As Jin Shixie expected, the effectiveness of Huayuan's soldiers did not last long. Only four years later, a major battle broke out between the Jin and Chu armies again.

After Hua Yuan's defeat, although the Jin State did not continue to clash with the Chu State in the Central Plains, it actively expanded its influence to the surrounding areas. In the Battle of Ma Tunnel, the Jin State defeated the Qin army, which greatly expanded the country's power. Affected by this, the countries of the Central Plains also moved closer to Jin. Zheng Guo relied on the power of the Jin State and even sent troops to attack Xu State twice. Xu Guo had become a vassal state of Chu when he was King Zhuang of Chu, and Zheng's move was undoubtedly an affront to the hegemony of Chu.

In the fifteenth year of Lu Chenggong (576 AD), the king of Chu, who had recovered from the crisis, planned to wave his troops north to avenge the Xu state. When convening the ministers to discuss the matter, Zi Nang strongly advised that the agreement of Hua Yuan's soldiers should be observed, and suggested that the matter should be resolved through diplomatic means. But Zi said: "If the enemy is profitable, it will advance, how can there be an alliance?" The king of Chu then tore up the covenant and sent troops to attack Zheng and Wei, but Zheng Guo was not to be outdone and also returned to attack Chu. The Central Plains region is once again in a state of war.

In all fairness, although the state of Chu is not unknown, in the context of Huayuan's army, Zianti's opinion is undoubtedly untenable. The dispatch of troops by the state of Chu made it very passive diplomatically. Seeing that Chu was like this, the Jin State was also happy to push the boat down the river, and summoned the Qi, Song, Wei, Zheng and other states together with the Wu State in the southeast to meet the alliance in Zhongli to deal with the Chu State together. At this point, the Huayuan army was officially broken.

Seeing that the situation was not good, Chu immediately made peace with Zheng Guo alone. Zheng Guo, who had received the land of Ruyin as compensation, immediately sided with Chu and formed an alliance with Chu. With the support of the state of Chu, the state of Zheng attacked the state of Song and won the victory. And Wei Guo attacked Zheng Guo at the behest of Jin State.

The small-scale conquest of the Central Plains countries was just the prelude to the formal war between the two countries of Jin and Chu, and the real climax of the war had to wait until the Jin and Chu troops hiding behind the scenes sent troops to formally confront. Sure enough, in the second year, the Jin State officially sent troops to attack Zheng, and the Zheng State immediately asked the Chu State for help, and the Chu State immediately sent troops. The Jin and Chu armies met at Yanling (now north of Yanling, Henan). A big war is on the verge of breaking out.

The Jin army did not seem to be ready to engage the Chu army head-on. Hearing that the Chu army was coming, Shi Xie wanted to retreat and avoid the decisive battle of the main force. But Yin Zhi was resolutely opposed, and Fan Kuo, the son of Shi Xie, also supported Xun Zhi's opinion, saying that he could fill in the well stove in the camp and fight a decisive battle with the Chu State in the military camp. Although Fan Kuo's remarks that the newborn calf was not afraid of a tiger were reprimanded sharply by Shi Xie, he won the approval of other ministers and doctors of the Jin State. Luan Shu proposed that the Jin army stick to the camp, avoid the decisive battle of the main force, wait for the opportunity to counterattack, and strike preemptively, "Stick to the stronghold, retreat in three days, and attack it in retreat, and you will win."

It should be said that before the start of the battle, the Chu army did occupy a certain advantage. This day is a dark day, and it is considered unlucky in the spring and autumn period. The Chu army went the opposite way, approaching the Jin army at dawn under the cover of heavy fog to start a battle, and at this time, the Jin army's reinforcements Qi, Lu, Song, Wei and other allied forces had not yet arrived, and the Jin army was taken by surprise.

Although many generals emphasized that the Chu army was heavily arrayed, there were many good generals, and it was not easy to resist. However, Yin Zhi calmly analyzed the disadvantages of the Chu army itself, and pointed out that the relationship between the Chu army's generals and Zizhong was not good, the soldiers were old and the combat effectiveness was not high, and the Zheng army and the Chu army were not in order, and they used troops on obscure days that were usually considered inauspicious, so they were bound to be defeated and lost. Emperor Miao Ben, who fled from Chu to Jin and was well versed in the way of the Chu people's use of troops, pointed out that the elite main force of Chu was in the middle army, so he could concentrate superior forces to break the left and right armies first, and then combine forces to surround the Chinese army. Under the persuasion of Yin Zhi, Miao Benhuang and others, Jin Ligong finally decided to fight the Chu army head-on.

The tactical arrangement of the Jin State really achieved certain results, and under the onslaught of the main force of the Jin State, the left and right armies of the Chu army could not resist. The Jin army once approached the Chinese army of Chu, and the king of Chu was even shot in the left eye by the Jin general Wei Qi with an arrow, which can be described as extremely embarrassing. Although the Chu army was defeated and retreated, the combat effectiveness of the Chu army was superb and the tenacity of the fighting spirit also exceeded the expectations of the Jin State. Yang Youji, a famous marksman of the Chu State, showed his might in the defeated army, first killed Wei Qi with an arrow, and then led the army to resist the pursuit of the Jin army, while another fierce general, Shushan Ran, threw the Jin army soldiers as weapons at the Jin chariot, and the Jin army could not move and was forced to stop advancing.

The two sides fought fiercely for a day, and it ended at dusk. Although the scene was superior to Chu and inferior, the Chu army was not defeated, and the results obtained by the Jin State were extremely limited, and only the son of the Chu State was captured. When night fell, both sides collected their troops and returned to their camps, reorganized their soldiers, rescued the wounded, replenished food and grass, repaired weapons, and rearranged their positions, intending to fight again the next day.

At this time, Emperor Miao Ben came up with a clever plan, he ordered people to secretly relax the custody of Chu prisoners of war, let them escape back to the Chu camp to report the armament situation of the Jin army, and shake the military spirit of Chu State. Sure enough, when the king of Chu Gong got such news, he held a military meeting overnight, but Zi Yan, who was in charge of the Chinese army, was actually drunk and unconscious, so he couldn't come. After all, the king of Chu Gong is not very old, and when he heard about this, he lamented: "The sky defeated Chu Yefu!" You can't wait. "He ordered a retreat. The next day, the heavily armed Jin army found that the Chu army had retreated overnight, so they captured the Chu army camp and seized the Chu army's grain and straw, and at this time, the Jin reinforcements came to Yanling one after another. On the Chu side, the son who missed the fighter was blamed by the king of Chu and persecuted by Zizhong, who was at odds with him, and had no choice but to commit suicide and apologize. The Battle of Yanling thus ended with the victory of the Jin Kingdom.

There were many reasons for the defeat of the Chu State in the Battle of Yanling: first, it was naturally unknown and was in a disadvantageous position in terms of morality and public opinion; Secondly, in order to seize the advantage of the fighters, regardless of the actual advance speed of the army, forcibly marching and launching an attack not only failed to be impatient, but also caused fatigue of the army and led to a decline in combat effectiveness. Thirdly, in the battle, the military commander made a mistake in judgment and failed to command, resulting in passive beating at the tactical level, and it was only by virtue of the outstanding combat ability of individual soldiers that the situation was barely maintained; In the end, the coach did not abide by military discipline and delayed the fighter.

Compared with the Chu State, the Jin State's victory undoubtedly benefited from its correct strategy and tactics. However, unlike the Battle of Chengpu, which established the hegemony of the Jin state, the Battle of Yanling did not allow the Jin state to obtain the desired political benefits. From the scene of the endless debate between the ministers and doctors before the war, it can be seen that the Jin State has many politics, the secretaries are not in harmony, and the monarchs and ministers are separated. As Xuanbo, the doctor of Lu State said after the war: "There are many ways to govern the Jin Dynasty, and you can't follow it, and you would rather do things Qi and Chu." There is only death, contempt for Jin! ”

During the war, the Qi, Lu, Song, Wei and other national reinforcements did not advance and waited and saw as a concrete manifestation of this mentality. Therefore, although the Jin state won the Battle of Yanling, it did not gain control of the vassal states of the Central Plains. In particular, Zheng Guo, who was friendly with the Chu State, always refused to bow to the Jin State. Sure enough, not long after the Battle of Yanling, civil strife broke out in the Jin Kingdom, and Sanhe, Jin Ligong and others were killed in the civil strife. Although there was later the resumption of hegemony by the Duke of Jin, it could not restore the decline of the Jin State.

The Battle of Yanling was the third and last battle between the main armies of the two countries in the decades-long struggle for hegemony between Jin and Chu. It also marked the defeat of the Chu state to dominate the Central Plains, and although the Jin state was victorious, its influence on the princes of the Central Plains gradually declined.

After the Battle of Yanling, the situation of Jin and Chu fighting for hegemony became fierce again. At this time, the states of Qi, Lu, Song, and Wei were friendly with the Jin state, while the states of Qin, Zheng, Chen, and Cai were friendly with the state of Chu. Although the Jin State won the Battle of Yanling, it was trapped by the domestic situation, and its hegemony in the Central Plains has been unstable. In order to expand the influence of the Jin State in the Central Plains, the Jin State repeatedly attacked the Zheng State, but the Zheng State was grateful for the rescue of the Chu State in the Battle of Yanling, and his political position has always been biased towards the Chu State, and with the support of the Chu State, the Jin State has been engaged in war with the Jin State for more than ten years. Later, although he was forced to compromise with Jin because of his lack of strength, he always communicated with Chu Dark.

Although the state of Chu was defeated in the battle of Yanling, it did not lose much vitality, and still had the ability to compete with the Jin state, so it gradually got closer to the state of Qin, which also had a gap with the Jin. The two sides not only agreed to attack the Jin Kingdom together, but also carried out a marriage. However, at this time, the state of Chu was attacked more fiercely by the gradually rising state of Wu, although the two sides won and lost each other, but the attention of the state of Chu was pinned down in the southeast, and the attention to the Central Plains naturally weakened. On the other hand, the Qi State in the east also took the opportunity to expand its power again, trying to compete with the Jin State for the position of hegemon.

The protracted war situation has placed a great burden on all countries. Under the turbulent situation, civil strife in various countries broke out one after another, setting off another wave of political changes, and the secretaries, doctors, and scholars gradually grasped the actual power of the vassal states. Civil strife broke out in the Jin State, Zheng State, and Qi State one after another, especially between several secretaries and doctors of the Jin State and the monarch, which led to a great loss of the national strength of the Jin State, and could only barely maintain the superficial strength.

This chaotic situation lasted for about thirty years, and the protracted war situation and increasingly fierce internal contradictions had made it difficult for even superpowers like Jin and Chu to survive, let alone the smaller ones caught in them. Against this background, once again "killing the army" has become the consensus of all vassal states.

In order to alleviate the sharp contradictions between the vassal states, the former orphan of the Zhao family first reduced the amount of regular tribute paid by the small state to the Jin State, and then expressed the hope that someone would come forward to mediate between the Jin and Chu and reach a peace agreement through the uncle Sun Leopard of the Lu State.

Zhao Wu's opinion was endorsed by the princes of various countries at that time. At that time, the civil strife in the Qi State had not yet ended, and the Cui family and the Qing family were in power, so it was natural to make friends with the vassal states to stabilize the situation. The ruling sons of Zheng at that time saw the trend of peace in the vassal states, so they fortified and cleared the fields when the allied forces of Chu, Chen, Cai, and Xu attacked, and did not resist, providing room for peace talks.

As the conditions for the army to fight gradually matured, some people naturally volunteered and were willing to mediate. The last time the host of Huayuan's soldiers was Doctor Song Guo, and this time it was Doctor Song Guo who stood up. Similar to Hua Yuan, Xiang Xu had a close relationship with Zhao Wu on the one hand, and Yin Qujian on the other hand. Seeing that the princes advocated the killing of soldiers one after another, Xiang Xu decided to follow the example of his predecessors and preside over the meeting again. In this way, while stopping the war, it can also greatly increase the prestige and status of the Song State.

With such a purpose, Xiang Xu embarked on the road of lobbying. He successively visited the four most powerful powers of Jin, Chu, Qi, and Qin. Relying on their personal relations with those in power, Jin and Chu naturally complied, and Qin also readily agreed, only Qi hesitated for a while, and also agreed under the persuasion of the doctor Tian Wenzi. Seeing that the big countries supported the army, the small countries naturally agreed.

In the twenty-seventh year of Lu Xianggong (546 B.C.), the second military meeting was held again at the west gate of the Song Kingdom. Compared with the last time Huayuan killed the soldiers, the degree and scale of this time have increased a lot. A total of 14 countries, including Jin, Chu, Qi, Qin, Lu, Wei, Chen, Cai, Zheng, Xu, Song, Di, Teng, and Cao, sent representatives.

Through the mediation of Xiang Xu, the two countries of Jin and Chu established the basic pattern that the subject states of the two countries should meet each other, that is, the so-called "Jin and Chu subordinate to each other". However, due to the strong national strength of Qi and Qin, and their alliance with Jin and Chu respectively, they can be an exception, while Di and Teng are vassals of Qi and Song, respectively, so they do not need to participate in the alliance.

Although the peace agreement was reached, the atmosphere at the venue was tense before the alliance ceremony. The two countries of Jin and Chu have been fighting for many years, and their hatred is very deep, and they are wary of each other. At the time of the formal alliance, in order to prevent accidents, the state of Chu secretly put armor on the inside of the dress, intending to fight if there was a disagreement, and the state of Chu ordered Yin Qujian to claim: "Jin and Chu have no faith for a long time, and it is just a matter of profit." If you have ambition, how can you use it? When the Jin State learned of this news, it also made preparations in advance, planning to rush into the capital of the Song Kingdom and defend the city once there was a change.

At the formal meeting, the delegates jointly adopted the agreements reached and determined the proportion of contributions to be paid by each country. However, in the end, when the alliance was bloody, the two countries of Jin and Chu once again fought for the position of the leader of the alliance, and the two sides refused to give in to each other, which almost broke down the negotiations. In the end, under the persuasion of Uncle Xiang, the eldest doctor of the Jin State, the Chu State served as the leader of the alliance, but in exchange, the name of the Jin State was first written on the alliance book.

Although there were many turmoil, the second meeting of the army, which was known in history as "Xiang Xu's soldiers", finally ended smoothly. Compared with the short-lived Huayuan soldiers, the effectiveness of this meeting was much longer. Since then, there have been no major wars between the vassal states for decades, and a rare period of peace has been ushered in.

The meeting established a bipolar political pattern in which the two countries of Jin and Chu jointly claimed hegemony. For the Jin, Chu, Qi, Qin, and other major powers, the convening of the conference was conducive to dealing with the increasingly acute contradictions at home and restoring the national strength that had become increasingly empty due to the war. For the small vassal states of the Central Plains, on the one hand, they were free from the intrusion and destruction of war, and on the other hand, they also carried the heavy burden of obeying the two great powers and paying two tributes.

After the end of the meeting, the princes of Qi Jing, Chen Ai, Cai Jinghou, Qi Wen, and the monarchs of Yan, Hu, Shen, and Bai Di went to the Jin court to meet the Jin Pinggong in the following year; And Lu Xianggong and Song Pinggong, Chen Aigong, Zheng Jiangong, and Xu Miangong worshiped King Chu Kang of Chu State. Since then, these small countries have "served in the courts of Jin and Chu", and "made the best use of their soil, valued their coins and silks, paid tribute to their duties, and congratulated the murderers from their fate", resulting in a situation where they "dare not live in peace, ask for their endowments, and meet current affairs".

In the first year of Lu Zhao (541 B.C.), five years after Xiang Xu's rebellion, the nations once again met in Qiudi to reaffirm and emphasize the spirit of the meeting. Although Xiang Xu's military campaign was aimed at sacrificing the interests of small countries to maintain the living space of a large country, the situation of achieving peace through diplomatic means, especially the leading role played by the Song State in the two times before and after the conference, also illustrates the positive significance of the conference. The conference promoted the historical process of the Spring and Autumn Period and had a far-reaching impact.