The most interesting thing about the Three Kingdoms is that in the early stage, the heroes were fierce and aggressive, depending on who had the biggest fist; In the later stage, it was not comparable to fists, and began to fight wits and courage.
Take Lu Bu in the early stage, no one dared to shout before his death, and after Lu Bu's death, the generals disagreed with each other. After the generals who disobeyed each other withered one by one, the world gradually changed from "fighting ruthlessly" to "fighting wits".
Zhuge Liang and Sima Yi at the end of the period are an example, the first-class veterans of the two countries have died one after another, and the remaining military generals are completely insufficient to set off a war to destroy the country. So the two started a tug-of-war of brainpower, fighting who was tired first and who made mistakes first.
So when Zhuge Liang was alone in the empty city, Sima Yi obviously saw through Zhuge Liang's lack of resistance, why didn't he take down this henchman in one fell swoop?
As we all know, "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is almost a chapter from the perspective of Shu HanLuo Guanzhong completely entrusted his emotions to the Shuhan Group, and he was too partial to Zhuge Liang.
Under his eccentricity, the credit for beheading Huaxiong was changed from Sun Jian to Guan Yu, and the burning of Bowangpo was originally fought by Liu Bei, and it was also arranged on the head of the fledgling Zhuge Liang, and even the burning of Chibi was originally the credit of Zhou Yu.
Therefore, in order to highlight Zhuge Liang's anticipation of the enemy and his clever calculation, his opponent Sima Yi was tragically reduced to an almost second-rate character, so that the portrayal of Sima Yi was not as profound as Zhou Yu.
So when Zhuge Liang laid out an empty city plan, according to Luo Guanzhong's description, Sima Yi was very panicked, suspecting that the Shu army in the city was ambushed and did not dare to attack. After thinking for a while, he decisively withdrew his troops, and let go of Zhuge Liang's head in vain.
So did Sima Yi really retreat because he was worried about the ambush as described?
Before the emergence of the imperial examination system in feudal society, the power to select officials was firmly in the hands of the nobles. The emperor selected his own political team, and it all relied on these gatekeepers to recommend each other.
The advantage is that these groups can benefit the emperor**, even if it is for their own interests, they must support the ruler; The disadvantage lies in the fact that in this way, the bureaucratic system is completely monopolized, and the various gates and valves are intertwined, and the whole body is affected by one trigger. This led to chaos in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, where either courtiers who seized power appeared, or eunuchs and scholars colluded with each other.
The Sima family has always been a famous family in the Eastern Han Dynasty and has a strong gate valve nature. When Cao Cao was alive, in order to support the Han family and maintain the rule of the imperial court, he was very disgusted with the rotten gate lords, and the blow was extremely strong.
However, Cao Cao's subversive attitude was indeed unfavorable to Emperor Xian of the Han Dynasty, but in terms of behavior, he was solving problems for the imperial court, crusading against one after another princes who were not subordinate to the imperial court.
is like what he said to himself: "If the court didn't have me, I really don't know how many people would be called emperors and how many people would be kings." ”
Under Cao Cao's strong wrist, the Sima family could only do the tasks assigned by Cao Cao with peace of mind, and had no chance to turn over. In particular, Cao Cao had a very bad opinion of Sima Yi, and reminded Cao Pi many times not to reuse Sima Yi.
But when Cao Cao died, Cao Pi wanted to stand on behalf of the Han Dynasty. Then to persecute the emperor, there must be the support of the scholar gatekeeper. To achieve this,Cao Pi reused the gate valve of the scholar clan that his father had suppressed all his life, and the Sima family was one of them.
When Cao Pi was alive, although he benefited from the Sima family, he still remembered his father's entrustment and never gave Sima Yi power. After Cao Pi became critically ill, in order to prevent the recurrence of the matter of forcing the palace to make concessions, he had to choose a representative from the scholar clan, so Sima Yi became a minister again.
Also entrusted to Gu were Cao Xiu and Cao Zhen, two brothers in the clan who were the key figures in the real power and counterbalance to Sima Yi. Therefore, Sima Yi has always been feared by the Cao family.
After Cao Rong ascended the throne, it was the key point for Zhuge Liang to come out of Qishan. The two brothers Cao Zhen and Cao Xiu can't move lightly, that is the foundation of the Cao family, so only Sima Yi will send troops to resist the Shu army.
This battle is called the "Battle of the Street Pavilion". According to the description of "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", Zhuge Liang did not listen to the suggestion and appointed Ma Tan to lead the army, so that he was stationed in the main road of Jieting, and used the terrain to block the army of Wei general Zhang He, preventing Sima Yi's follow-up troops from occupying Jieting and cutting off the grain road.
However, Ma Tan was stubborn and self-serving, neither obeying the plan nor obeying the advice of the soldiers, so he insisted on camping on the mountain, wanting to take advantage of the terrain to dive into Cao Wei's army.
How do you know that when Zhang He's skills are superior, he cut off the water source of the Shu army, and only resists and does not attack. The Shu army without water had a problem eating, and it didn't take long for it to collapse without a fight. The Shu army withdrew in a panic, and Sima Yi led the army to chase and kill, making Zhuge Liang lose the opportunity. Faced with this situation, Zhuge Liang had no choice but to order a retreat to Xicheng and dispatch troops to raise food, but he only had more than 2,500 old and weak soldiers available.
After that, Sima Yi led an army of 150,000 to continue south, and Zhuge Liang, who had no chance of winning, actually opened the four gates of the city and ordered the soldiers to clean the streets, while he sat on the tower of the city gate and stroked the qin, as if he did not see the soldiers coming to the city.
According to Luo Guanzhong, Sima Yi had a psychological struggle and had been calculating whether Zhuge Liang had ambushes.
In fact, this loophole is very obvious, since there are 150,000 troops, can't you exclude a thousand-strong force to reconnoiter around? Or can't you send a shooter to shoot Zhuge Liang down? No matter how bad it is, it is no problem to send a small force into the city to check, there is no need to retreat immediately.
Therefore, what caused Sima Yi to retreat was not the fear of ambushes, but the deeper reasons. And Zhuge Liang is betting on whether Sima Yi can think of this reason - "The cunning rabbit dies, and the lackeys cook; The birds are all gone, and the good bow is hidden".
Zhuge Liang and Sima Yi are like two weights on the scale, as long as one side is heavy, the other side will be unstable. Zhuge Liang died, Shu Han had no support, and Sima Yi's elimination of Shu was a sure thing.
On the other hand, since Zhuge Liang is dead, then replacing Cao Zhen or Cao Xiu can also destroy the Shu Kingdom, why do you need him Sima Yi? On the contrary, even if Sima Yi destroyed the Shu Kingdom with his own hands, this kind of courtier with high merit and great power would often not have a good ending.
Originally, the Cao clan was very jealous of the Sima familyAs soon as Zhuge Liang died, the Sima family had no meaning of existence, and what awaited Sima Yi was only the suspicion of the emperor and being given death.
In other words, Zhuge Liang can't die, at least until another powerful leader appears in Shu, Sima Yi can't take the initiative. Therefore, Sima Yi could only think of an excuse to withdraw from the army.
Fortunately, after Zhuge Liang died, Jiang Wei led the Shu army. Jiang Wei was more radical than Zhuge Liang, and the nine attacks on the Central Plains undoubtedly gave Sima Yi enough time to stabilize his team.
In this way, Sima Yi survived Cao Cao, Cao Pi and Zhuge Liang, and even Cao Rong to death, and once again became the minister of Tuogu. This time he had no worries, because in the process of fighting against Shu for a long time, his own team had grown and was no longer afraid of political struggles.
To sum up, Sima Yi out of consideration for his own safety, even if he saw the empty city plan, or even if Zhuge Liang walked out of the city gate, he would not be able to kill. The battle between the two is so exciting, it is really amazing.