Three Kingdoms: I am not Liu Bian

Chapter 349 Burning the Wax Valley, Pacifying the Southern Regions

On the western battlefield of Nanzhong, General Jia Cong, after defeating the allied forces of the Nanzhong kings in Yuexi County, did not linger. He ordered Right Sima Huang Zu to lead 1,500 Cong soldiers and 3,000 Yizhou troops to continue to wipe out the stubborn remnants of the Yuexi barbarians within the territory.

Meanwhile, Jia Cong himself led the remaining two thousand elite Cong soldiers and six thousand Yizhou soldiers, totaling eight thousand troops, to rush south to aid General Zhao Wen, who was fighting a bitter battle in the middle of the road.

Before leaving, Jia Cong only left Huang Zu with the four words "act as you see fit," without any other instructions.

Huang Zu came from the Jiangxia Huang clan and had a long career in officialdom. He had also participated in military operations to suppress the Wuling barbarians in Wuling County, so he naturally understood the meaning behind the phrase "acting expediently".

In case of an emergency, Huang Zu only needed to submit a report: The Yuexi barbarians put up a stubborn resistance, even setting fire to the forest in an attempt to perish with the heavenly soldiers and jade, but unexpectedly the wind direction changed suddenly, and the raging fire backfired, engulfing the settlements of the Yuexi barbarians and even extending into the jungle, turning it into a scorched earth.

After all, what the imperial court wanted were the gold, silver, copper, iron, cinnabar, lacquer, and oxen and packhorses from the four southern prefectures, not this dense forest that was difficult to develop and utilize. Therefore, no one would hold Huang Zu accountable for his crimes. Instead, the Yuexi barbarians who died in the fire would be included in the merits of the war.

As for the eastern battlefield, General Yan Yan, who was the first to achieve victory, encountered fierce resistance in the subsequent military operation to wipe out the remaining bandits in Zangke County, which hindered the progress and resulted in considerable losses for his troops.

Eight thousand soldiers set out on the expedition, but after the Zangke Commandery was initially pacified, a headcount revealed that only five thousand five hundred remained, including the lightly and seriously wounded, a reduction of nearly thirty percent.

Yan Yan left the seriously wounded and some soldiers in good condition to Liu Chong, the governor of Zangke, and instructed him to guard the rear. He then led 1,500 Cong people and 2,500 Yizhou soldiers, a total of 4,000 soldiers, westward and marched to Yizhou.

Communication was difficult in the south. Although Jia Cong of the Western Route Army and Yan Yan of the Eastern Route Army were moving toward the Central Route Army as planned, no one knew the perilous situation that Zhao Wen's troops were facing.

The central route troops suffered more than half their losses. Even the commander-in-chief, Zhao Wen, was hit by three arrows and two swords. Fortunately, his armor was sturdy, but his movements were somewhat inconvenient. This shows just how dangerous the battle was.

If it weren't for the fact that a defensive line had been built along the Tu River beforehand, with strong fortifications and ample bows and arrows, and that the actual commander, Zhang, the Left Sima of the General of the West, remained calm and composed in the face of danger, and commanded with composure, they would not have been able to hold out against the fierce attack of a rebel army five times their size without collapsing.

Then, Yan Yan's troops on the eastern route were the first to break into the territory of Yizhou Commandery. Under the guidance of Han Chinese guides from Zangzang Commandery, his troops cut from Louwo County in western Zangke into Tonglao County in eastern Yizhou Commandery. They crossed the Wen River and, with the guidance of former officials of Jing Yi, the former governor of Yizhou Commandery who had been killed by the rebels, advanced rapidly along the shore of Dianchi Lake. They launched a surprise attack on Dianchi County, the commandery seat with its troops under sparsely armed, and captured the city in one fell swoop, taking Yong Kai, the son of the rebel leader Yong Zhou, prisoner alive.

Yan Yan naturally felt immense hatred for this villain who instigated the war, murdered the Prefect of Yizhou, the Clerk of Household Affairs, and more than sixty accompanying officials and guards, and even led his troops to surround and kill Jing Yi, the Prefect of Yizhou.

After the persecution of the Party, Jing Yi was reinstated as the magistrate of Wudu. He was an honest and upright official who was deeply loved by the people. Due to his political achievements, he was promoted to the governor of Yizhou. When he was about to leave Wudu, the "people" wept bitterly and saw him off. More than 700 "people" accompanied him to Ju (east of present-day Lueyang, Shaanxi), and more than 300 "people" accompanied him all the way to Baishui (present-day Baishui Town, Qingchuan County, Sichuan) before bidding him a tearful farewell.

It's unclear how these "commoners" obtained travel permits for traveling more than 600 li from their hometowns, how they ensured food and drink along the way, and how Jingyi could bear to let these "commoners" take him 1,200 li round trip.

Although Jing Yi also coveted empty fame and even mobilized his family to promote himself, during his tenure as governor of Yizhou, he reduced the burden on the people, restored production, and stabilized social order. The price of one shi of rice had fallen to about eighty coins before the Yellow Turban Rebellion, which was a real achievement.

However, Yan Yan did not execute Yong Kai on the spot. Instead, he kept him under strict guard, preparing to present him as a captive to the emperor at the Imperial Ancestral Temple, where he would be publicly executed and offered as a sacrifice to the past emperors of the Han Dynasty. News of the emergency at the rear, the fall of Dianchi Lake, and the capture of his beloved son arrived one after another. When the news reached the rebel army, the morale of Yong Zhou's troops was thrown into chaos, and they hurriedly returned to rescue him.

The central government troops had been holding out for months and were seething with anger. Zhang Ze immediately led his remaining 3,000 troops out in full force to pursue the rebels and decisively defeated the 5,000 rebels responsible for covering the rear.

However, Yong Zhou's main force, which had retreated hastily, failed to return to reinforce the enemy and instead ran into Jia Cong's western army on its way.

Jia Cong led his troops in a counterattack, driving the main force of the enemy all the way into a valley that the local people called "La Valley".

Lagu is the site of an ancient Yi tribe. The Han people who migrated here called it "Nanshan" because it was located on the south bank of the Tu River. Later, in order to distinguish it from another mountain, it was called "Nanshan Lagu".

Lagu has only one narrow road, making it difficult to deploy troops. It can be described as a dangerous place where one man can hold off ten thousand.

Jia Cong and Zhang Ze, who arrived just in time, joined forces and immediately sealed off the valley entrance with earth, wood, and rocks, and then ambushed two thousand archers on the mountains on both sides.

Then, soldiers stood on the mountain ridges on both sides and threw countless earthenware pots filled with oil into the valley. Rockets followed and instantly ignited towering flames. The entire La Valley was instantly transformed into a fiery inferno, burning La Valley and the rebel army to ashes, and Yizhou County was recovered.

After a two-week rest, Jia Cong led his troops into Yongchang County.

The number of tribes in Yongchang Commandery was much greater than that in Yuexi Commandery, Yizhou Commandery, and Zangke Commandery, including tribes such as Chuanxiong, Dan'er, Xiyue, Jiuliao, and Guanpu. However, this was a deliberate arrangement by the Han court.

In the twelfth year of Emperor Xiaoming's Yongping reign, King Xianli Liumao of Ailao sent his son Huli and his subordinate tribes' "kings" to the capital Luoyang to request submission. They led seventy-seven vassal states, more than 50,000 households, and more than 550,000 people to submit to the Han Dynasty. The court established Yongchang Prefecture in that area.

In the first year of Emperor Xiaozhang's reign (1642), King Leilao of Ailao rebelled against the Han dynasty.

Then Emperor Xiaozhang dispatched a total of 9,000 troops, including Yuejun, Yizhou, Yongchang Yi, and Han soldiers, to attack. Lu Cheng and others from Kunming Yi in Xielong County volunteered and led their people and troops from various prefectures to attack Leilao in Bonan. They defeated Leilao, the king of Ailao, and killed him. His head was sent to Luoyang.

Then the court divided the tribes in Yongchang County, supported the smaller tribes to break away from the larger ones, and instigated conflicts between the tribes, constantly causing them to bleed each other dry. As a result, the coalition forces that have now been formed are riddled with internal contradictions and are unable to muster a force strong enough to resist the Han army.

On May 29th of the second year of the Han Dynasty, the Han army recovered the entire territory of Yongchang Commandery. The Shan Kingdom, established by the former people of Ailao, sent envoys across the Nu River to enter the country to congratulate the Han army on its great victory. Thus, this eight-month-long campaign in the south officially came to an end, and all that was needed was for the court to send officials to take over.

When news of the victory arrived from Yizhou, Empress Dowager He, who was ruling from Luoyang, immediately ordered Chen Lin, the Vice Minister of the Imperial Household Department, to widely distribute official reports, spreading the news of the court's suppression of the rebellion in the four southern prefectures to all directions, to demonstrate the court's unparalleled bravery and its invincibility in every battle.

(End of this chapter)