Three Kingdoms: I am not Liu Bian

Chapter 40: Traitors must be eliminated at any time! (Happy New Year's Eve everyone!)
This grand court meeting was nominally a court meeting, but in reality it was Liu Bian's one-man show.

The prince was very angry and the consequences were serious.

The officials and scholars were also very angry. A bunch of peasants and beggars came to our capital Luoyang and dared to rebel?

If the peasants rebel, won't they just chop off the heads of these wealthy families, steal their property, and sleep with their wives and daughters?

How can this work!

It has always been the case that only our wealthy and powerful families can chop off the heads of peasants, rob their land, and sleep with their wives and daughters!
Isn’t this the opposite of Tiangang?
Traitors must be eliminated at any time!
All the officials, regardless of faction, united together as never before and took the initiative to donate grain and money to Mr. Liu in the hope that Mr. Liu would send troops to suppress the bandits!

Liu Bian also announced the punishment for Tang Zhou and Ma Yuanyi.

After Tang Zhou was captured by Zhu Gongdao and Bao Chu, he confessed to Jia Xu all the information he knew without being tortured, including the list of leaders of various parties, many matters related to the uprising, and even the approximate whereabouts of Zhang Jue.

Because Tang Zhou cooperated and indeed handed over a lot of important information, Liu Bian not only temporarily spared his death penalty, but also gave Tang Zhou the identity of the first person to report the incident, establishing Tang Zhou as a "loyal and righteous man" who was moved by the prince's benevolence and took the initiative to report the Taiping Dao's rebellion.

It’s not that Liu Bian is so kind, but because Tang Zhou’s identity makes him qualified to live.

As one of Zhang Jiao's first disciples, Luoyang Fang's deputy commander chose to surrender to the Han court.

Liu Bian wanted to keep villains like Tang Zhou alive. He wanted to disgust Zhang Jue and let the world see how "united" the Taiping Dao was.

As for Ma Yuanyi, alas, he was a stubborn and unrepentant person. Liu Bian ordered him to be taken to Caishikou.

Several jailers roughly put Ma Yuanyi onto the prison van. The van moved slowly forward, and the wheels made dull creaking sounds as they passed over the road, each sound seemed to announce his fate.

Along the way, the sound of gongs was deafening, and the jailers shouted at the top of their lungs: "The Taiping Dao traitor Ma Yuanyi is plotting rebellion, his crime is unforgivable!"

People on the street rushed in and blocked the road.

Some people looked terrified, some were curious, and some people who had received favors from the Taiping Dao had a trace of pity in their eyes, but under the angry gazes around them, they could only bury their sympathy deep in their hearts.

Although there were many people in Luoyang who believed in Taiping Dao, most of the people who could settle down in Luoyang were rich farmers who lived a stable life and did not have to worry about food and clothing.

They believed in Taiping Dao just to seek peace of mind, just like praying to God and ancestors during the New Year to bless their family with prosperity and a good harvest in the coming year.

But if you let them not live this peaceful life but join the Taiping Dao in rebellion, then these believers will turn around and denounce the Taiping Dao.

I just pray for the blessing of your great god in heaven. I have offered incense and sacrifices. What's the matter? Do you want me to spend all my money to fight with you?

Naturally, everyone will condemn the traitors and bandits who disrupt their peaceful lives.

As the prison van circled the city and arrived at Caishikou, it was already filled with dense crowds of people. Shouting and cursing were heard everywhere, and people kept throwing stones at the prison van.

Ma Yuanyi was dragged out of the prison van and pressed on the dusty ground. His hair was disheveled and his face was covered in dirt, and he looked very miserable.

He looked around at the people watching around him. Ma Yuanyi couldn't understand why these people who usually respected him so much and praised him as a "virtuous teacher" would look at him with such indignation.

"Why?" Ma Yuanyi wanted to question the people around him, but unfortunately, Jia Xu had already ordered his tongue to be pulled out to prevent Ma Yuanyi from saying anything treasonous before his death.

He could only watch helplessly as the jailers came forward and put his limbs and neck into strong rope loops, and the other ends of the ropes were tied to five strong horses.

Torn to pieces!

Or a more vivid way of saying it is, being torn apart by five horses!

There is no doubt that this cruel death penalty will cause the victim to suffer great pain before death.

This method of execution also made Ma Yuanyi, who had suffered all kinds of torture but never confessed his accomplices, show fear in his eyes for the first time. He whimpered incoherently and twisted his body desperately to try to break free from the ropes, but it was all in vain.

Jia Xu, who was entrusted by the prince with the important task of supervising the execution, was dressed in a civil official's robe. His face was as gloomy as water, and he stared at Ma Yuanyi coldly.

He is now full of vigor and ambition. Who in the whole city of Luoyang doesn’t know him, Jia Wenhe?
Of course, most of them are bad reputations.

Jia Xu arrested thousands of people overnight, and no less than two or three hundred people were beaten and killed for resisting during the arrests. He was notorious for his cruelty, enough to cure a child's night cry.

At the court meeting, the prince dismissed He Jin from his post as the governor of Henan on the grounds that "the General of Chariots and Cavalry failed to supervise properly, allowing the Taiping Dao rebels to hide under his elbows." He then appointed Jia Xu as the governor of Henan with the rank of two thousand stones because he uncovered the Taiping Dao rebellion!

Now he has truly soared to the sky!

Moreover, the prince did not take back the imperial sword, which meant that the prince did not take back the power of life and death given to him. As the governor of Henan, he still had the power to execute first and report later.

Jia Xu was grateful for the prince's trust in him. He held the execution order tightly in his hand and his eyes stayed on Ma Yuanyi for a moment. Seeing that the time had come, he waved his arm and threw the order.

The moment the command arrow landed, five cavalrymen raised their whips at the same time and whipped the horses' buttocks hard.

The horse felt pain and let out a high-pitched neigh, raising its front hooves high, then galloping madly in five different directions.

The enormous force instantly pulled Ma Yuanyi's body up, and his screams were sharp and shrill, reaching the ears of every onlooker.

Immediately afterwards, a creepy tearing sound was heard.

Blood flew and splattered everywhere.

A living person was reduced to a few broken limbs in just a moment, dragged behind the horse, leaving a long trail of blood on the ground as the horse galloped.

Everyone was shocked by the bloody and cruel scene. Even those who were used to seeing executions in Caishikou couldn't help but gasp and felt fear from the bottom of their hearts.

Some children who had secretly come to watch without their families' knowledge were now terrified, their faces pale and their cries wailing as they desperately tried to squeeze out of the crowd. This bloody scene, which would terrify even adults, would probably become a nightmare that would last a lifetime for these children.

Afterwards, Liu Bian formally issued an edict, declaring the Taiping Dao to be a "leftist" sect, and that Taiping Dao sacrifices were obscene. He also declared the Taiping Dao leader Zhang Jiao to be a rebel, and issued arrest warrants for the Taiping Dao high-ranking officials and leaders of all parties, offering a large reward. However, anyone who sheltered them would be charged with treason!

(End of this chapter)