Mythical Three Kingdoms

Chapter 1479: Chapter 1424: The North Is About to Explode

Chen Xi felt like he was about to explode. The Battle of the Huai River between Guo Jia and Zhou Yu was an utter mess. Guo Jia won in the grand scheme, but because he underestimated Zhou Yu’s completely unscientific commanding ability, he was broken through head-on by the opponent.

Well, this wasn’t entirely unexpected. Among the top strategists, those who are excellent at commanding probably only include Zhou Yu, Cheng Yu, and the not-yet-matured Zhuge Liang, Sima Yi, and Lu Xun. Later, it’s probably going to be Deng Ai, Zhong Hui, Chen Tai, and Jiang Wei.

But the problem is, if you remove the intelligence bonus and only talk about commanding, Zhou Yu could probably rank in the top ten of this era. His weakness, like Li Ru’s, is that his teammates always like to court death.

What’s more terrifying is that the reasons for the failures of these two aren’t due to their own incompetence, but because their teammates screwed up again. Not only did the teammates screw over the two of them, but through insane methods, their teammates ended up screwing themselves.

From this, it can be seen just how incredible these two are. The difficulty of teammates trying to harm them is simply beyond imagination.

In short, upon receiving Guo Jia’s secret letter, Chen Xi was still quite pleased. After all, Zhou Yu, that perennial wild but never capsizing guy, being disgusted by Guo Jia was good news. However, as he continued reading, Chen Xi felt something was off with Guo Jia.

Chen Xi had also experienced Zhou Yu’s spiritual talent once. Relying on an above-limit spiritual capacity, Chen Xi expressed that he could withstand all sorts of negative effects. However, recalling the Yangtze River incident, there was still some sluggishness in reaction. Combining this with Guo Jia’s speculation, Chen Xi found it quite reasonable.

But all of Guo Jia’s subsequent proposals were rejected by Chen Xi. All local city-building and enclosing South Huai River were denied by Chen Xi. Clearly, not blasting Zhou Yu offhand made Guo Jia full of resentment, but in Chen Xi’s view, just stabilizing the situation on the Huai River was enough.

Of course, Chen Xi couldn’t say outright that he didn’t support it in his reply. He could only say that there weren’t enough construction teams and not enough craftsmen, leaving Guo Jia to figure it out himself. Naturally, Guo Jia’s boast about occupying South Huai River could only come to nothing.

However, the Battle of the Huai River was just an interlude. The big deal was still to come. The northern situation had changed again, and the changes were like watching a spinning lantern—one side sings, then the other side sings, back and forth the cycle continues—until Chen Xi himself couldn’t see how the situation would develop.

Before, everyone in the Central Plains was cursing Shen Pei. But within a month, the new news was that Shen Pei flatly pushed back the Xianbei who had entered Youzhou. This was good news, and all the previous one-sided scolding of Shen Pei was completely reversed.

Of course, this was just on the surface. When the news of Shen Pei letting the Xianbei enter Jundu Mountain came out, those previously only engaging in empty talk now rolled up their sleeves, motivating their private soldiers to head north, waving the flag of a righteous cause to settle the Hu people.

In short, profit moves people. Adult male population trade costs ten thousand coins, women and children five thousand coins, Chen Xi’s official price. No one worried about Chen Xi not paying. Chen Xi directly mortgaged five million qing of land and the Money Exchange as collateral. Although everyone knew it was just moving from the left hand to the right, the land was undeniably firm as collateral.

Plus, Yuan Shu personally went north with a large number of subordinates well-versed in Feng Shui, farming, and land management for months of research. He eventually confirmed Chen Xi wasn’t joking—the land was indeed top-quality farmland, without question.

Central Plains land exchange was sealed by the aristocratic families with Chen Xi, but there was still a surplus after exchanging the five million qing of fertile land there. Chen Xi quietly contemplated and felt that if the aristocratic families were willing, they might be allotted some as well. A hint was given that they could swap population for farm acreage.

However, it wasn’t effective. Private slaves were a thing; each great family wasn’t clean, and even Chen Xi’s family’s maids were essentially private slaves. Chen Xi himself wasn’t clean, so it was needless to mention other families.

A great family without ten thousand or so private slaves couldn’t genuinely call itself an aristocratic family, which is why progress in this area hasn’t been evident. Man Chong has been working on it all along, but the results have been rather lackluster.

Luckily, when laws were first drafted, all aristocratic families under Liu Bei signed, so essentially, all families took the bait. Sooner or later, this would be enforceable; the question was only how many generations it would take to resolve.

As a result, when the Xianbei entered Jundu Mountain, the opportunistic families discovered that what Chen Xi demanded was population exchanged for land. The population from the Central Plains native clan, as long as registered independently, could be exchanged for land, and the same could be converted with foreign clans.

Although the foreign clan’s price was somewhat unfair, how could ten young and strong outer Hu not exchange for a qing of black soil? A thousand could trade for a hundred qing of ancestral black land. A deal with no capital—why not do it? Furthermore, it carries a righteous cause above and great interests below—not doing it is simply madness.

So after Shen Pei let the Xianbei enter, families with foresight were all verbally berating Shen Pei, while secretly delighted and ready to conduct the costless transactions under the banner of a righteous cause, but the deal hadn’t even begun when Shen Pei smashed their plans.

Now, the families couldn’t even criticize, forced to darkly praise Shen Pei’s work while secretly seething with anger. Some even harbored thoughts of taking Shen Pei down.

Shen Pei completely severed their financial route. If they weren’t furious, it would be a ghost. What’s more infuriating is that Shen Pei now stood on the top of the righteous cause, and people of this era wanted to save face—especially families priding themselves on long-standing heritage.

Hence, no matter how furious they were, they had to give congratulations. But what happened next was like a roller coaster ride—leaving families, readying for action, unable to keep up.

First, Shen Pei let the Xianbei enter, then Shen Pei was defeated and besieged, after which Shen Pei reversed course and pushed them back. The blood battle under Jundu Mountain nearly finished the Xianbei, and yet, just when victory was near, Juyong Pass fell.

When the news first arrived, aristocratic families under Heaven thought Shen Pei might be up to his old tricks, luring the enemy deep to score heads off the Xianbei in waves, as he had done before. But what happened next practically left these families with jaws agape.

The guard general of Juyong Pass and everyone below Guo Tu, including Guo Tu, perished at Juyong Pass. The pass was breached. Meanwhile, Shen Pei, who had defeated the Xianbei and was riding the momentum into the pass to corner the Hu people, encountered them head-on and was defeated!

Zhang He, one of the Four Pillars of Hebei, was grievously injured, and his heavy cavalry suffered over half casualties. Shen Pei became the third top civil official to be shot by the divine stone since its descent—preceded by only Pang Tong and Fa Zheng. Xin Ping had never reached their level.

The Hu people showed unexpected quality. Reports suggested Shen Pei even forcibly called back the will of the Vanguard Death Squad through the tight connections of Zhang He’s Great Halberdier and Vanguard, however...