Chapter 1249 – North Song Has No Generals, South Song Has No Officials

The Ashoka Dynasty taking over Tibet was something that Ouyang Shuo had not expected.

Songtsen Gampo rejected the Mongol Empire in the north and defended against Great Xia, but he was unable to escape the fate of his dynasty being swallowed up in the end.

Speaking of which, this was the first time an outside force had interfered in the battle for China, which made Ouyang Shuo feel a loss of face.

Even then, Ouyang Shuo had to treat the matter really carefully. A day ago, Li Jing had already led the Bear legion corps back to the Shu Lands border. Great Xia's first attempt at conquering Tibet had ended in failure.

Li Jing sought punishment, but Ouyang Shuo suppressed it.

With the complicated nature of the Battle of Tibet, being able to lead the Bear legion corps to retreat fully was already a remarkable achievement. As such, why would Ouyang Shuo even punish him?

Before he dealt with Qin, Tang, and Song, Ouyang Shuo was not going to start another battle with Tibet.

As for the Ashoka Dynasty, they would need a period of time to digest up such a huge swathe of land. Furthermore, the Shu Lands were hard to attack and easy to defend. As long as Ashoka was not crazy, he would not even attempt to attack it.

Temporarily setting Tibet aside, Ouyang Shuo shifted his attention to the three countries.

7th month, 3rd day, along with the deadline getting closer, Ouyang Shuo was prepared to use the Great Song Zhao family as a sacrifice. Who would have expected a theatrical change to occur in Great Song on the night before the deadline?

Zhao Guangyi had saved his family.

However, later generations would probably see him as a thief and see Zhao Kuangyin as the proper ruler.

Ouyang Shuo had no plans of bothering about what had happened. What he knew was that after the coup's success, Jingchu Province had become an item in Great Xia's bag.

Great Xia had taken a huge step toward destroying the three countries.

...

7th month, 5th day, Great Xia Cabinet Grand Secretary Jiang Shang acted as the special ambassador of his majesty and led a squad toward Xiangyang City to accept the surrender.

Before this, the armies of both sides had already stopped warring.

The Great Song guards troops on the frontlines had surrendered and were awaiting the instructions of the Privy Court. Rough estimates placed the number of Great Song troops awaiting reorganization at around 380 thousand.

Jiang Shang brought along the imperial decree from the Imperial Court.

The imperial decree gave Zhao Guangyi the title of Song King and Zhao Kuangyin the title of Song Marquis. Such kindness was already the most that the emperor could show. If Zhao Kuangyin was unhappy, he would be truly not knowing his place.

Apart from the Zhao family royal family, the old officials in Great Song received new appointments.

Zhao Pu became the Chuannan Provincial Governor, and Fan Zhongyan would shift over to Jingchu Province.

Zhao Pu was the secretary of Zhao Kuangyin. In the 7th year of Xiande, Zhao Kuangyin and him had started a coup and established the Song Dynasty.

He became the prime minister in the 2nd year of Gande, helping Zhao Kuangyin take over Fanzhen. He made many major changes such as executing garrison law, changing the official system, and setting Border Defense legion troops.

In the 3rd year of Chunhua, Zhao Pu died from illness at the age of 71 and was given the title of Zhan King. He was given the title of 'loyal' and listed as one of the 24 meritorious officials of Zhaoxun Court.

Although he did not read many books, he loved the analects of Confucius. The analects affected him a lot and became a famous part of Confucian rule.

With his talent, there would be no problems with him taking the role of Provincial Governor. However, being given the Chuannan Provincial Governor role right away surprised many.

Although the Imperial Court had quashed the rumors of Chuannan Province being a Zhili Province long ago, the high status of Chuannan Province was undeniable.

Ouyang Shuo's true goal was to move Fan Zhongyan away from Chuannan.

As Jingchu Province had imperial city Xiangyang and was a big province in the central region of China, it would not be too bad on Fan Zhongyan. Ouyang Shuo hoped that this adjustment would be understood as a warning to him.

Apart from Zhao Pu, Murong Yanzhao, Gao Huaide, Wang Shenqi, Han Lingkun, Shu Shouxin, Zhang Lingze, Zhang Guanghan, and Zhao Yanwei were all given positions.

North Song had no generals, South Song had no officials.

Out of all the officials, only Zhao Pu was decent in terms of civil and military skills.

...

Along with Great Song's surrender, the China situation became really clear. Now, it was up to the attitude of Qin and Tang. Be it Qin Shihuang or Tang Taizong, neither would admit defeat easily.

Forcing them surrender was even harder than killing them.

Imperial capital, emperor palace.

Administrative Mentor Court Grand Secretary Zhang Liang was invited to the Imperial Reading Room.

"How do you think I should deal with Qin and Tang?" If he could, along with Ashoka aggressively forcing his hand, Ouyang Shuo would like to avoid the use of war to take over these two countries.

However, if they did not fight, these two countries would not surrender.

This became a dead end, which was why Ouyang Shuo sought Zhang Liang, asking him to think of a solution.

Zhang Liang replied, "Qin Shihuang and Tang Taizong are both prideful leaders and will be able to understand the situation that they are facing. What we need to do is to give them a way to step down."

Ouyang Shuo nodded.

"What way do you think we should give them? Do I need to personally talk to them?"

"No!" Zhang Liang directly shook his head and said, "With your authority, you cannot lower yourself to ask others to surrender. If you make an exception, it'll make Qin and Tang arrogant and make it hard to rule Guangxi Province."

Zhang Liang's worries were certainly true.

Qin and Tang had a number of famous officials and generals. Furthermore, both countries had stayed in Guanxi Province for a long time. If Great Xia gave them too much face, it might give them the wrong impression. They might start to think that their submission to Great Xia was them giving Great Xia face, which would lead to them becoming really arrogant.

This was something that Ouyang Shuo did not want to see.

Zhang Liang said, "I think we should act from Ashoka."

"How so?"

Ouyang Shuo was confused and did not understand how these two matters were linked together.

"Both Qin Shihuang and Tang Taizong were the orthodox rulers of China in the past. If they still want to fight internally while enemies are attacking China, wouldn't they be going against the name of China? I suggest we send out a high-profile envoy to use this as a breakthrough point to convince them to back out." Zhang Liang said.

Ouyang Shuo frowned, "Will that work?"

"If you do not mind, I'm willing to personally lead a group to one country."

"Okay!"

Ouyang Shuo was always open to suggestions and decided to let Zhang Liang give it a try.

...

7th month, 7th day, Great Xia Cabinet assistant secretary and Administrative Mentor Court Grand Secretary Zhang Liang led an envoy to Great Tang. At the same time, Honglu Temple head Zhang Yi personally led an envoy to Great Qin.

In history, Zhang Yi was a Chancellor of Qin, and him going back now could be called him going home. Ouyang Shuo hoped that Qin Shihuang could agree to seclude himself and go behind the scenes because of this little bit of relationship.

Ouyang Shuo could use officials and generals but not emperors. Ouyang Shuo would not try his luck and would not take Qin Shihuang under his charge.

Even Chu Overlord Xiang Yu was not willing to work for others, much less Qin Shihuang and Tang Taizong.

To really recruit them would give rise to many huge problems.

Hence, even if the two countries were to surrender, Qin Shihuang and Tang Taizong could only retire and be a casual king in the game world with zero contact with politics.

As for whether there would be a chance in the future to instantiate them on Planet Hope to expand territory, that was another matter. After all, there were many unknown matters on Planet Hope, so how would Ouyang Shuo know?

While Zhang Liang and Zhang Yi were sent, Great Xia did not move any troops and silently awaited the outcome. If they were still unwilling, to prevent further wastage of time, Ouyang Shuo would have no choice but to use war to settle the matter.