Chapter 546: Li Zicheng Is Dead — My Chance Has Come!

"Wahaha! That faithless bandit chief Li Zicheng must have died for sure! Damn it all, a real man dies when he dies — what's the point of pretending to be alive? I've heard of living men playing dead before, but a dead man playing alive — that's the first I've ever heard of it!"

In Chengdu, Sichuan, inside the palace of the King of the Xi, a big man of about forty in a red robe, tall with a tiger's jaw and a sallow complexion, sat on a tiger-skin throne, a wine cup in one hand, drinking as he discussed Li Zicheng's feigning of life with the civil and military officials seated on either side.

This man, needless to say, was the present emperor and old Long-Live of the Xi dynasty — Zhang Xianzhong!

Submitting to Li Zicheng as a subject and accepting the title King of the West Country and so on — that was all for outside consumption. Behind closed doors in his own lair, Zhang Xianzhong was still the emperor of the Xi dynasty, and if anyone dared say otherwise, so long as Old Zhang wasn't drunk, that man would most likely die very ugly.

Of course, if the fellow was lucky enough to say the wrong thing just when he happened to catch a drunken Zhang Xianzhong, then it was no problem at all.

For instance today — after confirming that Li Zicheng was feigning life, Old Long-Live Zhang was greatly delighted, gathered all his civil and military officers for hearty drinking, and was now half-drunk and half-sober, his temperament transformed accordingly — from a slaughtering demon king into a harmless, kindly middle-aged good guy.

Zhang Xianzhong was moody and unpredictable, certainly fond of killing, perhaps even a bit mentally abnormal, with a special love of torture-killing. But to say he slaughtered every human being in Sichuan province was obviously slander, because he never fully controlled all of Sichuan.

His army was also roving bandits, even worse than Li Zicheng at building base areas. And after entering Chengdu, the army's fighting strength dropped badly. In no time at all he lost Chongqing, Kuizhou, Luzhou, Xuzhou, Jiading, Lizhou, and other places. Nearly half of Sichuan was gone, leaving only the prefectures of Chengdu, Long'an, Baoning, Shunqing, and Baoning Subprefecture.

Moreover, even these prefectures were not firmly under the Xi court's control. His Xi court only had a somewhat stronger presence in the central part of Chengdu Prefecture, and the only place that could count as fully controlled was probably just the city of Chengdu itself.

So Zhang Xianzhong could not kill all the people of Sichuan — killing all the people of Chengdu was still possible. But judging from his current mood, it seemed he would not be starting a great slaughter in Chengdu either.

Because Li Zicheng was nine chances out of ten already dead, and Old Long-Live Zhang was very likely to replace Li Zicheng's position in the rebellion world and become the chief head of all the righteous armies!

"Imperial Father is sagely wise!" The one speaking loudly was a man with a somewhat gloomy face, around thirty, with five long tufts of beard below his chin, dressed in a red robe and wearing a red Guan Yu cap, looking very imposing.

He was the first of Zhang Xianzhong's four adopted sons, originally named Sun Kewang, now named Zhang Kewang. In Zhang Xianzhong's Xi court, he held the position of one man below, ten thousand above. He ranked first among the generals, held the office of General Who Pacifies the East, served as army supervisor, and controlled both civil and military affairs. Because Zhang Xianzhong had no sons (not that he couldn't produce them, but he couldn't raise them — they either died young or were captured by government troops), this Zhang Kewang was very likely to be the future Xi Taizong!

The future Xi Taizong was, like his imperial father, in a good mood, so he had drunk a few extra cups, and a smile had surfaced on his gloomy face as he grew more talkative.

"That One Tiger (Li Guo) is two years older than Li Zicheng — how could he be the Crown Prince? It's not as if Li Zicheng had no young nephews. This must mean Li Zicheng has met with disaster, and Li Guo is keeping the death secret, ruling as regent with the Crown Prince's authority to hold real power.

Moreover, Li Zicheng has always kept his armies and territory under tight control, never willing to split his forces. How could he let the four great lords Liu Zongmin, Tian Jianxiu, Yuan Zongdi, and Liu Fangliang each command an army and each become a regional military governor? Isn't that dividing up the army and territory?

Besides, Guanzhong has been the home of emperors since ancient times — how much more important than Sichuan! If Li Zicheng were not dead, how could Li Guo let Gao Yigong and Luo Hu lead troops through Hanzhong into Sichuan? This is clearly One Tiger fearing he can't hold the situation, so he summoned those two to bring troops and prop up the scene!"

And indeed, Zhang Kewang's analysis was quite reasonable!

Zhang Xianzhong's ability as emperor was not as good as Li Zicheng's, but his eye for adopting sons was truly excellent — Zhang Kewang, Zhang Wenxiu, Zhang Qineng, Zhang Dingguo, all four sons were talents!

That was why historically Zhang Xianzhong's group grew even stronger after his death and became even harder to deal with — if Li Zicheng's death made Zhu Cilang breathe a huge sigh of relief, then if Zhang Xianzhong died, Zhu Cilang would certainly be too anxious to sleep.

Zhang Xianzhong nodded with a smile, took another big gulp of wine, and laughed: "Being emperor of Sichuan is too hard. None of these Sichuan people recognize a wise lord. I treat them sincerely, but they all want to rebel against me — it's gotten me thoroughly annoyed. Better to plunder and leave, go through Yangping Pass, Lueyang, Feng County, out through Dasan Pass, and fight our way back to Guanzhong. While those two boys Gao Yigong and Luo Hu are leading troops south, seize the home of emperors in Guanzhong in one stroke!"

Guanzhong was a fine place! Li Zicheng liked it beyond measure, Wu Sangui dreamed of getting his hands on it, and Zhang Xianzhong thought of it day and night too — it was just that before, with Li Zicheng holding Guanzhong and the Great Qing court also contending for it, Zhang Xianzhong could only dream, not actually dare to send troops to seize it.

This old Long-Live of the Xi still knew how much he weighed — he could not defeat Li Zicheng, unless he too "feigned life" like Li Zicheng and let his four adopted sons divide up the great power.

But now Li Zicheng was dead, and the Great Qing court had stopped paying much attention to Guanzhong ever since Hooge was killed by Zhu Cilang. And according to spy reports, the main Shun forces garrisoning Guanzhong were now moving south in great strength.

So Zhang Xianzhong felt his chance to enter Guanzhong had come! Only by entering Guanzhong could there be any possibility of taking the whole realm! Huddling in Sichuan meant nothing more than a few decades of wealth and rank — an emperor within the Kui Gate, sooner or later to be taken in by the emperor of the Central Plains.

Zhang Xianzhong did not want to end up playing Liu Adou or something like that — he couldn't bear that humiliation!

"Imperial Father," the one now speaking was a young man in his twenties, dressed the same as Zhang Kewang, also calling Zhang Xianzhong "Imperial Father," "right now the whole route from Yangping Pass to Dasan Pass has been taken over by Liu Fangliang's men (most of this territory belongs to Hanzhong Prefecture, but Liu Fangliang only had half of Gongchang and was very dissatisfied; to appease him, Yuan Zongdi cut Feng County and Lueyang from his own Hanzhong and gave them to him), so I'm afraid it won't be easy to fight through."

This young man was Li Dingguo, now called Zhang Dingguo, also an adopted son of Zhang Xianzhong. He was the best-looking of the four adopted sons — dark face and long beard, sword-like brows and star-bright eyes, straight nose and wide mouth. The dark complexion came from the sun; leading troops in battle was outdoor work, and wind and sun could never leave one fair. And the long beard was standard equipment for a handsome man of the medieval age.

Hearing Zhang Dingguo's doubts, Zhang Xianzhong still wore a smiling expression. Zhang Dingguo had followed him since childhood (age ten) and was the closest to him of the four adopted sons — if in the end he still had no biological son to take over, the Xi Taizong position might well go to Zhang Dingguo!

"Huang Shu!" Zhang Xianzhong raised his voice and barked.

Then one saw Huang Shu, dressed in a blue robe, his face full of terror, trembling as he stood up, walked before Zhang Xianzhong, and flopped to his knees — during these days in Chengdu, he had truly had his eyes opened, witnessing how Zhang Xianzhong killed people!

In terms of ferocity, this man was number one under heaven! Zhu Cilang and Li Zicheng simply could not compare!

During these days in Chengdu, Huang Shu could be said to have been walking at every moment along the edge of flaying and death by a thousand cuts.

But a Zhang Xianzhong who had been drinking did not kill people. He merely said with a chuckle: "You go to Yangping Pass and tell Liu Fangliang: give me a road through, and I'll give him the territory of Long'an Prefecture."

Hearing these words, Huang Shu felt as if he had received a great amnesty — saved from certain death!

Seeing that Zhang Xianzhong's mood seemed not bad, his dog's courage swelled a bit, and he asked one more question: "My Emperor, if you are going north, who gets Chengdu Prefecture?"

Zhang Xianzhong laughed: "Who do you think? How about giving it back to the Zhu family emperor? Later, when that old scoundrel Ma Shiying holds Chengdu and that bandit chief One Tiger occupies Chongqing, let them fight each other to the death. I'll go to Guanzhong and do great things myself!"

(End of Chapter)