At the beginning of November of the second year of Guangxi, the rebellion of the Xiliang Army that shook the world finally ended with the head of Li Dao Guo Yan. However, at the same time as the destruction of the Xiliang Army, a major event occurred in Jingzhou that attracted the attention of the world - Sun Jian, the Taishou of Changsha, forced Wang Rui, the assassin of Jingzhou, to kill Wang Rui, the assassin of Jingzhou, on the charge of collaborating with the enemy and seeking rebellion.

In the bureaucratic system of the Han Dynasty, there was a big difference between the history of the assassin and the state pastor, the state minister was the military administrator of a state, the absolute superior of the county guard and the county order, and belonged to the feudal officials who held the authority, with a rank of 2,000 stones. The Thorn Shi is only a petty official of 600 stones, although he does not have a high rank of 2,000 stones, but he has the right to supervise the state and county orders, and is directly under the jurisdiction of the central government.

However, Sun Jian, the Taishou of Changsha, did not inform the imperial court in advance, and killed the local ministers sent by the imperial court to supervise the local ministers, which was undoubtedly a rebellion. At this time, the imperial court was not the original imperial court that was discredited because of Dong Zhuo's chaotic government, on the contrary, because of Liu Wei's efforts, the prestige of the imperial court has begun to flourish. Sun Jian's behavior at this time was completely a blatant challenge to the authority of the central government, and as soon as the news reached Luoyang, the bigwigs in the court were extremely angry, and Yang Biao, the Taibao, proposed to send troops to attack Sun Jian and capture him to Luoyang for punishment.

However, before the court could decide on a result of how to deal with the Jingzhou incident, Sun Jian's explanation of the matter was passed to the imperial court.

Sun Jian said in the seal that Wang Rui had colluded with Li Dao Guo Yan's rebels and wanted to rebel against the imperial court, and he forced Wang Rui to kill him because of the imperial court's rebellion.

Sun Jian's explanation was not believed by the court bigwigs, and many people thought that he was making quibbles and talking nonsense. However, there was something that came with the watch badge that left them dumbfounded.

There is really a rebellious text.

Who sent it?

The ministers in the court were stunned. However, they soon discovered the problem - the revenge text was fake.

Not to mention that the imperial court has never issued such a document, Wang Rui, the assassin of Jingzhou, did not take any action when Li Dao and Guo Yan had just started the rebellion, how could there be any collusion with the rebels after the Xiliang rebels had been quelled?

This matter must have been framed by someone Wang Rui, but a new problem was placed in front of them:

Who wrote this false verse?

The envoy who went to question Sun Jian received only the answer: "I only know that the imperial court edict ordered me to rebel, and I don't know anything else." ”

Sun Jian played a stinky scoundrel, and the ministers of the court had no way to take him, but they couldn't convict him because of this, so they couldn't solve it and had to submit it to Liu for decision.

Regarding the Jingzhou incident, in addition to the introduction of the incident in the seal given to him by the minister of the imperial court, Liu Wei also secretly ordered the members of the Wei Yi faction to conduct an investigation into the incident and learn the general ins and outs of the incident.

According to the results of the investigation, the deepest reason why Wang Rui, the assassin of Jingzhou, was killed, was himself.

Wang Rui's popularity in Jingzhou is really stinky.

In October of the fourth year of Emperor Ling's reign, Guanhu, a Lingling man, called himself "General Pingtian" and led the people to rebel and invade Guilin County. The imperial court sent Wang Rui and Sun Jian to quell the rebellion together, so the two of them can be regarded as having a little friendship. It's just a pity that Wang Rui thinks that he is a scholar who has read the scriptures and has looked down on Sun Jian, a martial artist, and he often has contempt in his ordinary speech. In this regard, Sun Jian has long secretly held a grudge in his heart.

If he only looked down on Sun Jian, Wang Rui would not end up like this, and his arrogant personality and his relationship with Wuling Taishou Cao Yin were also very bad. Taking advantage of Li Dao Guo Yan's rebellion, Wang Rui publicly expressed his suspicion that Cao Yin had colluded with Li Dao Guo Yan several times, and that he should send troops to recruit him.

Cao Yin was scared when he heard this. Although the official position of the assassin is not large, he has considerable supervision power over the county guard, and to a certain extent, he can also send troops to suppress rebellion. During the period of Emperor Zhao of the Western Han Dynasty, Liu Ze, the grandson of the king of Qi Xiao, rebelled, and was immediately destroyed by the Qingzhou Thorn Shi Jun Budo at that time, and Jun Budo was rewarded as Jing Zhaoyin. Therefore, it is not impossible for Wang Rui to kill himself by colluding with Li Dao and Guo Yan to rebel.

As the saying goes, the first strike is strong and then the first hand suffers, I am better to die than you to die. Compared with Wang Rui who said that he wanted to kill Cao Yin, Cao Yin is a doer who does what he says. In addition, he himself has a special ability, that is, he writes very well.

There is nothing special about Cao Yin's scholarly writing in this era, but Cao Yin's special thing is that his so-called good writing means that he is good at forging official documents.

This Cao Yin, in addition to being a taishou, is still a **.

Of course, Cao Yin usually does not write the word "certificate" on the city wall of Wuling County, and then leave his contact information below. His forgery of official documents is only a hobby of his life, not a means of livelihood.

However, a government official usually forges government documents as his hobby, so it can be seen that this Cao Yin is not a good person.

Now, Cao Yin can just use this ability of his. He forged a document of the imperial court against him, which listed Wang Rui's sins, and said that he was a traitor who brought disaster to the country and the people and colluded with the rebels. and sent the text to Sun Jian, the Taishou of Changsha, and ordered Sun Jian to arrest and execute Wang Rui.

The reason why Jia Yin chose Sun Jian is actually for three reasons: first, Sun Jian's brave martial arts are famous in Jingzhou; Second, Sun Jian is a well-known second stunned man, reckless and unruly, and did things that crossed the border to quell the rebellion in his early years; Third, and the most important reason, Jia Yin knew that Sun Jian and Wang Rui had an enmity, and when he saw the counterinsurgency article, he couldn't ask for it, and he wouldn't suspect that it was fake at all!

The later development of the matter was as Jia Yin expected, and after Sun Jian received the text, he immediately led his troops to Xiangyang, the administrative office of Jingzhou, to hunt and kill Wang Rui.

And Wang Rui stood on top of the city tower, watching Sun Jian's troops coming from afar, and didn't know what it meant, so he sent someone down to inquire about the intentions of this army. Sun Jian's subordinate Zu Mao lied: "We serve the country, but the rewards given to us by the imperial court are very small, and we don't even have decent clothes." We have come this time to ask your Excellency to be extra gracious and give us some more money. ”

Wang Rui believed Zu Mao's words and felt that this was a good opportunity to envelop the soldiers of Jingzhou, so he generously said: "What's so difficult about this. As a thorn, is there anything else I have to be stingy? ”

At that moment, Wang Rui ordered someone to open the treasury and let the soldiers go in to get it for themselves, to see if there was anything else to use. And when the soldiers came to him, Wang Rui found that Sun Jian was also among them, and couldn't help but be surprised, and hurriedly asked: "The soldiers came here to ask for rewards, why is Sun Fujun here?" ”

Sun Jian sneered and said, "I have come to take your head on the order of the imperial court!" ”

After speaking, the surrounding soldiers suddenly surrounded Wang Rui. The sudden change made Wang Rui panic, and asked Sun Jian loudly: "What crime did I commit?" ”

Sun Jian said coldly: "I don't know about this!" ”

Looking at Sun Jian's cold face, Wang Rui was desperate. He understood that no matter what crime he committed, it didn't matter whether he was guilty or not, Sun Jian had only one purpose, to let himself die.

Desperate, Wang Rui begged Sun Jian to give him a decent death, Sun Jian nodded in agreement, and Wang Rui committed suicide by taking poison in the mansion that night.

After reading the investigation report on the Jingzhou incident submitted by the Unified Investigation Agency, Liu Wei fell into silence for a long time. Although the original and end of the incident are not much different from the historical materials that Liu Wei saw in another time and space, and the whole incident seems to be that Wang Rui, Jia Yin, and Sun Jian designed a vendetta against each other because of personal grudges, but Liu Wei keenly saw a political signal that was extremely dangerous for the Han Empire behind the whole incident.

Whether it is Wang Rui, Jia Yin, or even Sun Jian, who was used as a stunned person and a murder tool in the whole incident, is not as simple as it seems, and what is hidden behind the incident may be a conspiracy.

Wang Rui wanted to kill Jia Yin, and Jia Yin designed to kill Wang Rui, although these things seem to be vendetta caused by personal grudges between the two people on the surface, in fact, they reflect an extremely dangerous thing for the Han Empire - that is, the warlords and princes in the late Eastern Han Dynasty have begun to gradually change from being obedient to the court to wanting to expand their strength.

In history, it was Liu Dai, the assassin of Yanzhou, who attacked and killed the Taishou Qiaomao of the Eastern County under his jurisdiction, which opened the prelude to the princes attacking each other and expanding their power in the late Eastern Han Dynasty. In the same year, Sun Jian's killing of Wang Rui, the assassin of Jingzhou, was actually a sign that the local government began to work separately and expand its territory.

Without Dong Zhuo's rebellion, there would have been no incident of the Kwantung princes fighting against Dong. Liu Wei didn't know if Qiao Mao would let Liu Dai kill him, but Liu Wei knew that the power ambitions of the local princes did not stop because of this.

The evil consequences of Emperor Ling's delegation of power to the local prefectures and county guards in the last years are finally beginning to manifest now. In the face of the chaotic situation in the world, the local princes began to be ready to move, and some began to be dissatisfied with the existing rights, eager to expand their power, and finally reached the point where they could compete with the imperial court, or even replace it.

However, the problem is that due to Liu Wei's intervention, without the destruction of Dong Zhuo's rebellion and Li Dao's rebellion in history, the prestige of the imperial court has not been greatly destroyed. On the contrary, under Liu Wei's efforts, the Han Empire began to get rid of the influence of political events such as the "Rebellion of the Ten Standing Servants", and the country gradually flourished.

This created an awkward situation between the central court and the local princes. On the one hand, the imperial court did not yet have the strength to completely recover the power in the hands of the governors and counties; On the other hand, none of the local governors and county guards have developed enough to compete with the imperial court.

This made the situation of the warlord melee in the late Eastern Han Dynasty developing towards a distorted situation, and the behavior of Wang Rui, Jia Yin, and Sun Jian in the Jingzhou incident can be vaguely seen as a repressive manifestation of the local princes' eagerness to expand their power and fear of the prestige of the imperial court.

Let's talk about Wang Rui first, although he has the right to supervise the county guards of Jingzhou, he does not completely control the life and death power of the county guards. To put it bluntly, the position of the assassin is only a commissioner sent by the imperial court to the local area, and the two thousand stone people are too afraid of the prestige of the imperial court to be respectful to the petty officials of the six hundred stones. And when the prestige of the imperial court declined, the local county guard naturally did not rely on the prestige of the imperial court fox and fake tiger. Therefore, as the assassin of Jingzhou, Wang Rui must establish his local prestige if he wants to expand his power in the chaotic situation. And the most direct way to establish prestige is to kill people to establish prestige. That's why Wang Rui let out the wind and said that Jia Yin colluded with the Xiliang rebels and wanted to arrest him. To put it bluntly, Wang Rui wants to use Jia Yin to make an example of the monkey and establish his prestige in Jingzhou. The reason why Jia Yin was chosen is also very simple, Jia Yin has an enmity with himself, and this kind of person cannot belong to him, so he just uses it to establish his authority.

And Wuling Taishou Jia Yin designed to kill Wang Rui, not just to protect himself. Because even if Wang Rui said that he wanted to kill Jia Yin, he actually had many ways to resist. For example, if you report to the imperial court, or simply defend the city, Wang Rui does not have many soldiers and horses, and he has no moral name, and he will inevitably retreat if he does not attack the city. However, he chose to design and frame this shady method, and behind it was actually hidden the intention to cause chaos in Jingzhou, and their local county guards were convenient to take advantage of the chaos to make trouble. After Wang Rui was killed, Jingzhou fell into chaos, and the local thieves were the first to attack, and each militia dominated the local area.

However, what Liu Wei couldn't see through the most was Sun Jian's behavior. After killing Wang Rui, he could have taken Jingzhou by himself, and he did not have any behavior of getting involved in the power of Jingzhou, on the contrary, he just Chen soldiers in Xinye, waiting for the results of the imperial court's handling of the Jingzhou incident.

At first glance, Sun Jian really seemed to have been deceived by Jia Yin, and forced Wang Rui to death for the prosperity and stability of the Han Dynasty, but Liu Wei didn't think so in his heart.

Historically, Sun Jian was not a simple character, and when he was still a seventeen-year-old boy, he designed to repel robbing pirates. When Zhang Wen, Dong Zhuo and others crusaded against Bian Zhang's Xiliang rebellion, he pointed out to Zhang Wen that Dong Zhuo's arrogance and arrogance would become a big disaster, and persuaded Zhang Wen to kill him. It's just that Zhang Wen hesitated, so he gave up. Such a cow can't see that Jia Yin's essay is fake? Liu Wei would not believe it at all.

In fact, Sun Jian must have seen that he had a fake text in his hand, but he pretended not to know and killed Wang Rui by pushing the boat. His purpose in doing this must be to cause chaos in Jingzhou like Jia Yin. However, what Liu Wei didn't understand was that Sun Jian didn't get any benefit from it, so why did he do this?

Liu Wei was puzzled by this, and it was not until soon after that the fox's tail behind the Jingzhou incident was really revealed.

Taifu Yuan Kui wrote to Liu Bian, thinking that Jingzhou was in turmoil at this time, and the place was in chaos, so he should send a capable minister to suppress it. Nanyang is too shou Yuan Shu can be outstanding, the governance of Nanyang is more effective, leading Jingzhou is the expectation of the public, so Yuan Shu is the pastor of Jingzhou, and the shepherd guards Jingxiang.

(To be continued, stay tuned for the next chapter)