Chapter 55 Photochemical coup: the emperor became a prisoner

Since returning to Chang'an in the first year of Guanghua (898 AD), Zhaozong Li Ye seemed to be a different person. In the past, the emperor was gentle and refined, calm and self-disciplined, but now he has become alcoholic and moody.In this regard, the most disturbing thing is the eunuch beside him.Because Emperor Zhaozong had no ability to deal with feudal towns since he ascended the throne, but he was very good at fighting eunuchs.The great eunuchs Tian Lingzi and Yang Fugong were all planted in his hands, and in the spring of the third year of Guanghua (AD 900), he joined hands with the prime minister Cui Yin to get rid of Zhu Daobi and Jing Wuxiu, the left and right privy secretaries who were in charge of the government.The eunuchs are all in danger.Whether it is a high-ranking official or the little yellow gate who specializes in sweeping, they all fear and hate this unpredictable and increasingly violent emperor.

At that time, the leaders of the eunuch group were the left and right lieutenants Liu Jishu and Wang Zhongxian, and the left and right privy officials Wang Yanfan and Xue Qixuan.A constant apprehension and panic crept among them.In view of this situation, the four quickly reached a consensus - they should take the initiative to attack, and must not sit still. After many conspiracies, the four eunuchs finally formulated a plan of action - wait for the opportunity to launch a mutiny, support the crown prince to ascend the throne, and force the emperor to abdicate as the Supreme Emperor. Intimidate the vassals, coerce the emperor to order the princes.

The plan is established, and the next step is to wait for the opportunity. On the fourth day of November of this year, Emperor Zhaozong went to Beiyuan to hunt and drink. When he returned to the palace late at night, he was already very drunk.In the early morning of the next day, the gate of the palace was not opened for a long time.Realizing that the opportunity had come, Liu Jishu went to Zhongshu Province to summon Cui Yin on the grounds that "there must be changes in the palace", and then broke in with a thousand forbidden troops, heading straight for Zhaozong's bedroom. When everyone entered the dormitory, they were stunned by the scene in front of them—several people who were killed last night were still lying stiffly on the ground, with blood splattered everywhere, and the emperor was still lying on the dragon bed sprawled and sleeping soundly.

Liu Jishu sneered and said to Cui Yin: "Look, this is what the lord did. How can such a person rule the world? It's been like this since ancient times! For the sake of state affairs, I'm afraid this can't be counted. Faithful?" Looking at the heavily armed Forbidden Army soldiers behind Liu Jishu, Cui Yin's face was pale and he was sweating profusely, so he could only nod his head nonuo. On the sixth day of the lunar new year, Liu Jishu summoned hundreds of officials to enter the palace. In front of Chen Bingdian, he took out a joint memorial requesting the prince to supervise the country, and ordered Cui Yin and the officials to circulate it and sign it.No one in the civil and military courts of the Manchu Dynasty dared to say "no", and signed their names one after another.

Then, the forced palace operation began. Liu Jishu took the memorial jointly signed by hundreds of officials and led more than a thousand forbidden troops, swaggering all the way into the palace, killing everyone on the way, until they reached the Sizheng Palace where Zhaozong was located. Hearing the sound of killing outside, Zhaozong was so frightened that he fell off the imperial couch.As soon as he got up and wanted to run, Liu Jishu came over and held him down, saying: "Your Majesty, are you tired of being the emperor? Now, both the government and the public are asking the prince to supervise the country. Please move to the East Palace (Shaoyang Court) and rest well." .”

Zhaozong said unwillingly: "Drinking with the virtuous ministers the day before yesterday, I drank a few more glasses, how could it be so bad?" Liu Jishu waved the memorial in his hand: "We didn't do this, it was Nan Si (courier)'s idea, and we can't do anything about it. Your Majesty, please stay in the East Palace temporarily, and take you back to the palace when the situation is stable." On the same day, Emperor Zhaozong was forced to hand over the Jade Seal of Chuanguo, and was escorted to Shaoyang Yuan together with the empress, with only a dozen concubines, princesses, and court ladies accompanying him.Seeing the emperor's cowardly appearance, Liu Jishu suddenly felt a sadistic desire, so he called the emperor in front of him, picked up a silver stick to write and draw on the mud floor, and said: "In a certain year, a certain month, a certain day, If you don’t listen to me, this is your first crime; if you don’t listen to me on a certain day in a certain year, this is your second crime; on a certain day in a certain year…” I kept counting down dozens of piles, until the area around the feet of the emperor was completely filled, and then I stopped my hand with unsatisfactory intentions.

When leaving, Liu Jishu locked the courtyard door with his own hands, poured molten iron into the keyhole, and then ordered Li Shiqian, the deputy envoy of the Left Army, to lead his troops to guard and let him closely monitor the emperor's every move.Finally, Liu Jishu ordered someone to cut a hole in the courtyard wall to deliver meals, and at the same time strictly ordered everyone not to pass in weapons, scissors, needles and other things. Obviously, Liu Jishu didn't want Zhaozong to commit suicide, but wanted to trap him in it and suffer, so that he could not live or die. A few days later, Zhaozong asked someone to hand over a message, asking for some money and cloth.

Liu Jishu was delighted when he heard it. What do the prisoners want money for?Could it be that you want to bribe the guards with money to improve the situation?Hehe, it's a beautiful idea! Zhaozong's request was rejected.He had no choice but to settle for the next best thing, offering only paper and pen. Liu Jishu sneered again. paper and pencil?What do you want to do again?Is it possible that you want to write a distress letter and hand it out, so that someone will come and kill me so that you can be rescued?Do you really take me, Liu Jishu, for a fool? It is conceivable that all Zhaozong's requests were flatly rejected by Liu Jishu.

It was already deep winter and the weather was extremely cold. The concubines and princesses who were imprisoned with the emperor were short of clothes and quilts, and their weeping continued day and night. On the tenth day of the Lunar New Year, under the plan of Liu Jishu and others, Prince Li Yu changed his name to Li Zhen, that is, the throne of emperor. At the same time, he took Li Ye as the Supreme Emperor, and Shaoyang Temple was also renamed Wen'an Palace. The emperor became a prisoner, and was deposed and abused. Everyone in the world knew it well, but everyone stood still. This is an extremely delicate moment.Everyone is waiting and watching, no one wants to be the first bird, they all want to catch the fisherman's profit.As a result, nothing happened—Zhaozong was deposed for a whole month, and the world remained silent.

In this case, Prime Minister Cui Yin had to take action. Relying on his personal friendship with general Sun Dezhao and others, Cui Yin secretly found them and asked them to kill the eunuch and rescue the emperor.Of course, Cui Yin offered them a very high price, and promised to give high-ranking officials generous salaries after the event was completed.Sun Dezhao and others were so moved that they launched a mutiny on the second day of the first lunar month of the following year, killing Liu Jishu, Wang Zhongxian and other four people, and rescued Zhaozong. After Emperor Zhaozong was restored, Liu Jishu and other four people were copied and beheaded immediately, and a large number of party members were killed at the same time.Immediately afterwards, Emperor Zhaozong appointed Sun Dezhao as the envoy of Jinghai Jiedu and Tongping Zhangshi, and named him Li Jizhao.

Although Zhaozong was restored, the coup still left him and Prime Minister Cui Yin with lingering fears.Soon, Cui Yin proposed to Zhaozong that the root of all the troubles was that the eunuchs controlled the military power, and the only way to completely eradicate the troubles was to take back the military power of the forbidden army and put it under the control of the prime minister. Isn't this Zhaozong's idea?However, this matter is not that simple.Because in this dynasty, eunuchs have been in control of the Forbidden Army for more than a hundred years. Everyone has long regarded this as a matter of course, and it is by no means something that can be changed.In addition, from the point of view of the Forbidden Army itself, they must be closer to the eunuchs, and have little affection for civil servants.Because generally speaking, civil servants always pay more attention to discipline and principles, which will undoubtedly restrict the soldiers of the Imperial Army.But eunuchs are different, they don't care about anything except interests. Therefore, just as Cui Yin made a suggestion, it immediately caused an uproar among the Forbidden Army, and the generals issued strong protests one after another.Even Li Jizhao, who had already left the imperial army, stood up and said to the emperor on behalf of his former colleagues: "We have been in the army for generations, and we have never heard of handing over the army to scholars!" Emperor Zhaozong had no choice but to use eunuch Han Quanhui and Zhang Yanhong as left and right lieutenants again. These two eunuchs had served as Fengxiang's military supervisors before, and their relationship with Li Maozhen was extraordinary.Now Prime Minister Cui Yin and the eunuch are in the same situation, Han and Zhang are bound to invite Li Maozhen to help.At the same time, Cui Yin, who had a close personal relationship with Zhu Quanzhong, was worried that he would be retaliated by the eunuch, and of course he had to use Zhu Quanzhong as foreign aid. It is conceivable that in the days to come, these two factions will surely start a life-and-death struggle.And the emperor Li Ye, whose power has been sidelined and whose fate is like a totter, will surely become a victim again in such a vicious struggle. In the last few years of the ninth century, Zhu Quanzhong of the Central Plains seemed to have replaced Li Keyong of Hedong as the most powerful warlord in the world. Since the first year of Wende (888 A.D.), Zhu Quanzhong has launched a large-scale expansion operation since he eliminated his neighboring rival Qin Zongquan.First of all, he directed his troops to the east, first eliminated Shi Pu who was entrenched in Xuzhou in the second year of Jingfu (893 AD), and then annexed Yunzhou and Yanzhou in the fourth year of Qianning (897 AD).Later, Zhu Quanzhong turned his attention to the three towns of Heshuo in the north. In May of the first year of Guanghua (898 A.D.), Zhu Quanzhong crossed Hebei and captured the three prefectures of Xing, Ming and Ci under Li Keyong.In December of the same year, Li Hanzhi, a general under Li Keyong, surrendered to Zhu Quanzhong in Luzhou.In the second year of Guanghua (899 A.D.), Liu Rengong of Youzhou invaded Weibo in the south. Zhu Quanzhong assisted Luo Shaowei of Weibo to repel Liu Rengong, thus bringing Weibo into his sphere of influence; Wang Rong of Germany.In October of the third year of Guanghua (AD 900), Zhu Quanzhong attacked Dingzhou again and forced Wang Chuzhi of Yiwu to surrender.Liu Rengong dispatched a large army to rescue, but was defeated by Zhu Quanzhong, and more than 60,000 people were killed. Liu Rengong's situation was over, so he had to surrender to Zhu Quanzhong. So far, all the towns in Hebei have belonged to Zhu Quanzhong, and Li Keyong's right arm has been cut off. Immediately afterwards, Zhu Quanzhong turned his gaze to the river again. In Zhu Quanzhong's view, as long as Li Keyong's other arm is removed, Hedong will be in his pocket.