Yingdu was captured by Wu Qi's army, but the royal family members in the city had already left. Even the sacrificial vessels in the city were taken away by the Chu State. It can be said that most of the entire Ying capital was hollowed out.
Seeing this situation, Wu Qi's face became a little ugly. He originally wanted to break the capital of Ying, capture the King of Chu, and build on Sun Wuzi's great achievements, but he found out that the King of Chu ran away early.
At that time, more than a dozen generals under Wu Qi asked for battle, each one more loud than the other. One said that if he raised 10,000 troops, he would capture the king of Chu, another said that he raised 7,000 soldiers, and the third said that he raised 5,000 soldiers.
Wu Qi directly ordered them to return to the military camp to restrain the soldiers. They were not allowed to harass the people, and were not allowed to rape or plunder. Send out personnel to maintain law and order in the city, kill all the bullies and scoundrels who take advantage of the chaos to burn, kill and loot in the city, and at the same time send out troops to put out the fire.
When the King of Chu withdrew his troops, he emptied all the treasuries in the city. The 100,000 people in the city still needed Huai State to provide food and grass. Coupled with prisoners of war, Huaiguo's logistical pressure skyrocketed.
Select some of the prisoners who are well behaved, willing to cooperate, and have smart minds. Let these people come forward and tell the people that the Huai army will not kill people indiscriminately. At the same time, let all the people return home and tell them that the Huai army will distribute food to them.
After arranging these tasks, Yingdu quickly settled down.
After occupying the capital of Ying, the King of Chu fled westward, and there was no large-scale Chu army around. But there are still a large number of broken troops running around.
After Wu Qi appeased the people of Yingdu, he immediately ordered the army to be divided into thousands of troops to destroy the defeated army in Chu State and recruit them to surrender.
Those who are willing to surrender will be appeased and temporarily turned into auxiliary troops. Those who are unwilling to surrender can be caught and thrown directly back to mine, or undergo other labor reforms.
The defeated army that had burned, killed, looted and turned into bandits was directly strangled to restore order to the Chu State as soon as possible.
At the same time, he ordered more grain supplies to be delivered from the rear. After capturing Yingdu, Huai State's grain consumption increased several times.
Fortunately, this time the Chu State was conquered, a large number of nobles and ministers were captured or killed, and their family properties were directly expropriated by the Huai State. Then let the Huai navy transport grain through the river.
Wu Qi originally wanted to lead his troops to pursue the King of Chu directly, but after reading the message from the secret guard, he decided to postpone it.
The secret guard sent word that the King of Chu fled westward and entered Badi. If he wanted to attack Badi, the first obstacle was Kuimen. The secret guards have already investigated. Kui Gate is steep and the most powerful gate in the world.
The river here is narrow, the water is full of rocks, and the rapids wash it out, making boating extremely dangerous. If you are not careful, the hull of the ship will be torn into pieces by the rapids, and the ship will be destroyed and everyone will die in just a moment.
The Huai navy couldn't get through at all, and the King of Chu also used iron chains across the river. There were Chu troops on both sides of the cliff. As soon as the Huai navy approached, thousands of arrows were fired, and the navy had to retreat.
There is no need for a large army to defend this place. It only needs a few thousand soldiers to defend it. Even if there are a hundred thousand troops, there is no way to capture it.
As for the land route, although it is not as dangerous as the water route, it is equally rugged and difficult to travel. After leaving Fudu, you need to go south to Jiangling, then northwest through Yidu, and cross the Yiling Mountain Road. The places you pass are all high mountains, and there are many Sanmiao Yi people among them.
After passing here, you still need to walk through the plank road. The road is steep and steep. The Huai soldiers are not good at climbing mountains. Everywhere they pass are rugged and dangerous mountain roads. As long as hundreds of people are arranged to defend these mountain roads, even thousands of troops will be unable to move. .
After learning about the situation in Badi, Wang Pu and Wu Qi both decided to postpone the attack. This battle has captured all the Hanjiang Plain and Nanyang Plain of Chu State. The King of Chu led his people into Ba in embarrassment, which can be said to be a great victory.
All the best places in the Chu Kingdom were occupied by the Huai Kingdom, leaving only Badi and Shangyong as kings of Chu. These two areas are located in high mountains and ridges, making them easy to defend and difficult to attack. It cannot be broken down in a short period of time.
In addition, after annexing a large area of Chu State's land, Huai State's territory extends to the sea in the east, Yidu in the west, Baiyue in the south, and Nanyang in the north, covering an area of 2,000 miles.
Having captured so much territory at once, Huai State needed to take control as soon as possible. Wang Pu ordered Wu Qi to build a city in Yidu to block the way out of Badi to the east. He also sent a large number of Legalist disciples to take over the system of Chu State and at the same time changed it to the system of Huai State.
Most of the nobles and feudal lords of the Chu State were captured because of their conversion. These people were directly deprived of their fiefdoms by Wang Pu, and then moved their families to Chaodi, Zhoulai, Huaibei, and Wu.
The remaining nobles surrendered completely, and most of them were minor nobles. Familiar with the local situation and helping the Huai Kingdom stabilize the place, Wang Pu rewarded these nobles and allowed their children to move to the Huai Kingdom Academy to study. And these nobles were appointed to some official positions.
After clearing out most of the aristocratic forces, the Chu State restored calm and re-established order very quickly.
Badi, Jiangzhou.
The King of Chu was relieved after hearing that the Huai army did not advance westward.
This time the Chu State was defeated, and more than half of its territory was lost. Now only Badi and Shangyong are left, with a population of almost one million. This still forced a large number of people from the Chu State to move in. Before the King of Chu entered Ba, this The population of both places is less than one million.
After the King of Chu entered Jiangzhou, he immediately ordered Jingmu's younger brothers Jingming and Qu Chang to continue to implement the reform. And this time the King of Chu learned from his experience and took Jingmu's reforms one step further.
Nobles should not be hereditary without merit, the Shiqing Shilu should be completely abolished, the well field system should be abolished, land should be distributed to the people, and land trading should be allowed.
Reward military merit, prohibit private fighting, promulgate a military merit reward system, and stipulate that nobility can only rely on military merit. Emphasis on agriculture and suppression of business, rewarded farming and weaving, nationalized salt mines and wells, abolished the enfeoffment system, revoked all feudal lords, and changed rewards for meritorious service into food towns.
All the contents of the reform were written into the "Laws of Chu", including rectifying the administration of officials, removing the incompetent, abolishing the useless, and building water conservancy. The people were organized into households, and all the people were divided into five families and ten families into one ten. Taxes were collected according to the household and the number of people.
The Chu State's reform this time was stronger than that of the Wei State, and it improved the Wei State's reform.
Without the interference of nobles and ministers, the Chu State's reforms were implemented very quickly. A large number of people obtained land, and their originally restless emotions calmed down instantly.
Such drastic reforms in Chu State allowed Chu State to quickly settle down.
The King of Chu even ordered to recruit talented people to reform and strengthen the country. Many Legalist disciples who had been deposed because Jingmu was killed and the reform failed were reused again.
Although most of the Chu State's land was lost, after this incident, all the forces in the Chu State that obstructed the reform were almost wiped out.
The king of Chu promoted the art of hegemony, which quickly stabilized the shaky state of Chu. The implementation of the farming and warfare system continued to improve the strength of the state of Chu.
——
Huaigong ordered Wu Qi to attack Chu and defeat the capital of Ying. The Chu state was destroyed. The king of Chu moved west to Ba and moved the capital to Jiangzhou, which was called Western Chu in history. ——"Warring States Policy·Chu Ce"
(End of chapter)
