At the end of February, Shu forces withdrew from the Wuchuan River Valley. The new Shu envoy, Yuzhou Military Administrator Cao Gan, carrying an edict from Shu ruler Wang Jian, arrived in Jinling again on the sixteenth day of the third month.
It was the third month of spring with bright sunshine. The slender-figured Cao Gan, dressed in a long robe, stood on the official vessel gazing at the damaged outer walls of Jinling city in the distance.
Compared to when he had left Jinling, the repair work on the entire outer city walls had made essentially no progress. He thought to himself that it appeared Chu had completely halted repairs on Jinling city to concentrate resources on preparing the offensive against Chaozhou.
However, Chu forces had long completed their assembly in Shuzhou and along the southern banks of the Yangtze, yet had delayed until now without launching a major attack on Chaozhou. Cao Gan was puzzled, unable to understand what internal contradictions and entanglements within Chu remained unresolved.
Cao Gan naturally couldn’t guess that all this stemmed from the Chu Emperor’s suspicion of Xuzhou.
Since Shu forces had previously been the ones to initiate military conflict, the Shu envoy’s official vessel was strictly forbidden from passing directly through the water gates to dock at Nanpu Bridge pier within the outer walls. Instead, they were ordered to travel from the Yangtze waterway via the Xiaotang River to dock at Shen Family Wharf outside the western city.
The Great Chu Ministry of Rites and Court of State Ceremonial each only dispatched one administrative secretary, leading six or seven minor clerks to Shen Family Wharf to handle reception matters.
What was slightly more favorable was that the house arrest of Shu envoy Wei Qun was finally lifted.
Wei Qun had been confined to Duding Post Station for over four months. Though his food and clothing needs were met, the days had been truly difficult to endure.
As Shu’s Court of State Ceremonial Minister, his rank naturally exceeded that of Yuzhou Military Administrator Cao Gan. But upon hearing that Cao Gan was bringing a new edict from Shu ruler Wang Jian to Jinling, he hurried early to Shen Family Wharf to meet with Cao Gan.
Moreover, he and his dozen escorts had only been “invited” out of Duding Post Station by the Great Chu Ministry of Rites today. If he didn’t leave the city to meet Cao Gan, he had nowhere to stay temporarily in Jinling city.
The officials from Great Chu’s Ministry of Rites and Court of State Ceremonial naturally showed no favorable attitude toward this Shu envoy’s arrival. After receiving the state letter submitted by Cao Gan, they merely designated an inn for them to stay in while awaiting word, not even arranging official lodging for them, before returning early to the city.
Cao Gan didn’t mind particularly. After all, the two kingdoms were currently still in a state of war. Whether to accept Shu’s proposal for peace negotiations, and when to enter the peace process, Chu’s ruler and ministers also needed to weigh the matter first.
The officials from the court bureaus needed to demonstrate Great Chu’s upper kingdom dignity this time, adopting a proud and cold demeanor. But the county officials dared not be too careless.
Besides clearing out an inn at Shen Family Wharf early for Wei Qun, Cao Gan and their escorts to move into, the county simultaneously dispatched several dozen bailiffs and county soldiers dispersed inside and outside Shen Family Wharf. On one hand, they were responsible for monitoring the Shu envoy’s attendants to prevent them from freely entering and leaving the area. On the other hand, they needed to prevent river bandits or roving brigands from infiltrating.
If any personnel losses befell the Shu envoy at Shen Family Wharf, the local authorities absolutely couldn’t bear that responsibility.
“Why did the ruler rashly decide to dispatch troops to occupy the Wuchuan River Valley?”
With the settling-in tasks left to the escorts, Wei Qun, who had been confined for over four months with all outside contact completely severed, couldn’t wait to pull Cao Gan into a private room at the inn to inquire about the many events that had occurred in Shu during this period.
He couldn’t concern himself with the fact that Cao Gan was a trusted confidant of Marquis Changxiang Wang Yong and that they really had no friendship to speak of.
The private room was located on the inn’s second floor. Opening the window revealed the broad expanse of the Xiaotang River beyond.
Though repairs on Jinling city had been completely halted, Jiangnan’s prosperity hadn’t suffered severe damage. From the boats moored at Shen Family Wharf, one could see that after a year of rest and recovery, inside and outside Jinling city had gradually restored itself.
Facing Wei Qun’s question, Cao Gan certainly wouldn’t answer with complete candor.
Before submitting the state letter to officials from Great Chu’s Ministry of Rites and Court of State Ceremonial, Cao Gan had also shown the state letter to Wei Qun.
Cao Gan had come this time to seek peace. The state letter submitted to Great Chu naturally explained and clarified both the military provocation and Shu’s subsequent internal handling of the matter.
At this moment, Cao Gan generally followed the state letter’s content, explaining to Wei Qun in considerable detail the various situations that had occurred in Shu during this period.
Within Shu, those who had strongly advocated from the beginning for dispatching troops to reclaim the Wuchuan River Valley and seize the opportunity to control the Qianjiang passage were Vice Minister of War Huang Zongcheng and Marquis Wei Wang Xiaoxian. Their reasoning was also quite dignified.
Wuchuan had historically been an ancient county subordinate to Ba Commandery and Jiannan Circuit. The Wu tribespeople, as a branch of the mountain tribes, had long been subjects of the Bashu regional regimes. There had long been voices calling for recovering Wuchuan.
However, initially these voices weren’t strong enough to overshadow the overall situation of the Shu-Chu alliance.
When large-scale civil unrest erupted in Sizhou, and simultaneously news emerged that multiple new salt brine springs had been discovered in the mountain ridges flanking the Wuchuan River Valley—while Sizhou’s defenses in the Wuchuan River Valley were virtually nonexistent—considering that if the Wu tribespeople regrouped and recaptured the Wuchuan River Valley, it would directly affect Shu forces’ suppression of the mountain tribes in southern Sichuan, with Huang Zongcheng and Marquis Wei Wang Xiaoxian taking the lead, voices within Shu supporting dispatch of troops to occupy the Wuchuan River Valley suddenly grew loud.
At the time, they also calculated that Chu’s internal and external troubles remained unresolved, and the Chu court’s interests along the Qianjiang line were far less significant than Shu’s. As long as Shu forces acted decisively, they could ultimately compel Chu to compromise.
However, the Chu court pacifying rebel bandits to form a new metropolitan division to attack the Wuchuan River Valley, along with the Wu tribespeople’s frequent raids on both banks of the Qianjiang, were beyond Shu forces’ expectations.
Considering signs of Liang forces assembling in Guanzhong, Ruler Wang Jian ultimately decided to cut losses, issuing an edict to withdraw the heavily damaged Shu forces from the Wuchuan River Valley and restart peace negotiations with Chu.
“Were new salt springs truly discovered in Wuchuan?” Wei Qun knew Cao Gan couldn’t possibly speak with complete candor, but couldn’t help wanting to inquire in more detail.
“Two saline springs were indeed discovered in the mountains near the Wuchuan River Valley, though their brine output doesn’t match the two existing salt wells in Wuchuan,” Cao Gan said.
“Why bother going through all this trouble!” Wei Qun couldn’t help shaking his head and saying bitterly.
Currently, Shu possessed nearly four hundred salt wells capable of producing brine, with annual salt production exceeding four hundred thousand dan. If large-scale brine deposits had been discovered in Wuchuan’s deep mountains, considering that Wuchuan might fall back into Wu tribal hands, dispatching troops to occupy it should indeed have been considered.
Wei Qun believed that during the period when the army occupied the Wuchuan River Valley, they should have carefully surveyed the surrounding mountain ridges. Ultimately discovering only two saline springs made this entire affair truly not worth the losses.
Even if Wuchuan ultimately could have five or six brine-producing salt wells, even if they could annually produce five or six thousand dan of well salt, in terms of scale this would be far inferior to the Banan region which already had over thirty salt wells, barely sufficient to supply one county’s human and livestock consumption.
“Indeed, after going through all this, Chu’s ruler and ministers harbor resentment that’s difficult to dispel. I don’t know if this mission will have a favorable outcome!” Cao Gan also sighed in agreement.
Cao Gan would never acknowledge that through this affair, not only had the Crown Prince, Marquis Qingjiang Wang Hongyi’s influence at court suffered another heavy blow, but the Crown Prince’s influence within the Left Qingjiang Army had also been severely damaged. They could also use subsequent accountability for the campaign’s failures to purge the Crown Prince’s trusted generals from within the Left Qingjiang Army.
To provide an explanation to Chu, Ruler Wang Jian decided to strip Vice Minister of War Huang Zongcheng and Marquis Wei Wang Xiaoxian of their official ranks, demoting them to service in the Liang Province army.
Regardless of whether Shu and Chu could restore relations this time, the anger harbored by both sides’ troops stationed along the Qianjiang would be difficult to eliminate. Considering also the threat of the Wu tribespeople’s resurgence, Marquis Changxiang Wang Yong naturally still needed to continue overseeing Yuzhou and wouldn’t be rashly transferred to Liang Province.
“Chu forces will probably formally launch their offensive against Chaozhou in the next few days. They should give us a way to step down gracefully,” Wei Qun said.
He was about to inquire further about other recent events in Shu when he noticed Cao Gan’s attention seemed captured by something outside the window. Curious, he asked, “What matter has Master Cao watching so intently?”
Wei Qun turned his head to look in the direction of Cao Gan’s gaze and saw a three-masted sailing vessel with an estimated capacity of around three thousand shi slowly approaching Shen Family Wharf, apparently also intending to dock at Shen Family Wharf.
“This three-masted sailing ship should be constructed by Xuzhou,” Cao Gan said.
Hearing Cao Gan say this, Wei Qun understood why Cao Gan had been distracted.
He looked carefully and noticed this large vessel’s masts were slightly shorter, but exceptionally wide horizontally—indeed the soft horizontal sails characteristic of Xuzhou.
The large vessels currently constructed by Xuzhou were mainly supplied to the naval forces at Yueyang and Jinling, as well as for Xuzhou’s internal use. Other regional clans, shipping gangs, merchant associations, and even local government offices temporarily couldn’t directly purchase large vessels from Xuzhou.
After all, Xuzhou’s shipyard production capacity was also limited, and previously they had prioritized constructing large warships for military supply.
Now that such large three-masted sailing vessels appeared on the river outside Jinling city meant this very likely was a civilian merchant vessel that had departed directly from Xuzhou.
Wei Qun sighed and said, “While confined in Jinling, I heard discussions among Chu’s minor officials that Jinling apparently harbored considerable suspicion that Han Qian was colluding with our Great Shu, and also suspected that the Sizhou civil unrest was secretly instigated by Han Qian. However, after both sides fought so brutally in the Wuchuan River Valley recently, Han Qian probably no longer needs to worry about suffering further suspicion. This must be why he’s allowing Xuzhou merchant vessels to sail directly to Jinling to seek profit, right?”
Currently, except for those who truly knew the details or comprehensively grasped information about both Chu and Shu, no one from any perspective could further question whether Han Qian was colluding with Shu forces.
From every angle, it appeared that Shu’s ruler and ministers, seeing civil unrest erupt in Sizhou and seeing an opportunity to completely control the Qianjiang passage, while mistakenly assuming that Chu, facing unresolved internal and external troubles, wouldn’t particularly care about gains and losses along the Qianjiang passage, had undertaken a military gamble.
If Xuzhou wasn’t colluding with Shu forces, it was also difficult to question whether the Sizhou civil unrest was secretly instigated by Xuzhou. After all, before Shu forces occupied the Wuchuan River Valley, Xuzhou had maintained extreme restraint regarding the Sizhou situation.
“Perhaps that’s the case,” Cao Gan said dismissively to Wei Qun. But truly knowing the inside details, he understood that Xuzhou cargo vessels entering Jinling was definitely not as simple as Wei Qun described.
It should be that Marquis Qianyang Han Qian, after enduring restraint for a period, wanted to once again extend his reach back into Great Chu’s central authority, right?
Cao Gan also wasn’t clear who Xuzhou had dispatched to Jinling this time, whether they would proactively contact him, or somehow manage to establish contact with Princess Qingyang…