[Server Chat Log]
[IronRift: "Searching mountains and seas and still can't catch him. Just from one look, this really is the descendant of the God of Drivers."
AshPvP: LoL, Wanyan Gou: Hurry and go to the West to invite the Buddha Genghis Khan.
RuinCore: Du Chong is truly a vile piece of trash. Back when he served as prefect of Cangzhou, he used the excuse of 'fearing spies' to slaughter all people coming from the north, forcing the people into mutual hatred. Later, when he replaced Zong Ze in defending Kaifeng, this dog only knew how to dig open the Yellow River. The Jin army barely suffered any impact, but more than two hundred thousand common people were directly drowned.
And that was not even the end of it.
Du Chong digging the Yellow River could be said to have left a disaster for a thousand years. The Song dynasty's own records state, "The Yellow River entered the Qing River to block the enemy, and from then on the river never returned to its former course." This directly created the earliest Yellow River floodplain region.
DeadPing: In terms of sheer disgusting harm, this thing surpasses even Chiang Kai-shek. Du Chong's act of breaching the Yellow River directly triggered, more than sixty years later, the most severe event of the Yellow River capturing the Si River and flowing into the Huai. From that moment on, the Huai River basin suffered flooding for over six hundred years. It only ended in the late Qing, when the river once again broke and the channel shifted north.
The Ming dynasty would like to say, thank you very much.
And yet Zhao Gou still praised him, saying, "Sacrificing family for country, possessing the valor of a great hero. Facing the enemy and judging the situation, bearing the style of ancient famous generals." Truly a man who deserves to be cursed to have no descendants.
And you know what.?
Song dynasty unofficial histories record that Zhao Gou, while fleeing, was in the middle of passionate intimacy when he was frightened by Jin troops and was scared into impotence. A eunuch emperor. A first in all of history.
Zhang Fei: Is that true?
DeadPing: Basically confirmed. Zhao Gou was famously lustful, but after the great escape, he never had any more children. Either it was severed or completely ruined. There is no other possibility.
voidframe: "The Peace-Seeking Hero Wanyan Gou." But honestly, it was fortunate that Wanyan Gou could run. He teased the Jin people so hard that they were driven half mad with desire, stretching their battle lines too long, giving Yue Fei and Han Shizhong the chance to seize opportunities.
Li Shimin: Only today do I realize how shallow my own understanding has been.]
Inside the General's Residence of Chang'an, everyone exchanged looks in silence.
In the end, it was Jian Yong who laughed and said,
"As His Majesty of Tang said, the fall of Northern Song truly exceeds what any person could imagine. It is… strange."
Jian Yong paused for a moment, then chose the word "strange" after some thought.
Everyone pondered it and could not help but nod. Was it not exactly so?
Every time they felt that the actions of the Song rulers had already broken through the limits of normal human imagination, they would then learn of even more outrageous deeds.
The result was that now, when looking at the affairs of Northern Song, they were gradually becoming detached from any sense of reality. On one hand, they treated it as a warning, staying alert to avoid stepping into the same pits. On the other hand, there was even a subtle feeling of watching a farce for entertainment.
After all, strictly speaking, Zhao Da should have been the one in greater urgency.
"This Yue Fei saving the people and resisting the Jin, truly is especially difficult," Liu Bei said softly, once again sighing on behalf of Yue Fei.
The light curtain's explanation was brief, but with Yue Fei serving as Du Chong's subordinate and witnessing such reckless and cruel actions, he most likely tried to remonstrate.
And in the end, when Du Chong defected to the Jin, how Yue Fei fought his way out, gathered men, and resisted in the rear of the Jin army. The hardship and suffering of that process could never be fully explained in just a few sentences.
But fortunately, now Yue Fei truly had accomplished the feat of saving a collapsing situation and holding up a falling great house.
"If one could truly recover the lost lands like this, creating a fine tale of harmony between ruler and minister, how wonderful would that be?"
That said, Liu Bei also knew that this was absolutely impossible.
Kongming shook his head, stood up, and stepped aside to reveal the map behind him, saying,
"We may as well discuss the matter of the Yellow River capturing the Huai, so as to prepare in advance."
Then Kongming, without hesitation, began to recount from memory in a calm and detailed manner.
"In the twelfth year of Emperor Xiaowen, a breach at Suanzao caused the river to overflow, and Dunqiu changed course."
"In the third year of Yuanguang, the breach at Huzi caused another course change. Emperor Xiaowu personally led the Yulin Army and spared no effort. Yet afterward, Guantao also breached, dividing into the Tunshi River, passing through Wei Commandery, Qinghe, Xindu, and entering the Bohai Sea. The river flooded for a thousand li, and countless disaster victims appeared."
"In the fifteenth year of Emperor Guangwu's Jianwu era, the Tunshi River silted up at the Mingdu Mouth in Qinghe and breached again. Tens of thousands of disaster victims appeared. The two rivers merged into one, then split into several branches entering the sea at Qiansheng…"
…
In the GanluHall, Yan Liben was likewise explaining to Li Shimin.
"…In the twelfth year of Emperor Ming of the Former Han, Wang Jing was ordered to construct channels and embankments from Xingyang to Qiansheng, building over a thousand li of dikes, thus forming the Great River."
"The Great River occasionally breached, but the main course did not change its straight path. Its stability lasted for several hundred years. Observing the later Northern Song Yellow River course, it can be seen that there must have already been one major change, with the Yellow River altering course at Weizhou to join the Wei River and enter the sea. This should have been due to the old channel silting up, already showing a tendency to shift south."
"And judging from the map of its capture of the Huai…"
Yan Liben raised his head and looked at the extraordinarily clear map of later generations. He inhaled sharply and said,
"The Yellow River enters the Huai through the Si River and merges with many rivers. The southern branch's water momentum differs from the northern. The river channels are complex and dense, with mountain ranges interwoven. When compared, this causes the Yellow River's water momentum to become extremely unpredictable."
"And using narrow and thin channels to carry the waters of a ten-thousand-li river, one can imagine that the river will inevitably swing between Huainan, Henan, and Jiangnan. Mountain floods will not be limited to one place. Across a thousand li of land, there will all be the disaster of marshlands."
Using the map of the Sweet Dew Hall, Yan Liben's explanation was extremely clear, and the scene that resulted was not hard to imagine.
Thus Li Shimin could not help but draw in a cold breath, imagining a giant dragon of flooding river rampaging across the three regions, where at every movement thousands of mu of fertile fields turned into swamps and tens of thousands of people perished. And such a situation would last for more than six hundred years.
"This Du Chong truly deserves death a thousand times over. He and this Zhao Gou can indeed be called a perfect match."
Wei Zheng's brows were tightly knit, disgust clearly written on his face, while deep unease surged in his heart.
After all, Wei Zheng still considered himself a Confucian scholar. And the later generations had also said that the Song era was a time when Confucian learning rose to prominence.
But now, looking at the founding posture of Southern Song, with such ruler and such ministers, how could learning be governed? How could one speak of cultivating the self and governing the state? How could one speak of inner sageliness and outer kingliness to pacify the realm?
Moreover, earlier there had also been floating words stating that Neo-Confucianism flourished during Southern Song. This made Wei Zheng's mood even more complicated.
Looking across Northern Song, although there were many problems, at least there were talents such as Fan Zhongyan and Wang Anshi who could be called great figures. But Southern Song… with such a ruler and such chief ministers, what was there to talk about regarding self-cultivation and statecraft?
On the other side, what Li Shimin cared about most was whether Great Tang would encounter such a crisis. Fortunately, Yan Liben's answer allowed him to relax.
"The river course built in the Former Han has been peaceful up to now. One only needs to reinforce the embankments to ensure a hundred years of safety."
"If silt is regularly cleared and branch channels opened, using later methods to build new dikes on old ones, and protecting the vegetation upstream, then even several hundred years of peace can be ensured."
Thus Li Shimin truly let out a breath of relief.
There was no choice. The scene of thousand-li Yellow River flooding described by Yan Liben was truly terrifying.
"Even though this concubine does not understand military strategy, I still know that when a great army moves, there are scouts outside as eyes and ears, and strong soldiers patrolling within. How could digging a river go unnoticed by the army's eyes and ears? At most, it could only delay them for seven or eight days."
Empress Zhangsun sighed, not hiding her contempt for Du Chong at all.
"It is only pitiful for those diligent common people. They had no scouts as eyes and ears. In confusion, the great waters arrived, and they all became wronged souls."
"This Song emperor becoming a ruined man overnight may well be repayment from these wronged souls."
Seeing the Empress's angry expression, Li Shimin smiled helplessly and quickly held her hand, making a promise.
"This disaster has been foreseen. It will surely not be encountered again."