【New struggle】
Two months have passed in the blink of an eye, and spring has arrived again. On the fourteenth day of the first lunar month in the twelfth year of Xiantong (871), the day before the Lantern Festival, the body of Princess Tongchang was buried.
According to custom, paper people and horses are burned. Although the people and horses are made of paper, the clothing and accessories on them are real, including silks, jewels and jade... each of which is filled with one hundred and twenty carriages.
There is no need to go into detail about the specific scene. Just a small detail and you can use your imagination: after the court ceremony, people competed for the incinerated ashes and picked gold and silver from them. The gold and silver jewelry they grabbed needed to be shipped in large baskets.
Rest in peace. Princess Tongchang was officially buried.
With tears in his eyes, Wei Baoheng looked at the majestic tomb in trance. After burying the princess, his consort was also half buried. I cried for her today, who will cry for me tomorrow?
We can no longer slowly fight a war of attrition. Soldiers need speed, so be quick and move quickly!
"A true man will cut off when he should. If he continues to cut off, there will be trouble in the future!"
This time the opponent is extremely powerful. If you want to win, you must take the enemy by surprise and catch him off guard. You must be fast, accurate, and ruthless. You must kill the enemy with one move and not give him any chance to breathe. Be fast, be fast, be fast! Wei Baoheng, you can’t hesitate any longer!
Wei Baoheng has never been an indecisive person. He is like a turtle waiting for a fish to approach. Once a small fish comes within the attack range of his neck, he can always seize the opportunity and take it down in one go; of course, he is not a person who attaches great importance to emotions. A righteous person.
Because the target of this attack was none other than his former close comrade-Prime Minister Lu Yan.
The two have a lot in common: both are handsome; both are bad.
Before the establishment of the "Baoyan Party", Lu Yan was already able to exert influence in the government. He has a close confidant named Bian Xian. When the magistrate of Zhide County met with Tang Yizong for some reason, he once said, "As long as the property of Bian Xian's family is confiscated, it will be enough to feed the entire army for two years." Tang Yizong was puzzled and asked, "Who is Bian Xian?" He replied : "Lu Yan's cronies." Tang Yizong was furious. How dare you alienate my friendship with Lu Aiqing? The county magistrate was exiled to Aizhou (now Thanh Hoa City, Vietnam).
This small incident is enough to illustrate Lu Yan's status in the court, and also reflects the extent of Lu Yan's corruption. Just one of his subordinates is almost like the greedy Heshen in later generations.
Lu Yan and Wei Baoheng colluded to form the "Baoyan Party", and each wanted to get what they needed. One was the prime minister who monopolized half of the sky in the court, and the other was a popular figure next to the emperor and the new prince-in-law. Two people interact with each other based on benefit, power, and power.
If you use gold to intersect, you will be forgotten if gold is used up; if you intersect with benefits, you will scatter when all the benefits are exhausted; if you intersect with power, if the power goes away, you will fall; if you use power to intersect, if you lose the power, you will abandon it.
Through the first wave of struggles, the power of the "Baoyan Party" began to emerge, and everyone inside and outside the court was frightened. Seeing that the "Baoyan Party" was about to dominate the world with one hand, it would dominate the world.
Just when the struggle was in good shape, internal strife suddenly broke out within the "Baoyan Party", and the "Baoyan Party" suddenly launched a fatal attack on the "Yan Party".
Lu Yan never expected that Wei Baoheng, a young man, would be so bitter, his methods would be so cruel, and his behavior would be so despicable! On the eve of a great victory, they rolled pancakes into croquettes and fired them with artillery. He claimed to be an old man, but he was killed by a cheap young man who betrayed his lust.
The boat of friendship can capsize at any time.
Lu Yan regretted and refused to give in. He firmly believed that he had a chance to turn defeat into victory and avenge his previous humiliation. Because Tang Yizong's physical condition was not very optimistic, his body was in poor condition and he was declining.
"Hmph, when the emperor returns to the west one day, will your kid have a good life? Little kid, just wait for me, and let's see who can outshine the other! If you have the guts, just wait for me!"
In April, Luyan was demoted to be the military envoy of Xichuan. It’s not that bad. If you haven’t gone to Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Chengdu, why don’t you go there? They just finished the war and they need talents like you.
When Lu Yan left the city and hit the road, the citizens of Chang'an began to hit him with broken bricks and small stones (it seemed that fruits, vegetables, eggs, etc. were not enough to satisfy their hatred).
Just because he had hope for the future, Lu Yan could still maintain his celebrity demeanor and humor. He was applauded by Banerzhuan, and he even said to the temporary mayor (Kwon Kyung-soo Yoon) beside him, Xue Neng: "Before I leave, And the common people gave me bricks to bid farewell to me! (Before leaving, I was given rubble to bid farewell)."
Xue Neng is an official promoted by Lu Yan. At this time, Xue Neng told Lu Yan with practical actions what it means to lose power when power is lost and give up when power is lost: Xue Neng slowly raised the wat board and said respectfully: "In accordance with relevant laws and regulations and current rules and regulations, the prime minister Traveling without the protection of armed police and public security.”
Lu Yan smiled bitterly and cursed in his heart, "Villain, villain, a complete villain! Okay, okay, okay. Xue Neng, just wait for me. I can lift you up or throw you down." Die. Just wait for me!"
Lu Yan went to Xichuan bitterly, waiting to see the light of day again and take revenge.
After killing Lu Yan, Wei Baoheng achieved a staged victory and eliminated the biggest hidden danger in the revolutionary ranks, and he did so without leakage. To be honest, Wei Baoheng was really not very sure about overthrowing the once powerful Lu Yan. Three points depended on strength and seven points depended on luck.
The huge gamble in this political struggle fueled Wei Baoheng's arrogance. No one in the court could restrain his clutches anymore, and he began to carry out purges more unscrupulously, and soon created two major unjust cases in the late Tang Dynasty - the Yu Cong case and the Wei Yinyu case.
【Yu Cong Case】
In February of the second year after Lu Yan was removed (the 13th year of Xiantong, 872), he was demoted to Deputy Minister of Defense (Secretary of the Ministry of War) and Prime Minister Yu Cong, and became the military envoy of Shannan East Road.
In May, he demoted Yu Cong to the position of Puwang's teacher and worked in Luoyang, the eastern capital (Puwangfu, branch of the Eastern Capital). At this point, Yu Cong changed from taking a back seat to standing on the sidelines, losing all real power.
Do you still remember Wei Baoheng’s worries when Princess Tongchang first died? He was worried that he would lose power due to the death of the princess. The Yu Cong he is framing now is a fallen prince-in-law.
Yu Cong married Princess Guangde, the fourth daughter of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty and the sister of the current emperor Yizong of the Tang Dynasty. In other words, Yu Cong is the brother-in-law of Yizong of Tang Dynasty, the uncle of Princess Tongchang, and the aunt-in-law of Wei Baoheng, while Wei Baoheng is Yu Cong's wife and nephew-in-law.
The essence of the "Yu Cong Case" is that the wife's nephew-in-law framed her aunt-in-law's father-in-law... Simple, right?
They are both princes-in-law, but there is still a huge gap between them as people.
Yu Cong was appointed prime minister in the eighth year of Xiantong (867). He was a man of great backbone and integrity. Just because he despised Wei Baoheng for relying on favors and manipulating power, and was unwilling to follow others' influence, let alone collude with him, he was ostracized, deprived of all real power, and demoted from the capital.
Demoting Yu Cong from the capital was just the beginning of the "Yu Cong case", and the climax came next:
On May 12, Li Dang, Wang Jie, Li Du, Zhang Fen, Feng Yanqing and Yang Shu were demoted;
On May 14, Yan Qi, Li Kuang, Zhang Duo, Li Jingzhong, Xiao Yu, Li Du, Zheng Yante, and Li Zao were demoted. The Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of War, the Ministry of Personnel, the Generals of the Guards... the fourth-rank officials were all moved to Dongting Lake and Lingnan. They have a common crime - having close contacts with Yu Cong.
Those who were judged as "Yu Cong's followers" and were implicated were not the only ones:
On May 15, he demoted Pinglu Jiedu envoy Yu Xuan to the position of chief historian of Liang Palace; demoted Hunan observer envoy Yu Gui to serve as governor of Yuanzhou (now Yichun City, Jiangxi Province).
Yu Xuan and Yu Gui are both Yu Cong's brothers, so of course they must be counted as "Yu Cong's party members".
After cutting off "Yu Cong's gang members", Wei Baoheng made up for the remaining blood of Yu Cong, and then demoted him to the governor of Shaozhou (now Shaoguan City, Guangdong Province). From Guangdong and Guangxi, another one has gone.
While ostracizing and suppressing Yu Cong, Wei Baoheng also cleverly seized another opportunity and used it as a breakthrough to launch another political conspiracy and created the "Wei Yinyu Case".
