It was going to be dusk, and Pei Ju's mansion was brightly lit.

Since he unloaded the Tang Dynasty's Ministry of Rites, Pei Ju has gradually faded out of people's field of vision, and few people have heard from him.

Pei Ju did get into everything, but after all, he was a person who had been up and down in the sea for most of his life, and it was impossible not to pay attention to the general trend of the world, he was old, but he was in good spirits, and his intelligence and thinking ability were far better than some so-called Xiangguo. If Li Yuan made him the prime minister, he would be fully capable of handling tedious affairs. However, even if it is a great unified dynasty where the son inherits his father's business, there is a saying that 'one son of heaven and one courtier', not to mention that he is a courtier of Emperor Wu of the Sui Dynasty, no matter from which aspect, Li Yuan cannot let him be the minister of political affairs, but after he resigned from the Ministry of Rites, Li Yuan also wanted to keep this experienced old man and give advice by his side.

On the one hand, Pei Ju did not look down on the Li Tang Dynasty and did not want to have too many entanglements with the Li family, lest after Li Yuan's failure, his children and grandchildren would also be purged by Yang Dong; On the other hand, Pei Ju decided to turn the rest of his life's energy from the world to the family, and laid out a century-old overall situation for him, Pei's family.

Pei Ju believes that the general trend of the world is in the Sui Dynasty, and the time is not far off for Yang Tong to reunify, and because of the war of more than ten years, the old family and the old forces will be dealt a fatal blow, without the constraints of these huge political forces, all the policies of Yang Tong will be postponed, the strong emperor and the support of the people of the world, no one can oppose the method of employing people by the imperial examination, and the Jiupin Zhongzheng system will become history with the fall of the Li Tang Dynasty.

The imperial examination system is a great opportunity for anyone, and the way to obtain this opportunity is to be talented, and the children of the Pei family not only have to produce talents, but also understand all the governing strategies of the superiors, so that they can be like-minded with the emperor and go hand in hand, without worrying about being abandoned by the superiors, and slowly bring out more children and occupy positions at all levels of the imperial court step by step.

Pei Ju's sons are relatively mediocre, and because they are officials in the Tang Dynasty, it is impossible to obtain any position in the soon-to-be-unified Great Sui Dynasty, and there is no value in training, so he pours all his hopes and efforts into his grandchildren.

At this time, he was discussing the situation with his five elderly grandsons in a secret room, "The emperor is the most fickle person in the world, and to understand his mind, you must not only listen to what he says, but also what he is doing, and as long as you know what is in the interest of him in doing so, you can judge his next move." Emperor Shengwu had the opportunity to destroy the Tang Dynasty last year, but he did not take advantage of the victory to pursue, nor did he occupy Xiangyang and other counties. Therefore, his first goal this year is obviously not Li Tang, but Li Mi, unifying the Central Plains and unifying the South will put the goal on Li Tang, but unfortunately the Chinese Wu of the Dynasty was frightened by the momentum created by the Sui army, and did not consider last year's events into the overall situation, if he understood the intention of Emperor Shengwu, he would not be so passive. ”

"Grandfather."

The eldest grandson Pei Hong saluted, he is Pei Xuanji's eldest son, twenty-four years old this year, and he is also the person Pei Ju focuses on cultivating, only to hear him say: "The saint lost too many troops in the Eastern Expedition last year, I think Emperor Shengwu could have taken advantage of the victory to pursue, occupy the empty forces of Chungling, Xiangyang, Yiling, Xicheng, Fangling and other counties, and forced the Li Tang Dynasty to retreat into Bashu. When the time comes, he only needs to send an army to block Yiling, so that the Tang army will not be able to leave Shu, so that it will not be like today, not only to deal with Li Mi, but also to spend countless troops to defend Li Tang, he is not only not decisive in doing so, but also consumes countless property, and he did not fight to the end at the beginning, which seems to have left himself a big trouble. ”

Pei Ju asked: "Let me ask you, is Jingxiang easy to fight, or Bashu is easy to fight?" ”

"Naturally, it's Jingxiang ......" Pei Hong said this, and suddenly realized: "I understand, the reason why Emperor Shengwu suddenly took it back was that he hoped that the Li Tang Dynasty would lead all the war potential to Jingxiang, and then annihilate the Li Tang Dynasty and all the troops in Jingxiang, so that Bashu, which was easy to defend and difficult to attack, would almost not fight." ”

"Not bad."

Pei Ju smiled and nodded, "These grand strategies are not important to you now, what is important to you is the change in the power structure of the Li Tang Dynasty after the failure of the Eastern Crusade." Think about it seriously, when the Holy Lord returned to Xiangyang, what changes took place in the court? ”

Pei Hong pondered for a moment and said: "After the Holy Lord returned to Xiangyang, the first thing was to scatter the descendants of the King of Jin everywhere and separate from the King of Jin to form one. Second, it is necessary to readjust the political affairs hall and the chief officials of the six ministries of the three provinces, and use clan relatives and foreign relatives in positions closely related to the state, such as the military, finance, and people. ”

"That's right, then why did the Holy One do this?" Pei Ju induced the eldest grandson's train of thought step by step.

"I think the saint is balancing power, and most of the previous important positions were held by the Guanlong nobles, but with the Sui army releasing the rumors of reconciliation with the world's families, the Guanlong nobles are ready to move, and the Guanlong nobles are against the Western Wei, against the Zhou, against the Sui, and the practice of killing the lord, the saint sees that the situation in the Tang Dynasty is not good, for fear that the Guanlong nobles will oppose the Tang Dynasty again, so he will include his cronies in the power structure, but the official position is limited, which requires a lot of people to give way, and it becomes logical to crack down on the powerful Dugu faction." Under the careful teaching of his grandfather, Pei Hong got a glimpse of the path of power change, and his thinking became clear.

Pei Ju was very satisfied with the clarity of the eldest grandson, and asked again: "With the death of Dugu and Dugu Huaien, there is no one in the court who can speak, Dou Liang took the opportunity to win over many families of the Dugu faction, and the Dugu clan is almost isolated except for the relationship with the Yuan family and the Zhao family, where do you think the next step for the saint will be?" ”

"What's next?" Pei Hong frowned and thought hard.

At this moment, Pei Hong's younger brother Pei Xu said: "Grandfather, brother, I think the next thing the Holy Lord will deal with is the Dugu clan. ”

Pei Hong suddenly realized and asked, "What is your basis?" ”

"At the time of the Yuan and Japanese Dynasty Meeting, the Holy Lord officially promulgated the land system for military merits, and all generals who made military merits would receive land rewards, but the land obtained from the destruction of the Buddha was far from enough." Speaking of this, Pei Xu changed the topic: "Although the Guanlong nobles are weak now, they are just relatively powerful in the past, and the former Guanlong nobles benefited from the great power in their hands, and they took advantage of the power in all parts of the world, resulting in land and commerce all over the world." After Emperor Wen of Sui established the state, he restricted them and curbed the excessive expansion of the Guanlong nobles, and Emperor Wu started with the huge land of the Guanlong nobles, found a lot of criminal evidence, and forced them to exchange the ill-gotten land in exchange for Emperor Wu's forgiveness. At the beginning of the troubled times, the Guanlong nobles retreated back to the Guanlong lair, although Guanlong was lost, but they still had strong power and wealth in Bashu, most of the good land was owned by the Guanlong nobles, and all kinds of money-making businesses were also monopolized by them. The Dugu clan has countless fields in Bashu, and these are exactly what the saints need. ”

Pei Ju stroked his beard and smiled, his grandson's discussion with each other was exactly what he was happy to see, and they were in the right direction, and the content of the discussion was getting closer and closer to the essence.

As soon as he said this, Pei Xuanji's report came from outside the door: "Father, Pei Xiangguo urgently asks to see you." ”

"What is he doing here?" Pei Ju frowned when he heard this, and his voice was full of strong disgust.

Pei Xiangguo, naturally, is Pei Lonely. He and Pei Ju and Pei Yun are the same generation, but this person's sense of power is too heavy, for the sake of power can be regardless of all consequences, he can do anything, this kind of crazy gambler has never been liked by the steady Pei Ju and Pei Yun, when the two were both prime ministers of the Sui Dynasty, they were afraid that Pei would be ruined in the hands of this person, and they never seriously carried it, so they have been a Jinyang palace eunuch who has nothing to do. What happened later also proved Pei Ju and Pei Yun's conjecture, Pei Lin had been encouraging Li Yuan to rebel when the situation was unclear.

The original head of the Pei family was Pei Ju from the lineage, but after Pei Lian, the concubine, became the founding hero of Li Tang, he took advantage of Li Yuan's kindness to seize the position of the head of the family, and has been talking ill of Pei Ju in front of Li Yuan behind his back. Unexpectedly, this guy suddenly visited at night, which made Pei Ju's good mood disappear all at once.

"It seems to have something to do with the relocation of the capital." Pei Xuanji, who was outside the door, also knew the contradiction between his father and Pei Lian, and quickly said: "If my father is inconvenient, I will send him away." ”

Pei Ju pondered for a moment, then said, "Let him wait in the outer study." ”

Seeing must be to see, Pei Lin is the prime minister of the Li Tang Dynasty after all, and it is very likely that Li Yuan asked him to come to him, the key is that he lost power in the Li Tang Dynasty, and he can't get first-hand information, and he also wants to get some information from Pei Lin that he doesn't know to support his analysis.

Pei Ju changed his clothes and came to the outer study unhurriedly, the door was not closed, and Pei Lian could be seen sitting there with his head bowed and pondering, with a very solemn expression. So he coughed lightly, walked into the room, and said with a smile: "Let Pei Xiangguo wait for a long time, it's a sin." ”

"Brother is polite."

Pei Lin hurriedly got up and returned the salute, even if he was Li Tang Xiangguo, even if Pei Ju was no longer official or positional, no matter how much he calculated Pei Ju behind his back, but when he faced Pei Ju, the sense of awe accumulated over the years still gushed out involuntarily, looking very humble.

The reason why he came to the door overnight was indeed to move the capital, but it was not Li Yuan's intention, but his own.

Li Yuan's previous most trusted people were Pei Lin and Liu Wenjing, because Pei Lin was good at observing faces, and Liu Wenjing was a scholar and businessman, and he didn't realize that he offended people, so Li Yuan relied on Pei Lin more, but Pei Lin was the culprit of the failure of the Battle of Bingzhou, which not only indirectly killed Li Deliang, but also led to the fall of Bingzhou, plus he and Liu Wenjing were unreasonable to fight for three points, so far, both of them are disgusted and disgusted by Li Yuan, and slowly alienated, while Chen Shuda and Xiao Yu have become profitable fishermen.

Liu Wenjing is familiar with military affairs, has a strong view of the overall situation, and is good at planning a huge battle situation, and has always been an indispensable figure for Li Yuan, plus Liu Wenjing has also been a lot smoother after several years of experience, so Li Yuan attaches importance to Chen Shuda and Xiao Yu and does not alienate and snub Liu Wenjing. And Pei Lin is an expert in internal fighting, a layman in foreign wars, and the loss of merging states, which is no longer valued by Li Yuan, nominally Xiangguo, but in fact it has moved away from the center.

Pei Lin didn't know whether Li Yuan's inspection of Bashu was really inspecting or moving the capital, and he wanted to hear Pei Ju's opinion, so he took a sip of tea, put down the teacup and asked, "Brother heard the news that the Holy Admiral is going to inspect Bashu?" ”

"There was a lot of uproar about it, and I naturally heard about it." Pei Ju smiled and said: "The emperor's patrol has been a top priority since ancient times, and everyone in the workshop is saying that the saint's patrol is the prelude to the actual relocation of the capital, but I don't know if it's or not." ”

Pei Xiao groaned: "I heard that Li Mi is dead. ”

"Is that true?" This news shocked Pei Ju, "This is too fast, right?" ”

Pei Lin smiled bitterly: "Yang Tong crossed the sea to the south, attacked Li Mi's rear, captured Jiangdu, and then fought a few games easily, and Li Mi was finished." ”

Pei Ju nodded, Li Mi died, the next step of the Sui Dynasty was naturally to attack Li Tang, Li Yuan was afraid that he would not be able to defeat him, so he fled in the name of inspecting Bashu, and once he arrived in Bashu, he would not return to Xiangyang.

This reason is exactly the same as Yang Guang's southern tour of the river, Yang Guang's cleverness is that he did not mention that he wanted to move the capital, plus he ran all over the world all the year round, so when he proposed to tour the south of the river, the resistance was very small, even if the courtiers objected, they only hoped that he would sit in Luoyang, command the army to quell the rebellion, and increase the confidence of the imperial court, but Yang Guang never came back after he went.

And with Yang Guangnan's tour as an example, as well as the news of Li Mi's demise, Pei Ju suddenly saw through the true motive of Li Yuan's inspection, and asked, "What is the reaction of the court officials?" ”

Pei Lin sighed slightly, "The news of Li Mi's defeat is still in secrecy, this news is only in the political affairs hall, nine out of ten people in Xiangyang don't know about Li Mi, when the saint released the news of the inspection, the court and the central government naturally had a lot of opposition, behind it was the Guanlong nobles who were promoting, and they also made an opposition to Bozi, and many people signed on it." ”

"Li Mi was defeated, the battle of the Sui and Tang Dynasties was imminent, Xiangyang had become the forefront of the war, the imperial court was very unsafe here, and the saint was afraid that he would like to move the capital. Pei Ju glanced at him and asked with a smile.

"It is indeed necessary to move the capital at this moment!" Pei Lin nodded, and said: "It's just that what I can't figure out is that if the news of Li Mi's defeat is said, many people also know that the battle of Sui and Tang is about to break out, and the voice of opposition will be reduced by at least more than half. I couldn't figure it out, so I asked my brother for advice. ”

Pei Ju listened to it for so long, and finally knew that Pei Lin had been kicked out of Li Tang's core by Li Yuan, otherwise, he would not be suspicious, but directly got a clear answer from Li Yuan's mouth, he suddenly felt that Pei Lin could let himself get a lot of information that he didn't know, so he decided to help him, as long as he analyzed it thoroughly, then he would also share some secret news in the future, so he said: "If I guessed correctly, this time the Holy Lord is going to wipe out all the opponents, and release the wind of patrolling Bashu before Li Mi is defeated, It is to draw out those who do not have the same heart as the court. You see, the news of Li Mi's defeat will definitely continue to be concealed until it can no longer be concealed, and this time the people who oppose the inspection will probably not be able to escape. ”

Pei Lian's face turned pale, Pei Ju was such a powerful character, he immediately saw Pei Lian's uneasiness, and asked, "Are you also signing the opposition book?" ”

Pei Lin shook his head: "I didn't understand the true intentions of the saint, so naturally I wouldn't sign it hastily, but I saw that the initiator was Yu Yun, and there were more than a hundred names behind it, and this list of powerful lineups included most of the Guanlong family heads in addition to the Dou clan, and there were many officials from the Guandong clan." ”

"These people are finished, and they will surely die." Pei Ju concluded.

"With so many people, will the Holy One be able to do it?"

Pei Ju glanced at Pei Lian, he found that Pei Lian had known Li Yuan for so many years, and he couldn't see through Li Yuan's nature at all, let alone understand the madness of a dying emperor, and then said: "When the regime is facing a major crisis, the suspicion of the superior will often become more and more intense, this is a rule that is difficult to break since ancient times, the wise and martial Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty is no exception, Gao Wei, who is poor and extravagant, and Emperor Wu of Sui is no exception. Today, when the crisis of the Li Tang Dynasty is becoming more and more serious, because of the Sui Dynasty's reconciliation order, the Guanlong nobles have a new way out, and there are not many people who are willing to live and die with Li Tang. It is very likely that these people will cooperate with Yang Dong and dedicate Jingxiang Bashu to Yang Dong, just like when they betrayed the Great Sui and dedicated Guanzhong to the Shengshang, compared to the Tang Dynasty, what are these people? ”

"Little brother understands." Pei Lin was convinced, he really didn't expect that there was such a big secret behind this simple thing, at this moment he felt that the gap between himself and Pei Ju was too big, and people guessed the root with just a few words, but he couldn't figure it out if he wanted to break his head.

Pei Ju didn't say anything more, he didn't believe Pei Lin very much, so he didn't tell Li Yuan about Li Yuan's plot against the Dugu clan's land, if Pei Lin told Li Yuan, he would be unlucky. And what he said before, in fact, as long as he is a wise bystander, he can see one or two, so he is not worried about anything, and he believes that Pei Lin will not be stupid enough to spoil Li Yuan's plan, with Pei Lian's person, I am afraid that he will use his own words to take the opportunity to add fuel to the fire and get some credit from it.

。。。。。。。。。。。。

At the same time, there was a heavy rainstorm in the sky, Li Shimin was escorted by more than 1,000 cavalry, rushed from Yiling to Xiangyang, after a day's long-distance attack, he had passed Xiangyang Yiqing County, and the brightly lit Xiangyang City could be seen in the distance.

The news of Li Mi's demise came back from his intelligence point in Nanjun, Li Shimin was extremely surprised, worried that the Sui and Tang wars would follow, so he braved the rain to return to Beijing to discuss countermeasures with his father, the heavy rain drenched him all over, but he didn't care at all, many years of military career, so that he had a healthy body, and the heavy rain could make him more sober.

At this moment, Li Shimin only felt a sudden jump in his eyebrows, and the alarm in his heart suddenly rose, as an outstanding archer, he was very familiar with this feeling, and rolled on the spot without the slightest hesitation.

"Puff puff puff"

A series of five crossbow arrows were fired at his horse, which fell to the ground with a bang and died foaming at the mouth.

"Toxic."

Li Shimin broke out in a cold sweat and said loudly: "There are assassins, everyone be careful." ”

Almost at the same time as the order was given, dozens of figures appeared in the bushes on both sides of the official road, and these people did not speak, each raised the crossbow in his hand and aimed it at Li Shimin's direction to shoot a round.

Fortunately, Li Shimin retreated quickly, and the crossbows in the hands of these people were not only the two-stone rhubarb crossbows used in the army, but the arrows were quenched with severe poison, and the opposition was a little slower, I am afraid that they would be poisoned and died like that war horse.

At this time, more than 100 masked people rushed to the official road, and without saying a word, they launched a fierce attack on the place where Li Shimin was with the weapons in their hands.

Li Shimin reacted quickly, took the bow and arrow from the dead horse, and didn't look closely, so he opened his bow and set up the arrow, pulled the string like a full moon, and fired three arrows at once, and the three arrows shot at the masked man who was the fastest and closest to him like lightning, and the other party probably didn't expect Li Shimin to be so calm at this time, let alone Li Shimin reacted so quickly, and was caught off guard, he was directly shot by Li Shimin and fell to the ground screaming.

"Blow the trumpet!"

Li Shimin stretched his bow three times in a row, and after shooting down nine people, he felt that he couldn't react, so he threw the bow and arrow, and pulled out the Dingtang knife on his waist with his backhand, the Dingtang knife may not be as famous as Zhan Lu, Long Yuan, Ganjiang, and Mo Ye, but it is also extremely sharp, Li Shimin just swept the knife, and cut off all the five horizontal knives close to him, but these people obviously had special training, and before Li Shimin counterattacked and killed, five other people quickly followed up and stabbed Li Shimin.

Li Shimin flashed sideways, a faint light flashed, and an assassin's head was directly split open.

Zhai Changsun, who was the commander of the guard, saw the opportunity to take off the horn from his waist and puffed up his cheeks to blow, this is the horn of the Red Armor Army under Li Shimin's command, after the Red Armor Army was destroyed in the first battle of Zhuyang Pass, Li Shimin re-selected brave men from the army and the people, and trained day and night, and Zhai Changsun in view of the destruction of the Red Armor Army, not only increased the amount of training, but also found the art of assassination from the ancient books, day and night training, although the Red Armor Army has not yet been formed, but also has a certain level. When they hear the sound of the trumpet, they will immediately kill them.

Zhai Changsun finished blowing the horn, shook the spear, and Li Shimin worked together to kill the enemy, the two of them were long and short, Li Shimin, who lost his war horse, defended it, Zhai Changsun attacked, and under the joint efforts of the two, dozens of well-trained assassins could not get close.

However, the Red Armor army on this section of the road suffered a disaster, and they were hunted down by assassins armed with strong crossbows, and they fell to the ground without saying a word. However, after all, the Red Armor Army was outnumbered, and the Assassins' crossbows were slow to load, so they saw the Red Armor Army rushing in, but they were unable to take Li Shimin for a long time, and the first Assassin whistled, and a group of Assassins had to retreat.

"Shoot the arrows!" Seeing that the other party was about to retreat at this moment, where was he willing to stop, Zhai Changsun shouted, and the Red Armor Army quickly took off his crossbow, and fired a volley at the assassins who wanted to retreat, and half of them fell in an instant, and the rest retreated in panic.

"Don't enter the forest, don't chase after the poor, don't fall for the thief's plan." Li Shimin waved his hand to stop Zhai Changsun, who wanted to pursue, and ordered: "Do your duty!" ”

"Whoa!" Zhai Changsun answered, ordered people to strengthen their vigilance, and the deputy commander Tian Liuan carefully looked at a few assassins who were not hit, turned his head to look at Li Shimin and said, "Your Highness, these assassins have also committed suicide by swallowing poison." ”

"Don't bother with it, it's important to go back to Xiangyang." Li Shimin waved his hand and said, "Let people call local officials to dispose of these corpses." ”

"Does Your Highness know who the main envoy is?" Zhai Changsun looked at Li Shimin and said.

Li Shimin pondered a little, shook his head, and said: "At this time, there are too many people who want my royal family to die, and I don't know who did it. ”

"Could it be that Yang Dong sent someone to do it?" Zhai Changsun asked.

Li Shimin shook his head and said, "It can't be Yang Tong, he is a rule-based person." ”

Zhai Chang felt that His Royal Highness had made a mistake and was crazy, if Yang Tong talked about the rules, then he Zhai Changsun would be a saint, and said in a lost voice: "Yang Dong talks about rules? So what happened to Li Mi at the beginning? ”

"Back then, Li Mi asked Pei Shiqing to marry Yang Qi's princess and Wang Shichong, with the purpose of bringing disaster to the east and trying to trigger the battle between Sui and Zheng. This behavior was the greatest insult to the royal family of the Sui Dynasty, and it also broke the laws of war, which caused Yang Tong's terrifying revenge, and after that, he never launched an assassination of such a scale. Li Shimin said solemnly: "He does everything on the battlefield, but he always abides by the rule that the family is not too bad, otherwise he will not easily return the royal family." ”

When Yang Tong attacked Daxing Palace, he almost caught Li Yuan, but although Li Yuan escaped, the imperial concubine, prince and princess in the palace were arrested, and finally spent a lot of money to redeem it.

Zhai Changsun knew that it was about the dignity of the royal family, so he didn't say much.

"Let's go back to Beijing." Li Shimin took the war horse sent by a soldier, mounted it vertically, and ran towards Xiangyang City under the escort of the Red Armor Legion.