"Chicken ribs... what exactly can you figure out from that?" Zhang Fei scratched his head. He had read books before, but this one clearly exceeded his current operating system.
Zhuge Liang thought for a moment, half guessing, half analyzing. "Chicken ribs... little meat, lots of bone. Not hard to chew, yet hardly satisfying. Tasteless to eat, wasteful to discard?"
"Huh? Kongming, you barely ever eat chicken, so how do you know this so well?" Zhang Fei asked in surprise. "Let this Old Zhang teach you. If you fry chicken ribs in hot oil and sprinkle them with minced ginger and garlic, they are an absolute masterpiece to go with wine! How is that tasteless?"
Zhuge Liang was speechless. This man... are we even talking about the same thing?!
Jian Yong had heard of this name before.
"Yang Dezu of the Hongnong Yang clan? His father, Grand Commandant Yang Biao, is a loyal minister of the Han dynasty. How could Yang Dezu actually get involved in a succession struggle?"
Jian Yong felt none of this made sense at all. If he was a loyal Han minister like his father, why bother getting dragged into Cao Cao's family drama? If he planned to pledge loyalty to Cao Wei, why choose such a dangerous path?
Everyone in the room let out a long sigh for the Hongnong Yang clan. Cao Cao's power was massive right now. Later on, Cao Cao would accept the Nine Bestowments and become King of Wei, and his son would even usurp the Han and change the dynasty. The loyal Han ministers left behind in Xuchang were only going to have a harder and harder time.
"What does this 'zhiyin' mean?" someone asked in confusion.
"Based on the context, it should mean chicken. Splitting one word into two might be some kind of future slang," another person guessed.
Meanwhile, Liu Bei was completely absorbed in a different line. "Qualified to contend for the realm."
His heart surged. He, Liu Xuande, had finally reached that step! Restoring the glory of the Han dynasty was his bounden duty!
So what if I used to weave mats and sell sandals? I can still fight for the entire world! I can still...
"Big brother, what does it mean that the chance for Shu Han to unify the land was wiped out by the joint efforts of your relatives?"
Liu Bei stared intently at those words, then swept a confused gaze across everyone in the room.
The light screen had previously hinted that Sun Quan broke the alliance and Liu Feng refused to send reinforcements, leading to Guan Yu's death. Did this mean there were other relatives involved in the mess?
But what other relatives did he even have? His eyes lingered on Mi Zhu for a second before he completely tossed the idea aside.
If Mi Zizhong betrayed me, it would be like Sun Quan killing Zhang Zhao and chopping off his own arm!
Impossible! Absolutely impossible!
After scanning the room and finding no answer, Liu Bei let out a long sigh toward the heavens.
Liu Feng caused the death of his second brother.
Liu Shan... could not even preserve the ancestral temple.
Raising children... why was it this difficult?
Sun Qian could only gently tug on Liu Bei's sleeve and give him an encouraging look. "Do not worry, my lord. We still have a chance!"
[Lightscreen]
[Now that we are done with the main course, we can finally talk about other things. Although the Battle of Hanzhong was a major victory for Liu Bei, it is a pity they only managed to kill Xiahou Yuan.
Cao Cao retreated partly because Zhao Yun went on an absolute killing spree, making grain transport extremely difficult.
On the other hand, it was also because Guan Yu was closing in, which was basically like holding a knife to Cao Cao's neck.
Boss Cao probably remembered his painful experience in Yanzhou back then, so he hurriedly gave up Hanzhong and ran back to guard his home base.
Therefore, the top merit for taking Hanzhong belongs to Guan Yu!]
Everyone in the room was stunned.
Wait... so you can calculate the merit like that?!
Huang Zhong stood there, slightly dazed. He had risked his old bones to personally slay the enemy general... and now he was not even first? Not even second? Should his merit only be below Zhao Yun? So now he just got third place?
Zhang Fei's eyes lit up immediately. Aha...
Zhang Fei felt a spark of hope. "Since second brother gets an assist just by glaring from Xiangyang and Fancheng, then this Old Zhang and Ma Mengqi in Wudu, using our battered troops to pin down the massive Cao army, must count as a contribution too, right?"
'Good grief, you got smashed and chased back by the three Caos, and you only brag about your battered troops without mentioning that you were in reality a defeated general?' everyone thought to themselves.
[Lightscreen]
[Also, the Battle of Hanzhong had another unsung hero, and that is Zhuge Liang, who managed the logistics!
You can understand this by simply reviewing Liu Bei's route. The whole campaign lasted over two years. The march through the Jinniu Road took half a year, and later Liu Bei went all in and ran off to Dingjun Mountain.
So Zhuge Liang had to handle Gao Xiang's grain supply through the Jinniu Road, while also opening up a completely unplanned supply line through the Micang Road to send food to Liu Bei at Dingjun Mountain.
On top of that, he had to feed Zhang Fei and Ma Chao's armies stalling in Wudu.
Just thinking about this logistics pressure gives you a massive headache, but the Prime Minister stubbornly held it all together!
In fact, the logistics managed by Zhuge Liang for Shu Han were always incredibly reliable. The Records of the Three Kingdoms note that during the northern expeditions, Zhuge Liang even invented the Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse.
Over the next thousand years, legends about the Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse were countless. Ancient people believed in ghosts and gods, thinking Zhuge Liang knew dark magic because the Wooden Ox and Gliding Horse could run through the mountains without human power. It is honestly quite ridiculous.]
Liu Bei looked at Zhuge Liang with eyes full of expectation.
Zhuge Liang immediately waved both hands.
"No, no, absolutely not. No magic. I do not know magic at all."
While finding it funny that future generations made up stories about him knowing dark magic, he also felt a deep sense of kinship with the light screen.
Managing logistics is genuinely exhausting!
In fact, while the screen was talking about the Battle of Hanzhong just now, Zhuge Liang was already racking his brain over how to handle the logistics... only to realize it was indeed his responsibility.
At this moment, Zhuge Liang felt a faint sense of emotional damage.
[Lightscreen]
[In reality, the wooden ox and flowing horse are just variations of wheelbarrows. Modern museums in Sichuan and Hunan even have reconstructions. Feel free to check them out.
They definitely do not move on their own. Otherwise, we would have solved the eternal problem of perpetual motion machines.]
Images appeared on the light screen.
Zhuge Liang instantly began sketching them down at high speed.
Copying my future self does not count as plagiarism, right?
[Lightscreen]
[The supply lines of Shu are actually very similar to the Huaihai Campaign during the founding of our nation.
Marshal Chen once said emotionally: the victory of the Huaihai Campaign was pushed forward by the people using wheelbarrows.
And this has always been true throughout history. As the Internationale says, there is no savior, no divine emperor. Human happiness can only be created by our own hands.
Whether it is Shu Han logistics or modern warfare, there is one common truth.
Glory belongs to the working people!]
Everyone in the hall was dumbfounded. The room was completely frozen.
This speech hit them like a massive temple bell ringing right inside their skulls, leaving the whole group dry-mouthed and wide-eyed.
The working people!
"This..." Zhao Yun looked a bit lost. "Do they not have an emperor? But the light screen previously mentioned their founding leader evaluated me..."
"Perhaps it is just a similar title," Zhuge Liang said, his gaze looking far away. "The light screen has shown us that west of the Kunlun Mountains, south of the southern ridges, east of Fusang, and further north of the grasslands, there are thousands of lands and countless customs. Perhaps there are nations without emperors. The future generations might have learned and borrowed from them."
But in his heart, Zhuge Liang firmly memorized the phrase working people. He managed logistics and knew better than anyone that all food, clothing, and supplies came from those common folks who seemed to never have a voice. But just like the Yellow Turban Rebellion, if you oppressed them to an unbearable degree, they would unleash a force like a collapsing mountain and a tsunami!
Just like his lord. Zhuge Liang looked at Liu Bei's figure.
Ever since the words "Glory belongs to the working people" appeared, Liu Bei had been standing there frozen in deep thought.
Did Zhuge Liang follow Liu Bei because he was a recognized Imperial Uncle? Or because of the so-called Left General of the Han?
It was simply because, compared to the other warlords, Liu Bei actually treated the common folks like human beings!
The Cao army massacred cities at the drop of a hat, and Cao Mengde turned a blind eye when Cheng Yu used human flesh as military rations.
The elite families in Jiangdong owned endless fields, leaving the common folks without a single spot to stand. Sun Bofu was a hero, but his younger brother...
Let us just go back to talking about how a hundred thousand troops created the God of War at Xiaoyao Ford.
---
Fun Fact:
The word "people" first appeared in the Book of Songs, in the section Daya Yi, as a loyal minister's remonstration to a tyrant king.
The minister was Wei Wugong (卫武公), a senior official of the late Western Zhou dynasty. He wrote Daya Yi to warn King Ping of Zhou (周平王) about the dangers of his reckless rule. The poem had twelve chapters and contained lines such as:
"质尔人民,谨尔侯度,用戒不虞"
(Strengthen your people, be careful with your laws, and guard against unforeseen dangers.)
It was a desperate plea from an old minister watching his kingdom fall apart.
The poem also contained the line:
"惠于朋友,庶民小子"
(Be kind to your friends and to the common people, even the young.)
Wei Wugong did not stop at giving advice. In his later years, he reportedly stopped drinking and forbade his attendants from making careless remarks to maintain his integrity. He lived to an old age and remained sharp until the very end.
The ancients probably never imagined.
Two thousand years later, the king would be gone.
And only the people would remain.