Chapter 1352: Let's Rebel Together!

Pingwu County, the seat of Long'an Prefecture, lies amid the mountains on the upper reaches of the Fu River. The terrain is extremely rugged, and it sits in a far corner of Sichuan, not blocking any major road toward the Chengdu Plain.

In a Sichuan now thrown into utter chaos, it was a rare hiding place that drew no attention.

Moreover, since the land west of Pingwu County bordered the region where Ü-Tsang met Sichuan, this was a vast area of extremely difficult terrain and extreme poverty, a region that since ancient times the central dynasties had found easy to overlook.

For the forces of Li Dingguo, defeated in the fighting across southern Shaanxi and northern Sichuan, the Pingwu area made a fine refuge.

From the seventh month of the first year of Dongping Daxing, large numbers of garrison troops and their families had poured from southern Shaanxi and northern Sichuan into the little county of Pingwu. The small county town was suddenly crammed with well over a hundred thousand people, nearly bursting at the seams.

Why did so many Shun garrison troops and their families not go to Chengdu instead?

That requires a word about the factional problems within the Shun court.

Wherever there are people, there are factions, and there is strife. The Shun, a dynasty cobbled together from the two "righteous armies" of the Roving King Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong of the Xi, was naturally not short of factional struggle.

Although under pressure from the Ming the Shun court's internal struggles were not fierce, had never broken into open violence, and even presented a surface of perfect harmony, the covert jockeying never stopped. And the contest for the prize of Burma was the long-term object of the struggle between the Shun's two factions.

Faced with an aggressive Ming dynasty pressing in from outside and ever-sharpening land conflicts within, the Shun's princes and ministers naturally understood that trying to use their sliver of territory in Sichuan and Yunnan to reverse the tide against the Ming was all but impossible.

One corner resisting the whole realm has never ended well!

So Burma, as a line of retreat, became a fine place coveted by both factions within the Shun. That patch of Burma had originally been conquered by Li Dingguo and Li Laiheng together, but after the failure of the Siam campaign, Li Dingguo was transferred to the northern front, and Burma gradually became Li Laiheng's "private plot." Li Dingguo's people were all squeezed out of Burma.

Later came the "Pirate Grandson" Li Jicheng, who built his prestige through the Arakan campaign and the plundering of India, and firmly seated himself as "King of Burma."

And Li Dingguo himself had been dumped on the Shaanxi battlefield by Li Guo and his son Li Laiheng, unable to get away for years on end. Thus it became very hard for the "Four Kings of the Xi" to contend for Burma again. Even if they forced their way south, at best they would be living under someone else's roof, with no way left to stand as equals against Li Zicheng's line and jointly rule the Shun. Quite possibly they would not even get the treatment of guests under another's roof!

Under these circumstances, the "Four Kings of the Xi" could only turn their attention westward, to the snowy highlands.

So after the failure of the southern Shaanxi–northern Sichuan campaign, Li Dingguo made Pingwu County in Long'an Prefecture his new base camp. The troops and garrison households withdrawing from southern Shaanxi and northern Sichuan, as long as they had even a trace of connection to the Four Kings of the Xi, were all pulled by Li Dingguo into Pingwu.

As for weapons, baggage, and provisions, they flowed like water into Pingwu County from every place still within reach of the orders of Li Dingguo and Ai Nengqi.

By the ninth and tenth months, before the Songpan Plateau was sealed off by winter's heavy snows, large numbers of troops commanded by Li Dingguo's trusted lieutenants were dispatched by him to the southern part of the Songpan Guard (south of the grasslands and the Min Mountains), to seize the upper reaches of the Min, Fu, and Heishui rivers.

Yet Li Dingguo had no intention of making a clean break with the Shun dynasty. Even if he went up onto the snowy highlands, he would still be a good prince of the Shun!

The Zhu Emperor's surrender envoys had already come several times, all of them old subordinates of Li Dingguo captured on the southern Shaanxi–northern Sichuan battlefields, and they brought what looked like quite decent terms of submission. But Li Dingguo remained unmoved throughout.

For in his view, he and the Zhu Ming dynasty were ultimately not of the same path. Even if the Zhu family tolerated his group for the time being, one only had to think of how Wu Sangui died to know that even if they did not fall out now, there would come a day of settling accounts after autumn.

And he understood very well that once he accepted amnesty, Yuan Zongdi, camped at Chengdu, would immediately become the primary target of Wu Sanfu's attacks.

And over in Chengdu Prefecture, there were still gathered hundreds of thousands, even up to a million, garrison troops and garrison households who had fled there from all over Sichuan. If those people fell into Ming hands, could they expect any good end? Even if they were not all killed, they would be exiled to the Twelve Principalities of the Southern Seas and the New Continent to suffer!

Those people were also Li Dingguo's old subordinates. How could he bear to see their good Burma household registrations turned into the "green booklets" of the United States of New Continent?

And Wu Sanfu, because of his brother Wu Sangui's death, regarded Li Dingguo as a thorn in his eye, a spike in his flesh!

With Li Dingguo repeatedly refusing to submit to the court, Wu Sanfu had set aside Yuan Zongdi in Chengdu and begun concentrating his main force toward Long'an Prefecture, preparing for a great battle with Li Dingguo in the mountains of northwestern Sichuan.

Just as a great battle in Long'an Prefecture was about to erupt, Liu Wenxiu arrived in Pingwu County after a roundabout journey.

"Second Brother, what brings you here? Was the road smooth all the way? How are things at Chongqing Prefecture?"

When Liu Wenxiu reached Pingwu, Li Dingguo was inspecting Huangyang Pass at the west gate of Pingwu County (Huangyang Pass was the route Li Dingguo would have to take to withdraw to the Songpan Guard). On hearing the news, he immediately rushed back to the county town with his guard. The moment he saw the travel-worn Liu Wenxiu in the prince's residence in the county town, he asked directly.

Liu Wenxiu smiled bitterly. "Fourth Brother, I've come to join you. Things are bad at Chongqing Prefecture; it probably can't hold much longer. The overland route from Chongqing isn't easy to travel. Fortunately there are still some naval forces on the Jialing and Fu rivers, so I was able to get out through Hezhou!"

"What happened?" Li Dingguo was startled. "Chongqing Prefecture is a strong city."

"What good is a strong city?" Liu Wenxiu sneered. "If His Majesty won't fight to the death to hold it, no city is strong enough."

"What? His Majesty wants to abandon Chongqing?" Li Dingguo frowned deeply. "Then why did he come to Chongqing in the first place?"

"Exactly!" Liu Wenxiu said. "If he hadn't come, Tian Jianxiu might have held out a few more months. But now, he's unwilling to die with the city, yet doesn't want to bear the blame for abandoning all of Sichuan. So he sent me to Pingwu to find you and make you the scapegoat."

"What?" Li Dingguo didn't understand. "His Majesty means for me to submit a memorial requesting the abandonment of Chongqing Prefecture?"

Liu Wenxiu shook his head and casually produced Zhu Cilang's handwritten edict. "Fourth Brother, see for yourself!"

Zhu Cilang's handwritten edict was also on yellow paper, looking much like a Shun imperial edict. Li Dingguo assumed it was an edict from Li Laiheng, and immediately stood up, saying with great respect, "Li Dingguo, respectfully receiving the sacred decree!"

Only after speaking did he take the edict with both hands, unfold it, and glance at it. He let out an "Eh?" and said, "His Majesty's handwriting has improved greatly. Could it be he's been practicing these days in Chongqing Prefecture?"

"Not at all! Look carefully."

"Oh, let me look!"

At a single look, Li Dingguo's face changed drastically. "This, this is the Zhu Emperor's own hand? What does he mean by this?"

"What does he mean?" Liu Wenxiu smiled bitterly. "Naturally, he's telling us to go over to the Ming dynasty!"

Li Dingguo stamped his foot. "I mean His Majesty — the Dongxing Emperor of the Shun — what does he mean?"

Liu Wenxiu said with absolute certainty, "His meaning is to tell us to go over to the Ming dynasty!"

"What?" Li Dingguo was stunned again and again. "His, His Majesty has surrendered?"

"No!" Liu Wenxiu waved a hand. "Anyone may surrender to the Zhu, but His Majesty and the Crown Prince cannot surrender to the Zhu!"

"Then why is he telling us to surrender?" Li Dingguo was completely baffled.

Liu Wenxiu snorted. "He's telling us to make a false surrender. That way he can use it as an excuse to run off to Yunnan! When the time comes, the blame for losing Sichuan will be ours, and he'll still be a good emperor!"

"He, he—" Li Dingguo looked at Liu Wenxiu. "Second Brother, what are we to do?"

Liu Wenxiu gave a cold snort. "Turn his trick to our own use, of course. The hundred thousand-plus people here in Pingwu are all of our Xi line — that is our brothers' capital! As long as we have soldiers and officers in hand, wherever we go we can eat well and drink well! The Zhu Emperor wants us to go up onto the highlands, and to me that looks just fine. Fourth Brother, why don't we go be Ming officials together!"

(End of Chapter)