Chapter 515: Sacrifice

"Your Majesty, what is the meaning of this?"

When Diwu Lun named the living Wang Mang and ordered the Embroidered Uniform Commandant Zhang Yu to handle it personally, Dou Rong, Geng Chun, and the others were all stunned.

The trouble and awkwardness that Wang Mang alive and meeting Diwu Lun might bring — Dou Rong and Geng Chun had long discussed it in secret. To avoid a situation like King Tang of Shang meeting Jie of Xia and "feeling ashamed of his virtue," the two had even thoughtfully planned to do the dirty work for Diwu Lun, letting old Wang Mang be killed by the "Red Eyebrows"!

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In Geng Chun's view, Diwu Lun had used Wang Mang to destroy the justice and conviction the Red Eyebrow Army had always prided itself on, causing this mighty armed force that had fought across several provinces without collapsing to crumble into dust. Then, by capturing and killing Fan Chong, he had broken their backbone — even if the Red Eyebrow remnants scattered and fled, they could never again amount to anything.

Conversely, if Wang Mang were to die at the hands of the "Red Eyebrows," it would form a perfect closed loop. Diwu Lun could even go afterward to Wang Mang's grave and put on a show of weeping — after all, the past bond of sovereign and subject could not be erased.

But Diwu Lun had acted on emotion, choosing what the two saw as the worst possible course.

A blunder — this simply should not have been a major misstep from the wise and brilliant Emperor they held in their hearts.

"Setting aside the question of whether, once Wang Mang is truly brought back, he should be treated as a traitor to the state or a deposed emperor — killing him would be awkward. Would we really have to exile him to Nanchao, like Jie of Xia?"

Right, Nanchao is still in Wu Han's hands — could it be that the Emperor intends to use Liu Xiu's hand to kill the old emperor?

"If Zhang Yu goes to search for Wang Mang and Mang truly perishes at the hands of villains, the whole world could well see it as Your Majesty sending a trusted agent to carry out a secret assassination…"

With so many drawbacks, Diwu Lun's stubborn insistence left Dou Rong and Geng Chun utterly baffled. Yet they dared not disobey, and only secretly withdrew the men they had planned to send to help Wang Mang achieve "dignity."

They could not fathom it — truly could not fathom it.

It was Geng Chun who, on the pretext of closeness and concern, ventured to ask Diwu Lun a single question. Yet His Majesty the Emperor treated it as nothing at all, saying only, flatly: "No particular reason."

Diwu Lun clasped his hands behind his back. "Four years ago, when I raised troops with everyone at Hongmen, had Wang Mang fallen into my hands then, it would indeed have been awkward — I would not have known how to deal with him."

"But now…"

Diwu Lun smiled. "The hour of wu has arrived. It is time to do that thing!"

……

"In the end, we still could not rescue the Grand Duke."

Xu Xuan was stricken with grief. Though he had taken no action to relieve them, in his heart he had never thought of abandoning Fan Chong. No one had expected that Fan Chong's own core troops would be overrun by the Wei army in a single night!

Upon receiving the news, Xu Xuan retreated at top speed, rejoined the troops he had left at the Ji River crossing, and hurriedly crossed the river — yet the Wei vanguard still caught their tail, leaving several thousand men stranded north of the Ji.

Seeing the cause of so many years destroyed in a single morning, Xu Xuan, amid his sorrow, was also deeply unsettled.

"Never mind Yu Province — the various Red Eyebrow remnants cannot even hold Yan Province now."

Nanyang? They likely could not return there either. Cen Peng's Wei army division had been garrisoned at Wuguan and Shangyu all along; with the Red Eyebrow main force moving north, Cen Peng would never sit idle before an empty Nanyang.

Now it was truly a case of the food gone and the birds flying to the woods — the Red Eyebrows began scattering each their own way. As far as Xu Xuan knew, the Fourth Duke Xie Lu had taken his remnant troops and fled east to Qing Province.

Xu Xuan, however, had another idea: "Apart from Fan Chong, the Third Duke Feng An is the most skilled in battle. He is now fighting Liu Xiu at Pengcheng. If he can win, the Red Eyebrows can sweep through Huaibei and even enter Huainan…"

Xu Xuan's mind was made up — he would immediately take his remnant troops and go join forces with him.

Since Fan Chong's ideal had been proven a misguided path led astray by Wang Mang, then when the time came, Xu Xuan could freely put into practice the approach he himself had always wanted.

"From among the Liu clan members the Red Eyebrows have captured — that bunch of cowherd boys, for instance — we'll raise up an obedient one as a puppet emperor."

"Then Feng An and I will be kings. In this way, we can make the Red Eyebrows hold out a few more years in the Two Huai region!"

Yet from the mouths of fleeing routed soldiers, Xu Xuan learned that Diwu Lun had already disclosed the news that Wang Mang was still alive. This had taken everyone by surprise — even Xu Xuan had assumed that Diwu Lun, scheming and timid, would do everything to conceal the matter, then send men to secretly hunt down and kill Wang Mang…

Letting it out — apart from shattering the last shred of the Red Eyebrow Army's will to resist, what use was it? This was something Xu Xuan could not comprehend.

But for the Red Eyebrows, this matter was also a deadly poison. The army was in a state of panic, and with Fan Chong captured, the Red Eyebrow Army's disintegration had inevitably begun.

"That being the case, there is no longer any need to keep denying it and secretly execute Wang Mang."

Xu Xuan began to change his mind. "Instead, when we enthrone the emperor, we shall cruelly execute Wang Mang as a sacrifice to Heaven, thereby drawing a clear line against Mang's regime. Only then can we vent the Red Eyebrow soldiers' fury and give them an accounting."

Yet no sooner had Xu Xuan issued this order than the trusted aide sent to Chugiu Village to carry out the task of executing Mang returned.

"Lord Xu!"

The trusted aide's face was full of terror. "Old Man Tian — has escaped!"

……

Violent jolting made him open his eyes. He found himself being carried on someone's back, and this giant was still striding forward, moving swiftly along a country lane.

The dust kicked up by those footsteps made old Wang Mang cough violently. Ju Wuba immediately set him down — the giant's hands could crush Wang Mang's old bones at any moment, yet when he placed him onto the grass, his touch was extraordinarily gentle, as if tending to his own aged father.

That they had been able to escape with their lives owed much to "Old Man Tian's" reputation among the Red Eyebrows. A few Red Eyebrow fighters who did not know the truth had thought this was yet another of Xu Xuan's internal power struggles; indignant at the injustice, they had secretly assisted Ju Wuba. Once Ju Wuba got his hands on a weapon, he slaughtered in all directions, cutting a bloody path in and out among hundreds of men, and rescued Wang Mang.

But he had been wounded too — gashes covered his body, and an arrow was lodged in his arm, the result of using his hand to block a shot meant for Wang Mang at the last critical moment.

Wang Mang had seen all of this. He reached out and gestured over the arrow but in the end did not pull it out, only sighing: "Ju Wuba, things have come to this — I have once again been abandoned by all. Why are you still so loyal and brave? With your abilities, whether in Han, Wei, or the Red Eyebrows, you could achieve great things. Why bind yourself to me, a sovereign of a fallen state?"

Wang Mang could be quite obstinate about certain things — apart from his zeal for reforming institutions, there was also the name change he had given Ju Wuba years ago to match an auspicious omen, and he had always addressed him that way.

Ju Wuba prostrated himself and knocked his head on the ground. "Is it not only right and proper for a subject to be loyal to his lord? Though I am but a rustic from Donglai, I still understand the principle that one who eats another's grain should die in his service."

Wang Mang could only sigh with deep emotion. If all his subjects had been like Ju Wuba, why would his reforms have failed? He had nothing left to bestow as reward, and only gently stroked Ju Wuba, saying: "You are truly my Zilu!"

Even now, Wang Mang still cast himself as Confucius, and Ju Wuba had plainly become his foremost disciple — and his only loyal one.

In truth, Wang Mang could afford to be rather proud. In terms of life experience alone, Confucius's lifelong wandering like a homeless dog could not compare at all to Wang Mang's legendary tale of hardship, displacement, and living under an assumed name. It is said that Confucius once tried to persuade Robber Zhi to abandon evil and follow good, only to be roundly rebuked by Robber Zhi — whereas Wang Mang had actually infiltrated the ranks of the "Robber Zhis" and served as their strategist.

After using the last bit of clean water to help Wang Mang swallow the final green dumpling of wild greens and millet, Ju Wuba pointed to the fork in the road ahead, his face showing difficulty. "Your Majesty, where should we go from here?"

Ju Wuba was deeply worried. In truth, they now had nowhere to go: Xu Xuan's Red Eyebrow remnant wanted to kill Wang Mang; to the southeast, the King of Wu, Liu Xiu, regarded Wang Mang as a usurping traitor, and falling into his hands would mean certain death.

As for the Cheng family in Western Shu — Gongsun Shu was an old subject of the Xin Dynasty and had even acknowledged the Xin Dynasty, but it was simply too far away.

Wang Mang did not know either. According to his earlier thinking, Wang Mang had planned to stop pretending, lay his cards on the table, and wait where he was for Fan Chong to return victorious, tell him the truth, and then go calmly to his death.

Before dying, he even intended to pass the position of "Son of Heaven" to the giant Fan — Wang Mang could not wait for a more suitable candidate. In this way, he could ensure that in the brand-new Land of Joy established by the Red Eyebrows, generation after generation of "Sons of Heaven" would be elected from among the worthy, never again perpetuating the selfish dynastic rule of the family or the tyrannical Qin imperial system.

Yet the world is unpredictable — Ju Wuba had rescued him, and along the way they heard that the Red Eyebrow Army had suffered a great defeat at the He-Ji region…

Upon hearing the news of the Red Eyebrow Army's defeat and Fan Chong's capture, Wang Mang was stunned for a long moment, and then moisture trickled down.

Touching his face, he realized that he was, to his surprise, weeping old tears.

Strange to say, when Wang Mang's empress, his old wife, passed away, and when several of his sons and grandsons were ordered to take their own lives by Wang Mang for disobedience — he had not wept.

When his reforms failed and the realm was thrown into chaos, though Wang Mang grew so anxious he could only eat abalone to stave off hunger, he still had not wept in desperation.

Back when Diwu Lun drove him from Chang'an and he fell from the pinnacle — Wang Mang had not wept.

Only after losing everything, hiding deep in the mountains of Hanzhong, even being declared dead and forced to live under a false name — only then did he not weep.

Yet today, Wang Mang's tears would not stop; he was deeply grieved.

The abolition of slavery and the redistribution of land within the Red Eyebrow Army — Wang Mang had poured too much of his heart's blood into these. Unlike in the past, when he would issue an order and leave it to his subordinates to carry out, this time Wang Mang had done everything himself, wanting to rebuild the rule of the Three Dynasties step by step.

He never imagined it would all turn to bubbles, his ideals falling like those teardrops, once again striking the ground and mingling with the mud.

"Diwu Lun."

After he finished weeping, aside from worrying about Fan Chong, Wang Mang's hatred for that man also deepened.

The rebellion at Hongmen back then had been a stab in the back from the shadows, making Wang Mang turn in shock to look at that young whelp and cry out: "My minister Boyu — you too?"

And this time, it was a frontal assault straight to the chest.

Having already failed once, Wang Mang of course understood that all ideals can only be built upon powerful military force. Only giants like Fan and the Red Eyebrows, these "soldiers of high antiquity," could support a grand design.

Yet Diwu Lun personally led a great army, met the Red Eyebrow main force head-on, and ultimately annihilated them between the He and Ji rivers — cutting their flesh, tearing their sinews, even snapping their backbone. This also caused the "promised land" Wang Mang had woven for Fan Chong to come crashing down.

No — his grief went beyond even this.

"Between the He and the Ji, many people must have died," Wang Mang murmured, still in that tone of compassionate lament.

Beginning with Fan Chong, familiar faces flashed before Wang Mang's eyes. The people he had encountered among the Red Eyebrows over the past two years were mostly full of genuineness — even when ugly and greedy, they displayed it openly. Even someone like Xu Xuan wore his hostility and suspicion toward Wang Mang plainly on his face. Not like the past, at court, where even those closest to him, like Liu Xin, were just like Diwu Lun — all wearing masks. Who could know whether what lay beneath was a flower or a dagger?

At this thought, when Juwuba asked him where they should go next and tentatively said, "Your Majesty, shall we go to Qing Province? Your servant is a man of Donglai and knows the area well. Donglai is near the sea — if the worst comes, we can simply take a boat out and find a small island to live in seclusion."

In the past, Wang Mang might have clapped his hands in approval at this idea of "When the Way does not prevail, take a raft and drift upon the sea."

But today was different. After wiping away his old tears, Wang Mang stubbornly pointed behind them.

"There!"

North? Juwuba froze. That was the direction where the Wei army was stationed.

"I mean to go see Diwu Lun!"

Wang Mang stood up in fury, but he could no longer stand steadily at all. During his imprisonment he had developed a foot ailment, he had lost his walking stick, and could only lean on Juwuba for support.

"I want to see for myself."

Wang Mang said: "See how Diwu Lun will deal with me."

"When he sees me, he will surely quote that line of Mencius, calling me a brigand against benevolence, a despoiler against righteousness — and so killing me can be called executing a mere fellow, not regicide!"

"But even if Diwu Lun controls the mouths and brushes of the literati, even if all under Heaven are temporarily misled by him and cannot understand what I have done."

Wang Mang said fiercely: "No matter how many excuses Diwu Lun finds, as long as I die at his hands, die within his army, he will bear the name of 'regicide'!"

So he was willing to stake his life, to spray Diwu Lun with a gout of blood before dying. Juwuba was greatly alarmed and wanted to remonstrate further, but Wang Mang stopped him, his voice shifting from grief and indignation to shame.

"Diwu Lun is narrow-minded, vicious, and venomous. He will surely slaughter the Red Eyebrows in great numbers."

"But that boy is most skilled at feigning benevolence and righteousness."

"If I take all the Red Eyebrows' so-called crimes upon myself, perhaps I can make him stay his butcher's blade."

This decision astonished even Juwuba — the old Emperor, who had always been accustomed to sacrificing all under Heaven and the common people.

Today, he had actually resolved to place himself in the position of the "sacrifice"! What kind of spirit was this?

Wang Mang began to count, one by one, what he had once possessed: "Friends, kin, family, renown, the imperial throne, all under Heaven… and the name of Farmer Tian, even the dream of the rule of the Three Dynasties!"

Gone — all of it gone.

"Apart from this life, which has dragged on until now, I have nothing left to lose."

The white-haired old man stretched out both hands. Apart from the loyal giant at his side, he stood utterly alone between Heaven and Earth, making the words that followed sound desolate and bleak.

"Since the Great Way cannot prevail, then let these old bones of mine be traded for Fan Chong, and for the lives of thousands upon thousands of the Red Eyebrow Army!"

His tears only fell when he had sunk into utter despair.

"And let them also serve as an offering to the Age of Great Peace — which can never be brought back again!"