As the New Year approaches, all counties in Yanzhou are lively, and Chen Liu is no exception. Located in the main traffic artery, as an important town of merchants, Chenliu is not only a distribution center for all kinds of goods, but also a center for the exchange of news, all kinds of news from all directions, blended together, and spread to the four directions with the carriages and footsteps of business travelers.

Yanzhou was hit by a pandemic this year, but Chen Liu escaped. The epidemic was mainly in Shanyang and Dongping in the east of Yanzhou, and it was already much weaker when it spread to Chenliu in the west. Zhang Chao is also experienced, timely prevention and control, and took the initiative to link with Yuzhou to control the impact of the epidemic to the minimum, so the population not only did not decrease significantly, but increased because of the arrival of refugees.

Despite this, Zhang Chao was still afraid that something would happen and affect the atmosphere of the New Year, so he seized the time to inspect the townships to see if there were any poor people who could not support themselves. The advantage of receiving from Yuzhou is that it is convenient to get all kinds of materials, and the disadvantages are also obvious, if the people can't survive, they will choose to settle in Yuzhou. If he didn't want the population loss to be serious, Zhang Chao had to do a good job of bereavement work to avoid the appearance of displaced people.

Although each family just said a few symbolic words, understood the situation, and walked for a day in a row, Zhang Chao still felt a little tired. After delivering money, food, wine and meat to a new refugee, he sighed as he walked out the door.

"With Qiji, you don't need to whip yourself."

The officials on the side looked at each other and smiled, smiling a little bitterly. Their mood was as depressed as Zhang Chao's. With Sun Ce's example by his side, Zhang Chao didn't dare to be careless. Zhang Chao didn't dare to be careless, they had to be affected, not only did they have to follow Zhang Chao to visit their homes, but there were fewer opportunities to fish in troubled waters. There is a fixed amount of money, food, and materials, and the more they distribute to the people, the less oil and water they have.

The two scholars came from a distance, scolding as they went, their voices were not small, and their emotions were a little excited, until they got closer, they saw the carriage and horses of the Taishou, glanced at each other, immediately closed their mouths, lowered their heads, and hurried against the inner wall on the opposite side. Zhang Chao looked at it, realized that there was a problem, and made a look, and the accompanying soldiers rushed over and "invited" the two scholars over.

In the face of Zhang Chao's questioning, the reader was a little confused, and after a while, one of them took out a roll of paper from his arms and handed it to Zhang Chao. Before Zhang Chao could answer, Liu Cao, who was on the side, was anxious and stretched out his hand to stop him. Seeing this, Zhang Chao pushed Liu Cao away, took the crumpled paper, unfolded the scroll and read it carefully, and as soon as he saw the beginning, his face changed. He glared at Liu Cao fiercely and continued to read.

Liu Cao and the other officials looked at each other, but they had no choice but to prepare for Zhang Chao's anger.

I don't know when an article spread in Chenliu, and it spread rapidly, becoming the hottest topic of conversation on the streets. Of course, the officials of the Taishou Mansion knew, but none of them dared to tell Zhang Chao about it, the reason was very simple, there was also the privacy of Zhang Chao's brothers in this article.

This article is Li Ru's "Personal Experience of the Rebellion of Jisi", which is about those things in the last years of Emperor Ling.

Zhang Chao barely finished reading the article, his hands trembled uncontrollably, and his face was even paler. He crumpled the article into a ball, but he didn't throw it out. However, he also knew in his heart that grasping this article would not solve the problem, this article was not handwritten, but engraved, and hundreds or thousands were circulated outside, even if he wanted to, it would be too late to clear it.

Liu Caoqiang came over with a smile. "Ming Mansion, this is just Li Ru's nonsense that he wants to use for self-evidentness, the foolish people are ignorant, and he is cited as a talking point, and the Ming Mansion does not have to take it seriously. Those who are clear will clear themselves, and after a while, they will naturally be fine. ”

Zhang Chao's face twisted and weighed it repeatedly for a while. "These ...... It's true. ”

"Really?" Liu Cao showed a look of surprise, but his eyes were very calm. If there must be surprise, it is also a surprise that Zhang Chao will admit it, not that there is any surprise in the fact itself. This article has been circulated for so long, and some people have tried to refute it, but to be honest, it has little credibility, and the vast majority of people have already decided that it is true.

"Alas......" Zhang Chao sighed and waved his hand, signaling that the two scholars could go. He lowered his voice and said to Liu Cao and a few officials who came over: "This is General Sun's inscription before the battle against General Yuan, how to write the inscription, you should know better than me." ”

Liu Cao and the others were speechless. What the other party wants is to expose the other party's privacy and hit the other party's morale, which can be exaggerated, but it cannot be faked, especially not faked that is easy to be punctured, otherwise the other party will refute and reap the consequences. In other words, Zhang Chao made a judgment on this article as an insider, and the basic facts are accurate, and Li Ru did not make it up.

Liu Cao was the first to react, and immediately said: "Could it be that Mingfu Kunzhong wants to break with Yuan Benchu, such a thing is simply the anger of people and gods." ”

Zhang Chao's smile was very bitter, and his heart was even more bitter. The reason why he admits that this is a fact is because he knows that this is indeed a fact, and since this article is engraved, there must be Sun Ce's shadow behind it. With Sun Ce's meticulousness, he will not give them a chance to refute; The second is that he really doesn't have a good impression of Yuan Shao, and he doesn't want to be with him anymore, so it's not a good thing to take this opportunity to show his attitude.

What he was waiting for was Liu Cao's words.

Seeing Zhang Chao's smile, Liu Cao and others understood, and immediately scolded Yuan Shaolai, and from time to time whitewashed two sentences for Zhang Miao's brothers, to show that they were mistaken by Yuan Shao. Zhang Chao saw it in his eyes and sighed secretly. Needless to say, these people have long complained about Yuan Shao, they didn't say a word in front of him before, they just cared about his face, and they didn't know what to scold Yuan Shao behind their backs.

Li Ru's article is ruthless, exposing Yuan Shao's most unbearable side, coupled with Yuan Shao's unrighteous act of not saving him not long ago, his reputation that he has worked hard for many years will not be long before it will collapse, at least the number of people willing to support him in the Yanzhou family will be greatly reduced, and the scene when Yuan Tan made the Yanzhou family flock to him with a single order will never appear again.

Maybe it's time to send someone to contact Cao Ang. Yanzhou needs a new Ming monarch, and in the case of not being able to surrender to Sun Ce, choosing to ally with Cao Ang is undoubtedly the safest choice.

Zhang Chao was not in the mood to visit poor households again, so he rushed back to Taishou Mansion and wrote three letters in a row and sent them to his cronies. One letter to Sun Ce is a normal greeting on the occasion of the New Year; One letter to Cao Ang, in addition to greetings, also invited him to stay on tour after the New Year. It was a routine matter for the assassin to inspect the counties, but Chen Liu's situation was special, even when Yuan Tan was in office, he did not come to Chen Liu, and Cao Ang was even wiser to sit back and watch the Zhang brothers do the secession;

The last letter to Yuan Shao, in addition to informing Chen Liujun of public opinion, also politely rejected Yuan Shao's previous request for him to assist in the battle, and emphasized Chen Liushishu's attitude that he would not provide grain and grass support, let alone give up any city.

The three letters were all written by the chief secretary Ruan Yu, and the articles were written beautifully, and Zhang Chao's decision quickly reached the ears of the officials of the Taishou Mansion through Ruan Yu's mouth, and then spread to the counties and townships as these people went home for the New Year one after another.