first, and second, they could claim credit for the new dynasty.

Wang Mang had no choice but to release the prisoners in the prison, formed a new army to resist, and forced them to swear an oath of allegiance: "If anyone is not a new house, the ghost will remember it!" These prisoners don't care what kind of ghost you are. They dispersed in a rush, and dug up the grave of Wang Mang's wife and parents, and burned his coffin, nine temples, Mingtang, etc. On the first day of September in the twenty-three year AD, the rebel army broke through the Xuanping Gate in the east of Chang'an. Wang Yi, the defeated general in the Battle of Kunyang, led his remnants to resist desperately.The next day, the youths Zhu Di and Zhang Yu in Chang'an City also took advantage of the chaos and set fire to the door of Weiyang Palace, shouting everywhere, "Rebel Wang Mang, why don't you surrender!"

Fires ignited everywhere in the palace, and Wang Mang, who was avoiding the fire in the front hall of the Xuanshi, was still comforting himself at this moment: "I am born with virtue, so what can Han soldiers do!" The allusion of "born with virtue in me, what to do with him", it is really not wrong to say that he is a nerd. On this day, holding the Emperor Yu's dagger in his hand, he didn't eat anything, but sat with the slowly rotating handle, listening to Tian Wenlang's report on the progress of time.Some people heard this failed reformer muttering that sentence non-stop throughout the day: "He was born with virtue, and Han soldiers are as good as he is!"

What came to his mind was probably the scene of people cheering when he was ordered by the Han Fu.He couldn't figure out why he failed until he died. Outside the window, there is the sound of shouting and killing that is getting closer. On the third day of September, Wang Mang fled from the front hall with more than a thousand followers to the Jiantai in the Cangchi of Weiyang Palace, hoping to use the Cangchi to stop the rebels.Although Wang Yi was defeated in Kunyang due to his underestimation of the enemy, he was indeed loyal. He fought in the city for two or three days, and after all his men were killed, he was still unwilling to escape, so he made a bloody road to Jiantai. Want to protect Wang Mang.

Faced with so many enemies, Wang Mu, Wang Yi's son, lost the courage to fight and took off his clothes in an attempt to escape.Seeing this, Wang Yi was furious, get out of here, our father and son will die in battle here! The defenders held on for a long time, the arrows were gone, and the two sides fell into hand-to-hand combat.After paying a considerable price, the besiegers finally stepped on the corpses of Wang Yi and his son and attacked Jiantai. Wang Mang hid indoors and was hacked to death by Du Wu, a businessman from Chang'an who was chasing him. Du Wu didn't know that the old man was Wang Mang, so he only took off his ribbon as a trophy.The school lieutenant and public guest knew that this was Wang Mang's belongings, so he asked Du Wushou where the owner was?Du Wu told him: "It's in the northwest corner of the room."

The public guest ran to the pile of dead bodies, and after a lot of work, he finally found Wang Mang's body, cut off his head, and gave it to Wang Xian, the leader of the rebel army who besieged Jiantai.When other soldiers heard about it, they fought over Wang Mang's body, and dozens of people were killed in the fight. Wang Xian called himself the Great General of the Han Dynasty and commanded hundreds of thousands of rebel troops in the city.However, he was just a hooligan who wanted to take advantage of the chaos, lived in the East Palace, fornicated Wang Mang's wife, and even usurped the emperor's chariots and horses. On the sixth day of September, the main force of the Han army, Li Song, and other troops entered Chang'an, and Wang Xian was executed on the charges of failing to hand in the emperor's seal and ribbon in time, taking many court ladies, and building the emperor's drum flag. Wang Mang's head was sent to Wancheng where Gengshi Emperor Liu Xuan was stationed. Liu Xuan looked at the head and said quietly: "If he didn't usurp the Han, he should be another Huo Guang." He smiled and said, "Then it's your turn to be emperor?" Later, Liu Xuan moved his capital to Luoyang, and in February of the second year, he moved the capital to Chang'an. From then on, he also embarked on the road of perdition.