On March 30, Jiao Zhongqing received the exact information that Sun Ce would go to Dantu to hunt five days later, that is, on April 4.

He first hid his wife, sister, and mother in a riverside village, and then immediately crossed the river and asked Xu Gong Sanmen to go to the designated place to ambush.

After that, he hurried back to Lujiang, hid his blade in his sleeve, and came to see Li Shu alone, reporting the news that the "Thorn Strategy" plan had been launched.

When reporting the news, Jiao Zhongqing carefully observed Li Shu's facial expression, and at the same time secretly made up his mind that as long as there were signs of "unkindness" on Li Shu's face, he would preemptively kill Li Shu on the spot.

Over the years, he has deliberately hidden his superb force, and he can use one enemy to one hundred forces. In order to wait for this day, to find out the truth that he was "hanging himself from the southeast branch" in the dream.

If it weren't for this obsession all the time, when Lujiang City was broken five years ago and Lu Kang died, he would have chosen to live and die with the city.

Li Shu was overjoyed when he heard the news, and immediately held Jiao Zhongqing's arm and praised "Don't forget the old master, the true righteous man", "thoughtful, really handsome"; On the one hand, he made a big banquet in the inner hall and invited him to drink freely.

Jiao Zhongqing glanced at the sumptuous banquet vigilantly, and did not sit down, but politely declined Li Shu's kindness, only saying that he "had a wish" at the moment, and was willing to return to the rivers and lakes from now on, be a farmer, and never be born again in this life.

He didn't notice that Li Shu's face changed a few times the first time he grabbed his arm.

Li Shu shook his head repeatedly, and immediately waved his hand, agreed to the request of "resignation and retirement", and sent Jiao Zhongqing outside the mansion with a smile.

The whole process was calm and unusual.

It was only at this time that Jiao Zhongqing's hanging heart finally let go.

Arch his hand and Li Shu solemnly said goodbye, turned over and rode away.

Li Shu stopped at the door of the Taishou Mansion, stroked his short beard under his chin, and watched Jiao Zhongqing's distant back, motionless.

A twenty-year-old boy in a strong suit walked out of the shadows quickly and said, "Father, it's all arranged, tonight... Well~! ”

When he said this, Brother Gongzi stared at Jiao Zhongqing's back and made a gesture of cutting down with a knife.

Li Shu nodded, wiped the cold sweat that came out of his forehead, turned his head to glance at him, and said faintly: "Si'er, today is really dangerous, my father almost splattered blood in front of him for five steps, this Jiao Zhongqing has a hidden weapon in his sleeve, his eyes are murderous, and the person who comes is not good." ”

Brother Gongzi arched his hand and reminded: "Father, I am the fifth, not the fourth. ”

"Hmm... Wu'er, do you believe that your father can collapse in front of Taishan without changing his face, and be calm in the face of assassins? ”

Hearing his father, who had always been timid and scared, said this, the son-in-law Li Gang was stunned, looked at his father's slightly trembling legs, and said carefully: "Father, do you want the child to tell the truth?" ”

"Tell the truth!"

"The boy... Unbelief. ”

Li Shu glared at his fifth son angrily: "Don't believe it? I don't believe you can't help your father? ”

"Ooohoh..."

After being held up by his son, Li Shu quickly calmed down.

After a moment, I couldn't help but look up to the sky and laugh out loud.

It seems that he saw the heroic posture of cutting off Jianghuai and becoming the emperor of the soil.

In fact, as early as two months ago, that is, in January of the fifth year of Jian'an, when Cao Cao preemptively launched according to Guo Jia's intelligence and spread the news of Dong Cheng and others' killing to Lujiang, Li Shu was very panicked. lest Sun Ce know that he is secretly sabotaging the contact between the Son of Heaven and Sun Ce.

He realized that once Sun Ce noticed that he had different intentions, Xiaobawang would definitely kill Jiang Lai, teach him to be a corpse first, and then kill his whole family!

So he repeatedly urged Jiao Zhongqing to hurry up and assassinate Sun Ce.

But at that time, Cao Cao was busy blitzing Liu Bei in Xuzhou, and took a defensive position against Yuan Shao, and did not show too many flaws.

In this way, this assassination plan, which was instructed by him and led by Jiao Zhongqing, can only be postponed and wait for the opportunity.

Now, finally waiting for the assassination plan to be launched, Jiao Zhongqing is no longer useful.

At that time, it was time for Jiao Zhongqing to take the secret of "assassination" and die without knowing it.

Originally, Li Shu arranged for Jiao Zhongqing's death method to "martyr for love" and "hang himself on the southeast branch". Because at the beginning of the plan of "assassinating Sun Ce by the hands of a small official", he investigated Jiao Zhongqing's details clearly, not only knowing that Jiao Zhongqing was extremely strong and had the courage of a hundred people; also knows that Jiao Zhongqing and his wife Liu Lanzhi have a very strong relationship, and Jiao's mother has a very strong personality and is not in harmony with Liu Lanzhi.

In Li Shu's imagination, the original plan was like this: he secretly sent people to provoke the relationship between Jiao's mother and Liu Lanzhi, in order to achieve the goal of Jiao's mother driving Liu Lanzhi back to her parents' home, and then asked for Liu Lanzhi to marry her fifth son Mingli, and secretly imprisoned Jiao Zhongqing, so as to coerce Jiao Zhongqing to assassinate Sun Ce.

After Jiao Zhongqing completed his plan to assassinate Sun Ce, he first faked the illusion that Liu Lanzhi committed suicide, and then asked Jiao Zhongqing to "hang himself on the southeast branch" to cover up his role in the murder.

After that, he will consciously spread the loyal love story of Jiao and Liu in Lujiang.

Thinking about it, the people of Lujiang will inevitably burst into tears after hearing this touching love story, and they will regret it deeply, and they will not find the truth hidden under this poignant love story.

But Li Shu never expected that this plan would die at the beginning. Although Jiao's mother was at odds with Liu Lanzhi, under the instigation, it did not rise to the extent of expelling the latter from the house.

Moreover, Liu Lanzhi is pregnant - which greatly eases the tension between her mother-in-law and daughter-in-law.

What Li Shu didn't expect was that although the plan of "coercing his wife to make a small official" died, Jiao Zhongqing still promoted the "assassination" plan without hesitation, and even without any help from him, Jiao Zhongqing completed the "assassination" plan alone.

This made Li Shu feel a surprise.

However, even if Jiao Zhongqing is so powerful, this little official still can't stay, and the fewer people who know the secret of assassinating Sun Ce, the better.

So, Li Shu, who couldn't make a plan, had two more plans.

The second plan was to take advantage of the fact that Jiao Zhongqing had arranged the assassination plan and reported to him today, to pour him until he was drunk, and then ordered the guards to come out and hack him to death with knives, and then kill his entire family, creating the illusion of "dying from the bandits".

But this plan also failed.

Jiao Zhongqing not only did not enter the table, but also hid a weapon in his sleeve.

Li Shu was almost scared to pee at that time.

In addition to being shocked, Li Shu realized that Jiao Zhongqing had become wary of him.

As long as he moves a little bit today, it is very likely that he will be the one who died on the spot.

He knew that Jiao Zhongqing was a ruthless man who dared to face Sun Ce, and the hundred and ten sword and axe men in the ambush in the palace were afraid that before they rushed to him, he would be cut off by Jiao Zhongqing first.

So he pretended to be indifferent, generously agreed to Jiao Zhongqing's resignation, and sent the latter to the door.

It wasn't until he saw the latter go away that he breathed a sigh of relief.

The second ploy also failed.

Fortunately, Li Shu has a third strategy.

As soon as this plan comes out, Jiao Zhongqing will die!

……

Jiao Zhongqing didn't know that the danger was approaching step by step.

He had completely let down his guard against Li Shu.

After leaving the Taishou Mansion, he came to the village by the river, took his wife, sister, and mother back home, and planned to leave in the next few days to settle in Jingzhou.

He believed that Lujiang could not stay for a long time, and once Li Shu chose to stand on his own after Sun Ce's death, he would inevitably face a war.

From the war of Sun Ce's heirs.

This heir is most likely eighteen-year-old Sun Quan.

Sun Quan is also a ruthless man!

……

Four days later, on the 4th day of April in the fifth year of Jian'an, Sun Ce went hunting in Dantu and was attacked by Xu Gong's three men, shot in the cheek by an arrow, and died soon after.

At this point, Jiangdong's plan to threaten Cao Cao was completely bankrupt.

Subsequently, Li Shu took advantage of Sun Ce's new death and the political situation in Jiangdong was unstable, so he raised troops in Lujiang to stand on his own.

The Lujiang River was immediately attacked by Sun Quan and his relatives, Li Shu was beheaded, and the soldiers and civilians in the city were slaughtered or migrated, and the stars were scattered. No one noticed the whereabouts of Jiao Zhongqing, a small official in Lujiang, and no one could recall Jiao Zhongqing's abnormal behavior in recent years.

Because before this (Li Shu became self-reliant, Sun Quan slaughtered the city), Jiao Zhongqing had been killed by Li Shu, and the whole family was hung on the southeast branch.

The southeast branch was overcrowded for a while.