Chapter 99 Part One

Let's say that the twenty-nine-year-old Liu Xiu hibernates in Wancheng, keeping a low profile, and his time is coming.As the emperor of the new dynasty, the 69-year-old Wang Mang can only stay in Chang'an, and his era is coming to an end. After Kunyang's disastrous defeat, the majesty of the new dynasty fell to the ground, and domestic heroes took advantage of the situation to rise up, killing their mushou, calling themselves generals, and spreading all over the world within ten months.The largest of these are: Liu Wang, the former Zhongwuhou of the imperial family of the Han Dynasty, raised his troops in Runan, gathering tens of thousands of people.

Gongsun Shuzhong combined tens of thousands of people, proclaimed himself Yizhou Mu, and ruled Shu County separately. Kai Xiao was called the general, and with 100,000 soldiers, under the banner of the Han army, he captured most of Liangzhou. At this point, Wang Mang's empire fell apart more and more.The counties and counties in the southeast and north were cut off from the news, and they had actually separated from the central government. The only area Wang Mang could really control was the Sili Department, namely Henan, Hanoi, Hedong, Hongnong, Jingzhaoyin, Zuo Fengyi, and the right There are only a few counties in Fufeng, but its territory has shrunk to less than one-sixth of its original size, and its population is less than one-fourth of its original size.The new dynasty is still an empire in name, but only the strength of the princes is left.

Looking around from Chang'an, there are the Han army, Chimei, and Liu Wang in the east, Gongsunshu in the south, and Kaihuo in the west. It is already surrounded by four sides. The defeat of the new dynasty is only a matter of time.So, naturally, someone among the ministers of the new dynasty had the idea of ​​selling out for glory, and this person was Wang Mang's cousin Wang She. Wang Sheguan, General Juwei, is equivalent to today's commander of the garrison, commanding all the armies in the capital.The fact that Wang She was able to make important points based on this is a sign of Wang Mang's trust in him.Taoist Ximen Junhui was a guest of Wang She's family, and Wang She was very lucky.Ximen Jun Huishan's astronomical prophecy, seeing that the general situation of the new dynasty is gone, privately told Wang She: "The new family is dying, the general should plan as soon as possible. The prophecy said that the Liu family will be revived, and Liu Xiu will be the emperor. In my opinion That is Liu Xiu, the master of the state (that is, Liu Xin, Liu Xiu's name was later changed)." Wang She was tempted by this, so he consulted with Da Sima Dong Zhong.The two hit it off immediately, and decided to follow God's will to depose Wang Mang and support Liu Xin as emperor.

Wang She and Dong Zhong paid a visit to Liu Xin under the pretext of asking about the astrology.Liu Xin was shocked. He talked about him from left to right, but dared not respond.The next day, Wang She came to the door alone, and wept to Liu Xinti, saying: "Wang Mang's father is sick and impotent, and Wang Mang's mother is addicted to alcohol and lust. I doubt that Wang Mang is not my Wang's child. The reason why I support the national teacher and call him emperor , just want to preserve the Wang clan, why doesn’t Master Guo believe it?” Liu Xin hesitated, and said, "Astronomical prophecy, Ximen Junhui has little knowledge. Liu Xiu should be the son of heaven, it is God's will, but this person is not me, but in the Eastern Han army."

Wang Shedao: "Since this is the case, we will change our plan and do it. Da Sima Dong Zhong leads the elite soldiers of the Chinese army, and I lead the palace guards. They conspire together to kidnap Wang Mang and descend to the east of Nanyang Emperor. If not, the whole clan will be wiped out!" Wang Mang killed Liu Xin's three sons. Liu Xin had long had resentment in his heart, and was worried that once the Han army captured Chang'an, as Wang Mang's henchman, he would inevitably be liquidated bloodily. Why not follow Wang She's plan and kidnap Wang Mang to surrender, and the concubine will be rich Kebao, so he secretly conspired with Wang She and Dong Zhong.

There is an ancient saying that if a scholar rebels, he will fail in ten years.Liu Xin is a scholar among the scholars (Ban Gu wrote "Hanshu", highly praised Liu Xin's knowledge, and even compared him with Mencius, Xunzi and others, saying: since Confucius, there are many scholars who have written essays, only Meng Ke, Xunzi, Dong Zhongshu, Sima Qian, Liu Xiang, Yang Xiong, and Liu Xin, all of them are well-informed, knowledgeable about the past and the present, and their words are useful to the world), and the rebellion naturally took more time.Wang She and Dong Zhong hated the coup d'état immediately, but Liu Xin leisurely said, "This is a big matter, we should wait for the Taibai Star to come out." Liu Xin said: "If you want to succeed in your affairs, you must wait for the time of the day. When Taibai governs the sky, the world will change, and the people will change the king. We will wait for the time to move, and great achievements can be made."

A half-hearted Ximen Junhui can fool Wang She for a moment, not to mention Liu Xin, the world's number one astronomical prophecy!Wang She and Dong Zhong believed in Liu Xin as a god, and they didn't dare to make mistakes, so they had to wait for Taibai Xing as Liu Xin said. In order to ensure the success of the coup, Dong Zhong befriended Sun Ji, Marquis of Wu, and told him about his plans.After Sun Ji came home, his face was pale and he couldn't eat. His wife asked in surprise, and Sun Ji told the truth.Sun Ji's wife spoke quickly, and told her brother Chen Han when she turned around.Chen Han was overjoyed, he immediately realized that great wealth had come.

In the blink of an eye, it was July, and Taibai Xing still hadn't appeared, and Chen Han couldn't wait to pull Sun Ji to ask Wang Mang for credit.When Wang Mang heard the words, he remained calm and sent envoys to announce that Dong Zhong, Liu Xin, and Wang She had entered the palace, saying only that there were state affairs to be discussed.Liu Xin and Wang She didn't know that the conspiracy had already been revealed, and they were successfully tricked into the palace.Dong Zhong was speaking in the camp of the Chinese army, when the envoys came to call out, Wang Xian, the guard, was alert by nature and felt that something was wrong, so he immediately advised Dong Zhong: "If you don't plan for a long time, I'm afraid it will leak. It's better to kill the envoys and rein in the troops." Palace." Dong Zhong refused to listen and followed the envoy into the palace.

As soon as Dong Zhong, Liu Xin, and Wang She entered the palace, they were captured and tortured, and they all confessed.Liu Xin and Wang She knew that they could not escape death, so they committed suicide one after another. Wang Mang thought that they were old ministers of flesh and blood, and hated their internal collapse.Compared with Liu Xin and Wang She, Dong Zhong's end was much more miserable.Wang Mang wanted to use Dong Zhong's death to shock the world, so he did what he could with extreme cruelty. He ordered Huben to gouge out Dong Zhong's flesh and deboning him. Dig a huge pit, pour alcoholic poison into the pit, spread with sharp-edged thorns, push all of them into the pit and bury them alive.

As the instigator of this conspiracy, the Taoist priest Ximen Junhui was sent to Chang'an East City to be beheaded.Along the way, the common people were crowded with spectators. They were used to seeing death row prisoners walking towards the execution ground. Some cursed, some cried, some begged for mercy, and some were incontinent. When they saw these, they felt happy.However, Ximen Junhui was calm and unusually calm. The people were greatly disappointed and clamored: "Cry!"Scold one!Please forgive me!Incontinent one!Ximen Junhui looked back at the common people, they knew that he was about to speak, and all fell silent.Ximen Junhui smiled inscrutably and profoundly, and said, "Liu Xiuzhen is your lord (Liu Xiuzhen is your emperor)." The common people were confused at first, what is this?Then she became dissatisfied and yelled for Ximen Junhui to say something more.Ximen Junhui still said the same thing: "Liu Xiuzhen is your lord." The people laughed at him and threw things at him.Ximen Junhui holds his head high, he firmly believes that the truth is in his own hands, and he does not blame these ignorant people.

When they arrived at Dongshi Execution Ground, Ximen Junhui was executed calmly.The executioner raised his sword, Ximen Junhui turned to the executioner and said, "Liu Xiuzhen, your lord." The executioner raised his eyebrows: Really?Seeing that the executioner was somewhat convinced, Ximen Junhui couldn't help being very happy and grinning. The sword fell, and Ximen Junhui's head, together with his smile, was chopped off into the dust.