Chapter 184 Li Jue’s Thoughts…

Some people are martyrs who are still ambitious in their old age, while others are old and there is nothing they can do about it.

Dong Zhuo obviously belongs to the latter.

For someone like Li Jue who had followed Dong Zhuo early on, his change was particularly tragic.

In his early years, he joined the army from a powerful family in Liangzhou, and relied on his growing power to fight for a higher position, until he had the opportunity to touch the place where one person is second to none, and he seized the opportunity to succeed in one fell swoop.

At that time, Dong Zhuo was full of ambition and vision.

When they were running rampant in Luoyang, Li Jue was extremely glad that he had chosen to follow Dong Zhuo.

But what about now?

He listened to Dong Zhuo in a daze. Given Qiao Yan's habit of deploying troops, she would never allow such a gap in her rear, giving them an opportunity to take advantage of it.

And given her habit of mobilizing troops in early spring, no one could guarantee that while they were sending out troops, Qiao Yan would also march into Chang'an at the same time.

If this were true, their retreat would be completely cut off, and even the two original escape routes of the middle and the worst would no longer exist.

Theoretically, this statement does have some basis.

In the spring of the fifth year of Zhongping, Qiao Yan led troops outside the Great Wall to attack the Xianbei royal court.

In the spring of the sixth year of Zhongping, she sent troops again to ensure that the Xianbei would not invade again and deepen their awe of the Han Dynasty.

In the spring of the second year of Guangxi, she led troops to Gaoping City and slaughtered 8,000 Zhong Qiang.

In the spring of the third year of Guangxi, there was indeed a high probability that she would continue to send troops to fight.

Although Li Jue had secured the position of General of the Central Army under Dong Zhuo's command before Dong Zhuo entered Luoyang, his understanding of Dong Zhuo was no less than that of others.

He saw clearly whether Dong Zhuo chose not to advance at this time because of his clear judgment of the situation, or chose to shrink back because he was afraid to fight.

Li Jue felt a chill in his heart.

If Dong Zhuo, the leader, is like this, what should those who follow him do?

Should I follow him and wait until Qiao Yan’s power becomes stronger and stronger, until he surrounds and kills them in Chang’an?

Or continue to flee southward and enter the territories of Yizhou and Jingzhou?

If Li Jue was the kind of person who was content with a small fortune, he might have accepted this arrangement.

However, most of the useful people around Dong Zhuo were killed or injured in the battle of Luoyang, and he was promoted from captain to the rank of captain, which made him somewhat dissatisfied.

Dong Zhuo's aging state and the wealthy yet lonely environment around him undoubtedly exacerbated his changes in mentality.

Although he did not express this irritable emotion when dealing with Dong Zhuo, his face immediately fell when he returned to Gaoling where he was stationed.

"The Prime Minister wants to wait, but his opponent won't let him wait so peacefully. What do you think this is?"

"I think if the Prime Minister doesn't make a decision, we should either pack our bags and be ready to leave at any time, or prepare our own burial clothes!"

Li Jue's wife was shocked and asked, "What does this mean?"

She had previously thought that the defense of Chang'an was as solid as Mount Tai.

In the end, Dong Zhuo did not rotate the garrisons in these places as Jia Xu had suggested, so Li Jue was still guarding the mouth of the Jingshui River in Gaoling, and his nephew Hu Feng was stationed in Chunhua.

During this period of more than a year and a half, the garrison forces of both sides expanded along with Dong Zhuo's military expansion and recruitment.

This increase in military strength made her feel more at ease.

Why do they have to prepare their own burial clothes now?

Li Jue sighed, "The Prime Minister no longer wants to fight. He can't fight anymore!"

He raised his voice a little, gritted his teeth and said, "But does he know that at his current point, taking a step back is not about finding a place to enjoy his old age, but will only lead to falling from a height and being smashed to pieces."

"——Take us with you!"

Li Jue's wife talked eloquently about the advantageous positions of Gaoling and Chunhua, but she was speechless when faced with this critical situation.

It took her a long while to finally squeeze out a sentence and ask, "Then...then what should we do?"

Li Jue took the teacup from his wife, drank the water, calmed down a bit, and said the answer he had figured out on the way, "The Prime Minister doesn't want to fight anymore, but I still want to! Then take over the control of the army from him!"

People don’t always want to die!

He also has to try his best.

But this is not an easy thing to do.

He saw the change in Dong Zhuo's mentality at this time, but the soldiers under Dong Zhuo's command would not obey his command.

These people formed an interest and military group with Dong Zhuo as the core, not him, Li Jue.

He held his aching head and asked his wife, "What do you think? If we let Shi'er marry the prime minister's granddaughter, and we become one family with the prime minister, is it possible..."

Li Shi is his son, and Dong Bai is Dong Zhuo's granddaughter, and they are about the same age.

It would be a good thing if we could gain further trust from Dong Zhuo in this way.

But before he could finish his words, his wife sternly rejected him. "Don't even think about it!"

"I'm telling you, even if you want to take over the prime minister's army through your marriage, don't even think about marrying Dong Bai. That girl has been spoiled by her grandfather, so she's not a good match. I think you should give your daughter to Prime Minister Dong and get him to be your father-in-law."

"What nonsense are you talking about!" Li Jue's face turned dark.

"You know I'm talking nonsense, don't you?" She sneered, "I'm telling you! If you really want Shi'er to be your raft to seize power, you don't have to wait until the Bingzhou army enters Chang'an. I'll take your son to jump off the Gaoling city wall right now."

"Alright, alright, stop making trouble for me here..." Li Jue grabbed her hand, stopping her from turning around and leaving, "I can try another method, right?"

His wife has always doted on her son Li Shi, so he was not surprised at all that his wife would behave like this at this time.

But once this road was cut off, he couldn't help but think that he didn't really have to have such a connection with Dong Zhuo.

If you take stock of the forces under his command, there are actually quite a few of them.

After Dong Zhuo's elder brother died early and his younger brother died in battle, he was left with only his old mother, granddaughter, and Dong Huang, who commanded the imperial guards. He had few relatives to take care of each other.

Even Dong Huang replaced Fan Chou as the commander of the guard guarding the Chang'an Palace City only because of Dong Zhuo's suspicion.

But Li Jue has many relatives under his command.

He had two cousins, Li Ying and Li Huan, who were in Chang'an with him at this time, as well as two nephews, Li Li and Li Xian, who were old enough to lead troops in battle, and a nephew, Hu Feng, who was appointed as the Cavalry Commander by Dong Zhuo and was stationed in Chunhua.

If these people each led a unit...there would be no need to be so afraid of Dong Zhuo.

Li Jue put himself in other people's shoes and thought that if destruction was imminent, would Fan Chou, Zhang Ji, Duan Wei and others really be loyal to Dong Zhuo?

There is also Yan Xing, who joined Dong Zhuo because of the Liangzhou Rebellion.

That guy chose to work for Dong Zhuo because Dong Zhuo was the only one who had the opportunity to send troops to Liang Province and avenge Han Sui.

How would such a young general with extraordinary martial arts skills react if he learned that Dong Zhuo was planning to give up the counterattack?

There is also Jia Xu, who often gave advice to Dong Zhuo but sighed because of Dong Zhuo's choices.

If Li Jue remembered correctly, he was willing to give up the lives of his wife and children in Bingzhou and work for Dong Zhuo because Dong Zhuo could give him the opportunity to revive the Jia family in Wuwei.

But Dong Zhuo obviously failed to live up to the situation laid out by Jia Xu.

Thinking about it this way, maybe even Jia Xu could be won over by him!

Li Jue thought this through, and his mind suddenly became clear.

However, he did not choose to act immediately, but waited until Jia Xu was arranged by Dong Zhuo to supervise the troops in various camps and defenses. Seeing that Jia Xu was staring at the straight road for a long time, as if sighing why Dong Zhuo did not act according to his plan, he started to talk to Jia Xu.

"Mr. Wenhe, please forgive me for asking you something. I also think that your method of attacking Bingzhou is feasible—"

Seeing that Jia Xu's attitude towards him softened a lot because of this sentence, Li Jue struck while the iron was hot and said, "The Prime Minister may think that Qiao Yan is invincible because of the previous defeat in Luoyang and the successive failures of Ma Teng and Han Sui. But in the final analysis, she is just a child. If you want to control two states by yourself without any mistakes, even the gods can't do such a thing."

Jia Xu asked, "What do you want to say?"

"I want to say, you see, if we can kill first and report later, so that the Prime Minister can see the subtlety of your plan, maybe he will wake up and take follow-up actions immediately. Why not give it a try?"

Li Jue said righteously, "We are all Liangzhou people, and Liangzhou people can only rely on each other. How could we let such a God-given opportunity slip by! Even if the Prime Minister wants to blame me for this and convict me, I will admit it. It is much better than being wiped out on the Guanzhong Plain without even taking a single step."

As soon as he said this, he stared at Jia Xu's expression.

If the other party showed any abnormality, he would rather risk the trouble of cleaning up the mess and get rid of Jia Xu here.

But he only saw that the other party seemed to be somewhat moved, but was quickly suppressed under a calm expression, and then said: "You are too late."

Li Jue was at a loss: "What do you mean it's too late?"

Jia Xu replied: "If you had told me earlier, I might have tried to help you again, so that you could achieve some success without being blamed by the Prime Minister, but I can't do that now."

"You must have received the news sent back by the scouts patrolling the straight road. A few days ago, the Bingzhou herdsmen continued to cultivate the land in Shangjun and even sent out garrisons. This may be just her setting up another military settlement to continue expanding the arable land in Shangjun, but there is another possibility - someone leaked the news, so she was prepared for our attack from this route."

Li Jue hesitated for a month about whether to talk to Jia Xu.

According to the situation of marching and fighting, this means that the opportunity has been missed.

Qiao Yan's performance also enabled Jia Xu to dissuade Li Jue from attacking Shangjun without having to find many reasons.

Although the two parties were in different places and were unable to have extra communication, the progress of things was always under control.

Jia Xu was inclined to believe that Qiao Yan had come up with some method to increase per-acre yield, which was why he expanded the arable land in Shangjun.

However, he probably would not have thought that at that time in the southern part of Shangjun, which is the location of today's Yan'an and Suide, the crop being planted and heavily guarded was not millet or wheat, but cotton.

Of course, this did not affect his ability to continue to "make trouble" in Chang'an City.

The time when he proposed the idea of ​​attacking Bingzhou to Dong Zhuo was of course carefully chosen.

It was just before Li Jue came to report the garrison situation to Dong Zhuo.

What Li Jue saw was a scene where his suggestions were fruitless and he couldn't help but sigh. This was also intentional on his part.

He also finally heard the Xiliang general's desire to ignore Dong Zhuo's command and act independently.

The base of the wall had become loose, and it was time for him to use the shovel.

Seeing Li Jue's confused look because the opportunity to fight had been lost, Jia Xu said, "I know that General Li is a man of courage and strategy. He wants to kill first and report later not because he has any intention of betraying the prime minister, but just wants to help the prime minister break the current dilemma."

"But the situation has changed. General, please don't make unnecessary sacrifices. If you must do it, you have to find another time and another method."

It can be said that Jia Xu's words "Don't make meaningless sacrifices" are particularly to Li Jue's liking.

He quickly bowed to Jia Xu and said, "Please teach me, sir."

At this moment, Li Jue had only one thought in his mind -

If Dong Zhuo can't use this strategist well, then let him use it!

These undercurrents in Chang'an City did not cause any signs to spread to the outside world.

After Li Jue was persuaded by Jia Xu and gave up his plan to mobilize troops, it seemed that Dong Zhuo still had the final say here.

Qiao Yan was confident that Jia Xu could manipulate the situation, so he began to concentrate on presiding over the spring farming activities in Liangzhou and Bingzhou.

Especially Liangzhou.

The winter rapeseed that was sown after the fields were reclaimed last year turned into a golden sea of ​​flowers spreading out before our eyes in the following April.

Rapeseed flowers can produce seeds twenty days after blooming. When Qiao Yan was inspecting the fields in Wuwei County, the flowering period was actually halfway over.

After ten days or so, the flowering period is over and the rapeseed here will be harvested, and then wheat will be planted.

During this period of handover, most of the Qiang people who were originally directed to the five service locations would be added to the farming team.

The only exceptions are probably members of the Reception Office and the Foreign Languages ​​Office.

However, the number of Qiang people in the former is originally limited. The latter's biggest task at present is to guide each Qiang person to the corresponding field settlement. With the help of the Chinese language they learned in the winter, they can complete the explanation of various tasks. In fact, they should also be counted in the ranks of spring ploughing.

As Qiao Yan paced along, he saw many Qiang people in uniform standing between the ridges of the fields. They had to deal with the old farmers transferred from Bingzhou on the one hand, and convey messages to these Qiang people on the other. They were extremely busy.

Compared to the tones she heard from outside the window when she just returned to Liangzhou in February, in just two months, perhaps because of practice makes perfect, the Chinese language she heard had improved significantly.

At least it sounds much better than before.

The other Qiang people worked in the Manufacturing Office, Textile Office, Construction Office and other places for a winter and received corresponding salaries. They had initially established confidence in Qiao Yan.

When they are working in the fields, it seems difficult to tell at first glance that they were originally a nomadic people.

It is also even more difficult to remember that in the previous two years, they were still engaged in a life-and-death battle with the Han army.

Seeing all these scenes, Qiao Yan said to Zhao Yun beside him with emotion: "Zilong, do the Qiang people today look like the Black Mountain bandits yesterday?"

But now, the Black Mountain bandits have become the Black Mountain Army... no, they have become an inseparable part of the Bingzhou Army.

So, what about these Qiang people?