Chapter 896: Peace

That night, Old Cao drank a lot of wine—more than he had ever had since being captured by Wang Yan, even when he had tried to drown his sorrows with Dukan.

Knowing one has failed and having already failed—there is a gap between these two. No matter how much of a hero Old Cao was, having been a Han official for over twenty years and a "pillar of the Han court" for another twenty-plus years, totaling over fifty years—most of his life had been spent in this. Now that Jiangguan had fallen and the Shu region had no support, it was infinitely equivalent to having already failed. Even with Old Cao's resilient will, he couldn't withstand this blow.

The old guy, who had originally been quite spirited, suddenly lost his heart, and his whole person aged significantly. Wang Yan comforted Old Cao very thoughtfully, saying not to underestimate Tianzhu, as the barbarians there still had some strength. And even more thoughtfully, he diagnosed Old Cao and prescribed medicine to regulate his body, hoping Old Cao would live to be a hundred.

Old Cao could originally live to be over sixty, which was already quite good for someone who had spent half his life on horseback, fighting north and south, east and west. But Wang Yan felt Old Cao should live longer.

There was no doubt that in his hands, Old Cao would definitely be subjected to severe punishment. Even if he were a leader of a side, he could not escape this fate; he would surely die, and die miserably, to further consolidate his political foundation and firm up his political line. This did not stem from personal grudges, but from the struggle.

But if Old Cao were to be exiled to cross the plateau to Tianzhu, that wouldn't be enough. After all, it was an expedition, an opening of a new homeland. Old Cao was, after all, a majestic lord with vision, brains, and even more courage; he must live for many more years to thoroughly gain a foothold in Tianzhu.

If one were to rely on the people under Old Cao, along with his sons who were fighting among themselves, they would basically be useless. After all, the Tianzhu people weren't stupid; they would also divide and win over. Although they might be inferior in combat effectiveness and didn't have such high-end military strategy and tactics as China, they would also learn, and they were fighting on their home turf. They wouldn't just bow down and submit to Old Cao's rule the moment he arrived.

When Cao Cao was alive, he did not unify China, but that does not mean Cao Cao was incompetent; no one would deny the achievements of Cao Cao's life. And these achievements have been condensed into three words: Emperor Wu of Wei.

A proper tough guy.

Therefore, Old Cao's longevity was of top priority for governing Tianzhu. It could be said that for Old Cao's sake, Wang Yan had truly put in a lot of effort.

Although Old Cao was quite happy about being treated and nursed by a famous doctor like Wang Yan, he didn't like it when he heard Wang Yan's straightforward explanation of the reason.

He had no choice but to be sad alone.

Compared to Old Cao's sadness, Wang Yan could now be said to be in high spirits. Although, in fact, ever since he had received the favor of the "Living Father" and passed the initial stage, he had been bathing in high spirits all along.

Having controlled Jiangguan, cut off the grain supply, and blocked the southern region of Jiujiang, Wang Yan's large army was slowly pressing forward. The one hundred thousand troops in Jiujiang could only run into the mountains if they wanted to escape, or jump into the Yangtze River, hoping Wang Yan's navy wouldn't catch them so they could drift out to sea. At the same time, there was the good reputation Wang Yan had cultivated for over twenty years. The officers who knew they wouldn't have a good end couldn't stop the vast number of common soldiers.

So, unsurprisingly, the one hundred thousand Cao troops in Jiujiang mutinied. It was unknown who had been the first to strike their superior, but once it started, it couldn't be stopped. In the end, they killed officers large and small, and because they had gone crazy with killing, they also killed many of their own people.

At the same time, the besieged Linxiang couldn't hold out either and opened the city to surrender, capturing the quite famous Xun You, as well as the mascot of the Great Han, and a crowd of court officials.

With this, the war of unification with Cao Cao came to an end, ending in final victory for Wang Yan's side. As for the subsequent pacification of the Shu region, and Sun Ce, Shi Xie, and others who were fighting for their lives, they were just aftershocks.

In history, they had their positioning, but for Wang Yan and the others of the time, the war had already ended, because the remaining ones were no longer enough to resist. This war ended before the spring of 209.

In the chilly spring of Jiang Nan, Wang Yan still wrapped himself in a robe, rode a horse, and led his army—and even more so, led Old Cao and the others—slowly into Linxiang City.

Linxiang was not the seat of Jingzhou, but Jingzhou had a large population—it was the province with the largest population before the Yellow Turbans, reaching over six million people—so the development of the cities here was quite good, and Linxiang was the same. Later, Old Cao moved the Han Emperor to reside here and developed it steadily for many years, so Linxiang City could be considered to be flourishing these years, and the city was much larger.

Old Cao even built a small palace for the Han Emperor here, while his own prime minister's office was set up in the government office.

Riding all the way to the palace, which was not particularly towering or magnificent, Wang Yan dismounted and walked up the steps with Cao Cao and the others, entering the palace.

At this moment, two rows of people stood respectfully inside the main hall. Most were men, but there were also a few women. Their gazes were all fixed on the entrance, their expressions unclear.

Although these people were prisoners and defeated people, the convergence of all their gazes still exerted a certain pressure. However, for the victor, this was not a problem. After all, without a strong inner energy and a firm will, one wouldn't be a victor, let alone when the victorious person was Great General Wang.

Wang Yan held his precious sword, and amidst the gaze of this group of people, he slowly walked forward with Cao Cao and sat down on the dragon throne.

He clearly saw many people glaring at him with anger, which was very normal and understandable. After all, there were many loyalists to the Great Han, and for such a big rebel as him to have succeeded, it would be strange if they had a good look.

He glanced at Liu Xie, who was cowering and trembling slightly while holding his wife. He then looked at Cao Cao, who was standing with his hands behind his back on the platform in the middle of the high steps, silently watching the scene in the hall.

Wang Yan said: "Meng De, how do you intend to settle the Han Emperor?"

"I intend to establish the Great Han beyond our borders, and the Han Emperor will naturally go with me."

Old Cao's thoughts were still very complicated. The Great Han of China had perished, and he wanted to inherit the name of the Great Han in Tianzhu. He had a bit of an obsession with the Great Han.

Of course, this decision actually had no impact on him; it was just a matter of the country's name. Liu Xie couldn't make the decisions even if he went over, and it wouldn't be long before he had to abdicate. But it wouldn't work if Liu Xie didn't go. After all, Liu Xie was the legitimate successor of the Han royal family. Without this legitimacy, the Great Han Old Cao established would not be the Great Han of now; these were two different things.

Wang Yan nodded with a smile: "Since that is the case, the court officials will all go with the carriage, which will also save me from slaughter."

"That is exactly as it should be."

Old Cao approved of Wang Yan's words. These people were all capable; now they were looking for trouble with him all day, but after leaving their homeland and arriving beyond the borders, they would certainly be able to work with all their hearts. However, there was a prerequisite: they had to be able to arrive in Tianzhu alive to count.

The journey was thousands of miles long, the road was difficult to travel, and people would certainly die. How many would die and who would die was unknown; it depended on whose life was tough.

Of course, they could choose not to go, but not going meant death, and it wasn't as simple as suicide. They wouldn't even have the chance to commit suicide; Wang Yan would absolutely not allow it. Whoever committed suicide should prepare to have their bones picked over by others for hundreds of years.

Wang Yan didn't want to bother either. This group of people was of no use in his hands, nothing more than moving a few more bricks. By comparison, these people could indeed play a greater role in Tianzhu. After all, they were all intelligent people. The various noble aristocrats of Tianzhu were of course also smart, but in front of the Cao Wei camp of the Three Kingdoms era, where capable people emerged in large numbers, they were obviously not enough to look at.

Looking at the row of imperial seals on the low table in front of him, Wang Yan picked them up one by one to play with. There were many imperial seals, and they had various uses. Even if they were relatively crude at this time and far from the peak of centralized power, and not like the Manchu Qing which had over twenty large seals, there were still a few.

Speaking of the one he was most interested in, it was naturally the one Wang Yan picked up last: four inches square, with five dragons carved on the knob, one corner inlaid with gold, and a warm feel to the touch—it had already been classified as a mythological item, the famous Heirloom Seal of the Realm.

In the past, when Yuan Shu surrendered to Old Cao, he used the Heirloom Seal as a bargaining chip, so the Heirloom Seal ended up in Old Cao's hands. No one would be affected by a seal; Old Cao understood this even better. Everything he had stemmed from his strong troops and sturdy horses.

Originally, Yuan Shu declaring himself emperor wasn't because of this seal, but because his strength was indeed not weak at the time. Added to his own temperament and ambition, that was why he rashly declared himself emperor. The Heirloom Seal brought him a kind of legitimacy.

After all, this jade seal was indeed extraordinary; it came from Qin Shi Huang, and that was before Ying Zheng had conquered the six states. Having experienced various changes, been lost several times, and reappeared, it had been passed down for over four hundred years until now, experiencing the Qin, the Former Han, and even now. Moreover, Qin Shi Huang unified the world and called himself emperor, which in itself had a special significance.

"Received from Heaven, may it last forever and prosper..." Wang Yan played with the jade seal, looking at the carved characters, and muttered.

This was carved by Prime Minister Li Si under the order of Qin Shi Huang, using bird-and-flower seal script. Li Si's end wasn't very good, but his calligraphy was very good, and he had also completed the task very excellently.

For this Heirloom Seal, Wang Yan didn't have any special feelings. Even if there were many legendary stories, it was ultimately just a seal. It was just that he had indeed never seen it, and now he was just looking at it out of curiosity. Having been emperor twice before, the Heirloom Seal had long been lost, and he hadn't seen it then either.

Now that he was playing with it, that was that. However, he did plan to replace the general's seal on the money with this Heirloom Seal when printing money in the future. He naturally acknowledged the special value of this seal.

As for the matter of forgery, Wang Yan had rich knowledge of antique appreciation. Although he indeed didn't have another seal to compare it with, judging from his judgment of the jade material, the judgment of the era, and his personal feelings, this was real.

Moreover, Old Cao didn't need to do such a thing, and the Han Emperor and court officials didn't have the time to do it. After all, that jade was quite hard to come by. When the country was flourishing, of course, one had everything, but the current group of people were all very poor; where would they have so many treasures?

Finding an ink pad, he stamped it on a piece of white paper. Looking at the stamped characters on the paper, Wang Yan nodded with satisfaction, used a new piece of paper, and picked up a brush to write. While writing, he glanced at Cao Cao.

"You need to go to the Shu region yourself. Everything will be decided according to what you and I discussed earlier. You can start preparing in the near future. The matter of sending scouts to explore the path must be arranged properly. After next spring, you all will set off on the road; you must not delay for even a moment."

Cao Cao nodded and cupped his hands, which counted as an answer.

This was something the two of them had discussed long ago: Cao Cao would go to reorganize the Shu region to avoid Wang Yan having to continue moving troops. When the time came, Cao Cao would directly select the population and divide a batch to use for the expedition.

Of course, Wang Yan saying they would leave next year certainly didn't mean all five hundred thousand people would leave at once. After all, the journey was long and difficult to travel; all five hundred thousand would die on the road. Instead, it would be in batches, with a few tens of thousands leaving in each batch.

The first batch would be the high-level officials, elite soldiers, and their families. Wang Yan would dispatch naval warships to send them over. In the future, naval warships would also be used for transport, and with a fixed location, trade routes would be easy to open.

In fact, Wang Yan had originally intended to let Old Cao cross mountains and ridges to get there, but later he thought about it and gave up. The common people had suffered too much; there was no need for them to just die on the road like that.

But even so, long-distance sea travel would still result in deaths. Accompanying conquest, there was always death. If others didn't die, one's own people would die first.

For them, it was also an incomparably huge test. The current scale of the fleet was already very large. In twenty years, even if many warships had been retired, there were still over fifty, each larger and more advanced than the last.

The fleet sent out back then had all returned. Although the losses were heavy and many had drifted to different continents, they had ultimately gained important navigation experience and preliminary, albeit not precise, sea charts. Tianzhu had already been explored for Wang Yan's fleet. Supplies along the way were not lacking, and the things they brought were enough for a round trip.

After all, there were many people when they went, and only the people sailing the ships when they returned; it could always be solved.

Wang Yan finished writing the two sheets of paper, waited a while for the ink to dry, stamped them separately with the Heirloom Seal and his general's seal, found a eunuch who was shrinking in the corner to lower his presence, and instructed him to arrange for people to send these two letters to Sun Ce and Shi Xie.

The meaning of letting the Han court send people was very simple: that place was truly remote, news transmission was not smooth, and they didn't know the results here. Now it was a eunuch of the Han court, using the seal of the Heirloom Seal and his own Great General Wang's seal, which was enough to prove its authenticity.

The content of the letter was also simple, giving them two choices. Either wait until he had finished reorganizing the situation in Jiang Nan and the Shu region, and the large army would go south to capture them and kill them one by one, or take advantage of the time before he went over to quickly pack their bags and get lost.

He also talked about the affairs of Han Sui and Cao Cao, letting them have a sense of the situation.

Jiaozhi certainly had to be occupied, but there was only a population of one million there, so it wasn't urgent to occupy it. After all, Wang Yan had basically received Old Cao's thirteen million population without injury. The work of these people was quite complex, and he didn't have the heart to bother with Sun Ce and Shi Xie for the time being.

So he gave them a chance to take people to develop outside. If they didn't grasp it, then they couldn't blame him. When he sent Old Cao away next year, he would kill them on the way.

It was just a pity for Sun Ce and Zhou Yu, who were both people who had made a great name for themselves in this world, but had been defeated in Great General Wang's world without even engaging in battle. It was because they developed slowly and were impacted by the larger aftershocks.

However, Sun Ce was also lucky. After all, originally, after he unified Jiangdong, he was assassinated, and later he didn't recover well and died young. But now, with Great General Wang's intrusion, Sun Ce hadn't fought Liu Bei and had to go back to work for Yuan Shu, escaping the killing blow and living healthily until now.

As for the Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao sisters, Wang Yan naturally wouldn't admit that he was also quite curious. If Sun Ce was sensible, then he would have no fate with Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao. If he wasn't sensible, then it was hard to say.

But obviously, facing the current situation, Sun Ce would definitely be sensible...

However, Wang Yan didn't care. He wasn't a lecherous ghost; how could everything be perfect? If he really had to send a large army to kill Sun Ce and Zhou Yu for such a small matter, it would be a bit unpresentable.

Although he was indeed from a rogue background, he wasn't a real rogue. Didn't soldiers die in war? His iron heart wasn't reflected in this aspect; that really wasn't worth it.

Everything had value, or to think from another perspective, some people in Wang Yan's position might send a large army. Because the beauty of Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao had been spread for two thousand years, and they were sisters, which stirred some people's pleasure nerves. Then in the eyes of these people, the casualties caused by such unnecessary wars and the resources consumed by long-distance expeditions were naturally not comparable to Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao.

Of course, there were also excuses. After all, there were so many foolish emperors, and so many tricks; relatively speaking, such behavior didn't seem to be anything.

But for Wang Yan, specifically going to fight an unnecessary war for Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao was truly unnecessary. For him, this was a complete economic account. That was why he said that if Sun Ce wasn't sensible, he would kill Sun Ce and Zhou Yu as a matter of course...

The subsequent development went very smoothly. Old Cao personally went out and exchanged opinions with the powerful clans, and the powerful clans were forced to agree to put down their weapons and go on an expedition to Tianzhu. They couldn't disagree; in Wang Yan's hands, they would truly die, and their bones would be picked over by others for hundreds of years.

So the garrisons at all the dangerous places in the Shu region all put down their weapons. Except for the elites selected by Old Cao, all of them went home.

And the news of the expedition to Tianzhu also spread widely. Old Cao finally retained one hundred thousand combat soldiers, as well as corresponding young women and children, with not a single old person. Even among his combat soldiers, the older ones were weeded out, and young people were supplemented.

Wang Yan provided them with more advanced armaments, as well as grain and fodder for the departure, sending them all the way to the land of Tianzhu.

To be honest, this was not fair to the common people who were selected to follow Old Cao on the expedition to Tianzhu, but who cared what they thought? Cao Cao needed them, Wang Yan wouldn't keep them, and they had no choice but to obey; there was no other path.

After selecting the people, Wang Yan arranged for these people to develop the land in the Shu region, and the first batch of people to depart began to migrate. They had to migrate to Wu Commandery by the sea, which was the estuary of the Yangtze River, where Wang Yan had a wharf.

All kinds of things had to be transported; this was a huge job, and all preparations had to be made. By the spring of the coming year, Old Cao would take the people, board the warships, set sail, and go on an expedition to Tianzhu.

This was work Old Cao had to coordinate. All Wang Yan had to do was arrange for people to connect with them. He was still presiding over the work in Jiang Nan and the Shu region, to thoroughly stabilize the common people and restore production and construction.

The war had ended, and peace had once again become the theme of this ancient land. The difference was that this time, the common people had stepped onto the stage of history. Wang Yan was purely a commoner, later becoming a refugee. He stood with the common people, creating a powerful empire that would last for hundreds of years and whose ideology would influence the world for years to come... ===== CHAPTER 897 =====