Li Hongyun continued to watch countless light spots moving in Chang'an City from God's perspective.

Obviously, if this trend continues, people around the prince will soon be incited to rebel and become members of the Qin royal party.

There is an obvious key point in the struggle between the two, and that is the fundamental issue of both parties.

The King of Qin has a very solid foundation, which is a military meritorious group composed of many famous ministers and military generals with the King of Qin's Palace as the core.

The military merit group's trust and support for the King of Qin was unreserved.

While King Qin made great military achievements, the huge prestige he built for the grassroots of the army and the people at the bottom is also an aspect that cannot be ignored.

Many people only know about the King of Qin but not about the Emperor. This is not surprising.

I remember that Liang Gaozu raised troops from Jinyang to conquer Chang'an and left the King of Qi in his base camp in Jinyang to guard it. As a result, the King of Qi acted recklessly in Jinyang and took pleasure in shooting and hunting people on the streets.

So by the time Liu Wuzhou came over, the Liang Dynasty had already lost the support of the people in Jinyang. Not only did they not help Liang Jun, but they went into hiding one after another.

When the King of Qin came to pacify Liu Wuzhou, when the people heard that it was the King of Qin who was coming, they came out to support Liang Jun one after another.

In the eyes of ordinary people, this is a very reasonable thing. To them, Liang Gaozu, who was as high as the sky and the emperor as far away as the emperor, was just an invisible and intangible symbol. What did it have to do with them?

The King of Qin led his army to quell the troubled times, and also strictly ordered his men to do no harm to the people. Comparing the two, it is self-evident which one the people would favor more.

On the other hand, the prince does not have much fundamentals.

If there was one, it would be the group of ministers that his status as prince had won for him.

These ministers hope to make a contribution in helping the prince succeed to the throne, but how many of them will stand firmly by the prince's side?

How many of them are helping him because of his status as the prince, and how many of them really recognize this person?

I'm afraid it's hard to say.

Therefore, in the first stage of poaching each other, King Qin obviously had the upper hand in all aspects.

If this continues, the prince's position will be in danger.

Although in hindsight, it can be seen that the stronger the power of King Qin, the more obvious Liang Gaozu's willingness to pull a side was. If the stalemate continued, it would be almost impossible for King Qin to depose the crown prince and replace him with normal means. However, at that time, he was

The prince in the game cannot know this.

He could not fully trust his father, Liang Gaozu.

Therefore, in order to protect himself, the prince naturally launched a counterattack.

But how to fight back?

Soft methods have failed. If you want to poach someone, Prince Qin's palace is basically a monolith, and you can't do it with money or personal charm.

Then you can only use hard methods.

Two spots of light came out of the prince's palace and came into the deep palace. They were the prince and King Qi preparing to meet Liang Gaozu.

At the same time, a light spot came to Yuchi Jingde's house and lingered outside the door.

Li Hongyun continued to watch the play, and he found that the light spot on Yuchi Jingde's side did not move for a long time. It seemed that he had not started to take action yet, so he first watched the performances of the Crown Prince and King Qi in the palace.

"Father, my son, please kill the King of Qin!"

The prince and King Qi both knelt down.

Liang Gaozu frowned, but he didn't seem too surprised, he just waved his hands helplessly: "You two, stop making trouble!

"Hasn't this matter been mentioned many times? The King of Qin has the power to bring peace to the world, and he has no serious charges. If he wants to be killed, what reason should he use to stop the people of the world from talking about it?"

But the King of Qi still refused to give up: "Father, although I am not guilty, if I don't kill the King of Qin, disaster will happen in the long run!

"After the King of Qin defeated Luoyang, he kept on the sidelines and refused to return to Chang'an. Not only that, he also scattered money and silk privately, gave away wealth widely, and continued to establish his prestige along the way.

"My father had issued an edict at that time, asking the two noble concubines to select treasures from the treasury. As a result, King Qin disobeyed the order. What is this if not rebellion?

"If my father is really determined to kill him, why bother?"

For the emperor, if he really wanted to kill someone, he would not have to worry about finding a reason.

What King Qi said was quite excessive. You must know that he was not an ordinary hero. He was the second son of Liang Gaozu and his second brother.

It stands to reason that when brothers slandered each other in front of their father, Liang Gaozu, the father, should have been furious and even punished King Qi.

However, he fell into silence.

King Qi's words obviously moved him.

If the King of Qin deliberately conspired to rebel, then Liang Gaozu didn't quite believe it at this time.

But this does not mean that Liang Gaozu had no grudges against King Qin's behavior.

When the two noble concubines took his imperial edict and went to Luoyang to select treasures from the treasury, but were rejected by the King of Qin, Liang Gaozu was already very unhappy. He summoned the King of Qin and cursed him, asking: "Is my edict not as good as yours?"

Teaching?”

This has always been a thorn in Liang Gaozu's heart.

What's more, although what King Qi said was embellished, it was also true.

In the process of pacifying Luoyang, the King of Qin rewarded all the treasures in the treasury to the soldiers, and at the same time vigorously recruited talents.

The key to these behaviors depends on how they are interpreted.

It can be interpreted that he was rewarding meritorious officials for the Liang Dynasty and winning over people's hearts. It can also be interpreted that he was doing this to cultivate his own power.

What did King Qin do to cultivate his own power?

Even if there is no rebellion at this time, what will happen as time goes by?

At this moment, the prince said in time: "Father, even if you don't kill King Qin now, you should be held accountable. Otherwise, if father continues to indulge, King Qin will become even more arrogant and wanton, and will no longer take father into consideration."

inside.

"According to my opinion, my father should issue an edict to reprimand the King of Qin and dismantle the Tiance Mansion, in order to show the intention of knocking on the mountain and shaking the tiger, so that the King of Qin can restrain his behavior."

Obviously, the two brothers are also well versed in negotiation skills.

If you say that you want to open a window at the beginning, then it will probably not work; but if you first say that you want to remove the roof, and then take a step back and say that you just want to open a window, then the possibility of this plan being approved will be greatly increased.

.

Sure enough, Liang Gaozu was silent again.

What the prince said is a good idea.

Liang Gaozu did not want to see King Qin's power expand indefinitely, but after all, he was not an ordinary hero, but his second son who was related by blood. He could not just kill him for any reason like he did with ordinary heroes.

Although Liang Gaozu often had conflicts between his three sons, he still had a father-son feeling for King Qin.

After a long silence, Liang Gaozu nodded: "Okay, in that case, I will ask someone to write an edict."

The prince and King Qi were overjoyed and said goodbye.

After the two left, Liang Gaozu immediately found the prime minister at the time and wanted him to draft such an edict.

However, Prime Minister Chen Shuda was horrified: "Your Majesty, you must not do this!

"The King of Qin has made great contributions to the world, how can he be deposed easily? What's more, the King of Qin is a temperamental person with an extremely strong character. If he is suppressed with such an unconvincing reason, I am afraid that he will be worried and angry, and there will be unexpected diseases!

"By then, it will be too late for Your Majesty to regret it!"

Liang Gaozu fell silent again.

After much consideration, he decided not to issue the edict.

As for what made Liang Gaozu give up, it's hard to say.

There are four key words in Chen Shuda's original words: "unexpected disease".

The word "disease" has many meanings in ancient Chinese, such as damage, jealousy, hatred, speed, fierceness, etc. But the word "disease" here can only have two interpretations.

The first explanation is its original meaning, which is "disease", and the second explanation is its extended meaning, which is "shortcomings, problems, disasters" and so on.

Chen Shuda's words can be said to be quite level.

He did not say "unexpected disaster", but used the word "disease", which conveyed two meanings at the same time.

The first meaning is that the King of Qin is a man of temperament, and if he is suppressed forcefully, I am afraid that he will get sick from anger and die of sorrow and anger.

This is to arouse Liang Gaozu's sympathy as a father.

The second meaning is that if the suppression is forcible, some unpredictable disasters may occur.

And this hints at the danger of Liang Gaozu doing this.

As for which meaning Liang Gaozu focused on, only Liang Gaozu himself knows.

Li Hongyun prefers the second option.

Obviously, although Liang Gaozu had temporarily given up the idea of ​​punishing the King of Qin at this time, his suspicion of the King of Qin would become more serious after this incident.

Because in the process of deciding to issue and cancel the edict, Liang Gaozu realized a problem, that is, even if he was the emperor, it was no longer easy to manipulate the King of Qin at will.

And this kind of thing is unacceptable to the emperor.

Even if the other person is his own son.

In history, it was not uncommon for the emperor to personally kill the prince, not to mention that the King of Qin was not the prince.
To be continued...