Destroy Jin and conquer Song, and carry the Northern Expedition through to the end

Chapter 328 The Prime Minister in the Future is Even More Formidable

According to historical records, the meeting between Liu Dalang and Yu Sheren was truly a meeting of golden wind and jade dew, better than countless things in the world. The two sides felt sorry for meeting each other too late, shared their ambitions, vowed to restore the Han Dynasty, and then the wheel of history rolled forward.

But in fact, when the two met for the first time, one of them had come from a long journey and was exhausted; the other had been chased by the Jin army for a long time and was in a miserable state.

In the winter, white steam was rising from both of their bodies, and the smell of sweat mixed with the smell of horse manure was indescribably strange.

But neither Liu Huai nor Yu Yunwen cared.

Liu Huai first looked Yu Yunwen up and down.

This man was about fifty years old, with a square mouth, big ears, a round face, and a long beard flowing under his chin, which was even thicker than that of his father Wei Sheng.

Judging from his facial features, Yu Yunwen was not a thin and majestic person. He had a smile on his face when he spoke, which made people feel like spring breeze.

Just like Di Renjie played by Liang Guanhua, rather than being the future prime minister recognized by the Song court as having great potential as described by Ye Yiwen, he is more like an uncle next door who is a good cook.

After a rather impolite look, Liu Huai also shook Yu Yunwen's hands and said sincerely, "With such an important official as Yu Sheren here, Jiangnan is safe. By the way, Lord Ye asked me to say hello to Yu Sheren."

Yu Yunwen's smile remained unchanged, but his eyes narrowed. "General, are you here to support us on the orders of Lord Ye?"

This actually refers to Liu Huai's faction.

Moreover, the pro-war faction in the Southern Song Dynasty fell into decline after Yue Fei was unjustly killed in the 12th year of Shaoxing. Later, when Qin Hui took control of the government, he suppressed the pro-war faction like dirt.

The relationship between Zhao Gou and Qin Hui, a pair of bastards, is also very interesting. Although both of them advocated submitting to the Jin Dynasty, their starting points were different.

Zhao Gou was completely terrified. His family, country, parents, siblings, and name in history were all inferior to his comfortable life. For the sake of comfort, Zhao Gou would sell out everything he could.

Qin Hui was a pure capitulationist, relying on military pressure from the Jin to maintain his position as prime minister in the Song. Otherwise, with people like Zhao Ding around, why would he, Qin Changjiao, be prime minister? Therefore, he needed Zhao Gou's cooperation to suppress the pro-war faction.

When persecuting the pro-war faction, Zhao Gou and Qin Hui hit it off, but after they settled down, their relationship became another matter.

The rumor that Zhao Gou hid a knife in his boots when he met Qin Hui was not groundless.

At that time, the court was almost entirely filled with Qin Hui's followers. After Qin Hui's death, in order to clean up the court, Zhao Gou appointed a group of officials who had been suppressed by Qin Hui, such as Tang Pengju and Ye Yiwen, the sworn enemy, Zhang Jun, who was reinstated as prime minister but then dismissed, Yu Yunwen, and Lu You, who was currently in Zhenjiang Prefecture.

This does not mean that Zhao Gou will activate the pro-war faction.

Who made the people suppressed by Qin Hui and the pro-war factions highly overlap?

Seeing the situation in the court, the peace faction, a group of insects, would never remain loyal to a dead man like Qin Hui. They slid down on their knees and pledged their loyalty to Zhao Gou.

The representative figure is Tang Situi.

Zhao Gou's attitude became ambiguous again. He allowed the pro-war and pro-peace factions to fight each other, while he wanted to be a holy emperor who ruled the country without doing anything.

If it weren't for the fact that Jin Guotai didn't give face, sending envoys to celebrate the New Year every year to point at Zhao Gou's nose and scold him, and now he directly went south to attack the Song Dynasty, it is possible that this situation would have continued.

But by doing this, Wanyan Liang instantly gave the pro-war faction a handle to attack the pro-peace faction.

You talk about peace every day, but does your father Jin Guo give you any face?
At this juncture, Zhao Gou no longer dared to rely on the peace faction to cause trouble.

Apart from anything else, the leader of the peace faction, Tang Situi, as prime minister, was still ordering his confidants Wang Zhiwang and Long Dayuan to dismantle armaments and refrain from provoking border conflicts in July this year. This was really outrageous.

After Tang Shitui was completely demoted, the victory of the war faction came so suddenly.

What happens then?

Of course there will be internal fighting. Not to mention the powerful enemy, there will be internal fighting even if we die!
The fact that Ye Yiwen, the Privy Councilor who knew nothing about military affairs, was pushed to the Lianghuai area where the fighting situation was the worst was itself part of the internal strife.

Although the pro-war faction was gradually divided into factions, Yu Yunwen was very special, or it could be said that the Shu literati represented by Yu Yunwen were very special. Since the Northern Song Dynasty, the Shu literati had formed their own faction.

However, when Qin Hui was in power, he had been suppressing the literati and officials in Shu very thoroughly, resulting in this faction having almost no high-ranking officials. Although the former leader Zhao Kui recommended some talents in recent years, it was ultimately too hasty and the foundation was insufficient.

A clear example is Zhang Jun, theoretically the leader of the Shu literati. He was reinstated after Qin Hui's death, but was quickly suppressed for his advocacy of war. This was precisely due to the lack of power among the Shu literati. Otherwise, what was the point of being a prime minister? Someone who could be summoned and dismissed at will?

Although Yu Yunwen was theoretically in the same faction as Ye Yiwen, he was already the Secretary of the Central Secretariat at that time. He would be sent out for two years to take charge of military and political affairs, and would be appointed as prime minister after his return.

How could I become someone else's faction's lackey? No one else would dare to use me!

Yu Yunwen himself is the future leader of the literati in Shu!
From a certain perspective, Ye Yiwen and Yu Yunwen were more like political allies.

As a member of the pro-war faction, Yu Yunwen traveled around the world, watched the ups and downs of officialdom, and had a clear understanding of the situation in Tai Nai long ago.

When did the war faction begin to suffer complete defeat?

It wasn't when Zhao Ding committed suicide! It wasn't when Zhang Jun was demoted! It was when Yue Fei was unjustly killed!
As a faction whose political goal was to recover the Central Plains, it completely lost the ability to defeat the Jin army.

Without this ability, no matter how much the war hawks boasted about abandoning the Central Plains and the two rivers a hundred times, attacking Huanglong a thousand times, and recovering the old capital ten thousand times, it was ultimately just an illusion.

Therefore, today when the pro-war faction has won a complete victory in the court, the generals who can defeat the Jin army will be the focus of everyone's efforts to win over.

Ye Yiwen was only vaguely aware of this, but Yu Yunwen not only figured it out, but even made preparations for both situations as soon as he saw the Huaixi army's collapse.

The first is to win over military leaders and make political promises to them.

The second is that Yu Yunwen himself wants to be a famous general who defeats the Jin army!
After hearing Liu Huai claim to be the Shandong Volunteer Army, and considering the fierce murderous aura and neatly-arranged weapons on these armored cavalry, Yu Yunwen quickly realized that these must be elite troops who had fought several tough battles with the Jin bandits in Shandong.

We should win him over at all costs.

In response to Yu Yunwen's question, Liu Huai pulled out a waist badge and a letter from the inside of his breastplate. "It's not just Lord Ye. General Liu Qi has also issued a military order appointing me as the commander-in-chief of the Hezhou cavalry and infantry. However, before leaving, Lord Ye has instructed me to take the waist badge and find Yu Sheren. I want to work together with Yu Sheren to protect the Song Dynasty."

Liu Huai's words had already made his stance clear: he wasn't Ye Yiwen's close friend, but at most a political ally. He came to Caishiji to fight in obedience to the overall strategy, but he wasn't sent by Ye Yiwen.

Yu Yunwen took the document with the imperial seal, then picked up Ye Yiwen's personal waist badge and found that it was indeed engraved with his signature. He nodded immediately and said, "If that is true, then I am just a simple scholar and cannot handle such a heavy responsibility. I will have to rely on General Liu for the rest of the matter."

"Yu Sheren is too polite. I am a subordinate at home. You can just call me Da Lang." Liu Huai said with a smile. After thinking for a moment, he said, "Although Yu Sheren is not your husband now, he will be your husband in the future. I am just a warrior. I am good at killing enemies in battle, but I cannot coordinate the overall situation. I have to rely on Yu Sheren for his high-level guidance."

Yu Yunwen was overjoyed, and his chubby face looked like a chrysanthemum blooming.

Yu Yunwen's meaning is very simple, that is, he knows that he is not good at military command, so he only talks about political strategy and will not interfere in military decision-making, and will entrust the war to Liu Huai.
Liu Huai returned the favor by directly pushing Yu Yunwen to the position of commander-in-chief. If they lost the upcoming Battle of Cai Shi, there would be nothing to say and they would just die for their country; if they won, Yu Yunwen would have gained political capital for saving the country in times of crisis and turning the tide.

Of course, Liu Huai also has his own considerations on this.

Liu Huai had a military status in the State of Song at this time, because as long as he had soldiers, he would be a king. He had 5,000 elite soldiers who had fought in the bloody battle in Shandong, which was enough to make any military strategist dare not underestimate him.

But Liu Huai's political status in Song State was almost non-existent.

This led to the fact that even if the Shandong rebels fought a bloody battle with the Jin army in Cai Shi, the Song court would not care.

Merit, merit that can be reported, and merit that is recognized after being reported are two completely different things.

Instead of doing this, it would be better to give this political capital to Yu Yunwen, and get rewards from him after the two sides form a political alliance.

Putting aside other things, at least Yu Yunwen was almost the most reliable person in the State of Song that Liu Huai could rely on at that time.

"Then I'll be bold and call you Liu Dalang." Yu Yunwen said with a smile, "What do you think of the current situation, Dalang?"

Liu Huai was about to speak when he saw Zhang Baiyu and others coming over with the bound prisoners.

"Yu Sheren, let's first interrogate the military situation."

Shi Jun, who had been listening like a fool for a long time, suddenly perked up and looked at the captives with a grin, like a wolf that had been hungry for three days looking at a fat lamb.

This guy listened for a long time, but didn't realize that Yu Yunwen and Liu Huai had reached a temporary political alliance with just a few words. He just felt that the two of them spent a little too long exchanging greetings.

(End of this chapter)