Chapter 312: Three Kingdoms Kill

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Xiao Puxian and Xiao Sese had just helped Zhao Yu into the bedroom when he let go of them, straightened his body, walked to the table on his own, and ordered: "Bring me a bowl of sobering soup."

Seeing this, Xiao Puxian and Xiao Sese—who had long been married to Zhao Yu—knew perfectly well that Zhao Yu was not drunk at all, at least not as deeply as most people imagined.

Correct.

Zhao Yu was not drunk at all.

Even if Zhao Yu were in the newly reclaimed, ever-dangerous Yanjingcheng, let alone in his own imperial palace in Dongjing Bianliang, he would never allow himself to become drunk enough to risk mishaps.

"Now that I've reclaimed the Yan-Yun region, can't I finally enjoy some peace after a lifetime of war?"

No.

Truly no.

The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers couldn't stop the northern nomads' hooves from charging south—do you really think a single Great Wall can hold back the Liao, Jin, or Mongols?

Humans are intelligent beings; they will always find a way to climb over this wall.

Someone might wonder: why did Qin Shi Huang and Zhu Yuanzhang build the Great Wall? Wasn't it to defend against northern nomadic invasions?

In truth, the Great Wall's primary function was not defense, but early warning.

The watchtowers and beacon towers along the Great Wall, in modern terms, were like surveillance cameras: when enemies broke through the wall, smoke would rise at that exact point, clearly visible from the walls of Yanjingcheng, allowing troops to be deployed strategically along the invasion route.

Without the Great Wall, the northern frontier of the Central Plains dynasties stretched thousands of kilometers—nomads on swift horses with curved blades would strike like shadows, vanish like wind, and you'd never know when they came, where they headed, or when they left.

Thus, the Great Wall was mainly for early warning—if it truly could repel northern nomadic invasions, Chinese history would not have seen so many minority incursions into the Central Plains.

Take the Great Ming as an example.

When the Great Ming fell, the Qing army entered the pass—it was already the sixth time they had penetrated the Central Plains.

Before that, the Qing army had already crossed the Great Wall five times to launch large-scale raids into the heart of the Great Ming.

Fifteen years before the Great Ming's fall, Huang Taiji had already led Qing troops through Mongol territory, breached the Duan'an Pass, and first entered the heartland of the Great Ming to besiege Beijingcheng.

That campaign led to Yuan Chonghuan's execution.

A few years later, Qing forces split into four columns, focusing their main assault on Datong and Xuanhua, breaking through multiple passes to invade the Central Plains again for plunder.

Then, Prince Ying Aji'e led his army through the pass, captured twelve cities, won all fifty-six battles, seized vast numbers of people and livestock, and slaughtered countless Ming troops.

Next, Dorgon, as overall Qing field commander, led his army through the pass, captured Jinanfu, looted and burned the city to ashes, and took 462,300 people and livestock captive.

Chongzhen, ignoring the Ming army's inferiority in open-field combat, ordered Lu Xiangsheng to fight the Qing in open battle, resulting in Ming defeat and Lu Xiangsheng's death.

Chongzhen urgently recalled Sun Chengzong and Hong Chengchou, who were besieging Li Zicheng, to rescue the capital—allowing Li Zicheng, reduced to just eighteen riders, to escape.

During the fifth Qing incursion, led by Abatai, Qing troops killed Prince Zhu Yipai of Lu and thousands of other commandery princes and officials in Leling, Yangxin, Dongyuan, Anqiu, and Ziyang; captured three prefectures—Yanzhou, Shunde, and Hejian—thirty states, thirty-six counties, totaling sixty-six cities; seized 369,000 people and vast livestock; at one point, Qing forces even reached Haizhou within the Southern Zhili province—the modern-day Lianyungang in Jiangsu—nearly reaching the Yangtze River.

Of those five major incursions, two occurred when Qing troops entered in autumn, fought through the entire winter in the Central Plains, and only returned beyond the pass in spring; three times they marched past Beijingcheng as if it were an empty land.

Qing troops, laden with loot and captives, strolled across the Lugou Bridge in modern-day Beijing for over half a month, while over a hundred thousand Ming troops stationed in Tongzhou dared not sortie.

Tianjinwei, the eastern gateway to Beijingcheng, was occupied by Qing forces for over six months; when they finally withdrew, they flew banners reading "Gentlemen, no need to see us off," mocking the Ming army.

Before the Qing entered the pass, northern nomadic raids on the Central Plains never ceased.

In the fourteenth year of Zhengtong, the Wala leader Esen led a massive southern invasion, first crushing the Ming main force at Tumu Fortress and capturing Emperor Yingzong Zhu Qizhen, then advancing unimpeded, breaching key passes like Juyong and Zijing, and pressing straight to the gates of Beijingcheng.

At that moment, the Ming capital hung by a thread; had Yu Qian not stepped forward, rejected the proposal to relocate south, hastily assembled troops, and fortified defenses with remnants of the army to hold Beijingcheng, the Ming dynasty's fate would have ended then.

Even after this crisis passed, raids by Mongol tribes continued; during the Jiajing era, Mongol cavalry once again surrounded Beijing, burning, killing, and looting for days on the city's outskirts before withdrawing.

And historically, the Mongols themselves, upon rising from Mobei, swept across Eurasia with unstoppable force, easily breaching the Great Wall, annihilating Jin Chao, and incorporating the entire Central Plains into their empire; to them, the Great Wall was nothing but a pile of bricks and stones, utterly incapable of stopping their iron hooves.

Clearly, whether the rugged Yan-Yun region or the sturdy Great Wall, neither could fundamentally halt the nomads' southern advance—the pressure of survival and the demand for resources kept them perpetually eyeing the Central Plains; even temporary defenses might delay the impact, but they could never block the recurring collisions of north and south throughout history.

The successive emperors of the Song dynasty and many others believed the Yan-Yun region was a natural barrier against northern nomads.

But history proved that holding Yan-Yun did not guarantee lasting peace.

Zhao Yu understood this clearly.

Thus, even after reclaiming Yan-Yun and completing unification, Zhao Yu dared not slacken.

Because the Jin Chao and Mongols Zhao Yu faced were unquestionably stronger and harder to counter than the Mongols and Qing the historical Great Ming had faced—the Jin archers, the Mongol cavalry, both were terrifying forces; they were like wolf packs on the steppe—cunning, ferocious, greedy, always ready to pounce on their prey.