Chapter 38: A Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (part 3)
Meanwhile, Fuchai sent some men to see the capital's condition and negotiate with Goujian for a ceasefire.
When the officials arrived at the capital, they saw how the capital city had been heavily guarded, and not even a fly could get inside the city. It took them almost two days that they're allowed to enter the city gate to meet General Yan, who was in charge of guarding the capital city.
The five officials sent by Fuchai were brought to General Yan's office.
"Minister Shi, I'm sorry that you all have to wait for some time to be able to pass the gate. The soldiers are just following orders and dare not to open the gate randomly," Xuanye explained.
"Hmm, that one I could tolerate. But we have shown them the tally and the letter sealed by the king. Yet the soldiers didn't trust us and let us wait outside the city gate," Minister Shi said.
"The soldiers were following orders. Please accept my apology!" Xuanye said.
Minister Shi was not happy, but he knew that General Yan was a strict military man. There's no use to vent anger at him. Together with Minister Shi and the others, General Yan departed to the palace to report to Crown Prince You.
Crown Prince You was glad to receive Minister Shi and the others.
"Minister Bo Pi, Minister Shi, tell me about your negotiation proposal!" Crown Prince You said.
"Yue State demands us to return their twenty cities!" Bo Pi said. "With our circumstances right now, I think we just have to agree with them to return some cities to them!"
"No way! That's ridiculous," Crown Prince You angrily said. "If they demand three of five cities in return, I could still tolerate. Twenty cities? That's absurd!"
"I think the number could be discussed. The king is busy with the meeting now, and we can't afford to lose this war. Therefore, perhaps we should negotiate with them. Twenty is too much, then perhaps, ten, or fifteen cities?" Minister Shi said.
"Ten or fifteen cities?" General Yan interrupted. "Sorry, I'm interrupting. But I have been in the Wu military for almost thirty years. Every city we have, we earned it through the blood of our soldiers. We wiped out Yue a few years ago. Was not it you who said that Yue was harmless and had no power already?" General Yan looked at Bo Pi with fierce eyes. "Now that Yue becomes stronger, they demand their former twenty cities! How are you going to explain that, Minister Bo Pi?"
"Hey, why are you blaming me? It is our king himself who showed mercy to Goujian and let him go. Are you saying that our king's decision was not wise?" Bo Pi replied.
"Bo Pi, don't twist my word. I'm asking you, was not it you who said that Yue was harmless and powerless? But right now, you're exaggerating their power!" General Yan said. "I agree that we should negotiate, but we also have our proposal, and we should not just give them what they demand!"
"General Yan, now you could tell us how's the situation!" Crown Prince You said.
"Report, Your Highness: at the beginning, we had twenty thousand soldiers, and Goujian's army attacked us severely on the northern gate. Right now, we have lost three-four thousand soldiers. But since we could resist the Yue army, our soldiers are in good morale now. I am pretty sure that we can defend our city wall for one month. And in a month, the Yue army most likely will retreat," Xuanye said.
"One month? How can you be so sure? Please explain!" Crown Prince You said.
"In a month, either our soldiers who are now on the north arrive at the capital. Or the Yue army will be running out of food supply. I have sent some men to sabotage their food supply!" Xuanye said.
Crown Prince You pondered for a while and said, "Are you confident in this?"
"I am a hundred percent confident!" Xuanye said.
"General Yan, don't you think that you're overconfident?" Minister Shi said. "And what if we lose? Remember, we are outnumbered!"
"I'm not saying that we could easily win the war," Xuanye said. "But I'm pretty confident that we will not lose this war! You could continue the diplomatic negotiation, but in my opinion, four cities are the maximum number we could give them!"
"Four? They demand twenty!" Bo Pi was startled.
"Four!" Crown Prince You said firmly. "Bo Pi, Minister Shi, negotiate with them! Our Wu State is only willing to give them back four cities!"
"Your Highness,…" Bo Pi and Minister Shi said.
"Enough! I don't want to hear anything further. Just negotiate! Four is the maximum!" Crown Prince You said.
"General Yan, you do your job and defend the city wall. I rely on you! One month!"
"Yes, Your Highness," Xuanye said.
Crown Prince You made the right judgment. Indeed Wu was not as weak as they had previously thought. With his experiences, General Yan managed to defend the city and gave a lot of trouble to Goujian and his army.
After half a month, Goujian had lost almost thirty percent of his soldiers. At the same time, there's no sign that the Wu city wall could be penetrated, or they would concede in the negotiation.
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Goujian and Fan Li were frustrated. They had never thought that with the number of soldiers two and a half times the number of Yue's soldiers, the Yue army still could not penetrate the gates of Wu capital's city wall.
They became furious when they knew that the Wu State was only willing to return four cities for a ceasefire.
"Bo Pi has received a lot of money from us. Send another man to push him harder!" Goujian said.
Bo Pi - a minister, trusted by Fuchai; was a wolf in sheepskin. He received a lot of bribery from Goujian, and instead of wholeheartedly for Wu, he always worked for both sides. He didn't care who would win the contention, Wu or Yue. He only cared for money.
He had received a lot of money from Fan Li to get rid of Crown Prince You.
Bo Pi didn't mind at all with that. He hated Crown Prince You, since the prince suspected him received bribery from Yue. Somehow, it was not easy for him to get rid of the prince.
While he was thinking and pondering how to get rid of Crown Prince you, a man came to Bo Pi's house.
He's a man in his thirties. He said that he was the son of Bo Pi's old relative, Madame Fan.
Bo Pi was a bit confused. He didn't recall he had a relative with Fan as a surname.
"My mother's name is Li. She asked me to see you," the man smiled and submitted a little box to Bo Pi. That's the box that he used when communicating with Wen Zhong or Fan Li.
"Surname Fan, name Li! He must be Fan Li's man," Bo Pi said in his mind. He nodded and said, "Aye, young man, please sit down!" Bo Pi said and warmly welcomed him while asking his servants and guards to leave him and the guest alone.
After he made sure nobody's around, Bo Pi asked, "Young man, what can I do for you?"
"My mother is a bit annoyed that you haven't done your task!" The man said. "She said that in doing business, one has to possess integrity and will do anything to make the deal accomplished."
Bo Pi knew that Fan Li was using this man to push him to get rid of the crown prince as soon as possible. He had accepted the bribery. He had no choice.
"I know. Please tell your mother; I need her help to deliver the goods!"
"Tell me what we should do to help you!" the person said.
Bo Pi revealed his plan to the young man in a low voice.
After he finished, the young man smiled lightly and nodded. "We will prepare for it!"
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Minister Shi was a loyal minister. He had no intention to sell his country just like what Bo Pi was doing. Yet, he's under pressure from Crown Prince You to finish the negotiation.
General Yan was right, Goujian's army could not do much even after several fierce attacks. Goujian had lost forty percent of his army, while the Wu army also lost around thirty percent of its soldiers.
Although Yan Xuanye was very confident, somehow, the others could not rest assured. It was thirty thousand soldiers of Yue versus fourteen thousand soldiers of Wu. Not to mention that the Yue people were ruthless.
That day, Bo Pi and Minister Shi came to make a report to Crown Prince You.
"Your Highness, it's been half a month. And we only have thirteen-fourteen thousands of soldiers by now. I hope that you will concede a little bit. Just imagine, Yue demands twenty cities, and you only allow us to negotiate for four cities. This is not a business deal, this is difficult," Bo Pi said.
"General Yan said that he could manage to survive for one month. It's still half a month. No rush!" Crown Prince You said.
"Aye Your Highness, you trust that old man too much! You see, he hates the other ministers and me because of Wu Zixu's case. Although I believe that he's loyal to our country and you, but he's trying to make us do something impossible. He may only want to push us, but he doesn't realize that he's endangering our country. Even if we could win the war, our twenty thousand soldiers probably also gone!"
"If we concede and willing to exchange ten cities, then I'm sure Goujian will leave immediately!" Minister Shi said. "Your Highness, don't forget that our food supply is also partially sent from other cities!" Minister Shi asked.
"We still have enough food supplies, right?"
"Right now, our food supply is exactly enough for another fifteen days. But what if His Majesty hasn't arrived in fifteen days? The report we got two days ago mentioned that the meeting was not over yet!" Bo Pi said.
"General Yan makes an over-optimistic calculation on this war!" Minister Shi added. "He's very arrogant! If he's the one who should negotiate with Goujian and Fan Li, I wonder if we could get a peace treaty with only four cities!"
Crown Prince You was still young. Therefore he became confused.
"General Yan said that our defence is strong. We should wait for another fifteen days! By that time, if we are cornered, we could offer them ten cities!" He carefully said.
"Your Highness, let me take you to the city tower gate, and you can judge by yourself if our defence is strong or not!" Bo Pi said.
Crown Prince You agreed to check the condition from the city tower gate the next day.
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