Chu State, Yingdu, Zhu Palace.

The miserable autumn rain sprinkled the earth, the rain fell on the green tiles, and then joined into a column of water and splashed on the ground, stirring up thousands of splashes.

In the entire Zhu Palace, there was a slaughter, and several temple people hurriedly walked by carrying a corpse covered in bruises. Everyone bowed their heads and did not dare to be careless.

In the main hall, Chu Hou's face was gloomy, and just now he killed a temple man who entered the door with his left foot first. Since ascending the throne and succeeding to the throne of the country, Chu Hou Jian has always been so moody. At every turn, he beats and scolds the people in the palace, and if he is not careful, he may be beaten to death.

Therefore, the people in the palace temple are all trembling and trembling, respecting and being cautious every day, and only after the evening will they sigh a little and live another day.

After Chu Hou Jian ascended the throne, the state was unstable. The matter of the first monarch Chu Chenggong made the minister of the secretary suspicious. The state of Chu has integrated a lot of barbarian habits and advocates the style of witches and ghosts. There are many people who have seen the affairs of the ancestors, so rumors have spread in the court.

Chu Hou Jian knew that the situation was not good, so he befriended the secretary doctor and appeased the government, on the other hand, he sent his teacher Pan Chong to win over some scholars and nobles, and gradually controlled the power of Chu State, Pan Chong forced the ancestor to death with him, which can be said to be the person he trusted the most.

It took three years for the two of them to finally take complete control of the court.

At first, he was able to give benevolence and favor and give a lot of preferential treatment to the nobles and nobles, and the state of Chu quickly settled down. Later, he sent envoys to reconcile with Qi and Jin, wanting to deal with Huai together, like a Ming monarch.

But after taking full control of the court, his true nature began to be exposed, becoming more and more irritable, killing people at every turn, and many of his opposing families were killed or exiled by him, so a large number of ministers and doctors became silent. The court has become a hall of Chu Hou Jian's words, but under the calm court, there is an undercurrent.

Chu Hou Jian learned the lesson of the ancestors who were hostile to the Central Plains countries, after all, with the rise of the Huai State, the Chu State also felt great pressure and wanted to deal with the Huai State first.

The Marquis of Chu befriended the countries of the Central Plains, and paid tribute to Zhou Tianzi, who gave him sacrificial meat and told him: "Defend the south, calm the turmoil of the various ethnic groups, and do not invade the countries of the Central Plains."

The state of Chu agreed not to go north again, but in fact the reality forced them to face it, because the four kingdoms of Zhong, Cai, Huang, and Jiang had already threatened the state of Chu. Chu even wanted to form an alliance with Qi, Jin, and the Central Plains countries again to attack Huai, but Qi and Jin did not want to provoke Huai.

On the contrary, they would prefer to see the two states of Chu and Huai fighting.

The idea of an alliance between Chu and Jin and Qi failed, but it also eased their relations, and then turned their attention to the allies of Huai, Zhong, Cai, Jiang, and Huang. Originally, these four countries were not taken into the eyes of the Chu State, and the population of each Fang State was only more than 300,000, so they were not the opponents of the Chu State at all.

However, since the Zhongguo Kingdom, the four countries supported by the Huai State quickly approached and formed an alliance, and later their strength also increased rapidly.

Now the combined population of the four countries is about 1.3 million, although it is far lower than that of Chu, but Chu has other enemies, and it is impossible to draw all the troops to fight against them.

And the Four-Power Alliance is on the side of Chu State, so Chu Hou can't sleep at ease. What's more, the Four Kingdoms had an enmity with the Chu State, the Xianjun of the Cai State was imprisoned in Chu, the Jiang State and the Huang State were also repeatedly attacked by the Chu State, and the Zhong State was even sealed by the Huai State.

Therefore, after stabilizing the government, the Marquis of Chu began to mobilize the army of the country and prepared to deal with Zhong, Cai, Huang, and Jiang.

After the Huaishui Four Kingdoms governed the upper reaches of the Huaishui, there was no raging Huaishui, and there were Anfeng Ponds that could irrigate hundreds of thousands of acres of fertile land. Chu Hou also sensed the threat of the alliance of Zhong, Huang, Cai, and Jiang, and wanted to pull out these four nails.

Therefore, in the fifth year of the Marquis of Chu, the state of Chu sent an army of 50,000 troops to conquer the Huang State in October of that year on the grounds that the Huang people did not return to Chu Gong, and the Huang State asked Zhong, Cai, and Jiang for help, and the three countries each transferred 5,000 soldiers and horses, and Wang Zhong was the commander to go south to save the Huang.

The Marquis of Chu sent Qu Wan to lead an army of 50,000 to attack Huang, and the army drove straight in, but Huang could not stop it, retreated to the national capital, and the Chu army besieged the city. Wang Zhong led the army to the rescue, showing that the enemy was weak, and he was invincible in three battles, and the Chu army was arrogant.

The armies of the four countries retreated in formation, cleared the wilderness, and asked for help from the Huai State.

In November, everything withered, the wilderness was full of withered grass, the weather was cold and frozen, and the Chu army was mostly southerners and did not tolerate severe cold, so they collected more wood for heating. In order to collect wood, Qu Wan stationed the camp in the forest of Nanshan, at this time everything withered, the forest fell leaves everywhere, and the branches and vines dried up.

It was the night when the north wind suddenly rose, Wang Zhong led the army to launch a night attack from the north, and all the five thousand elites were bunched with grass, taking advantage of the night to attack the Chu army camp, and set fire to the wind.

At this time, the grass and trees are dry and yellow, the weather is dry and dry, and it coincides with the north wind howling, and the wind helps the fire to spread in all directions, the fire is continuous, the Chu army camp is burned, and the soldiers are in chaos. Wang Zhong took the opportunity to attack, the Cai army from the west, the Jiang army from the east, and the Zhong army from the north, under the combination of the three armies, the Chu army was defeated and collapsed, and fled all the way south.

Wang Zhong led the army to pursue, the Chu army was defeated, most of the dead and wounded fled, the cars and ships were all abandoned in the wilderness, the army broke 30 camp tents, the Chu army suffered more than 10,000 casualties, and Qu Wan was only spared.

The Chu army retreated in disarray, suffering heavy casualties, and when it withdrew to the territory of Chu, there were less than 10,000 of the 50,000 troops left. Qu Wan saw that there were only some remnants of the defeated army of 50,000 left, and he suddenly felt that he had no face to return to Chu, so he killed himself by the river.

The army of Chu suffered heavy losses, and the alliance army of the four countries followed, taking the opportunity to enter the territory of the Chu state, the Chu army was defeated in successive battles, and the four countries invited the country to send troops, and the marquis saw that the Chu army was defeated, so he led the army to join.

When the Marquis of Chu heard of the defeat of the army, he hurriedly transferred the army of the country, with Pan Chong as the general, and led the army to support, and the two sides fought in Lishan. The war was stalemate, the state of Chu summoned the subordinate countries to help, the army of the Huai State arrived, and the Chu army relied on Lishan to form a formation to defend it, and the wall was clear.

Seeing that the war was deadlocked, Chu was afraid that Huai would attack from the east and attack from the northeast, so he sent an envoy to sue for peace, ceding the west of Suiguo and two hundred miles south of Huang, and the two sides were to strike their troops.

Zhong, Huang, Cai, Jiang, and Entourage divided the land equally.

Although the state of Chu was defeated, it did not damage its muscles and bones, but the enmity between the two sides is getting bigger and bigger. Although Suiguo gained benefits at this time, he was afraid of being retaliated against by Chu afterwards, so he formed an alliance with Zhong, Huang, Cai, and Jiang.

On the other side, Huai sent Ji Yue to secretly negotiate with Suihou and asked him to help Xiong Yun, the prince of Chu, return to China. Xiong Yun has now become an adult since he fled the Chu State. Thinking of this, Suihou immediately decided to support Xiong Yun to return to Chu, compete for the position of Marquis of Chu, and disturb the state of Chu.