"Shiqi [Guan Jing], tell Xuande the news."

Hearing Gongsun Zhan's order, Guan Jing, the long history of Gongsun Zhan, spoke. Guan Jing was a middle-aged scribe with a thin face, two mustaches on his lips, and a goat's whisker on his chin. He glanced at Zhang Fei's somewhat dark face, and said to Liu Bei with a worried face:

"Liu Pingyuan, Zhang Sima, according to the news from the secret spies in Jixian County, Yuan Shao'er sent an envoy to visit Liu Youzhou at the beginning of the year, and it is said that he is willing to serve Liu Youzhou as the Son of Heaven again!"

"What?"

This news surprised Liu Bei, who has always been known for his joy and anger, not to mention Zhang Fei, who is still shallow in the city.

"This ...... Is that possible? ”

"Is this true?"

Zhang Fei's surprise was not over yet, Liu Bei had already taken the initiative to ask.

Guan Jing had expected Liu Bei's reaction, and replied lightly:

"Yuan Shao thought that today's son was not born by the first emperor, and he was rebelled and kidnapped by Liangzhou, which made the court dedignified and unworthy of being the emperor. And he even thought that Liu Youzhou's ancestor was the king of the East China Sea and was the prince of Emperor Guangwu, and he wrote to Liu Youzhou in secret, and he was willing to contact the princes of Kwantung to respect Liu Youzhou as the new son of heaven! ”

Although Guan Jing's answer was bland, Liu Bei and Zhang Fei's faces became fast.

"Liu Youzhou agreed?"

The only one who would ask so recklessly could only be Zhang Fei.

"Naturally, it never did."

The person who answered was not Guan Jing, but Liu Bei.

"Yide, Liu Youzhou's name moves in the sea, and he looks high in Kyushu, how can he take the liberty to agree to such a rebellious and unreasonable thing proposed by Yuan Rei?"

While explaining to Zhang Fei, Liu Bei's face turned pale, and his eyes were full of anger.

"Liu Pingyuan is really wise, of course Liu Youzhou will not agree to come down like this. However, if something really happens to the little emperor in Chang'an City, I'm afraid the situation will be difficult to say......"

Even if you are in the remote Northland Youzhou. Not long ago, the news of the great change in Sili had also reached the ears of Liu Bei and others along with those caravans that went to merge states to trade.

If Yuan Shao, Yuan Shu and others are the rebels of the Han Dynasty, then Han Sui and Ma Teng, who commanded the Qiang Han rebels in Liangzhou, are the thieves of the Han Dynasty. The Son of Heaven in Chang'an fell into the hands of these two thieves. It means that the authority and dignity of the Son of Heaven have become so weakened that they can be trampled on at will by the thieves of the past.

Even if Dong Zhuo was in chaos, although he was opposed by the Kwantung princes, no one dared to openly deny the court and the Son of Heaven. The princes can pretend to be deaf and dumb to the edict of the Son of Heaven issued by Dong Zhuo, and they can turn a deaf ear, but they will never dare to treat it as waste paper and throw it away directly. But when the person who manipulated the Son of Heaven became Han Sui, everything was different.

Don't say anything else. Today's princes, who will listen to the edict issued by the Son of Heaven under the manipulation of the traitor Han Sui?

The Son of Heaven who falls into the hands of thieves is incompetent. The Son of Heaven who is manipulated by thieves at will is immoral. Just ask an ignorant young man who has no virtue and incompetence, even if he was born by the first emperor, where is he qualified to have the most honorable title of "Son of Heaven" in the world?

Don't you hear that Henan Yin Zhujun broke through Chang'an after Li Dao and Guo Yan. He also planned to go to Beijing in accordance with the edict issued by the two. As a result, Han Sui captured Chang'an City, and Zhu Jun, who was already on the road. Immediately drove back to the camp at full speed halfway, recruited troops to practice martial arts, waited for the day, and called on the princes of the world to attack Guanzhong?

In such a situation, Liu Bei thought about it, and suddenly felt that Yuan Shao respected Liu Yu as the Son of Heaven. Is the probability of success really not small?

This is not the first time that Yuan Shao has expressed that he wants to respect Liu Yu as the Son of Heaven. As early as the beginning of Dong Zhuo's entry into Beijing, when Yuan Shao had just entangled the Kwantung alliance against Dong, he suggested to Liu Yu, who had a high reputation, to jointly elect Liu Yu as the new son of heaven. In order to depose Liu Xie's name as the Son of Heaven and prevent Dong Zhuo from causing trouble in the world under the banner of the Son of Heaven.

However, that time Yuan Shao's push was obviously to fight with Dong Zhuo. If Liu Yu really dared to agree to this proposal, he would immediately become the target of public criticism and be criticized by the world's corporals. After all, although Liu Xie, the young son of heaven, had just ascended the throne at that time, he had complete etiquette and there was nothing unruly. From this point of view, Yuan Shao's denial of Liu Xie's orthodoxy is actually quite reluctant.

As for Liu Yu, although he is also a member of the Han family, he is not even a prince, in terms of blood, there are at least hundreds of thousands of Han family relatives in the world, which is closer than his blood relationship with the previous Emperor Ling. According to the patriarchal law of the Han Dynasty, if you want to find someone to replace the young emperor, there are still a bunch of princes surnamed Liu in the world to find, and it will not be Liu Yu's turn.

Therefore, Liu Yu decisively rejected Yuan Shao's proposal at that time. In order to avoid suspicion, he even had to shrink in Youzhou and never take half a step south, to show that he had no intention of the world. This situation was probably expected by Yuan Shao. Without the powerful threat of Liu Yu, Yuan Shao was able to smoothly become the backbone of the entire Northern Kwantung Coalition Army.

However, times have changed. Now that the Son of Heaven has fallen into the hands of Han Sui and Ma Teng and others, it can be regarded as having lost the prestige of the imperial court on his own. No one will cling to a son of heaven who is manipulated by the thief party. In this way, it is really impossible to recommend Liu Yu to be the Son of Heaven.

As long as Liu Yu wants to be the Son of Heaven in his heart, with Yuan Shao's current status in the world of corporals, and the high prestige that Liu Yu has accumulated over the past few decades, at least in the prefectures and counties north of the Yellow River, no one will openly oppose this.

As for why Yuan Shao suddenly elected Liu Yu as the Son of Heaven?

I'm afraid I really have to ask Yuan Shao himself to understand. Anyway, Gongsun Zan and Liu Bei couldn't understand this thankless thing.

"However, if Liu Youzhou wants to be the Son of Heaven, what is the connection with our food?"

Zhang Fei asked thoughtlessly. And this sentence made Liu Bei's heart suddenly brighten.

"If Liu Youzhou has the heart to be the Son of Heaven, of course he won't care about Jizhou. If he wants to get Yuan Shao's full promotion, he must give Yuan Shao some practical benefits. ”

Guan Jing's explanation was exactly the same as what Liu Bei thought in his heart.

"Also, although the lord is Liu Youzhou's former official, after all, his ambitions are different from Liu Youzhou's. If Liu Youzhou wants to be the Son of Heaven, he will definitely refuse to agree with the lord's loyalty to the Han Dynasty. In the opinion of a certain family, although Liu Youzhou rejected Yuan Shao's move, he already had an idea in his heart. If he doesn't first suppress and win over loyal ministers of the Han Dynasty like the lord for his own use, he won't have the courage to openly claim the emperor. ”

Guan Jing's explanation, of course, will not be all true. In fact, Gongsun Zhan's unruly temperament has long been extremely stiff because of the difference in the attitude of the two sides towards the Northland Zahu. It is said that Liu Yu was so annoyed with Gongsun Chan that he once wanted to directly take advantage of the opportunity of Gongsun Chan to report on his work in Jixian County and directly kill Gongsun Zhan.

So far, Gongsun Zan is still willing to obediently obey Liu Yu's transfer order, in addition to being forced by Liu Yu's money and food supply pressure, he is still because he is Liu Yu's former official, and he does not dare to break the rules of the world.

According to the recognition of the Han Dynasty, the recommended officials should regard the recommender as the benefactor, and after joining the office, they need to try to maintain the same political attitude as the recommender. And those officials who are recommended and promoted, even if their official positions exceed those of the recommenders in the future, they are not allowed to be rude to the recommenders. If there are no such benefits, why should those important ministers of the court make a great effort to recommend others to the court?

Like Dong Zhuo, why does he have such a bad reputation in the eyes of scholars?

The most critical reason is that he, as half of the Yuan family's former officials, actually dared to kill Yuan Kui, the head of the Yuan family!

It can be said that such acts are challenging the political tradition of the Han Dynasty for more than a hundred years, and provoking the scholars of the whole world. If the scholars can't beat a fanatic like Dong Zhuo into the mud and never turn over, how can they maintain this set of relationship patterns between the lord and the recommended person in the future?

Because of this, if Gongsun Chan dares to take the initiative to attack Liu Yu, not to mention anything else, I am afraid that his current subordinates will have many people who are justified and openly oppose Gongsun Chan. It's called "you do the first year of junior high school, I do the fifteenth".

Of course, if Liu Yu dares to openly claim the emperor, according to the political tradition of the Han Dynasty, this is the time for "becoming a king and defeating a villain". At this time, as long as Gongsun Zan clearly expressed his support for the Son of Heaven of Chang'an and opposed Liu Yu's claim to be emperor, he would immediately be able to obtain the title of righteousness, and he could justifiably raise troops to crusade against Liu Yu. At this time, the world will also automatically ignore Gongsun Zhan's evil deeds against his benefactor because Gongsun Chan is maintaining the authority of the Son of Heaven.

These intricate relationships made Liu Bei and Zhang Fei dizzy. In short, if Liu Yu wants to be the emperor, he must first find a way to get Gongsun Chan to agree, or simply eliminate Gongsun Chan. And the grain of Gongsun Chan is Liu Yu's direct weakening of Gongsun Zhan's army.

Gongsun Zhan had no food in his hands, so he either obediently withdrew to Youzhou, disbanded the army, and obeyed Liu Yu's fate; Either they should quickly defeat Yuan Shaojun before the military rations are completely exhausted, and feed on the military rations collected from Jizhou. The former means Gongsun Zhan's submission to Liu Yu. The latter, on the other hand, is extremely difficult to do. Yuan Shao is not a guy who is easy to deal with, even if he was Dong Zhuo back then, he has never occupied the city defended by Yuan Shao.

After Liu Bei understood what he had and didn't have, Gongsun Zhan had already stood up, paced two steps in the big tent, and resolutely said to Liu Bei:

"Xuande, this battle is the last battle we have waited for in Jizhou. Win or lose, you take your troops to the plains to take office. ”

Liu Bei was stunned, and immediately understood the meaning of Gongsun Zhan's words. This is to prepare a way back for Liu Bei, lest Liu Bei have helped Gongsun Zan for so many years, but he will get nothing. From this point of view, under the pressure given by Youzhou Mu Liu Yu, Gongsun Zhan is also pessimistic about his future prospects......

"Big brother!"

"Needless to say, I've made up my mind. If you really want to help me, you can fight tomorrow's battle! (To be continued......)

PS: Thank you for the monthly pass of the "Wind Fluttering Clothes" book friends. The battle between Gongsun Chan and Yuan Shao is about to begin, and the final battle outcome will be an unexpected situation - of course, the author thought everyone was unexpected. If you are interested, you can make a guess in the book review area. Of course, there is no reward for guessing correctly - who called you spoiler orz.