Chapter 381 The Northern Expedition Begins

In the autumn of the 25th year of the Daqian Dynasty, a major event occurred in Luoyang, the capital of Great Liang.

Inside the Prince of Yan's Mansion, an attendant responsible for tasting food died immediately from poison after sampling a meal.

Gao Hu exploded with rage, leading his men through Luoyang and causing total chaos.

For a time, the imperial capital was on edge, and everyone felt themselves in danger, especially the officials aligned with Crown Prince Gao Long.

In just one month, more than a dozen officials close to Gao Long were stripped of their posts and imprisoned under various pretexts.

Gao Long was no pushover either; he even suspected that Gao Hu had directed and acted out this entire incident himself.

Sacrificing an insignificant little Eunuch to use as an excuse to move against him.

As the Crown Prince of Great Liang and the former commander of the Longxiang Army, he naturally would not sit idly by and wait for death, immediately beginning his counterattack.

As Gao Long began his counterattack, officials of Great Liang, from high-ranking court ministers to local county magistrates, fell one after another like harvested crops.

Even Gao Bing could not escape; had it not been for his transcendent status, he likely would have been clapped in irons long ago.

Gao Hu soon realized he was no match for Gao Long in political maneuvering. Just as he was feeling frustrated, Mr. Wei awakened him with a single sentence.

"Open and secret struggles in the court are not Your Highness's forte. Why must Your Highness insist on competing with the Crown Prince in this arena?"

Gao Hu slapped his forehead and exclaimed,

"Sir, your words have truly awakened me from a dream. I was indeed blinded by my own situation."

Soon, the Flying Tiger Army received Gao Hu's military order, ending their rest and reorganization to begin massing in Hongnong Commandery.

Gao Hu was not yet being too blatant, not daring to move the Flying Tiger Army directly into the Henan Yin territory.

However, Gao Long sensed the danger. He immediately redeployed two border armies loyal to him to cross the Yellow River to the south and station them in Mengjin.

And what was Emperor Gao Wu doing at this time?

He had fallen ill. After years of campaigning abroad, Gao Wu was left with a body full of injuries and ailments.

Over these years, he had exhausted his heart and soul managing state affairs. Ever since Guanzhong was lost, he had been unable to sleep day or night.

After all, he was a man in his sixties or seventies; he had fallen ill from accumulated overwork.

Yet at this time, his two sons were busy fighting each other, and not a single one was by his side.

Looking at the empty hall and the few Eunuchs by his side, this former Grand General of Daqian and founding Emperor of Great Liang felt a wave of desolation.

"Could it be that I was truly wrong? Otherwise, why would I end up like this? Xin'er, why did you leave me so early..."

Thinking of his late wife and his three rebellious sons, Gao Wu could not help but shed tears.

While Northern Liang was in a mess, Northern Yan was not doing much better and was currently in a state of total upheaval.

The reason was simple: under Qin Hui's prompting, Lu Kuan finally resolved to change the heir.

On the 20th day of the 10th month of the 25th year of Daqian, the Emperor of Great Yan, Lu Kuan, offered sacrifices at the Imperial Ancestral Temple and proclaimed to the world the three major crimes of Crown Prince Lu Heng:

First, forming cliques for personal gain; second, maintaining a private army for leverage; and third, intent to rebel.

He decided to depose Crown Prince Lu Heng and install Lu An, the son of Empress Yan, as the new Crown Prince.

Meanwhile, Zhang Su, the top general under Lu Heng, was stripped of all his positions, retaining only his title of Earl.

Originally, Lu Kuan intended to enfeoff Lu Heng as the King of Liaodong, letting him stay there peacefully until his death.

However, he could not stop Qin Hui from interfering; the messenger Qin Hui sent to deliver the decree also brought a bottle of poison.

Seeing this imperial decree and the bottle of poison, Lu Heng was furious and killed the delivering Eunuch on the spot.

The next day, Lu Heng allied with nomadic tribes such as the Xianbei and Khitan, raising an army of eighty thousand infantry and Cavalry to officially rebel under the banner of purging the sycophants around the Emperor.

Only then did Lu Kuan realize how much his son had grown over the years.

What surprised him even more was that, under Zhang Su's persuasion, the Pingzhou provincial inspector Lou Jin directly surrendered with his army.

In a panic, Lu Kuan ordered Grand General Yan Feng to take command and mustered one hundred thousand elite troops of Great Yan, prepared to fight a life-and-death battle with his rebellious son, Lu Heng.

A life-and-death struggle between father and son thus began.

The news soon reached the south. Without needing an order from Gao Yuan, Liu Rengui, who held discretionary authority, took action.

He sent Nan Jiyun as the vanguard to lead troops in an attack on Haozhou, Chuzhou, and Chu Prefecture.

At the same time, Liu Rengui sent a request to Gao Yuan, hoping for the cooperation of the Beiwei Army and the navy.

Gao Yuan was not stingy and immediately ordered Xia Luqi to lead the Fourth and Fifth Divisions of the Beiwei Army north to reinforce them.

He also ordered the North Sea Fleet to immediately detach warships to return to Weng Prefecture to support all of Liu Rengui's operations in Jiangdong.

Meanwhile, Cao Xing attacked Tsushima Island as requested by Gao Yuan, establishing a forward base to threaten the Korean Peninsula at any time.

If Lu Heng gained the upper hand in the Northern Yan civil war, Cao Xing would immediately move to take a bite out of Lu Heng on the Korean Peninsula.

Similarly, if Lu Kuan gained the upper hand, the North Sea Fleet would sail into Bohai Bay to launch attacks on places like Cangzhou to tie down Lu Kuan's forces.

For Daqian, a continuous civil war in Northern Yan was the most beneficial outcome, allowing Gao Yuan to easily encroach upon Northern Yan's territory south of the Huai River step by step.

As for Northern Liang, Gao Yuan was naturally afraid they might take the opportunity to reap the rewards. Therefore, he ordered Gao Xianzhi to lead the Anxi Army Corps, accompanied by half of the Shenji Camp, to be stationed at Tong Pass to threaten Northern Liang's core heartland.

The remaining half of the Shenji Camp was attached to the Central Corps led by Yue Fei to be stationed in E State. Gao Yuan's order to Yue Fei was to act as the situation warranted; if the opportunity arose, he wouldn't mind going to war with both Northern Yan and Northern Liang simultaneously.

Since the number of cannons had increased, and with the three great commanders Yue Fei, Gao Xianzhi, and Liu Rengui, Gao Yuan was confident that Daqian possessed an absolute advantage in strength over the other two powers.

With an absolute advantage in strength and others courting their own ruin, Gao Yuan felt that his goal of unifying the Hua Country before the age of forty-five could finally be realized.

At the same time Liu Rengui launched his attack on Haozhou and other areas, in Pingzhou, the army led by Lu Heng and the army led by Yan Feng had already clashed.

The pot-bellied Yan Feng sat on his warhorse, raising his whip to point at Lu Heng across from him.

"Lu Heng, you snake-blooded and wolf-natured rebellious son! His Majesty showed you heavenly grace by allowing you to live out your years in Liaodong, yet you colluded with alien tribes to rise in rebellion. You truly deserve to die!"

Hearing the words "deserve to die" from Yan Feng's mouth, the bottle of poison immediately flashed before Lu Heng's eyes. That small bottle had repeatedly appeared in his dreams these past few days, torturing him to the point of madness.

Being mentioned again by Yan Feng at this moment was like lighting a powder keg; Lu Heng exploded instantly.

"Yan Feng, you and your sister are in cahoots, deceiving the Emperor and monopolizing the government. You are the ones who truly deserve to die!"

After speaking, Lu Heng turned and shouted orders to the soldiers behind him.

"Pass down the order: whoever slays Yan Feng will be promoted three ranks and enfeoffed as a Marquis of Ten Thousand Households!"

Yan Feng on this side was not to be outdone either.

"By His Majesty's order, the rebellious son Lu Heng is beyond forgiveness. Whoever takes his head will be enfeoffed as a County Marquis, a title to be inherited in perpetuity!"

And so, the father and son had completely fallen out, with no trace of affection left as both sides viewed the other as a mortal enemy.

As a veteran general of many battles, Lu Heng's command level was definitely not something Yan Feng—who had only risen to power because his sister married Lu Kuan—could match. After less than half a day of competing in formations, Yan Feng revealed a weakness.

Lu Heng waved his command flag.

"Kill! Capture Yan Feng alive for me!"

The Xianbei and Khitan Cavalry positioned on the wings swarmed forward, lunging toward the Yan Army.

Lu Heng had promised them that if they could capture Yan Feng alive, he would divide the pasturelands beyond the Great Wall equally among them and send them a large amount of grain.

These tribal Cavalry units had the worst equipment but charged the fastest, and consequently, they suffered the heaviest blows.

Yan Feng was a Grand General after all; even if he was somewhat incompetent, he still possessed basic military competence. He immediately ordered the change in formation to stop and for the archers and crossbowmen to release a barrage of arrows.