Chapter 95 The end of Cao Hong (fifth update, please be the first to subscribe! 56)
“Those who hold this letter want to go out from the west gate. The city gate here leads to Yanzhou.”
Liu Feng talked eloquently: "Although Cao and Lu are vying for supremacy in Yanzhou now, the one who is close to Xuzhou is Cao Yanzhou." He also asked his planners Xun Yu, Xi Zhicai, Cheng Li and others whether they could attack Xuzhou first and then pacify Yanzhou. "
"If it hadn't been for Xun Wenruo who urged Cao Cao not to give up halfway, he even cited the Han Dynasty in the past. Emperor Gaozu guarded Guanzhong, Emperor Guangwu occupied Hanoi, and consolidated the base to control the world. This allowed Cao Cao to temporarily put aside his intention to conquer Xuzhou three times. "
When Liu Feng talked about his three expeditions to Xuzhou, even wise men like Chen Deng and kind-hearted elders like Mi Zhu all heard that Cao's color changed.
Not to mention Cao Bao and Xu Dan, their faces were as pale as wax and they were filled with fear.
This can’t be blamed on the two of them. The entire Danyang army was defeated by Cao Cao several times. How can we not be afraid?
This shows how high Cao Cao's status is in the hearts of Xuzhou people.
"Therefore, I can't arbitrarily determine whether Cao Changshi knows the identity of the other party, but I can be sure that the person who gave Cao Hong the idea must be someone from Cao Cao's side!"
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Liu Xin was full of heart and said unambiguously: "Even if it is not him, it must be the plan of the counselors around him. In my nephew's humble opinion, this plan is so vicious and treats people as fish, and I am afraid that Dong A Chengli will "Dedicated."
Liu Feng's confidence, coupled with the evidence in front of him, left Cao Bao and Xu Dan speechless.
Besides, although Liu Feng hypocritically said that he could not judge Cao Hong arbitrarily, he knew that the other party was Cao Cao's man, but what difference did it make whether he knew or not?
In fact, he has already been informed. Even if he was deceived, it would be a capital crime.
Just betraying the interests of the state and plotting against others is enough to punish Cao Hong.
Tong Cao just nailed the coffin tighter and made Cao Hong's death more complete.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan also acquiesced at this moment that Cao Hong had colluded with Cao Cao. This crime was irredeemable in Xuzhou, and it was the kind of death without a burial place.
Cao Hong was personally promoted to the position of chief historian by Tao Qian.
As a result, you haven't even passed Tao Qian's first year, and you are already wagging your tail with Tao Qian's mortal enemy. Who else will I kill if I don't kill you?
Cao Bao and Xu Dan looked at each other, stood up and left the table together, and bowed to Liu Bei: "I sincerely ask Duke Ming to remove Cao Hong and take him into custody to distinguish between loyal and traitorous people."
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Liu Bei was overjoyed. He quickly stood up and helped the two of them up, holding one of them with one hand: "Wen Wei, it's the right time. It's rare for two people to understand righteousness deeply. They are really virtuous ministers of Bei."
Liu Feng Zai One side interjected: "Congratulations, father, for being able to get the help of two wise ministers, Uncle Cao and General Xu. In that case, why not leave the matter to them and let them investigate and deal with Cao Changshi.
If If Cao Changshi is innocent, Uncle Cao and General Xu will definitely clear up his grievances and provide him with justice." br>
Liu Bei was very happy when he heard this. He turned to Cao Bao and Xu Dan and asked: "My son's words are deeply in my heart. I wonder what you two think? Can you help me solve my problem?"
Now that the conversation has come to this point, can Cao Bao and Xu Dan still talk about it?
The two could only agree with mixed emotions.
After receiving the order, the two people left the table and retired.
At the gate of the state capital, the two looked at each other for a long time and sighed together.
"How could Cao Guangyi be so stupid as to get involved with Cao Cao? Has he forgotten who drove my lord to death?"
Cao Bao spoke first, and in his words Full of resentment, he was obviously very dissatisfied with Cao Hong's collusion with Cao Cao.
This also vaguely means that he has believed Liu Feng's words.
Xu Dan glanced at Cao Bao and sighed: "We'd better go to his house and ask him in person."
Cao Bao nodded in agreement, and then the two of them each led their own soldiers, and added The executioners sent by Shangzhou Prefecture went to Cao Hong's mansion together.
On the way, they met Zhang Lie who was coming in a hurry, and they joined the team together.
Xu Dan seized the time and told Zhang Lie about the general situation on the way. The latter was so shocked that he almost lost his eyes.
Is this Cao Hong so stupid?
This is the only thought in Zhang Lie's head.
Cao Hong's mansion is a mansion purchased during Tao Qian's time. It occupies a large area and is very luxurious inside. It is much more luxurious than Cao Bao and Xu Dan's family.
Although Cao Bao is considered the second in command of the Danyang faction, second only to the boss Tao Qian himself.
But firstly, he is a military commander and cannot interfere in any place. Secondly, he is also an honest person, and it is not excessive to exploit his soldiers.
Therefore, the wealth he accumulated over the years in Xuzhou is probably less than one-tenth of Cao Hong's.
The same goes for Xu Dan, who even made much less than Cao Bao.
After all, Cao Bao is a Zhonglang General. His peers can call him Cao Wenwei. If they are more respectful, they can also call him Cao Jianwei, because he is the current Jianwei Zhonglang General.
But Xu Dan is different. He, the lieutenant general, is one level lower in terms of strength and status. He is purely used by Tao Qian to divide Cao Bao's power, and he doesn't even have a nickname.
That is to say, the world is now in chaos and the court has lost its laws.
Otherwise, a high-ranking general-level official like Zhonglang would be comparable to a state pastor with two thousand shi. Only the central government can appoint and remove him, and the local government will not be qualified to perform.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan entered Cao Hong's home and saw all kinds of rare furnishings in the backyard, including pearls, agates, gold and jade, and their eyes turned red with envy.
This damn Cao Guangyi, who usually complains about his poverty to them, secretly made so much money.
Hearing that Youqiu Ba came to make trouble, Cao Hong came out angrily after hearing the news.
After seeing Cao Bao and Xu Dan, Cao Hong was obviously stunned for a moment, but he quickly reacted and said to them with dissatisfaction: "Wen Wei, Zhengshi, why is this? Why? Bringing people into my mansion and harassing my family members?”
Having said this, Cao Hong suddenly became even more anxious when he saw the Qiu Ba people running around and teasing the maids.
"Wen Wei, Zhengshi, if anything happens, let's go to the back hall and tell them. You let these soldiers withdraw first."
Cao Hong originally wanted to talk to Cao Bao , Xu Dan talks nicely.
But the two people on the other side just sneered at him and didn't talk to each other at all. This made Cao Hong become angry and shouted at the latter two: "What do you mean by this? Do you think this is the case?" Want to rebel? "
Cao Bao sneered. This Cao Hong is still putting on airs when his death is imminent. He really doesn't know how to live or die.
Xu Dan winked at Zhang Lie, who chuckled, led someone forward and suddenly held Cao Hong down.
“Are you crazy?”
Cao Hong didn’t realize the situation until he was held down, and looked at Cao Bao and Xu Dan in disbelief: “What are you going to do? I’m from the state Governor Shi, are you rebelling?"
"Hey, Guangyi, you are confused."
Cao Bao walked up to Cao Hong, sighed and shook his head: "You and Han. Xun’s incident happened. Zhengshi and I were sent by the envoy. You should understand, right?”
Cao Hong's body trembled, sweat broke out on his forehead, and his angry curses suddenly became quieter.
But after a moment, he raised his head, his pale face was bloodless, and his trembling lips wanted to defend: "I, we just want to... want to do meritorious service for the emperor. What's wrong with wanting to do meritorious service? ?”
Xu Dan said displeased: “That’s enough, Cao Guangyi, don’t deceive Brother Wen Wei and I as fools anymore. Your handwritten letters were intercepted by messengers. Is there any room for quibbles? "
At this time, Cao Hong was completely paralyzed, and his whole body was as limp as a noodle.
Cao Hong was in a very embarrassed state at this time, his clothes were dirty and his whole body was almost completely pinned to the ground by the big soldiers.
However, he seemed to have been stretched out, and his whole body was weak. If it weren't for the soldiers holding him down, he would have fallen to the ground long ago.
Originally, Cao Bao and Xu Dan planned to give Cao Hong some face. After all, we are all from Danyang, and we can't do anything too great, so we must give him some face.
When it was revealed that Liu Bei was going to execute Cao Hong, the two of them agreed to persuade him to try to save Cao Hong's life and let him return to his hometown in Danyang for retirement.
But when the two saw the wealth hidden by Cao Hong, their thoughts began to change.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan looked at each other and changed their attitudes in a tacit understanding.
At this time, the two of them felt that their previous thoughts were too superficial and failed to fully understand the seriousness of Cao Hong's crime.
This is colluding with foreign enemies, and it is Cao Cao who colludes.
The entire Xuzhou, including Danyang soldiers, has a blood feud with Cao Cao, and they are sworn in.
Cao Guangyi went too far this time. He actually communicated with Cao Cao and cheated on others. This was a betrayal of the elders of Xuzhou, the people of Danyang, and the deceased former envoy Jun Taogong.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan had a brief exchange, and were pleasantly surprised to find that the other party and Xu Dan wanted to be together.
It would be better for Cao Hong to die. After all, money and silk are very attractive, and they don't want to return these things to Cao Hong in the future.
After all, no one wants to have a debt collector watching over them in the future.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan asked their soldiers to pack and seal the money in boxes, and then discussed. In the end, it was decided that Cao Hong must die, and half of Cao Hong's property should be handed over to Liu Bei. The remaining half would be divided between Cao Bao and Xu Dan, and the remaining half would be divided between Xu Dan and Liu Feng.
Liu Feng's 10% benefit was proposed by Cao Bao. Originally, he planned to argue with reason and convince Xu Dan.
Unexpectedly, Xu Dan agreed directly after thinking about it for a moment.
This made Cao Bao feel a little uncomfortable, as if a fist had been punched in the air. He even wondered whether Xu Dan was secretly hooking up with Liu Feng behind his back, so he agreed so readily.
However, Xu Dan had no choice but to do anything without evidence. Finally, his goal was achieved. As long as he could go to Liu Feng first to claim credit, he wouldn't bother to worry about it so much.
"Brother Wenwei, Brother Zhengshi, two dear brothers, I know I made a mistake, please help me!"
Cao Hong didn't catch his breath until now Come, desperately trying to grab the last life-saving straw: "For the sake of you and our hometown party, will you save my life?"
"Save your life?"
Xu Dan said angrily: "How do you want us to protect you? You are Tongcao, I don't think we will both be implicated by you."
Xu Dan Danyue said and became even more angry: "Did you ever think about me and brother Wen Wei when you passed the Cao Cao?"
"How can I pass the Cao Cao?"
Cao Hong was crying all over his face at this moment. It's Hua. He just wanted to find a way out. How could he become Tongcao?
Cao Bao directly waved his hand and asked someone to gag Cao Hong's mouth.
It's too late for Cao Hong to say anything now, so why listen to his nonsense.
Cao Hong's fate has been doomed, and his line of Danyang civil servants will also be purged.
Liu Feng stayed with Liu's mother and mother in the state capital for a long time, and rushed to the military camp in the evening.
This group of Danyang soldiers were already used to Liu Feng eating and living with them. Bold soldiers such as Wang Gui actually dared to joke with him cautiously.
Everyone also knows that Liu Feng is very serious during training. Although he is young, he trains strictly and does not restrain himself from talking or laughing.
But when he was resting, he was able to put down his arrogance and mingle with the soldiers.
On weekdays, he also gave the soldiers extra meals and meat many times, arranged for women and children to clean the barracks, and washed and mended the soldiers' clothes, which moved the soldiers very much.
Especially after dinner every night, he would often chat with the soldiers and tell them stories about celebrities who were about to become prime ministers. At the same time, he also hinted that good soldiers should defend the country and their hometown. In this way Only in this way can we gain the love and respect of the people.
If you bully the civilians in peacetime, but are timid and cowardly in wartime, you will collapse at the first touch.
So how can such soldiers demand respect and admiration from civilians?
No matter these things or words, it is impossible to change the soldiers' thoughts and concepts at once.
But with the subtle influence, even if it only plays a small role, Liu Feng is willing to do it.
Not two days later, Cao Bao and Xu Dan suddenly sent someone a gift worth 400,000 yuan. They must have rounded up the sum for him.
Liu Beina also received the same gift at the same time, but the value was five times more than Liu Feng's.
Liu Feng quickly figured out the source of the money, and he was not polite. He collected it all and put it into the treasury.
Cao Bao and Xu Dan embezzled Cao Hong's property, which is definitely illegal.
Can they be punished now?
Obviously not, because the use of troops is imminent.
And when Liu Bei took the initiative to send the two of them to capture Cao Hong, he actually tacitly acknowledged that they were confiscating the property and dividing the spoils.
Liu Bei didn't expect that the two of them would be so understanding, and they would even divide it into two parts to honor their father and son.
In this case, they can only accept the money with a smile. Even if they take it and send it to the state government to subsidize the finance, it is better than returning it to Cao Bao and Xu Dan to squander it.
A few days later, it was February.
The state capital’s farmland plan is about to begin. If we don’t start taking action, spring plowing will be delayed.
Originally, the state capital has selected more than 4,000 families, all of which are families with more than two young men and women.
These people were evenly distributed to Cheng County, Lanling County and Xiangben County. Lu Su was eventually worshiped as the military commander of the field, with a salary of two thousand dan, responsible for all military affairs, and also served as the magistrate of Xiangben County.
Lu Su burst into tears of gratitude. After thanking him, he took office and began to arrange personnel and materials.
Liu Feng's troops will escort two thousand households of civilians to Xiangben County in the west of Tancheng County. This is the main transportation route from Tancheng to Yanzhou. It was very prosperous in the past, with many caravans coming and going, and it was a very wealthy country. county seat.
But now, there is only an empty city left.
But compared to Cheng County and Lanling County, Xiangben County is much better. At least its city and the houses in the city are still there.
Most of the original civilians here died after escaping from the city, plundered, killed and captured by Cao's army and the defeated soldiers.
The biggest casualty was at the foot of Tancheng County.
At that time, Cao Jun chased to the camp outside Tan City. The gates of Tan City were tightly closed and they did not dare to open the door, leaving all the tens of thousands of civilians fleeing outside the city to Cao Jun.
After Liu Bei arrived, he teamed up with Cao Bao to launch a counterattack. Unfortunately, this counterattack not only failed, but was almost defeated by Cao's army.
Therefore, although Xiangben County remains intact, the owner inside has changed.
The first batch escorted 500 households, totaling 2,664 people, and set out first, including 60 officials, all of whom were drawn from other counties in Donghai County.
Liu Feng ordered that Xu Sheng’s troops be assigned to participate in this operation. Pan Zhang and Cao Meng’s troops set off first and had already set off with food, cattle, salt and other supplies.
Xu Sheng had 500 men, plus 30 of his own soldiers, for a total of 530 men.
This is not because Xu Sheng has more soldiers than General Xu Dan, but because Xu Dan met with Liu Bei that day and it was impossible for Xu Sheng to bring all his soldiers with him like Xu Sheng did when he went on an expedition.
These soldiers of Xu Sheng are all relatives, friends and guests of his family. They all have good martial arts skills, are relatively united and have strong combat effectiveness.
Xu Sheng also intended to take them with him to train them, and then release them to become low-level officers.
Outside the west gate of Tancheng County, Liu Feng saw the households waiting for their escort.
Although these people are mostly young and strong, they are extremely thin and have obviously not eaten enough for a long time.
These people have distributed some rations. Each person can probably get a few buckets, which is enough for them to eat for several days.
When they get there, there will be new supplies, enough to keep them going until the summer harvest.
The straight-line distance from Tancheng to Xiangben is only more than 20 miles, but there is a Yishui River between the two cities. Therefore, a bridge built in a narrow place must be detoured, so it is not as convenient as going to Jiqiu County in Langya County.
“Brother Wen Xiang, take one group to go in front to open the way, another group to the back, and the rest to guard in the middle.”
Although the nominal commander of this team is Army Sima Xu Sheng, but he always came to ask Liu Feng's opinion on everything, which made Liu Feng very helpless.
However, Liu Feng also wanted to take the opportunity to gain practical experience, so he gradually overstepped his authority.
Xu Sheng did not complain at all, on the contrary, he was very obedient.
The team set off, and everyone hoped to set off as early as possible, otherwise it would be too late to reach Xiangbi. In that case, they would have to spend a night in the wild, and the weather was freezing, so there would probably be a lot of attrition.
Fortunately, there were no accidents along the way. There were occasional bandits, but when they saw the regular army, they were so frightened that they fled in panic.
At this time, Liu Feng did not ask the cavalry to pursue, but maintained a safe reconnaissance distance to cover the large troops as they continued to move forward.
Finally, when the sun was setting in the west, the brigade finally arrived safely in Xiangben County.
At this time, the gate of Xiangben County was still open, and a group of soldiers stood outside the door.
Torches have begun to be lit on the city walls, and large pots have been burned in the open space inside the city, with boiling rice porridge rolling in the pots.
The villagers in the fields were already tired and hungry, but the experience of queuing in the past month made them consciously queue up instead of rushing in.
Seeing the households finishing their hot porridge and being escorted to nearby houses, Liu Feng breathed a sigh of relief and showed a satisfied smile.
That day, Liu Feng persisted until the end. After everyone had rested, he and Xu Sheng went back to rest.
(End of this chapter)