My father, Li Shimin, please call me Crown Prince

Chapter 387 King Wei: I can lose, but the King of Jin must never win.

Prince Wei's Mansion.

After Li Tai learned the news, he hurriedly called Chai Lingwu over to discuss countermeasures.

"What should I do?"

Li Tai felt gloomy. If the young eunuch had not overheard the conversation between Prince Jin and Concubine Wu, he would not have known until now that his father was already preparing to take action against the Crown Prince.

The most important thing is, just as Wu Cairen said, if the prince can't find his father, he will definitely take action against him and Prince Jin.

Prince Jin fled when he heard the news, but would he die at the hands of the prince to help Prince Jin?

After listening to King Wei's story, Chai Lingwu thought in his heart.

The current situation is obviously not good.

Regardless of whether the prince wins or loses, it seems that the King of Wei is doomed to fail.

However, Chai Lingwu did have some plans after all.

After a moment's silence, he said, "King Wei, I have three strategies: best, medium and worst."

Li Tai was stunned for a moment, his mind was blank and he had no idea at all. Chai Lingwu still had three strategies: good, medium and bad.

Hearing this, I immediately felt that I had not misjudged the person.

"Tell me the best strategy."

Chai Lingwu said: "Since the news of the crown prince's uprising has been known, the king of Wei can mobilize the guards in the palace to assist your majesty after the crown prince has raised his army."

"Then your majesty will certainly look at the King of Wei differently after this, and then slowly make plans for the position of Crown Prince."

"Given your majesty's preference for the King of Wei, it won't be difficult for him to compete with the King of Jin without a crown prince."

"Although the Prince of Jin has the support of Zhangsun Wuji, who will be the crown prince in the end will depend on your majesty's wishes."

After listening to this, Li Tai felt that this was indeed a good point, but it just felt that it was lacking something.

Then he continued to ask: "What is the middle strategy?"

Chai Lingwu continued, "The middle strategy is to do what the King of Jin did, and protect yourself first, or even secretly find out where the King of Jin is hiding, and then tell the Crown Prince who is raising an army."

"King Jin wants the Crown Prince to deal with King Wei, right? King Wei can use his own methods to return the favor. When the Crown Prince kills King Jin, the Crown Prince position will naturally be in King Wei's pocket."

Li Tai thought about it and suddenly found that this middle strategy seemed better than the best strategy.

Then he asked again: "What is the next step?"

Chai Lingwu's eyes became sharper, and he said something shocking: "The worst option is to tell the Crown Prince about this."

Li Tai was shocked: "What does this mean?"

Chai Lingwu stared at the King of Wei and said slowly: "Although the Qinghe Cui family took full responsibility for the Western Turkic incident, Your Majesty has already had some prejudice against the King of Wei in his heart, and it is not like before."

"Given the current situation, the sooner the King of Wei decides, the worse it will be."

"No matter who wins or loses, the King of Wei will have a hard time getting to the position of Crown Prince. Doctor Chu is now being ignored by Your Majesty, and it is difficult to shake the Emperor's heart for the time being. The Grand Tutor Changsun supports the King of Jin, which makes Your Majesty let the King of Jin transfer the Right Jinwu Guard to help. It can be seen that in Your Majesty's mind, the Crown Prince has already been decided."

"If the crown prince fails, then the matter is settled. The King of Jin will definitely take this opportunity to seize the throne and win the emperor's heart. The King of Wei will never have a chance to turn things around."

"So for the King of Wei, the worst thing is time."

"At this time, what is lacking is your majesty's understanding of Doctor Chu, and what is lacking is the King of Wei winning your majesty's favor again. Therefore, maintaining a stable situation between your majesty and the prince is the key."

Li Tai paused for a moment.

These are not the three strategies of upper, middle and lower. They are clearly the three strategies of lower, middle and upper.

However, this bad plan really hit Li Tai's heart.

How could Li Tai not feel his father's attitude towards him? There was clearly a hint of coldness in his tone.

In addition, Chu Suiliang was neglected, so for him, it would be a waste of time, place and people to decide on the position of crown prince.

On the other hand, King Jin had everything going for him: time, place, and people.

How can he win the position of crown prince?

All these years of planning are just to help Prince Jin?

Li Tai was unwilling.

No one would be willing to accept this.

He can lose, but King Jin must never win.

"But what if we tell the Crown Prince about this and he mobilizes his troops in advance?"

Li Tai had actually already made up his mind.

Upon hearing this, Chai Lingwu understood that what the King of Wei needed at this time was a stepping stone.

"If Your Majesty wins, the King of Jin will be the Crown Prince, and the King of Wei will remain the King of Wei, but he will be sent to a foreign vassal state."

"If the crown prince wins, then your majesty will abdicate and the King of Wei will remain the King of Wei."

"Although your majesty is not happy with the King of Wei, you must ask the Crown Prince to protect the lives of the King of Wei and the King of Jin. With the Crown Prince's ability, in order to ensure a smooth accession to the throne, he will definitely not take action against the King of Wei and the King of Jin."

Li Tai understood.

My father won, the throne of crown prince went to the King of Jin, and he was still the King of Wei.

The prince won, and the throne belonged to him, but he was still the King of Wei.

If that's the case, why doesn't he take a gamble?

Chai Lingwu's next words made Li Tai make a decision.

Chai Lingwu continued, "Your Majesty came to the court in person earlier, and the Crown Prince had a large army under his control. He had the opportunity to imprison Your Majesty and seize the throne, but the Crown Prince did not take action and let Your Majesty leave."

"Then the prince took over the Daming Palace. He had 30,000 elite soldiers of the Shenwu Army and artillery in hand. If he stormed the Xuanwu Gate, how could Your Majesty stop him? However, the prince did not take any action."

"From this, it can be seen that the prince has a big plan. He wants to defeat the enemy without fighting and force Your Majesty to abdicate with his own strength."

"So when the Crown Prince learned about Your Majesty's affairs, he did not necessarily initiate the rebellion and seize the throne. He would most likely mobilize the hidden troops in Chang'an to control the city of Chang'an, or even replace the Jinwu Guards to protect Chang'an and besiege the imperial city."

Chai Lingwu's analysis makes sense.

He had witnessed the power of the Shenwu Army. On Suzaku Street, only a thousand Shenwu Army soldiers were able to block tens of thousands of Chang'an elite troops.

Although they had the advantage of cavalry, the morale of the army was high and they did not retreat at all when facing a strong opponent. This can be seen from the fact that the weak did not retreat at all.

In the past, he had heard that the prince was good at training soldiers, but he didn't think much of it. However, that incident on Suzaku Street, Chai Lingwu saw it with his own eyes.

You have to know that those soldiers and generals are just foreigners from Liaodong. Without the training of the crown prince, let alone defeating the strong with the weak, even in a one-on-one fight, how could they resist the elite troops of Chang'an who have been on the battlefield for a long time?

According to common sense, Chang'an's elite troops should win with fewer troops, but the reality is the opposite.

It should be noted that this was without the use of artillery.

It is true that Xuanwu Gate was heavily guarded, but with 30,000 Shenwu soldiers and artillery, even Tongguan guarded by Li Weigong, Yuchi Jingde, and Cheng Yaojin could not stop it, so how could Xuanwu Gate stop it?

The prince clearly could have taken it, but he didn't do it. Naturally, it was for his greater pursuits.

Therefore, after the Crown Prince learned that Your Majesty was preparing to take action, it is very likely that he would not choose to turn against Your Majesty, but would instead break Your Majesty's plan, maintain the situation, and strengthen himself in order to continue to pressure Your Majesty.

There is a lot of gambling involved here, but for the King of Wei, it is just a gamble. After all, winning or losing at this time makes no difference to the King of Wei.

Li Tai gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, then tell the Crown Prince about this. We can't let that villain Zhinu succeed."

Now Li Tai hated Li Zhi even more than Li Chengqian.

He lost to the prince because he was not as skilled as him.

But when Zhinu picked the peaches, Li Tai felt as if ten thousand ants were crawling on his body and felt uncomfortable all over.

In the past, Zhinu was extremely servile to him, obeying whatever he said and even vowed that she would never compete with him for the position of crown prince and would always follow his lead.

But now, it's just that the villain has succeeded and is extremely rampant.

Think about the collusion with the Turks. Didn't the King of Jin participate in it? It was obvious that he agreed and participated in it.

But afterwards he cleared himself of all blame.

Although the incident with the Western Turks was in the past, when you think about it, my father issued an edict to Li Jing to mobilize troops, but in fact Li Jing had already sent troops to besiege the Western Turks. It is clear that my father had long been aware of the actions of the Western Turks and had secretly gathered troops.

At first, Li Tai thought that it was very likely that his father had got the news from somewhere else, but later he changed his mind and felt that it was most likely Li Zhi who informed on him.

Otherwise, why didn't my father have any doubts about Li Zhi?
During that period, Li Zhi often came to his Prince Wei's mansion.

As for Fang Yiai, Li Tai did not have too many doubts. How could this fool have such thoughts?

Probably after his father learned about the affairs of the Western Turks, he discussed it with Prime Minister Fang, and then Prime Minister Fang forbad him to have too much contact with him.

Although it was just a guess, Li Tai still believed it to be so.

Therefore, no matter what, King Jin must not be allowed to succeed.

After making up his mind, Li Tai discussed with Chai Lingwu how to inform the prince about this matter.

"I'm afraid the prince doesn't believe me."

Li Tai was a little conflicted. He and the prince had always been hostile to each other. If he went to inform the prince at this time, would the prince believe him?

Chai Lingwu said: "The prince has to believe it. Even if he suspects the King of Wei, he will secretly make arrangements to prevent changes."

Li Tai nodded and said, "Okay, then send someone directly to deliver the message to the prince."

In order to prevent the prince from having enough time to react, Li Tai immediately sent someone to the Daming Palace to deliver the message.

soon.

The news reached Li Chengqian.

The letter was very short.

"Your Majesty has learned about the Crown Prince's sneak attack on Liaodong. Please make plans as soon as possible."

After reading the letter, Li Chengqian summoned Du He, Li Yuanchang and Zhao Jie to discuss the matter.

"Everyone, take a look." Li Chengqian threw the letter onto the table. "The King of Wei sent someone to deliver this letter, saying that my father has already known about the hidden troops in Liaodong."

Li Chengqian was not too surprised, as the Liaodong submerged troops were what they had been doing in recent months.

Not only the infiltrating soldiers and generals, but also money, food, weapons and armor.

It is almost impossible to completely conceal the truth.

Both the newly infiltrated soldiers and the 30,000 Shenwu Army in Chang'an require a large amount of money and food for support.

Neither the imperial treasury nor Li Shimin's private treasury could provide money and grain, so naturally Li Chengqian had to find a way to solve the problem himself.

Therefore, transporting money and grain from Liaodong to Luoyang became a necessity.

Li Shimin actually knew about this, but he could not take any action because if he cut it off, it would mean that he was falling out with Li Chengqian.

It is obvious that the current situation is that, openly, Li Shimin does not have the ability to turn against Li Chengqian.

It’s not that Li Chengqian can definitely defeat Li Shimin, but that Taiji Palace cannot defeat Daming Palace.

Of course, as long as Li Shimin left Taiji Palace and called on the whole country to support him, Li Chengqian would be unable to stop him.

But then again, if you can't do it, you can just run away.

As long as Li Chengqian runs to Tongguan and arrives in Luoyang, he will be able to establish his own regime.

Even if Luoyang cannot be defended, we can still return to Liaodong.

If Li Chengqian returned to Liaodong, it would be a big trouble for the Tang Dynasty.

At the beginning, just the eastern expedition to Goryeo was extremely costly, not to mention the expedition to the entire Liaodong. Moreover, the Liaodong guarded by the prince was completely different from the Liaodong of that year.

Even if the Tang Dynasty used all its strength, it could at best be on equal terms with Liaodong.

It was also because of this situation that Li Chengqian had many backup plans and was not too afraid of Li Shimin.

"absurd!"

Li Yuanchang shouted coldly: "Li Tai has always been an enemy of us. Now he suddenly warns us. What is he thinking?"

Li Yuanchang has always disliked this fat man, Prince of Wei Li Tai.

Therefore, they did not believe Li Tai's message at all and thought it was a conspiracy of Li Tai.

Zhao Jie thought for a moment and said, "What the King of Han said is not without reason. The King of Wei has always been hostile to us, so he naturally has bad intentions. There must be something fishy about this message."

"But the things mentioned in this letter are not necessarily all false. After all, there are a large number of soldiers secretly stationed in Chang'an, so it is normal for some to leak out."

"If His Majesty learns of this, it is inevitable that he will take some action."

Du He nodded in agreement with Zhao Jie's words and said, "Brother Zhao is right, but in my opinion, this letter may not be a fraud."

"The Prince of Wei is in a precarious situation now. Your Majesty has a grudge against him because of the Western Turkic issue, and the Prince of Jin has the support of Zhangsun Wuji, so he is already at a disadvantage in the fight for the crown prince position. If Your Majesty really wants to take action against the crown prince at this time, what is Li Tai most afraid of?"

"What he fears is that both the Crown Prince and His Majesty will suffer losses, allowing the Prince of Jin to reap the benefits."

"If the King of Wei wants to break the impasse, he can only keep the situation in chaos. If he really tells the Crown Prince about your majesty's plan, he can use us to contain your majesty. Secondly, if we fight with your majesty, he can wait for an opportunity to act. Although this plan is risky, it may not be unreasonable."

Li Yuanchang sneered: "What a 'maybe not without reason'! Du He, oh Du He, when did you become so naive? Li Tai and the prince have been fighting for so many years, and every time they fought, blood was shed. Now he suddenly extends an olive branch, it's clear that he wants to drag the prince into the quagmire!"

He became more and more excited as he spoke, and the jade pendant on his waist rose and fell with his breathing.

"Besides, the letter only mentioned 'soldiers sneaking into Liaodong', but did not mention the specific number of troops or the location of their deployment. It's clearly a feint to test our reaction!"

Zhao Jie put his hand on his shoulder and said, "Don't worry, King of Han."

Li Yuanchang looked at the prince and said, "The King of Wei knew that the prince and Your Majesty were at loggerheads, but he deliberately sent us such an ambiguous letter in order to throw us off balance!"

At this point, Li Yuanchang's eyes were burning: "Your Highness, now we have a strong army, 30,000 elite soldiers of the Shenwu Army are ready to fight, and there are hundreds of artillery. Since Your Majesty has noticed it, why not take this opportunity to start the rebellion in advance and rush into the Taiji Palace."

Du He interrupted immediately: "You can't do that, King of Han, have you forgotten the prince's grand plan? What we want is to 'clear the court' and make His Majesty abdicate willingly, not to be charged with treason! If we act rashly at this time, won't we give everyone in the world a handle?"

Seeing that they were arguing again, Li Chengqian waved his hand to interrupt everyone.

"Well, the King of Wei sent a letter, proving that this matter is no longer a secret."

"In that case, tell the Divine Might Army to stop hiding and take over the Left and Right Jinwu Guards in Chang'an City."

(End of this chapter)