Zhang Xi was summoned to Youjiangkou by Liu Bei and participated in an important military meeting.
This military meeting was not discussing military operations, but a private matter of the Lord's family.
Jiangdong sent envoys, saying that they heard that Liu Bei didn't have a wife yet, so he wanted to marry Liu Bei and came to test Liu Bei's intentions.
Obviously, in the eyes of Zhuge Liang and Pang Tong, this was a signal that Jiangdong was preparing to marry Liu Bei.
Marriage is not a matter of unilateral consent. All these must be communicated in advance. Only when both parties are willing, will someone be sent to mediate and go through the process.
Otherwise, one party would rashly send a matchmaker to negotiate, but the other party would directly refuse. Wouldn't that be very embarrassing? !
Therefore, the envoy sent by Jiangdong was just here to check things out. They only said that they were getting married, and they didn't even say who the marriage partner was.
But it doesn’t matter if you don’t say it, everyone is smart and can guess who it is.
Sun Quan and Liu Bei are both lords of the same party. If they want to get married, or if Liu Bei does not have a wife, it must be Sun Quan who marries a relative, otherwise it cannot be called a marriage.
As for Sun Quan, the only one of his generation who is not married yet is Sun Shangxiang.
Sun Ce did have three daughters. The eldest daughter married Lu Xun, and the remaining two daughters were indeed of marriageable age. But if Sun Ce's daughter came to marry, the hierarchy would be completely messed up, and Liu Bei would become Sun Quan's nephew. son in law.
You know, if you really count them by age, Liu Bei and Sun Jian are actually of the same generation, and Sun Quan is also a junior, but they are both princes, so they barely evened out the relationship.
Therefore, it is impossible for Sun Quan to marry his niece. This is not a marriage, but a provocation to the relationship between the two families.
As for marrying Da Qiao or Mrs. Xu, unless Sun Quan is mentally retarded.
Therefore, as long as both parties have the intention to marry, Sun Quan has only one choice, and that is his biological sister, Sun Shangxiang.
Liu Bei, Zhuge Liang and others were discussing the pros and cons of Sun Shangxiang's marriage.
Marrying a real wife is a big deal, not just a matter of Liu Bei's multiple wives.
Especially since this head wife is from Jiangdong, she represents the interests of Jiangdong and is related to the alliance between the two families and the future development route.
Liu Bei originally refused.
Although he does not have a wife, he does have a concubine named Mrs. Gan.
The only pity is that Mrs. Gan is a singer. With this status, it is okay to be a concubine, but she will be ridiculed and looked down upon by the world, especially the wealthy family.
This is the reason why Liu Bei never straightened Mrs. Gan.
At this point, Liu Bei is indeed inferior to Cao Cao.
Cao Cao's Mrs. Bian was also an actress, but she was also appointed as the first wife by Cao Cao.
However, Mrs. Bian had been ridiculed by the wealthy family all her life. Even later, she was even told to her face by her granddaughter-in-law, the Yu family, that the Cao family liked bitches and the country would be destroyed sooner or later because of this.
So, when Liu Bei did this, he really couldn't tell whether he despised Mrs. Gan or loved Mrs. Gan.
Because Zhang Xi's little wings flapped one by one, Mrs. Gan did not die of illness at the end of last year and is now living well, so Liu Bei himself did not have much intention to marry a real wife.
But the current problem is that whether Liu Bei marries a real wife is no longer Liu Bei's family matter.
After all, it was Jiang Dong who brought up this matter first.
Although Liu Bei's power has developed significantly now, it is still not as good as Jiangdong's power, so Liu Bei needs a stable development environment.
And deepening the relationship with Jiangdong is obviously more in line with the interests of the current Liu Bei Group.
Therefore, Pang Tong and Zhuge Liang rarely unified their opinions this time and supported Liu Bei in marrying Jiangdong's official wife.
It was Xu Shu who raised objections.
It was not that he was opposed to Liu Bei marrying a wife, but he felt that Jiangdong's purpose was impure and might just be using the excuse of deepening the alliance to force Liu Bei's group to make concessions to Jingzhou's land.
One is the mouth of Youjiang River in Nanjun, and the other is part of the county town of Changsha County, both of which may be Jiangdong's purpose.
Furthermore, in the long run, Liu Bei will definitely find a way to develop westward and enter Xichuan to expand his foothold. As for Jiangdong, if they were asked to develop north and face Cao Cao's pressure alone, they would definitely not agree, so sooner or later they would set their sights on Yizhou.
The current Liu Bei Group and Jiangdong Group almost equally share the Yangtze River natural barrier, with Liu Bei Group occupying the upper reaches and Jiangdong Group occupying the lower reaches.
If the Jiangdong Group wants to enter Bashu, it must pass through Liu Bei's territory. Once the two parties are related by marriage, do you think we will agree or not? !
You can't fight with your own people over someone else's territory, right? !
Therefore, it is better not to get married, as this will save you trouble in the future.
When Liu Bei saw that this was not a problem, the spring plowing had just ended, and the prefects and county magistrates from all over the country were coming to Wuling to report on the spring plowing situation. He simply used this excuse to gather the civil and military officials together and discuss it together.
Of course, Jiangxia's Guan Yu cannot move lightly. Just in case, let Zhang Xi come over.
Therefore, this military meeting was really not just a few counselors discussing behind closed doors, but civil and military officials including Zhang Fei, Zhao Yun, Mi Zhu, Jian Yong, Chen Zhen, etc. all came.
Even Kou Feng, as the Changsha garrison, officially attended such a high-level military meeting for the first time. He was so happy for this Erha that he didn't realize that his brother was looking at him with a very vicious look.
This Kou Erha, the rumors he spread last time are not over yet! ! !
Let’s talk about it after the meeting.
As for Zhang Xi, after listening to Liu Bei's military agenda, he also fell into deep thought.
Do you want to agree to the marriage? !
Theoretically speaking, the advantages of marrying Jiangdong at this time outweigh the disadvantages.
Zhuge Liang and Pang Tong were right. Liu Bei needed a stable development opportunity. Marriage was good for consolidating the alliance, and just having multiple women would not have much impact on the power of Liu Bei's group.
As for the thing that Xu Shu is worried about, it is not important at all. Those who are warlords these days have a thinner skin than others. There are many excuses to make. They will not have to lend a passage to Jiangdong Army just because of a marriage. .
But emotionally Sun Shangxiang was not happy to marry his lord Liu Bei, so he ran away from the marriage.
After getting in touch with him during this period of time, I realized that although Sun Shangxiang was a little emotional at times and liked to draw his sword at every turn, he was really not a bad person.
Moreover, Zhang Xi's purpose of approaching her may not be pure, but she really regards Zhang Xi as a friend.
Zhang Xi was very troubled by this.
As for the reactions of Liu Beijun's other generals, they were somewhat different.
Zhao Yun and Zhang Fei both thought it didn't matter, since they were just Liu Bei's multiple wives, and they couldn't interfere in military affairs.
Civil servants would have more considerations. For example, Mi Zhu said that if he could get married to Jiangdong, then Liu Bei Group's tentacles might be able to enter Jiangdong. Of course, Mi Zhu considered this issue from a business perspective.
However, Chen Zhen, Jian Yong and others expressed their opposition.
He is not afraid that his master will have multiple women, but he is afraid that Jiangdong will take this opportunity to interfere in Jingzhou's affairs.
Especially Jiangxia and Changsha.
Needless to say, half of Changsha's territory belongs to Jiangdong. If Jiangdong continues to take the opportunity to infiltrate, it is hard to say whose family Changsha County belongs to.
Jiangxia is the most important place in the Liu Bei Group now. It has the best economic development and has not been affected by any war. At the same time, it is the closest to Jiangdong, and the south bank of the Yangtze River directly borders Jiangdong.
When Huang Zu was stationed in Jiangxia, Jiangdong fought several times, obviously determined to win Jiangxia.
Now that he has in-laws as an excuse, Jiangdong can use the dowry argument to infiltrate around Jiangxia.
These days, the imperial power does not go to the countryside. Even if the county magistrates are all members of the Liu Bei Group, it is hard to say who those Jiangxia families and village elders listen to, pay taxes to, or fight for.
It can't be defended in the first place, so how can we give them an excuse to intervene again.
In this way, a group of people were deadlocked in their opinions. Only Zhang Xi, a heavyweight counselor, had not yet spoken.
In this case, Liu Bei had no choice but to speak in person and ask Zhang Xi's opinion.
But Zhang Xi is still confused. He feels that he can't be sorry to his friends, but he can't be sorry to his lord.
When Liu Bei asked, Zhang Xi naturally had to speak.
"This is my lord's family matter, and it should be resolved by my lord." Zhang Xi said some nonsense first, and then sighed quietly and said, "She is just the wife, after all, she is the mistress. I don't know what Young Master Liu Chan means."
Liu Chan is only three years old this year, what opinions can he have?
But Zhang Xi's words immediately made Liu Bei and others' expressions change.
They are not stupid, and they obviously understand the intention of Zhang Xi's words - if Liu Bei marries Jiangdong's first wife, then Liu Chan will be considered a concubine or a legitimate child.
If it is considered a concubine, then it means that the child born to Jiangdong's wife is the legitimate son.
Liu Bei is already fifty this year. God knows when he will give birth to a legitimate son again, and I don’t know if Liu Bei can wait until his legitimate son grows up.
And even if the legitimate son grows up, there is no guarantee whether the legitimate son will favor Jiangdong and alienate the Jingzhou Group and Liu Bei's veterans.
In this way, it is nothing more than repeating the old path of Yuan Shao and Liu Biao, which may eventually lead to internal divisions within the group and infighting.
This is what Liu Bei, Zhuge Liang and others do not want to see.
If it is considered a legitimate child, then what will Mrs. Gan do? Should she hand over the three-year-old Liu Chan to his first wife to raise him and deprive Mrs. Gan of her custody rights? ?
But in this way, the relationship between Liu Chan and Jiang Dong will be closer in the future.
If Liu Bei succeeds to the throne a hundred years later, and the current situation remains the same, then the Liu Bei Group will completely become a vassal of Jiangdong.
After Zhang Xi said this, the scene suddenly became quiet.
And Zhang Xi also shut up at this time and stopped talking.
Now, Sun Shangxiang, I am very worthy of your friend.
(End of chapter)
