Chapter 78 Chapter 12 Greeting the Son of Heaven

In Chang'an, the temporary capital of the empire, the power of the imperial court has always been jointly held by the "three-person group" composed of Li, Guo Si, and Fan Chou.After Wang Yun was killed and Lu Bu fled, this place was still ruled by the Liangzhou warlords. The Liangzhou warlords are a big concept. If it is subdivided, apart from a few of them, Ma Teng and Han Sui, who have been incorporated by the imperial court and officially appointed General Zhengxi and Zhenxi General Han Sui, should also belong to this camp.In the past, they used to be rivals to each other, but now everyone has been officially appointed by the court, and it is hard to tell whether you are black or I am white.Ma Teng, the general who conquered the west, was stationed in Wu (now Meixian County, Shaanxi Province), which Dong Zhuo had painstakingly managed, and Han Sui, the general who conquered the west, was stationed in Jincheng (now Lanzhou, Gansu).At the beginning of the first year of Xingping (194), Ma Teng had a conflict with the "group of three" and started fighting.

According to the "Book of the Later Han Dynasty", Ma Teng went to Chang'an on business at that time, and led his troops to move to Baqiao in the eastern suburb of Chang'an.Ma Teng wanted to go through the back door of Li, who was in charge of the court work, because of his private affairs, but Li ignored him. In fact, there is a mystery hidden behind this. Ma Teng's trip is not an ordinary business trip, but premeditated.Ma Teng secretly planned a coup d'état, and the participants included Ma Yu, General of the Right Zhonglang, Liu Fan of the Right Zhonglang, Zhong Shao, the former Governor of Liangzhou, Du Tien of the Zhonglang, and so on.Liu Fan, the son of Liu Yan, was kept in Chang'an as a hostage. His younger brother Liu Zhang was just sent back to Yizhou to tell his father not to engage in separatist activities.After Zhong Shao became a celebrity, his grandfather Zhong Song and father Zhong Fu both became the third Duke.This is a coup planned by several high-ranking officials and young military officers, and Ma Teng is the real behind-the-scenes driving force.

Li didn't give Ma Teng any face, so Ma Teng used this as an excuse to turn his face against the "three-member group".Seeing the escalation of the conflict, the court hoped to calm down the matter, so it mobilized Han Sui to mediate.Han Sui left Jincheng and entered Guanzhong in a grand manner, and when he arrived, he publicly stood with Ma Teng. Not only that, Liu Fan's appearance on the coup list shows that the situation is even more unusual.According to "Heroes" and other books, Liu Fan did not participate in the name of an individual, but represented Liu Yan.In February of the first year of Xingping (194), the coalition forces of Ma Teng and Han Sui had advanced to Pinglian, fifty miles west of Chang'an. Some of the coup forces retreated to Huaili (now Xingping, Shaanxi).Li ordered Guo Si, Fan Chou and his nephew Li Li to lead troops to fight Ma Teng.Ma Teng, who had lost his internal support, did not dare to stay around Chang'an for a long time, and retreated to Liangzhou.Guo Si and Fan Chou attacked Huaili, and Ma Yu, Chong Shao and others involved in the coup were killed. "Heroes" also said that it was Liu Fan who caused the leak of the coup plot.After the incident was revealed, he first fled to Ma Teng's barracks, and then to Huaili. The two places were in different directions. Liu Fan's visit may have conveyed Ma Teng's order to Huaili's coup forces.

At the same time, Liu Fan asked Liu Yan for help, and Liu Yan sent school lieutenant Sun Zhao to lead five thousand Shu soldiers to help.This back and forth must take a lot of time. Before Sun Zhao arrived, Huaili was breached. Liu Fan, Ma Yu and others were killed together, and Liu Dan, Liu Yan's other son who stayed in Chang'an, was also killed later. Afterwards, the "group of three" not only hated Ma Teng and Han Sui, but also feared that they would make a comeback, so in the name of Emperor Xian Liu Xie, they pardoned the sins of the participants in the rebellion, reappointed Ma Teng as General Andi, and appointed Han Sui For the safety of the general, this matter has come to an end for the time being.

During this operation, Li Li's nephew, Li Li, put on a show and didn't listen to Guo Si and Fan Chou's greetings very much, which made Guo Si and Fan Chou very uncomfortable. Although the "three-person group" is in power together, Li Chang regards himself as the chief leader, which has long made them dissatisfied.Now it is even more unacceptable for Li's nephew to show his power in front of them. Guo Si was still a little self-restraining, so he didn't say anything.But Fan Chou couldn't help it, and taught Li Li a lesson: "Now that people in the world want to kill your uncle when they mention it, why do you rely on your power? Don't I dare to kill you?"

The contradictions between Li, Guo Si and Fan Chou tended to expand.On the way back to Liangzhou, Han Sui, an old Jianghu, played another beautiful trick of divorce, which caused their conflict to erupt all of a sudden. According to the "Kyushu Spring and Autumn Annals", after Ma Teng and Han Sui failed, Fan Chou chased them all the way to Chencang (now Baoji, Shaanxi). Han Sui sent someone to Fan Chou to send a secret letter, saying that you and I are in the same state People from Liangzhou, we don’t have any personal grievances. Although there is a little disagreement, the general interests are still the same. We will inevitably have to deal with each other in the future. Leave a way out?

Fan Chou thought about it and ordered the soldiers to retreat.Fan Chou was also invited to meet Han Sui on the battlefield. They rode their horses to the front of the battle, and they were very close. Others could only see that they were talking happily, but they couldn't hear what they said. They talked together for a long time before they finished. (But he rode forward to pick up the horse, adding arms to each other). Li Li happened to be at the scene and witnessed the scene with his own eyes. After returning, he made a small report to his uncle Li.Li suspected that Fan Chou was in collusion with Han Sui, so he notified Fan Chou to hold a military meeting. As soon as Fan Chou arrived, he was killed on the spot, and the "group of three" was officially disbanded.

Facts have repeatedly proved that power cannot be shared in troubled times, especially the supreme power.At that time, there were no houses of elders, no parliament, and the only feasible power model was the rule of strongmen. The Liangzhou Group that lost Dong Zhuo lacked a strongman who would unite all the people.It's just that Fan Chou died unjustly. Did he plan to plot something in front of tens of thousands of soldiers?However, such things are often easy to believe.Han Sui's trick left a deep impression on another person, this person is Jia Xu, who may have been there at the time.

Sixteen years later, Cao Cao led his troops west to Tongguan. Facing the coalition forces of Ma Chao and Han Sui, Cao Cao asked Jia Xu for advice. So the two armies also staged this show before the battle, and Yuehan then made a routine, "handing over horses and changing time".Afterwards, Ma Chao really became suspicious. Cao Cao's trick is not new, the inventor turned out to be Han Sui himself. In fact, Li Weiwei never thought that this was a trick of the enemy, but the conflict between him and Fan Chou has a long history, and Fan Chou's bravery in battle, love for his subordinates, and great prestige made Li feel dissatisfied for a long time. It is inevitable.Now there just happened to be an excuse, and under the guidance of the idea that he would rather believe what he had than believe what he had not and would rather kill by mistake than slip through the net, Li still made up his mind to kill Fan Chou.He must not have discussed it with Guo Si before doing this.Guo Si had always had a good relationship with Fan Chou, and when Fan Chou was killed, Guo Si immediately felt sad for the death of a rabbit.Li and Guo Si are peaceful on the surface, but they are preparing to meet each other in private.

From the first year of Xingping (194) to the second year of Xingping (195), the nationwide famine also spread to the Guanzhong area. In order to raise military rations, Liangzhou soldiers killed and looted in the Sanfu area, making people miserable. The sharp decline and severe shortage of supplies. According to the book "Xiandiji", even the clothes of Emperor Xian's palace and civil and military officials became a problem. Emperor Xian wanted to transfer some cloth from the imperial treasury to make uniforms for everyone. Li disagreed, saying that the palace people already had Clothes, why do you want to do it again?Emperor Xian had no choice but to rely on his own efforts. He ordered the sale of more than a hundred horses, and asked Da Siongqing to find a way to get some silk to make clothes for everyone.

Li heard it and said that their family was short of these things, so he cut off the money and silk.After Jia Xu heard about it, she persuaded Li not to do this, but Li didn't listen at all. "Book of the Later Han Dynasty" also records a ridiculous incident of Li Qian. He almost took Tang Ji, the wife of the late Shaodi Liu Bian, the wife of the late young emperor Liu Bian, as his concubine.After Liu Bian died, Tang Ji returned home.Li's army captured her during the battle in the Kanto. Li saw her beautiful and wanted to occupy her, but Tang Ji firmly refused.When Jia Xu heard the news, he hurriedly reported it to Emperor Xian. Liu Xie was very sad and sent his servant to bring his token (Chi Jie) to Li before asking him to come.